Data PacMan's M & Ms (Metagame and Match-Up) Discussion Thread

[Nu~]

Why do you think we lose to Kirby? He's another one of the characters that are too slow to punish a whiffed trampoline, making it a near 100% get out of jail free card (final cutter might hit us for 5% or something, oh well). When we force him off of the ground, our Bair, Uair, tilts, and smashes are great for contesting his jump-ins. How does he deal with us playing super defensive in general?

I've never really had trouble with Kirby, and with the galaxian setups I'm seeing Dee do, it'll probably be even easier since I can't see Kirby stopping us from getting it in hand consistently.

For Falcon, I feel that MU is even. It can feel difficult if the Falcon knows your fruit, runs through hydrants, ignores it once it's out, uses jab properly, and doesn't take huge risks unless it's worth it, but I feel like our combos on him + trampoline help to swing it back to even. If we ledge camp him with the trampoline and litter the stage with hydrant + trampoline whenever we can't be near a ledge, we shut down his grab game and he has to take decent risks to get to us. Our Uair is much like his and usually converts to 20%+ every time we tag him with it. He has to be mindful when he does jump-ins because our Bair and Uair can do a number on him. If he waits trampoline out, we can get galaxians in our hand and use Dee galaxian combos for big %.

That being said, Falcon is fast enough to keep pressure on us. He outboxes us solidly and his grab game is pretty oppressive, but we have methods of suppressing it and answering back. We have trouble KO'ing Falcon if we can't land bells, while he can KO us sub 100% with rage raptor boost...it's annoying, but I'd still put the MU near even.

@ fromundaman I've had the same KO'ing issues against Ike. Last time I fought a good one online, he would quick draw over my head as a mixup. I hit him with a Key at 150% and he lived. Then I proceeded to lose because I had given him full rage + he landed a few key hits. Key is so strong, yet so weak. I wish it scaled with rage...

Edit: man, why is Key so weak? I know it pierces and can be re-caught, but 15% really isn't that much for a 2+ second charge for a projectile that can be used against us and is easily out-prioritized. Why can't it have some bonus shield damage or something?

Man, I don't even use key outside of edgeguard snipes and z drop tricks.

Bell is better in almost every other case.

Although...a key that does more damage would make the z drop lock pretty stupid...you can already get up to 100% on pikachu by z dropping a key on him once and proceeding to lock him 6 times, finishing with a nair.

Extra shield damage would make a lot of sense. Or make it actually beat everything like it pretends to do.

 

[Zage]

Why do you think we lose to Kirby?

I wouldn't say we lose. -1/+1 Is a slight disadvantage or close to even. Those match-ups depend entirely on the skill of the player, where as -2/+2 are pretty much up hill battles, even if player skill are equal.

Characters with multiple jumps can just sit in pac-man's blindspot and wait to punish, Pac really can't cover this space well without the bell or some hydrant launch angles. Especially Kirbies who know to jump with their back turned to you so they can B-air.

I might be bias here though. I don't have that much experience in the MU, and every major I've went to I ended up fighting really good Kirbies (Mike Kirby/Triple R) and I've played Poyo who makes the MU seem really tough.

I agree with falcon though, I was struggling to put -1 or +1, but didn't want to put 0 for the MU because I don't believe there are any completely even match-ups outside of mirror matches.

 

[Nu~]

@ Sinji may be able to help here considering he has beaten mike Kirby before.

 

[Dee-SmashinBoss]

@MikeKirby do you know much about the Pacman MU vs Kirby?

 

[Sinji]

Against kirby, you wanna use the hydrant on top of him while he is floating in the air. It will send him in the air giving you time to set up. Use the galaxion to combo and catch his float in the air. The bell will catch him in the air for upsmash finish.

 

[fromundaman]

I'll come back to this thread when I have time, but Kirby is the MU I know the best as we have multiple good Kirby players in the area for some reason, on of which is my training and doubles partner.

This MU is even in a weird way in that it's a bit in our favor until he gets our power, at which point it's a bit in his favor (one reason is that key gives him a kill confirm off of a grab).

 

[Sinji]

Sorta Pac-Man related but I made a video on Rosalina's Up air. I think it should get Nerfed. In the match up I feel like this is one thing we should really look out for. He GP is fine but this!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Go4RNjcuMnA

 

[Nu~]

Luckily, our hydrant passes through her up air.

 

[Thinktron]

A friend requested me to make this.

At the top of my head, little mac, Dr. Mario, Samus and Ganondorf



EDIT: saying Pac-man beat Samus was a bad idea

 

[Nu~]

Luigi, Olimar, DK, Bowser, Dex3

This should probably go in the matchup thread tho

 

[PEPESPAIN]

Samus and Dr. Mario aren't one of our best MU. They are even or bad for us

 

[Nu~]

Samus gets camped out and loses the mid range battle.

Dr.Mario doesnt have the speed to threaten us like Mario, and trampoline hurts him twice as much.

They both lose badly

 

[KayJay]

Samus gets camped by almost every character, good Samus players don't rely on camping. The Matchup is even, it's very good for Samus that Pacman doesn't have high runspeed so we have a better time spacing with Z-Air. Spacing via Bombs are safe due to his low run speed. Pacman gives us plenty of time to charge our Beam, we can gimp him but he will rarely gimp us.
At least even.

 

[Tonetta]

The cool thing about the pac-samus mu is as samus I can just grab whatever fruit you throw at me and then cheese you down with b moves.

 

[BSP]

The cool thing about the pac-samus mu is as samus I can just grab whatever fruit you throw at me and then cheese you down with b moves.

No you can't. Pac-Man can side B whatever you shoot at him and heal himself in the process. Your best bet is some mindgame with homing missile -> charge shot. If Pac-Man is scared of that, he can leave the pellet on the ground and it will tank any scary level of charge shot for him. If you're insisting on holding the fruit, your best punish on reading that is to throw the fruit at him, relinquishing it. Then again, you could up B too, but the risk : reward is not in your favor in that case.

With optimal galaxian combos, I'd put the waiting game in Pac-Man's favor. IIRC Samus' big damage strings come from grabs, and while they do hurt, she has to land that grab first on a character that's pretty good at avoiding them to begin with. Still, the MU is probably even-ish.

 

[Xygonn]

I think Samus has a slight advantage. Fruit and pellet beat CS. This is a big deal and is the only reason this isn't a total blowout. Pacman's fast nair and frame 1 upb (whaaaaat?!) help you escape strings that are very effective on other characters. Aside from that pac-man doesn't have a ton of tools that help. Zair stops most fruit (all but melon and key). Screw attack goes through fire hydrant, I'm sure good pac-mains know better, but I get lots of upb kills through hydrants for those that don't know better. Pacman has a very very hard time killing Samus with slow KO moves and a meh gimp game. We can easily upb OoS between pacman's dash attack hits. I agree with Kayjay that bombs are quite good in this MU.

Samus is susceptible at low percent to getting vortexed a bit by a combos up to like 50%, but after that, pacman has a hard time landing more than one hit at a time.

 

[Hark17ball]

No you can't. Pac-Man can side B whatever you shoot at him and heal himself in the process. Your best bet is some mindgame with homing missile -> charge shot. If Pac-Man is scared of that, he can leave the pellet on the ground and it will tank any scary level of charge shot for him. If you're insisting on holding the fruit, your best punish on reading that is to throw the fruit at him, relinquishing it. Then again, you could up B too, but the risk : reward is not in your favor in that case.

With optimal galaxian combos, I'd put the waiting game in Pac-Man's favor. IIRC Samus' big damage strings come from grabs, and while they do hurt, she has to land that grab first on a character that's pretty good at avoiding them to begin with. Still, the MU is probably even-ish.

It's not just grabs. Dash>UAir>UAir>UpB works bell well at lower %. But dash>Uair>Nair>Dair can be chained rather well too. I assume @ Tonetta is meaning if Samus holds onto your fruit you can't use another one (like Robs gyro) so you lose a very valuable tool to block CS among other things.

 

[BSP]

It's not just grabs. Dash>UAir>UAir>UpB works bell well at lower %. But dash>Uair>Nair>Dair can be chained rather well too. I assume @ Tonetta is meaning if Samus holds onto your fruit you can't use another one (like Robs gyro) so you lose a very valuable tool to block CS among other things.

Ok on the combos.

I assume "cheese down with B moves" to mean using missiles and charge shot to camp Pac-Man while holding his fruit. That won't work against him if he's paying attention. It could be a problem if Samus has a large % lead. Otherwise, the match becomes a stalemate because shooting at Pac-Man will heal him.

Can Samus use Zair while she's holding a fruit? I don't remember.

Edit: Samus choosing to hold the fruit means she loses a lot of options. Basically all grounded offensive options minus specials are gone if you hold one, and you have to z-drop -> aerial to use aerials. It's not hard to do that, so I usually don't bother bringing it up. It's give and take.

 

[Tonetta]

Choosing to hold the fruit retains the option of choosing to use the fruit, which tends to lead to shield break situations. If we grab your bell, we have setups that actually lead into the bell, which will lead into a cs translating into like 50% damage and a possible KO. If you're getting side b heals from missles, the samus is doing the wrong setups. Samus projectiles can be timed to hit simultaneously so you're either forced to shield or jump, side b is not a real option.

In any case this mu is pretty boring when exucuted properly.

 

[DungeonMaster]

You do realize that hydrant loses to Samus' up-air and it's Samus' primary combo tool in the game right? Samus is one of the few character that can rush pac-man down and ignore his attempts to stall the game. Samus doesn't have to respect hydrant, at all. Aerially charge right into him with up-air.

 

[Nu~]

Please. If you think his primary ground tool of defense is the hydrant, then you are mistaken. You are not rushing us down when your mobility makes it easy to litter the stage with trampolines.

 

[Depth_]

I'd say it's easy for Samus and I agree with KayJay, but I don't even think it's even. We can easily close gaps with Z-air to get within close proximity. Our damage output is generally twice as high because of our combo ability and potential for followups off of our normals.

Before Pacman will have gotten his key, we'll probably already have a charge shot and be running towards him to apply pressure. Pacman gets outranged pretty hard even without the use of projectiles and I'm positive that charge shot eats the key. Hydrant is also the only projectiles in the game that charge shot loses to, but with little to no consequences.

Pacman gets juggled easily by Samus, but he cannot juggle us. Samus catches his landings pretty easily. The hydrant actually makes it easier, but the character seems to have a hard time catching our landings without his key. I would say we actually go even in terms of frame data . Don't forget that we have a 3 frame jab, 5 frame multi-hit up-air, 6 frame disjointed d-tilt, but we must acknowledge your 3 frame n-air. It's a hassle when we attempt shield crossups with up-air.

Finally, Pacman can't kill Samus, but we have an easy time killing him. We have a b-air that kills most characters from the center near 110 and a b-air trump that kills middle weight characters in the 70s. Samus has a spike, an amazing edgeguard tool in the form of u-tilt that kills on ledge near 80, a charge projectile that kills when half charged off-stage and somewhere in the 100s from the center. We have guaranteed killsetups into f-smash against your character because of his floatiness. Airdodge reads against Pacman near the ceiling come pretty easy because we can challenge hydrant, thus he gets killed off the top with Screw Attack just like any other character.

What does Pacman have against Samus? His key, fruits, and smashes, but his smash attacks are like frame 18. Samus is a heavy weight, floaty, and has above average recovery. You will struggle to kill us, we dish out more damage, and kill earlier. This matchup is absolutely terrible for Pacman.

I think we win 60/40.

 

[Nu~]

Charge shot and key cancel each other out. And why would pacman focus so much effort in getting the key? I would charge up a galaxian and place a trampoline between us to force you to approach from an awkward angle. I can also easily launch multiple hydrants at you with various z drop tricks while you try to approach.
If we Fair a hydrant at you and run behind it with a fruit in hand, you have no options to escape without taking at least some damage.

You also won't get your grab or dash attack combos easily because of that trampoline.

fromundaman you know this matchup better than I lol

 

[Depth_]

Everything knocks hydrant back. It's only ok pressure at best, but again, it should be noted that Samus can knock hydrant back with missiles and charge shot. Get the key because it's probably your only method of killing Samus efficiently. Samus also doesn't have to approach Pacman. If you try to position a trampoline between us, I'm just going to use Z-air, missiles, and charge shot, three of my best attacks, two of which beat hydrant. Also, if you run behind Hydrant with fruit, we can just shield. The shield damage from most of your attacks are kind of minuscule. You're also out of a grab.

When Samus holds a fruit, she can still z-air. Also, it doesn't matter if we lose our normals. Our b moves define us. We're out of a grab when we're holding your fruit, but bombs and charge shot eat over half a shield. Missiles eat about 35% of a shield. That's another thing that should be noted in the MU. Samus doesn't lose to shield, but Pacman does. He actually has a worse grab than us. It's only 4 frame faster, but we actually big damage from landing one and have more range.

Edit*

It should also be noted that Samus doesn't need dash attack or dash grab to deal insane amounts of damage. 3/4th charge shot does 22%. We kind of beat Pacman in pretty much every regard. Raw damage output, combo potential, survivability, kill potential, shield pressure.

You really don't have much in this matchup.

 

[Tonetta]

Out of curiosity, what's stopping us from just using cs to punish your on-stage trampoline?

 

[Zage]

The Samus MU is definitely one of our best.

Side-B all her projectiles for a 2% heal each time, the pellet also blocks all mid-high level charge shots if its left on the stage.

She isn't going to beat you with just Zair, so if she insists on holding onto your fruit, she has no choice but to heal you. She also has a pretty slow air speed, around 38th or 39th IIRC. She's not rushing you down if you have a trampoline/hydrant on the stage. It's basically a win at character select.

Other good matchups?

Bowser
Little Mac
DK?
Ganondorf

 

[Tonetta]

You only heal 2% per projectile if the samus is dumb and bad

 

[Depth_]

Sied b? Every option you guys are proposing for beating Samus is so incredibly niche... Again, Samus doesn't have to rush down Pacman. We have higher base damage and dominate the mid-range game quite easily. It should be noted that we can dash attack, dash grab, z-air, missile, and charge shot from mid-range. Assuming your trampoline isn't in the middle of the stage, all options except dash attack and dash grab should overcome it because they reach nearly half stage.

N-air isn't a tool we use in neutral. Also, could you explain what you mean by healing? That sounds really sketch. Having a slow airspeed means things if you can capitalize off of it, which I don't see Pacman doing well against Samus. We can stall landings with bombs and deny attempts to have our landings caught with charge shot, missile, and z-air.

I'm legitimately struggling to find just a piece of knowledge that convinces me that this matchup is anything other than bad for Pacman. It's going to take a bit more than gimmicks and charge shot losing to various telegraphed projectiles to do so. It's not her only attack, but it is her best attack.

 

[Zage]

I'm legitimately struggling to find just a piece of knowledge that convinces me that this matchup is anything other than bad for Pacman. It's going to take a bit more than gimmicks and charge shot losing to various telegraphed projectiles to do so. It's not her only attack, but it is her best attack.

It's no gimmick. Side-b's pellet comes out on frame 1 and absorbs all projectiles that don't pierce. Once it does it can be picked up for a 2% heal, which pac-man can do since he's instantly able to act the moment the pellet drops. It even still absorbs projectiles once its on the ground,half-full charged shots can't hit him, even if hes standing directly next to the pellet.

Her best bet at going even with pac-man was by beating him with her own, better, projectile game (which she does have imo). But that doesn't matter because side-b invalidates all her projectiles and heals him in the process.

 

[Tonetta]

I hope you realize that samus can have more than one projectile hit a target at the same exact time and that using side b might heal you 2% but you'll be taking 5-10% to do so

 

[Depth_]

Dude, Projectiles aren't the only thing that Samus has against Pacman. I've listed countless reasons why Pacman should struggle in this matchup. Have a go at debunking those. You're leaving me in the dark here. I'll list them for you.

• Combo Ability
• Survivability
• Kill Potential
• Frame Traps (Landings)
• Shield Pressure
• Base Damage Output
• Range
• Off Stage Presence
• Trump mixups

Every Pacman game I watch looks like a massive uphill battle. I really don't think you can climb Samus. We just have too much. You won't be killing us, comboing us, living longer, catching our landings during various segments of the game, tapping our shield in close range, applying shield pressure, or out ranging us.

 

[Zage]

I hope you realize that samus can have more than one projectile hit a target at the same exact time and that using side b might heal you 2% but you'll be taking 5-10% to do so

The moment the pellet hits the first projectile, pac-man can take any option including shield, and shield's come out frame 1 in this game, so it'll be power-shielded.

Dude, Projectiles aren't the only thing that Samus has against Pacman. I've listed countless reasons why Pacman should struggle in this matchup. Have a go at debunking those. You're leaving me in the dark here. I'll list them for you.

None of that really matters. Pac-man just does not have to deal with Samus up close, she doesn't have the tools to keep up, especially with having some of the slowest A moves in the game and the 39th slowest air speed. She has good combo game but she is never going to get the chance to use it.

On top of having to deal with the trampoline, she also has to get around the Hydrant. Her only grounded options for launching the hydrant in one hit are unstaled Utilt, unstaled Up-angled F-smash, or with the unstaled sweet spot of neutral/down angled F-smash. Which all really slow moves, with loads of end lag.


Her kill potential rests largely on charge shot, but side-b is a frame 1 option and eats all of her projectiles.

I'm assuming since you asked how we heal off side-b, that you've never seen it actually done in a real match. If you ever get the chance to play a Pac-man who does know how to play the Samus MU, I can guarantee you'll see how heavily one sided it is for pac-man.

 

[Tonetta]

How are you using trampoline on stage without being hit by cs? This is the second time I'm asking.

 

[Zage]

You just aren't hitting us lol. Starting at 30% Samus doesn't recover and land fast enough after being hit by up-b OOS to hit him with charged neutral b, unless he lands on a platform that's at height you got up-b'd at.

 

[Tonetta]

oh so you're doing raw upb's then as an anti engagement mechanism. That works like once or twice a set if your opponent pays any attention.

 

[Zage]

They're not raw. They're outofshield, which also come out frame 1 and are unblockable. Even then, since you can't take out the hydrant instantly (without using your charge shot), there is nothing stopping pacman from just spawning a trampoline behind it.

 

[Tonetta]

oos is raw. why am I even that close to you in your shield anyways?

 

[Depth_]

The moment the pellet hits the first projectile, pac-man can take any option including shield, and shield's come out frame 1 in this game, so it'll be power-shielded.



None of that really matters. Pac-man just does not have to deal with Samus up close, she doesn't have the tools to keep up, especially with having some of the slowest A moves in the game and the 39th slowest air speed. She has good combo game but she is never going to get the chance to use it.

On top of having to deal with the trampoline, she also has to get around the Hydrant. Her only grounded options for launching the hydrant in one hit are unstaled Utilt, unstaled Up-angled F-smash, or with the unstaled sweet spot of neutral/down angled F-smash. Which all really slow moves, with loads of end lag.


Her kill potential rests largely on charge shot, but side-b is a frame 1 option and eats all of her projectiles.

I'm assuming since you asked how we heal off side-b, that you've never seen it actually done in a real match. If you ever get the chance to play a Pac-man who does know how to play the Samus MU, I can guarantee you'll see how heavily one sided it is for pac-man.

Samus has average runspeed, a dash attack that travels nearly half stage, and a z-air. How doesn't she have the tools to keep up? Your airspeed is only barely faster than ours. Same thing goes for your run speed. However, we close gaps easier. Also, slowest A moves in the game? We have a 3 frame jab, 6 frame d-tilt, 8 frame f-tilt, 8 frame n-air, 9 frame b-air 5 frame up-air and 6 frame f-air. The only A moves we have that go over frame 10 are U-smash, U-tilt, and D-air. That's actually average if not borderline above average frame data considering the range of the attacks last time I checked. Our frame data is better than Falcon's, which probably has you shocked right now.I doubt people actually keep up with this stuff, but the Samus is bad bandwagon is really strong these days.

Also, you're making a pretty big deal about what can launch Hydrant. Did you forget that we have higher base damage. I don't know how many times I'll be stressing this, but yeah, doesn't the thing have to take 13% to be launched? What do you have that does that much percent? F-smash? D-smash? Frame 18, lmfao. What does that mean? It means that you have to hit it more than once to launch it. That's a hassle.

We can launch Hydrant with U-tilt, F-smash, B-air, Charge Shot, and D-air right off the bat, moves that we hardly stale or just simply won't be staled enough to actually matter. It almost sounds as though Samus is better that managing the hydrant than Pacman, but wait... she is. She can actually use the Hydrant to apply shield break setups, ridiculous shield pressure that actually matters and nets consistent damage or payout if we confirm off of it, and general stage pressure.

Also, her kill potential is not solely reliant on charge shot. I'm going to kill you at 80 with a b-air trump, 80 with u-tilt on ledge, 115 with an f-smash, 110 with a SHAD b-air. Basically take whatever number of kill options Pacman has and multiply them by 10 and you get Samus' kill potential. I'm looking at a spreadsheet that contains the kill percents for your character right now. It's not pretty, and once again, the things that do kill at a decent percent that aren't spawned from your neutral b (smashes) have atrocious frame data.

I'm still convinced that this matchup is 60/40... scratch that. 65/35

 

[Zage]

3 frame jab, 6 frame d-tilt, 8 frame f-tilt, 8 frame n-air, 9 frame b-air 5 frame up-air and 6 frame f-air. The only A moves we have that go over frame 10 are U-smash, U-tilt, and D-air.

D-tilt, f-tilt both have their IASA frames at 40 and all your aerials have the same IASA value or large amounts of landing lag, or both. None of them are ideal for dealing with the hydrant and still allowing you to stay in his face. You can charge shot it, but if you waste charge shot on the hydrant, you aren't able to stop us from using up-b which gives more than enough time to throw another hydrant down.

Basically take whatever number of kill options Pacman has and multiply them by 10 and you get Samus' kill potential.

What lol.

I'm going to kill you at 80 with a b-air trump, 80 with u-tilt on ledge, 115 with an f-smash, 110 with a SHAD b-air.

Ganon can kill at 10% with Warlock punch, but that doesn't mean hes going to do it all the time. These are just options she has. The only things that I see going for Samus here is if she maybe trumps us, but anyone can just buffer an action and not get trumped.

Like I said earlier, you asked me about some of the things Pac can do, so I'm assuming you never played one who knows the Samus MU and put those things into action, so a match up ratio is pointless. Speaking from actual personal experience and not theory craft, Samus has never given me trouble, I haven't seen much of what you're saying hold true. She just gets bopped for free by Pac-man /shrug.

 

[Depth_]

I'm pretty sure we were just talking about startup frames, but recovery frames? What consequence comes from hitting a Hydrant with a move that has below average cooldown? It's already flying your way, so you'd have to avoid the Hydrant to punish me while I'm still in cooldown. Last time I checked Pacman was too floaty, has bad air speed, an average roll at best, and average run speed. He also has no way to close gaps quickly and easily while applying non-projectile based pressure that isn't dash attack, so he's kind of telegraphed. I would have already recovered by the time you're attempting to punish my cooldown if that's what you're talking about.

Are you referencing cooldown in regards to potential followups after we hit a Hydrant our opponents way? We have access to full stage pressure and again attacks that nearly go half stage in the form of z-air, dash attack, and dash grab.

Also, consider the range of the attacks in relation to their cooldown. I know it would be nice for Samus to have a d-tilt or f-tilt that had like no cooldown, but they're already exceptional moves at it is. D-tilt is probably one of the most quickest to start and disjoitned normals in the game, props the opponent up for easy followups and reads, and has good shield push and damage.

Another thing, Pacman's landing lag is almost identical to ours. I'm just pulling spreadsheet after spreadsheet and applying them to what you're saying and still leaving with unanswered questions or the feeling that you're actually not comparing Samus to Pacman at all. You're telling me what Pacman can do to deal with Samus, but I'm just hearing up b and Hydrant. Sounds like your options are limited.


Edit*

I don't understand the What lol, by the way. At least attempt to refute my claim of Samus having more kill options and your character having like none. Maybe that's why most Pacman matches I see are timeouts?