Serenes Forest Smash Tutorial/FAQ (and other Q's): Less-than-Obvious Stuff and More

[Rehab]

Just a little fun thing I felt like making. I won't be surprised if I end up talking to myself but all's good. There’s going to be some derp-obvious things in here, some explanations of some derp-obvious things in here and some things you wouldn’t have guessed at without looking them up. Feel free to use as a question thread for game functions, also.

-The basic, important shit

Q: Get hit?

A: No.

Q: What universal options do I have out of shield? (even if you haven’t asked this question fuck you this is important)

A:

-Drop your shield - release the shield button. Derp. Since there is universal lag in this that amounts to about a sixth of a second, in a heated moment this is usually the least preferable.

-Roll- press the control stick either directly left or right while holding the shield button and your character will quickly make a dash in said direction with some invincibility frames at the beginning. While every character’s roll is a slightly different speed, most all of them can be useful ways to escape pressure, though should your opponent predict that, things get situationally sketchy. If you are in the habit of rolling towards your opponent to get closer often, smack yourself. Then stop that. Even when trying to keep your game unpredictable, aside from in some instances with laggy wifi playing a part, a good player can punish this on reaction. Finding a better way to approach is generally in your best interest.

-Spot Dodge- Basically a roll in place your character is invincible for a few frames then is vulnerable for a situational amount of time. If you’re looking to punish from a defensive option, you generally have more rewarding options, which is what this section is here to tell you about. It can be useful in some situations where your shield is low and you have the leeway to dodge at a specific point to avoid pressure, but there’s usually a better approach to dealing with the problem that grants you back control faster.

-Jumping Out Of Shield (OOS)- I wish somebody had told me I had this option when I first started playing this game. With extremely minimal lag, you can do any form of normal jump out of shield, which means you can almost immediately do any normal jump move out of shield. While this varies between characters obviously it can give a completely new meaning to what is punishable and what isn’t. Because of this function, you can also immediately perform your character's up+B and upsmash moves out of shield. While this is much more important for some characters, say Marth, than others, this is yet another one of those things you gotta keep mind when approaching or defending.

-Shield Grabbing- Press any attack move while holding shield, and your character will pop right out of shield laglessly and perform a standard standing grab. This and jumping OOS revolutionize how you will look to punish moves, though grabbing OOS obviously actually puts you in a punishable position if you fuck up.

Different chars have different OOS options obviously. You want to know your shit here, since punishing misses is pretty big in smash. Likewise, should your opponents begin to wise up and use their OOS options to their fullest extents, you will have to play a whole new game in terms of how punishable you are. If a jump-in attack lands right next to them and they block, for instance, you are generally going to get raped. Space, space, space.

Q: How did I recovered?

A: While this is obviously different for all characters, there are some basics you can keep in mind to make it easier on yourself with most characters.

-sweetspot the edge- Most characters have a recovery move, like say Metaknight’s up+B, that can have some ending frames cut off in favor of immediately grabbing the edge. This generally leaves you less open to some bullshit happening right when you try to grab the ledge, so if your character can do it, learn it.

-if you know the opponent is going to edgehog, do something about it- While going for the ledge, with many characters’ far-reaching recovery/lack of on-stage lag necessary/the invincibility frames the ledge provides is more often the safest way to get back on stage than it isn’t, obviously there are people who will try to prevent this. Should they edgehog, if they blatantly mistimed it, they will just be sitting there waiting for you to knock them off with your recovery move (assuming yours has a hitbox). If you’re in legit danger when you get knocked off the edge of dying (IE if you play Ike or Marth) you must learn to expect when your opponent will grab the ledge and be invincible, and how you can punish them should they mistime something. If your character has some form of recovery stalling ability for a mixup, all the better. Note that there will be times where if they don’t screw up, you’re going to die. The point is not in those occasions to call out edgehoggin, which will always be legit, but to not let yourself be forced to recover from such a shitty position in the first place.

Next orders of business: 1) Spacing:the big bad metagame/ 2)Autocanceling. Most useless term ever?

Edited July 8, 2009 by Rehab

[Rodykitty]

Your next tutorial should be about controlling space.

It is one of the most important things to know how to do in Brawl.

[dondon151]

You can up smash and up B out of shield as well.

[Xort]

Don't get hit.

[Rehab]

Your next tutorial should be about controlling space.

It is one of the most important things to know how to do in Brawl.

While I am shitty at explaining spacing, good idea.

You can up smash and up B out of shield as well.

Derp, completely forgot up+B, and wasn't sure if you could still up smash in Brawl. Merci.

Don't get hit.

Noted

[dondon151]

I was thinking of Melee when typing that. I don't play Brawl so I don't know if up smash OoS works.

[Doom103]

Your next tutorial should be about controlling space.

It is one of the most important things to know how to do in Brawl.

thats very character specific, Ike zones very differently than IC and they zone completely different than Spamus

I wouldn't waste time, just give a definition

More so you should explain universal things like the proper way to CP stages and characters. Short hops, item gliding ect.

Explain what tiers are too its good for them to know what tiers are and how they are picked

[Rodykitty]

thats very character specific, Ike zones very differently than IC and they zone completely different than Spamus

I don't give a care if he has to go through every single character.

He absolutely.

Must.

Do.

This.

Before.

Anything.

Else.

There's a general concept for controlling space anyway, and it is basically limiting what your opponent's options are and the space he has compared to yours, especially in a game where combos are almost non-existant (and no, you can't debunk this based on fighting opponents that don't know how to DI) where you must always have control of the playing field in order to continue doing damage. People should be smart enough to apply it to their character.

[Doom103]

I don't give a care if he has to go through every single character.

He absolutely.

Must.

Do.

This.

Before.

Anything.

Else.

There's a general concept for controlling space anyway, and it is basically limiting what your opponent's options are and the space he has compared to yours, especially in a game where combos are almost non-existant (and no, you can't debunk this based on fighting opponents that don't know how to DI) where you must always have control of the playing field in order to continue doing damage. People should be smart enough to apply it to their character.

Thats generally learned from experience, every situation is different and requires a different spacing tech,. But yeah, mostly comes from experience

[Rodykitty]

To get that experience, you need to actively tune yourself to play correctly. You don't just automatically get it right, which is why he should still inform players on controlling space, otherwise they'll never figure out how to grow experienced in that area.

It's more than just 'use zair as samus or fair/usmash as Ike", it's the art of positioning your character in gaining an advantage while denying your opponent an opportunity to strike back at you when you find an opportunity to hit him.

Edited July 11, 2009 by Chainey

[Agro]

It's more than just 'use zair as samus or fair/usmash as Ike", it's the art of positioning your character

Playing video games is not an art.

[Doom103]

Playing video games is not an art.

But it is a sport and being amazing at a sport could be considered art which would tranlate to yes it is art

[Zanarkin]

But it is a sport and being amazing at a sport could be considered art which would tranlate to yes it is art

playing video games is a sport well thats news to me

[Rehab]

Update coming soon. In case you guys aren't done though, would you mind packing the "how did I classify playing game with others" spew somewhere else?

[Zanarkin]

Why haven't you updated it? i was interested in reading this.

[Rehab]

I didn't communicate well enough that more than anything else, I was hoping this would be an interactive Q/A type thread. But for the hell of it:

Q: What's spacing and why do I care?

A:

- while it runs deeper than this, the basic gist means using all the space your character's moveset comfortably covers to do what your character is designed to do in whichever situation. What this boils down to in the short term, largely in part because of Brawl's low stun in particular, is that you want to use a move at the maximum distance you can to avoid being punished. You care becase you don't like being punished.

-while it's generally inadvisable to whiff a move or have it blocked at anything other than the max range possible, that doesn't mean what every character wants to do is play keep away the whole match and never move in closer than their biggest poke allows. Besides the fact (yes, fact) that it's tedious as a motherfucker to keep up, it doesn't tend to get you kills when you want them (as in today) and the odds are that there is a character that is going to chew you up for trying unless you're playing a character that's made for it, like DK, Marth or MK. In case you were wondering what the hell I'm getting at, the very broad point of the idea of spacing is to know what moves you can rely on at what ranges to do whatever it is that gets your character their damage and kills, and keep your off-hand damage down as low as possible.

-keepaway spacing example: Let's say I play Marth ( ) and I'm against Wario. It's not too hard to figure out I gain little from getting in as close as possible where he can exert shield pressure or trade some hits, so I want to keep him at a couple-arms length where my basic punisher, Dancing Blade, is most effective, and where I can keep him out of Wario Stupid Shit^TM range with forward air. The only reason I would want to get any closer is that I can get good damage off a grab release, but grabs are hard to force on Wario, so I only want to take that opportunity when it's handed to me. Knowing my ranges so I'm not just throwing out things a quick Wario can jump OOS to punish (somewhat) on whiff makes me much harder to beat in this match.

Q: What's autocanceling and why did anybody ever think this shit needed a name?

A:

-as you have noticed, every character in smash has a recovery animation of some size when landing in the middle of an attack. the concept of autocanceling is about the most basic thing ingame tutorials don't spell out: executing an air attack early enough in a jump so that you don't land during a part where you'll be stuck in recovery for a few precious fractions of a second. This is the kind of thing that you want to know backwards and forwards for your character: depending on the character, the points at which you can autocancel a particular air move rule the way you use that move, or in extreme cases whether it's a good idea to use the move at all. For example, Snake's reason why his air moveset is generally not used for pressure (along with bad moaneuverability) is his relativeley terrible set of autocancel times: he faces significant lag on landing for a while after many of his moves no longer even have an active hitbox, so much that it's basically impossible to get rid of the lag on most of his options from a shorthop, usually forcing him to reserve neutral air and back air for situational full hops, down air for big, beefy punishments, and forward air for that crazy situational spike. It may seem silly now, but how well you have the concept down with your character this will make or, more likely, break you in a heated moment.

of course melee and 64 have L-canceling so nobody gives a shit about it in those games sort of. See below. It never hurts to try for the lag cancel, though.

Edited September 27, 2009 by Rehab

[dondon151]

You never explained why autocanceling needed a name...

Prior to Brawl it had to deal with IASA frames that negated lag before the actual attack animation was over; it seems now that autocanceling in most cases is just a pretentious term for "doing an aerial earlier so the attack ends before you hit the ground."

[Rehab]

Shit, I gues I did pussyfoot about it enough. Good catch.

[Rei]

Here's your tutorial.

[Candlejack]

You die when you are killed.

But in all seriousness, don't choose your main character just because they are good. Choose one you actually like; Brawl, outside of Meta Knight, is actually balanced compared to other games.