Need Help Please

[D. Disciple]

Sup everyone, I'm trying to decide between my top 3 characters that I want to play with in tournaments, I picked up Lucario cause I like his style and floatiness and just because it's Lucario.

I'm in the process of uploading more vids, but here are some matches of me going up against Aarosmashguy (Aaron).

Can you guys comment and critique the matches please. I don't own the game or a wii yet, but I will pretty soon.


Vs Aarosmashguy's D3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkWRG4lziOY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qhOR80g_vo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpSf8__Cmq0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Muqcgv-icXg - I hate Waddle Dees

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVhd2sopW08 - Come Back!

Vs Aarosmashguy's Toon Link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MU9RxbK4TZ0

 

[Da N]

Youve got the real gist of his style, but there are a few things you could be doing better.

First, play on the ground a little more. Lucario has a great ground game along with his air game. I usually only saw you come down for some smashes.

You like to shoot baby auss (aura spheres) which is a good idea, but use them more in the air to control their movements more.

With a heavy character like Dededee, try to juggle more with his u-tilt, it racks up damage quick and is frustrating. Believe me i play a lot of Dededeed and Snakes. Also use the a-a- > B combo more.

Last, instead of using short hopped b-airs a lot, use his fair to gimp those big players off the edge. Then finish with a dair or a fully charged aus. It will kill them and knock you back some for an added return help.

But keep it up your really good.

 

[Milln]

First, play on the ground a little more. Lucario has a great ground game along with his air game. I usually only saw you come down for some smashes.

Ignore this. Your current style of an aerial Lucario is fine. All you need is a bit more practice and to:

I suggest charging your aura sphere a little more often. Perhaps not to full, but a little more than baby. Also, when you're going for the gimp and you don't think your bair will do the job, instead of just fair to fair, do fair to Aura Sphere which is much more KO Efficient.

Try not to ever nair off the edge. The recovery delay is way too long. A quick-to-realize opponent will gimp you each time.

You're very frantic with your ExtremeSpeed which lead to like three deaths that could have been prevented. Lucario players must be calm and collected at all times so that you can make split decisions about whether going for the ledge or going for the wall-cling will be more effective. Try to get the reflex UpB habit out of your muscle memory. Focus.

Work on your dair timing. It got you killed twice because you did it right above their head and ate an utilt or an usmash. You're great at chasing their jump with it, though, so, keep it up, it's powerful even at 0%.

Combo into Aura Sphere, even if it's not charged. When they're too far away to reach after an aerial rave, fiyabawl 'em.

Work on your Float Palm (YES, THAT'S WHAT WE'RE CALLING IT.) by practicing it from different heights and fast falls so that you can hit your opponent with it and even chase them up and Force Palm 'em for no reason other than sheer style.

 

[BlackenFire]

Dont mind my post, im a scrub =o

Well first off, I like your use of Lucario's aerial attacks and chases, and your playing style is pretty much of what most Lucario players should be doing. I see no faults really, though I can suggest to do what I do.

While your aerial combat is great, you don't really need to improve on ground tactics, just try rolling a tad more to separate yourself from the enemy. I noticed a lot of the times when you were hit, you shielded, which is a good thing of course. Sometimes rather than shielding and letting your opponent smack you some more, roll out of the way and launch a BAS or two. Also try spot-dodging then a D-Smash or U-Tilt, it your good at it most of the time it will hit hard.

Really though, I love using BAS's but you don't use as many charged Aura Spheres as you could be, especially in combo with F-Air. Not really an improvement but a suggestion really is to use D-Air a bit more and time it well.

As for your edge-game, use ExtremeSpeed a little less with getting kicked around and F-Air back, you received a lot of unnecessary hits because of it. When you jumped down, not sure exactly why you use Down-B when it would have either kileld you or you could use Up-B faster.

I don't ever use Force Palm in mid-air so i can't help really. Just try using a jab or two into grabbing, cause I hardly ever saw any ground game in all three videos, while its not necessary, it could help alot when you can't jump.

 

[D. Disciple]

Thanks guy, the reason why I really didn't try to do fair into aura spheres because I didn't think that combo would actually work. I kept practicing it in training mode and I kept missing with the aura sphere, so I was like forget it and thought of other things to do in that situation.

I'll start practicing more once I get a chance to play with someone though. I got a couple more vids getting processed right now.

 

[Milln]

Don't do it immediately out of fair unless tehy're right in your face. sometimes you'll have to space it by delaying the shot a tad or moving back or forward before you fire. If they airdodge, big deal. They can't get back to the edge because they're too far down, now. =3

 

[Jeepy Sol]

As far as approaching with Force Palm, I recommend against it. I noticed in the first video you approached with it twice and Dedede hit you out of it both times. Other than that and what has already been said, you got a great Lucario.

 

[Milln]

In regards to the new videos, what happened to your beautiful air game? =o You seem much more at home in the sky than on the ground. Also, that was -almost- a nice double team at the end of the Toon Link video. =x As a rule of thumb, don't try to double team utilts or usmashes, you'll get hit more often than not due to how Double Team handles your fall speed.

 

[Pentaoku]

In regards to the new videos, what happened to your beautiful air game? =o You seem much more at home in the sky than on the ground. Also, that was -almost- a nice double team at the end of the Toon Link video. =x As a rule of thumb, don't try to double team utilts or usmashes, you'll get hit more often than not due to how Double Team handles your fall speed.

This and I could be right or wrong, but I find double teaming aerials much more efficient if you know you're not facing a direction that'll get you screwed.

 

[Milln]

Double Teaming aerials is, indeed, nice. You're at one spot for your opponent to hopefully not miss and you should be able to smack 'em and follow up or at least charge a Sphere.

 

[BlackenFire]

Wow, what happened to the great air game? On the new videos you were just getting pushed around like nothing. I liked the use of rolls and DT but all those failed smashes got punished for big time. More or less your aerial game decreased and your ground game was constant missing grabs and a lot of smashes that were blocked or failed, not to say that you didn't get a few good ones though.

Your use of BAS was great in the first videos, but you didn't abuse Aura Sphere as much as you could have. You did fine overall, just not as great as you could have in the newer ones.

In regards to your friends D3, he loves his D-Airs doesn't he?

 

[Tallen]

dammit three times I was going to give a nice long answer to you and the server crashed XD
happily Infi-tan noticed most things I did, so I don't have to torture myself again XD

It's hard to see from videos whether or not you were using well mindgames, but this is perhaps my best tip to you: overabuse them XD. It's frankly a matter of taste, however using well mindgames CAN give you the upper edge ESPECIALLY when the opponent is winning or when you're really behind in damage.
Try this (it usually works with my friends): as soon as I get high % and begin to get knocked out far I enter full defensive mode: I dodge every single attack and charge AS as much as possible. after dodging four attacks my opponent begins to get frantic and gets more and more desperate to KO me. as soon as he makes an opening I double-team, and when he's falling I throw the fully-charged AS at him (I have a good aim with it XD), hopefully killing him in the process.

Everything else the people before me already said, though i'd insist in Infi-tan's comment in staying cool in the fight: no point in getting frustrated. Either way nice job, you're playing Luc well!

 

[D. Disciple]

To answer those questions. I seriously don't know we were playing for like 5 hours. Then I dunno he started to read me, I kept rolling around too much and just started to play very scrubbish at the 2nd half of most of the tapes we played which annoyed me. I dunno I guess I got too competitive and loss focus of just having fun and do what I like to do.

 

[indianunit]

IMO and this is just my opinion...i think you're better off with pikachu. I've seen both types of videos and i would say pikachu ftw. On the other hand, it is about fun and if you find lucario more fun (like me) go with lucario.

 

[D. Disciple]

Yeah my Pikachu is good. I just wanted to have an alternate too, I find playing Pika/Lucario/Sonic and Pokemon Trainer fun. Lucario is just sweet cause I like his aerial game and what not.

I got in some practice today, and yeah that fair to aura sphere combo works really well. I'll be getting more vids next week, with a tourney down at Wisconsin, but I am getting more practice in with Aaron and people from River Falls as well. So I'll probably improve a lot more with both.

I also worked on my ground game a bit more, cause I was looking at the other vids I captured and was disgusted at how my style changed through out the matches, when i was doing good to when i started to turn into garbage. I noticed that I wasn't really taking my time in attacks and wasn't spacing myself pretty well to set up into string of attacks to keep him off the edge.

 

[Ionizer]

My suggestion is to let up on the attacks a little. Not a lot, just a tad. Let them come to you. Luke is superb at turning an opponent's moves against them. Try to play defensively, see what happens. If you don't like ti, or it doesn't suit you, try to find a good middle ground between offense and defense. Also, I noticed you don't like using Ftilt and Fully charged Aura Spheres. Add more of both to your game. Also, you have immense control over Lucario's Extreme Speed, but you don't use it. Quite a few times I saw you use XSpeed like a teleport. You need to think of XSpeed like Pika's Quick Attack, curve at the last moment to reduce your freefall time and lag.

If you haven't already, watch Milln's Inner Fire videos. They may help you out. Good Luck and I hope you stick with Lucario, he's a blast to use.

 

[D. Disciple]

Don't worry I don't plan on dropping him yet. That was the highest competition I've had so far. But yeah I totally agree with Infi-tan and the others on how my aerial game changed. Like I said before, I think I was having less fun, and loss a lot of concentration. Because in the first videos compared to the others I have on my computer atm. I lose that graceful floaty lucario, and it turns into Frantic, Begging Please let me get a hit in Lucario....Yeah let's go with that.

Thanks for the tips guys, and yes I do watch Inner Fire, I should watch them a bit more because I need to practice on Wall Clinging and controlling my extreme speed better as well, and as I said earlier I am going to a tourney next week, so I'll probably get some tourney vids of my Lucario going up against multiple characters and what not. I'll be practicing as much as I can until the tourney, expect great things from my Lucario, and I will bring back that beautiful air game you guys saw in the first few videos and then some!

 

[Tallen]

one of the best things about Luc i noticed is that there are so many ways for you to use him. Some characters are just limited to a specific battle tactic but with Lucario you can be an amazing air fighter (D. Disciple, that's you XD), a counter maniac (I know I am), comboist (Infi-tan), survivor (you know the person who is just a master at staying alive at high %?), and a crap load of others.
i think we should make an entire topic about the different battle strategies and how to make good use of changing in the middle of the battle. THAT would be more useful than seven different combo topics.

 

[Mynt]

My suggestion is to let up on the attacks a little. Not a lot, just a tad. Let them come to you. Luke is superb at turning an opponent's moves against them. Try to play defensively, see what happens. If you don't like ti, or it doesn't suit you, try to find a good middle ground between offense and defense.

I agree with this.. Playing an air based offensive Lucario is perfectly viable, but a good defense is just as important in setting someone up. With a combination of AS, great tilts or even jab into AP, Lucario's defensive game is very solid. Having just one or two approaches shut down can plant seeds of doubt and hesitation in your opponent which you can use to your advantage. Don't get me wrong though, I'm not saying to turtle up, but work it into your game a little bit at a time to keep yourself from being to predictable and transition into some good reactionary combos. It's something I'm working on too, especially against the bigger guys since I tend to think, "oh, they're slow, I can beat them to the punch." -- Then promptly eat an utilt....

It may not suit your playing style, but its always good to have other tricks in your bag just in case. Seeing that you've obviously played against your friend a lot, you guys have probably found patterns in each other. As its been stated, you have a beautiful air game, but against some new opponents it pays to be more rounded... there's bound to be someone out there who can out-air you, and you might need to switch tactics. One of the best universal strategies in any competition is to disturb your opponents rhythm and exploit their weaknesses... get them out of their comfort zone. If your ground game is weak, someone's going to see that and try to take advantage of you there. The solution isn't to avoid it, but find a way to make it work for you if you need to resort to it. I'd give different advice if Lucario didn't have a good ground game, but he does have the tools to be effective.

Hope this helps and good luck on your tourney!

 

[D. Disciple]

Nice post man, thanks for the tip.

I got some more vids coming up, did some matches with people from River Falls. Did Pretty well

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p80SzK_UfnQ It's a pretty good match I think. You guys decide, more will be up.

 

[Pentaoku]

Very nice job against that Ness.

 

[D. Disciple]

Thanks I got more vids up. I'm putting teams up later on today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwdhKe6ffew Ending = Mindgames!