The Pityflip
How to perform and apply Zetterburn's flashiest recovery mixup
Pityflip is, at its purest, just a wavebounce Dspecial cancelled into the flip. Alongside the flashy tricks, its main purposes are movement and recovery mix ups. Wavebouncing/reversing Dspecial alone is a great way to mix up your landings and platform movement, but the flip makes you that much more mobile and slippery (and cool).
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The inputs consist firstly of a Down Special followed by a press of the dodge button to cancel into a flip, but what matters the most is how you turn yourself around with the analog stick. There are a plethora of methods and personal preferences to do this, but my favorite and the easiest way is to perform a quarter circle. Starting with your analog stick facing diagonally downwards towards whatever ledge you wish to slide off of, quickly press dodge to perform the flip cancel and roll your analog stick 90 degrees to the other side, pointed diagonally downwards towards where you started the flip.
Learning the flip this way allows for the pityflip to be initiated whether facing towards or away from ledge. While facing towards, there is no need to start diagonally downwards, as you can just hold down and input the flip to launch the correct way. However when facing away from the stage, the diagonal turns you around first so that you launch towards the edge, while the quarter circle will turn you back around. The reason l say to practice with the diagonal anyways is to build muscle memory and become comfortable performing the tech regardless of which way you are facing.
Nuanced control of your aerial drift, and/or a fastfall input just above ledge can both help you hit the slideoff correctly if the spacing of the flip wasn’t perfect.
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Spirit Tree and Air Armada are the best stages to practice this on, as you can bounce between the plats with ease. Practice going from one platform to another, but also perform the quarter circles to return to the platform you just came from (flip off of the ones you are facing away from) to get comfortable going both directions.
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Recovering with pityflip, you should be looking to bait an attack from your opponent while you clip the stage and quickly slide off after regaining all of your resources. This allows for an almost immediate reversal, as you have back your double jump, walljump, and air dodge, but you are still in a vulnerable position offstage. As stated before, this option is fundamentally a mixup, as when predicted it can be very easily punished and is not worth it. It is however quite difficult to react to when done right, especially if your opponent isn’t ready for it, so if you use it wisely, it can save you from a lot of hassle recovering with Up B and Down B on repeat.
Flip around and find out!