Ridley (SSBU)/Down special

Hitbox visualization showing Ridley's down special, Skewer.

Overview

Ridley pulls his tail back and winds up for a bit before violently stabbing with it. The move is high-risk, high reward, with the sweetspot causing the opponent to crumple if it lands, as well as dealing massive damage, with 45% from the first stab followed up with an extra 10% when he retracts his tail. The attack also ignores Super Armor. The high damage output and crumple allow Ridley to deliver a devastating punish upon landing with the attacks sweetspot.

A notable issue with the attack is the sweetspot allows the opponent to act a bit before Ridley can, meaning that Ridley will often need to read the opponent's getup option to get a meaningful follow up. The sweetspot is also only active for an extremely narrow window and only sweetspots at the center of his tail barb, meaning the positioning to land this attack is narrow, with the sourspot dealing pitiful damage and being rather useless and dangerous to connect with. Additionally the move deals negligible shield damage, meaning a opponent can shield the attack upon seeing it coming. The move is also classified as a grab, meaning reads off of throws are completely useless when trying to land the attack due to grab immunity. Finally, the move is slow, taking a half-second for the sweetspot to come out, meaning it can be easily dodged outside of hard reads. However, due to it's marginally faster startup compared to other powerful and slow moves, such as Warlock Punch, Ridley can sometimes force the attack to land via tech chasing the opponent.

Overall, Skewer rarely sees use in professional settings due to the extreme risk and commitment that comes with using it. However, it does occasionally see use in hard read and tech chase situations, albeit rarely.

Update history

8.0.0

The tipper hitbox deals more damage (40% → 45%).
The tipper no longer triggers a Special Zoom nor crumples opponents with grab immunity. This significantly worsens a hard read into the move from Ridley's down throw at low percents, which is now unsafe on hit, and removes the infamous Skewer bury infinite in doubles matches.

Hitboxes

ID	Damage	SD	Angle type	BK	KS	FKV	Radius	Bone	Offset			H×	SDI×	T%	Sound	Hit bits	Hit part	Shieldstun
0	45.0%	-37	Standard	0	100	20	2.1	top	3.0	7.0	24.5	0.0×	1.0×	0%	None	All	All	—
1	45.0%	-37	Standard	50	30	0	2.1	top	3.0	7.0	24.5	0.6×	1.0×	0%	Slash	All	All	x0.2
2	5.0%	0	Standard	30	50	0	2.2	top	0.0	7.0	8.0	1.0×	1.0×	0%	Slash	All	All	x0.2