Little Mac, we may lose just by the weight of a character with more range than us, a lot more damage than us, and kills us pretty well too.
But eh, he has not a single thing that punishes full hop forward air. However, his momentum is disgusting, I can get hit at like 30% and be pushed off stage/to the ledge, and I won't ever regain a solid position again to play in neutral for the rest of that stock, and then unfortunately you deal with Mac having the KO punch ready for your next stock.
This is the danger of Mac right here. This is where the actual match up numbers could mean anything because of the sheer stupidity of what Mac does.
Good things to know:
1. His counter hurt box is like 1.5-2 swords length in front of him (the dumbest thing this character has in my honest opinion, on a design level it makes zero sense and the amount of respect I have to give it as Marth is probably the only reason I don't think we hard counter him, lol), with his ftilt and dash attack being longer, upwards of 3 swords length or so. Marth has to play a mid-range game without any commitment, and that involves zoning around that 3 swords length away.
2. Up Throw at 0% sends Mac into tumble. See you KO-punch
3. A lot of his super armor loses to moves that would put him into tumble or are dealing 8% or more damage? I'm not certain how it works entirely, but I feel like tipper forward tilt just ... denies him a lot of the time? Either way, can be abused/worked out to truly understand the neutral game between us.
4. He has a slow grab and his shield drop jab is faster. Space outside jab and watch the awkwardness Mac has to deal with with down tilt or jab hitting his shield.
5. Transcended priority (our specials): Loses to super armor, but beats everything else he has. Space and poke, poke and space.
You can dash towards a Mac and expect forward tilt and win cleanly/easily with dancing blade
I won't put it past me losing to Mac in tournament, in terms of character designs I abhor, Mac is one of them, but I don't think Marth loses at an optimal level. Until I feel comfortable with dealing with his momentum (if that's even possible) and feel I can space at mid range in a way to be able to react and beat Mac on the fly.
Mac's ground reach does remind me of Brawl Olimar a bit, and the way I'm trying to describe the match up is the same way I would do so in that case. Olimar's grab is 2.5-3 swords length, up smash has more horizontal range than fair, and certain pikmin (yellow) more vertical. Mac's obviously a lot faster on the ground, but I still feel most of his actions are heavily telegraphed (beyond movement choices), even more so than Oli. He's a sitting duck to us off stage and above us, and one punish is enough to put them in that position, where they shouldn't ever be surviving from.
I would look at Brawl Marth videos against Olimar and Snake to see how one deals with Mac.
Mikeneko vs Ally for example, where Ally never lands, no mixup back air (or in this game, mac's counter) meant anything because all he had to do was grab, over and over again, and throw out perfectly safe forward airs otherwise. I don't know what Mac can do beyond beating us into a pulp before we can even hit him once (it happens
), because I otherwise feel pretty confident in being able to 0-death Mac from any set up attack (fair, up air, up tilt, down tilt and expect the roll, etc) in neutral or a grab.
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At 3 swords length away, Mac has only single options, in Marth's case, he has MANY MANY MANY MANY options. Better Walk that can be dtilted/ftilted or jabbed out of; dash to: dancing blade, full hop forward air or shield. Add in Dash breaker for lols.
Mac's walk is pretty alright so that's where I see his Meta developing for him, but otherwise
out of a dash there is nothing you cannot see coming from a mile away (P.S., they all lose
on reaction to full hop forward air). His dash roll is very very very very good though, but that's his only other option.
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