In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, fighting on the ground is only half the battle. When you’re in the air, whether it’s because you’re chasing the other player or because you were knocked away, there’s a few things you should keep in mind.
While playing Smash Ultimate, it’s inevitable that you’ll spend quite a bit of time in the air. This is where you’ll need to know another set of skills for the game: your aerial options. In the air you can attack, dodge, and influence your movement with a value in the game called Directional Influence (or DI for short). We’ll go more into
Characters will all have their own recoveries, typically accessed by inputting up as your direction and pressing the special attack button. These recoveries all have one universal purpose: to try and help you get back on stage. Now, depending on your directional input or the nature of the recovery itself, these moves can offer lots of vertical or horizontal movement. They can also act as different attacks: dealing multiple weaker hits that combo into each other for more damage, offering one strong hit with knockback that makes it a viable kill move to end a combo with, or perhaps even counting as a grab that requires you to make contact with your opponent before damage can be dealt.
Some recoveries offer no offensive abilities at all, such as Mewtwo’s and Palutena’s teleportation recoveries. It’s key to note, however, that other teleportation recoveries do have offensive traits, and in the case of Zelda, teleporting straight up with an opponent can actually result in a relatively easy kill confirm. Learning to control the trajectory of these characters when invisible is relatively tricky, though, so we recommend practicing to get a feel of how to control your characters when you can’t see them.
Something to also keep in mind after using a recovery is that characters will enter a state of helplessness. True to its name, in this state characters are unable to attack or even dodge incoming attacks, they can only control how they fall through the air. You can tell if a character is in this state as they will enter a special pose exclusive to this state and their character model will begin to flicker. There’s only one exception to this, however, and that is Bowser Jr. Upon using his recovery, he will still be able air dodge (albeit without directional input) and he even has aerial attacks exclusive to when he is in this helpless state. This is something to keep in mind if you’re playing as or against a Bowser Jr. player.
You can also dodge attacks in the air and even add a directional input to your dodge to make your character shift positions while invulnerable. This is something to keep in mind and can also be used to help gain a little bit of horizontal distance to aid in recovering to the ledge. Be careful, however, as opponents could possibly read your movements if you make too much of a habit of dodging in the air in predictable directions, resulting in easy punishes.
If you’ve been hit by a particularly strong attack, you should also try to air dodge in the opposite direction to nullify knockback as soon as possible to directionally influence (DI) the attack. By doing this and holding the opposite direction you were knocked back, you can survive attacks that would normally kill you if you weren’t inputting any direction after being hit.
This one is fairly self-explanatory. When you’re in the air, characters will often have their own separate move set for aerial combat. This moveset can be accessed based on directional inputs from the player so forward aerials (Fairs), neutral Aerials (Nairs) with no directional input, back Aerials (Bairs), up and down aerials.
Obviously, attacks can vary greatly depending on the characters, but these aerial attacks often are great moves to combo or confirm kills with. Practice with characters to understand the unique characteristics of their movesets and keep in mind how fast these attacks come out, their range, their knockback and how quickly you can act from the end of one attack. All of these traits influence how good a move can be.
Also something to note with aerial attacks is the ability for them to spike opponents. This means that opponents tend to rocket downwards after being hit by an attack that spikes them, resulting in easy kills even at lower percentages. If you can see an opportunity to safely spike an opponent, not only is it tremendously satisfying to land, but it can land you a significant lead in the match. It should be noted that some of these attacks that CAN spike, however, will often have harsh requirements to meet in order for the move to spike.
For example, moves such as Mario’s forward aerial, or Captain Falcon’s down Aerial can spike opponents directly downwards, however it requires timing and positioning for the move to be registered as a spike and not just as a regular aerial attack.
If you’re also chasing an opponent off-stage, another valid option would be stage spiking them. Unlike spiking, this time the player’s character takes a more indirect role. They must still hit the opponent, but the opponent gets launched towards the bottom corner of the stage and ricochets downwards: a spike with extra steps. One shouldn’t go for this tactic too often, however, as these attacks can be easily recovered from (called a tech). To recover from a stage spike, press the dodge/shield button right when contact is made with the stage. The character will then get up in place instead of ricocheting off the wall, allowing for players to have time to recover back to the stage. If you’ve taken too much damage, though, your character will still ricochet off of the stage, regardless of your input.
You should also note how fast and floaty the character is when attacking in the air. The faster they move and floatier they are, the easier they can keep up with and attack characters. The ease with which they move through the air will also naturally grant them more opportunities to attack.
So, try and keep all these options in mind the next time you find yourself knocked up in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Just because you’ve knocked your opponent away doesn’t mean they’re out of options, and you’re certainly not out of them either. Keep all your options in mind and remember to practice! These are basic, fundamental mechanics that you should learn to be able to maximize your time on the offensive or defensive.
