King K. Rool (SSBU)/Down aerial

King K. Rool down aerial hitbox visualization	King K. Rool down aerial hitbox visualization	King K. Rool down aerial hitbox visualization	King K. Rool down aerial hitbox visualization	King K. Rool down aerial hitbox visualization
 	 	 	 	
==Overview==
K. Rool does a flip before stomping downwards. Down aerial's clean hit is a relatively weak meteor smash, and it is overall his weakest aerial after neutral air. A lingering late hit lends it some use as a sex kick of sorts, but the hitbox is thin and the move as a whole is a bit slow, often making it difficult for K. Rool players to use. However, the payoff for landing it is immense. 
Down aerial is K. Rool's best confirm into grab once forward aerial launches too far with tumble, up until down aerial's early hit sends too high off the ground, usually post-tumblehttps://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D_yM8UhNDiQXFlyTx-fHM_uFjZ5hN9sffAZ3wYUlrRg/edit?usp=sharing. This allows for absurd damage in a short space of time, with down aerial dealing 15% alone and K. Rool's grab game allowing for many different routes to deal damage. Usually, a low-landed down aerial can lead to at least 45% in damage. 
Down aerial is capable of locking opponents until it sends into tumble as well, which occurs at around 50%. The sourspot will also lock until around 15%. These allow for K. Rool to get very high damage output from his lock combos, usually ending with dash attack, or if the player isn't confident, forward tilt. Locks are often set up by neutral attack or forward aerial, or very rarely low percentage Crownerang. While forward tilt can set these up, the hit advantage is almost never enough to justify attempting to do so. Hitting opponents with another down aerial as they get up can be used for further combo extension. 
Down aerial's most powerful utility comes as a hard punish for players not mashing fast enough out of down throw or down tilt. This is because it is possible to store its meteor smashes in buried states for around 40-50%, allowing K. Rool to get incredible combos. Down tilt virtually guarantees down aerial confirms from around 70%, allowing for forward smash. It's also very helpful as an out of shield option through SHFF, which is one of the few options King K. Rool has that can be seen as reliable. 
Down aerial's hitbox is large vertically, extending past the feet, thus making it disjointed. As the hitbox reaches well below the ledge, this makes it very good for 2-framing, or even nailing opponents before their ledge grab. The high number of active frames makes this even easier. If used from stage, even if it fails, there is usually enough time to get a neutral aerial ledgetrap off. In a similar vein, down aerial hits below platforms, allowing it to be used to stave off platform pressure and even combo from around 80%.
Naturally this large hitbox also makes it easy to end stocks with meteor smashes offstage. However, the FAF is very high, meaning a fast fall down aerial offstage will lead to an SD. The meteor smash has low base knockback, meaning it isn't safe on hit off stage until it sends into tumble; it is recommended to wait until around 80% to start doing it properly. The late hit is also very good for edgeguarding, sending outward, and the sweetspot on the hip has 20 more base knockback than the feet, scoring a KO reasonably early.
However, down aerial has significant drawbacks. The hitbox lacks horizontal range, making it difficult to use in neutral or even advantage. The move is unsafe on shield with 14 frames of landing lag. It doesn't autocancel out of a short hop and is quite laggy both on startup (frame 14) and on endlag (a very large FAF of 62). As a result, it is also very unsafe on whiff despite the Belly Super Armor backing it up, with it essentially being a free grab for the opponent once the hitbox has terminated. As a result, down aerial is usually used for whiff punishing or bury combo extensions.
==Hitboxes==
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==Timing==
===Attack===
Initial autocancel	1-3
Belly Super Armor 	14-25
Clean hit 	14-15
Late hit 	16-21
Ending autocancel 	40-
Interruptible 	62
Animation length 	70
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===Landing lag===
Interruptible 	15
Animation length	23
==Trivia==
*Similarly to King K. Rool's , the move's scripts have a line for terminating intangibility on frame 18, but without any line for starting it. This implies it was intended to grant intangibility of some sort (such as on King K. Rool's legs to create disjoint) at some point in development, but ended up being scrapped.
Category:King K. Rool (SSBU)
Category:Down aerials (SSBU)