Watching Little Boys: A Lucas Video Thread

[Naughty Pixel]

Hey guys, I've been playing ALOT of lucas recently and honestly I think I'm gonna main him. Here's a video of me and a friend playing earlier this week, maybe I could get a critique or some tips. I got a nasty shield break in the first game, was pretty hype. But when he switched to wario I had a bit more trouble against that.

Dirk(Lucas) Vs Dan (DK, Wario)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_IT8zrGWfw&feature=youtu.be

 

[Burnsy]

Can anyone critique some of my friendlies matches against K9's Ness? I find Ness to be somewhat difficult to beat personally, but not anything ridiculous. Maybe if I were to rate the MU for myself, I'd put it somewhere between 45:55 and 40:60 in Ness' favor, but I'm sure there are things I could be doing to bring it closer to even.

http://www.twitch.tv/azprojectmelee/b/380680738

Set 1: Starts at about 3:06:38

Set 2: Starts at about 3:30:30

EDIT:

Naughty Pixel, I watched your set. It isn't surprising you had an easier time against DK, I belive the MU is pretty heavily in Lucas' favor.

I don't have any MU specific tips really, just a few things I noticed:

You don't use DJC pkf as much as I think you can. It can really help you keep the pressure on and start combos from a safe distance, which makes life a living hell for DK and may be helpful for keeping Wario out of your face. It seemed like against Wario you guy were always really close slugging it out, but against someone like Wario I like to reset positioning and force him to weave around my PKF to get in.

I also noticed a few times where you used PK thunder to recovery even though an airdodge to tether would have saved you. Most of the time, the tether is just a better option so long as you are in range. Don't forget your can always detach and airdodge tether again if someone tries to gimp you off the tether, whereas once you have started PK thunder you are committing to 1 of two options, making it a bit easier to intercept. If you are facing the wrong way for a tether, just do a reverse magnet to turn yourself around first. @9:50 is a good example of a situation where an airdodge to tether may have saved you. @10:26 is an good example of a situation where using up-b really doesn't make any sense over tether.

 

[Oracle]

I caught some of the stream vs. k9's snake. Good ****, that matchup is super difficult. You pretty much played exactly how I would have, with a couple exceptions
1. You don't always need to double jump cancel. Its really good in combos, but a lot of the time you can get better followups from full hop double upair or full hop upair-> down air-> tech chase. Example: you dthrew snake and then did to djc up airs at about half of lucas's fullhop, however, this made your only good followup the weak hit of an upsmash, which didn't kill him. had you done fullhop double upair, the upsmash would have sweetspotted since you would have landed the upair closer to the ground.

2. Jab resets! You landed a ton of down airs which k9 missed the tech opportunity for, but then you went for a hard read, which is unreliable and uncecessary. Jab reset-> dash grab is pretty disgusting since the meaty dash grab has enough active frames to prevent any followup, and usually when you were in this situation they were at kill percent from upthrow

I'll look at the ness matches later. I also think its really hard from having played awestin a bunch. Mostly just try and keep up your pressure, since ness doesn't have good OOS options

 

[Naughty Pixel]

I'll give what I liked and didn't like rather than this is what you should do, since nobody is really a Lucas expert let alone me. So here it goes.

Things I didn't like:
mid/high % dash attacks, it didn't seem like they were leading into anything too useful. Lucas doesn't have too many great follow ups really high in the air. He can't get up there fast like Falco can. So on Ness atleast, I wouldn't use that too often later on.

Something that stood out to me was when Ness would to an on stage PKT2, and you shielded or distanced yourself from him. I understand that the safest option is to not get hit and wait for it to end, but I feel like that it's got to be punnishable. I know that as soon as it ends if he's on the ground he can act, but there must be a way to catch it. In friendlies I would probably try to catch it with a well timed down-b. Based on the knowledge that I can catch Warios side-B with it among other dash attachs. But in tournament I would have probably done what you did and waited. I notice you caught it like the last time he did it with a grab, thats great.

Things I'm not sure on:
Charging OU at the start of every stock. It gives you a nice finisher- if it connects. But the trade off is that you dont have those free seconds of pressure where you vie for a stronger position of the stage middle > side. It seems like an okay option when you're on a stage without a top platform to start on, like FD or Smashville. But when you do it on battlefield or dreamland not only do you use up your invincibility, you also end up getting punished by his PKF. Often leading into further punishment. Seems like this is probably only an issue in this MU though, since Ness has PKF to hold you in as you lose your invincible frames.

Up-Throw at high %s >115, personally I start looking for this too when I've hit them too much and its getting late into the stock I'll also look to finish with an up-throw. But I worry that it's people can DI it (correct me if I'm wrong) to be survivable for much longer than just 115%+ on the majority of the cast. So personally I'm trying not to get too attached to it as a reliable finisher.

This might not be something you can help, but those chain throws were a nuisance to you. I'm not sure 100% but maybe you could try to DI up towards a side platform on battlefield, otherwise you can try make your way to the edge.

Things I like:
PKF. You were doing some nice things with your placement and follow up to the PKF. You got some good grabs off of it. When I connect with PKF I like nair alot, it leaves you with alot of options for follow up. But grabbing is great too.

Down tilt. You were kind of on the right track using the down tilt (at least that's how it seemed to me). Watching this, I went ahead and tried putting it into my game. It's definitely nice at higher %s like 80+ when it starts knocking them up and you were doing some work with it, like dtilt to up smash a couple times at around 110% (that was hot). But then there were times when you were barely popping him up and then going for an F-Smash missing then repeating and he kept teching in place. A slower smash Up/Down to give enough time for the tech, or a grab (to catch a shield), or a combo starter like dair, uair, or down b could have been a good replacement to get more % on him.

Forward Smash. You got some nice connection with the stick. I like that you angle it up, presumably for the extra damage. Not much to say here, other than that.


________
So that's All I've got for you, hopefully it will have some use to you.

 

[Burnsy]

Great suggestions on Snake, Oracle, I 100% agree.

Naughty Pixel, I agree that charging OU at the beginning of a stock against Ness is unviable. It certainly isn't worth the PKF>combo you will eat, but it was something I hadn't been punished with often before tonight and was therefore worth the risk to me at the time. I'll have to remember to stop doing this.

I feel like I am usually pretty good keeping track of stage boundaries and character percentages before u-throwing, perhaps that didn't show through in this footage. I always take good DI into consideration of when I uthrow as well.

That is how I tried to DI the dthrow chain . If anyone has any input on how best to escape this please respond. This seems to be very easy to abuse on Lucas.

Heh yea, 3 strikes and I was out with those d-tilt>fsmash fails. It's a really nice kill combo at a bit higher % but I was just being super impatient and autopiloty. I don't really worry about damage when I angle f-smash though, I'm more concerned about hitbox placement. Sometimes off a high %dtilt they get popped too high for straight f-smash. In fact, if I had swung downwards maybe I would have connected on that 3rd swing.

Thanks guys

 

[Badge]

Charging OU at the start of every stock. It gives you a nice finisher- if it connects. But the trade off is that you dont have those free seconds of pressure where you vie for a stronger position of the stage middle > side. It seems like an okay option when you're on a stage without a top platform to start on, like FD or Smashville. But when you do it on battlefield or dreamland not only do you use up your invincibility, you also end up getting punished by his PKF. Often leading into further punishment. Seems like this is probably only an issue in this MU though, since Ness has PKF to hold you in as you lose your invincible frames.

Up-Throw at high %s >115, personally I start looking for this too when I've hit them too much and its getting late into the stock I'll also look to finish with an up-throw. But I worry that it's people can DI it (correct me if I'm wrong) to be survivable for much longer than just 115%+ on the majority of the cast. So personally I'm trying not to get too attached to it as a reliable finisher..

Up-Throw is a pretty reliable finisher from what I found. I just did a few tests with it and DI seems to have little influence on kill percents due to the throw sending literally straight up. Pure sidewards DI gives the best results and still only changes death percent by a maximum of 10%.

A bit of data. Character minimum (no DI) and maximum (optimal DI) death percentages on FD:
Jigglypuff: 90-97
Mario: 103-110
Ness: 103-111
Snake: 113-123
Captain Falcon: 139-149
Fox: 144-154

And from the main platform of Dreamland:
Jigglypuff: 118-125
Peach: 124-132
Mario: 131-141
Fox: 173-183

As for the OU charging, I too noticed that you're charging it literally every time you respawn. At one point you charged OU even though all of your smashes would have cleanly koed your opponent anyway, other times you would completely loose stage control due to this habit and then not land any smash that would have profited from the OU charge (not necessarily in the stream archive you linked just now, also in other videos). I've seen it from more Lucas players, too, yet I don't think it is a good idea to do it every time without prior thinking.

Edit: Forget about the "behind Lucas" part for the DI - one of my secondary controllers didn't input the maximum distance in one direction. I noticed that but missed deleting that part of my post.

 

[Naughty Pixel]

Oh sweet, thanks for that. I've told my friends to try to smash DI it but I wasn't sure if they just messed up or if it was just that strong. Guess I'll lean on that move a bit more then.

 

[Burnsy]

Great data, thanks for that.

It'd be useful to see some OU u-smash and f-smash data, because to me it feels like the damage and early kill potential you get from having the charge at the beginning of a stock is worth the positional advantage given up when charging during invincibility, with certain exceptions such as Ness' pk fire.

 

[Badge]

Oh sweet, thanks for that. I've told my friends to try to smash DI it but I wasn't sure if they just messed up or if it was just that strong. Guess I'll lean on that move a bit more then.

Very few throws have hitlag and Lucas' UpThrow isn't one of them, so smash DI doesn't work. Just tell them to hold perfectly left or right and they should survive as long as possible.

I mentioned one should DI "behind Lucas" in my last post, but that was just a mistake. It doesn't matter whether you DI left or right for vertical survival, so you can make it dependent on nearby side blastzone and similiar factors.

 

[Dron]

here are a few matches I had saved from last week before a tournament, unfortunately no tournament matches got recorded

I don't think my play is particularly impressive yet, but I feel like I've improved a bit since my last upload

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQliYgAcliU&feature=youtu.be

p.s. don't bother adding this to the OP, just thought I'd drop it in here

 

[Oracle]

Got 2nd going solo lucas. Got some great matches recorded. Marth is really difficult to fight

 

[foshio]

Good job dude!!

 

[Oracle]

Vids are up! Go on sethlon's channel to check them out

 

[Burnsy]

here are a few matches I had saved from last week before a tournament, unfortunately no tournament matches got recorded

You look like you've improved a lot! I don't see any reason why these matches shouldn't be added to the OP.

I didn't watch all the matches, but I watched most of them. It looked like you weren't using much dtilt, if at all. Any reason for that?

 

[Oracle]

It isn't very good. I used to use it a lot so now most people get out of it. Besides, jab is only a frame slower and is disjointed and has better followup options, so I just use that instead

 

[Burnsy]

D-tilt> fsmash is one of the most reliable punish-to-kill combos I can get at certain percents. What would you propose otherwise? I'm not looking for damage strings at that point (although sometimes I have to settle for them), I'm looking for the earliest opportunity to kill. The only reliable kill combo I see myself getting out of jab sequence at those percents is a DACUS.

It also can set up for an air juggle into u-smash in the middle of a lot of combos strings, and is obviously very fast out of a crouch cancel. I'm not suggesting you spam it in a neutral position, but it has utility over jab in certain situations. You never want to use it in a situation where your opponent can react with a CC.

 

[Oracle]

Dtilt hits low to the ground so its hard to land and is not very safe, and the fsmash combo only works at a handful of percents. Jab is disjointed and has range in front of lucas so it can stuff a lot of other options and is safer than dtilt. Usually I just go double jab to fair or tech chase

 

[Burnsy]

I understand what you mean about its risk, which is why I agree that it can't do the same job that jab can. But if you are at a percent where you know it will lead into good things, and you are able to punish them for a bad decision/whiffed move, then the risk isn't there because it is guaranteed to hit them without CC, and the early kill reward is much better than a jab into damaging follow-ups.

I do the same follow ups out of jab2, sometimes a short-hopped magnet into follow-ups or pressure works too.

 

[Dron]

I'm not sure how practical this is, but I remember seeing somebody (I think it was Calabrel) barely squeezing in a dtilt on people when they DI'd downthrow behind him and perfectly setting up for an fsmash finisher

it's super percent dependent I'm sure, but it seemed like it could be useful since Lucas doesn't seem to have many options at higher percents when downthrow is DI'd behind him (maybe DACUS or something, but I pretty much gave up trying to do that for right now, it's so hard to me )

 

[Oracle]

i just think lucas's jab is one of his best moves so i use it a lot. If they di'ed a dthrow behind you you can just upsmash or uptilt or regrab or a million things that are better than a dtilt flashy combo

 

[Dron]

I was mainly talking about high percents when they go really far behind you to where a non-DACUS'd upsmash wouldn't work, but yeah a grab would probably work fine actually

hey Oracle, I watched some of your matches and they were really good, I liked the shield pressure and use of aerials out of JC'd magnet, I need to incorporate that instead of just wavedashing out of JC'd magnet every time

do you have any tips on getting a more consistent DACUS? it destroyed that Zelda you played and you seemed to have it down pretty well, is it just muscle memory or is there anything specific you do?

 

[Burnsy]

I can't speak for Oracle and I know you asked him, but I pretty much have dacus consistent enough to use it in combos or use it to punish or anti-air from afar now without too much worry. I use the cstick down, control sick up+Z method, but have changed my contols so my unused trigger (R) is attack and now use that instead of Z.

There are 2 good reasons for using attack over grab.

1. Using attack instead of grab for the usmash portion takes the opportunity window from 2 frames to 3, which is more significant than you may think.

2. If you screw up the input, the worst you can get is an dash attack, wheras with Z you have a chance of getting a dash grab. Since your dacus target is typically far away, and a dash attack has MUCH less lag, there's a better chance of not getting punished hard.

Also on a personal note, I find using a trigger to be much more comfortable and therefore easier to use. It helps that I only use one button for wavedash OoS. The most important reason for using an attack input rather than grab is because getting a dash grab instead can reaaallly make you think twice about ever using it.

Whatever you do, I wouldn't give up on DACUS just yet. If you can get I down, its such a useful tool.

 

[Dron]

that actually sounds really helpful, unfortunately I actively use both triggers for different things and using both L/R is pretty much hardwired into my brain at this point

however, I just did some testing and I actually found that flicking the C stick to the right instead of down increases my consistency a lot, so I guess I shouldn't give up hope yet

edit: yeah, I'm getting like 80% consistency right now as opposed to probably 10-30% before depending on the day, this is amazing

how has nobody ever mentioned this before?

 

[Burnsy]

That's great man, glad you found something that works for you. Just be careful that you don't accidentally dash grab, I think it happens if your z input is a frame late (assuming default z is what you use). Against a good opponent, whiffed dash grab allows them their punish of choice, which generally means death for Lucas

 

[Badge]

The z input is 1 or 2 frames too soon when you get the dash grab (DA is cancelable into dash grab until one frame into the DACUS window).

Instant DAs and in extension DACUS' out of a standing position are only possible with c-stick down, because the initial dash can be canceled into F-Smash for 3 frames. So, that's the reason why probably nobody mentioned that you can also use c-stick right/left for the DACUS. You can theoretically use any input for DA->UpSmash as long as you're fast enough and you hold any direction on the c-stick when doing the Up-Smash. It's just that c-stick down->analog-stick up+attack is the easiest that can be performed as soon as possible which makes it the by far most common way to DACUS. If you wait until that Stutter Step F-Smash window is over, you could also use [attack button]->c-stick up, but that'd also involve being super fast, clawing or custom controls.

 

[Dron]

accidental dash grabs have definitely messed me up in the past, so I'll definitely keep a better watch on that Burnsy

and that makes sense 8adge, but I think I'll just try to work with c-stick right even though it isn't quite optimal, the downward motion is just really awkward for my hands (thumb/index fingers start hurting after just a few attempts usually)

 

[Oracle]

I generally just use cstick down-> up z, although I probably should use an attack button since I still miss a good amount of dacuses lol. practice practice practice

 

[BryE]

Hey guys. I got some Lucas vids against one of my friends named Dr. Yogi.
He normally has a hard time against me with any character that I'm really familiar with. However he's still a decent player imo.


Date of vids: April 27th 2013

Dr. Yogi (Mario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 1
Dr. Yogi (Mario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 2
Dr. Yogi (Mario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 3

Dr. Yogi (Wario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 1
Dr. Yogi (Wario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 2
Dr. Yogi (Wario) vs Chaser (Lucas) 3

 

[Burnsy]

Got some Project AZ videos for yall.

Burnsy (Lucas) vs Calabrel (Lucas)
$5 MM, 1-4

Watch as Lucases do Lucasy things! Almost kept that comeback going with that last match. I made a few critical mistakes such as missed usmash/dacus/grab opportunities and not capitalizing on zair hits, but no johns, I'll just have to wait to get my revenge next time. GGS Calabrel. I'm quite proud of the aerial reverse hit nair juggle into djc bair, that alone should have won me the round .

Burnsy (Lucas) vs Tai (Falco)
Winners bracket, 0-2

I see a few mistakes that could have tilted these matches in my favor, but Tai is an incredible player with a ton of Melee experience. Additionally, I don't get much practice against serious Falco players and still was able to hang in there a bit, so I feel pretty good about this one despite losing. Hopefully as I improve, this MU will get easier and I can take a round or even the set next time.

 

[SnatoWhato]

Alright Lucas fans, we don't main these guys but it was still a fun fight. Enjoy.

Lucas (Alex) vs Ness (Nate/Me): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JASaPdOuWf8&feature=youtu.be

 

[Oracle]

Played some lucas this past weekend. Smart rolling is really hard to deal with as lucas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vkemw_Q1PHk&t=5m16s

 

[HammerTime]

For anyone who might be interested, at Impulse 2013 I beat mango's falco with Lucas in winner's bracket. Unfortunately that set wasn't recorded but we played each other again in loser's and he beat me.

If anyone wants to check out the loser's set here it is:
http://www.twitch.tv/clashtournaments/b/417767431

It goes from around 3:12:00 until around 3:23:00

earlier in the video there's also sets with me against an ivysaur player and against weon-x

 

[Ishiey]

^ YT link in case anyone prefers that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMvjxX50lvU

 

[Burnsy]

"I got gimmick'd by Lucas" - Mango 2013

 

[Dron]

I made a short little combo vid, didn't have a lot of clips to work with and a lot of the stuff is escapable but I wanted to make something before 2.6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07DGIjbOPH0

p.s. the quality is amazing

 

[NeonApophis]

http://www.twitch.tv/azprojectmelee/b/426866061

There are a lot of games with my Lucas in this stream recording. Lucas dittos against Burnsy with good audio start at 2:27:00. I use him in a round robin that starts at about 3:34:00, and there are a bunch of random friendlies starting at the beginning of the video.

I don't have a ton of matchup experience yet, and I'm still figuring out a lot of the strategy surrounding Lucas's neutral game, but I also do a lot of things that I don't see anyone else doing. Feel free to give commentary if you have any, but I really just wanted to show some of the stuff I've been figuring out.

 

[Master WGS]

With 2.6 out, I'll probably start messing with this again. Really I was just bummed when the server moved that it messed up my first post formatting. Eventually I'll have the heart to look at it again.

 

[Huemon]

I made a short little combo vid, didn't have a lot of clips to work with and a lot of the stuff is escapable but I wanted to make something before 2.6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07DGIjbOPH0

p.s. the quality is amazing

Your lucas plays are really sub-par and I think you need to step up your game, scumbag.

 

[Dron]

get out of here

 

[Master WGS]

Alright, deleted all the links since none of them were to 2.6, and until the collapse tag works like I want it to, you guys get to deal with a big ol' OP 'cause I didn't get all those images for nothing. I'll get a Metaknight one up there soon, too, likely with one of Lucas' new animations hitting him.

Start posting new vids and I'll try to stay on top of this thread as stuff gets posted.