About Ness-------------------------------------------------------------------- Ness is originally from the 1994 Super Nintendo game EarthBound, an English port of the Japanese game Mother 2. The game was a big hit in Japan, but EarthBound didn't sell very well, despite Nintendo's bundling a strategy guide with it and doing advertising involving scratch-and-sniff stickers. However, due to its unique humor, the game became a cult classic and still enjoys status as a cult favorite. Mother 2 was a sequel to (try and guess); Mother, which was only in Japan and for the NES. It was never translated. There was a sequel called Mother 3, but this too was Japan-only and this time for the Game Boy Advance. Lucas in Brawl hails from Mother 3, and actually speaks better English than Ness. EarthBound is yet to be rereleased in the U.S. on GBA or Virtual Console, but the good folks at Starmen.net are petitioning their hardest for this to happen. The ESRB recently rated EarthBound, a sign that it will probably be released soon. Huzzah! Ness was a surprise inclusion in Super Smash Bros. 64 due to the obscurity of EarthBound and the non-obscurity of all the other characters. He was profanely awesome and, some might say, overpowered; ranked as the third best character (behind Pikachu and Kirby) for reasons that will be explained later. About me---------------------------------------------------------------------- I started playing Smash Bros. when it first came out, with Super Smash Bros. 64 in 1999. I started as Kirby and, like any low-level Kirby player, spammed his Stone attack like it was going out of style. I soon moved onto Ness, however, and have rarely looked back. I stuck with him through Melee, when he was close to the worst character in the game, but now in Brawl he is excellent again. I only play Brawl casually, and usually in 4-player so don't complain that my strategies don't hold up in tournament-level play or that I don't know enough about fighting one-on-one. ======================================================================= Table of contents ======================================================================= To skip to any of these sections, press control-F or command-F and paste the name of the section you want into the box. Smash terminology for noobs Why you should play as Ness Ness Basics Ness Through the Ages Ness in Brawl Ness's Attacks and How to Use Them General Strategies Some Combos Ness vs. Lucas Comparison 1 on 1 vs. Big ol' 4-player free-for-alls strategies Team Strategies Multi Man Brawl Home Run Contest Item Guide Individual Character strategies Fighting Ness Stages Random Lists Contacting Me Smash terminology for noobs-------------------------------------------------- -Spam- Using one or a few moves repeatedly. Usually people spam projectiles, but any move can be spammed. This is very annoying and is looked down upon. -SSB64 or SSB/SSBM/SSBB- Short for Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 64 (the original), Super Smash Bros. Melee, and Super Smash Bros. Brawl, respectively. -Meteor Smash/spike- any move that will knock an airborne opponent straight down (like Ness's down aerial move). This does little except look cool when the opponent is above land, but is deadly when someone is Meteor Smashed over a pit, resulting in a KO. -PK Thunder Missile/PK Cannonball/ PK Thunder2- Hitting yourself with PK Thunder to become a deadly projectile or for recovery. -Nair/fair/uair/bair/dair- Used to refer to aerials. Nair is a contraction of Neutral Aerial, where Neutral Aerial becomes N-aerial, which is then shortened to N-air, which is shortened to nair. Nair=neutral aerial, fair=forward aerial, uair=up aerial, bair=back aerial, and dair=down aerial. -Spot dodge- shield button and smash down on the control stick/d-pad. Makes a quick dodge. -Sweetspot- hitting with the "best" part of an attack to deal the most damage and knockback possible. -Dodge Roll- shield button and either side smash on the control stick/d-pad. Makes a roll that can be used to avoid projectiles or safely get you behind a foe. -Gimp/gimping- Killing an enemy who has low damage by using moves that kill regardless of damage (like Meteor Smashes and the Dragoon) -Nerf/depower- When a character or an attack is made less powerful from one Smash Bros. game from the next. -Buff/power up- When a character or an attack is made more powerful from one Smash Bros. game from the next. -Knockback- How far an attack sends a foe -pwnee- One who gets pwned, duh. -Combo- I don't see how anyone can not know this, but.. a combo is a set of attacks strung together that the opponent has a hard time getting out of. -Edgeguarding- Trying to prevent an opponent already off the stage from landing back on it. -Punishability- The likelihood that, by using a move, you leave yourself open to being hit in retaliation. -Edgehogging- There Can be Only One. Only one person can be holding the edge at one time, and if you are, an opponent won't be able to grab it when recovering. You get a few moments of invincibility when you first grab the edge, so try to time them so the opponent's recovery move can't dislodge you. -Finisher- an attack that KOs the opponent. -Priority- An attack's chance of negating other attacks and keeping on going. -Disjointed hitbox- anything a character uses to hit another character with that is not actually part of them, like swords, for example. Ness's baseball bat and yo-yos are good examples of disjointed hitboxes. Disjointed hitboxes tend to have superior priority and can easily clank enemies' moves and still hit. -Clank- when two attacks hit each other, the one with the higher priority goes through, but if the two attacks have the same priority, both end and no damage is done. Negating an attack by hitting it with an attack of your own is called clanking it (named after the clanking noise made when two attacks hit each other.) Wavedash- ha ha, no wavedash in Brawl Why you should play as Ness----------------------------------------------- He is a very unique character and can almost always be counted on to have the proper move for virtually any situation. He is nice and fast, but not so light that you will die very easily. He has three, count 'em, three projectiles for a variety of uses and has a few good finishers. he fights well in the air, if you like that kind of thing. If you enjoy being underestimated, the computer does not play a very good Ness, and so players that have only versed CPU Nesses will be stunned when you destroy them. Ness makes a great character to kill spammers with since he can absorb energy-based projectiles {{cough Pit's arrows cough}} and heal. He can reflect projectiles, so if you play people who predictably spam large projectiles (like Samus or Lucario), you can have quite a lot of fun. Many of his moves are very satisfying like this; nothing beats nailing someone with PK Flash, meteor smashing them when they try to recover, absorbing their fully charged Super Scope shots (and subsequently L.O.L.ing at them), or giving people trying to intercept your recovery a lethal surprise. Ness Basics------------------------------------------------------------- The main thing to know about Ness, the thing that makes him unique, is that most of his moves can be used in several different ways. This makes him very adaptable and versatile, but also that much harder to use. He has a few very powerful attacks {{cough PK Flash cough}} and does not want for finishers like some {{cough Sheik cough}}. He also has 3 projectiles that are vastly different in terms of use and usefulness. His recovery can be very good if you master it. He is excellent in the air and can ALMOST challenge Jigglypuff (almost). There is a tradeoff; he is pretty light. You will get killed a bit more easily than if you play as one of the middleweights, but thankfully not as easily as uber- light characters like Jigglypuff or Mr. Game and Watch. Ness Through the Ages---------------------------------------------------- Like I said earlier, Ness was incredibly good in SSB64. His smash attacks sent the opponent a long ways and were excellent at KOing, his PK Fire came out quickly and was hard to escape, and hitting himself with PK Thunder sent him a huge distance and was practically a one-hit- kill if you crashed into someone with it. He was not quite the aerial master we know and love him for today; his forward and back aerials were not blessed by the magical PK goodness they enjoy in Melee and Brawl, but his down aerial more than made up for it. It was a very powerful meteor smash that came out almost instantly, making him great at edgeguarding. His throws were obscenely powerful and were a primary method of killing. In Melee, Ness recieved a tragic nerfing. His PK Fire took a while longer to deploy and did not trap the opponent as well, his PK Thunder was too hard to control, and, on top of that, it you did hit yourself with it you did not recover as far is in SSB64 and hitting opponents with yourself was a terrible attack. His new special, PK Flash, proved horribly limited in its usages and difficult to use (but it did look nifty.) His up and down smashes were slow and did virtually nothing if you managed to hit someone with them. His once-godly throws were useless and, due to decreased range, hard to even pull off. His dair that used to spike powerfully and come out instantly took such a long time to activate that I almost never got a meteor smash with it, and the opponent always managed to recover from it even when I did. As a kind of prize for putting up with all this nerfing, Ness became a lot more powerful in the air. True, his dair and nair were useless and almost useless, respectively, but he gained magic PSI sparklies (that's a technical term) on his fair, making it good at racking up damage and giving it good priority. His bair became a good killing move due to it's gaining PSI awesomeness if it connected. To add insult to injury, his new look looked kinda stupid, with a head way too big for his body. Fortunately, he comes to Brawl vastly improved. Ness in Brawl------------------------------------------------------------------ Ness has been very powered up for Brawl. Hooray! It seems to me that he has been the most powered up out of all returning characters, but Game and Watch fans may want to argue that point. Mr. G&W is certainly improved a lot in pretty much every way. But I digress... Anyway, Ness is now almost as good as he was in SSB64, and no moves come to mind as being nerfed much. His PK Fire works with SSB64-level speed, his PK Thunder is easier to control and hit with, and, while it still does not take you as far as in SSB64, PK Thunder2 packs a devastating punch greater than or equal to its 64-bit counterpart. His PSI Magnet still sports the awesome look it gained in Melee, and is still as useful as it was, and it has a new, unexpected helpful side effect as well. PK Flash is still a bit limited (OK, a lot limited,) but is faster and even more powerful, albeit with a smaller blast radius. Not much to say about his standard A attacks and tilts, but his smashes, yo-yos in particular, have been buffed exponentially. The bat comes out a touch slower but is more powerful (like it needed it..), but the yo-yos are the star of this show. They actually deal good damage and have great knockback! You won't be getting many kills with them, but at least they are useful now. They come out faster, too, by the way. You'll use them often. His aerials are better to boot; his dair is still laggy but so much less so that you can actually get a few meteor smashes with them, and the opponent can't escape dying once hit. I've spiked ROB and had him be unable to recover. In case you haven't unlocked ROB yet, he has the best recovery in the game (except Jigglypuff, of course.) You'll actually get a few kills this way. His fair and nair are unchanged, but his bair is perhaps his most nerfed move. It still packs a wallop, but you'll have to sweetspot it to reap the rewards. His uair is changed a bit as well. It now has pathetic range, but does incredible knockback if it does hit. This makes it a great finisher, since it's still pretty easy to hit with. His throws are yet another buffed aspect. His grab still has the terrible range it was saddled with in Melee, but his dash grab has some pretty impressive range on it, making it very easy to grab the enemy if you run at them. His forward throw always throws the foe a set distance, but this isn't as bad as it sounds (details to follow). His up throw is sorta useless, but I guess it sets up combos well, I dunno. His down throw is as awesome as ever, but pretty much unchanged. His backwards throw is where he shines. It is actually an ok killing move, and no-one has had a good killing throw, no-one! since SSB64. They need to be a good bit over 100%, but it's pretty easy to grab people. He also looks a bit more human, and no longer like he has an inoperable brain tumor. His new costumes, particularly the Mr. Saturn shirt, look great. ======================================================================= Ness's Attacks and How to Use Them------------------------------------- ======================================================================= I have ranked these in terms of damage, knockback, usefulness, applications, and awesomeness/fun factor. ------------------------------------------------ Basic (A-button) attacks ------------------------------------------------- =Standard= -A - One basic punch. Does negligible damage and essentially no knockback. Only useful in interrupting big scary attacks (Like Ganondorf's Warlock Punch or something similar), but if you are going to use this, you might as well make it a AAA combo for some decent damage and a bit of knockback. Utterly useless on its own. -Usefulness- 1, Ease of Use- 10, Fun/awesomeness- 1, Damage/knockback- 1/1 -Kills at: Yeah, right. -Standard AAA combo- A jab followed by another jab followed by a kick. Does a fairly small amount of damage, but gets the opponent a decent distance away from you. Very fast, so I use it when I can't get any other moves in. Use frequently as it is impossible to dodge all three hits and difficult to shield. The opponet may clank it, though. -Usefulness- 10, Ease of Use- 10, Fun/awesomeness- 2, Damage/knockback- 5/5 -Kills at: No dice. -Dash Attack- Sometimes called PSI Brainshock. Ness runs and three sparklies appear in front of him, a bit like as in his Fair. Usually all the sparklies hit and trap the opponent until the last sparkly. If the last one hits for any reason, it sends the opponent upwards, and then you can try to attack them. If the last sparkly does NOT connect and you only hit with the first or second sparkly or both, the opponent is either pushed forwards a decent distance (good) or merely stunned a bit (not so great.) The attack does decent damage, particularly if all of it hits. This is a good attack to dash into combat with because it lasts a while and comes out quickly, but it becomes predictable quickly and so you shouldn't overuse it. -Usefulness- 6, Ease of Use- 7, Fun/awesomeness- 3, Damage/knockback- 5/6 -Kills at: Not happening. =Tilts= -Forward tilt- One side kick. Very like standard AAA combo in terms of damage and when you should use it, but only one hit so it is easier to defend against. It knocks the enemy farther away the higher damage they have, so it can actually send them a pretty good ways off if they have high (100+) damage. At extreme damage levels it can kill, but so can pretty much anything else. -Usefulness- 10, Ease of Use- 9, Fun/awesomeness- 2, Damage/knockback- 4/6 -Kills at: Too high. 150+. -Down tilt- A single quick kick low to the ground, but you can press the button rapidly to do many kicks. One alone does pathetic damage and knockback, but you should never do just one. You can/should do more until the enemy stops getting hit by them, but be careful 'cuz they might try to hit you back. This attack should be used sparingly in regular combat, but you can edgeguard with it every once in a while (usually you should edgeguard with PK Flash) to throw people off. Stand at the edge of the stage and use this move repeatedly so your foot goes out over the side and hits people as they try to recover. You can keep this move up forever, so don't fret too much about timing. -Usefulness- 8, Ease of Use- 9, Fun/awesomeness- 4, Damage/knockback- 7/2 -Kills at: Forget it. -Up Tilt- Ness hits above him as though "setting" a volleyball or trying to catch something. Sends the opponent an OK distance straight up if it hits, but they must be directly next to you or above you. Here too they fly farther the more damage they have, and you can kill them at lower damages than with the side tilt, but they still have to be so damaged that you are better off trying other things. This attack does not repeat will like the down tilt does, so don't even think about using it that way. This is Ness's only attack that always sends people straight up, so it is pretty useful, but don't overuse it. -Usefulness- 8, Ease of Use- 7, Fun/awesomeness- 2, Damage/knockback- 3/6 -Kills at: 160+, but at least it kills. =Smashes= -Side Smash- This is a hilarious attack. If you take the time to think about it, it is pretty silly that your slightly overweight, baseball-cap- wearing kid character just smacked a scary-looking dragon or ape or whatever with a baseball bat. This makes this attack awesome and worth using if you can. Joking aside, this is a pretty useful attack, and we are getting into the attacks that can be used multiple ways. Used as is, the bat is powerful and a good method to KO with. You should know that the tip of the bat deals more damage and knockback than if you are standing right next to them when you hit them. This is good, but you shouldn�t worry about trying to do this too often as trying too hard to set up a �tipper�, as they�re called, will get you KOd. The other useful effect of the bat is that it can reflect any projectile, much like Fox's reflector, as if Ness is hitting a baseball. This is deeply useful for reflecting big scary projectiles like Samus's Charge Shot or Lucario's Shadow Ball-oops- I mean Aura sphere. I miss Mewtwo so much! [sobs] The timing required for this is inhuman if you're at close range, so don't depend on this. At longer range, the timing is much easier, but they will have time to react and shield, if they know what's good for them, as, like Fox's reflector, the projectiles return to sender more powerful than on delivery. This strategy is best used sparingly since the opponent will catch on quickly. Deeply awesome. -Usefulness- 7, Ease of Use- 5, Fun/awesomeness- 7.5, Damage/knockback- 8/8 -Kills at: 100-120. -Up Smash- Ness throws a yo-yo out in front of him and performs Around the World, hitting in an arc above him. If you charge it, the yo-yo floats in the air in an amusingly impossible fashion in front of Ness before going Around the World. The unique thing about this is that the yo-yo deals damage when floating. You can trap the opponent in the floating yo-yo's attack and then immediately smack them with it at full charge. This attack has an even better hilarity factor than the baseball bat, and should be used often. Since the yo-yo while floating stops most attacks from the front and has good priority, you can defend yourself with it too. I enjoy blocking projectiles with it, but it foils dash attacks well enough too. You can beat up multiple opponents with it, making it a good move to use in multiplayer (more than one-on-one, anyway.) New to Brawl is this yo-yo's ability to do some damage. It actually knocks the opponent far enough away from you that they can't counterattack. If they shield it, just hold the charging yo-yo and it will deplete their shield greatly. You can even kill with it, but this only starts being possible at 130+ damage. It is still a great and versatile move. -Usefulness- 9, Ease of Use- 9, Fun/awesomeness- 8.5, Damage/knockback- 7/6.5 -Kills at: 140 or so. -Down Smash- Very similar to Up Smash, except it starts behind Ness and goes to the front, a bit like Walk the Dog. The same charge mechanics appply, except behind Ness; you can still defend yourself against rear attacks and block projectiles. It is even better at clearing you some space in a 3 or more player fight. It still gives you enough knockback that they can't counterattack, but is virtually never fatal. Use frequently, but not quite as often as the Up Smash. -Usefulness- 8, Ease of Use- 8, Fun/awesomeness- 7.5, Damage/knockback- 7/6 -Kills at: Sorry but no. =Specials= ------------------------------------------------------------------ -Side Special; PK Fire- Ness says PK Fire in a way that will annoy your friends if you use it regularly amd shoots a small orange projectile that is lightning bolt-shaped. It will only travel three or so Ness-lengths along the ground before vanishing, so don't try to snipe people from a distance with it. It won't work. The little orange projectile is pretty pathetic and only heals you 2% if you absorb it using PSI Magnet and it vanishes if it hits the ground, so it's no use on slopes. PK Fire is NOT pathetic, however. If it hits someone, it bursts into a pillar of flame which is difficult to escape from. Big, slow characters can be easily trapped until the pillar dies away after a few seconds, as can most characters at low damage percentages. As the foe has more damage, it will become more likely that they will be knocked out of the pillar. If they DO stay trapped for the whole duration, they take about 22% damage. If you use PK Fire in midair, the projectle goes diagonally downwards, but it still does the exact same thing if it hits. This is good for hitting opponents on the ground waiting to hit you when you land. Since the flames do not hurt Ness himself, you can safely walk up to them and get a free hit. The bat is the attack of choice for this, and a fully charged hit is quite easy to pull off while they are held captive. The PK Fire damage plus the bat damage can exceed 40%, so doing this twice will set them up for a finisher. If you somehow trap them while they are at higher damages, say 80 or more, you may went to hit them with a Cannonball while they are helpless, and this will often result in a KO. Yay! This is of course excellent, but PK Fire has other, even more excellent uses as well. The most evil thing you can do with PK Fire is for you to try to nail someone with it while they are over a cliff. In case you didn't know, hitting something with PK Fire while it is in the air causes the usual pillar of flame, except that the pillar falls down. This may seem like it is only good for Ness's Break the Targets challenge in SSB64, but what if someone is trapped in the pillar when it falls? That's right! They STAY trapped in the pillar as it falls. It probably won't fall long enough for them to die while still in it, but it can certainly drop them far enough so that they can't recover. Characters whose recovery only takes them horizontally are very suceptible to this {{cough Donkey Kong cough}}. This is amazing and you get to watch them painic and try to get out of the pillar and recover. A side note; you don't need to worry about Fox and company reflecting your PK Fire because by the time they reflect it, it won't go far enough to hit you. For this to happen, you would have to be at point blank range, and, due to the lag on PK Fire's deployment, doing it at close range is a bad idea. It is best used at such a range that they are so far away from you that they can't hit you while you start using it, but close enough that they don't have time to react. -Usefulness-7 Ease of Use- 7 Fun/awesomeness- 7 Damage/knockback- 7/2 -Kills at: The closer to zero, the more likely you are to trap them off a cliff. -Up Special; PK Thunder- Ah, PK Thunder. Equal parts steerable projectile, devastating attack, and recovery move. If you're going to play as Ness, you WILL need to master all these uses. First up; the projectile. It looks like an electric sphere with a tail. When you use it, Ness goes into a psychic-looking pose and is immobile, since you steer the PK Thunder using the Control Stick. You can of course hit people with the projectile. It does 8% damage and knocks them an OK distance, but if you hit them with the tail it does 1% damage and no knockback, but they are stunned for a few moments and the PK Thunder does not vanish like it does if you hit them with the thunderball part of it. While they are immobilized, you can swing the Thunder around and hit them with the ball end, or, if you are in midair and feeling lucky, you can hit yourself with it and fly into them with great force. This is hard to do but well worth doing. I like to use this to annoy distant opponents while I stay safely in some secure spot. This will often provoke or bore them into trying to come get you, at which point you can kill them at close range with your uber-leet skillz. Alternatively, they may just shield your Thunder since they have lots of warning. So it's not THAT useful in normal cicumstances, but if someone has a Golden Hammer or similarly big, scary item that you don't want to be smacked by, this strategy lets you sit comfortably away from danger and shoot steerable projectiles at them until they drop the item or it runs out. You can even break the Smash Ball this way. One neat use of Thunder is that, if you can hit someone in a bubble off the screen (maybe called a Maginfying Glass, I dunno), you can kill them regardless of damage. Hitting yourself with PK Thunder launches you in the opposite direction as where you hit yourself with it. So if you want to go left, you'd want to hit yourself on the right. Doing this is called PK Thunder2, PK Thunder Missile, or PK Cannonball. It does 25 damage if you hit someone while electrified, but the main allure of Cannonballing into people is that is incredibly powerful knockback-wise. It is a great way of killing people with less than 100% damage (much less for light characters). I have seen it kill Samus, who is a one of the three heavyest characters in the game, at 64%. It kills Mario, the so-called "average" character who is actually middle of the road in terms of weight, starting at 30% if he's near an edge. This is Ness's stongest move, even surpassing PK Flash, his strongest move in Melee. The Thunder itself moves in a tighter circle than in Melee, so you can hit yourself with it more quickly. If an opponent is stunned by a Deku nut, shield break, etc., this is one of the moves you should consider doing. The other are fully charged bat or PK Flash. Since you sail a good distance when you hit yourself, a decent idea might be to stand a bit away from everyone in a free-for all and then launch yourself at them with a Cannonball. They will be so busy fighting each other that you can get triple kills this way, but they catch on fast and will scatter in future if they know what's good for them. Ness has ridiculous priority while electrified and shrugs off any projectile, so you needn't worry much about being counterattacked. The last, possibly most important use for PK Thunder is recovery. Since it shoots you a good ways if it hits you, it is just a matter of practice to be able to recover effectively using the Cannonball. Just hit yourself towards the stage. It's easy! But, since you need to have some room to maneuver the Thunder, you won't be able to use your handy third jump in deep trenches like the one in the middle of Yoshi's Island from Melee. Also, if others are also trying to recover, you may hit them instead of yourself and fall helplessly, so if you ARE falling along with others, you may want to wait for the crowd to thin a bit. The worst part is that you have to be able to recover even when you can't see where the Thunder is because you are offscreen, so you must be able to recover in any direction while blind. Practice! *Side Note* Shouln't it be PK Lightning? Wouldn't "PK Thunder" just be a psychically-generated loud sound? I guess PK Lightning just doesn't have the same ring to it. PK Thunder- Usefulness-4 Ease of Use- 7 Fun/awesomeness- 5 Damage/knockback- 6/3 -Kills at: 300 if they're near the top of the screen (Sudden Death!). 400 if not. PK Thunder2- Usefulness- 10 Ease of Use- 4 Fun/awesomeness- 10 Damage/knockback- 9/10 -Kills at: 30 if they're near an edge. -Neutral Special- PK Flash- PK Flash is a tank. Ness says PK Flash in a way that makes you think he either has a speech impediment or a really thick Onett accent, shoots a small green spark into the air that gradually grows and decends before detonating in an epic green explosion that deals 37% damage. Sound spectacular? It is. Even better, you can steer it horizontally and it charges faster than in Melee. Tragically, it has a very limited range of applications. Trying to hit anyone with a fully charged Flash is utterly stupid. It is so big and obvious that if you try it on anyone in normal conditions they will either: panic and run away, making you miss; shield, ruining your effort; or smack you with their most powerful attack while you charge the move helplessly. Ow. Needless to say, this should be avoided, but you MIGHT be able to get away with it in a 4-player free-for-all while the other 3 players are occupied with killing each other. Here again, however, they will catch on fast. It can be downright dangerous to use PK Flash around G&W, since he will likely absorb it with Oil Panic. Even if the other two attacks he catches before dumping the bucket on you are crap, the PK Flash he caught will be more than enough for 70-80+ damage and a one-hit kill. And no, you cannot absorb the Oil using PSI Magnet, although other Nesses and Lucuses (Luci?) will be only too eager to absorb the Flash with their PSI Magnets and heal for 50+ damage. So what is PK Flash good for? Three things; edgeguarding, looking epic, and hurting people above you. The looking epic comes from the fact that you can overkill stunned people with it. Stun them with a Deku Nut, Belossum, or by breaking their shield, and you can get a free, fully charged Flash in on them. There is no better attack for killing stunned people than this. As soon as you see someone stunned, go for it. The hurting-people-above-you aspect is pretty simple; just shoot a Flash up if someone keeps dropping on you. You won't be able to charge it all the way, but you can still deter them very effectively. The last, most useful use of PK Flash is edgeguarding. It too is quite simple. After you knock a foe off the edge, as they try to recover, charge a Flash to nail them with as they return. They will find it (heh heh) difficult to recover and dodge the Flash at the same time. After they learn just how painful it is to be hit by a fully charged Flash just when they think they have safely recovered, they will be very wary of getting hit again and may plunge to their death of falling as they deperately try to avoid being nailed again. Be sure to taunt. Since you have nothing better to do while a foe tries to recover, you may as well always try this technique. even if you miss, the opponent probably won't be able to counterattack in time, so this use of PK Flash is probably the safest around. Usefulness- 3 Ease of Use- 2 Fun/awesomeness- 10 Damage/knockback- 10/9 Kills at: 50-60 or so. -Down Special; PSI Magnet- Useless, you say? Hardly. It has always been pretty useful, but in Brawl it has gained two new effects that make it more usable and less punishable. The basic idea of this move is that a nifty- looking blue shield thing appears around Ness and, if you are hit by any kind of energy-based projectile, i.e. lasers, electricity (Pikaaaa!), etc, you prevent the damage and instead recover 1.5x what it would have dealt you. This makes playing as Ness one of the few times when you will be happy to see spammers like Pit, Pikachu, and the like on online games. Damage running a bit high? Stroll over to the spammer, put up the PSI shield, and enjoy. If they're used to spamming, it may take them a while to realize what you're doing and stop, and, during that time, you can recover scads of damage. When facing Samus this move is a gift from the heavens as well, as EVERY Samus player spams the charge shot (which you can absorb) . You may notice that people are killing you while you are shielded. This can be annoying, but Brawl affords you some opportunities to prevent this annoyance. One new effect is that, when you deactivate the shield, anyone nearbly will be pushed away. The effect is subtle and does no damage, but if they are gleefully charging a smash attack, this should push them far enough away for you to be safe and counterattack. The other new effect, and one many people don't know about, is that after absorbing anything, you can immediately do an attack without the usual cool-down lag, allowing you to blast enemies who think that you are vulnerable after absorbing something. The bat is a good chice for this, as is a PK Fire if they're longer off or aforward tilt if they're closer in. Doing this once or twice will make them think twice before trying it again. One last usage of the PSI Magnet is to discourage spamming altogether. If you and the spammer are the only ones playing, and you always absorb their Light Arrows or whatever, they may stop, and everyone will be happier. In case you hadn't already figured it out, playing as Ness on a team with someone who has an energy projectile and with Team Attack on allows your friend to heal you whenever you need it. Even better is when your team consists of only Nesses, in which case you can both heal each other. Additionally, you can absorb some energy-based stage hazards, particularly those on Corneria like the Arwings' lasers. -Usefulness- 8 Ease of Use- 4 Fun/awesomeness- 7 Damage/knockback- 0/1 Kills at: If they're stunned, maybe you can push them off a cliff with this, otherwise nuh-uh. -Ness's Final Smash: PK Starstorm- Can this be counted as a special? I guess so... ANyway, I dislike Final Smashes because they unbalance the game even more than Golden Hammers and other too-powerful whatnot. I play with Smash Balls off, but you should know what this move does even if you don't ever use it. Ness floats a bit off the ground and yells "PK Starstorm!" Then giant meteors come down and kill the crap out of your opponents. Unless they move. Or dodge. Or stand still and get lucky. Or run back and forth in a panic. There is not much skill involved in using this move since the meteors' pattern is generated randomly. Too bad. You ARE invincible while Ness is floating and burning and yelling, but this wears off midway through the attack, when the metors are still falling, so you have some time to try to punt your panicked opponents into the meteors. Each meteor does 20% damage and smash-attack level knockback, and more than a dozen fall each time. Unless they have high damage, one meteor might not kill them, but they can and do get flung into other meteors, which is usually fatal. Note; if you use this move while off a cliff, Ness floats as usual for the first half, but falls for the second, which is bad news for you if you don't have any jumps left. If you die while the meteors are falling, they stop falling. Bummer. One last attribute of the meteors is that they fall over the entire stage about equally, meaning that, if you use this at the Temple, your odds of hitting one specific area are rather slim, but they become much better on smaller stages like Final Destination. This move isn't quite as epic as I would like it to be, but 'tis enough, 'twill serve. Usefulness- 10 Ease of Use- 10 Fun/awesomeness- 7 Damage/knockback- 8/8 -Kills at: For just one meteor, maybe 90-100. If they hit multiple meteors, they don't need to be damaged at all. =Aerials= -------------------------------------------------------------------- -Neutral aerial (nair)- Ness spins and hurts anyone right next to him. Yes, you have to be right next to somone to do this, but it activates instantly and is Ness's only attack to hit all around him simultaneously. Due to its speed, this comes in handy in tight spots, like being surrounded or not having enough time to do anything else. It has decent knockback, but don't expect to kill anyone with it. It lasts a small while after being activated, but if you don't hit anyone with the initial hit, you will do less damage and knockback, to the point where they won't be knocked far enough away to not counterattack. Useful overall. -Usefulness-7.5 Ease of Use- 7.5 Fun/awesomeness- 3 Damage/knockback- 5/4 -Kills at: Upwards of 100-150. -Forward Aerial (fair)- Ness holds his hands in front of him as he has since SSB64, but PSI magics appear around it. They cause pretty high damage, 11% or so, but have no knockback until the end, when the knockback is only enough to push the enemy away from you so they can't counterattack. You'll never kill anyone with this except on stages where you can walk to your death, like Flat Zone. It is only really good for racking up damage, but it does come out almost instantly and have decent priority, so you should use it often. Quite useful overall. -Usefulness-8 Ease of Use- 9 Fun/awesomeness- 3 Damage/knockback- 6/2 -Kills at: Nope. -Up aerial (uair)- Ness does a flip and hits people with his less-oversized- than in-Melee head. It now has very limited range but is very powerful. It activates pretty instantly, but, due to the short range, you'll want to do a jump or midair jump to help the range a bit. This is a good move to use when they block/dodge/clank all your usual, more obvious finishers. Otherwise, this is quite limited in its applications. -Usefulness-3 Ease of Use- 4 Fun/awesomeness- 4 Damage/knockback- 5/7 -Kills at: A bit more than 100. -Down aerial (dair)- Ness makes a noise, waits a beat, and puts a foot down in midair. The foot sends the opponent straight down, but hitting any other part of Ness will do some minor damage and knockback, enough to get the enemy away from you but no more. The key to using this move well is learning the lag time between the activation and the stomp. Since this move spikes, you'll want to hit enemies with it while they're over voids, making them die. This requires practice, but is worth a try since it looks so cool if you can do it. It is a change from trying to PK Flash people as they return, and this is better for 3- or 4 player battles since you don't leave yourself open while charging the Flash. If you hit an earthbound (pun intended, sorry) enemy with this, they bounce off the ground and fly up into the air a good distance. -Usefulness-7 Ease of Use- 4 Fun/awesomeness- 10 Damage/knockback- 5.5/7 -Kills at: The spike kills at any percentage, hitting an enemy on the ground kills at 130+. -Back aerial (bair)- Ness kicks behind him. Boring-looking, but it electrocutes anyone who it hits as it first comes out, boosting its coolness factor considerably. It comes out almost instantly and if you do sweetspot it, it does 15 damage and has terrific knockback. This is one of Ness's killing moves. If you don't sweetspot it, it only does minor damage and knockback. If you don't hit with Ness's feet, it does minor knockback in random directions, but this may be useful, I don't know how. Since this activates so fast, you can and should use it often. -Usefulness-7 Ease of Use- 8 Fun/awesomeness- 6 Damage/knockback- 6/8 -Kills at: 90-100. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ness's Throws-------------------------------------------------------------- Getting hold of an enemy-------------------- Ness's standing grab range is as pathetic as it became in Melee. He has pretty short arms, so naturally his range suffers. Still, standing grabs are useful, no matter the range, but the main attraction here is Ness's much-improved dash grab. In Melee, he stumbled forwards, rarely actually grabbing anyone, but in Brawl he zooms forwards almost a full Ness-length before grabbing normally. This is blindingly fast and lets you grab an opponent as easily as if you had a tether grab, minus the long lag that tether grabs have if you miss. Coupled with this is the fact that Ness's throws are actually useful in Brawl. -Pummel (A while holding enemy)- Ness headbutts the enemy he is holding. Does very low damage, but you can headbutt once or twice then throw as normally for some extra damage. This doesn't seem worth it to me so I always skip the headbutts. If you feel otherwise, go for it. -Usefulness-2 Ease of Use- 8 Fun/awesomeness- 1 Damage/knockback- 2/0 -Kills at: No, it doesn't. -Forwards throw- Ness psychokinetically flings the opponent in front of him diagonally, doing 11 damage. The main thing about this throw is that it ALWAYS sends the opponent a certain distance. This means that you probably won't kill with it, but that you CAN set up edgeguards when the opponent has O% damage. You can throw them off an edge and PK Flash them as they return for 48 damage right off the bat. Or throw them and hit them with PK Fire while they're off the cliff for a kill (PK Fire traps them better the lower damage they have, and if you do this immediately they will only have 11 damage when you hit them with it). So it's not useless by a long shot. -Usefulness-7 Ease of Use- 7 Fun/awesomeness- 7 Damage/knockback- 5/5.5 -Kills at: Not at all. -Up Throw- Ness psychokinetically flings the opponent stright upwards after spinning them around over his head. Moderately nifty-looking. They need to be at 200+ damage for this throw to KO them, so you can forget about killing with it. I suppose you can combo into a PK Thunder or what-have-you, but there's no denying this is Ness's most useless throw. It deals 11 damage, but so does every other throw of Ness's except the down-throw. The only use I can see for this is to double-team people in Team Battle. You can throw them straight up into whatever attack your teammate has ready. At least this gets some points for looking showy. -Usefulness-1 (4 in Team Battles) Ease of Use- 6 Fun/awesomeness- 5 Damage/knockback- 5/6 -Kills at: 200+ -Down throw- Ness grabs the enemy, puts them on the ground, jumps over them and floats there, and bombards them with awesome PK flames for 9 damage. I use this the most often out of all of Ness's throws for one main reason- it looks totally badass. The damage is lower than all his other throws and it flings them a shorter distance, but the awesome factor outweighs its faults. Also, since they don't fly as far as in the other throws, you can combo out of this, making it a good way to rack up damage. This is the only throw I ever use except for the back throw, which I use when trying to finish someone, and the front throw, which I only use to try to get the foe off a cliff to be spiked at low damages. Every other time, this is the throw to use. -Usefulness- 8 Ease of Use- 8 Fun/awesomeness- 9 Damage/knockback- 4.5/3 -Kills at: Looks awesome, but doesn't kill. Murder's a crime. -Back throw- Just like the forwards throw, only Ness throws them (gasp) BACKWARDS! Bet you didn't see THAT coming. This is the best killing throw in the game. It kills at such a low percentage as to actually be useful, unlike everyone else's throws. You can kill at 100 or even lower damages if you are near to an edge. This is highly useful since it is a heck of a lot easier to grab someone than land a bat hit, PK Flash, or PK Cannonball, Ness's other big finishers that can kill at sub-100 damages. Not much more to say about this one. Great move. -Usefulness- 10 Ease of Use- 7.5 Fun/awesomeness- 6 Damage/knockback- 5/8 Kills at: 100 or so. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Taunts-------------------------------------------------------------------- Taunting people is one of the best aspects of Super Smash Bros., and Ness does not disappoint in this category. -Up taunt: Okay! This is the perfect taunt! It will annoy the bejeezus out of your friends if done repeatedly and looks cool besides. Use often. In SSB64, it was a quick "Okay!", but in Melee it was nerfed to a stupid-sounding "ooo--kay..", but its back to its original in Brawl. Also, it will kill your enemies at 20%! Well, maybe not. -Side taunt: Ness points his bat diagonally and makes a satistfied sound. Not as useful as the up-taunt, but better to use after killing someone with the bat. Infinity style points if you use this taunt and THEN kill someone with the bat. Awesome! -Down Taunt: Ness makes a noise and waves PSI energy about, which he watches. His worst taunt, in my opinion, but fun to use after killing someone using a PSI ability. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Well, that's about it for Ness's moveset, but there's more to learn! -------------------------------------------------------------------------- RECAP When you should use what move: Get away from me!-type situations: AAA, side tilt, down tilt, grabs Enemy coming in from above: PK Flash, PK Thunder, up tilt, up smash Surrounded!: Down smash, short-hopped nair Medium range/ characters that outreach you: PK Fire They're stunned! Free hit!: PK Flash/ PK Cannonball They're far away/have big scary item: PK Thunder Edgeguardin': PK Flash, dair Darn it, why don't you die already!?: (They have so plenty [120+ damage], and you can't seem to land one of the usual finishers) Uair, bair, back throw. Killin': Bair, bat, back throw, PK Flash, PK Canonnball Gimpin': Forward throw, PK Fire, dair Pwnin': PK Flash/ PK Cannonball General Strategies---------------------------------------------------- -Big characters are easier to gimp -Big characters are easier to kill with PK Fire while they're off the edge. -You can get free hits on spammers while they're busy spamming. PK Flash! -Use PSI Magnet if anyone tries to spam anything at you. -Enjoy yourself! Ness is the best character, since Mewtwo got the boot, for having fun-to-use moves. -Multihit attacks like the AAA combo or fair are hard to evade/shield. -Grab shield- or Counter/Double Team-happy opponents. -If you're playing SSB64, abuse his grabs, PK Cannonball, and godly dair. You'll miss them in Brawl. -If you're playing Melee, buy Brawl. Ness is infinitely better in Brawl than in Melee. If you can't get it for any reason, play as Mewtwo in Melee while you can. -Kill Pit. -Running away is OK. Some Combos----------------------------------------------------------- -PK Fire to bat -Down throw to fair to nair -Up throw to PK Thunder to PK Thunder to PK Thunder to... -Side tilt to PK Fire ---------------------------------------------------------------------- While Ness's moveset is still fresh in your mind, I might as well do a: Ness vs. Lucas Comparison------------------------------------------------ For Brawl, Ness gained what would in Melee be called a "clone," but is now called a "Luigified" version (luigified meaning that their moves are different enough that you can't really call it a clone.) His name is Lucas and he comes from Mother 3, a Japan-only game and sequel to EarthBound. He plays like a slower, faster version of Ness (with a few exceptions, of course [PK Freeze is the big one, of course]), and, sadly, his moves are not as versatile as Ness's, and you will find playing Lucas not at all the same as playing Ness. I don't like that they cloned Ness and think Lucas is inferior (and a coward besides; Ness shouldn't have taken that arrow for him...), but feel free to differ. Standard A-moves- ------------ -AAA-Lucas's standard AAA combo is similar to Ness's and only different cosmetically. No real difference here. Advantage: Draw -Dash attack- Lucas's behaves as if Ness only hit with the last sparkly; it pops them right up and does decent damage, but Lucas doesn't shoot any other sparklies except one after some lag, so this is useless. Advantage: Ness -Side Tilt- Like Ness's, only PSI-powered, so it's a tad slower and stronger. I prefer tilts to be fast, so I'm giving Ness the advantage here. Advantage: Ness -Up tilt- Virtually identical in function to Ness's, but Lucas's is a PSI- powered flip kick a lot like Fox's uair. Since it looks a bit cooler, I'm saying Lucas wins here. Unless you like volleyball. Advantage: Lucas -Down tilt- Lucas's is exactly the same as Ness's, except he does a little spin at the end. Ness looks happier doing it, though. Advantage: Draw -Forwards smash- Lucas's looks very similar, except instead of hitting enemies with a well-crafted, personalized bat, he hits them with a branch. A branch. This time, however, Lucas's is faster and weaker than Ness's, and, like I said, faster seems better to me; here especially since it makes reflecting stuff easier (yes, Lucas's bat reflects stuff too). But it's a BRANCH. Geez. Advantage: Lucas -Up smash- This is where they start getting REALLY different. Lucas's up smash bears no resemblence to Ness's yo-yo, instead he shoots up a big 'ol PSI hexagon that is massively powerful but as obvious as something obvious. This is probably the most- or second-most powerful up smash in the game, and I would love to see a good Lucas player duke it out with a good Ivysaur player in an up smash-only deathmatch to see whose is most awesome. Sadly, it is slow and painfully obvious, and lacks the range Ness's has besides, so victory to Ness. Advantage: Ness -Down smash- Another move that has no resemblance to any of Ness's moves. This one seems like it was actually inherited from Mewto. Bring him back, Nintendo! We miss him! Lucas points at the ground in front of him and shoots PK-stuff in three bursts. This is quite damaging but only hits in front of him and is slow. Ness's is quick, useful for absorbing projectiles, and hits on both sides of him. Advantage: Ness Specials-------------------------------------------- -Forwards special: PK Fire- These don't work the same at all. Lucas's only flings enemies diagonally; it doesn't have any of the trapping effect of Ness's. Worse, Ness's flings people instead of trapping if they have high enough damage. The only redeeming thing about it is that it always goes straight; it doesn't go diagonally if used in midair. This is good in some situations, bad in others. Ness wins. Advantage: Ness -Down special: PSI Magnet- Lucas undeniably has the advantage here. It looks like his would only cover his front half, but he turns if hit from behind, so it does cover all of him. I read on the Super Smash Wiki that Ness's Magnet heals for 1.5x the damage dealt, but Lucas's heals for 2x. Best of all, Lucas's doesn't just push enemies away subtly, it does good knockback and damage. Lucas's is genuinely superior here. Advantage: Lucas -Up Special: PK Thunder- The Thunders look identical, but work in different ways. Ness's is faster; enemies can outrun Lucas's if he tries to use it as a projectile, and they have ample warning that it's coming. It does a touch more damage and knockback than Ness's, but, as advertised, it does go through enemies so you can get multiple hits. This is all well and good in Multi-Man Brawl, where you can get many easy kills this way, but in regular brawls, the knockback knocks the enemy so far away and the Thunder moves so slowly that more than one hit on one opponent is impossible if they're paying attention. Even worse, since Lucas's goes through people, they can counterattack while your in the helpless PK Thunder-controlling animation. No, you shouldn't use this move of Lucas's for offence. Bear in mind that Ness's Thunder has none of these weaknesses. Also bad for Lucas is that, whle his PK Cannonball goes a good bit further, if you hit someone, most of the time you do under-ten damage and no knockback. If you and they stay trapped while you're electrified for the whole move, you do 30 or so damage and small knockback (Ness's does 25 and HUGE knockback.) So Lucas's PK Canonnball is useless too. It is better for recovery since you can recover in a crowd of falling people; no fear of hitting someone and losing PK Thunder. Lucas's Thunder's smaller turning radius means he can recover in some trenches Ness would die in (Ness's Thunder hits the wall and vanishes), this is too steep a price to pay. Advantage: Ness -Neutral Special: PK Flash/PK Freeze- I hate PK Freeze. It's like the developers said "Hey, PK Flash is awesome! But let's give Lucas an attack like it that, if you hit someone with it, it freezes them! Yeah! Freezing's awesome! Except that it does less damage, and won't kill anyone, and you can't hit them 'cuz the ice block pops up a bit! Yeah! WOOHOO Lucas!" This attack is horrible. PK Flash and Freeze are both so hard to hit with that, if you do, you might as well deal 37 damage and kill them rather than do crappy damage and freeze them. You don't even get free hits on them since the ice block flies up a little if it encases someone. You can't use it for edgeguarding since they usually come out of the block at a higher altitude than they entered it at. Utter fail. Advantage: Ness Aerials------------------------------------- -Neutral Aerial- Lucas does a flip like Ness but also crackles with psycho- kinetic energy, just like everyone's favorite non-returning Melee character, Mewtwo. This is laggier but does more damage and looks cooler. Since Ness's in faster and the difference in damage is no biggie, Ness takes the day. Advantage: Ness -Forward aerial- Just like their dash attacks, Lucas's fair is the equivalent of Ness's last sparkly alone, so it has lag, but very similar effects. Ness wins because of this lag. Advantage: Ness -Up aerial- Ness's has less range but much greater power. Since both come out instantly, I'm giving Ness this one since they're so similar. Advantage: Ness -Back aerial- These are very different. Ness's is rather straightforward and quite powerful, but Lucas's is weird. He does a backflip and kicks. It is laggy but if you have ridiculous timing and luck, it can be a weak spike. Otherwise, it is just weak and laggy and hits the opponent in no particular direction. Advantage: Ness -Down aerial- Lucas's dair is much like Ness's only instantaneous and with PSI sparkiles. Ness's spikes powerfully, but Lucas's spikes only on the last hat and then weakly. If Ness had as much lag on this as he did in Melee, I'd give this to Lucas, but, as he doesn't, Ness wins. Advantage: Ness Throws------------------------------------- Lucas has greater standing grab range, but they tie on dash grabs. A few brownie points to Lucas for being able to use his grab move (the Rope Snake) for a tether recovery. -Pummel- Both do the same thing. 'Nuff said. Advantage: Draw -Up throw- Identical in effect, both look a bit different. Lucas's is not as cool as Ness's, but I'm ignoring that. Not. Advantage: Ness -Forward throw- Both look similar but Ness's has set knockback, making it useful for gimping with dairs or PK Fire. Lucas's is useless for killing so Ness gets this one. Advantage: Ness -Down throw- Both put the foe on the ground and BURNINATE them but Ness does it cooler. Advantage: Draw -Back throw- Lucas's back throw is useless, Ness's kills people, Ness wins. Advantage: Ness FINAL SMASH----------------------------- Lucas gets more and yellow meteors that, although they do less damage each, only 14%, are bigger and harder to dodge, and you get more of them. SInce most PK Starstorm-related fatalities (FINISH HIM!!!!) happen when the pwnee gets hit by multiple meteors, more and bigger is better. Lucas's meteors come straight down instead of radiating from a point offscreen, but this doesn't affect it at all. Lucas's actually looks a bit cooler too in a rare turnaround. Advantage: Lucas -------------------------- The Breakdown: Ness 15, Lucas 3. If you value power over speed, it's Ness 7, Lucas 11, but I don't. It comes down to personal perference in the end, I guess. Ness forever! -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 on 1 vs. Big ol' 4-player free-for-alls strategies -------------------------------------------------------------------------- In case you haven't already learned the hard way, many strategies that will win you a 1-on-1 match will get you pwned in a 4-player free-for- all, and vice versa. Examples of this include; edgeguarding with PK Flash, trying to hit distant antagonists with PK Thunder, and, oftentimes, throws. Here's a list. Will help you win in 1-on-1's but you will die if you try in free-for-alls: -PK Flash (in ANY circumstances): This is already a risky enough move in 1-on-1 fights as it is already. It's a big and powerful move that you are totally helpless while charging. While in 1-on-1 matches it is not rare for someone to be knocked so far away that you can safely charge this, but such a break in the action rarely occurs in 4-player slugfests. Your enemies are likely to say "Ooh; Ness is helpless; KILL!" and bash away while you try frantically to charge this. -PK Thunder sniping: Same principle as PK Flash; you are helpless while you do this so every opponent except the one you are trying to electrocute will take advantage and smash you. -Throws of any kind: When grabbing someone, you cannot use any other attacks until you chuck them away from you. If the action is thick enough, diverting your attention towards one person and away from the other two means that you're open to all kinds of nastiness, limited only by your opponents imagination, and don't think they don't know it. -------------------------------- Will help you win in free-for-alls but will get you killed in 1-on-1: -Flailing blindly: This is not that bad a strategy if you are surrounded. If you can't see what you're doing because of all the chaos, any kind of non-laggy move can help because it will probably hit SOMEONE. -Items: If you play free-for-alls with 4 players, odds are you probably have items on but if you play 1-on-1 competitively, items are off. You should definitely know how to use them (see Item Guide) and you should try your hardest to keep big scary items like hammers and Cracker Launchers out of hostile hands. -Different strategies: There are two schools of thought on fighting 4-player. They are: Using attacks that hit a large area and trying to corral your enemies so you can hit all of them at once with big attacks, or attacking whatever is closest normally. Since Ness doesn't really have any moves with a shotgun-type effect, you'll be better off using the second method. PK Fire sets up a nice wall that no enemy can get through, so use this to buy time to run away or charge in. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Team Strategies --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ness is very good at playing nice with others on teams. You can have your teammate keep an opposing team member busy whilst you charge PK Flash, or you can double-team people for lots of fun. Try to persuade your teammate(s) to choose characters that cover Ness's flaws, like not having the strongest ground game out there. Lucas actually makes a good teammate for Ness since you can both heal each other and cover each other using your assorted projectiles. Who'd'a thunk? If team attack is on, try to ally with someone with energy projectiles so they can heal you using your PSI Magnet. Mr. Game and Watch is a good choice as well for a teammate if Team Attack is on, since, not only can he heal you using Chef, you can PK Flash his Oil Panic three times to give him an instant kill on whoever he wants. Don't let your teammate do all the work; try to work as a team. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Multi Man Brawl ------------------------------------------------------------------------- I like Multi Man Brawl. The Alloy team is more like the awesome Fighting Bad Graphics Team from SSB64 than the wimpy Wire Frames from Melee. I don't play it that often, but most of your moves will kill an Alloy if they hit. Here's the list of what will kill them. -Forward tilt -Up tilt -Up smash -Down smash (this is a great move for MMB) -Side smash -PK Flash -PK Thunder -PK Fire? I dunno. -Nair -Uair -Dair -Bair -Up throw -Back throw If killing the most is your goal (10/100-man Brawl, etc,) jump right in and spam nairs, down smashes, and anything else that hits a wide range. If survival is the goal (5/15-minute Brawl, etc.), use projectiles (PK Thunder is great at this) and any other ranged attacks you choose. Good Luck! (Particularly on Cruel Brawl. You're gonna need it.) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Home Run Contest --------------------------------------------------------------------------- I don't play this mode a heck of a lot either, but I can help a little. Go for many small, damage racking moves like fairs and PK Fires instead of one or two big-ticket attacks like PK Flash. Liberal throwing of the bat can help a lot, as can comboing good ol' Sandbag off the energy walls. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Item Guide --------------------------------------------------------------------------- It would take up too much space to write about every single item, so instead I'll just write about the ones that Ness can do special stuff with. -Smash Ball: Break it with PK Thunder if it's far away, don't let the opponents get it. Nuff said. -Assist trophy: If someone other than you gets it, don't let them stand still to break it open. Combo them to death. -Poke Ball: You can absorb some Pokemon's attacks, like Staryu's. Know which attacks you can absorb and which you can't. Heal responsibly. -Blast Box: Run behind it to a safe distance and, when pursued, detonate it using PK Fire right when the opponent is near it. Human players won't be duped more than once, most likely. -Sandbag: Wouldn't it be awesome if Sandbag was playable? He's pretty cool. -Food: Eat it, kill people who are eating it. -Dragoon pieces: Same as Smash Ball; Get it, don't let others get it. If someone else gets it, and starts targeting you, dodge roll and try to get close to other players to get the Dragooneer to change targets. Your chances of getting hit by this are lower on bigger stages since the person has smaller targets to air for. If hit, try to L-cancel the hit if you bounce off something (called teching.) -Starman: This gives you a chance to try all your risky moves like PK Flash and PK Cannonball safely, but other players and even CPUs know to run away from you. -Metal Box: Makes you worse in the air but you flinch less. Maybe you can hit people who don't know this with the bat. -Superspicy Curry: You can absorb the flames people shoot with this item, so be sure to try. -Beam Sword: Gives Ness some needed extra reach, plus you can throw it at people if you have to. -Home Run Bat: Nerfed from Melee! You take a ridiculous time to charge this now for a Home Run, so it's useless for clobberin'. You CAN throw it to great effect, on the other hand. -Star Rod: Absorb the stars it shoots. -Hammer/Golden Hammer/Cracker Launcher: Keep these away from your opponents, kick ass if you have them. Pretty simple. And no, you cannot absorb the cracker launcher ammo. -Super Scope/Ray Gun/Fire Flower: You can absorb what all these shoot, so do so. Use them normally on your opponents if you have them. -Bob-omb: Ow. -Smart Bomb: No, you cannot absorb the Smart Bomb explosion. -Deku Nut: If their damage is high enough, nail them with it and kill them, if not, try to get them with the stun effect of this (Hit close, but not directly) and then PK Flash or PK Cannonball them. -Pitfall: Get them to fall into it and then PK Flash or PK Cannonball them. -Hothead: Ok on its own, but actually the most evil item in the game in Ness's hands. They grow if hit by flame or electricity attacks, so what to do? PK Flash them of course! Then you'll be able to throw a 40 damage projectile that's basically a one-hit kill. Enen better is if you can get it to land on a platform. Then it will slide around the platform and one-hit kill anyone it hits. Excellent! Your opponents won't let you lay hands on this once you pull this off, though. -Mr. Saturn: Always get this item and try not to let him die. C'mon, where's your EarthBound pride? Bonus points for avenging his death if someone throws him off a cliff. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Individual Character strategies --------------------------------------------------------------------------- -Mario: He's supposed to be average, but he seems not that great to me. The computer plays a great Mario, probably at Neintendo's request. His side smash is fast, so be quick on the shield if you think it's coming. FLUDD is useless unless you get stunned, so don't worry about it. The main unique element to Mario is his cape, which he can and will use to reflect your PK Thunder and PK Fire. Don't worry about the PK Fire, it won't last long enough to reach you, but DO worry if he reflects PK Thunder. Absorb it if you can. Mario likes using his fireballs, so absorb them too. Not so tough. His Melee-only clone Dr. Mario was a slower, stronger, better version of him, but not special enough to be in Brawl, evidently. He won't be missed. I'm gonna anger all the Luigi fans and say that Mario's other clone, Luigi, is still around. -Difficulty: 5 out of 10. -BEWARE!: Him turning you around using his cape while you try to recover. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Jump over it. Not very difficult. -Donkey Kong: Donkey Kong players are kinda few and far between, but tend to be pretty good. He has big range, so bother him with projectiles. His recovery is the original "Lots of horizontal, almost no vertical" recovery, so he is probably the most suceptible character in the game to being PK Fired while off the cliff. If you grow weary of this, you can try to dair him during his recovery, since he's pretty vulnerable then too. Be defensive on land, since his attacks are so powerful and deal so much damage. -Difficulty: 5.5 out of 10. -BEWARE!: His Giant Punch. He is invincible while winding up when he is about to do it, so get outta there, don't try to interrupt him. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Be elsewhere. -Link: This is annoying; he has three projectiles and you can't absorb any of them. No, you cannot absorb the blast from his bombs. Link players LOOOOOve to spam his dair; if they try, a few PK Flashs should discourage them. On the way back, his boomerang pulls you in, but you can use this to your advantage by simultaneously diving at him. This lets you do an attack from a good distance away in a split second, and will make him beware of using his own boomerang. With his Hylian Shield, he can block your PK Fire so don't rely on it. With his sword he also outreaches you, so try being aerial. His sword has better range and priority than Ness, so get in fast, attack, and retreat. -Difficulty: 7 out of 10 -BEWARE! His Final Smash -Dealing with his Final Smash: Stay airborne, behind something, far away, or any combination of these you can. -Samus: This isn't so bad. Samus players can be relied upon to spam their Charge Shot and missiles. This is good for you because you can absorb the Charge Shot. It has been nerfed from Melee, but you should still try to absorb it rather than take the hit. And no, you cannot absorb the missiles, power or homing. Samus is about on par with Ness for range, so you won't need to rely overmuch on projectiles. Samus has a pretty crummy recovery that you should be trying to foil via PK Flash and dairs. Her fair and dair last a while and are powerful, so be careful when approaching from the front or from below in the air. She's not so tough. -Difficulty: 3.5 to 4 out of 10 -BEWARE!: You can't absorb her missiles, so don't try. -Dealing with her Final Smash: Very hard to dodge, try to be above her when she uses it. Try also to be at 0% damage so it might not kill you. And no, you can't absorb it. -Zero Suit Samus: Samus's new alter-ego for Brawl. She loses what makes her Samus; long-range projectiles but gains speed and in-close range. This is bad news for Ness; no projectiles to absorb and better range than Ness. Naturally, you will be using projectiles heavily. Since she doesn't have an Up-B recovery move, only a tether recovery, you can gimp her by knocking her off the edge and then edgehogging with the proper timing. If she gets you with her Paralyzer, it's a free hit for her, so be careful. I don't know if you can absorb the Paralyzer shot, but I'm tenatively going to say don't try it. -Difficulty: 6 to 6.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: The pieces of Samus's Power Suit that ZSS throws at you. They hurt. -Dealing with her Final Smash: It has pathetic range, so just don't get in too close. Even if it does trap you, it often won't kill you. Ha ha. -Kirby: Kirby is quite similar to Ness, actually. Both were powerful, god-like even in SSB64, then nerfed in Melee, and now awesome again for Brawl. Kirby took it pretty hard in Melee; his dash attack was crap, his oh-so-spammable Down-B was nerfed, his drill-kick dair was useless and his hammer was slow. He is back for Brawl, and pinker and rounder than ever. If he copies you, he'll get PK Flash. I guarantee that the Kirby player will try out PK Flash, and you can profit by this, or be destroyed. You will profit if you let him charge it, then use the PSI Magnet just before he detonates his Flash to heal for 50% damage. If the Kirby player spams his Stone move, as many do, dodge roll out of the way and then dash in and grab him. Works every time. You should also be careful of him dair drill-kicking you because it can spike and hurts besides. His hammer works in midair now, so dont get too close. You can absorb the shock wave that his up-B shoots out, so do this if he spams that. Alternatively, just roll behind him and smack him with the bat when he lands. Kirby is quite aerial, but exploit the fact that his nair and dair have lag on them. Kirby is a great character to play as, but that shouldn't stop you from killing him. Sorry, Kirby. -Difficulty; 4.5 out of 10 BEWARE!: His forward smash is the quickest in the game and rather powerful despite its speed. -Dealing with his Final Smash: If you are far enough away, you won't be sucked in at all, even if you are it is far from a one-hit kill. -Fox: Fox has been nerfed from Melee, but you still shouldn't write him off as harmless. First, he is faster than you. The Fox player knows it. Perfect your timing on your laggier attacks {{cough dair cough}} or use more quick, multihit attacks like your AAA combo and fair to ensure that you don't NEED ridiculous timing. Of course, you can absorb his blaster shots, but they don't reach that far in Brawl so he is unlikely to spam them at you from a distance. His recovery is poor and predictable so go nuts with the PK Flashes and, if he uses his up-B while near the edge but over a pit, jump out quickly and spike him with your dair. Fox falls quickly, so you can combo him much more easily than you could, say, Jiggly. Fox will have some trouble finishing you off as well, so hurt him in the extra time this buys you. He has a reflector, but, like for Mario's cape, you only need to worry about him reflecting your PK Thunder. Absorb it if he does. -Difficulty: 5 or 6 out of 10 -BEWARE!: His reflector can damage you. Not very scary, but I couldn't think of anything better for you to BEWARE! of. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run and hide. You might be able to absorb his tank's shots, but I doubt it. Tell me if you know! Since his tank doesn't fly well, on small stages where there is nowhere to run and hide, it is better to stand on top of the tank and jump off if he starts flying. -Pikachu: Another godly-in-SSB64-nerfed-in-Melee-back-again-in-Brawl character. Pikachu has speed, power, Thunder, and the most annoying taunt move in the game (Pika Pikaaa!). Fortunately, you can absorb his neutral-B Thunder Jolt move, which is good. It could get annoying otherwise. You can also absorb (Gasp!) his Thunder move, which tends to wreak havoc and get spammed left and right. Many Pikachu players spam this and the CPU seems programmed to use it whenever you are above Pikachu. You have lots of warning (Pikaaa!) to tell you when to deploy the PSI Magnet. If you are at 0% damage or near enough or are bored of absorbing it, just go down there and kill the Pikachu in the lag time when he is vulnerable after using Thunder. And no, you cannot absorb his forward smash, although it really looks like you should be able to. He has good aerials, so you may want to stay earthbound (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Get it?) and use projectiles more. He has worse range than you on all of his fast attacks, so get in close and keep the hits coming. His Skull Bash is lethally powerful if you let him charge it all the way, but it takes too long and you can easily hit him with the bat as he comes at you. Mega bonus points if you say "Here's the windup... and the pitch!" before hitting him out of the park. He used to have a cool clone, Pichu, in Melee. Pichu was very distinctive in that you usually hurt yourself more than the opponent hurt you, but he was faster, had some moves more powerful, and had cooler costumes. He was kinda fun to play as, but I doubt he'll be missed much now that Pikachu is almost as fast as Pichu was, minus the self-damage problem, and has Pichu's spiffy goggles. -Difficulty: 5.5 to 6 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Pikachu killed Pichu and took his costumes! Kidding; in fact Melee-Pichu evolved into Brawl-Pikachu, or so the Super Smash Wiki says. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run back and forth in a panic and hope he doesn't know how to control it. -Marth: I hate Marth. He has beastly reach that lets him clobber Ness with his sword from a safe distance while you can't touch him. Except with projectiles, which incidentally you should use liberally. Marth LOVES to Counter your PK Cannonball or PK Flash and then smack you with it for 1.1 times the damage and knockback, and PK Flash coming back at you is not a pretty thing. It sucks. So in consequence, don't use PK Cannonball on him unless he is in shield-break helpless state. His recovery sucks so you can edgehog him with good timing or PK Flash him to great effect. If the enemy gets Counter-happy, just grab them. They can't Counter that. If you're feeling daring, wait until the Counter wears off but before they can apply a new one and hit them with Ness's personalized bat in that time. This could get dicey because you don't want the bat coming back at you either. Marth's aerial game is worse but longer-ranged than Ness's, so beat him in the air if you can. One of Ness's harder matchups. His more awesome clone, Roy, did not make it into Brawl. Many of Roy's moves were faster, though some {{cough Flare Blade cough}} were slower but stronger. He had less reach so was a bit easier for Ness to kill. He also looked infinitely cooler and far less like a woman. -Difficulty: 8.5 to 9 out of 10 -BEWARE! When he has the Smash Ball and is burning, him using his taunt move that LOOKS like he's gonna do his Final Smash but he's actually not and then you dodge and then he does it again and you dodge again and then he does it for real and your ultimate ninja reflexes can't save you and he kills you with it. Bummer. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Be behind a solid object or higher up than he is. BONUS: if he does it and goes off the edge he goes off the screen and dies. -Mr Game and Watch: I love Mr. G&W. He looks the coolest out of every character and has awesome moves to match, like producing turtles, fish, frying pans, manhole covers, and assorted other LCD whatnot from nowhere and pwning with them. One of the big things about him is that all his moves, ALL OF THEM, have completely insane priority. They will stop your attacks cold and go straight through and kill you. There's not a heck of a lot you can do about this except to keep the hits coming on him, so do this. He can absorb your PK Fire, Thunder AND Flash using his unique Oil Panic move. Three PK Fires are useless so don't worry if he catches them, three PK Thunders can be a bit painful, but you want to avoid letting him absorb even one or two PK Flashes like the plague. Simply don't use these projectiles on G&W. You can absorb the food his Chef neutral-B move shoots. Yummy. And no, you cannot absorb the Oil Panic oil. This will be a tough fight for Ness, but you have better aerials, so take to the skies. -Difficulty: 7.5 out of 10 -BEWARE: Him catching PK Flash. If he gets three of them, it's 100+ damage (in Melee; in Brawl it only goes to 60 damage but keeps its knockback) and a one-hit kill. This is the most powerful move in the game, hands down. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run away. The Octopus is slow, very slow. If you have nowhere to run, try to jump over it. -Luigi: The "eternal understudy." Luigi is actually better than Mario, even though he looks stupider. He was a clone of Mario in SSB64, had some different moves in Melee, and is almost completely different in Brawl. He is a bit faster and weaker on the ground, but better it the air, which is bad news for Ness because that's where you like to be. His side smash is even faster than Mario's,so you should be defensiive at higher damages since he likes to use it as a finisher. His Green Missile is as easy to defend against as Pikachu's Skull Bash, so don't fret over it. His up-B does 1 damage if it hits you, but if he connects at the very beginning of the move, it is devastating. Don't let him in close. He likes his fireballs almost as much as Mario, and you should know by now that you can absorb them. He has better recovery than his redder brother, but it's nothing PK Flash can't handle. -Difficulty: 6.5 out of 10 -BEWARE! Him up-B-ing you while you can't move during his Final Smash. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Either run away before he uses it and beat it out of him with PK Thunder or be airborne when he uses it and jump to safety. You won't be affected in the air. -Diddy Kong: Diddy Kong is fast and anoying, but rather easy if you get past this. You can throw his bananas at him, but don't let them trip YOU up. He can spike you pretty easily, so start a Cannonball if it looks like he'll try this and intercept him with it. To counteract his speed, keep a barrage of weak hits coming at him. He's pretty bad in the air and consequently if you can pop him into the air with an up smash or tilt, you can take him down up there. He doesn't have the best range, and you can take advantage of this with the bat. I didn't like him much in Diddy Kong Racing, and I don't like him now. -Difficuty: 3.5 to 4.5 out of 10 -BEWARE! Getting caught in combos by him -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run erratically. Not much else you can do. -Zelda: Zelda is insanely buffed from Melee. Her aerials are devastating if she sweetspots them, her Din's Fire is now more powerful and faster (but just as absorbable), and her up-B Farore's Wind can be used to attack now. You can still take her in the air if you come in from weird angles, since the sweetspot on her aerials is a point to her left or right or her bottom. Coming in from above is bad because her up aerial is a huge-ass explosion that is all sweetspot. Don't get in too close on the ground either; her smashes are quick, very damaging, and fairly powerful. You can try projectiles, but her Nayru's Love move now comes out faster and still reflects them. This sucks, I hear you cry. But Zelda has one weakness. On the whole, she is SLOOOOWWW. If you play VERY defensively, she will find it hard to hit you and if you keep attacking constantly, using quick attacks, you can rack up damage quickly. Still tricky, though. -Difficulty: 8 to 8.5 out of 10. -BEWARE!: Shiek racking the damages and then turning into Zelda to kill you. -Dealing with her Final Smash: DONT TRY TO ABSORB IT! Be higher up or lower down than she is. -Shiek: Hmmmm...I never see Zelda when Shiek's around... Oh well, I'm sure it's just a coincidence. Treat Shiek like you would Fox or any other fast character: good timing, multihit attacks, relentless assault. And no, you cannot absorb Needle Storm. Nothing really different about Shiek, except, like Zelda, you will find it difficult at best to PK Flash her as she recovers. But she can't finish you off well, so everything works out. -Difficulty: 6 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Shiek racking the damages and then turning into Zelda to kill you. -Dealing with her Final Smash: DONT TRY TO ABSORB IT! Be higher up or lower down than she is. Not different from Zelda's at all. -Pit: KIIIIIIIILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL! I loathe Pit. He is the most annoying character in the game and those arrows would be REALLY annoying if Ness didn;t have the PSI Magnet. When I don't play as Ness, they really get to me. My first priority in a match is always kill anybody who happens to play as Pit. This prejudice will hopefully discourage anyone from playing as Pit. If everyone kills Pit, maybe no-one will play as him. Join the cause! Don't bother with projectiles, he'll reflect them with his down- or side-B moves. His sword gives him good range but a bit of lag after his moves, so move in for the kill whenever he whiffs one. He is annoyingly good in the air as well and his moves hit the random angles that ordinarily I'd tell you to approach from. The best hope you have is to gimp his Wings of Icarus move (his up-B that gives him crazy recovery.) If he is hit while he is flying around, he falls and has no hope for recovery. Just intercept him with a PK Thunder or jump out, nair him, and jump back. I would also advise you to play with the sound off so his stupid voice doesn't make you so angry that it clouds your judgement. -Difficuly: 7.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: of not killing him. If you don't kill him, the person playing him might make a habit of using him, and if too many people play as Pit, the terrorists win. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Dodge roll constantly. Most of the little flying things will miss you and you can LOL in the Pit player's face before killing him. -Meta Knight: One of the coolest and most fun characters new to Brawl. I like playing as him very much, but not as much as Ness. One of his distinguishing features and one of the things that makes him so much fun to play as is his ridiculous speed. All his tilts activate instantly as do all his aerials, and his smashes come out as fast as some characters' tilts. He IS edged out by Sonic as the fastest character in the game, however. This means that he can have his way with any character not fast enough to keep up, and that he can literally run in circles around the heavies like Ganondorf or Bowser, hurting them all the while. His sword gives him some nice reach to boot. This is bad for Ness players, and it means you'll need to be lightning fast to beat him, since he WILL kill you if you aren't fast enough. You can forget about your lag-ridden moves like the bat or dair; they will get you killed. Tilts and the AAA combo are your best friends for this bout. He doesn't have any projectiles and can't reflect them either, so PK Fire can help you out. With MK's gliding ability, it'll be hard to edgeguard with PK Flash, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. Good luck with this one. Side note; his Dimensional Cape is the most spectacular and useless move since Mewtwo was at large. Kudos to him for having it. -Difficulty: 8 or 9 out of 10 -BEWARE!: His awesomeness -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run away and try to hit it out of him with projectiles. If playing 4-player, hope some other sap gets hit. It's not all THAT powerful if it hits, still, so don't panic. -Falco: Fox's even-more-annoying clone. People say he's different but he's not THAT different, IMO. He's a bet slower and hence easier, but he will still reflect your projectiles and is better at hitting you with his reflector than Fox. His laser shots don't end, so he will try to spam them at you from a distance unlike Fox, but you'll have so much advance warning that you are a noob if you don't absorb them. Not much else to say. Oh, yeah; he's better in the air, so be on your A-air-game. -Difficulty: What I gave Fox plus .5 to 1. -BEWARE!: That annoying dash of his. I can't really figure out what to do about it except run away. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run and hide. That's it. You REALLY shouldn't jump on top of it becasue Falco's tank can take you off the top of the screen with ease. -Pokemon Trainer: I love Pokemon! The Trainer (let's call him Red, for old time's sake) is one of the most fun characters to play as because you get three characters, and Charizard is a badass. Squirtle: Ridiculously fast. He has small reach on his quick attack because he's a Tiny Turtle, so use your longer arms to your advantage. You will have enough warning on his smashes to shield or vacate the area, so no trouble there. Unfortunately, there IS trouble in the air. His aerials have decent range and are insanely quick. Your fair outprioritizes them, but your other aerials are in trouble. So much trouble that you may want to stick to ground combat. Squirtle's recovery is pretty bad, and edgehogging with proper timing will help you no end. Once you kill Squirtle, it's time to move on to: Ivysaur: Ivysaur has middling power but impressive range. Better than Ness's at least. Stay a bit farther away and use PK Fire a lot. Why? Because It's Super Effective! And because it traps Ivy well and boosts your effective range. Not that Ness was very good at this to begin with, but attacking Ivysauron, the Great Eye, from above is a bad idea. His Bullet Seed can trap you for 60+ damage and his Vine Whip is a killing move (learned at Level 10, no less.) His up smash is in competition with Lucas's for the most powerful up smash in the game, and I think Ivy wins. So coming in from above is a terrible idea. His neutral A combos forever, so careful not to get messed up by it. His up and down aerials are laggy, even if his forwards and back aerials have awesome range, so getting him in the air is worth a shot. And no, you cannot absorb his Razor Leaf, no matter hiw much you think you should be able to. Again we have a tether recovery, so edgehog like mad for the kill, whereupon you will face: Charizard: This guy is a beast. He is a heavyweight with a fast run speed, so running away won't help. Even his tilts have some lag, and this means attack like crazy so he can't kill you. All his aerials except the forwards and up and back have lots o' lag, so an aerial fight might go your way. The main thing is to not let him get in one of his big attacks in. Just one side smash from him can wreck your attack rhythmn and probably kill you besides, in addition to the massive damage. His Rock Smash is another thing to watch for, in light of its relatively little lag time. Good thing it's really obvious. It's hard to miss his pulling a boulder from nowhere. And no, you cannot absorb the shards that Rock Smash produces. Charizard can glide too, but is easier to PK Flash while doing it than other gliding characters. But he's still an absolute beast. -Difficulty: Squirtle: 7 or 8 out of 10 Ivysaur: 6.5 out of 10 Charizard: 5 or 6 out of 10 -BEWARE!: You can get a free hit on any Pokemon right when Red sends it out and you should BEWARE not taking advantage of this. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run away and be higher or lower than the trio of Pokemon. And no, you cannot absorb Solar Beam, Hydro Pump, OR Fire Blast. -Ike: Aether! Aether! Huraaaaaaaaagh! Aether! I don't like Ike, no matter what the crowd may think. Besides, I thought Roy was their boy.? This heavyweight is actually not as slow as you think. Yes, all his devastating moves DO have enough warning time for you to go get yourself a soda, come back and see how Ike's doing, go read the Ike section of this FAQ, and be back to the game in time to shield, some of his moves have a little speed to them. His AAA combo that everyone loves to spam, for example. This is fast enough that, if they be spammin' it, you should stay behind them, and hit them as they try to turn around, then roll behind them again. Works every time. If they spam Aether, as noobs online often do, keep some distance between them and you and, as they lift up in the first part of the attack, roll to behind where they will land and nail them when they touch down. Aether is a shoddy recovery move, so you can edgeguard to your heart's content. Chances are that if they're spamming Aether, they won't know that Quick Draw can also be used for recovery. You may laugh freely as they plunge to their doom. Shield the big attacks, and Ike won't be able to put the hurt on you. That's about all there is to Ike. He's big and stupid. -Difficulty: 3 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Don't let your shield down too soon when you see a big attack coming. One single Ike hit can do upwards of 30-40 damage. -Dealing with his Final Smash: He has to be at close range to do it, so just beat the Smash Ball out of him with projectiles. Easy. -Snake: Snake has some of the most unique or downright weirdest moves in Brawl. I don't fight him often, so I could use help with this section! What I do know is that his smashes are all more like a second set of specials than powerful attacks. His down smash lays a motion-sensor bomb that's invisible and can hurt you or him. Try to remember where it is and hope he forgets and gets exploded by his own mine. His side smash is a ridiculously powerful rocket launcher that you can and should see coming a mile away. Roll behind him and charge your bat. His upsmash can reach to off the screen and is obscenely powerful, so attacking him from above is useless. His tilts are somewhere between tilts and smashes in terms of speed and power, and have decent range; be quick on the shield. His aerials are slow but long-reaching and strong, but this should be no problem if you don't stay in one place too long and keep attacking. His grenades are easy to spot and shield against or run from. His down-B, C4, lays a lump of explosive on the ground that he can detonate at will. This is visible and esily avoided. His up-B takes him a long ways but is very predictable, letting you PK Flash him at your leisure. Not a very challenging foe, but a unique one. -Difficulty: 4 or 5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: His deadly cardboard box. You think it's funny now, but when it kills you don't come crying to me. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Dodge immediately when he shoots at you or get him to target someone else. -Peach: Fighting Peach isn't as hard as it used to be. She can still float and hurt you with her aerials but she isn't as good as she used to be. Definitely nerfed. Her side-B is no longer devastating and now makes hearts instead of an explosion if it connects. Her turnips are still annoying but the catch-thrown-items mechanic in Brawl has been improved so that if you use an aerial or maybe even regular A-move right before the item hits you you can catch it and nail the person who threw it. This is most fun (and risky) with Bob-ombs, but works fine on Peach's turnips. If you're not feeling up to this timing challenge, you can just shield the turnips. BOOOOORRINGGG. Otherwise, Peach is very easy. Her smashes won't kill you even at 130% even if they DO connect, and they take a while charging. Her aerial game is bad, and you should destroy her up there if you can. One of Ness's easier fights. -Difficulty: 3 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Her hitting you with a frying pan is just mean, even if it doesn't kill you. -Dealing with her Final Smash: This is one of the easiest you'll face. She doesn't have any big finishers so you almost never die after she puts you to sleep. You can even gorge yourself on peaches if there are any left. -Yoshi: Yoshi is another quirky character with a devoted fanbase, like Ness. He is very aerial but pretty slow on terra firma. Kill him there. His up aerial is incredibly strong and has some range to it, so don't attack from above. Not that you would anyway. He has better range than you but you can use your speed to compensate. His Egg Roll is spammable, but you can avoid it easily with dodges or, if you are confident, hit him out of it with the bat. He likes to throw eggs if you are at long range, but they are obvious and somewhat slow. And no, you cannot absorb them. He is invincible during his double jump, despite the fact that it looks like you should be able to intercept it. His recovery is almost nonexistant after his second jump, making edgehogging a good idea. That's about it, except I think Mario should be able to ride him. That'd be cool. -Difficulty: 6 or 7 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Him meteor smashing you with his fair or Egg Lay while you try to steer PK Thunder at yourself. Don't try it over the edge unless you have to. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Maybe you can absorb the fireballs, but I would just dodge roll instead. -Ganondorf: An obese powerhouse. None of his moves have any speed to speak of. You ought to be able to dance around him and destroy him. The only problem comes when he gets a hit on you. His A move can kill you from 0% if you are near the edge. This is ridiculous, but you will want to defend frantically against this sort of power. Keep moving all the time. If you have tried Ganondorf's Melee Break the Targets stage you will know how much trouble Ganondorf has hitting a moving target. DO NOT LET HIM HIT YOU! His recovery is fail as well. Edgehog or PK Flash, your choice. Piece of cake, unless you slow down. -Difficulty: 2.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: If you are stunned by a Deku Nut or sleeping or shield break, he WILL kill you in one hit. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run away from him and do NOT be right in front of him. -Ice Climbers: Ah, Canada. Land of hockey, curling, maple syrup, mounties, and more hockey. There are two of them, which should make it twice as hard, but it isn't. You can absorb their Ice Shots and maybe their Blizzard move (EHHHHHHHH!), I dunno. Since they are very good when together, you will want to separate them by hitting only one and then not letting them reunite. Your grabs are useless here since if you grab one the other will just bash you with a hammer. Their strong attacks aren't too fast, and some of their attacks lack range, so you'll want to get in their face a bit. Playing a distance game works too since you can absorb their only projectile and they can't do squat against your three, except shield. Not too difficult, but good human IC's will do crazy stuff that might mess you up. But I'm sure you can cope, eh? -Difficulty: 5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: If you beat on them too bad, they won't sell you cheaper Canadian medicine. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Tricky. Don't stand on the iceberg if you can help it. Hard to avoid taking damage here. Hmmm. -King Dedede: One of the faster heavyweights, his speed hampers your ability to dance around him and beat him up. He has a decent neutral aerial but it has pathetic range; aerial attacks will still work well. Very odd for a heavy are his multiple jumps, but they are slow and predictable and still don't gain him much height. Dair away. Or PK Flash, but PK Flash might not be the instant kill it often is against him, he being so heavy. You can edgehog to decent effect as well. No, you cannot absorb his Waddle Dees/Doos and Gordos, but you can kill them for practice and they never hurt you anyhoo. His side smash, Jet Hammer, and up-B all are lethal at low percentages but incredibly obvious and you're stupid if you don't run, attack to interrupt them, or shield. His side tilt has a lot of range to it and Dedede players love it, but your PK Fire's range is longer. Get it? Good. -Difficulty: 3.5 to 4 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Him hitting you with any of his huge moves while you're stunned -Dealing with his Final Smash: Dodge roll and jump like a maniac. Find high ground if you can. -Wolf: Andross has ordered him to take you down. Fortunately you can be saved by doing a barrel roll! The last of the Space Animals (Fox, Falco, and Wolf). Wolf is far less clonelike than Falco and doesn't seem much like one at all besides his B moves. His blaster fires very slowly but does 5 or 6 damage percent each hit. You can absorb these happily. Like Fox's, Wolf's blaster shot ends after some distance so he can't spam it at you from afar. His up-B actually functions a lot like Lucas's PK Cannonball, dealing lots of damage but no knockback for most of it but giving OK knockback at the end. It doesn't take as long to charge as Fox's or Falco's, making spiking him while he charges it useless. His side-B is wonky and he doesn't use it often. Nothing to worry about here. His Reflector is a bit more dangerous, and Wolf players love spamming it (even the CPU does it). This means PK Thunder is a bad idea usually. More dangerous is that it can negate your attacks and knock you away if Wolf activates it at the right time. It works much like Counter, but far less dangerous to you since the Wolf player needs insane timing. Wolf is weak in the air; your duty is clear. Wolf players often move erratically to be tricky. He'll calm down after being PK Fired a bit. He gets trapped easily like other heavies. -Difficulty: 4.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: People spamming his side smash. Just roll when you think he'll do it. -Dealing with his Final Smash: We're gonna have fun with this thing! This awesome quote heralds the coming of Wolf's Landmaster. Same rules apply to his as to Falco's: run, don't stand on it, except his lasts a shorter time, lucky for you. -Mewtwo: I know he's not in Brawl, but he was so awesome in Melee that I just have to do a section on him. Because Mewtwo is, bar none, the sickest, most epic, most kickass character in the entire series. True, in every tier list he is always ranked the worst, but the thing with Mewtwo that makes him so excellent and unique is that winning is secondary to being awesome. Many of his moves look more like they were designed to look cool or humiliate or intimidate the opponent than to work efficiently for combat. His down smash is a great one; he points diagonally downward and looks condescending, as if to say "You are a noob." and kills the enemy this way. Best...down smash...ever. His down-B and side-B are the most fun and third most fun moves in the game (PK Flash is second), with side-B (Confusion) spinning the foe around and depositing them humiliatingly on their bottom, ready to be down smashed. It reflects projectiles as well, always fun, and can be used to help recovery a bit. His down-B is easily the coolest move ever. It does no damage, but paralyzes the enemy for a short time, letting you taunt to let them know that they're in your control and can't do anything about it, and then destroying them with an uber-attack of your choice (I was always partial to Shadow Ball, myself). The only moves close to Mewtwo's in fun and excellence in Brawl are PK Flash and Meta Knight's superb Dimensional Cape. Mewtwo could lose but still make the opponent feel inferior, and was the most fun character to play. With him inexplicably missing from Brawl, Ness is the most fun. Mewtwo was such a badass in the Pokemon games that it was hard to believe he could be put in a Super Smash game and remain fair, but Nintendo did it. Most awesome character ever. -Lucario: Mewtwo's replacement for Brawl, and a pitiful excuse for a Mewtwo replacement. Some people think Lucario is a Mewtwo clone, but they share almost no moves. Lucario's Aura Sphere equates to Mewtwo's Shadow Ball, and Lucario has a very similar side smash, but they share almost no moves besides those. Lucas has Mewtwo's down smash and neutral aerial, but no-one calls Lucas a Mewtwo clone. The one cool thing about Lucario is that he becomes better the more damage he takes, topping out at 182. Otherwise he would automatically win any Sudden Death matches, I suppose... But this means that he sucks at low percentages. He is big and slow, so Ness will have no problem defeating him. His Aura Sphere that Lucario players love moves lazily, making it a prime target for absorbtion by PSI Magnet. Lucario is crap really. I want Mewtwo back! -Difficulty: 4 out of 10 -BEWARE!: They might have Lucario in future Smash games instead of bringing back Mewtwo. -Dealing with his Final Smash: No, you can't absorb this. Try to jump over over him when he does it. That's all. -Ness: Fighing yourself? Well, if you must. I have a seperate section for this, feel free to skip to it. -Sonic: The main thing about Sonic is that he is fast. Very fast. Remember how to deal with fast characters and you should be fine. Good timing and multihit attacks are critical. Since Sonic doesn't have any projectiles and can't do anything about your other than evade, spam away. His fighting style isn't as unique as Snakes, but Sonic is still a blast to play as. He runs ridiculously fast, and his down-B works just like it did on the Genesis. He has all the classic noises too, like the spring noise. This is a pretty straightforward fight, and, like other fast characters, Sonic wants for killing moves. His side smash is what he'll usually try, but it has poor range, so keep him at arms length and you can survive with 200% damage or more. Sonic is still a great character and his early games were WAY better than Mario's games from the same time, except for maybe Super Mario World. Yes, I am a Sega fan.I'd love to see more Sonic characters in Super Smash. Tails and Knuckles are just a no-brainer to put in. C'mon, Nintendo! -Difficulty: 7 out of 10 -BEWARE!: How great Sonic The Hedgehog 2 was. -Dealing with his Final Smash: See Pikachu -Bowser: Ha ha. Consider yourself lucky if you face Bowser. He is a lot like Ganondorf in that you can frolic in merry circles around him and kill him with ease, except he is even slower. He is also the heaviest character in the game, so you can easily PK Fire gimp him or just rack up 100+ damage before he can get out of it. He is easily spiked and if you have a quick shield finger you can avoid all his big one-hit kill attacks. PK Flash and PK Cannonball are less effective due to his sheer bulk, but it's worth it for all the other stuff you can do to him. He always gets sweetspotted by your bairs, fairs, and dash attacks. He likes his fire breath entirely too much, but you can see it coming leagues off and raise shields. Well, PSI Magnet, anyway. Ness's eaisest fight. -Difficulty: 1 out of 10 -BEWARE!: His side smash. Forty-freaking-three damage and alomst always a one-hit kill isn't fun to be on the recieving end of. -Dealing with his Final Smash: You can run and hide somewhere he can't hit, or, alternatively, you can go bananas and smack him with everything you've got so he has 500000 damage on him when Giga Bowser ends and you can kill him with PK Thunder or actually any move at all. He's such a big target when Giga that you can't miss. -Wario: Now this is wonky. You'd think Wario would be another huge, easy- to-gimp fattie like Ganondoofus or Bowser, but he isn't. He is big and heavy and prone to suffering at the hands of PK Fire, but he is very maneuverable. Especially, oddly enough, in the air. He actually outclasses Ness in midair, a rarity. You'll want to make this a ground fight, where you can use PK Fire and the bat's seperior reach. Wario doesn't have any projectiles unless you count the bike, which you can easily deal with by jumping and nairing or fairing him off of it. His up-B is terrible for recovering, even if it does have a Samus screw-attack type effect, so he needs his bike to recover, and he can't have it if it is lying around the stage after you hit him off it. His down-B is pungently powerful and gives him insane recovery if he uses it for that, but more often he attacks with it. This can be dangerous and humiliating, but he can only do it every two minutes so don't sweat it. -Difficulty: 6.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Wario Man's fart. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Run away and don't get hit. Shield what you can if you must. -Toon Link: A clone of Link, really the only clone in the game. Fight him as you would older, less cel-shaded Link. Here are some of the differences: -Toon Link's boomerang hurts on the way out AND on the way back. Be careful, as you can't exploit its return anymore to dive at the thrower -Toon Link's bombs hit a wider area but with less power and more cel-shaded goodness -Toon Link is faster but has less reach. Be quick. I actually find Toon Link easier than Big Link because of his shortened range. TL has cooler victory poses going for him, however. -Difficulty: 6.5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: You can't beat him up and take his Lon Lon milk like you could Young Link in Melee. Dealing with his Final Smash: Stay airborne, behind something, far away, or any combination of these you can. -R.O.B.: This is a pretty cool character. He has surprising speed for a heavy, a projectile that charges by itself over time, an item he can charge up and throw at you (and that you can throw back) and absolutely beastly recovery that you can't interrupt. His smashes are fast and long ranged, so projectiles are the way to go. He can't reflect PK Fire in time using his side-B and he gets trapped well like all the other heavies, so I encourage PK Fire spamming here. Avoid his Gyro and throw it back at him for irony points. You can absorb his laser if you have enough warning, but that's a big if. In the air, his nair, bair, and dair are slow and you can exploit this to kill him in the air. His recovery is, like I said, amazing. He can fly until he runs out of fuel but until then can attack as normal. You can spike him as he returns since he isn't so maneuverable in the air. PK Flash might work, too. -Difficulty: 7 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Him edgeguarding with his Gyro -Dealing with his Final Smash: Maybe you can absorb it...but I'd just be far away. -Olimar: Now this is a quirky one. Olimar depends almost completely on his Pikmin. The only moves he doesn't use them for are his tilts and neutral aerials. Since I tend to like the weirder characters, Olimar was my favorite for a time until I realized that, while it IS undeniably fun to watch the colored Pikmin combos you plan with such care play out perfectly, it just doesn't match the sheer awesome factor of nailing recovering people with PK Flash. Olimar's smashes (and his tilts, come to think of it, have great range, power, and spammability, so approach cautiously and with PK Fire. His aerials are good, but he is not as maneuverale in the air as Ness. A nifty stategy is to air dodge to behind him, causing him to miss with his aerial and then leaving him open. You should kill any Pikmin he throws at you and then beat him up when he doesn't have any left. Tip: Don't give him a moment's pause when he has no Pikmin and he won't be able to pluck any more and you can kill him with ease. These tips will help you send the good Captain back to Hocotate with journal entries on how badly you owned him. -Difficulty: 8 out of 10 -BEWARE!: His Final Smash is the best in the game -Dealing with his Final Smash: Jump and stay up to avoid the wild Bulborbs, don't be near the middle of the stage or you'll be hit by the rocket coming down, don't be too near the edge of the stage since the Bulborbs can push you off. -Captain Falcon: Falcon PUNCH! You don't want to get hit by that move. Aside from awesomeness, the good Captain isn't so great. He's faster on the ground than you, but his air game is far inferior. The Knee of Justice has lag on it so that he'll rarely hit with it. On the ground, you can interfere with many of his attacks and disrupt his momentum by launching a volley of small, fast attacks. Be quick, keep the fight aerial, and Douglas Jay Falcon will fall. -Difficulty: 4 to 6 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Falcon Punch. It looks epic and hits hard. -Dealing with his Final Smash: Coolest Final Smash in the game, hands down. If you're ahead and playing casually, you may even want to get hit by it to see how cool it is. Otherwise, avoid like you would Ike's or Meta Knight's Final Smash. -Lucas: Exploit the weaknesses already discussed in the Ness-Lucas comparison. Lucas's attacks are slower and, consequently, you should be faster. -Difficulty: 5 out of 10 -BEWARE!: How much PK Freeze sucks -Dealing with his Final Smash: Dodge roll when you see one coming, that's it. -Jigglypuff: If you take nothing else from this FAQ, take this: NEVER underestimate Jigglypuff. She WAS a punching bag under CPU control in SSB64 and Melee, but if a human plays as Jiggs, they are either: Playing her becasue they got unlucky with the Random character button; or an absolute god with her. She has been nerfed for Brawl but will still whup you if you're not careful or sometimes even if you ARE careful. Jigglypuff absolutely dominates the skies, going aerial with her is suicide, even for an aerialist like Ness. Her ground game is where she has been nerfed; her smashes are slower and her range still sucks worse than Ness's, which is a big plus for you. She can recover from absolutely any attack that doesn't KO her due to her five midair jumps and Pound, but she is the lightest character in the game in Pichu's absence and easily KO'd. Stay out of the air at all costs and you'll have a chance. -Difficulty: 8 out of 10 -BEWARE!: Being sung to, taunted at, and then Rested. -Dealing with her Final Smash: If the stage is big enough, her Final Smash is virtually useless and you have nothing to worry about, but if not, jump off right before she yells, stall a bit, and recover while she's shrinking. As tempting as it may look, you shouldn't counterattack while she shrinks; touching her deals Rest-level damage and knockback. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fighting Ness ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To fight Ness, simply exploit what weaknesses Ness has. You should know them by now. Don't use your projectiles overmuch; Ness will just absorb them. A great way to beat Ness is to take advantage of his PK Thunder recovery. Jump down there and get hit by his PK Thunder so he goes into helpless and can't recover. If you can, intercept him as he steers it using YOUR PK Thunder. If you really want to annoy the Ness player, pause the game while he steers it. It will break his concentration and he might flub the recovery. If this works, they might become violent, so use with care and NOT on your bodybuilder friends who can hurt you severely. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Stages ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To save time, I'll just discuss the stages Ness can do special stuff on. -Distant Planet: Knock people into the Bulborb's mouth, edgehog the edge of the ledge the water comes down when it rains. -Halberd/Delphino Plaza, etc.: You can recover up through the main platform. Do this to help yourself, but also to kill people who think you can't do this. -Delphino Plaza/Pirate Ship, etc: Anywhere there's water, you can dair people who are swimming to send them straight down and kill them. -Skyworld: When the platforms are there, not just clouds, you can't recover up through them, but neither can your opponent(s). When it IS just clouds, hitting people downwards can send them through the clouds to their doom. Dair! -Summmit/Pokemon Stadium2: When the iceberg is sliding downward or the stadium is is Flying mode, you can stay in the air longer and beat people with Ness's awesome aerials. -Corneria: You can absorb the lazers that the Arwings, Wolfen, and Great Fox shoot at you with PSI Magnet. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Random Lists ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Everyone loves Lists! --My mains in SSB64--(ranked in order of most to least used) -Ness -Kirby -Pikachu --My mains in Melee--(ranked in order of most to least used) -Ness -Mewtwo! -Kirby -Jigglypuff --My mains in Brawl--(ranked in order of most to least used) -Ness -Olimar -Kirby -Pokemon Trainer -Pikachu -Jigglypuff --Top 3 most useful Ness attacks-- 1. AAA combo 2. PK Thunder 3. PK Fire --Top 4 most awesome/fun-- 1. Mewtwo 2. Ness 3. Meta Knight 4. Charizard ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Contacting Me ---------------------------------------------------------------------- My e-mail address is [email protected]. Feel free to send me tips, inaccuracies about this FAQ, polite flames, anything really. If you send me something particularly awesome, like a video of you pwning with Ness or beating up on Pit with anybody, or a humorous screenshot, I will send you my Friend Code for Brawl. (Be sure to send me yours!) To do this, save the replay by pressing Z after the battle, then saving it to an SD card, then put the SD card in the computer, get the file, and email it as an attatchment. Hope you enjoy playing Ness as much as I do. That's it for this FAQ. Happy Smashing!