Farore’s Wind maintains some of Zelda’s momentum, and is most apparent during double jump. Performing a double jump moving backwards or forwards, followed by an immediate Farore’s input, carries Zelda’s teleport startup in the direction of the double jump at a reduced speed. With this knowledge, you can take more evasive actions. Try starting a teleport to somewhere safer or quickly adjust your Farore’s position to make a sweet spot possible. Teleport drift also happens during fast fall. Start a fast fall, input Up-B, and the downward momentum will cause your teleport to drop faster.
Teleport drift is also affected by other momentum, such as hitstun. If you begin a Farore’s immediately out of hitstun while in motion, your Farore’s will drift with your momentum. This stacks with double jump drifting, and can be used to move a considerable distance away from your opponent. Knowing this, you can react to prevent combos, or quickly escape to ledge for an advantage.
You can also use double jump drift for low or flat recoveries. Double jump slightly below ledge, then use the drift to shift the ledge grab range. This is one of the safest possible recoveries, as the length of Farore’s magnet grab makes it more difficult for your opponent to react in time. Attempts to edgehog Zelda in this situation are marginally effective, as Farore’s snaps to the ledge as soon as it is unoccupied. Additionally, variable distance and increased frames from this action can assist in avoiding death from longer instances of edgehogging.
Now that we know Farore’s is affected by momentum, we can assume it is also affected by lack of momentum. If a double jump is stored, you can perform a drift “stop” teleport. With the control stick in neutral, tap jump into a Farore’s Wind input. Stop teleports are useful to sweet spot Farore’s, as stopping drift allows you to more reliably hit your target, either on a ledge or a platform for an edge cancel. Drift stop teleports are still affected by prior momentum from attacks after hitstun, but seem to ignore momentum from wavelands and shield push. However, drift stop teleports are sometimes inconvenient. For example: when you’re trying to fast fall drift before your double jump, you will often end up double jumping a frame or two before Farore’s and only perform a normal drift, or drift stop. If you input Up-B within a frame (fast enough that there is no full return to neutral) you will still be able to fast fall drift, even with a double jump.
Grounded Drift teleports are also possible, by teleporting after jumpsquat similar to wavedashing. I refer to these as hover teleports. You can also double jump immediately after jumpsquat for a bigger double jump drift teleport. This is considered an aerial teleport, and is best used on flat ground to Farore’s edge cancel.
Executing Farore’s Wind on stage from any horizontal angle (or lower) keeps Zelda grounded, and cannot be used to ledge cancel. This is due to 0 momentum on startup, and thus no drift. This makes a sliding cancel like Sheik’s teleport edge cancel impossible; however the same idea can still be applied to quickly grab ledge and throw out a hitbox. If you hover teleport while running to the ledge, you can start a Farore’s as soon as jumpsquat ends; either by a jump or by sliding off the edge and drift teleporting. The teleport should drift far enough to allow an easy sweet spot with SE / SSE inputs (or tighter). You can also use Farore’s while sliding to stop yourself on the spot; this is especially useful during Amsah teching as it gives you an unexpected way to burn momentum and regain stage presence without needing to grab ledge.
While Zelda’s drift teleport is typically used with a double jump, it’s also possible to fast fall drift with Farore’s while a double jump is available to you. Either tilt into up tilt range for the Up-B input, or buffer the “up” input during an aerial, or uninterruptible action to prevent a double jump. One application of this technique is to waveland off of ledge, hold your jump, then drift a teleport back to ledge. It not only throws a hitbox, but quickly grabs ledge. You can do this with either method; I find it easiest to buffer “up” while wavelanding.
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