A secondary for Fox?

[GLaDOS 3000]

After being trashed by a Rosalina at a tournament, it has become clear to me that going all-fox-all-the-time is a bad idea. I think I should choose a secondary for unfavourable matchups. Who best covers Fox?

 

[Foster J.]

Sheik lmao

 

[Rhus]

If you don't want to just jump on the Sheik train, Wario is tons of fun and covers Fox's weaknesses well. @DavemanCozy seconds Wario iirc and I'm thinking about spending some time with him as well.

Oh, and Wario does well against Rosalina as well.

 

[Project_B]

It depends on whether you want a good pick against Rosalina or just a secondary for general purposes. For both, I would recommend Wario, Pilachu, or Dark Pit; pick a character that has better throw options and good at staying in the air and attacking, as well as having some tools to deal with Luma. Rosalina aside, the characters I feel are best to cover up bad MUs for Fox are Luigi and Ness, but unfortunately they both have bad matchups against Rosalina, so you would still need another character. I would recommend trying out several characters against a friend to get a sense of whether or not they have the tools you're looking for against Luma, as well as a good way to kill a shielding opponent, plus a nonlinear or less linear recovery. As I said before, the best picks for your situation are probably Wario, Dark Pit, or Pikachu.

 

[GLaDOS 3000]

I didn't really think of Wario. Interesting. And yeah, I kind of didn't want to just jump on the Sheik train lol. She's fun, but by now a huge number of people know that match up like the back of their hand.

 

[M@v]

Fox -can- be solo mained, but a couple matchups, particularly Rosalina and Luigi(on small stages) will be really hard. There are a couple lower tier matchups that can cause trouble too. Lastly, there's always that chance there's that one matchup that's fine for Fox, but you just can't grasp it. If you are solely looking to just deal with those inital two, there are a couple choices, although I think rosa only maybe loses to sheik tbh. Sheik and ZSS work well vs both of them, and there are a few others that either do good vs just one of them, mediocre vs both, etc. As an example, Robin is my anti Luigi character, and even though I feel she loses to Rosa still, it doesn't feel as hard as the matchup with Fox to me.

 

[Tenretsujin10]

Rosalina can be beaten pretty handily by Fox if played right, but the matchup is still in Rosalina's favor. Play your dash attacks well, and try to convert every opening into racking on damage or killing Luma. Fox has the damage output and burst to decimate Luma. Also, Jab 1 > Jab 2 (if spaced well) > Upsmash destroys Rosalina.

I'm also in the process of finding a secondary for Fox, It's currently Sheik but I'm considering Marth.

 

[Project_B]

Rosalina can be beaten pretty handily by Fox if played right, but the matchup is still in Rosalina's favor. Play your dash attacks well, and try to convert every opening into racking on damage or killing Luma. Fox has the damage output and burst to decimate Luma. Also, Jab 1 > Jab 2 (if spaced well) > Upsmash destroys Rosalina.

I'm also in the process of finding a secondary for Fox, It's currently Sheik but I'm considering Marth.

Fox has the frame data on his normals to combat Rosalina, but his recovery is so linear that he has a lot to trouble returning to stage, even more so than most characters do vs Rosalina. That being said, as long as you can destroy Luma, which Fox can, the matchup becomes much easier.

I think that Sheik is a great secondary if you can get the combos, follow ups, and movement down, especially because she can cover up Fox's worst matchups. I don't think that Marth is a particularly good secondary, as he suffers a lot from the same characters as Fox, but hopefully when played to his full potential he will beat Luigi.

Unrelated: @ M@v , which low tier characters could potentially cause Fox trouble? I was curious because I had been thinking about either Peach or Zelda (although I think Zelda is an even MU) might cause trouble for him by abusing his high falling speed and low weight.

 

[M@v]

GW and Kirby are the two big mid tiers that seem to cause fox some trouble imo. Either that or I just suck vs them . I also think Fox loses vs Robin; it used to be even, but losing the double jab lock vs him/her (Robin had no answer to the lock) + Robin's several buffs have....tipped the scales...in Robin's favor.

 

[Tenretsujin10]

I think that Sheik is a great secondary if you can get the combos, follow ups, and movement down, especially because she can cover up Fox's worst matchups. I don't think that Marth is a particularly good secondary, as he suffers a lot from the same characters as Fox, but hopefully when played to his full potential he will beat Luigi.

I just feel that Sheik has become so painfully boring to play. I've been thinking that Marth could effectively wall out Luigi and wouldn't have to deal with Luigi's Nair since Marth doesn't rely on combo'ing per say. Plus, I can go offstage with Marth and not have a care in the world, unlike Fox :3

 

[Rhus]

I personally second Robin/Mewtwo and working on Pit.

I seem to be able to deal with most of Fox's bad MUs with these guys. Like @ M@v I use Robin against Rosalina but I feel I'm just better at playing the MU.

I'm more known for my Mewtwo than my Fox around here. ._.

 

[Project_B]

@ Tenretsujin10 - Marth should wall out Luigi in theory, but his aerials are just so laggy that it is tough to get anything out of using them, and you can really only hit his shield out of a short hop, which limits you to one aerial before you land. Aside from that, Marth's frame data is so bad in comparison that one power shielded aerial and Luigi can freely grab you, plus he can abuse his fireballs vs Marth and there is not too much of an answer to that. Maybe it can work if you take time to learn the matchup and (Marth's main advantage right now) gimp Luigi every time you can. There are probably several posts about the matchup on the Marth and/or Luigi threads, but I haven't checked yet.

 

[Project_B]

@ Rhus - Great! I personally fared somewhat poorly in the Robin vs Rosalina matchup, relying on back throw and back air during her recovery to KO and getting bodied as I tried to recover, but I know that the matchup is doable if you can send Luma offstage quickly (which I didn't). Keep working with Mewtwo, we need at least one person advancing his meta, plus, he can be good to pull out as a counterpick that people won't know the matchup for.

While on the subject of Rosalina, if you are working on Pit then he is basically interchangeable with Dark Pit, and I think that DP has a very good matchup against Rosalina due to the spacing tools + okay frame data + great offstage presence to intercept Rosalina, as well as the sideB killing Luma better than almost anything else. I now use Dark Pit as a "counter" to Rosalina. His recovery is still linear and has no hotbox, but it is long enough to recover from almost anywhere (much farther than Robin or Fox) plus he has a super-armored recovery option with sideB and multiple jumps to get around. Aside from him, characters with nonlinear recoveries should have a better shot.

 

[Rhus]

Keep working with Mewtwo, we need at least one person advancing his meta, plus, he can be good to pull out as a counterpick that people won't know the matchup for.

Yeah, I won't lie the Mewtwo boards spend far more time talking about how he needs buffs than they do about improving him currently. It's kind of upsetting, he's such a cool character. ;(

It might just be how I play Mewtwo but I seem to be able to handle Fox's bad MUs with him. I don't live in a great area for Smash, however, so it's hard to judge.

 

[Project_B]

@ M@v - I definitely agree with Kirby beating Fox. G&W I'm not sure about, because although I have lots of trouble vs G&W (I feel more comfortable fighting Sheik), I also have trouble fighting him with all of my characters. I get frustrated when he has no lag on anything, and even more frustrated if I get dThrow > 9'd. I know it doesn't happen often, but 9's are just too annoying. I was fighting some G&Ws in Brawl a couple weeks ago, and I got hit with a 9 while playing Sheik at around 20% and I DIDN'T DIE! It wasn't even one of those godlike DI moments, the move just didn't have enough power to kill which made me wonder "what the esports happened?" 9's didn't even used to one hit KO. I feel like my stock was "gimmicked" away from me whenever I die even earlier, playing heavier characters in Smash 4, especially since G&W has a true combo into judge off of a throw. My main problem lies in not being able to punish him for anything. On shield, I have trouble punishing any aerial other than laggy down air, dTilt seems completely safe, fSmash is just too fast, and I need to be very fast to get a simple hit in after dash attack. I also have had trouble teching his aerials offstage, but I think that I have the timing down now. I have been beaten so badly by G&W players that I temporarily picked up Rosalina just to wall him out and play ONE matchup that I couldn't learn!

If you have any insight, I'd love to hear it (unrelated as it might be to the topic of the thread), and I wonder what you think about the Zelda matchup for Fox after the patch, because it was discussed on the matchup thread for Zelda, and I have been made uncertain about how it is.

Yeah, I won't lie the Mewtwo boards spend far more time talking about how he needs buffs than they do about improving him currently. It's kind of upsetting, he's such a cool character. ;(

It might just be how I play Mewtwo but I seem to be able to handle Fox's bad MUs with him. I don't live in a great area for Smash, however, so it's hard to judge.

Well, you might have discovered something as there are really no notable Mewtwo placings in tournaments so far, and many people played him once for fun and then died at 10% and said, "Well, I'm never playing that character again". I do think that Mewtwo needs buffs, but so far Sakurai has seemed to have been somewhat random with the big buffs/nerfs, so the Smash community needs to accept Mewtwo how he is and try to do better with him. If you do well with him, even just online, that could be a step towards finding out some way to make him work as a character. Good luck with whatever you do, and if you end up carrying the character, make sure to show people that this "awful" character can actually do some awesome fighting.


By the way, I also live in an area where there are, to my knowledge, no locals that are near enough for me to easily get to, so I spend more time studying the game than competing in it, trying to get an understanding of the game, trying to help the Smash Community on Smashboards, and playing against some friends and my younger brother.

 

[M@v]

I think Fox Zelda is fine; the top player on the smashladder right now is a Zelda actually (Ven), and I'm second. Ill try to get the set up next time we play. Ill get into more details later about the other stuff ;3

Also, quick aside, try not to double post if you can; just edit your initial post. I went ahead and deleted the 2nd post, and moved all of its contents into the first post for you

 

[Project_B]

Sorry about that! I came back to the thread and wanted to respond to Rhus because I saw that he had responded to me, after I posted to you.

Well, I'll definitely watch your set against Ven's Zelda once it's up!