TobiasXK
Smash Ace
Now before the actual guide I've got stuff to say. For one, this guide is dated. It was first released about a year ago, and was written even further back. That's why it's undergoing updates. Now, I'm posting the guide basically as is, just because we need one here on the boards. Anything that needs to be changed, added, any new ideas? Post. It'll be addressed in the update, and you'll be credited. I'm updating it currently, and so I will be changing and adding stuff in this topic.
I've left out character matchups because they were empty. That will be added with the update, as I now know a LOT more about that sort of thing. I'm also adding a section on Stages, so that you know where your advantages lie. If you have any input, feel free to let me know. Counterpicks are rather important, and I want an intuitive section on Character Matchups and Stage Picks to help people out.
***NOTE: THIS FIRST POST OF THE GUIDE WILL DEAL MOSTLY WITH TECHNIQUES. YOU PROBABLY ALREADY KNOW ALL OF THIS STUFF. IT'S MAINLY FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE TOTALLY NEW, AS I HOPE TO OFFER NOT JUST A DEFINITION, BUT ALSO EXPLANATION AND DESCRIPTION OF USE. FOR PEOPLE NEW TO LUIGI BUT NOT NECESSARILY NEW TO COMPETITIVE SMASH, YOU CAN GLANCE THROUGH FOR IDEAS OR JUST SKIP THIS ALTOGETHER.
THE SECOND POST WILL BE THE OVERVIEW, MOVESET, STAGEPICKS AND CHARACTER MATCHUPS.
-=Luigi FAQ=-
Written by: Tobias Xel'Kythe
Special thanks to Magus17, my former mentor and the guy who got me started on Luigi and this guide.
[ Table of Contents ]
[01. Happy Smashing]
[02. Things to know]
[04. Standard Techniques]
-{04A. Shielding}
--{04Aa. Rolling}
--{04Ab. Spot Dodging}
--{04Ac. Shield Grabbing}
-{04B. Air Dodging}
-{04C. Teching}
-{04D. Ledge Game}
[05. Advanced Techniques]
-{05A. Wavedashing}
-{05B. L-Cancelling}
-{05C. Short Hopping}
--{05Ca. Shffls}
--{05Cb. Wavedashed Aerials}
-{05D. Advanced Ledge Game}
--{05Da. Recovery}
--{05Db. Ledge-hopping}
--{05Dc. Edgehogging Tactics}
-{05E. Dash Dancing}
-{05F. Dash-Cancelling}
-{05G. Jump-Cancelled Grabs}
-{05H. Crouch Cancelling}
-{05I. Directional Influence}
--{05Ia. Smash DI}
--{05Ib. CCDI}
-{05J. Advanced Shielding}
--{05Ja. Shield-Aerials}
--{05Jb. Shield-Wavedashing}
[06. An Overview of Luigi]
-{06A. Old School vs. New School}
--{06Aa. Old School Luigi}
-{06Ab. New School Luigi}
[07. Luigi's Arsenal]
-{07A. Tilts}
-{07B. Smashes}
-{07C. Aerials}
-{07D. Throws}
-{07E. Specials}
-{07F. Others}
-{07G. The Taunt}
[08. A Note to the Players]
[09. Character Matchups ]
[10. Stage Picks ]
***NOTE: To navigate the guide more quickly, hit CTRL+F to use your browser's built-in searh function and search one of the topic headings in the Table of Contents to find the corresponding section.
[01.] Happy Smashing
Happy Smashing
[02.] Things to Know
Basically this little bit covers miscellaneous terms, abbreviations and jargon that will appear throughout the guide. Anything listed here that you don't know of will undoubtedly be explained in the Standard or Advanced Techniques sections. You lot should know this.
1. Nair/ANA: Neutral Aerial Attack
2. Fair/AFA: Forward Aerial Attack
3. Uair/AUA: Up Aerial Attack
4. Bair/ABA: Backward Aerial Attack
5. Dair/ADA: Down Aerial Attack
***Those same N, F, U, B, and D may be tagged at the beginning of -throw, -tilt, or -smash, respectively.
6. DI (directional influence): You do it all the time when you're recovering and probably when you're being comboed, as well. It's tilting the control stick when you're in the air to influence the direction you drift. Later on, I'll go a little bit in depth with this to help you out with how to DI effectively and at the right times.
7. CC'ing: Crouch Cancelling (holding down when you're hit on the ground to reduce knockback)
8. CCC'ing: Crouch Cancel Countering (crouch cancelling and using an attack to counter)
9. Priority: Priority is basically the ability of an attack to "beat out" another or take precedence. Really, it's a combination of the timing of the attack, the hitbox (the part of the attack that deals damage), and the recieving hitboxes of your opponent. It's complicated and doesn't matter. Don't worry about priority.
10. Lag: Lag is the delay before or after an attack's animation, where you can't really do anything. Simple enough.
***Some lag can be cancelled or reduced
11. WD: Wavedash (this will have it's own section, but in short: Jumping and using the airdodge immediately at a diagonal into the ground, so that you don't leave the ground, but slide, instead)
12. Sex kick: A neutral aerial attack that has a long lasting hitbox and generally good priority, because of a long window where the attack can hit. Luigi's nair is a sex kick.
***They were named this by MattDeezy's crew because they function like a *****, hittin' it as long as they're out.
13. Ledge: The edge of the stage where you can grab onto.
14. Shffl: Short hop fast fall and L-cancel
15. Whiff: To miss. Swingin at air. Be thwarted in your attacking plan by a well-placed spotdodge or wavedash.
16. Ping: The ping sound that you hear during Jigglypuff's Rest, a Homerun Bat Smash, or... LUIGI'S SWEETSPOTTED UP+B. "Ping" will refer to hitting with Lui's Superpunch so that it makes the ping sound and actually does something...something sexy.
17. Chop: Luigi's fair
[04.] Standard Techniques
In this section, I'll outline the standard techniques such as shielding, rolling, etc. These will likely be things that you already do, but you could improve your game by using even the simplest of techniques to their greatest effectiveness.
- {04A.} Shielding
It's a shield! You use it to block! You press R or L and the standard bubble shield pops up, covering all of Luigi. It gradually decreases in size and can then be angled by tilting the control stick to block attacks aimed at parts where Lui is no longer covered. After a long while or a bit of abuse, the shield will break, leaving you stunned and vulnerable. You don't want that to happen, obviously, so don't hold the shield up for extended periods of time. You can also press L or R very lightly to bring up a light shield that is bigger, weaker, and also diminishes slower than the regular shield. If youtime your shield perfectly, you can also powershield attacks. This will block the attack instantly without hurting the shield at all or having to hold the shield up. You will know that you have powershielded if you see a white flash. Projectiles will also be deflected if you power-shield them. To powershield, you want to put up your shield as soon as an attack or projectile is close enough to the character for it to intersect with your shield when you put it up. As you can imagine, this is a very small window, but with alot of versus matches, your ability to powershield will become better (mostly from simply being quick enough to shield when you see an attack coming, where you'd normally just get hit).
Now Shielding is extremely basic, but many newer players hardly ever shield, opting to roll or just get hit, instead. I advise that you get into the habit of shielding, however, as it's a very useful defense. And from the shielding position, many options become open to you. For instance, you can jump out of the shield, meaning you can perform your aerial attacks or your up+B directly from your shield. But we'll talk more about that in a bit. Moreover, though, you gain the ability to roll, SpotDodge (or sidestep dodge) and Shield Grab. Despite the existence of Rolling and Spotdodging, you do want to work on your timing with shielding and get used to shielding alot. In a high-paced match, being able to shield attacks and quickly counter is VERY useful. Now then...
***NOTE:You may want to get into the habit of shielding with the trigger that you don't use to Wavedash. We haven't gotten to waveadashing yet, but just keep it in your mind.
-- {04Aa.} Rolling
To roll, you simply need to shield and hit left or right on the control stick. Luigi has a relatively quick roll, and it has it's uses, as it allows you to dodge attacks and move at the same time. Naturally, however, there is a downside. Rolling has a fair bit of lag tacked on at the ends of the animation. You also always roll the exact same distance. This means that rolling can quickly become very predictable, and an experienced player can easily hit you immediately after you come out of a roll.
Once you read up on wave-dashing in the next section, you will see that wavedashing is generally better than just rolling for Luigi, but you don't want to neglect his roll. There are times when rolling benefits you, and you always want to have as many options open to you as possible.
-- {04Ab.} Spot Dodging
A spot dodge, or sidestep dodge, is performed by simply shielding and hitting down on the control stick. It is a short stationary dodging maneuver that can be used to dodge almost any attack or grab, though certain attacks are hard to spotdodge. For instance, Doc's pills travel slowly enough that if you spot dodge them, alot of the time, they'll still hit your back once the sidestep is over. Homing missiles are another.
Spot dodging is quicker than rolling, so if you are good at timing them they are far more useful in most cases. They lag less, as well, meaning that you can come out of sidestep dodging a smash attack or grab and counter with a down-smash or whatever you please.
Specifically with Luigi, however, spotdodging becomes useful when moving, as well. Lui's low traction makes it so that if you dash and spotdodge, you still will slide forward a bit. Also, well-placed spotdodges in the middle of wavedashes help Luigi approach against projectiles like frequent SHLing (Short Hop Lasering) from Falco.
Spot dodging is a useful tool, and you'd do well to become comfortable with using it.
-- {04Ac.} Shield Grabbing
You can hit Z to grab. Yes, you can also hit L/R and A at the same time and grab. However now that you're starting to shield more, why not grab from the shield? You hold up the shield to block an attack, hit A, and you've grabbed them. This becomes very useful with dealing with fast attacks like shffl'd aerials. Luigi's grab range isn't the greatest, but it's still good. Learn how long it is, so that you don't end up grabbing at air.
- {04B.} Air Dodging
To airdodge, press L/R when you're in the air. You can also tilt the control stick to air-dodge in any direction. Airdodging can be useful to evade midair attacks and projectiles, but after an airdodge, you are left free-falling...and Luigi doesn't fall very fast, so you will VERY easily be hit before you reach the ground. My advice is that if you're high enough in the air that airdodging down won't get you to the ground or really close to it, and you need to dodge an attack, use your second jump if you have it, or try to beat it out with Luigi's sex kick (n-air) or his tornado.
Another use of airdodging is recovery, when you just need that little push to snap to the edge of the stage, and don't want to drop lower and up+B. You should probably be using it more in this way than to actually dodge attacks. You can also just come in higher and air-dodge through your edgeguarder (probably at a diagonal down to get onto the stage more quickly).
***NOTE: If you want to airdodge to the ledge with Luigi, you will need to airdodge above the ledge, so that you freefall or a second after the airdodge is complete. Otherwise, Luigi will be incapable of grabbing on to the edge.
The best thing about airdodging though? It allows wavedashing, which is the very first part of the next section of this guide. Stay tuned.
- {04C.} Teching
Yet another gift in the L/R triggers... Teching is staple. In fact, you probably already do it. When you're hit hard and end up tumbling in the air, you can hit L/R just before you smash painfully into the ground to gracefully recover with a handstand-esque maneuver that we call 'teching', from the technical bonus in Street Fighter.
While Luigi is catching himself, upside down, you can also then hit right or left to do a techroll, which goes slightly farther than the normal roll and allows you to get out of the way immediately after you land.
You can also tech on cielings, and walls, and if you hit up on the control stick while you walltech, you will perform a pseudo wall-jump, even though Luigi can't normally walljump.
Now teching is amazingly useful, as it greatly speeds up your recovery time, and also allows you to escape combos such as those started with throws like Fox's down throw, which can be teched out of. However, if you're tumbling high in the air, you may not always want to wait until you float to the ground to tech. Instead, you can smash left and right on the control stick to return to your normal free fall where you can attack and whatnot.
- {04D.} Ledge Game
Basically this is a little segment on how you can get up from the edge, as there are four basic ways of doing this. The first, of course, is just standing up. Tilt the control stick up and Luigi gets up onto the stage slowly. It's rarely the best course of action. You can also hit X/Y to jump from the ledge, L/R to roll, or A/B to attack. There are two different ledge attacks, one when you are under 100% and one when you're over. The first does 8% and is somewhat quick. The second one is very slow and laggy, but does 10% damage. It also has some invincibility frames which aren't redeeming at all. hese are the basic options, and none of them apart from rolling or the occasional low-damage ledge attack will really be used against opponents with any sort of edgeguarding game... However, this is the standard techniques section. I'll teach ou some better alternatives for getting up from the ledge in the next section. And on we go!
[05.] Advanced Techniques
This section will cover the more advanced little nuances of playing at a competitive level, explaining techniques like Wavedashing, L-cancelling, etc. There will also be some things that are very easy to do and aren't really "advanced techniques" but are somewhat neglected by most non-tourney players, like crouch cancelling and DIing intelligently.
- {05A.} Wavedashing
You've been wondering what the **** wavedashing is? Here it is, as promised.
-=How do you do it?=-
Wavedashing isn't particularly tricky, but it does take nimble fingers. To wavedash, you'll need to jump and immediately airdodge at a diagonal into the ground. Ideally, you'll want to be able to have the airdodge register before you even see your character leave the ground, so the jump and the airdodge need to be all but simultaneous, as Luigi has a 5 frame jumping animation (which is only 1/12th of a second). If you do it correctly, your Luigi should slide for a bit in his landing position and some white smoke will kick up. If you see Luigi jump a tiny bit before he/she slides, then it's still a wavedash, but you'll want to learn to airdodge quicker. A good wavedash will give the impression of just the slide... a character standing there and then sliding across the ground, with nothing in between.
An easier way to wavedash is to do it directly out of a crouch. If you're already holding the control stick at a diagonal down, then all you have to do is hit X/Y and L/R at almost the exact same time. I recommend this only to see what it looks like, though, because getting in a habit of crouching before every wavedash kinda destroys some of it's speed and usefulness.
-=But what IS wavedashing, actually?=-
Wavedashing is a technique that turns an extremely low angled airdodge into a slide on the ground. It's the product of the physics engine of the game. It uses an airdodge into the ground to cut off the jumping animation, and the left over momentum plus low traction causes your character to slide. Accordingly, low traction yields long wavedashes and high traction yields short wavedashes. For this reason, Luigi has the single longest wavedash in the game. Traction on the stage also matters. For instance, an oil spill on Flatzone or the UFO on Fourside will give <i>any</i> character a super long wavedash.
Because it's an aspect of the physics, there are two other things that will affect the length of a wavedash. The first is the timing of the airdodge. Delay the airdodge a little bit while you're characters a touch higher off the ground, and the wavedash will be slower and shorter. If you wait until you're coming down from a full jump, then the falling momentum adds to the airdodge and the wavedash gets longer. The second thing that alters the length of a wavedash is the angle of your airdodge. A shallow angle closer to perfect left/right gives you a longer wavedash. If you tilt the control stick in a steep angle below the corner for the 45 degree down-right/down-left angle on the controller, you get a shorter wavedash. You can even airdodge straight down. You won't move at all, but it cuts off your jump quickly. The normal wavedash is right in the 45 degree down-left/down right, but learning to control how long your wavedashes are can be very useful... especially for
Luigi.
Essentially though, all extraneous information aside, wavedashing is moving while standing still. It allows you to perform any possible move or attack, just as though you were standing neutral...only with wavedashing, you can move at the same time.
-=Okay, so how is this useful?=-
If you didn't read that last little short paragraph, allow me to reiterate. When you're wavedashing, you can do ANYTHING. It gets rid of the inhibitions that go along with running such as lag at the end of the animation. When you're wavedashing you have every possible attack open to you, and you can also roll, shield, spot dodge, jump, wavedash, crouch, or dash. Wavedashing also lets you move backwards without turning around, allowing for quick dodges and immediate retaliation. But let's look at the uses a touch more in depth...
MOVEMENT: Basic. Luigi tends to have this as his main form of movement, using it for approaches, moving between combos, evasion, landing from the air, etc. It can also be a wayto dodge an attack and retaliate immediately, something that rolling does not allow you to do A backwards wavedash gets you a quick dodge and then you can retaliate, if you're close
enough, or wavedash forward immediately and retaliate. Wavedashing also allows quick movement when coming down from the air. You can jump to avoid a projectile such as a super missile, and then place the airdodge to wavedash right before you land, meeting your opponent with a quick pop, or wavedashing back to avoid the followup. You can also wavedash the landings of attacks that finish in the air, such as short-hopped bairs, fairs, uairs and dairs with Luigi. Because the animation finishes entirely in the air, you can airdodge and wavedash without having to land first. This becomes very useful for linking hits and following up on attacks with Luigi.
WAVESMASHING: Since you can attack directly out of a wavedash, you have alternatives that you will probably prefer over the standard dash attack in some instances. For instance, as a Luigi player, you will likely take the down smash over the dash attack. Ergo, the wavedash + down-smash. Incidentally, certain smashes like that one also gain increased
range because of the movement in a wavedash. This "WAVESMASHING", however, also refers to "WAVETILTING" and "WAVENEUTRALA-ING." Since you can do any attack out of a wavedash, you keep quite a few options open. Down-smash and f-tilt tend to be what you'll wavedash the most with Luigi, but you're also allowed to jump/short hop and hit with an aerial, so that
happens, as well.
WAVESHIELDING: When you first learn to WD, you will likely end the dash with the shield up, due to holding the trigger for too long. You will probably want to try and work past this so that it doesn't happen all the time. However, waveshielding will allow you to advance on characters without inhibitions or threat (apart from being grabbed). Moving with the shield up can be dead useful in approaching, and the fact that you can wavedash out of a shield adds some extra goodness as well. Along with shielding during a wavedash also come rolling and spot-dodging, both with their advantages. Wavedashing into spot-dodges can be great to avoid projectiles without sacrificing movement in certain instances, such as when facing
SHLs from Falco. Waveshielding also allows shield-grabs from your wavedashes, too, so you can have some fun with that, as well.
EDGE-HOGGING: If you are hanging onto the edge of the stage, no other character can grab onto it. So if a recovering opponent has used all 3 jumps and is hoping to grab the edge and you're already there...they're screwed. If you wavedash backwards off the edge of the stage, you will automatically hang from the edge. Once you can wavedash consistently, this
is a touch quicker than jumping or SHing backwards off the edge. If you roll from the edge after edge-hogging, you gain a few frames of invincibility, and the ledge is still considered occupied, so this can help evade certain up+b attacks while still causing them
to miss the ledge.
***NOTE: If you've hit someone from accross the stage and need to edgehog quickly, you can wavedash forwards towards the edge, and tilt the opposite direction while you slide so that Luigi will turn around in mid-wavedash and then grab onto the edge.
MIND GAMES: This is the main aspect of wavedashing. The speed and mobility that wavedashing allows along with the freedom to do anything grants you the ability to have excellent mind games that utilize wavedashing... However, this is not something that can really be taught. Once you can wavedash consistently, you'll start noticing places where you can use it and as your mind games improve, you should be able to come up with some pretty neat stuff using wavedashing. You can check out pro videos for ideas, but I can't guarantee you'll actually see the mind games. Mind games are more in the fight, in the head of the player... Whether in high-level or just regular play without advanced tactics, you still want your opponent to be tricked into a position where you can attack them. Dash forward, and your opponent is probably going to attack, right? you get hit. Dash forward, wavedash back... your opponent attacked before you wavedashed back and now suffers from the lag of their failed attack. So you punish. That's a really simple and generic example, but it gets the point accross. Mind games... Simply put, mind games are the game.
Here's some more assorted information about wavedashing's uses... You can wavedash straight from the ledge by dropping and immediately jumping and airdodging onto the stage. This can get you back onto the stage quickly to meet an approaching opponent. Wavedashing also cancels the things that jumping cancels... For instance, since you can jump out of a shield, you can wavedash out of a shield. Stages with platforms also open up some new opportunities with waveadshing, since you can jump up through a platform and then airdodge so you wavedash accross it. This allows for some versatility on stages like Battlefield, where Luigi can have scarily fast, fluid movement around the entire stage.
For the most part, though, you'll find use for wavedashing on your own. These things are just outlines of some more general uses. With some practice, wavedashing becomes second nature. Most who do it get to the point where they can accomplish it 100% of the time with no problem. Wavedashing is not always necessary to your game, as there are some pros that
don't wavedash, however it is very useful... ESPECIALLY for Luigi, who simply makes orgasmically beautiful use of it. It is also not a glitch, or in any way cheap. It is merely an aspect of the physics in the game, and is referred to in the actual game as the "super dash technique" or something in Debug. It's the most versatile of the advanced techniques and can help ANY character's game. It's not necessary, but it sure as hell isn't useless. It's moving while standing still! So experiment with it. I'm sure you'll find some nice ways for it to improve your game.
A big read, I know, but Wavedashing is very important to a Luigi player, and is a big part of the reason that he has the potential that he does.
- {05B.} L-cancelling
L-cancelling is generally considered ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY in competitive play. In actuality however, Luigi rarely truly needs it. You should still learn to do it, though, for the times when you need it with Lui, and for your other characters.
L-cancelling stands for "Lag-cancelling." If you land after performing an aerial attack when the animation isn't 100% finished with (if it were, you'd just be freefalling), you suffer lag on the ground...dead time where you can't do anything. In high-level Smashing, that's just unacceptable, as the game is very fast-paced. L-cancelling reduces the lag by 50%. Luigi's aerials tend to finish entirely in the air, though, so they only need to be L-cancelled in certain situations.
How do you do it, then? After you perform your aerial, you need to hit L/R/Z just before you hit the ground. The window for this is small, so it needs to be timed more precisely than teching. If you're just learning how to L-cancel right now, you may want to try it out with Link's d-air or Bowser's B-air, as those are the most noticeably L-cancelled attacks. When you first learn to L-cancel, your shield may pop up for a split second. If that's what happens, start letting go of L/R/Z earlier. The entire point of L-cancelling is defeated when your shield pops up and goes down rendering you immobile for a second.
These will mostly get used for Luigi when you do short hopped, fast falled sex kicks, which ALWAYS should be L-cancelled so that you can follow up immediately.
- {05C.} Short Hopping
Short hopping. It's a short hop...as opposed to a full Jump. To short hop, you simply press X/Y/Up (whatever you use to jump) and release it quickly, before the jump animation is over (still 1/12th of a second, but it's pretty easy, actually). This will give you a jump about half as high as Luigi's normal jump, allowing you to use your aerials to attack foes on the
ground. Short hopped aerials make perfect followups to downsmashes or throws, and are going to be your most used type of attack (hell, short hopped sex-kicks are pretty much spammed.)
You can also Tornado out of short hops, as kind of a fakeout, where they're expecting a regular aerial, but are met with the huge range of the sliding Luigi tornado, instead.
Just short hopping an aerial is not usually something, you'll do with Luigi, however. You are more likely to shffl them (explained next), waveland them (explained after shffls), or double them up, such as using double b-airs, double f-airs, or following a short hopped aerial with a sex kick right near the ground in case your opponent shields (short hopped
double aerials should always be L-cancelled). To avoid being shield grabbed, you can also hold forward during an f-air or something so that you drift through their shields behind them and hit them with a b-air right near the ground, or something like that.
***NOTE: Another option after a shorthopped aerial is double jumping into more aerials!!!
Now, then. SHFFLs and SHWDs (fake term, but it's better than saying SHA?AWD).
-- {05Ca.} SHFFLs (Short hopped Fastfalled L-cancelled aerials)
You know how to short hop. You know how to L-cancel. To fastfall, you simply press down on the control stick when you're in the air floating downwards (after your jump/short hop has peaked). So then, to "shuffle" an aerial, you short hop, do your aerial, hold down to fast fall, and L-cancel. It's alot of things to do in just over a second, but you'll get used to it with some practice.
Now shffls are great. They're a big part of most people's games and while they aren't exactly spammed with Luigi, they do get used. For instance, most sex kicks that you use as approaches or launchers will be shffled.
Now, I'm going to take a moment to explain this, one of the bigger flaws that I find in Luigi... Luigi has a not-so-short short hop and a not-so-fast fastfall. Now really, his short hop isn't as high as certain other characters, but his floatiness causes him dead time at a height where you're just kinda hanging there for a second waiting for the jump
to peak so you can actually fastfall, which doesn't make you fall very fast at all. His short hop, along with his floatiness and quick aerials allows him double aerials in a short hop, and wave-dashed landings and whatnot, so that has it's upside and it's downside. However, for shffls, his short hop and fastfall are weird. To make up for Lui's time spent lingering in the air when you're trying to shffl a chop, you'll need to learn to stagger your aerials. I started doing it long ago, without ever really realizing it until recently... Now what you want to do is to start your short hops early. If you're
right next to them when you short hop for your shffled f-air, you will get grabbed or simply swatted away. So you short hop early, DI towards them, then f-air, fastfall and L-cancel as soon as the jump peaks. Now this'll look weird (staggered, really... which it IS...) --- you'll be floating not-so-fast, and then put out a fastfalled L-cancelled chop ridiculously quick. If you learn to space those and hit with them, though, they make great ends to grounded combos, or finishers to a mad dash (or wavedash) across the stage to catch up with your opponent.
***Short hop backwards to chops fastfalled forward are good news.
The other solution to the "high short hop, slow fastfall" problem is...
-- {05Cb.} Short Hopped Wavedashed Aerials
Yup. Short hopped wavedashed aerials. For a visual example of what these are, see my sig. You short hop and immediately perform your aerial attack of choice (anything but the sex kick will work). After the attack is done, if you started it early enough, you should be drifting back to the ground. Airdodge at a diagonal into the ground, and you'll wavedash instead of just landing stationary.
This aspect of Luigi's game greatly adds speed and mobility to his game. Where his aerial maneuverability is quite poor when you're trying to link hits in the air, on the ground, you can easily follow up and catch people by wavedashing short hopped aerials (even if you are higher up and hit them too far, you can always fastfall, wavedash before you hit the ground and catch up). Wavedashing your aerials also allows you to edgehog quickly if you need to. You can f-air someone off of the stage, wavedash the landing, tap the other direction to turn around, and there's a timely edgehog that will likely piss your foe off a fair bit.
Now wavedashing isn't your only option here. Since the attacks finish in the air, you can also tornado, or rejump and hit again if you whiffed or something like that...or rejump and TORNADO... Play around with this stuff for a while, and your Luigi will become quite versatile, with great speed and many options.
You can also use Luigi's quick-finishing aerials to recover from whiffs, as you can try again, rejump or wavedash away, etc. It's one of the greatest things about being Luigi, the fact that there is so much you can do.
***Mix them up. If you SHWD everything, they know that you'll be starting your aerials as soon as you short hop and can dodge early and hit you. If you shffl everything, they know that the timing is staggered and the attacks will be lower to the ground. Apart from knowing when you should use each, taking into account how high your opponent is, etc., you should
also know to mix it up so that you don't become predictable.
- {05D.} Advanced Ledge Game
Whether you're on the ledge, trying to get to it, trying to use it, or wanting to stop others from getting there, you want to have a good knowledge of your options with Luigi's ledge game beyond the little things mentioned before. In this bit, I'll explain some of the intricacies of using the edge to your advantage, as well as better ways to edge-hog or get
back up onto the stage. Here goes...
-- {05Da.} Recovery
"Omg Luigi's recovery sucks." Actually, it doesn't. It's sketchy as hell, but when you know what you're doing, it's definitely manageable. First things first... DI. The very first step to recovering successfully takes place the second you are hit. DI upwards when you're hit with an attack that'll send you out off of the stage. In doing this, you'll find that you will transfer alot of the horizontal knockback into vertical knockback. What this accomplishes is two things: 1.) You slow down in the air and don't get sent off a side blast line, and 2.) You gain height, giving you more possible recovery. Now then, you also want to make sure that you keep your 2nd jump...
Now to start your trip back to the stage, you should use uncharged green missiles in little bursts. This will get you your horizontal recovery and will also help you recover low. (***NOTE: If you're super close to the stage and can recover above it, you may as well just missile overhead and fastfall, using your 2nd jump and airdodge to avoid your edgeguarder once you're over the stage.) It also makes you green missile multiple times, giving you a greater shot at misfiring. If you're somewhat close to the stage and nearthe same height as the ledge, you can also use a charged missile to get right next to the stage underneath the ledge. Either way you should end up below your edgeguarder. From here, you can jump and up+B or airdodge to the edge, depending on how far you are. You'll want to learn how to sweetspot the edge, or time your up+B so that you snap right to the ledge without popping up above it where you can be hit (some edgeguarding attacks hit below the ledge, but if you sweetspot, you have a better chance of not being screwed).
Now in times of dire need of vertical recovery, with an extremely dextrous thumb, you can also use Luigi tornado to recover. To do this, you need to hit down+B and continue tapping B ungodly fast (you can also hold directions to drift more to the side). If you tap fast enough, Luigi will rise an insane amount before he starts to fall again. You want to use your 2nd jump as soon as possible after you rise with the tornado so that you don't lose too much height.
***NOTE: For every tornado where you attempt to rise, you must first have done a tornado on the stage. Performing a grounded tornado is "loading" the rising one, so to speak. If you can use the Tornado to recover, make it a habit of using a grounded tornado at least after each stock, just in case.
Well there you go. You got to the ledge. Congrats. Now what?
-- {05Db.} Ledge-hopping
You've still got an edgeguarder just waiting for you to come back up so they can pop you off again... Here's where ledge-hopping aerials gets you some space for a safe return to the stage.
So how do you ledge hop, then? First you need to know the fundamental technique that is ledge-dropping. To do this, press down when you're on the edge. You can also hit down on the C-stick, but I don't know why you'd do that. Difficult, neh? Now to ledge-hop, you simply ledge-drop and jump immediately. Perform your attack, drift back onto the stage, L-cancel, and that's that... basic Ledge-hopping. Now with Luigi, you've got options. For starters, you can ledge-hop any aerial, whereas some characters are limited... Also, a ledge-hop is just a touch higher than Luigi's short hop, meaning you've still got your double aerials, wavedashed aerials, tornadoes and whatnot open to you.
I'd say ledge-hopped f-airs are the most common ledge-hops for Luigi, but barely. Since you have so many options, you can vary it easily. Other ones I see/use alot are ledge-hopped d-airs into sex kicks when they shield (people usually shield ledge-hopped aerials). Tornadoes from the edge are also cool, but be careful with the timing on those, so you don't just drop because you did it before you were over the stage... I ledge-hop sex kicks occasionally, as well, and sometimes just wavedash through them if they shield prematurely or something like that.
Of course, you don't always want to ledgehop, so you keep open the options of rolling off the edge or using Luigi's ledge-attacks.
Now you can also ledge-hop attacks to edgeguard when you're in the edgehog position on the ledge. B-airs and d-airs are usually best for this. D-airs for when they approach from below-ish, and b-airs when you want to jump out off of the edge and hit them out of reach. Be careful, though. When you ledge-hop outwards too far, you will actually need to missile back and up+b to the edge. I tend to just wait nowadays, and edgehog. If they look like they are going to make it back, I ledgehop a b-air forward and fastfall it onto the stage to hit them if they pop up above the edge.
***NOTE: The better way to use ledgehops to edgeguard is to just drop and immediately use your aerial, when people approach really close, or to hit BACK, use your aerial, and then jump back to the stage. This gets rid of the risks that go along with actually using a ledgehopped aerial to edgeguard.
Learn to ledge-hop well, as there are times when you can actually retreat to the edge during a fight and hit them as they follow you there (which they will...almost always, for some reason). And naturally, it's a better way of getting back onto the stage than a slow laggy stand up or ledge-attack when you're above 100%.
-- {05Dc.} Edgehogging Tactics
Edgehogging is great. Your opponent makes it so close to the stage but fails to grab on because you're already there. Some people call it cheap. I call some people whiney and otherwise pathetic idiots. A kill you get from an edgehog is still a legitimate kill, so don't be hesitant to edgehog. With Luigi's great wavedash, he's almost MEANT to edgehog, as he can get from one side of the stage to the edge of the other side quite quickly.
Now that's generally how you'll edgehog---by wavedashing backwards off of the edge. Alternately, if you're facing the wrong way, you can wavedash forwards towards the edge and tilt the control stick the other way while you're sliding to turn around to where you'll grab onto the edge. You can also hit people off the stage with an aerial and wavedash the landing straight into an edgehog...
When you get onto the edge, you have a small window of invincibility frames, meaning that if you edgehog just before an opponent reaches the edge, their up+B will not hurt you. However, if you've been hanging there for a while, they can swat you away and take the ledge, recovering safely. This is why you've got alternatives to just hanging there. If you roll from the edge or use a ledge-attack, you have invincibility frames and a small amount of time where the ledge is still considered "occupied" at the beginning of the animation. So when you've got an up+b headed your way that's going to hit you, off, just
roll (or use the ledge attack over 100%, depending on which is necessary --- generally, rolling should work just fine).
You might get into a habit of edgehogging almost every time an opponent is off of the stage, which is fine, because from the edgehog position, you can jump up with ledge-hopped aerials to edgeguard your recovering foe if they're too close. Also, another great thing about edgehogging is that there aren't a great many ways for your opponent to get around it in most cases. Intelligent DI and good recovery skills can get them to where edgehogging won't help you, but otherwise, if they try to avoid the edgehog at the last minute by recovering over you, you can very easily just pop back up onto the stage and
hit them out again or use a kill move like Luigi's up+B ping while they lag.
Edgehogging is very useful. However, don't forsake your other means of getting kills. You should learn to spot when edge-hogging will do the trick and when using another means of edgeguarding such as wavedashing off the stage and using your f-air chop or d-air will work better. Learning to know the distances of each characters' recoveries will help avoid mistakes when edgehogging, such as getting hit, or having to ledge-hop an aerial outwards to hit them away (this is generally not good, for reasons mentioned in the previous section). It's much better to edgehog at the right times, and edgeguard at the right times.
***NOTE: The grappling beam or a hookshot will go through your edgehog. However, if you hit them while they're connected to the stage, they die, so drop b-airs on Link, YL, and Samus.
- {05E.} Dash Dancing
It barely even seems like a techique. Rather, it seems like fidgeting. However, dashdancing is very useful. Dash-dancing is dashing back and forth rapidly, allowing only the initial dash animation to show in each direction. To do it you just smash left and right repeatedly on the control stick. What it is is a mindgame technique, basically. Dashing forwards and
backwards, your opponent isn't quite sure what you're going to do, which way you're going to go... Perhaps they approach cautiously, and you end the dashdance and strike. Perhaps they approach too cautiously and quickly roll/wavedash back trying to fake you out. Wavedash out of dashdance? Crazy fast and easy to catch people with. There isn't a great deal to say about dashdancing alone, as it's a mindgame; you'll need to use it yourself and see what use you can put it to. However couple it with what you'll learn in the next little bit and you'll have some more ideas of how to use it...
- {05F.} Dash-Cancelling
Dash with Luigi, and it'll take a good while before you stop moving and gain the ability to do anything. This is because of his low traction plus the fact that the dash animation has lag at the end, anyways. Dash-cancelling solves this problem. Hit down while you're running, and you'll end the running animation, allowing for a quick smash or even another dash forward towards your confused opponent. Dash-cancelling gives you the ability to do running downsmashes, which, though they aren't quite as useful as wavesmashes, do have their moments. It also works nicely with dash-dancing, letting you stop immediately to do something. For instance, though this isn't seen much with Luigi, if you really wanted, you could dash out of the way of an attack, dash back towards your opponent, dash-cancel and retaliate. It's just like a wavedance, basically, but shorter, quicker and more viable in certain circumstances. It also aids with your dashdance mind games, as the immediate halt can throw off opponents or let you hit the ones who chose to approach foolishly. Again, though, there isn't a great deal to be said here. Onward.
- {05G.} Jump-Cancelled Grabs
These'll be called JC Grabs now for the duration of the guide, because JC is 11 letters and a hyphen shorter. >.> Anyways, JC grabs. Now the idea here is simple. You run. You jump. You grab. However, since you can't grab in the air, there's some timing involved. Basically you hit jump and grab at pretty much the same time. It's very easy to do. The result of these JC grabs, is that you do your standing grab out of a dash. "Whoamfg, who cares?" Dash grabs are laggy and slow. Standing grabs are quicker and less punishable. That is the great beauty to JC grabs.
Now you can accomplish the moving standing grab by wavedashing, as well. Here's where you gauge which one to use. Closer up, JC grabs are better, as the initial dash animation is short, and even if they move, you can still run after them or choose to wavedash. If you try to wavegrab closequarters, you'll almost always overshoot them. Using JC grabs also means you can grab out of a dashdance. So if you're dashdancing and they approach. JC grab. Or, if you dash towards someone to grab them and they roll behind you...dash back, JC grab.
These three dash-related techniques that we've just discussed are important. Wavedashing will not solve everything for you, because turning around in situations where you need to do it quickly, just doesn't happen with wavedashing, nor is wavedashing super useful close up to your enemy. Learn when to dash, when to wavedash. When to JC grab, when to wavegrab.
When to Wavedance, when to dashdance. It's important that you realize that spamming random wavedashes will get you nowhere, because Luigi has OPTIONS, and becoming predictable isn't the best one. ^.^
- {05H.} Crouch Cancelling
Not even remotely an advanced technique, but important and neglected... CCing helps you survive, just like DIing properly. CC an attack at low percentages and you won't move a bit and be free to counter with probably a downsmash, as that's the most logical choice. CC at higher percentages and you'll slide back, but still won't suffer the tremendous knockback
of certain attacks. CC at really high percentages, and you'll slide( or bounce --- if this happens, make sure to tech on the edge of the stage) off of the stage and accidentally fast fall to your death. Point? Don't ALWAYS just crouch cancel everything. Watch your damage and whatnot to see where you should stop CCing big hits and start DIing up and towards the
stage. Of course, you should also be playing a defensive game instead of just taking all hits and trying to make the best of it, but when you're not quick enough, CCing and DIing well can kinda make up for it.
Now CCing has downsides even at lower percents. Multi-hitting attacks will hit you multiple times. Case in point: CC Peach's down-smash, and you eat over 50% easy. The same goes for little combos, so crouch cancelling is not something you do unless you have to, because it will very easily hurt you more than it helps. If you don't think you'll be quick enough to
counter the next hit while you're CCing, then wavedash out of the way. You're already crouching, so you really just have to hit X/Y and L/R at this point. If you CAN CCC in time however, that quick d-smash is nice to turn their assault into your combo.
- {05I.} Directional Influence
DI is one of the big things separating the good players from the just decent ones. I myself am no expert on DI, as being able to DI properly in all instances comes from simply playing a ****load of matches and seeing what works. However, I do have a DECENT working knowledge of DI, and so I'll try and help.
The basics. When you're being comboed, chances are that intelligent DI can get you out of it. Alot of the time with simple combos, DIing up and/or backwards will allow you to drift out of range to jump, tornado, waveland, tech, or whatever. However, you also want to try and be less predictable with your DI. If someone tries to chain throw you or something and
you always DI a certain way, they'll predict it and move accordingly. Throwing your enemy offguard with your DI habits to break combos is almost as important as actually getting out of them, because combos in smash are usually situational and improvised.
DI will also be used when you're hit hard and to aid in recovery. When you're hit with an attack with big horizontal knockback (a KO attack, basically, like an f-smash or something) you generally want to try and hold the control stick UP and towards the stage (in that diagonal). This will transfer some horizontal knockback into vertical, meaning that you're
higher up and thus aiding in recovery as you have more time to get to the stage. Most less-experienced Smashers just DI directly against the attack, but that won't work as well. DI UP.
There are better ways of DIing hardhitters, though, Smash DI and CCDI, as explained next.
- {05Ia.} Smash DI
This is what is thought of as exact-moment DI. Smash DI is tapping and holding the control stick in the desired direction (in most cases diagonal up/forward) RIGHT AT THE MOMENT THAT YOU ARE HIT. This can be done whether you are on the ground or in the air and will greatly reduce the power of your knockback by trying to balance out momentum from two sides. You can also Smash DI out of combos or setups so that you don't just drift out of them slowly. Mostly, though, it's to cut down on the knockback of KO moves and help you survive longer.
- {05Ib.} CCDI
CCDI is an application of Smash DI that goes a little bit further. The CC is Crouch Cancel, just like it always is, and that means you can only CCDI when you're on the ground. What you need to do is crouch cancel in the moment(s) prior to the attack hitting and then Smash DI right when it connects. CCing reduces knockback. Smash DI reduces knockback. Together, the two in CCDI can help you perform incredible feats of survival at high percentages and against very powerful attacks. It's difficult to time, but very very useful.
If you wish to see CCDI in action, there's a very simple way to do it in Training Mode with 2 controllers. Pick Bowser and Luigi. Set the training mode dummy to Human control. Get your Luigi's damage up to 100% and F-smash him with Bowser. Watch the diagonal knockback that ROCKETS Luigi immediately offscreen into the blast line. Now, get Luigi back up to 100%. This time, when you F-smash with Bowser (you'll have to switch controllers quick if you don't have a friend to help you with this) hold down with Luigi while Bowser rears his head and then Smash up/forward right when the attack connects. If you've done it right, you should go pretty high up, but not into the blast line, and only be about a few feet in front of Bowser in horizontal distance.
CCDI DRASTICALLY improves your survival.
So yea. DI? Very important. Learn to DI well and it'll be quite helpful to your Luigi.
- {05J.} Advanced Shielding
Not really "Advanced Shielding", but just some stuff to consider:
-- {05Ja.} Shield-Aerials
Jump-cancelling the shield into an aerial? It's a good idea. For those times when a grab just won't reach far enough or they approach from behind or above, aerials out of Luigi's shield are perfect. I generally do this with the sex kick, to cut through whatever they happen to be trying, but feel free to use the others where you see fit. As said before, this isn't really advanced in any way, but just something you may not have thought about until now. Next!
-- {05Jb.} Shield-Wavedashing
Anything that can be jump-cancelled can be wavedashed out of. For those times when you block a tippered f-smash and feel like immediately wavedashing into a superpunch for the kill on androgyny... and other times, as well. I first saw this in an Azen/Anden match where Anden's Jigglypuff wavedashes out of the shield, under his opponent's attack and rests the guy to instant death. It was sexy, and got me thinking. Luigi's an amazing wavedasher. Luigi's got a shield. Why the **** not? Into smashes, superpunch pings... anything, really... It's just great to use, so keep it in mind.
We've now concluded the techniques bit and move on to more about Luigi's attacks and playstyles. Havin' fun yet?
I've left out character matchups because they were empty. That will be added with the update, as I now know a LOT more about that sort of thing. I'm also adding a section on Stages, so that you know where your advantages lie. If you have any input, feel free to let me know. Counterpicks are rather important, and I want an intuitive section on Character Matchups and Stage Picks to help people out.
***NOTE: THIS FIRST POST OF THE GUIDE WILL DEAL MOSTLY WITH TECHNIQUES. YOU PROBABLY ALREADY KNOW ALL OF THIS STUFF. IT'S MAINLY FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE TOTALLY NEW, AS I HOPE TO OFFER NOT JUST A DEFINITION, BUT ALSO EXPLANATION AND DESCRIPTION OF USE. FOR PEOPLE NEW TO LUIGI BUT NOT NECESSARILY NEW TO COMPETITIVE SMASH, YOU CAN GLANCE THROUGH FOR IDEAS OR JUST SKIP THIS ALTOGETHER.
THE SECOND POST WILL BE THE OVERVIEW, MOVESET, STAGEPICKS AND CHARACTER MATCHUPS.
-=Luigi FAQ=-
Written by: Tobias Xel'Kythe
Special thanks to Magus17, my former mentor and the guy who got me started on Luigi and this guide.
[ Table of Contents ]
[01. Happy Smashing]
[02. Things to know]
[04. Standard Techniques]
-{04A. Shielding}
--{04Aa. Rolling}
--{04Ab. Spot Dodging}
--{04Ac. Shield Grabbing}
-{04B. Air Dodging}
-{04C. Teching}
-{04D. Ledge Game}
[05. Advanced Techniques]
-{05A. Wavedashing}
-{05B. L-Cancelling}
-{05C. Short Hopping}
--{05Ca. Shffls}
--{05Cb. Wavedashed Aerials}
-{05D. Advanced Ledge Game}
--{05Da. Recovery}
--{05Db. Ledge-hopping}
--{05Dc. Edgehogging Tactics}
-{05E. Dash Dancing}
-{05F. Dash-Cancelling}
-{05G. Jump-Cancelled Grabs}
-{05H. Crouch Cancelling}
-{05I. Directional Influence}
--{05Ia. Smash DI}
--{05Ib. CCDI}
-{05J. Advanced Shielding}
--{05Ja. Shield-Aerials}
--{05Jb. Shield-Wavedashing}
[06. An Overview of Luigi]
-{06A. Old School vs. New School}
--{06Aa. Old School Luigi}
-{06Ab. New School Luigi}
[07. Luigi's Arsenal]
-{07A. Tilts}
-{07B. Smashes}
-{07C. Aerials}
-{07D. Throws}
-{07E. Specials}
-{07F. Others}
-{07G. The Taunt}
[08. A Note to the Players]
[09. Character Matchups ]
[10. Stage Picks ]
***NOTE: To navigate the guide more quickly, hit CTRL+F to use your browser's built-in searh function and search one of the topic headings in the Table of Contents to find the corresponding section.
[01.] Happy Smashing
Happy Smashing
[02.] Things to Know
Basically this little bit covers miscellaneous terms, abbreviations and jargon that will appear throughout the guide. Anything listed here that you don't know of will undoubtedly be explained in the Standard or Advanced Techniques sections. You lot should know this.
1. Nair/ANA: Neutral Aerial Attack
2. Fair/AFA: Forward Aerial Attack
3. Uair/AUA: Up Aerial Attack
4. Bair/ABA: Backward Aerial Attack
5. Dair/ADA: Down Aerial Attack
***Those same N, F, U, B, and D may be tagged at the beginning of -throw, -tilt, or -smash, respectively.
6. DI (directional influence): You do it all the time when you're recovering and probably when you're being comboed, as well. It's tilting the control stick when you're in the air to influence the direction you drift. Later on, I'll go a little bit in depth with this to help you out with how to DI effectively and at the right times.
7. CC'ing: Crouch Cancelling (holding down when you're hit on the ground to reduce knockback)
8. CCC'ing: Crouch Cancel Countering (crouch cancelling and using an attack to counter)
9. Priority: Priority is basically the ability of an attack to "beat out" another or take precedence. Really, it's a combination of the timing of the attack, the hitbox (the part of the attack that deals damage), and the recieving hitboxes of your opponent. It's complicated and doesn't matter. Don't worry about priority.
10. Lag: Lag is the delay before or after an attack's animation, where you can't really do anything. Simple enough.
***Some lag can be cancelled or reduced
11. WD: Wavedash (this will have it's own section, but in short: Jumping and using the airdodge immediately at a diagonal into the ground, so that you don't leave the ground, but slide, instead)
12. Sex kick: A neutral aerial attack that has a long lasting hitbox and generally good priority, because of a long window where the attack can hit. Luigi's nair is a sex kick.
***They were named this by MattDeezy's crew because they function like a *****, hittin' it as long as they're out.
13. Ledge: The edge of the stage where you can grab onto.
14. Shffl: Short hop fast fall and L-cancel
15. Whiff: To miss. Swingin at air. Be thwarted in your attacking plan by a well-placed spotdodge or wavedash.
16. Ping: The ping sound that you hear during Jigglypuff's Rest, a Homerun Bat Smash, or... LUIGI'S SWEETSPOTTED UP+B. "Ping" will refer to hitting with Lui's Superpunch so that it makes the ping sound and actually does something...something sexy.
17. Chop: Luigi's fair
[04.] Standard Techniques
In this section, I'll outline the standard techniques such as shielding, rolling, etc. These will likely be things that you already do, but you could improve your game by using even the simplest of techniques to their greatest effectiveness.
- {04A.} Shielding
It's a shield! You use it to block! You press R or L and the standard bubble shield pops up, covering all of Luigi. It gradually decreases in size and can then be angled by tilting the control stick to block attacks aimed at parts where Lui is no longer covered. After a long while or a bit of abuse, the shield will break, leaving you stunned and vulnerable. You don't want that to happen, obviously, so don't hold the shield up for extended periods of time. You can also press L or R very lightly to bring up a light shield that is bigger, weaker, and also diminishes slower than the regular shield. If youtime your shield perfectly, you can also powershield attacks. This will block the attack instantly without hurting the shield at all or having to hold the shield up. You will know that you have powershielded if you see a white flash. Projectiles will also be deflected if you power-shield them. To powershield, you want to put up your shield as soon as an attack or projectile is close enough to the character for it to intersect with your shield when you put it up. As you can imagine, this is a very small window, but with alot of versus matches, your ability to powershield will become better (mostly from simply being quick enough to shield when you see an attack coming, where you'd normally just get hit).
Now Shielding is extremely basic, but many newer players hardly ever shield, opting to roll or just get hit, instead. I advise that you get into the habit of shielding, however, as it's a very useful defense. And from the shielding position, many options become open to you. For instance, you can jump out of the shield, meaning you can perform your aerial attacks or your up+B directly from your shield. But we'll talk more about that in a bit. Moreover, though, you gain the ability to roll, SpotDodge (or sidestep dodge) and Shield Grab. Despite the existence of Rolling and Spotdodging, you do want to work on your timing with shielding and get used to shielding alot. In a high-paced match, being able to shield attacks and quickly counter is VERY useful. Now then...
***NOTE:You may want to get into the habit of shielding with the trigger that you don't use to Wavedash. We haven't gotten to waveadashing yet, but just keep it in your mind.
-- {04Aa.} Rolling
To roll, you simply need to shield and hit left or right on the control stick. Luigi has a relatively quick roll, and it has it's uses, as it allows you to dodge attacks and move at the same time. Naturally, however, there is a downside. Rolling has a fair bit of lag tacked on at the ends of the animation. You also always roll the exact same distance. This means that rolling can quickly become very predictable, and an experienced player can easily hit you immediately after you come out of a roll.
Once you read up on wave-dashing in the next section, you will see that wavedashing is generally better than just rolling for Luigi, but you don't want to neglect his roll. There are times when rolling benefits you, and you always want to have as many options open to you as possible.
-- {04Ab.} Spot Dodging
A spot dodge, or sidestep dodge, is performed by simply shielding and hitting down on the control stick. It is a short stationary dodging maneuver that can be used to dodge almost any attack or grab, though certain attacks are hard to spotdodge. For instance, Doc's pills travel slowly enough that if you spot dodge them, alot of the time, they'll still hit your back once the sidestep is over. Homing missiles are another.
Spot dodging is quicker than rolling, so if you are good at timing them they are far more useful in most cases. They lag less, as well, meaning that you can come out of sidestep dodging a smash attack or grab and counter with a down-smash or whatever you please.
Specifically with Luigi, however, spotdodging becomes useful when moving, as well. Lui's low traction makes it so that if you dash and spotdodge, you still will slide forward a bit. Also, well-placed spotdodges in the middle of wavedashes help Luigi approach against projectiles like frequent SHLing (Short Hop Lasering) from Falco.
Spot dodging is a useful tool, and you'd do well to become comfortable with using it.
-- {04Ac.} Shield Grabbing
You can hit Z to grab. Yes, you can also hit L/R and A at the same time and grab. However now that you're starting to shield more, why not grab from the shield? You hold up the shield to block an attack, hit A, and you've grabbed them. This becomes very useful with dealing with fast attacks like shffl'd aerials. Luigi's grab range isn't the greatest, but it's still good. Learn how long it is, so that you don't end up grabbing at air.
- {04B.} Air Dodging
To airdodge, press L/R when you're in the air. You can also tilt the control stick to air-dodge in any direction. Airdodging can be useful to evade midair attacks and projectiles, but after an airdodge, you are left free-falling...and Luigi doesn't fall very fast, so you will VERY easily be hit before you reach the ground. My advice is that if you're high enough in the air that airdodging down won't get you to the ground or really close to it, and you need to dodge an attack, use your second jump if you have it, or try to beat it out with Luigi's sex kick (n-air) or his tornado.
Another use of airdodging is recovery, when you just need that little push to snap to the edge of the stage, and don't want to drop lower and up+B. You should probably be using it more in this way than to actually dodge attacks. You can also just come in higher and air-dodge through your edgeguarder (probably at a diagonal down to get onto the stage more quickly).
***NOTE: If you want to airdodge to the ledge with Luigi, you will need to airdodge above the ledge, so that you freefall or a second after the airdodge is complete. Otherwise, Luigi will be incapable of grabbing on to the edge.
The best thing about airdodging though? It allows wavedashing, which is the very first part of the next section of this guide. Stay tuned.
- {04C.} Teching
Yet another gift in the L/R triggers... Teching is staple. In fact, you probably already do it. When you're hit hard and end up tumbling in the air, you can hit L/R just before you smash painfully into the ground to gracefully recover with a handstand-esque maneuver that we call 'teching', from the technical bonus in Street Fighter.
While Luigi is catching himself, upside down, you can also then hit right or left to do a techroll, which goes slightly farther than the normal roll and allows you to get out of the way immediately after you land.
You can also tech on cielings, and walls, and if you hit up on the control stick while you walltech, you will perform a pseudo wall-jump, even though Luigi can't normally walljump.
Now teching is amazingly useful, as it greatly speeds up your recovery time, and also allows you to escape combos such as those started with throws like Fox's down throw, which can be teched out of. However, if you're tumbling high in the air, you may not always want to wait until you float to the ground to tech. Instead, you can smash left and right on the control stick to return to your normal free fall where you can attack and whatnot.
- {04D.} Ledge Game
Basically this is a little segment on how you can get up from the edge, as there are four basic ways of doing this. The first, of course, is just standing up. Tilt the control stick up and Luigi gets up onto the stage slowly. It's rarely the best course of action. You can also hit X/Y to jump from the ledge, L/R to roll, or A/B to attack. There are two different ledge attacks, one when you are under 100% and one when you're over. The first does 8% and is somewhat quick. The second one is very slow and laggy, but does 10% damage. It also has some invincibility frames which aren't redeeming at all. hese are the basic options, and none of them apart from rolling or the occasional low-damage ledge attack will really be used against opponents with any sort of edgeguarding game... However, this is the standard techniques section. I'll teach ou some better alternatives for getting up from the ledge in the next section. And on we go!
[05.] Advanced Techniques
This section will cover the more advanced little nuances of playing at a competitive level, explaining techniques like Wavedashing, L-cancelling, etc. There will also be some things that are very easy to do and aren't really "advanced techniques" but are somewhat neglected by most non-tourney players, like crouch cancelling and DIing intelligently.
- {05A.} Wavedashing
You've been wondering what the **** wavedashing is? Here it is, as promised.
-=How do you do it?=-
Wavedashing isn't particularly tricky, but it does take nimble fingers. To wavedash, you'll need to jump and immediately airdodge at a diagonal into the ground. Ideally, you'll want to be able to have the airdodge register before you even see your character leave the ground, so the jump and the airdodge need to be all but simultaneous, as Luigi has a 5 frame jumping animation (which is only 1/12th of a second). If you do it correctly, your Luigi should slide for a bit in his landing position and some white smoke will kick up. If you see Luigi jump a tiny bit before he/she slides, then it's still a wavedash, but you'll want to learn to airdodge quicker. A good wavedash will give the impression of just the slide... a character standing there and then sliding across the ground, with nothing in between.
An easier way to wavedash is to do it directly out of a crouch. If you're already holding the control stick at a diagonal down, then all you have to do is hit X/Y and L/R at almost the exact same time. I recommend this only to see what it looks like, though, because getting in a habit of crouching before every wavedash kinda destroys some of it's speed and usefulness.
-=But what IS wavedashing, actually?=-
Wavedashing is a technique that turns an extremely low angled airdodge into a slide on the ground. It's the product of the physics engine of the game. It uses an airdodge into the ground to cut off the jumping animation, and the left over momentum plus low traction causes your character to slide. Accordingly, low traction yields long wavedashes and high traction yields short wavedashes. For this reason, Luigi has the single longest wavedash in the game. Traction on the stage also matters. For instance, an oil spill on Flatzone or the UFO on Fourside will give <i>any</i> character a super long wavedash.
Because it's an aspect of the physics, there are two other things that will affect the length of a wavedash. The first is the timing of the airdodge. Delay the airdodge a little bit while you're characters a touch higher off the ground, and the wavedash will be slower and shorter. If you wait until you're coming down from a full jump, then the falling momentum adds to the airdodge and the wavedash gets longer. The second thing that alters the length of a wavedash is the angle of your airdodge. A shallow angle closer to perfect left/right gives you a longer wavedash. If you tilt the control stick in a steep angle below the corner for the 45 degree down-right/down-left angle on the controller, you get a shorter wavedash. You can even airdodge straight down. You won't move at all, but it cuts off your jump quickly. The normal wavedash is right in the 45 degree down-left/down right, but learning to control how long your wavedashes are can be very useful... especially for
Luigi.
Essentially though, all extraneous information aside, wavedashing is moving while standing still. It allows you to perform any possible move or attack, just as though you were standing neutral...only with wavedashing, you can move at the same time.
-=Okay, so how is this useful?=-
If you didn't read that last little short paragraph, allow me to reiterate. When you're wavedashing, you can do ANYTHING. It gets rid of the inhibitions that go along with running such as lag at the end of the animation. When you're wavedashing you have every possible attack open to you, and you can also roll, shield, spot dodge, jump, wavedash, crouch, or dash. Wavedashing also lets you move backwards without turning around, allowing for quick dodges and immediate retaliation. But let's look at the uses a touch more in depth...
MOVEMENT: Basic. Luigi tends to have this as his main form of movement, using it for approaches, moving between combos, evasion, landing from the air, etc. It can also be a wayto dodge an attack and retaliate immediately, something that rolling does not allow you to do A backwards wavedash gets you a quick dodge and then you can retaliate, if you're close
enough, or wavedash forward immediately and retaliate. Wavedashing also allows quick movement when coming down from the air. You can jump to avoid a projectile such as a super missile, and then place the airdodge to wavedash right before you land, meeting your opponent with a quick pop, or wavedashing back to avoid the followup. You can also wavedash the landings of attacks that finish in the air, such as short-hopped bairs, fairs, uairs and dairs with Luigi. Because the animation finishes entirely in the air, you can airdodge and wavedash without having to land first. This becomes very useful for linking hits and following up on attacks with Luigi.
WAVESMASHING: Since you can attack directly out of a wavedash, you have alternatives that you will probably prefer over the standard dash attack in some instances. For instance, as a Luigi player, you will likely take the down smash over the dash attack. Ergo, the wavedash + down-smash. Incidentally, certain smashes like that one also gain increased
range because of the movement in a wavedash. This "WAVESMASHING", however, also refers to "WAVETILTING" and "WAVENEUTRALA-ING." Since you can do any attack out of a wavedash, you keep quite a few options open. Down-smash and f-tilt tend to be what you'll wavedash the most with Luigi, but you're also allowed to jump/short hop and hit with an aerial, so that
happens, as well.
WAVESHIELDING: When you first learn to WD, you will likely end the dash with the shield up, due to holding the trigger for too long. You will probably want to try and work past this so that it doesn't happen all the time. However, waveshielding will allow you to advance on characters without inhibitions or threat (apart from being grabbed). Moving with the shield up can be dead useful in approaching, and the fact that you can wavedash out of a shield adds some extra goodness as well. Along with shielding during a wavedash also come rolling and spot-dodging, both with their advantages. Wavedashing into spot-dodges can be great to avoid projectiles without sacrificing movement in certain instances, such as when facing
SHLs from Falco. Waveshielding also allows shield-grabs from your wavedashes, too, so you can have some fun with that, as well.
EDGE-HOGGING: If you are hanging onto the edge of the stage, no other character can grab onto it. So if a recovering opponent has used all 3 jumps and is hoping to grab the edge and you're already there...they're screwed. If you wavedash backwards off the edge of the stage, you will automatically hang from the edge. Once you can wavedash consistently, this
is a touch quicker than jumping or SHing backwards off the edge. If you roll from the edge after edge-hogging, you gain a few frames of invincibility, and the ledge is still considered occupied, so this can help evade certain up+b attacks while still causing them
to miss the ledge.
***NOTE: If you've hit someone from accross the stage and need to edgehog quickly, you can wavedash forwards towards the edge, and tilt the opposite direction while you slide so that Luigi will turn around in mid-wavedash and then grab onto the edge.
MIND GAMES: This is the main aspect of wavedashing. The speed and mobility that wavedashing allows along with the freedom to do anything grants you the ability to have excellent mind games that utilize wavedashing... However, this is not something that can really be taught. Once you can wavedash consistently, you'll start noticing places where you can use it and as your mind games improve, you should be able to come up with some pretty neat stuff using wavedashing. You can check out pro videos for ideas, but I can't guarantee you'll actually see the mind games. Mind games are more in the fight, in the head of the player... Whether in high-level or just regular play without advanced tactics, you still want your opponent to be tricked into a position where you can attack them. Dash forward, and your opponent is probably going to attack, right? you get hit. Dash forward, wavedash back... your opponent attacked before you wavedashed back and now suffers from the lag of their failed attack. So you punish. That's a really simple and generic example, but it gets the point accross. Mind games... Simply put, mind games are the game.
Here's some more assorted information about wavedashing's uses... You can wavedash straight from the ledge by dropping and immediately jumping and airdodging onto the stage. This can get you back onto the stage quickly to meet an approaching opponent. Wavedashing also cancels the things that jumping cancels... For instance, since you can jump out of a shield, you can wavedash out of a shield. Stages with platforms also open up some new opportunities with waveadshing, since you can jump up through a platform and then airdodge so you wavedash accross it. This allows for some versatility on stages like Battlefield, where Luigi can have scarily fast, fluid movement around the entire stage.
For the most part, though, you'll find use for wavedashing on your own. These things are just outlines of some more general uses. With some practice, wavedashing becomes second nature. Most who do it get to the point where they can accomplish it 100% of the time with no problem. Wavedashing is not always necessary to your game, as there are some pros that
don't wavedash, however it is very useful... ESPECIALLY for Luigi, who simply makes orgasmically beautiful use of it. It is also not a glitch, or in any way cheap. It is merely an aspect of the physics in the game, and is referred to in the actual game as the "super dash technique" or something in Debug. It's the most versatile of the advanced techniques and can help ANY character's game. It's not necessary, but it sure as hell isn't useless. It's moving while standing still! So experiment with it. I'm sure you'll find some nice ways for it to improve your game.
A big read, I know, but Wavedashing is very important to a Luigi player, and is a big part of the reason that he has the potential that he does.
- {05B.} L-cancelling
L-cancelling is generally considered ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY in competitive play. In actuality however, Luigi rarely truly needs it. You should still learn to do it, though, for the times when you need it with Lui, and for your other characters.
L-cancelling stands for "Lag-cancelling." If you land after performing an aerial attack when the animation isn't 100% finished with (if it were, you'd just be freefalling), you suffer lag on the ground...dead time where you can't do anything. In high-level Smashing, that's just unacceptable, as the game is very fast-paced. L-cancelling reduces the lag by 50%. Luigi's aerials tend to finish entirely in the air, though, so they only need to be L-cancelled in certain situations.
How do you do it, then? After you perform your aerial, you need to hit L/R/Z just before you hit the ground. The window for this is small, so it needs to be timed more precisely than teching. If you're just learning how to L-cancel right now, you may want to try it out with Link's d-air or Bowser's B-air, as those are the most noticeably L-cancelled attacks. When you first learn to L-cancel, your shield may pop up for a split second. If that's what happens, start letting go of L/R/Z earlier. The entire point of L-cancelling is defeated when your shield pops up and goes down rendering you immobile for a second.
These will mostly get used for Luigi when you do short hopped, fast falled sex kicks, which ALWAYS should be L-cancelled so that you can follow up immediately.
- {05C.} Short Hopping
Short hopping. It's a short hop...as opposed to a full Jump. To short hop, you simply press X/Y/Up (whatever you use to jump) and release it quickly, before the jump animation is over (still 1/12th of a second, but it's pretty easy, actually). This will give you a jump about half as high as Luigi's normal jump, allowing you to use your aerials to attack foes on the
ground. Short hopped aerials make perfect followups to downsmashes or throws, and are going to be your most used type of attack (hell, short hopped sex-kicks are pretty much spammed.)
You can also Tornado out of short hops, as kind of a fakeout, where they're expecting a regular aerial, but are met with the huge range of the sliding Luigi tornado, instead.
Just short hopping an aerial is not usually something, you'll do with Luigi, however. You are more likely to shffl them (explained next), waveland them (explained after shffls), or double them up, such as using double b-airs, double f-airs, or following a short hopped aerial with a sex kick right near the ground in case your opponent shields (short hopped
double aerials should always be L-cancelled). To avoid being shield grabbed, you can also hold forward during an f-air or something so that you drift through their shields behind them and hit them with a b-air right near the ground, or something like that.
***NOTE: Another option after a shorthopped aerial is double jumping into more aerials!!!
Now, then. SHFFLs and SHWDs (fake term, but it's better than saying SHA?AWD).
-- {05Ca.} SHFFLs (Short hopped Fastfalled L-cancelled aerials)
You know how to short hop. You know how to L-cancel. To fastfall, you simply press down on the control stick when you're in the air floating downwards (after your jump/short hop has peaked). So then, to "shuffle" an aerial, you short hop, do your aerial, hold down to fast fall, and L-cancel. It's alot of things to do in just over a second, but you'll get used to it with some practice.
Now shffls are great. They're a big part of most people's games and while they aren't exactly spammed with Luigi, they do get used. For instance, most sex kicks that you use as approaches or launchers will be shffled.
Now, I'm going to take a moment to explain this, one of the bigger flaws that I find in Luigi... Luigi has a not-so-short short hop and a not-so-fast fastfall. Now really, his short hop isn't as high as certain other characters, but his floatiness causes him dead time at a height where you're just kinda hanging there for a second waiting for the jump
to peak so you can actually fastfall, which doesn't make you fall very fast at all. His short hop, along with his floatiness and quick aerials allows him double aerials in a short hop, and wave-dashed landings and whatnot, so that has it's upside and it's downside. However, for shffls, his short hop and fastfall are weird. To make up for Lui's time spent lingering in the air when you're trying to shffl a chop, you'll need to learn to stagger your aerials. I started doing it long ago, without ever really realizing it until recently... Now what you want to do is to start your short hops early. If you're
right next to them when you short hop for your shffled f-air, you will get grabbed or simply swatted away. So you short hop early, DI towards them, then f-air, fastfall and L-cancel as soon as the jump peaks. Now this'll look weird (staggered, really... which it IS...) --- you'll be floating not-so-fast, and then put out a fastfalled L-cancelled chop ridiculously quick. If you learn to space those and hit with them, though, they make great ends to grounded combos, or finishers to a mad dash (or wavedash) across the stage to catch up with your opponent.
***Short hop backwards to chops fastfalled forward are good news.
The other solution to the "high short hop, slow fastfall" problem is...
-- {05Cb.} Short Hopped Wavedashed Aerials
Yup. Short hopped wavedashed aerials. For a visual example of what these are, see my sig. You short hop and immediately perform your aerial attack of choice (anything but the sex kick will work). After the attack is done, if you started it early enough, you should be drifting back to the ground. Airdodge at a diagonal into the ground, and you'll wavedash instead of just landing stationary.
This aspect of Luigi's game greatly adds speed and mobility to his game. Where his aerial maneuverability is quite poor when you're trying to link hits in the air, on the ground, you can easily follow up and catch people by wavedashing short hopped aerials (even if you are higher up and hit them too far, you can always fastfall, wavedash before you hit the ground and catch up). Wavedashing your aerials also allows you to edgehog quickly if you need to. You can f-air someone off of the stage, wavedash the landing, tap the other direction to turn around, and there's a timely edgehog that will likely piss your foe off a fair bit.
Now wavedashing isn't your only option here. Since the attacks finish in the air, you can also tornado, or rejump and hit again if you whiffed or something like that...or rejump and TORNADO... Play around with this stuff for a while, and your Luigi will become quite versatile, with great speed and many options.
You can also use Luigi's quick-finishing aerials to recover from whiffs, as you can try again, rejump or wavedash away, etc. It's one of the greatest things about being Luigi, the fact that there is so much you can do.
***Mix them up. If you SHWD everything, they know that you'll be starting your aerials as soon as you short hop and can dodge early and hit you. If you shffl everything, they know that the timing is staggered and the attacks will be lower to the ground. Apart from knowing when you should use each, taking into account how high your opponent is, etc., you should
also know to mix it up so that you don't become predictable.
- {05D.} Advanced Ledge Game
Whether you're on the ledge, trying to get to it, trying to use it, or wanting to stop others from getting there, you want to have a good knowledge of your options with Luigi's ledge game beyond the little things mentioned before. In this bit, I'll explain some of the intricacies of using the edge to your advantage, as well as better ways to edge-hog or get
back up onto the stage. Here goes...
-- {05Da.} Recovery
"Omg Luigi's recovery sucks." Actually, it doesn't. It's sketchy as hell, but when you know what you're doing, it's definitely manageable. First things first... DI. The very first step to recovering successfully takes place the second you are hit. DI upwards when you're hit with an attack that'll send you out off of the stage. In doing this, you'll find that you will transfer alot of the horizontal knockback into vertical knockback. What this accomplishes is two things: 1.) You slow down in the air and don't get sent off a side blast line, and 2.) You gain height, giving you more possible recovery. Now then, you also want to make sure that you keep your 2nd jump...
Now to start your trip back to the stage, you should use uncharged green missiles in little bursts. This will get you your horizontal recovery and will also help you recover low. (***NOTE: If you're super close to the stage and can recover above it, you may as well just missile overhead and fastfall, using your 2nd jump and airdodge to avoid your edgeguarder once you're over the stage.) It also makes you green missile multiple times, giving you a greater shot at misfiring. If you're somewhat close to the stage and nearthe same height as the ledge, you can also use a charged missile to get right next to the stage underneath the ledge. Either way you should end up below your edgeguarder. From here, you can jump and up+B or airdodge to the edge, depending on how far you are. You'll want to learn how to sweetspot the edge, or time your up+B so that you snap right to the ledge without popping up above it where you can be hit (some edgeguarding attacks hit below the ledge, but if you sweetspot, you have a better chance of not being screwed).
Now in times of dire need of vertical recovery, with an extremely dextrous thumb, you can also use Luigi tornado to recover. To do this, you need to hit down+B and continue tapping B ungodly fast (you can also hold directions to drift more to the side). If you tap fast enough, Luigi will rise an insane amount before he starts to fall again. You want to use your 2nd jump as soon as possible after you rise with the tornado so that you don't lose too much height.
***NOTE: For every tornado where you attempt to rise, you must first have done a tornado on the stage. Performing a grounded tornado is "loading" the rising one, so to speak. If you can use the Tornado to recover, make it a habit of using a grounded tornado at least after each stock, just in case.
Well there you go. You got to the ledge. Congrats. Now what?
-- {05Db.} Ledge-hopping
You've still got an edgeguarder just waiting for you to come back up so they can pop you off again... Here's where ledge-hopping aerials gets you some space for a safe return to the stage.
So how do you ledge hop, then? First you need to know the fundamental technique that is ledge-dropping. To do this, press down when you're on the edge. You can also hit down on the C-stick, but I don't know why you'd do that. Difficult, neh? Now to ledge-hop, you simply ledge-drop and jump immediately. Perform your attack, drift back onto the stage, L-cancel, and that's that... basic Ledge-hopping. Now with Luigi, you've got options. For starters, you can ledge-hop any aerial, whereas some characters are limited... Also, a ledge-hop is just a touch higher than Luigi's short hop, meaning you've still got your double aerials, wavedashed aerials, tornadoes and whatnot open to you.
I'd say ledge-hopped f-airs are the most common ledge-hops for Luigi, but barely. Since you have so many options, you can vary it easily. Other ones I see/use alot are ledge-hopped d-airs into sex kicks when they shield (people usually shield ledge-hopped aerials). Tornadoes from the edge are also cool, but be careful with the timing on those, so you don't just drop because you did it before you were over the stage... I ledge-hop sex kicks occasionally, as well, and sometimes just wavedash through them if they shield prematurely or something like that.
Of course, you don't always want to ledgehop, so you keep open the options of rolling off the edge or using Luigi's ledge-attacks.
Now you can also ledge-hop attacks to edgeguard when you're in the edgehog position on the ledge. B-airs and d-airs are usually best for this. D-airs for when they approach from below-ish, and b-airs when you want to jump out off of the edge and hit them out of reach. Be careful, though. When you ledge-hop outwards too far, you will actually need to missile back and up+b to the edge. I tend to just wait nowadays, and edgehog. If they look like they are going to make it back, I ledgehop a b-air forward and fastfall it onto the stage to hit them if they pop up above the edge.
***NOTE: The better way to use ledgehops to edgeguard is to just drop and immediately use your aerial, when people approach really close, or to hit BACK, use your aerial, and then jump back to the stage. This gets rid of the risks that go along with actually using a ledgehopped aerial to edgeguard.
Learn to ledge-hop well, as there are times when you can actually retreat to the edge during a fight and hit them as they follow you there (which they will...almost always, for some reason). And naturally, it's a better way of getting back onto the stage than a slow laggy stand up or ledge-attack when you're above 100%.
-- {05Dc.} Edgehogging Tactics
Edgehogging is great. Your opponent makes it so close to the stage but fails to grab on because you're already there. Some people call it cheap. I call some people whiney and otherwise pathetic idiots. A kill you get from an edgehog is still a legitimate kill, so don't be hesitant to edgehog. With Luigi's great wavedash, he's almost MEANT to edgehog, as he can get from one side of the stage to the edge of the other side quite quickly.
Now that's generally how you'll edgehog---by wavedashing backwards off of the edge. Alternately, if you're facing the wrong way, you can wavedash forwards towards the edge and tilt the control stick the other way while you're sliding to turn around to where you'll grab onto the edge. You can also hit people off the stage with an aerial and wavedash the landing straight into an edgehog...
When you get onto the edge, you have a small window of invincibility frames, meaning that if you edgehog just before an opponent reaches the edge, their up+B will not hurt you. However, if you've been hanging there for a while, they can swat you away and take the ledge, recovering safely. This is why you've got alternatives to just hanging there. If you roll from the edge or use a ledge-attack, you have invincibility frames and a small amount of time where the ledge is still considered "occupied" at the beginning of the animation. So when you've got an up+b headed your way that's going to hit you, off, just
roll (or use the ledge attack over 100%, depending on which is necessary --- generally, rolling should work just fine).
You might get into a habit of edgehogging almost every time an opponent is off of the stage, which is fine, because from the edgehog position, you can jump up with ledge-hopped aerials to edgeguard your recovering foe if they're too close. Also, another great thing about edgehogging is that there aren't a great many ways for your opponent to get around it in most cases. Intelligent DI and good recovery skills can get them to where edgehogging won't help you, but otherwise, if they try to avoid the edgehog at the last minute by recovering over you, you can very easily just pop back up onto the stage and
hit them out again or use a kill move like Luigi's up+B ping while they lag.
Edgehogging is very useful. However, don't forsake your other means of getting kills. You should learn to spot when edge-hogging will do the trick and when using another means of edgeguarding such as wavedashing off the stage and using your f-air chop or d-air will work better. Learning to know the distances of each characters' recoveries will help avoid mistakes when edgehogging, such as getting hit, or having to ledge-hop an aerial outwards to hit them away (this is generally not good, for reasons mentioned in the previous section). It's much better to edgehog at the right times, and edgeguard at the right times.
***NOTE: The grappling beam or a hookshot will go through your edgehog. However, if you hit them while they're connected to the stage, they die, so drop b-airs on Link, YL, and Samus.
- {05E.} Dash Dancing
It barely even seems like a techique. Rather, it seems like fidgeting. However, dashdancing is very useful. Dash-dancing is dashing back and forth rapidly, allowing only the initial dash animation to show in each direction. To do it you just smash left and right repeatedly on the control stick. What it is is a mindgame technique, basically. Dashing forwards and
backwards, your opponent isn't quite sure what you're going to do, which way you're going to go... Perhaps they approach cautiously, and you end the dashdance and strike. Perhaps they approach too cautiously and quickly roll/wavedash back trying to fake you out. Wavedash out of dashdance? Crazy fast and easy to catch people with. There isn't a great deal to say about dashdancing alone, as it's a mindgame; you'll need to use it yourself and see what use you can put it to. However couple it with what you'll learn in the next little bit and you'll have some more ideas of how to use it...
- {05F.} Dash-Cancelling
Dash with Luigi, and it'll take a good while before you stop moving and gain the ability to do anything. This is because of his low traction plus the fact that the dash animation has lag at the end, anyways. Dash-cancelling solves this problem. Hit down while you're running, and you'll end the running animation, allowing for a quick smash or even another dash forward towards your confused opponent. Dash-cancelling gives you the ability to do running downsmashes, which, though they aren't quite as useful as wavesmashes, do have their moments. It also works nicely with dash-dancing, letting you stop immediately to do something. For instance, though this isn't seen much with Luigi, if you really wanted, you could dash out of the way of an attack, dash back towards your opponent, dash-cancel and retaliate. It's just like a wavedance, basically, but shorter, quicker and more viable in certain circumstances. It also aids with your dashdance mind games, as the immediate halt can throw off opponents or let you hit the ones who chose to approach foolishly. Again, though, there isn't a great deal to be said here. Onward.
- {05G.} Jump-Cancelled Grabs
These'll be called JC Grabs now for the duration of the guide, because JC is 11 letters and a hyphen shorter. >.> Anyways, JC grabs. Now the idea here is simple. You run. You jump. You grab. However, since you can't grab in the air, there's some timing involved. Basically you hit jump and grab at pretty much the same time. It's very easy to do. The result of these JC grabs, is that you do your standing grab out of a dash. "Whoamfg, who cares?" Dash grabs are laggy and slow. Standing grabs are quicker and less punishable. That is the great beauty to JC grabs.
Now you can accomplish the moving standing grab by wavedashing, as well. Here's where you gauge which one to use. Closer up, JC grabs are better, as the initial dash animation is short, and even if they move, you can still run after them or choose to wavedash. If you try to wavegrab closequarters, you'll almost always overshoot them. Using JC grabs also means you can grab out of a dashdance. So if you're dashdancing and they approach. JC grab. Or, if you dash towards someone to grab them and they roll behind you...dash back, JC grab.
These three dash-related techniques that we've just discussed are important. Wavedashing will not solve everything for you, because turning around in situations where you need to do it quickly, just doesn't happen with wavedashing, nor is wavedashing super useful close up to your enemy. Learn when to dash, when to wavedash. When to JC grab, when to wavegrab.
When to Wavedance, when to dashdance. It's important that you realize that spamming random wavedashes will get you nowhere, because Luigi has OPTIONS, and becoming predictable isn't the best one. ^.^
- {05H.} Crouch Cancelling
Not even remotely an advanced technique, but important and neglected... CCing helps you survive, just like DIing properly. CC an attack at low percentages and you won't move a bit and be free to counter with probably a downsmash, as that's the most logical choice. CC at higher percentages and you'll slide back, but still won't suffer the tremendous knockback
of certain attacks. CC at really high percentages, and you'll slide( or bounce --- if this happens, make sure to tech on the edge of the stage) off of the stage and accidentally fast fall to your death. Point? Don't ALWAYS just crouch cancel everything. Watch your damage and whatnot to see where you should stop CCing big hits and start DIing up and towards the
stage. Of course, you should also be playing a defensive game instead of just taking all hits and trying to make the best of it, but when you're not quick enough, CCing and DIing well can kinda make up for it.
Now CCing has downsides even at lower percents. Multi-hitting attacks will hit you multiple times. Case in point: CC Peach's down-smash, and you eat over 50% easy. The same goes for little combos, so crouch cancelling is not something you do unless you have to, because it will very easily hurt you more than it helps. If you don't think you'll be quick enough to
counter the next hit while you're CCing, then wavedash out of the way. You're already crouching, so you really just have to hit X/Y and L/R at this point. If you CAN CCC in time however, that quick d-smash is nice to turn their assault into your combo.
- {05I.} Directional Influence
DI is one of the big things separating the good players from the just decent ones. I myself am no expert on DI, as being able to DI properly in all instances comes from simply playing a ****load of matches and seeing what works. However, I do have a DECENT working knowledge of DI, and so I'll try and help.
The basics. When you're being comboed, chances are that intelligent DI can get you out of it. Alot of the time with simple combos, DIing up and/or backwards will allow you to drift out of range to jump, tornado, waveland, tech, or whatever. However, you also want to try and be less predictable with your DI. If someone tries to chain throw you or something and
you always DI a certain way, they'll predict it and move accordingly. Throwing your enemy offguard with your DI habits to break combos is almost as important as actually getting out of them, because combos in smash are usually situational and improvised.
DI will also be used when you're hit hard and to aid in recovery. When you're hit with an attack with big horizontal knockback (a KO attack, basically, like an f-smash or something) you generally want to try and hold the control stick UP and towards the stage (in that diagonal). This will transfer some horizontal knockback into vertical, meaning that you're
higher up and thus aiding in recovery as you have more time to get to the stage. Most less-experienced Smashers just DI directly against the attack, but that won't work as well. DI UP.
There are better ways of DIing hardhitters, though, Smash DI and CCDI, as explained next.
- {05Ia.} Smash DI
This is what is thought of as exact-moment DI. Smash DI is tapping and holding the control stick in the desired direction (in most cases diagonal up/forward) RIGHT AT THE MOMENT THAT YOU ARE HIT. This can be done whether you are on the ground or in the air and will greatly reduce the power of your knockback by trying to balance out momentum from two sides. You can also Smash DI out of combos or setups so that you don't just drift out of them slowly. Mostly, though, it's to cut down on the knockback of KO moves and help you survive longer.
- {05Ib.} CCDI
CCDI is an application of Smash DI that goes a little bit further. The CC is Crouch Cancel, just like it always is, and that means you can only CCDI when you're on the ground. What you need to do is crouch cancel in the moment(s) prior to the attack hitting and then Smash DI right when it connects. CCing reduces knockback. Smash DI reduces knockback. Together, the two in CCDI can help you perform incredible feats of survival at high percentages and against very powerful attacks. It's difficult to time, but very very useful.
If you wish to see CCDI in action, there's a very simple way to do it in Training Mode with 2 controllers. Pick Bowser and Luigi. Set the training mode dummy to Human control. Get your Luigi's damage up to 100% and F-smash him with Bowser. Watch the diagonal knockback that ROCKETS Luigi immediately offscreen into the blast line. Now, get Luigi back up to 100%. This time, when you F-smash with Bowser (you'll have to switch controllers quick if you don't have a friend to help you with this) hold down with Luigi while Bowser rears his head and then Smash up/forward right when the attack connects. If you've done it right, you should go pretty high up, but not into the blast line, and only be about a few feet in front of Bowser in horizontal distance.
CCDI DRASTICALLY improves your survival.
So yea. DI? Very important. Learn to DI well and it'll be quite helpful to your Luigi.
- {05J.} Advanced Shielding
Not really "Advanced Shielding", but just some stuff to consider:
-- {05Ja.} Shield-Aerials
Jump-cancelling the shield into an aerial? It's a good idea. For those times when a grab just won't reach far enough or they approach from behind or above, aerials out of Luigi's shield are perfect. I generally do this with the sex kick, to cut through whatever they happen to be trying, but feel free to use the others where you see fit. As said before, this isn't really advanced in any way, but just something you may not have thought about until now. Next!
-- {05Jb.} Shield-Wavedashing
Anything that can be jump-cancelled can be wavedashed out of. For those times when you block a tippered f-smash and feel like immediately wavedashing into a superpunch for the kill on androgyny... and other times, as well. I first saw this in an Azen/Anden match where Anden's Jigglypuff wavedashes out of the shield, under his opponent's attack and rests the guy to instant death. It was sexy, and got me thinking. Luigi's an amazing wavedasher. Luigi's got a shield. Why the **** not? Into smashes, superpunch pings... anything, really... It's just great to use, so keep it in mind.
We've now concluded the techniques bit and move on to more about Luigi's attacks and playstyles. Havin' fun yet?
if any mods see this You should really consider getting this stickied.
