I hope someone links me to footage of Fatality playing against decent G&W's but since there probably isn't any I would just like to understand how to play against this character. He dies so easily but dtilt essentially means that rboost isn't a recovery option, leaving us with a melee-esque Falcon which dies if knocked offstage once. I kinda see that his neutral blows but I don't see how to punish it since he just throws out huge disjoints that linger forever, it feels like he constantly has a hitbox out. Any tips on how to play it would be appreciated!
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How to play against G&W?
- Thread starter Mystic-
- Start date
Frost | Odds
Puddings: 1 /// Odds: 0
If he keeps throwing out brainless dtilts, it should be fairly straightforward to stomp him, which will in all likelihood lead to a kill. GnW doesn't actually have any great grounded anti-air options- dtilt and ftilt and jab all have fairly low hitboxes. Basically (to my limited understanding of the MU), CF benefits most when he's on a different vertical plane than GnW. Try aiming to be either above or below him as much as you can, see if that helps.
Kazuyahimegami
Smash Rookie
Idk...GnW (SEEMS) like he would be able to shut down quite a bit of falcon's movement with SH Bacon and forward/down tilts...plus he has a get out of combo free card(his up-B) and his forward smash stays out so long >_>...but I mean, you can probably tell that I'm not talking about high level play. Hell, outside of me and my buddy screwing around with him for trolling purposes, there's not really anyone I've seen that uses him for real. I'd agree with OP about Mr. Fatality Vs. A Really Good/Decent GnW would definitely be the best Falcon Vs. GnW reference, if such a match ever comes up lol That's just my two cents on it haha
Foo
Smash Lord
To win this matchup, I've found you have to really take advantage of falcons speed over game and watch, and force him into tech chase situations. Game and watch beats you in neutral IF you are approaching and he knows it. Bacon shuts you down hard, but he can't spam it. Fair beats you hard, but it has decent lag. His other options shut you out really hard, but they don't cover high very well.
Game and watch has a terrible tech roll, so forcing techs is the best way to rack up damage against his up-b. Be ready to grab his standing tech but react if he does a rolling tech (keep in mind the techs loses invincibility and inaction sooner than it looks). If he does a rolling tech, you should be able to punish it on reaction.
However, the biggest and most important part of the matchups is.... DON'T GO OFF STAGE EVER. That's a stock, every time unless he messes up. Game and watch DASH ATTACK hits understage, so he doesn't even have to be set up. Not only that, but he is great at covering high recovery too.
I'd recommend taking him to a biggish stage, but not one with big blastzones. You'll want some room to work with, but you want to kill early too. I'd recommend stages like battlefield, ps2, FD, smashville, and lylatt (sorta). Small stages aren't bad, but you want to avoid massive blastzones at all costs (as long as the cost isn't FoD).
For comboing him, you have to keep in mind that he will be mashing up b. That means if your combos aren't frame perfect, you'll get hit. However, you can use this to your advantage. Up-b puts him above you, and he is floaty. If you space your up-airs perfectly, it'll beat out his down air. Also, baiting out downair leads to an easy knee and you can also hit him before key comes out. It's a three way mixup where he has to guess a 1/3 if you don't mess up.
Game and watch has a terrible tech roll, so forcing techs is the best way to rack up damage against his up-b. Be ready to grab his standing tech but react if he does a rolling tech (keep in mind the techs loses invincibility and inaction sooner than it looks). If he does a rolling tech, you should be able to punish it on reaction.
However, the biggest and most important part of the matchups is.... DON'T GO OFF STAGE EVER. That's a stock, every time unless he messes up. Game and watch DASH ATTACK hits understage, so he doesn't even have to be set up. Not only that, but he is great at covering high recovery too.
I'd recommend taking him to a biggish stage, but not one with big blastzones. You'll want some room to work with, but you want to kill early too. I'd recommend stages like battlefield, ps2, FD, smashville, and lylatt (sorta). Small stages aren't bad, but you want to avoid massive blastzones at all costs (as long as the cost isn't FoD).
For comboing him, you have to keep in mind that he will be mashing up b. That means if your combos aren't frame perfect, you'll get hit. However, you can use this to your advantage. Up-b puts him above you, and he is floaty. If you space your up-airs perfectly, it'll beat out his down air. Also, baiting out downair leads to an easy knee and you can also hit him before key comes out. It's a three way mixup where he has to guess a 1/3 if you don't mess up.
Off Topic: RIP ZSS? Have you joined the dark side of the Falcon?
On topic: I played with a decent G&W for awhile yesterday and I agree with most of what you said. The biggest thing was realizing his animations are extremely deceiving for both his tech rolls and even his hitboxes. They don't linger as long/have as much invincibility as they appear to. His CC dtilt is really good for even well spaced nair approaches so I tried to rely more on DD JCgrabs and stomps with nair as more of a mix up and it worked fairly well. And yea...the edgeguarding hurts my very soul LOL. Small blast zones but still with room to maneuver is definitely good in the match up but FD is extremely punishing if you do something stupid. He can combo you for days and he can get out of your combos much easier. The main thing is that Uair can beat key? I legitimately didn't know that. Appreciate the help!
Foo
Smash Lord
Upair can't beat key straight up, you just have to come in from the right angle. It's very tough. It'll look something like this.
Keep in mind this is the melee hitbox. I think the PM doesn't cover his face as well because it has a small circle at the top or the key, and a bigger circle at the base of the key. It makes it reach further down, but leaves him more vunerable at this angle. I'll double check that later. (Also, for the last 10 or so frames of key, the key is still out but the hitbox is gone, because game and watch is the most broken and poorly designed character in the game.
Also, the thing with FD is that it's punishing for BOTH sides. If he up-bs out of your combos, he has to hit the floor, giving you plenty of time and space to punish him for it. Both sides die early on this map. Also, because of G&W nair on platform techs, platforms don't really help you escape very well anyhow. If G&W had old bacon, I'd say this map was unplayable, but right now, I'd place it slightly above a map like yoshi's story or green hill, but well above maps like dream.
For approaches, I definitely don't like nair because of hold down to win game. No matter how well you space it, your F'd if you try it. I think bair shield cross ups work really well to apply pressure, and if they land you get a tech chase. Dair is also really good. Also, don't discount knee. In most matchups, knee isn't the best approach because you'll get outspaced. However, everything game and watch has outspaces you, so you have to get in between hitboxes. You may as well knee if you've accomplised that.
P.S. ZSS was my 3.02 main. I was really good and even won a tournament with her. However, 3.5 murdered her. They removed basically everything that was fun and interesting about her, making her into a really generic and boring character. No more dash cancel blaster, no more nair combos, no more tether grab, ABSOLUTELY NO FOLLOW UP FROM THROWS, no dive kick shenanigans, etc. Only fun moves that are in tact are side-b and up-b. Because of this, I can't stand to play her anymore, so I'm switching mains to falcon until she gets changed (if she gets changed).
RevengeOfTheStyle
Smash Rookie
Try getting on top of G&W's key with a stomp, or just wait for him to come down and grab?
I haven't done this MU with Dakpo in a long time. Our opinion back then (iirc) was that G^W had a small edge on most stages. With the changes to Falcon's grab boxes, and some nerfs/changes that are a tad beneficial for Falcon on handling G^W, he probably manages a slight edge instead this time. It's very hard to approach G^W with SH aerials of any kind, because the only stuff that can hit him easy or reliably is stomp + instant Uair. Everything else requires a bit of delay or extra timing, especially if you have to deal with his crouching (where every non-stomp aerial will need a delay or timing change to hit him).
Ideally, with the grab buffs, your main threat is to outright grab G^W if he does not attack or respond to that threat. You can grab him crouching, which uses to be the old "GG" choice from G^W kind of similar to a less lame form of Jiggs crouching under grabs. From there, you get into baiting a response that he probably will toss out to deal with your grab threat, and then finding a punish. If you are not threatening to grab, it becomes very difficult to put pressure on him because his low profile and standard attacks + Upb discourage SH aerials flying at him. If he leaves an opening for a cross up though, like you run with SH Dair and land behind his shield, that's an OK opportunity to fish for a real opening.
Also, when it comes to Dair I don't try to beat it out very much. I usually gauge how far up he is, and how long the attack has lasted, and try to land something as the move cools down. There's a brief period IIRC where the key looks to be out, but the hitbox is already gone or disappearing. Find that sweetspot, and you can land anything before they can deal with it. I would only try to trade or beat Dair if it's a "race for timing" where you are both trying to land the fastest aerial after he gets knocked up. If you choose to go sideways or at an angle, Knee or Bair might be better if you can manage it
Ideally, with the grab buffs, your main threat is to outright grab G^W if he does not attack or respond to that threat. You can grab him crouching, which uses to be the old "GG" choice from G^W kind of similar to a less lame form of Jiggs crouching under grabs. From there, you get into baiting a response that he probably will toss out to deal with your grab threat, and then finding a punish. If you are not threatening to grab, it becomes very difficult to put pressure on him because his low profile and standard attacks + Upb discourage SH aerials flying at him. If he leaves an opening for a cross up though, like you run with SH Dair and land behind his shield, that's an OK opportunity to fish for a real opening.
Also, when it comes to Dair I don't try to beat it out very much. I usually gauge how far up he is, and how long the attack has lasted, and try to land something as the move cools down. There's a brief period IIRC where the key looks to be out, but the hitbox is already gone or disappearing. Find that sweetspot, and you can land anything before they can deal with it. I would only try to trade or beat Dair if it's a "race for timing" where you are both trying to land the fastest aerial after he gets knocked up. If you choose to go sideways or at an angle, Knee or Bair might be better if you can manage it
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HiroProtagonist
Smash Apprentice
I'm assuming downthrow is the best option out of a grab in this matchup?
Ex Gnw Main here, GnW against falcon is a super volatile matchup, as falcon you can nair / stomp over his d-tilt hitbox. But you should mostly abuse the fact that GnW has no speed, no safe approach other than dair to up-b(frame 1). As counter productive as is seem try to pick the biggest stage you can(why? Gnw has a super good recovery) Well the reason is you can pop him on the side with a knee at ridiculously low percent, and you can stomp his up-b with proper timing also you dont wanna get thrown offstage against him. TLDR :dash dance, nair/dar over his d-tilts, take big stage sinice you kill him at super low percent no matter what.
The 9!
Smash Rookie
When I play against a falcon I'm looking to punish one of falcons approaches with dtilt, fade away fairs and bairs ,and f tilt. In neutral be smart with your approaches and conscious of what your opponent is doing when you go in. The scariest thing for G&W (or at least for me) is falcons dair. Stomping will beat out G&W's d tilt because of his poor CC game and you can begin juggling. Try to keep G&W above you because as a floaty, he has a very rough time trying to make it back to the ground and his dair isn't as safe as you think (you'll trade with it a lot). Overall, dash dance well, be patient, and be persistent when you get him in knockdown.
For counterpick stages, anything with platforms will at least even it out and tri-platform stages are your friend. Avoid flat stages like FD or stages with oddly placed platforms like Norfair.
For counterpick stages, anything with platforms will at least even it out and tri-platform stages are your friend. Avoid flat stages like FD or stages with oddly placed platforms like Norfair.
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Lil Bucket Hat
Smash Apprentice
Boy are you guys on for a treat now, mu is ****ing brutal, bruh