Lucas (SSBU): Difference between revisions

However, Lucas is not without his drawbacks. One of his most noticeable flaws is his poor defensive game. Because grabs out of shield have an additional 4 frames of start-up in ''Ultimate'' and Lucas lacks a very fast aerial or up smash, his out of shield game is among the worst among the cast. Additionally, because his overall grounded mobility is average at best, Lucas primarily struggles with rushdowns, as he can find it difficult to keep out the opponent with forward air and forward tilt. Lucas also struggles in disadvantage, as he doesn't have a good hitbox under him to force landings and being floaty makes him extremely susceptible to getting juggled. He also has a mediocre approach game outside of his PK Fire and his Zair, which leads to his approach becoming predictable and leaving him with few reliable options, especially against fast characters and characters with even longer and more disjointed attacks. Lastly, Lucas' combo game even though extremely deadly and having safe starters is also slow thus requires a read and additional high execution in order to get high damage started.  

In the end, Lucas fits into the disjoint zoner type and plays best when controlling foes' space and options thanks to his PK Fire, quick disjointed normals, and Rope Snake. However, he can be a formidable foe at close-ranged combat thanks to his amazing comboing and KOing ability, along with his great aerial game. Lucas players must also take advantage of his fantastic edgeguarding game by forcing his opponent off-stage with his powerful throws, with many of his aerials, his PK Freeze, his PK Fire and his PK Thunder being powerful enough to gimp or KO his opponent.

In spite of these nerfs, Lucas has nevertheless predominantly received many more significant buffs. His frame data and damage output have all been strengthened as a whole, which has made his attacks generally safer than in ''SSB4'' (especially if sweetspotted, due to their [[electric]] effect). Lucas's approach and aerial game are much more effective, as his [[forward aerial|forward]], [[back aerial|back]] and [[up aerial]]s all are now capable of [[autocancel]]ing from a short hop, the former is a much more viable move for KOing, and the latter's hitbox now matches its animation more correctly. His [[grab aerial]] can now be [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MA1bVZEyPQ0 double-jump canceled] as well, which now gives him an additional option for approaching and can be chained into itself repeatedly or forward air, giving it great combo ability. Also, his [[down aerial]] can now loop into itself at mid to high percentages, while being very difficult to SDI out of, and set-up kill confirms (most notably forward and down smash, and forward air), and the inability to tech grounded meteor smashes benefits his back aerial, which can also loop into itself and his other aerials. Thanks to these buffs, the aforementionned nerfs to his combo game have been somewhat compensated, with the latter still being extremely effective in his metagame. His grounded game has seen several noteworthy improvements, as [[forward tilt]] has more range and power, his [[up tilt|up]] and [[down tilt]]s have more combo ability, his sweetspotted [[forward smash]] is more powerful, [[up smash]] has exponentially increased power and now renders him invincible for longer, and [[down smash]] can now once again hit opponents multiple times. Finally, Lucas's special moves have all been improved as well; in particular, [[PK Freeze]] has been drastically improved as it, no longer makes Lucas helpless, can travel trough soft and semi-soft platforms, now follows the ground on contact with hard platforms, sends at a lower angle that gives it fearsome [[edgeguarding]] potential, and leaves opponents [[freeze|frozen]] for a much longer period of time at higher percentages. [[PK Fire]] also sends at a lower angle and has more knockback, making it a more impactful projectile when it connects; [[PK Thunder]] travels faster and is an even better edgeguarding and gimping tool; and PSI Magnet absorbs and recovers faster, but the hitbox is 2 frames slower on the release. Thanks to the significant power buffs to most of his already powerful finishers, along with his significantly better edgeguarding game, Lucas is overall a significantly more powerful character, now being able to KO his opponents much more easily and having a considerably better punish game.

In the end, while Lucas no longer has access to KO setups from his down throw and his footstool and locking based combos are less effective, many of his most glaring weaknesses were notably improved, some of his less-potent moves became much stronger, the significant buffs to his already great edgeguarding game and his much more powerful and damaging finishers have significantly improved his KOing ability and the changes to the game's pace have provided more flexibility for him, granting him far more options than he had in ''SSB4''. This makes him more of an ''all-rounder'', making him more similar to his fellow ''{{uv|EarthBound}}'' fighter Ness, though with more options, a much better edgeguarding game and a better recovery at the cost of simplicity and combo flexibility (though still having a flexible combo game). While Lucas's changes makes it uncertain as to whether he was buffed or nerfed, most players agree that Lucas has generally improved at the pace the rest of the cast has. So far, despite Lucas's playerbase remaining small in competitive play, he has achieved above average to strong results at the local and regional levels, thanks to players such as {{Sm|ChocoTaco}}, {{Sm|Mekos}} and {{Sm|WhYYZ}}, though they have been more sparse in national tournaments. As of now, Lucas's viability in competitive remains up for debate, although he is generally agreed to remain a viable character, likely moreso than in ''SSB4''.