With this guide I hope to:
SECTION I: JAB, TILTS, & DASH ATTACK
Neutral A: Short Flash
Not much to say about this move (personally I dislike it because it’s quite slow for a jab). Actually this move has potential to be quite detrimental to edgeguarding; because of the low knockback, if you use it on someone with their back to the edge or who has missed a recovery sweetspot, they may just be knocked directly onto the ledge rather than offstage or even be drawn toward you (which can be dangerous due to the attack’s low hitstun). Additionally, since this move has so little disjoint, trying to challenge a recovery with it may result in you getting knocked into the air, which can potentially turn a favorable situation into an unfavorable one very quickly. At higher percentages, however, this move can knock your opponent off stage and give you time to set up for a kill.
Forward Tilt: Mystic Swipe
This is another suboptimal option. Generally this move is used for comboing rather than edgeguarding. If you catch a character with the sweetspot, you may get set up for an up smash to up air combo at mid-high percentages and secure a stock. However if you’re in a position to do this, it would probably make more sense to just use forward smash. If you catch the opponent with the sourspot during the endlag on their recovery, it occasionally leads to a surprise kill off the side on small stages at high percentages. Still, not the best option, especially since many recoveries will actually have more priority.
Down Tilt: Trip
Ooooh, this move. I love it. Where to begin? So this move can be used quite easily as a tool for harassment at the edge. If you space it so that the edge of her
heel hangs just over the ledge, she’ll interrupt many characters’ recoveries. The beauty of this is that it hits slightly below the ledge, so even if your opponent is angling their recovery so that they should be sweetspotting, it can interrupt them. This is hell for Space Animals; this move interrupts phantasms, and unless they are extremely smart/lucky with their up-B, it will knock them out of it. (Careful about using this on Ganon and Falcon, btw; their up-B will just grab you out of this unless it’s only their hand sticking above the ledge.) At low percentages, just use this move repeatedly to tack on damage. At higher percentages, your opponent will hang in the air just a moment before falling back down. This is a perfect opportunity to finish them with a down smash. (If you don’t attack them straight out of this hanging animation, they may fall directly onto the ledge.) Guess what? That’s only half of this move’s edgeguarding utility! The other half is its meteor property. That’s right folks- the hitbox on her thigh is a meteor smash, and a strong one at that. Your opponent often won’t realize what hit them if you land this part of the move. However, the thigh hitbox can be difficult to space. In the end, which hitbox you want to aim for depends on your attitude; if you’re pretty confident you can time and space the meteor, go for the thigh, which will most likely result in a quick kill. If you’d rather play it safe, go for the foot and build up damage. You can even start off using the foot, reposition yourself while the enemy is restarting their recovery, then aim for the meteor. Any way you play it, this move is beautiful.
Up Tilt: Protective Sweep
This is another move that’s near and dear to my heart. Many people don’t realize the massive kill potential this baby has, so that makes it a good tool to pull out for a surprise knockout. It’s excellent at catching opponents who have opted to recover high or who are returning to stage with a move that can go through you (e.g. Phantasm, Double Team). Because of the high amount of active frames you don’t have to be too exact with the timing, which is very nice. Additionally, your arm is intangible. This is good because if your opponent has used a recovery move that doesn’t send them into a helpless state and tries to attack you out of it from above, even if they brush your arm with their attack you won't take damage. There are two keys to using this move to its fullest potential while edgeguarding. The first is knowing which platforms you can through with up tilt while standing on the ground. For instance, Zelda can hit through the bottom two platforms on Fountain of Dreams at nearly any of their heights. If the opponent is holding onto ledge, up tilt can cover three of their options under optimal conditions: standard get up, rolling onto stage, and jumping onto the platform nearest to the edge of the stage. The second key to maximizing Protective Sweep’s effectiveness is actually kind of throwing away one of its general conveniences: timing. At really high percentages, it really doesn’t matter what part of the attack connects. However, if you want to secure a kill as early as possible you have to be aware of when it hits which angles. The attack begins in front of Zelda at her waist and travels a full 180 degrees to the opposite side. The direction of knockback depends on the position of her arm when the attack connects. For example, if it hits when her arm is directly overhead, the opponent will be launched straight up. Therefore- assuming you’re facing the ledge- nine times out of ten its best to try and hit with the first few frames. On stages with small boundaries, this will send your opponent hurtling toward the horizontal blast zone at a nasty angle somewhere between 0 and 45 degrees that can’t really be DI’d effectively.
Dash Attack: Magical Push
In most situations this move isn’t an optimal choice. The only real time you want to resort to this is if your opponent just barely misses a ledge sweetspot and you’re too far away to get off any other attacks in time. Still, it has decent priority so if you are right at the edge and use it against a recovery move, there’s a good chance it will win, and at high enough percentages it can result in characters with poor recoveries being pushed too far away or at too low of an angle to get back on stage.
SECTION II: SMASH ATTACKS
Up Smash: Power Sweep
Though not her best edgeguarding tool, if you’re creative you might be able to put it to some use. If your opponent tries to hit you with their recovery and you read it, you can shield, then use this OoS to start up a combo and/or secure a kill. In most cases, a preferable alternative is dashdancing slightly away from the edge. Since you can up smash directly out of a run and this move comes out extremely quickly, you can catch nearly any getup option from the ledge with this. Most ledgehopped aerials aren’t fast enough to beat this move; only extremely long ledge getup attacks will reach you if you space your dashdance correctly; you can run quickly enough to cover a roll. There are only a couple of things that will result in this approach not connecting. A) your opponent uses standard getup under 100%; B) your opponent has an aerial that comes out faster; C) your opponent has a great ledgedash; D) your opponent opts to jump onto a platform near the edge.
Forward Smash: Shining Palm
This is a pretty basic “you done f***ed up, son” edgeguarding method. Basically, use this to punish scrubs who either land on stage right in front of your face or time a charged F smash so that it knocks them off the side when their recovery collides with it. In order to utilize this to its full potential, be very observant of the length of your opponent’s recovery, then wavedash back and use it. Since Zelda’s wavedash is quite short, it may take several of them to get the spacing correct. Another option is to dash toward center stage just ahead of their recovery, then using a pivot F smash once it ends. Thankfully, this is one of her few attacks that has no weak hit or sourspot, so if you get a hit, you get a hit. The exception to this rule is an oddity that occurs if this attack is used on the edge and the bottom connects to an opponent coming to the ledge from below. In this case, it does pretty much no damage but sends them straight downward, acting as a pseudo-meteor. This downward push isn’t at all strong enough to kill them if they’re aware of what’s going on, but if they get confused (or DI in for some reason and get caught under stage) you might get a weird kill off of it. Also, since this move has a pretty low startup and cooldown, if you’re feeling lazy it’s occasionally okay to just spam it until your opponent adjusts.
Down Smash: Compass Spin (A.K.A. “Falcon Killer”)
Oh, Compass Spin. Love of my life, fire of my loins, fastest of smash attacks. Due to its incredible speed and low cooldown, this attack is quite easy to abuse. As with most of Zelda’s moveset, it’s good in the hands of most but requires a bit of thought to get the most mileage out of. It can be used any time an opponent misses a ledge sweetspot, but it’s best when they’re trying to sweetspot from below and miss. In these cases, the angle this sends them flying at can make recovery impossible even if they’re at a relatively low percent. If your opponent rolls onto stage from on the ledge, you are almost guaranteed a hit with a charged down smash near the ledge since Zelda moves her foot in a full circle. Even uncharged, you can get up to about 22-25% off of this if your opponent rolls into both the front and back hit. The back hit has a notably higher amount of knockback, so it’s best to use it with your back toward them. If you mess up the timing and don’t connect, it’s often possible to simply input it a second time since the move is just that fast. This attack is also great for gimping seemingly un-gimpable characters who like to hover near the ledge with their multiple jumps. If you use it to keep them from getting back to ledge they can’t restore their jumps, and since many of them lack range on their up Bs, they fall to their deaths. This is especially good against ROB players who refuse to recover high since grabbing the ledge for them can be quite an ordeal. For a KO at high percentages, try telecanceling to the edge of the stage and down smashing for an easy kill. Careful; if you hit them toward middle stage by accident, they can tech roll toward you and possibly punish you if you’re slow to react or use this attack again without connecting.
SECTION III: GRAB & THROWS
Zelda’s grabs are excellent at getting opponents off the stage, which is what you want most of the time as her. Her considerable grab range means that between standing grab, pivot grab and shield grab (dash grabbing is a bit too much commitment for my taste) you should be able to get a hold of your opponent, and do nasty things once you do. Most people will try to do whatever they can in order to avoid being pushed to the edge, so keep that in mind when you’re trying to read their tech options and secure a grab (or any other attack, for that matter).
Forward Throw: Levitation
At early percentages, this move is great for getting heavy, floaty characters all the way to the end of the stage and into position for an early kill offstage. Despite the relatively low knockback, this move has enough hitstun for you to get off a number of attacks before your opponent can react. If you’re really ballsy and have great timing, you can grab an opponent who hasn’t sweetspotted ledge and forward throw them into a down air for a nasty edgeguard. As an added bonus, you can angle this throw a bit to confuse your opponent or to send them into a detonating Din’s that they avoided initially.
Up Throw: Levitation Launch
Not really a go to for edgeguarding, but if you catch a fastfaller with this at mid to high percents (~65-80%) you can almost always get an up air follow-up. And boy, does that sweetspot kill early.
Back Throw: Reverse Levitation
Pretty much the easiest way to get a kill with Zelda, especially on small stages. However, you will rarely get into a situation where you can kill with this move as a result of your opponent’s recovery option. If they roll into your grab range from the ledge and you’re facing center stage, you can get an easy kill at most percents on light characters. If you grab the ledge while your foe is offstage then realize that they are going to just barely make it back, go back on right before they get there and you’ve most likely got an easy back throw kill. If their recovery has low endlag, like PK Thunder or Firefox, you'll need to start climbing back onto stage right before they land for this tactic to work. Keep in mind that, like forward throw, this can be angled to fit your needs. (Here’s a cool underutilized trick: since the correct DI to survive this throw usually involves going up, against floaties at high percents you can angle it upward so that they basically end up killing themselves off the top trying to avoid the blast line.) Though your impulse may be to back throw in almost any situation, if doing so won’t guarantee a kill it’s often not a good idea. If you’re facing someone with a very predictable recovery (e.g. Fox, Ganon) and getting them offstage gives you a chance to employ more edgeguarding techniques to finish the stock, go for it. By contrast, if you face someone like Dedede who has plenty of options, you should probably restrain yourself. Instead, maybe try…
Down Throw: Plasma Beat
Near the edge, this move can make for a deadly trap. Against the majority of cast, a badly DI’d down throw means they eat a Lightning Kick. However, if your opponent DIs away from you, you generally can’t get a follow-up due to your slow dash speed. Near the edge you have the unique ability of allowing your opponent to pick their poison. If they DI incorrectly, you get a free Bair, which is always great. If they DI to avoid the kick though, they fall either to the ledge or-even better- off stage, but within distance for a safe edgeguard attempt from onstage. Any way the cookie crumbles, you will gain the favorable position and can then employ some of the techniques mentioned throughout the entirety of this guide.
SECTION IV: SPECIAL ATTACKS
Since special moves and aerials can be performed both on and offstage, I’ll split the rest of Zelda’s moveset into “on-stage” and “off-stage” sections.
Neutral B: Naryu’s Love
ONSTAGE: Here’s a fun one. Like down tilt, the onstage version of this move is mostly a harassment tool. If you use it repeatedly at the edge when the opponent is at a mid to low percentage, they will most likely sweetspot the ledge after a while. Still, good for building up damage. When you’re spacing this move, make sure that the bottom part of the diamond isn’t exposed; there’s isn’t actually a hitbox there, so your enemy could slip right through and hit you if you aren’t careful. This move is a pseudospike; if you position yourself so that part of the diamond that is facing toward offstage and right next to the weak spot on the bottom hangs right off the ledge, an opponent who hits it will be sent almost straight down. This is a more effective and easier-to-pull-off version of the phenomenon that sometimes occurs with Zelda’s forward smash; they’ll go down for a longer period of time, and you may get a kill off of it. This move covers getup options from the ledge quite well; if you space it properly you can cover the length of most rolls while also staying far enough away to avoid a good amount of getup attacks. Bear in mind that if your foe is hit with the side facing toward center stage, that’s where they’ll go. One drawback to using this move is the endlag; if you somehow whiff it, you are open to a punish, especially when your opponent is below 100% or has a recovery move with little to no cooldown. To help alleviate this problem, it’s usually a good idea to short hop this move and aim for the land cancel. That way even if you miss, you can just use it a second time to knock away opponents who want to rush in for a punish. Though I mentioned earlier that this move is more of a harassment tool than a finisher, it’s worth noting that because of the knockback growth it’s possible to knock your opponent too far away for them to recover, or, at very high percentages on stages with close blastlines, get an outright kill off the side. If your opponent tries to recover high you can use this move in midair, but nair does a better job at this since you can fall out of it.
OFFSTAGE: Due to its stalling properties, this move is probably Zelda’s safest offstage edgeguarding tool. If you save your second jump (which you nearly always should), there is very little chance of you dying. The thing to remember when using this offstage is that the aerial form of this move has no invincibility frames. Always aim to hit right in the center of the side facing out, as this has more priority than the diagonals of the diamond. If your opponent is near the stage when their recovery starts, this method of edgeguarding isn’t usually worth it; you have to make a pretty hard read as to what angle they’ll recover at, and if you miss you sacrifice stage control for no reason. It’s also not best to go offstage with this if your opponent is directly below you; remember, the bottom of this move has no hitbox so their recovery move will just send you flying. However, if you can get your opponent between you and the stage, a well-timed Naryu’s can knock them under the stage. This move is best used when you’re at the edge and your opponent is almost exactly in line with the ledge and near the max length of their sideways recovery move. While they are still in hitstun and/or in the startup frames of their move, use Zelda’s max length horizontal jump, Naryu’s so that the part of the attack I mentioned earlier connect. You should be able to make it back to stage quite easily, especially if you conserve your jump. Watch in satisfaction as your opponent then tries recovering again and just barely misses the ledge. Fun fact: somehow the sides of this move (again, not the diagonals) beat out PK Thunder, so if you’re quick on the draw you can even edgeguard Ness and Lucas with it.
Up B: Farore’s Wind
ONSTAGE: This move only really has two onstage edgeguarding usages. But oh, boy, are they good ones. While onstage, Zelda can use Farore’s to instantly snap toward the ledge from almost anywhere on the stage. On the ground, simply short hop, angle your control stick toward the ledge while she is invisible, release the control stick, and presto- she’ll grab automatically. From a platform, the process is the same but the short hop is unnecessary. (Careful not to hold onto the control stick too long; if you’re still holding it when she reappears you’ll most likely go too far and SD.) This is great against players who opt for the ledge even when they’re in range to land onstage. It’s also excellent against sword fighters, whose massive disjoint makes them impervious to the majority of your onstage edgeguards. In almost every situation, this is Zelda’s fastest method of grabbing ledge. In addition to the autosnap, this move can be used to ledgestall more quickly than simply jumping away and regrabbing the ledge. The renewed invincibility frames can sometimes be the key to whether you take a stock off your opponent or if they survive and knock you off the ledge.
OFFSTAGE: THIS IS THE HEART AND SOUL OF YOUR OFFSTAGE GAME. Know this move inside and out. Know how to avoid getting stuck on walls and SDing (release the control stick immediately after inputting the move). Know the maximum length. Know what angles you can and can’t recover from. Know how to cancel it to grab ledge and how to cancel it onto the stage in order to avoid punishes from missed offstage edgeguard attempts (missing the ledge or getting caught in the awful air to ground endlag of this move can be deadly). All the cool edgeguards in the world don’t mean a whole lot if you can’t recover after getting them. As previously stated, the length of your recovery (combined with your fall speed) is what lets you do many of the cool things that you can offstage, so don’t squander it. This move actually does have use outside of just getting back to the stage: it can be used as a gimping tool. Since there are hitboxes on Zelda’s whole body during the startup, you can send your opponent away from the stage if you connect with them while they’re recovering. It’s safest to do this with moves like Firefox that have startup animation, but surprisingly, this move can beat out or trade with many up and side specials at any point. Just be careful that you angle the move so you make it back to stage once it ends. It’s actually smart sometimes to let yourself get hit with some recovery moves and trade with them so that you get knocked farther up and have an easier time getting back onstage.
Side B: Din’s Fire
This move is a MONSTROUS edgeguarding tool in the hands of a smart player. Although it’s much more difficult to trap opponents in a minefield of Din’s in 3.5, there are some very positive changes in this patch that increase its overall effectiveness in edgeguarding
ONSTAGE
Baiting
This iteration of Din’s makes it much easier to avoid saving your opponent. As 3.02 Zelda, it was kind of easy to do on accident, sometimes with a mine you’d forgotten you ever even laid down. However, now that there’s only one to keep track of, accidents are much less likely to happen. Also, you can recall it so that your opponent doesn’t hit it and regain a B move. This leads me to the first major part of edgeguarding with Din: baiting the opponent. Sometimes people facing Zelda players try to be sneaky and run into the Din’s on purpose, either to save themselves or in order to recover at a more favorable angle than was previously possible. If you find yourself facing such a person, you can sometimes bait them into aiming for Din’s, then recalling it once they’ve committed to hitting it so they fall to their deaths. You can also bait Game and Watch and other characters with absorption moves by detonating it with side B right before their move activates to tack on percentage.
Sniping
Compared to 3.02 Din’s, 3.5’s version has faster startup and an overall growth in speed. This change makes for the more fun part of this move’s utility: sniping. It can mess with almost any type of recovery. With good aim and reaction speed, you can take out the ball on PK Thunder to seal stocks on Ness and Lucas. This also happens to be- in my opinion- the best edgeguarding tool in the game for tether characters. All you have to do is put a Din’s in their path and they’ll drop down from their tether, often resulting in an easy kill. Some standard recoveries have more priority than the undetonated Din’s, so time it so you detonate it in the middle of the recovery or as they’re starting up. Along with building up damage, this can help prevent your opponent from sweetspotting ledge and set them up for a kill. If your Din’s is at or near full size, the side B detonation may be enough to knock them too far away from the stage to get back. Very close to the ceiling or near the blast line, you might even score a KO. The full detonation kill (triggered by the mine being out for three seconds or by transforming into Sheik) is much more difficult to get in this patch than it was in 3.02. If you don’t have a Sheik, you probably shouldn’t really go for this as an edgeguard unless you’re prepared to miss the explosion and are comfortable spending a bit of time fighting as her until you can get your opponent off your back again. The one exception to this is if your opponent is caught far offstage and you’re pretty confident that you can time the explosion to hit them on their way back with Transform’s delayed detonation taken into account. Having said that, a timeout/transform detonation has devastating kill potential if it lands. Careful though; in some cases, the side-b detonation is actually more beneficial. For characters with really high fall speeds like the Space Animals, Captain Falcon, etc., a full explosion may well just knock them up and help them recover, whereas a side-b detonation would knock them away and lower their chances of getting back to the stage.
Covering Options for Enemies on the Ledge
Din’s is also excellent for covering getup options on your opponent. This is especially true when there are no platforms for them to recover onto. If your opponent is going to make it to the ledge and you’re too far away to do anything else, you have a couple of options to make their lives harder. One is placing fire right above them. Ideally, you’d want the mine to be high enough that they can’t jump over, but not so high that they can get by with just a standard getup. If you do manage to get this placement, you can more or less just throw out attacks with low endlag and hope that Din’s knocks your enemy into them. The second tactic is much more underhanded. Place Din’s directly behind them. Careful not to get stuck in the casting animation or you could get bum rushed. Besides, the size of the mine doesn’t actually matter for this method. If anything a smaller one is preferable. The gist of it is that Din's can stage spike people on its way back to you. VERY few people realize this. This is excellent for people who are trying to ledgestall. To avoid being spiked, they have to use an aerial to remove the hitbox or time their jumps back onto ledge very carefully. This method is particularly effective if you use scare tactics by dashdancing and throwing out attacks onstage. Your opponent will sometimes forget to count the amount of times they’ve stalled and get spiked once they lose their invincibility. In case of either of the two previously mentioned methods, if you see that your opponent has managed to slip through your trap and is approaching, it’s sometimes possible to immediately recall Din’s, then use a smash attack. Even if you whiff, Din’s will most likely knock your opponent into you before they’re able to punish. From there, they’re at your mercy. If you get the large Din’s to revolve around you (jury’s still out on how exactly you do this) you can crouch near the edge for harassment.
OFFSTAGE
I really don’t recommend using this move offstage for edgeguarding (or in general, really). The risk of you killing yourself or putting yourself into an unfavorable position is not worth the reward of a successful placement. The only exception I can really think of is if you’re near the stage, then B-reverse onto it while placing a mine. Overall, more flash than real usage here.
SECTION V: AERIALS
Neutral Air: Magic Spin
ONSTAGE: This attack is great if you suspect that your opponent may try to hop onto a platform and you want to cover that option without committing too much. Simply jump up and initiate the attack, then fade back to your original position in case they try sneaking past while you’re in the air. This is a pretty safe option even if you miss and they get past you since this attack has little to no endlag. The only drawback is that depending on what part of the move you hit them with you may help them back toward center stage. This move works more as a method of keeping people off the stage than it does as a kill, but it can accomplish both tasks at high enough percentages.
OFFSTAGE: This move can be kind of risky offstage. It lasts for kind of a long time so if you try chasing people with it when they’re offstage, you might end up getting too far away from the stage or end up at too strange of an angle to get back. However, this move does still have some use. If your opponent is attempting to recovery from below the stage, you can jump out, use a fastfallen nair to drag them down with you, then jump back and use Farore’s to return to the stage. This will most likely only result in a kill if you let yourself fall down with them for almost the entire move. On stages that don’t extend downward very far, this can often be a suicide kill, so it’s really only worth it if you either have a stock advantage or are at even stocks but have a notable percentage disadvantage. You can also jump out horizontally and try pushing someone too far away to get back, but Naryu’s is a much safer choice for that due to the stalling property.
Forward and Back Aerial: Lightning Kick
ONSTAGE: Near the edge, you can keep throwing out either of these moves pretty safely since they come out so fast and have so little endlag. Alternatively, you can just sit patiently and kick them in the face when they try to get onstage. The first method requires them being kind of dumb about their getup option, while the second is more based upon reaction speed and reading them. Either way, there’s a good chance this will result in a kill if it connects. If you know their roll length pretty well, you can position yourself so that if they do standard getup you’ll connect with one kick, and if they roll, you’ll connect with the opposite kick.
OFFSTAGE: If you get this move to connect offstage, it spells instant death for a good portion of the cast regardless of what percentage they’re at due to the immense knockback. If you want to disrespect someone, go out and meet their failed recovery attempt with a kick for good measure. If you jump off the stage and find your opponent between you and the stage, a well-placed kick can result in a stage spike. As cool and satisfying as this is, sweetspotting this offstage can be difficult due to timing and spacing, so it’s not always a realistic option.
Up Air: Condensed Blast
ONSTAGE: This move doesn’t have much use for edgeguarding onstage. There’s a small chance you can catch opponents recovering high with it, but due to the low cooldown, it’s a high commitment move and you can be punished for using this if you make the wrong read. In pretty much any situation you could actually use this, up tilt or up smash are probably better.
OFFSTAGE: This move is actually kind of good to scare floaties with multiple jumps or stalling techniques who are trying to return to stage after getting knocked away. If they’re smart they can probably avoid it, but if they’re high enough up you don’t really have any alternative options. Overall, one of Zelda’s lesser edgeguarding tools.
Down Air: Meteor Heel
ONSTAGE: This move is gorgeous. I consider it one of the hidden gems in Zelda’s moveset. Though it’s nigh unto useless until you get comfortable landing the sweetspot, once you do know it, it opens up some very nice options for the princess of Hyrule. This is another great tool for edgeguarding people who land on the stage with their recovery or whose getup option you read. Because Zelda is floaty, she can full hop, wait for an opponent to end up right beneath her, then sweetspot this move if you time and space it correctly. Near the edge, this move generally meteors your foe with crazy strength, sending them out then down- usually to their death. If you aren’t close enough to the edge, the knockback usually changes (???) and sends them up and out instead. Against floaties, this actually may be preferable since most floaties could probably survive the meteor with really good reaction time. This move can kill off the top quite early, so there’s really not a downside. If it sends a fastfaller into the air, the large amount of hitstun can actually act as an effective combo starter, sometimes setting up for an up-air finish. If you expect an opponent to recover to a platform near the edge and catch them on it, the angle of the meteor most likely spells instant death. However, since choosing this option only gives you platform coverage, it’s usually not the best choice unless you decide to make a super hard read. Note that this move does hit slightly below the stage, so you can potentially take a cue from Captain Falcon by shorthopping into Heels repeatedly if you see an opponent returning to the stage from a diagonal or from below.
OFFSTAGE: Overall I prefer this move onstage. Zelda has better, safer options there than she does with it offstage. Of course you can catch the unwary foe with it if they try grabbing the ledge from below just like you can with any other meteor or spike. However, since you can do the same thing from onstage that’s often the better option. One unique option you do gain offstage is edgeguarding tether characters. To be sure, this is purely situational. If you happen to be tumbling just above the ledge or something and you see a character grab onto the stage with a max length tether, you can fastfall down and catch them with a Meteor Heel before they pull up to ledge for the invincibility. It’s a guaranteed kill if it connects; you probably won’t even need to sweetspot the move for this. Since few characters are capable of being so aggressive toward tether characters in these situations, they’ll probably be caught by surprise. I only recommend going for this in situations of either desperation or when you’re a stock or two ahead and looking to style, as returning to stage after using this can be difficult sometimes.
And with that, I draw this guide to a close. I truly hope everyone who reads this guide finds it helpful. If you do, then let me know! If there’s something you think I could do to make it easier to navigate or something along those lines, let me know as well. Happy playing
- Enlighten Zelda players to some unique properties of her moves, which they may or may not be aware of
- Provide methods of setting up edgeguarding opportunities
- Provide a variety of possible edgeguarding techniques for both onstage and offstage use
- Give scenarios in which different techniques can and should be employed
- Let people know which techniques are effective against which characters
- Encourage Zelda players (and all other players, really) to be as creative as possible with their main to help with innovation and adaptation to the flow of battle
SECTION I: JAB, TILTS, & DASH ATTACK
Neutral A: Short Flash
Not much to say about this move (personally I dislike it because it’s quite slow for a jab). Actually this move has potential to be quite detrimental to edgeguarding; because of the low knockback, if you use it on someone with their back to the edge or who has missed a recovery sweetspot, they may just be knocked directly onto the ledge rather than offstage or even be drawn toward you (which can be dangerous due to the attack’s low hitstun). Additionally, since this move has so little disjoint, trying to challenge a recovery with it may result in you getting knocked into the air, which can potentially turn a favorable situation into an unfavorable one very quickly. At higher percentages, however, this move can knock your opponent off stage and give you time to set up for a kill.
Forward Tilt: Mystic Swipe
This is another suboptimal option. Generally this move is used for comboing rather than edgeguarding. If you catch a character with the sweetspot, you may get set up for an up smash to up air combo at mid-high percentages and secure a stock. However if you’re in a position to do this, it would probably make more sense to just use forward smash. If you catch the opponent with the sourspot during the endlag on their recovery, it occasionally leads to a surprise kill off the side on small stages at high percentages. Still, not the best option, especially since many recoveries will actually have more priority.
Down Tilt: Trip
Ooooh, this move. I love it. Where to begin? So this move can be used quite easily as a tool for harassment at the edge. If you space it so that the edge of her
heel hangs just over the ledge, she’ll interrupt many characters’ recoveries. The beauty of this is that it hits slightly below the ledge, so even if your opponent is angling their recovery so that they should be sweetspotting, it can interrupt them. This is hell for Space Animals; this move interrupts phantasms, and unless they are extremely smart/lucky with their up-B, it will knock them out of it. (Careful about using this on Ganon and Falcon, btw; their up-B will just grab you out of this unless it’s only their hand sticking above the ledge.) At low percentages, just use this move repeatedly to tack on damage. At higher percentages, your opponent will hang in the air just a moment before falling back down. This is a perfect opportunity to finish them with a down smash. (If you don’t attack them straight out of this hanging animation, they may fall directly onto the ledge.) Guess what? That’s only half of this move’s edgeguarding utility! The other half is its meteor property. That’s right folks- the hitbox on her thigh is a meteor smash, and a strong one at that. Your opponent often won’t realize what hit them if you land this part of the move. However, the thigh hitbox can be difficult to space. In the end, which hitbox you want to aim for depends on your attitude; if you’re pretty confident you can time and space the meteor, go for the thigh, which will most likely result in a quick kill. If you’d rather play it safe, go for the foot and build up damage. You can even start off using the foot, reposition yourself while the enemy is restarting their recovery, then aim for the meteor. Any way you play it, this move is beautiful.
Up Tilt: Protective Sweep
This is another move that’s near and dear to my heart. Many people don’t realize the massive kill potential this baby has, so that makes it a good tool to pull out for a surprise knockout. It’s excellent at catching opponents who have opted to recover high or who are returning to stage with a move that can go through you (e.g. Phantasm, Double Team). Because of the high amount of active frames you don’t have to be too exact with the timing, which is very nice. Additionally, your arm is intangible. This is good because if your opponent has used a recovery move that doesn’t send them into a helpless state and tries to attack you out of it from above, even if they brush your arm with their attack you won't take damage. There are two keys to using this move to its fullest potential while edgeguarding. The first is knowing which platforms you can through with up tilt while standing on the ground. For instance, Zelda can hit through the bottom two platforms on Fountain of Dreams at nearly any of their heights. If the opponent is holding onto ledge, up tilt can cover three of their options under optimal conditions: standard get up, rolling onto stage, and jumping onto the platform nearest to the edge of the stage. The second key to maximizing Protective Sweep’s effectiveness is actually kind of throwing away one of its general conveniences: timing. At really high percentages, it really doesn’t matter what part of the attack connects. However, if you want to secure a kill as early as possible you have to be aware of when it hits which angles. The attack begins in front of Zelda at her waist and travels a full 180 degrees to the opposite side. The direction of knockback depends on the position of her arm when the attack connects. For example, if it hits when her arm is directly overhead, the opponent will be launched straight up. Therefore- assuming you’re facing the ledge- nine times out of ten its best to try and hit with the first few frames. On stages with small boundaries, this will send your opponent hurtling toward the horizontal blast zone at a nasty angle somewhere between 0 and 45 degrees that can’t really be DI’d effectively.
Dash Attack: Magical Push
In most situations this move isn’t an optimal choice. The only real time you want to resort to this is if your opponent just barely misses a ledge sweetspot and you’re too far away to get off any other attacks in time. Still, it has decent priority so if you are right at the edge and use it against a recovery move, there’s a good chance it will win, and at high enough percentages it can result in characters with poor recoveries being pushed too far away or at too low of an angle to get back on stage.
SECTION II: SMASH ATTACKS
Up Smash: Power Sweep
Though not her best edgeguarding tool, if you’re creative you might be able to put it to some use. If your opponent tries to hit you with their recovery and you read it, you can shield, then use this OoS to start up a combo and/or secure a kill. In most cases, a preferable alternative is dashdancing slightly away from the edge. Since you can up smash directly out of a run and this move comes out extremely quickly, you can catch nearly any getup option from the ledge with this. Most ledgehopped aerials aren’t fast enough to beat this move; only extremely long ledge getup attacks will reach you if you space your dashdance correctly; you can run quickly enough to cover a roll. There are only a couple of things that will result in this approach not connecting. A) your opponent uses standard getup under 100%; B) your opponent has an aerial that comes out faster; C) your opponent has a great ledgedash; D) your opponent opts to jump onto a platform near the edge.
Forward Smash: Shining Palm
This is a pretty basic “you done f***ed up, son” edgeguarding method. Basically, use this to punish scrubs who either land on stage right in front of your face or time a charged F smash so that it knocks them off the side when their recovery collides with it. In order to utilize this to its full potential, be very observant of the length of your opponent’s recovery, then wavedash back and use it. Since Zelda’s wavedash is quite short, it may take several of them to get the spacing correct. Another option is to dash toward center stage just ahead of their recovery, then using a pivot F smash once it ends. Thankfully, this is one of her few attacks that has no weak hit or sourspot, so if you get a hit, you get a hit. The exception to this rule is an oddity that occurs if this attack is used on the edge and the bottom connects to an opponent coming to the ledge from below. In this case, it does pretty much no damage but sends them straight downward, acting as a pseudo-meteor. This downward push isn’t at all strong enough to kill them if they’re aware of what’s going on, but if they get confused (or DI in for some reason and get caught under stage) you might get a weird kill off of it. Also, since this move has a pretty low startup and cooldown, if you’re feeling lazy it’s occasionally okay to just spam it until your opponent adjusts.
Down Smash: Compass Spin (A.K.A. “Falcon Killer”)
Oh, Compass Spin. Love of my life, fire of my loins, fastest of smash attacks. Due to its incredible speed and low cooldown, this attack is quite easy to abuse. As with most of Zelda’s moveset, it’s good in the hands of most but requires a bit of thought to get the most mileage out of. It can be used any time an opponent misses a ledge sweetspot, but it’s best when they’re trying to sweetspot from below and miss. In these cases, the angle this sends them flying at can make recovery impossible even if they’re at a relatively low percent. If your opponent rolls onto stage from on the ledge, you are almost guaranteed a hit with a charged down smash near the ledge since Zelda moves her foot in a full circle. Even uncharged, you can get up to about 22-25% off of this if your opponent rolls into both the front and back hit. The back hit has a notably higher amount of knockback, so it’s best to use it with your back toward them. If you mess up the timing and don’t connect, it’s often possible to simply input it a second time since the move is just that fast. This attack is also great for gimping seemingly un-gimpable characters who like to hover near the ledge with their multiple jumps. If you use it to keep them from getting back to ledge they can’t restore their jumps, and since many of them lack range on their up Bs, they fall to their deaths. This is especially good against ROB players who refuse to recover high since grabbing the ledge for them can be quite an ordeal. For a KO at high percentages, try telecanceling to the edge of the stage and down smashing for an easy kill. Careful; if you hit them toward middle stage by accident, they can tech roll toward you and possibly punish you if you’re slow to react or use this attack again without connecting.
SECTION III: GRAB & THROWS
Zelda’s grabs are excellent at getting opponents off the stage, which is what you want most of the time as her. Her considerable grab range means that between standing grab, pivot grab and shield grab (dash grabbing is a bit too much commitment for my taste) you should be able to get a hold of your opponent, and do nasty things once you do. Most people will try to do whatever they can in order to avoid being pushed to the edge, so keep that in mind when you’re trying to read their tech options and secure a grab (or any other attack, for that matter).
Forward Throw: Levitation
At early percentages, this move is great for getting heavy, floaty characters all the way to the end of the stage and into position for an early kill offstage. Despite the relatively low knockback, this move has enough hitstun for you to get off a number of attacks before your opponent can react. If you’re really ballsy and have great timing, you can grab an opponent who hasn’t sweetspotted ledge and forward throw them into a down air for a nasty edgeguard. As an added bonus, you can angle this throw a bit to confuse your opponent or to send them into a detonating Din’s that they avoided initially.
Up Throw: Levitation Launch
Not really a go to for edgeguarding, but if you catch a fastfaller with this at mid to high percents (~65-80%) you can almost always get an up air follow-up. And boy, does that sweetspot kill early.
Back Throw: Reverse Levitation
Pretty much the easiest way to get a kill with Zelda, especially on small stages. However, you will rarely get into a situation where you can kill with this move as a result of your opponent’s recovery option. If they roll into your grab range from the ledge and you’re facing center stage, you can get an easy kill at most percents on light characters. If you grab the ledge while your foe is offstage then realize that they are going to just barely make it back, go back on right before they get there and you’ve most likely got an easy back throw kill. If their recovery has low endlag, like PK Thunder or Firefox, you'll need to start climbing back onto stage right before they land for this tactic to work. Keep in mind that, like forward throw, this can be angled to fit your needs. (Here’s a cool underutilized trick: since the correct DI to survive this throw usually involves going up, against floaties at high percents you can angle it upward so that they basically end up killing themselves off the top trying to avoid the blast line.) Though your impulse may be to back throw in almost any situation, if doing so won’t guarantee a kill it’s often not a good idea. If you’re facing someone with a very predictable recovery (e.g. Fox, Ganon) and getting them offstage gives you a chance to employ more edgeguarding techniques to finish the stock, go for it. By contrast, if you face someone like Dedede who has plenty of options, you should probably restrain yourself. Instead, maybe try…
Down Throw: Plasma Beat
Near the edge, this move can make for a deadly trap. Against the majority of cast, a badly DI’d down throw means they eat a Lightning Kick. However, if your opponent DIs away from you, you generally can’t get a follow-up due to your slow dash speed. Near the edge you have the unique ability of allowing your opponent to pick their poison. If they DI incorrectly, you get a free Bair, which is always great. If they DI to avoid the kick though, they fall either to the ledge or-even better- off stage, but within distance for a safe edgeguard attempt from onstage. Any way the cookie crumbles, you will gain the favorable position and can then employ some of the techniques mentioned throughout the entirety of this guide.
SECTION IV: SPECIAL ATTACKS
Since special moves and aerials can be performed both on and offstage, I’ll split the rest of Zelda’s moveset into “on-stage” and “off-stage” sections.
Neutral B: Naryu’s Love
ONSTAGE: Here’s a fun one. Like down tilt, the onstage version of this move is mostly a harassment tool. If you use it repeatedly at the edge when the opponent is at a mid to low percentage, they will most likely sweetspot the ledge after a while. Still, good for building up damage. When you’re spacing this move, make sure that the bottom part of the diamond isn’t exposed; there’s isn’t actually a hitbox there, so your enemy could slip right through and hit you if you aren’t careful. This move is a pseudospike; if you position yourself so that part of the diamond that is facing toward offstage and right next to the weak spot on the bottom hangs right off the ledge, an opponent who hits it will be sent almost straight down. This is a more effective and easier-to-pull-off version of the phenomenon that sometimes occurs with Zelda’s forward smash; they’ll go down for a longer period of time, and you may get a kill off of it. This move covers getup options from the ledge quite well; if you space it properly you can cover the length of most rolls while also staying far enough away to avoid a good amount of getup attacks. Bear in mind that if your foe is hit with the side facing toward center stage, that’s where they’ll go. One drawback to using this move is the endlag; if you somehow whiff it, you are open to a punish, especially when your opponent is below 100% or has a recovery move with little to no cooldown. To help alleviate this problem, it’s usually a good idea to short hop this move and aim for the land cancel. That way even if you miss, you can just use it a second time to knock away opponents who want to rush in for a punish. Though I mentioned earlier that this move is more of a harassment tool than a finisher, it’s worth noting that because of the knockback growth it’s possible to knock your opponent too far away for them to recover, or, at very high percentages on stages with close blastlines, get an outright kill off the side. If your opponent tries to recover high you can use this move in midair, but nair does a better job at this since you can fall out of it.
OFFSTAGE: Due to its stalling properties, this move is probably Zelda’s safest offstage edgeguarding tool. If you save your second jump (which you nearly always should), there is very little chance of you dying. The thing to remember when using this offstage is that the aerial form of this move has no invincibility frames. Always aim to hit right in the center of the side facing out, as this has more priority than the diagonals of the diamond. If your opponent is near the stage when their recovery starts, this method of edgeguarding isn’t usually worth it; you have to make a pretty hard read as to what angle they’ll recover at, and if you miss you sacrifice stage control for no reason. It’s also not best to go offstage with this if your opponent is directly below you; remember, the bottom of this move has no hitbox so their recovery move will just send you flying. However, if you can get your opponent between you and the stage, a well-timed Naryu’s can knock them under the stage. This move is best used when you’re at the edge and your opponent is almost exactly in line with the ledge and near the max length of their sideways recovery move. While they are still in hitstun and/or in the startup frames of their move, use Zelda’s max length horizontal jump, Naryu’s so that the part of the attack I mentioned earlier connect. You should be able to make it back to stage quite easily, especially if you conserve your jump. Watch in satisfaction as your opponent then tries recovering again and just barely misses the ledge. Fun fact: somehow the sides of this move (again, not the diagonals) beat out PK Thunder, so if you’re quick on the draw you can even edgeguard Ness and Lucas with it.
Up B: Farore’s Wind
ONSTAGE: This move only really has two onstage edgeguarding usages. But oh, boy, are they good ones. While onstage, Zelda can use Farore’s to instantly snap toward the ledge from almost anywhere on the stage. On the ground, simply short hop, angle your control stick toward the ledge while she is invisible, release the control stick, and presto- she’ll grab automatically. From a platform, the process is the same but the short hop is unnecessary. (Careful not to hold onto the control stick too long; if you’re still holding it when she reappears you’ll most likely go too far and SD.) This is great against players who opt for the ledge even when they’re in range to land onstage. It’s also excellent against sword fighters, whose massive disjoint makes them impervious to the majority of your onstage edgeguards. In almost every situation, this is Zelda’s fastest method of grabbing ledge. In addition to the autosnap, this move can be used to ledgestall more quickly than simply jumping away and regrabbing the ledge. The renewed invincibility frames can sometimes be the key to whether you take a stock off your opponent or if they survive and knock you off the ledge.
OFFSTAGE: THIS IS THE HEART AND SOUL OF YOUR OFFSTAGE GAME. Know this move inside and out. Know how to avoid getting stuck on walls and SDing (release the control stick immediately after inputting the move). Know the maximum length. Know what angles you can and can’t recover from. Know how to cancel it to grab ledge and how to cancel it onto the stage in order to avoid punishes from missed offstage edgeguard attempts (missing the ledge or getting caught in the awful air to ground endlag of this move can be deadly). All the cool edgeguards in the world don’t mean a whole lot if you can’t recover after getting them. As previously stated, the length of your recovery (combined with your fall speed) is what lets you do many of the cool things that you can offstage, so don’t squander it. This move actually does have use outside of just getting back to the stage: it can be used as a gimping tool. Since there are hitboxes on Zelda’s whole body during the startup, you can send your opponent away from the stage if you connect with them while they’re recovering. It’s safest to do this with moves like Firefox that have startup animation, but surprisingly, this move can beat out or trade with many up and side specials at any point. Just be careful that you angle the move so you make it back to stage once it ends. It’s actually smart sometimes to let yourself get hit with some recovery moves and trade with them so that you get knocked farther up and have an easier time getting back onstage.
Side B: Din’s Fire
This move is a MONSTROUS edgeguarding tool in the hands of a smart player. Although it’s much more difficult to trap opponents in a minefield of Din’s in 3.5, there are some very positive changes in this patch that increase its overall effectiveness in edgeguarding
ONSTAGE
Baiting
This iteration of Din’s makes it much easier to avoid saving your opponent. As 3.02 Zelda, it was kind of easy to do on accident, sometimes with a mine you’d forgotten you ever even laid down. However, now that there’s only one to keep track of, accidents are much less likely to happen. Also, you can recall it so that your opponent doesn’t hit it and regain a B move. This leads me to the first major part of edgeguarding with Din: baiting the opponent. Sometimes people facing Zelda players try to be sneaky and run into the Din’s on purpose, either to save themselves or in order to recover at a more favorable angle than was previously possible. If you find yourself facing such a person, you can sometimes bait them into aiming for Din’s, then recalling it once they’ve committed to hitting it so they fall to their deaths. You can also bait Game and Watch and other characters with absorption moves by detonating it with side B right before their move activates to tack on percentage.
Sniping
Compared to 3.02 Din’s, 3.5’s version has faster startup and an overall growth in speed. This change makes for the more fun part of this move’s utility: sniping. It can mess with almost any type of recovery. With good aim and reaction speed, you can take out the ball on PK Thunder to seal stocks on Ness and Lucas. This also happens to be- in my opinion- the best edgeguarding tool in the game for tether characters. All you have to do is put a Din’s in their path and they’ll drop down from their tether, often resulting in an easy kill. Some standard recoveries have more priority than the undetonated Din’s, so time it so you detonate it in the middle of the recovery or as they’re starting up. Along with building up damage, this can help prevent your opponent from sweetspotting ledge and set them up for a kill. If your Din’s is at or near full size, the side B detonation may be enough to knock them too far away from the stage to get back. Very close to the ceiling or near the blast line, you might even score a KO. The full detonation kill (triggered by the mine being out for three seconds or by transforming into Sheik) is much more difficult to get in this patch than it was in 3.02. If you don’t have a Sheik, you probably shouldn’t really go for this as an edgeguard unless you’re prepared to miss the explosion and are comfortable spending a bit of time fighting as her until you can get your opponent off your back again. The one exception to this is if your opponent is caught far offstage and you’re pretty confident that you can time the explosion to hit them on their way back with Transform’s delayed detonation taken into account. Having said that, a timeout/transform detonation has devastating kill potential if it lands. Careful though; in some cases, the side-b detonation is actually more beneficial. For characters with really high fall speeds like the Space Animals, Captain Falcon, etc., a full explosion may well just knock them up and help them recover, whereas a side-b detonation would knock them away and lower their chances of getting back to the stage.
Covering Options for Enemies on the Ledge
Din’s is also excellent for covering getup options on your opponent. This is especially true when there are no platforms for them to recover onto. If your opponent is going to make it to the ledge and you’re too far away to do anything else, you have a couple of options to make their lives harder. One is placing fire right above them. Ideally, you’d want the mine to be high enough that they can’t jump over, but not so high that they can get by with just a standard getup. If you do manage to get this placement, you can more or less just throw out attacks with low endlag and hope that Din’s knocks your enemy into them. The second tactic is much more underhanded. Place Din’s directly behind them. Careful not to get stuck in the casting animation or you could get bum rushed. Besides, the size of the mine doesn’t actually matter for this method. If anything a smaller one is preferable. The gist of it is that Din's can stage spike people on its way back to you. VERY few people realize this. This is excellent for people who are trying to ledgestall. To avoid being spiked, they have to use an aerial to remove the hitbox or time their jumps back onto ledge very carefully. This method is particularly effective if you use scare tactics by dashdancing and throwing out attacks onstage. Your opponent will sometimes forget to count the amount of times they’ve stalled and get spiked once they lose their invincibility. In case of either of the two previously mentioned methods, if you see that your opponent has managed to slip through your trap and is approaching, it’s sometimes possible to immediately recall Din’s, then use a smash attack. Even if you whiff, Din’s will most likely knock your opponent into you before they’re able to punish. From there, they’re at your mercy. If you get the large Din’s to revolve around you (jury’s still out on how exactly you do this) you can crouch near the edge for harassment.
OFFSTAGE
I really don’t recommend using this move offstage for edgeguarding (or in general, really). The risk of you killing yourself or putting yourself into an unfavorable position is not worth the reward of a successful placement. The only exception I can really think of is if you’re near the stage, then B-reverse onto it while placing a mine. Overall, more flash than real usage here.
SECTION V: AERIALS
Neutral Air: Magic Spin
ONSTAGE: This attack is great if you suspect that your opponent may try to hop onto a platform and you want to cover that option without committing too much. Simply jump up and initiate the attack, then fade back to your original position in case they try sneaking past while you’re in the air. This is a pretty safe option even if you miss and they get past you since this attack has little to no endlag. The only drawback is that depending on what part of the move you hit them with you may help them back toward center stage. This move works more as a method of keeping people off the stage than it does as a kill, but it can accomplish both tasks at high enough percentages.
OFFSTAGE: This move can be kind of risky offstage. It lasts for kind of a long time so if you try chasing people with it when they’re offstage, you might end up getting too far away from the stage or end up at too strange of an angle to get back. However, this move does still have some use. If your opponent is attempting to recovery from below the stage, you can jump out, use a fastfallen nair to drag them down with you, then jump back and use Farore’s to return to the stage. This will most likely only result in a kill if you let yourself fall down with them for almost the entire move. On stages that don’t extend downward very far, this can often be a suicide kill, so it’s really only worth it if you either have a stock advantage or are at even stocks but have a notable percentage disadvantage. You can also jump out horizontally and try pushing someone too far away to get back, but Naryu’s is a much safer choice for that due to the stalling property.
Forward and Back Aerial: Lightning Kick
ONSTAGE: Near the edge, you can keep throwing out either of these moves pretty safely since they come out so fast and have so little endlag. Alternatively, you can just sit patiently and kick them in the face when they try to get onstage. The first method requires them being kind of dumb about their getup option, while the second is more based upon reaction speed and reading them. Either way, there’s a good chance this will result in a kill if it connects. If you know their roll length pretty well, you can position yourself so that if they do standard getup you’ll connect with one kick, and if they roll, you’ll connect with the opposite kick.
OFFSTAGE: If you get this move to connect offstage, it spells instant death for a good portion of the cast regardless of what percentage they’re at due to the immense knockback. If you want to disrespect someone, go out and meet their failed recovery attempt with a kick for good measure. If you jump off the stage and find your opponent between you and the stage, a well-placed kick can result in a stage spike. As cool and satisfying as this is, sweetspotting this offstage can be difficult due to timing and spacing, so it’s not always a realistic option.
Up Air: Condensed Blast
ONSTAGE: This move doesn’t have much use for edgeguarding onstage. There’s a small chance you can catch opponents recovering high with it, but due to the low cooldown, it’s a high commitment move and you can be punished for using this if you make the wrong read. In pretty much any situation you could actually use this, up tilt or up smash are probably better.
OFFSTAGE: This move is actually kind of good to scare floaties with multiple jumps or stalling techniques who are trying to return to stage after getting knocked away. If they’re smart they can probably avoid it, but if they’re high enough up you don’t really have any alternative options. Overall, one of Zelda’s lesser edgeguarding tools.
Down Air: Meteor Heel
ONSTAGE: This move is gorgeous. I consider it one of the hidden gems in Zelda’s moveset. Though it’s nigh unto useless until you get comfortable landing the sweetspot, once you do know it, it opens up some very nice options for the princess of Hyrule. This is another great tool for edgeguarding people who land on the stage with their recovery or whose getup option you read. Because Zelda is floaty, she can full hop, wait for an opponent to end up right beneath her, then sweetspot this move if you time and space it correctly. Near the edge, this move generally meteors your foe with crazy strength, sending them out then down- usually to their death. If you aren’t close enough to the edge, the knockback usually changes (???) and sends them up and out instead. Against floaties, this actually may be preferable since most floaties could probably survive the meteor with really good reaction time. This move can kill off the top quite early, so there’s really not a downside. If it sends a fastfaller into the air, the large amount of hitstun can actually act as an effective combo starter, sometimes setting up for an up-air finish. If you expect an opponent to recover to a platform near the edge and catch them on it, the angle of the meteor most likely spells instant death. However, since choosing this option only gives you platform coverage, it’s usually not the best choice unless you decide to make a super hard read. Note that this move does hit slightly below the stage, so you can potentially take a cue from Captain Falcon by shorthopping into Heels repeatedly if you see an opponent returning to the stage from a diagonal or from below.
OFFSTAGE: Overall I prefer this move onstage. Zelda has better, safer options there than she does with it offstage. Of course you can catch the unwary foe with it if they try grabbing the ledge from below just like you can with any other meteor or spike. However, since you can do the same thing from onstage that’s often the better option. One unique option you do gain offstage is edgeguarding tether characters. To be sure, this is purely situational. If you happen to be tumbling just above the ledge or something and you see a character grab onto the stage with a max length tether, you can fastfall down and catch them with a Meteor Heel before they pull up to ledge for the invincibility. It’s a guaranteed kill if it connects; you probably won’t even need to sweetspot the move for this. Since few characters are capable of being so aggressive toward tether characters in these situations, they’ll probably be caught by surprise. I only recommend going for this in situations of either desperation or when you’re a stock or two ahead and looking to style, as returning to stage after using this can be difficult sometimes.
And with that, I draw this guide to a close. I truly hope everyone who reads this guide finds it helpful. If you do, then let me know! If there’s something you think I could do to make it easier to navigate or something along those lines, let me know as well. Happy playing
