A Few Matchup Questions (Vs. Fox/Falcon)

[Gいたん]

I've been playing Sheik for about a year now and I've been realizing i have difficulty with the same things in the Fox and Falcon Matchups

Fox:
How do I effectively needle camp a campy fox?
Usually the foxes in my area camp me a lot more than be aggressive because ive learned to do well against to aggressive style, but I always fail against the campy style due to impatience and improper needle camping. Usually i just stupidly go from platform to platform reverse needle-ing as i fall off or just jumping in place and shooting angled needles at the grounded fox, but if i do that he usually snakes under me and gets a pretty good punish.

When it comes to tech chasing, I find it difficult to react well to the tech rolls away unless i wavedash towards that direction after the down throw. When I miss, I get Shined or Spotdodged into grab/shine and followups. Is there a better way to secure that tech chase on the tech roll away?(Dash Canceled grab, if expecting Spot Dodge Down Smash, Dash back and wait, etc???)

Falcon:
What Should I do against a falcon over shooting nairs at me?
I know my forward tilt can beat it, but I never know what to do to get into the right positioning
Usually the top level falcon in my area will over shoot me with nairs and while I try to get into position by trying to weave out of it with dash/wavedash i still get hit and he gets a solid follow up.

What should I be doing to Falcon on stage outside of tech chasing him?
I can Tech chase falcon pretty well once i get the grab but like I said with my Falcon overshooting his nairs and outspacing me Grabs aren't as common, so what should i be doing to stop him and GET that grab?

These may be sort of vague or something but I'm not used to asking questions on the boards without footage of my play or someone seeing what i mean, but Hopefully i got the point across.

Thanks in advance to anyone who gives any advice

 

[Sir Bubbles]

Fox:

Keep your spacing with long ranged aerials (Nair and Bair, for example) this will help you win neutral exchanges because a Fox basically forces the opponent to approach with his lasers.
Angled needles are bad, because the Fox can retaliate, go under you and U-Smash.

Try to read tech rolls to prevent him from punishing you.

Falcon:

Bait his nairs and keep him out with needles. Tech chasing Falcon with Sheik is also a great option to clock in a lot of damage.

Generally, long ranged attacks will help you, such as Nair and Bair like I already mentioned, and sheild when he throws a nair. After the sheild, use one of the longer ranged moves to keep him out. Sheik keeps out Falcon pretty hard, so I think you should have a much easier time against Falcon then Fox.

 

[Gいたん]

Fox:

Keep your spacing with long ranged aerials (Nair and Bair, for example) this will help you win neutral exchanges because a Fox basically forces the opponent to approach with his lasers.
Angled needles are bad, because the Fox can retaliate, go under you and U-Smash.

Try to read tech rolls to prevent him from punishing you.

Falcon:

Bait his nairs and keep him out with needles. Tech chasing Falcon with Sheik is also a great option to clock in a lot of damage.

Generally, long ranged attacks will help you, such as Nair and Bair like I already mentioned, and sheild when he throws a nair. After the sheild, use one of the longer ranged moves to keep him out. Sheik keeps out Falcon pretty hard, so I think you should have a much easier time against Falcon then Fox.

None of this advice really applies
Throwing out long ranged arials will only get me punished
And I already mentioned I read fox's tech rolls I just wasn't sure the best option to follow up
I also said outside of tech chasing on falcon
If I shield the nair I can be crossed up into dash grab or another Nair so that doesn't work either, especially not if I'd be throwing out another nair or bair

 

[The Lemon]

Here's my opinions...

Fox- A lot of people think that Sheik out-camps Fox, but I actually think Sheik loses. Here's what I think typically should happen:

At full stage, Fox will be SH lasering or something like that, then I (as Sheik) would SH or full hop over them and start charging needles. Fox would either jump higher to try to hit me in the air with some lasers, or he'd continue shooting on the ground, either way, I probably took a laser or 2. Once I land on the ground and he is horizontal with me, I throw my 2-3 needles which cancel out one of his lasers to reach Fox, but it's pretty easy to react to, so Fox just lands and shields the remaining needles. Then he goes just goes back to SH lasering and the process repeats. So unless that Fox is just not shielding or is missing all his lasers, I think Fox wins the full stage camping war.

At like... closer than full stage... like maybe 2 dash attack lengths, standing needles are obviously pretty bad. Maybe you hit him, but even if you do, you get punished and such. Needle cancelling on platforms is fine, or even without them is fine, but yeah, you gotta be more weary of them getting under your needles. The risk vs reward is not in your favor (getting 2-4% off needles vs taking a 30-40% approach from fox). Instead, I think diagonal needles would be more for limiting the movement of the fox. Not to try to hit him, because if you miss, he sharks under you and you get punished, but to throw the needles where you DON'T want him to go (so between you and him). Sooooo, if fox decides to try to get under you, he would get hit by the needles, and maybe you get an opening. Or if he just continues lasering, you stay in neutral.

Let me know what you think, as I also have trouble with the fox MU, and always enjoy discussing these with others! I'll post thoughts on the other subjects soon...

 

[The Lemon]

K I forgot I said I would continue discussing my thoughts on your questions, but here I am now! lols

So for the tech chase, I think there's not much to else to do besides practice. The tech chase flow chart is very simple, but also very difficult to execute because the timing is pretty tight.

But I do remember seeing a post about KK telling M2K that if he could master doing dash-cancelled grabs on the tech aways, tech chasing would become a lot easier. It DOES make the reaction window a little bigger. I guess it's just mentally difficult to be able to prepare yourself to do those different inputs.

I personally just use dash attack (this is after 23%). The reaction window is, for me, big enough, and DA does a little more % than dthrow, and it can still lead to combos and tech chases.

But yeah, not much you can do besides practice me thinks.


Now for Falcon!
As a side note, I too, am an ambassador in saying that this match-up is not THAT much in Sheik's favor. And I've been thinking this since 2010ish... I'm not very good OR even super experienced in the matchup, but here's my input anyways...

Yeah, you are right, ftilt "beats" nair. The problem I have run into for this though is that Falcon is so freaking fast that you can't really ftilt the nair reactively. ANDDD if you're just spamming, Falcon can either punish the whiffed ftilt with a grab, or he can shield it and get a shield grab. Not to say that ftilt is bad, but it's not good enough to just spam. But if Falcon is overshooting his nairs, there is a range that you can stand which is close enough to him that you could preemptively ftilt and stuff the nair approach, but if you miss it and get hit by nair, only the first kick will hit and there shouldn't be much follow up. You would just go back to neutral. So then, I guess you could say that ftilt is low risk, high reward.

Another option you have is to just crouch. This will often make the falcon go over and past you with his nair. Also, if Falcon goes for a grab, unless he grabs REALLY close to you, it will whiff, and you can punish with dtilt>grab, or just grab, or w/e... But if he goes over you, you don't really get much... or maybe you do, I haven't experimented with it that much yet.

I'm going to end this post before I continue for now...

 

[The Lemon]

Okay, now onto the general Falcon question. This post will also be for myself, but I'm going to "think out loud here..." or "type as I think..."

I'm rereading this blog post by KK (which is SUPER insightful if you haven't read it yet!):
http://myneverendingbrainstorm.blogspot.com/2014/07/goals-in-ssbm-intro-to-player-vs-player.html

and am going to try to apply it in this matchup which I am so bad at... So here we go!



In fighting games, we have goals.
Falcon: Grab or aerial Sheik
Sheik: Grab or dash attack Falcon or get him off-stage



Tools to accomplish these goals:
Falcon: Aerials can combo to grab and vice versa. Ground and aerial mobility (combined with his grab and aerials, or course). Dash dancing is a big one. He gets his goals from tech chases as well, but nothing comes to mind besides grabs and aerials which accomplish that. Tilts sorta, but I wouldn't be to scared of those since they would more often probably lead to me (Sheik) accomplishing my own goals. The knockback of his moves could also be a tool since Sheik's upB lag will often lead to a grab or aerial if Falcon can knock her off-stage. His SH in itself will also dodge grab and DA.

Sheik: Aerials can also combo into grab. Tilts do as well. Ground speed is decent. Not as fast as Falcons, but fast enough to be able to punish some whiffed stuff. Crouch (crouch canceling as well as for dodging). Needles (only the diagonal ones, though. Though horizontal can prevent Falcon's goals and helps "unlock" Sheik's dash attack). Knockdowns are good, so maybe like, dsmash, in addition to aerials and tilts, though it is risky. Nair OoS will also create a knockdown. I guess shield would be tool since Sheik's shield is pretty big.



Okay, now I'm thinking I guess just in neutral position. I'm thinking about how run in>WD back maybe is not so good in this matchup. It's good vs Fox and Marth and a lot of other guys because if it baits out an approach, you get a grab, but vs Falcon, I guess it just gives him more room to dash dance and do that long nair approach which is pretty safe on block but can lead into a lot of stuff. I guess it's fine if you're REALLY far away and but you have to be pretty far to make Falcon's nair miss. So what should I do instead...

Maybe just camp needles... but it does give Falcon a lot of space if we only want to throw "safe" needles (from far away), which I think his mobility is more important than ours... so I think Sheik would want to approach and close the gap... We did say that ftilt stuffs Falcon's aerials, and though it's risky if we whiff, it's something I'd like to have available to use, so I think walking is actually a tool I missed. WD also puts Sheik into a crouch which would avoid some aerials... so WD forward can be good.

So all large distances, I think I would want to throw needles to stop a dash dancing falcon, but then run in and wd forward when I'm in range for Falcon's nair approach. Than I would mentally prepare myself to ftilt if I see him jump at me. If he runs at me, I can crouch and be less afraid of the grab.

So in short, next time I play a Falcon, I guess I will experiment with some more aggressive play, but just walking forward more. It is simple, and will probably look "lame," but I think it might be a solution to Falcon's ridiculous speed...