by Doc – Owner, Founder, Fan of Putting Pants on Video Game Characters
I’ve trained and labbed the Pyra and Mythra amiibo three times now, taking expert care each time, and completed my video guide on the Amiibo Doctor Youtube channel. [LINK HERE]. But that video is by no means all-inclusive – so for the purposes of a complete record, I’ve included and expounded upon the research notes that I took when training the amiibo.
Everything in this is subject to change. Patches can happen, and I occasionally miss things when trying to train and research at the same time. If you’ve got something to add, send me an email at amiibodoctor@gmail.com. Please try to include evidence of the thing you’re adding.
Pyra & Mythra amiibo Training Notes
Changes randomly (Well, maybe not, but probably)
As I mention a lot in the video, Pythra switches like Pokemon Trainer. It appears, as best as I can tell, to be a largely random switching routine. Sometimes it looks like there’s a pattern – I noticed that the amiibo switched once after being juggled for 7 Up Tilts in a row. But the next few times I juggled the amiibo, it didn’t switch. Ditto situation when looking at damage taken since last switch, how many times it switches per stock, and so on. There’s just no pattern besides switching to Mythra to recover.
It’s funny – there was one time when I was fighting the amiibo and Pyra knocked me off-stage. Pyra then switched to Mythra, then immediately switched back to Pyra for no reason whatsoever. I was still off-stage and not close to recovering at the time, and the amiibo didn’t move in that time. It really seems to be either random, or such a dizzyingly complex series of subroutines that it may as well be random.
Built-In Combos
One of the most interesting discoveries I found was that Mythra’s got a lot of fancy-dancy stuff out of Forward Tilt, and a few things here and there out of Down Tilt. This isn’t anything close to an exhaustive list, but the crux of my research was focused on Pyra’s AI potential and Pythra’s switching, not Mythra’s follow-ups out of a seemingly useless move.
Mythra’s got Forward Tilt – Dash attack and Forward Tilt – Forward Smash as her most common follow-ups (for my amiibo, at least). Down Tilt – Forward Air is fairly frequent as well.
There’s nothing incredibly impressive, but I’m surprised that the developers bothered to include anything at all. I would’ve shelved this and gone for an Up Tilt juggle routine instead, which neither character seems to have. If Mythra had an Up Tilt juggle routine that could connect at least two or three times, that would’ve been massively useful for racking up damage, and would’ve benefited Pythra pretty notably.
Pineapples on Dream Land
Dream Land and Pokemon Stadium 2 are home to a moderately frustrating error with amiibo AI. When the AI recovers, it calculates a trajectory to return to the ledge given the parameters of its recovery options. Due to the stupid undersides of these stages, amiibo can’t properly calculate how to return to the ledge, so they just hit the undersides and die. This is called Pineappleing.
This is also the case with Pyra and Mythra, in case you were hoping and praying they would be immune to Pineappleing.
Using Up Special as an attack
I didn’t train my Pythra to use Up Special as an attack, but they can do it. It’s not a great idea, but they’ll do it.
Mythra will use it just about whenever – but she’s very vulnerable afterwards, and her Up Special doesn’t produce a very useful projectile. Mythra’s the reason that I passed on Up Special as an attack. I’ve seen Mythra use it on stage, use it as an on-stage edgeguard, even use it for no reason at lower levels. She loves this thing, man.
Pyra’s the one who has an actually useful Up Special, and she’s the one who’s not living up to her full potential. As far as attacks are concerned, there’s really no going wrong on non-platformed stages – it’s a hugely powerful KO move with massive damage and knockback, and she’s safe when using it. It’s like Ike’s Aether, but with teeth.
Nine times out of ten when my Pyra attacks with Up Special, it’s solely as an on-stage edgeguard. Again, this could just be because I didn’t focus on Up Special – but the fact that Mythra uses it liberally as an attack and Pyra doesn’t indicates to me that’s not the case. I’ve not seen anyone else’s Pythras to compare, so shoot me an email at amiibodoctor@gmail.com if you’ve got one that uses it differently.
Neutral Special
I said in the video that Mythra doesn’t use her Side Special, instead opting for her Neutral Special, which has a shorter range. I don’t understand the reasoning behind this.
In addition, they seem to have specific rules relating to charging Neutral Special. When I trained Pythra the second and third time, I always charged Neutral Special fully – but they don’t. Most of the time they’ll just input Neutral Special and release it uncharged. Mythra occasionally charges it for a half-second, but it’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it thing.
The only exception to this is the ledge. When Pythra is at the ledge, she’ll charge Neutral Special until the opponent is in range to be edgeguarded. That doesn’t happen often, but that’s because I taught them other attacks at the ledge.
Amiibo Doctor 