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This article is about Lucas's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. For other uses, see Lucas.

Lucas (リュカ Ryuka?) is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. The first EarthBound newcomer since the original Super Smash Bros., Lucas is the main character of MOTHER 3, the sequel to EarthBound, released only in Japan. While Lucas' Special Moves are very similar to Ness', his physical attacks, however, are all completely different. Lucas relies on his PSI powers far more than Ness, using them for all his attacks but his Forward Smash, Up Aerial, Down Tilt, and standard combo.

Lucas uses Duster's Rope Snake from MOTHER 3 to perform a Tether Recovery. The Rope Snake is also a taunt, where Lucas looks at the snake and argues with it. Lucas also utilizes Duster's Rope Snake for his grabs, giving him a ranged grab, much like Link, Samus, and Olimar. Like Ness, all of his Special Moves, as well as his Final Smash, derive from in-game attacks that are instead learned by another character, in his case, Kumatora, not Lucas himself.

Lucas ranks 30th on the tier list - the lowest ranked newcomer - due to his below-average matchups, tourney rankings and poor recovery. Like Ness, his Up-B recovery is unsafe (although still much safer than Ness'), but he has much better options that revolve around the wavebounce that his PK Fire gives him. Even though he has a tether recovery, his average speed and his lags on some attacks have led him into the lowest lower-mid tier position. Also, his unusually long grab release animation makes him the target for semi-infinite grab releases from Marth and an infinite from Donkey Kong.

Attributes[]

Strengths[]

  • Disjointed hitboxes on many attacks grant him high priority
  • PK Freeze is useful for setting up for follow-up attacks and kill moves
  • PK Fire has good range and high knockback that makes it useful for spacing, edge-guarding, and zoning
  • PK Thunder hits multiple times and can be guided to gimp opponents
  • PSI Magnet can absorb energy-based projectiles to heal Lucas and unlike Ness' has a hitbox that is useful for halting approaches and spacing opponents
  • Forward smash can reflect projectiles
  • Up smash is the most powerful up smash in the game, followed by Sonic, having high damage, launch, and kill power as well as a very large hitbox with great range
  • Most attacks are fast and useful for spacing
  • Down throw is an excellent combo starter
  • Back throw is a kill throw
  • Up throw is useful for mindgames and can kill
  • Down smash can easily punish dodging attempts, particularly spot dodges
  • Neutral aerial and down aerial hit multiple times, enabling them to punish airdodges
  • Has two meteor smashes: back aerial and down aerial
  • Forward smash is a reliable kill move
  • Fast tilts
  • Good grab game and air game, with three useful grabs and fast aerials
  • Great air speed
  • Good horizontal recovery when PK Fire recoil and PSI Magnet are used in tandem
  • Fast jab
  • Ranged grab
  • Tether recovery

Weaknesses[]

  • Long grab release animation makes him extremely susceptible to chain-grabs and grab release punishes
  • Poor recovery that is very unsafe in the form of PK Thunder
  • Poor match-up spread
  • High lag on some attacks, particularly kill moves, especially up smash
  • PK Freeze has slow maneuverability and leaves Lucas vulnerable
  • PK Fire has some starting lag
  • PK Thunder can be easily thrown off by opponents, messing up Lucas' recovery, and can leave Lucas vulnerable when using it as an attack
  • PSI Magnet is rather useless against characters with no energy-based projectiles
  • Down smash only hits on one side, leaving Lucas open to attacks from behind
  • Meteor smashes are unreliable as they need to sweetspot
  • Average dash speed
  • High ending lag on grab if it misses
  • Zair is poor as the Rope Snake quickly goes limp

Summary[]

Lucas is a character with mostly fast, strong and high priority attacks, and average dash speed. On the upside, his aerials are generally quick, and two of them can Meteor Smash opponents. His Forward Aerial has relatively good range, especially when retreating. Both of his two aerial Meteor Smashes are hard to hit with, in the sense that one can only Meteor Smash an enemy downwards with a certain "spot" of the attacks: the tip of his foot for the Back Aerial, and the 4th and final kick for his Down Aerial, which is the easiest to land but much weaker of the two. His Forward Smash often serves as his most reliable killing move, but it is very predictable. Some other KO options are Down Throw, Back Throw (near the edge) and Up Aerial, but these will not KO reliably until about 140%+ on a midweight. However, Lucas himself has very good aerial speed and turning, making him highly mobile when jumping.

His Smash Attacks are very strong: his Up Smash can be charged for massive damage and vertical knockback, his Forward Smash is very strong and fairly quick, and also reflects projectiles, like Ness', and his Down Smash is very strong, can hit three times and punishes spotdodges, rolls and airdodges, but has a bit of start-up lag. One of these attacks, Up Smash, tends to have more than enough ending lag to be easily punished in many situations and his Down Smash is punishable not by the ending lag, but by the duration of the move since it only hits in front of him, leaving him using only his Forward Smash for easy on-stage kills, which starts becoming too predictable for KO use.

Two of his Special Moves can be “controlled”, PK Freeze and PK Thunder. This means that these attacks both leave Lucas very vulnerable, because he can't move or attack when controlling these projectiles. PK Thunder is Lucas’ main recovery move. If it hits Lucas, it will shoot him in an angle depending on the part of Lucas's body which it hits, and can deal a large amount of damage if all its hits connect. PK Thunder normally goes through enemies and objects, but it can still be interrupted by certain attacks, hurting his recovery. PK Freeze can be controlled from side to side and can freeze opponents and do a good amount of damage if "charged", but the vertical nature of its knockback limits its use. His Side Special Move, PK Fire, is a single hit move that pushes Lucas back a little, making it great for Wavebouncing. It can also be used to Zap Jump, which gives Lucas’s recovery a substantial boost. His Down Special Move, PSI Magnet, can absorb energy based projectiles, such as Ray Gun bullets, Fire Breath, and even Pikachu's Thunder, and if it used right after PK Fire, can push him back even further, a technique called the Magnet Pull, giving him a great horizontal recovery. In addition, his midair jump is the 3rd highest in the game, falling a little shy of Ness, who is also exceeded by Yoshi. As stated above, the jump can be significantly lengthened by performing a PK Fire 1 frame after a midair jump has been inputted.

Lucas has a very quick jab, making it useful for creating space between the opponent. His Forward Tilt, having very little start-up and ending lag, shares that main use. Although it has KO potential at the edges of stages past 130%, both his jab and Forward Tilt have surprisingly disjointed range, especially the Forward Tilt. Lucas' Down Throw chains right into his Up Tilt at lower percents. Afterwards, the Up Tilt can be chained into itself until about 35%. The move itself has fairly low range, and is otherwise only really used for spacing.

Lucas himself has a powerful set of throws. Although his grab is slow and has low range compared to other tether grabs, his pivot grab is very fast and can be highly effective at times. His Forward and Up Throws aren't anything special really, except his Up Throw actually has good knockback to it, KOing about 20% after his Down Throw, but it is fast, which makes it a decent mindgame to trick the DI of opponents by throwing them faster than they would have expected. His Back Throw has very high knockback at times, and can KO at very early percents, especially if the opponent DI's badly (sometimes under 90% for the lighter characters). Although it's not always so reliable, otherwise it still has good KO ability for a throw. His Down Throw has the highest vertical knockback for any other throw (except for Olimar's Purple Pikmin's Up Throw), and is the strongest Down Throw in the game, knockback wise (although Squirtle's KOs soon afterward). Though, however good they may be, there is still the prospect of obtaining a grab, which in itself remains a challenge for most cases in advanced play, as a pivot grab isn't always effective, and both his regular and dash grabs are very laggy, however his standing grab is faster than some other standing tether grabs.

One of Lucas' most well known ways to kill is with a Lock. His Down Aerial is the best way to set up a lock (when performed correctly it is almost impossible to tech), his locking move (Strong Down) can rack up damage quickly, and he has excellent followups, such as Up Smash and Forward Smash. However, SDI can be used to escape his Down Aerial if caught in the first hits.

One of Lucas' greater areas of performance is his recovery. Not only is his PK Thunder better than Ness' for recovery, but he also has a tether and Zap Jump and Magnet Pull, making this the largest and one of the most important differences between him and Ness.

Being semi-infinitely grab released by Marth and infinited by DK is a major flaw in his game. Like Ness, Lucas suffers from 10 additional frames of lag when he is grab released from the ground, enough to be re-grabbed by Marth and DK and dash grabbed by others or open for certain attacks.

Moveset[]

Ground Attacks[]

Normal[]
  • Neutral Attack - Kicks with his right leg twice, then does a spin kick with his left. Very fast, as the hitbox comes out on the second frame. Three hits of 3%, 3%, then 4% for a max of 10%. All hits have surprising disjointed reach.
  • Dash Attack - Lucas slides forward, shooting PSI energy out of his hands. Has a bit of startup lag (frame 17), but decent range. 12% normally, 10% if hit at the tip.
  • Strong Side - Lucas does a back hand and creates a wave of PSI. Can be aimed up or down slightly. If aimed down, it can trip foes. 11% normally, 9% if the opponent is a bit behind Lucas. Fast startup, hits on frame 6.
  • Strong Up - Lucas does a one-handed stand flipkick charged with PSI. Can chain into itself at lower percents. Two hits of 3%, then 8% for a max of 11%. At later frames, it can Meteor Smash, albeit extremely weakly. A useful followup of Up Throw at low %. Very fast, hits on frame 4.
  • Strong Down - Lucas crouches and spins with his leg out. The tip of this attack trips. This can be used multiple times in a row, like Ness's Strong Down, then be chained into a fast attack. Is surprisingly disjointed, with the hitbox extending to half a character length past Lucas. Only the disjointed hitbox trips, with a high trip rate of almost 100%. It semi-spikes opponents, but due to its extremely low knockback, it is only noticeable at extremely high percentages. Perhaps the best use of this move is to perform a Lock after knocking an opponent down with the last hit of Down Aerial, which can be chained after the lock into almost any of his moves, most commonly Side Smash and Up Smash. 6%. Very fast startup, hits on frame 3.
Smash[]
  • Side Smash - Lucas swings his stick. Like Ness' Forward Smash, it is a reflector, but it is faster, yet is only slightly weaker (when compared with the sweetspot (tip) of Ness' bat, not the body or the handle), but it still has great knockback for a Smash Attack. 15% uncharged, 21% fully charged. Dubbed by players "Better Stick", which is one of Lucas' standard stick weapons in MOTHER 3. Decent startup, hits on frame 14.
  • Up Smash - Lucas releases a burst of PSI that erupts above his head, but also hits to the sides and damages any breakable floors Lucas may be standing on. It has a sluggish start-up and very long duration (hits on frame 28-53) and leaves dreadful lag afterwards (lasts until frame 100), rendering it very easily punished. It is compensated, however, by its extremely large knockback and range, it is the third strongest Up Smash in the game, KO percentage wise (only Ivysaur's and Mr. Game and Watch's are stronger). At the same time, its range is wide enough to hit two character lengths to the side of him, and able to hit foes on the very top platform of Battlefield from the bottom. Up Smash has massive hitlag when it connects, which is most noticeable on Brinstar, as the hitboxes linger for up to 2 seconds. Two hits of 2% (does not connect if opponent is far away), then 19% for a max of 21% uncharged, 27% for a max of 29% fully charged. This is believed to be, or derive from, his PK Love attack, since he uses a similar looking move to pull a needle both in MOTHER 3 and in one of his victory poses, and he can only pull needles if he has learned PK Love.
  • Down Smash - Lucas points at the ground in front of him, "shooting" three bursts of PSI energy at his feet. Though each hit is progressively weaker, their hitboxes gradually grow. In most cases, it is not possible that two of the hits will connect on the same enemy. Great for edgeguarding and punishing rolls, spotdodges and airdodges. The third hit has a chance of tripping foes at low %. It has slow startup (first hit on frame 20), and has minimal protection from behind except for the third hitbox covering his body, thus leaving Lucas very vulnerable. Three hits of 17%, 14%, then 11% uncharged; 23%, 20%, then 15% fully charged. If this move was used while he is on a destructible platform, the destruction of the platform would cause him to be in the air and the attack ends without lag. It is very possible to hit with more than one hit if Lucas is on a moving platform, like the one on Smashville. This is probably derived from PK Ground, where Kumatora would use PSI to shake the ground, making multiple hits that could also make opponents fall over.
Other[]
  • Ledge Attack - Lucas flips onto the stage, then does a sweep kick. 8% damage.
  • 100% Ledge Attack - Lucas slowly climbs up with his fist drawn back, then delivers a powerful punch. 10% damage.
  • Floor Attack - Lucas gets up and spins on one hand while sticking a leg out. 6% damage.
  • Trip Attack - Lucas gets up on his hands and kicks backwards, then thrusts his legs between his arms in a kick forward. 5% damage.

Aerial Attacks[]

  • Neutral Aerial - Lucas spins in a gyro pattern with PSI energy around him. Lucas' fastest aerial, and best for damage racking. Seven hits of 2%, then a hit of 3% for a max of 17%. This move depletes enemy shields quickly, and can be followed with a Jab to further damage a shield. Fast startup, on frame 5.
  • Forward Aerial - Lucas kicks his foot forward with PSI. Can be auto-cancelled. 12% normally, 10% if the enemy is a bit behind Lucas, 8% if the enemy is hit with the final frames of the move. Fairly fast, hits on frame 9.
  • Back Aerial - Lucas does a flip with his foot behind him and hooks them downwards with a stream of small PSI. Knocks backwards, but if one hits with the tip of his foot (at virtually ANY time), it is a good Meteor Smash. Regular, non-meteor smash, knockback is extremely low. 10% if sourspotted, 7% during last frames, 12% if sweetspotted. Somewhat slow for an aerial, hits on frame 15.
  • Up Aerial - Moves upwards a little and does a headbutt. Fast startup (frame 5), but has quite a bit of ending lag. It has abnormal range at the top of the back of his head. 13% damage.
  • Down Aerial - Lucas thrusts his feet downwards and creates several quick-flashing PSI energy. Multi-hitting attack with some ending lag if you do not auto-cancel it using a normal jump. Excellent for setting up Locks. The fourth hit can Meteor Smash weakly. Up to 20% damage. First hit on frame 4.
  • Rope Snake - Lucas thrusts his Rope Snake forward. No damage; for recovery purposes only. It can cancel landing lag when used as you hit the ground, and gives him a technique called Dustersliding that allows him to go from the ledge to the stage very quickly, allowing him to punish recoveries with an Up Smash such as Lucario's.

Grabs and Throws[]

  • Grab - Pulls out his Rope Snake which extends and grabs the opponent. Long range and less laggier than other tether grabs, especially his pivot grab, which has greatly reduced ending lag.
  • Pummel - Headbutts the foe. 3% damage. When done in the correct rhythm, it deals 9% per second, the highest of any character.
  • Forward Throw - Psychokinetically tosses opponent ahead. 10% damage.
  • Back Throw - Psychokinetically blasts opponent back. Good KO potential. A strong Back Throw. 10% damage.
  • Up Throw - Psychokinetically tosses opponent straight up. 10% damage. High vertical knockback for a throw, KOs at about 160 - 180%.
  • Down Throw - Psychokinetically slams opponent down, and stomps on the opponent. 7% damage. High vertical knockback. This is Lucas' strongest throw, as well as the strongest Down Throw in the game. Combines with Strong Up until 35% (average). Will KO at around 140 - 170%.

Special Moves[]

Lucas' Special Moves
Brawl 3DS/Wii U Ultimate
Standard Special PK Freeze
Side Special PK Fire
Up Special PK Thunder
Down Special PSI Magnet
Final Smash PK Starstorm

Taunts[]

  • Up Taunt - Lucas trips, shakes his head, and gets back up. Probably derived from Fassad's banana peels. It could also possibly be a reference to the naming screen in MOTHER 3, where Lucas attempts to run off the screen, but trips.
  • Down Taunt - Lucas creates PSI sparks with his fingers, moving his arms in a sideways motion.
  • Side Taunt - Duster's Rope Snake taps him on the shoulder and has a brief conversation with Lucas, as Lucas shrugs towards it.

Victory Poses[]

  • Lucas is found kneeling on the ground holding his stick, before turning to face the camera with a "hm?"
  • Swishes PSI hexagons in the air with his finger.
  • Pulls one of the Seven Needles out of the ground.

Idle Animations[]

  • Lucas moves his fists as if playing imaginary drums. (May be a reference to DCMC)
  • Lucas stamps one foot and then the other.

In competitive play[]

Lucas has a poor matchup spread overall. He counters 1 character, Ganondorf, soft counters 6 Characters, has 7 even matchups, gets soft countered by 12 characters, countered by 10, and hard countered by 4.

Lucas' 10 extra frames of lag while being grab released, and the extensive chain grabbing it allowed, was discovered very early on in Brawl competitive play. As a result, Lucas perpetually floundered between 27th-30th on the tier list in the low tiers, with minimal tournament results and a small player base, since the very beginning of Brawl. Lucas had a few dedicated and highly notable players however, most significantly Mekos, who managed to get unusually high tournament placings with a perceived low tier character; the pinnacle of such being Mekos placing 9th at SKTAR, which was only the second time (after San at Apex 2010) that a player would place in the top twelve at a national using a perceived low tier character (and this would be the last time in Brawl that a low tier player would place that high at a national).

The propensity of the aforementioned Lucas players to place significantly higher than their low tier brethren and the best players of some higher ranked characters, as well as occasionally taking sets off of big name players using high tier characters, led to many players believing Lucas was underrated and not the low tier he was always ranked as. While the BBR would finally formally move Lucas out of the low tier in their latest tier list after having ranked him a low tier for five years, they didn't actually increase his placing and he remains only one spot removed out of their low tier at his perpetual 30th ranking. The Japanese however rank Lucas a bit higher on their tier list, ranking 24th there in their middle tiers.

Role in Subspace Emissary[]

Subspace lucas

Lucas in the SSE

Lucas is seen walking alone in an abandoned zoo, until several Primids show up. Then, suddenly, the gigantic Porky Statue appears and chases after Lucas. Lucas runs from it, until he gets caught in a snag and is about to be crushed when Ness comes to his rescue by attacking the statue with a PK Thunder. Ness blows up the Porky Statue with his PK Flash, which reveals Porky Minch himself (based on his MOTHER 3 appearance). Ness and Lucas defeat him, but no sooner do they do so when Wario shows up and attempts to shoot Ness with his Dark Cannon. Ness dodges each time, so Wario eventually aims at Lucas and shoots. Ness pushes Lucas out of the way and gets turned into a trophy himself. Terrified, Lucas runs away as Wario cackles in the rain.

Later on, Lucas runs into the Pokémon Trainer as more Primids show up. After they are defeated, the Pokémon Trainer leaves, but Lucas decides to join him after remembering what happened to Ness. Lucas and the Trainer encounter and defeat Wario in the desert wastelands outside of an abandoned temple, but Lucas gets depressed when Ness is still nowhere to be seen. Along the way, the Pokémon Trainer catches Ivysaur and Charizard. After Charizard is caught, Galleom falls into the ruins, having been knocked down there by Marth, Meta Knight, and Ike. A battle ensues between Lucas, the Pokémon Trainer, and Galleom.

After the battle, Galleom grabs Lucas and the Pokémon Trainer, jumping high into the sky and out of the ruins. Galleom then attempts to detonate a Subspace Bomb as a last-ditch effort. Lucas, finally gaining his courage, uses PK Thunder to sever Galleom's arm, causing the two to plummet to the ground. Just before they hit the bottom, Meta Knight grabs the two and takes them to Marth and Ike. When there, Lucas shakes hands with the Trainer as a sign of their friendship.

Lucas and the other heroes confront the Subspace Gunship, and then journey into subspace to battle Tabuu. Lucas is defeated by Tabuu, but later revived by Ness and his companions (there is no cutscene of Lucas and Ness reuniting). He accompanies the heroes into the Great Maze, and can be used to defeat Tabuu at the final battle.

Exclusive Stickers[]

Lucas can use any sticker that has a PK attack bonus, similar to Ness. He can also use ice, fire, and electric attack bonuses for his special moves, and body, leg, and head bonuses for his physical attacks.

Costume Gallery[]

Alt-lucas

Lucas' various costume changes

Trivia[]

  • Lucas, along with Ness, Snake, Captain Falcon, Peach, and Ike is one of the only characters that talks in the Subspace Emissary. He yells "PK Thunder!" while using the move to free both the Pokémon Trainer and himself from Galleom.
  • Lucas's Special Moves aren't even his own attacks in MOTHER 3, but rather Kumatora's. The same happens with Ness in Earthbound, only his attacks belong to Paula and Poo instead.
    • Ironically, Lucas can actually learn PK Flash in MOTHER 3, but does not use it in Brawl.
  • Lucas's grab, Rope Snake, was never used by Lucas in MOTHER 3, but rather by Duster.
  • Lucas is one of four characters who can KO in Sudden Death with any throw.
  • Oddly, when the Rope Snake is used against a ledge at 1/4 speed, it jerks around while it clings to the ledge and while Lucas is being pulled up. At other speeds, it only jerks around while Lucas is being pulled up (it is unnoticeable at normal speed and 1.5 speed).
    • Also, when Lucas uses the Rope Snake when standing on a ramp or angled platform, Lucas's hair will flatten out.
  • Lucas never uses his hands directly to attack, except for his ledge attack (if his damage is more than 100%).
  • In a cutscene of the Subspace Emissary, Lucas is being chased by the King Pig Statue. While running he trips over a root. The next scene, his foot is tangled under the root.
  • Strangely, Lucas has teeth during the cutscenes of the Subspace Emissary, but not during the actual gameplay. Ness has this distinction as well.
  • Lucas is one of two characters to make their international debut in a Smash Bros. game. The other was Marth in Super Smash Bros. Melee.
    • Both of their debuts in their respective series were in a Japan-exclusive game.

External links[]

EarthboundSymbol Mother/EarthBound universe
Characters Ness (64  · Melee  · Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Lucas (Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Side Characters Final Smash Paula  · Poo  · Kumatora  · Boney
Bosses Porky Statue  · Porky Minch
Assist Trophies Jeff Andonuts  · Starman
Mii Fighter Costumes Flying Man
Stage Hazards Ultimate Chimera  · Flying Man
Enemies Devil Car  · Starman
Stages Onett  · Fourside  · New Pork City  · Magicant
Items Mr. Saturn  · Franklin Badge  · Ramblin' Evil Mushroom
Music List of Music (Mother/EarthBound series)
Collectibles Trophies Melee Trophies  · Brawl Trophies  · 3DS Trophies  · Wii U Trophies
Stickers List of Stickers (Mother/EarthBound series)
Spirits List of spirits (EarthBound/MOTHER series)
Masterpieces Mother 2/EarthBound
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