Disclaimer: this ranking represents the opinion of the writer and may not align with the ranking of the Team Dignitas professional Smash Melee players.

Many characters in Super Smash Brothers Melee already prove to be quite powerful and have quite an edge in close range combat. But if given a projectile, their edge can be sharpened even more. Spacing, controlling the neutral game, racking on damage, or even KO’ing opponents are all objectives met by many of the game’s projectiles, and this guide covers the general strengths and a technique each of the five most commonly used ones. If properly utilized and fully understood, these projectiles can boost the strength of each of these characters’ gameplan tenfold.

Falco’s Lasers

One of the most infamous projectile in all of competitive Melee, Falco’s laser is the definition of oppressive. The small amount of hitstun they tack on to an opponent may not seem impressive at first, but combined with the rate they can be fired (thanks to their auto-cancellability when Falco lands after they're fired from the air), the projectile can effectively control the neutral game at any time they desire. By simply short hop lasering, Falco has the necessary mobility to space his lasers from his opponent to either wall them out or set up aggressive play. While each laser only deals about 2-3% each, it’s just enough damage to make an opponent feel like they need to approach when being barraged by the red projectile. While simple in use, Falco’s lasers get the job done when it comes to walling out opponents, putting on damage, and stunning any foe just enough to start a powerful combo.

Double Laser From the Edge

This Falco specific technique is an aggressive ledge option he can perform, but a risky one at that. It is performed by letting go of the ledge, then quickly jumping (not to be confused with ledge jumping, which is jumping while still on the ledge), and then quickly firing two lasers while falling back onto the stage. If performed ideally, it can lead to Falco getting safely back onto the stage, and a punish while the opponent is in hitstun from the two lasers fired. However, if Falco is hit while firing his lasers, he will be forced to recover without his double jump (which is burned by performing the technique), making it an extremely dangerous situation for Falco. This is a high risk/high reward technique, so it should not be used liberally.

Fox’s Lasers

Fox McCloud is widely regarded by most of the Melee community as the best character in the game and many argue the same about his projectile as well. Similarly to Falco, Fox’s lasers do the same amount of damage, about 2-3% per laser. But unlike Falco’s lasers, which have hitstun and do a great job at locking down the opponent and controlling neutral, Fox’s lasers have no hitstun at all, and only serve as a means to rack damage onto the opponent. From this description alone, Fox has a strictly worse projectile game than Falco, but in reality, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Fox’s lasers have one other major difference from Falco’s; the output speed.

While Falco’s airborne lasers have 13 frames of startup time and 16 frames of wait in between repeated shots, Fox’s airborne lasers have only 10 frames each of startup and repeated shot wait time and are auto-cancellable in the same way as Falco’s. This allows Fox to put out more lasers than Falco could ever dream to in the same given time, and rack up tons of damage. However, since Fox’s lasers have no hitstun, they can’t be used in the same offensive manner as Falco’s. Instead, they reward defensive play.

Fox can camp the opposite stage side of their opponent and shoot out lasers freely, racking on tons of damage and leaving the opponent no choice to retaliate and open themselves up in many cases. This is precisely why many hail Fox’s projectile game as one of, if not the best, as it allows the normally hyper-offensive space animal to play a simple, reserved, but very effective, pressure-heavy neutral game.

Short Hop Double Laser

This Fox specific tech allows him to get out the most lasers as fast as possible, while still staying relatively mobile. It is relatively simple to perform, all it takes is speed and practice. As the name implies, after inputting Fox’s short hop, two lasers should be inputted as fast as possible before Fox touches the ground. Simple, but an extremely efficient technique overall.

Sheik’s Needles

Sheik is usually seen as a very grab and edgeguard heavy character and her needles only add to her overall trickiness. Although they are fairly linear and not too powerful, Sheik’s needles dish out a large amount of hitstun that compliments her grab game and edgeguards quite well. For starters, Sheik’s needles have the ability to be charged and stored. The longer she charges her needles for, the more of them she fires at once. Charging and releasing needles is done by holding and releasing the B button, with the charge being cancellable at any time by pressing L or R. Either of these techniques can be done while grounded or in the air. When Sheik’s needles are fully charged (maximum of 6), they can dish out a massive amount of hitstun and damage, which can be followed up by a grab or a dash attack if she’s close enough to the opponent.

The most effective way to execute this setup is for Sheik to hit the opponent with her airborne needles. When Sheik fires her needles in the air, they move diagonally down and in front of her, as opposed to directly forward when grounded. If Sheik is in a position where she can hit her opponent with needles while airborne, she can almost always follow up afterwards, due to needles being auto-cancellable in the same way Fox and Falco’s lasers are. Her unique aerial needles and massive amounts of hitstun are also what makes her edgeguards so scary. Sheik can bestow a barrage of needles onto an offstage opponent very quickly due to their airborne auto-cancellability, which is especially taxing for any offstage opponent below her. Regardless of how small they are, Sheik’s needles should be feared by any opponent to the hylian ninja.

Reverse Needle Cancel

This technique utilizes Sheik’s needle cancellability rather than the needles themselves and is one of the best ways she can quickly get to the ledge to propel her edgeguarding. To perform it, Sheik must first be running towards any ledge and then jumping offstage. Next, she must quickly tap the analog stick in the opposite direction and start charging her needles. If done correctly, Sheik will begin charging her needles in the air, but be facing the opposite direction; towards the ledge. Finally, while Sheik is charging her needles offstage and falling towards the ledge, she must cancel the charge so she can successfully grab on to the ledge and be in position to set up a devastating retaliation to any offstage foe.

Peach’s Turnips

Peach’s turnips are by far the most interesting and unique out of all the projectiles covered in this list, for more than one reason. For starters, Peach can only pull out her turnips when she is grounded, and afterwards, she holds them like she would an item. Peach’s turnips technically are items, as they follow the same properties as items do (can be thrown and caught, disappear after a certain total throw distance, etc.). This means that along with Link and Young Link’s bombs, turnips are the only items that can be used in competitive play. The other very unique property turnips have is an RNG mechanic

There are a total of 11 different types of items that can be pulled any given time Peach uses her down-b: 8 different kinds of turnips, and 3 different kinds of standard items (Mr. Saturn, Beam Sword, and Bob-omb). Each turnip type has their own unique percent chance of being pulled, and damage they deal. 5 out of the 8 turnips do 6-10%, and these are the most common turnips that appear, so these will usually be used in a match the most. The probability of each turnip and item as well as their damage percentages are listed below:

(Via ssbwiki)

Peach’s turnips excel at walling opponents out, due to their bulky size and good hitstun, and edgeguarding opponents. Most of the time, one hit from any type of turnip on an offstage opponent is enough to prevent them from getting back to the stage, thanks to Peach’s turnips dealing knockback, unlike the other 3 projectiles listed above. Peach does have to be careful when pulling her turnips from the ground, as she is vulnerable when doing so, which makes her opponent’s respawn time the ideal time to farm for a good turnip. Farming for good turnips is essential if Peach wants to secure a win, as getting a Stitch Face or a Bob-omb can easily change the tide of battle. Overall, while very different from the rest of the cast’s projectiles, Peach’s Turnips still prove to be dominant among them.

Q Drop

The Q Drop is the fastest technique Peach can use to farm turnips, as opposed to the simple (but still effective) pull and toss method. However, it is not very practical, as it is very difficult to do consistently. Despite this, it’s still a neat option to add to Peach’s arsenal. A standard Q Drop can be performed by jumping from the ground with a turnip in hand, and then double jumping extremely quickly while pressing z. This will cause Peach to double jump land (landing on the ground from the dip at the start of Peach's double jump) and z-drop her turnip right before she dips down and touches the ground.

Samus’ Missiles and Charge Shot

Along with Peach, Samus has a lot of variance in her projectile game, but in a completely different way than the pink princess. Samus has two completely different types of projectiles: missiles and her charge shot. Samus’ missiles come in two different forms and have two different effects; her super missile, which is fast, powerful, but linear, and her homing missile, which is slower, weaker, but homes in on opponents. Samus’ super missile is activated tapping the analog stick to the side and pressing b immediately afterwards, while her homing missile requires the analog stick to be held to the side before pressing B.

Even though both are auto-cancellable when fired from the air, Samus’ weight and floaty aerial mobility prevents them from being used in a practical, quick succession, like Falco’s lasers. Regardless, Samus’ super missiles are one of the most powerful projectiles in the game and do a good job of knocking an opponent offstage, edgeguarding them, or even KO’ing them outright. Because of this, they make a solid spacing tool from a long distance. Her homing missiles are much less useful, and only are effective while edgeguarding foes, as a large amount of power isn’t needed in that suit.

Samus’ charge shot packs an even bigger punch than her super missiles do and serves as a tricky but surprising kill move to boot. Similar to Sheik’s needles, the charge shot stays true to its name and can be charged and stored, but only while Samus is grounded. At base level, it's a fairly wimpy projectile and hardly sends the opponent anywhere, but when charged to its maximum size, it can potentially KO foes from anywhere on the stage. Samus also has a visual, flashing indicator on her body when her shot is fully charged, which can seep into the opponent’s brain and force them to play much more cautiously, as they know they’re at risk of doom from almost any distance.

Platform Missile Cancel

As mentioned above, Samus can not short hop super missile like Falco can do with his laser, but the Platform Missile Cancel is the next best thing. On Yoshi’s Story and Pokemon Stadium (base transformation), Samus’ short hop is just the right distance to barely reach each stage’s platforms when standing underneath them. If Samus short hops under the aforementioned stage’s platforms and fires a super (or homing, but super is generally more useful) missile quickly after, she should fire her missile and then land on the platform, cancelling the lag she would normally get from firing a grounded missile.

She can then drop down from the platform and fire another missile, resetting the process and allowing for the technique to be repeated in quick succession. The Platform Missile Cancel can also be performed on Battlefield, Dreamland, and Fountain of Dreams, but for the first two stages mentioned, she must double jump at the right timing to get to the higher platforms, instead of short hopping. On Fountain of Dreams, since the platforms constantly change height, Samus must either short hop or double jump depending on their distance from the ground. If the Platform Missile Cancel is performed in rapid succession, she can quickly overwhelm the opponent and barrage them with a moving wall of pain.

When used correctly, these five characters' projectiles are incredibly strong and can make or break a match. While short range battles are important parts of any given match, projectiles add a whole new level and depth of play. The amount of variance they can add to a match of Melee is truly surprising, and the game would not be the same without them.

Kudos and credits to Armada, Wii4Mii 99, Superdoodleman, X1-12, Bones, Stratocaster, Seikend, Massive, Quetzalcoatl, Magus, and standardtoaster for footage, information on each character, along with frame data editing and compiling.

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