Beast Dash Cancelling & Boosting

Sylvanos’ Side Special, a.k.a. Beast Dash, has a special property of being IASA cancellable on hit, meaning it is cancellable into quite literally any action. This can be used for mixups, combos, kills, or really anything your heart desires. Canceling Beast Dash opens up a huge array of options and avenues for creativity and is what gives this move all its value.

How it Works Copied to clipboard

Upon hitting your opponent or just about anything that gives hitpause with Side Special, you may input another action to cancel the move into the inputted action. Valid targets to cancel off include:

• Opponents
• Flowers (projectile or grounded)
• Kragg’s Rock or Pillar
• Ranno’s Bubble
• Olympia’s Crystal
• Forsburn’s Clone
• SK’s Dirt Block and Treasure Pile

And are cancellable into any action barring pure left stick/movement key inputs (dash, walk, fastfall):

• Grounded and aerial attacks
• Jump (allowing for wavedash as a cancel)
• Double Jump (will be discussed much much more later on in this guide)
• Parry, rolls and airdodge

Beast Dash’s speed can also be controlled with the left stick, allowing for cancels off of objects that would be positioned too closely otherwise.

Application Copied to clipboard

Now because this is a cancel from any Side Special hit into any action, there are countless uses to it and I encourage you to experiment and get creative. In this guide we’re going to focus on some specific valuable cancels rather than find every single possible combination this move can create.

Since Side Special is only cancellable on hitting a character or object, you should generally only be using it with this aim. Beast Dash has significant endlag on whiff including pratfall in the air, so whiffing is very likely to get you punished.

Up Strong Cancel Copied to clipboard

Ok yea, we need to talk about this one. Side Special > Up Strong is one of the most simple and common kill options in Sylvanos’ kit. It can kill fairly early, and be hit in most scenarios where you can land an Side Special. Simply cancel into Up Strong upon hitting your opponent and they will nice and neatly line up with your charging Up Strong on DI in, often near the tip for that extra launch power. This allows for some cheeky kills on opponents who either forget about it, are panicking, or can’t afford to DI out.

However, it’s not all unicorns and rainbows. DI out or to a platform will be enough for the opponent to escape this setup, and with how slow Up Strong is, you will not be getting any other followup if you whiff. As a kill option it’s simple and strong, but the opponent’s counterplay is just as simple, so don’t make a habit of relying on it as your primary means to kill.

Wavecancel Copied to clipboard

Cancelling Beast Dash into a jump, then using jump input as a wavedash allows you to effectively cancel Beast Dash into a wavedash, a fast versatile option allowing for countless scenarios. But even at its simplest, cancelling into a wavedash is much much faster than not cancelling on hit, so if you have no plan or idea what to do on hit, this is still a great option. Additionally it can be used to further mix up your movement and approaches, or for spacing yourself such as for Down Tilt tipper.

Flowers Copied to clipboard

You’ve probably noticed that flowers from your Ftilt or Nspecial, whether they are a projectile, growing, or fully planted, can be hit and then canceled off with Side Special. Well, here’s where I tell you that this interaction is quite possibly the strongest use for flowers and is what really elevates these cancels. Planting flowers allows you to set up spots in advance to give you cancels that are not dependent on your opponent, allowing you to have tricky approach options and sudden cancels, disjointed moves suddenly appearing out of a burst option, and more. This is how Beast Cancelling stops being just a combo tool, and turns into a neutral and approach tool. Do note that if you are too telegraphed your opponent will be able to punish you, or kill the flower causing Side Special to whiff.

Beast Boosting Copied to clipboard

Cancelling Side Special into double jump, commonly referred as Beast Boosting, allows you to achieve some insane airspeed that Sylv is otherwise nowhere near being able to achieve. A Sylvanos flying at you as fast as Ori or Slipstream Wrastor with a Fair is quite the scary sight!

Since Beast Boosting can be used upon hitting your opponent, it will allow you to follow their launch, tracing them in the air to get a followup, extending your combos and giving you far more options.

You can also incorporate Beast Boosting as a movement option, taking advantage of flowers to quickly reposition yourself through the air, chasing opponents otherwise out of your reach, or quickly closing large gaps in an approach.

Additionally, by controlling your jump with the left stick, you can choose how much momentum you want to transfer, including nearly none at all. You actually make this input after your opponents launch begins, so if your reaction time is good, you can even use this to react to your opponent’s DI, not carrying momentum to cover their DI in, or carrying it to chase DI out.

(Nearly) Grounded Copied to clipboard

While Beast Boosting requires you to be airborne when cancelling, you can achieve nearly grounded Beast Boosts by inputting them just above the ground. This is simple and straightforward enough when hitting opponents, and it can work with flowers too, but the vertical spacing is more tight. Getting into this height window to hit the flower but be in the air can be done with a fast enough input from a jump, or by falling into the window after a shorthop, albeit slower than the former method. Keep in mind that missing the flower will result in a few weeks worth of endlag.

Ledge Beast Boost Copied to clipboard

Since there is a brief input window for Beast Boost’s cancel, you can perform what I call a Ledge Beast Boost by hitting something on the ledge then waiting till you’re just off the ledge to double jump.

This application is more niche, as there are easier ways to achieve nearly grounded Beast Boosts that aren’t nearly as strict on timing and spacing, but recognizing when this is possible will allow you to take advantage of those scenarios when it lines up.

Recovery Copied to clipboard

This is my personal favorite application, however it is the most niche despite its flashiness, and requires more setup than anything else here. Beast Boosting as a recovery tool allows you to cover a lot of distance quickly, while threatening an attack and still being able to use Up Special. Due to the amount of setup and resources it requires, as well as its potential telegraphing, it is not often that this is your best option, but it is a powerful one. The easiest setup for this recovery is to fire a the seed with a forward angle, then airdodge up or diagonally up (depending on if you need more or less distance between you and the flower), then Beast Dash into the flower with some timing/reaction and get the boost. Optionally you can also do a stall with a single Bair (if you already have good horizontal spacing) to conserve your airdodge, though this is a harder setup.

Beginning to implement Beast Cancels and Beast Boosts into your play will level up the variety of your punishes and neutral mixups, and you’ll be Mr. Beast in no time!