The Lemon
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2011
- Messages
- 43
Life update (5/2/15): I'm pretty busy with school this quarter, so it's hard to find time for smash. Sorry, and it pains me to say this to anyone who has been following... but I will be on hiatus for a little for now... BUT, expect to return! I do enjoy writing about this!
Last update on 3/26/15
Added a personal blog section in the post below this! Check it out if you're interested in my progress!
Introduction
Greetings, reader! Welcome to my Sheik guide! I go by Bonbon. I'm a NorCal (408) Sheik main, currently attending UC Davis. I would consider myself about a low-mid level player (I tend to go 3-2 or 2-2 in tournaments), so I'm not exactly the most ideal person to be writing a guide. Not to mention, I sort of lost my passion for Smash a little back and stopped attending tournaments, due to a combination of some disappointing performances (including going 2 and out at EVO), learning how to play Ultra Street Fighter 4, and just becoming REALLY busy with school and other important things in life. However, I still love Melee, and often find myself still daydreaming about the game during class and such. I have found that one thing that I REALLY enjoy about Melee is learning the strategies and understanding the key components of match-ups, which can help lead to victory! As a result, I've actually been getting back into playing again. I think I am too busy atm to attend tournaments as much as did before, but I am still working on my game knowledge just by playing with my housemates, which I would call "recreational" players.
So, as sort of a "side project" kind of thing, I will be working on this guide! I will be giving MY thoughts and opinions on how I think Sheik should be played, and would appreciate getting some advice from you all. And hopefully, as a result, we can all become better Sheik players!
To reiterate, this will be a WIP! I don't know how much attention this thread will be getting, but I will be trying to update it at least once a week. IMO, there is not a whole lot of resources for Sheik (at least compared to other characters), and there isn't an up to date Sheik guide atm, so I will be mostly relying on comments, which again, I am not sure if they will show up and if this will be popular, as well as information from other threads! Whatever the case, I hope you enjoy this guide as much as I hope to enjoy writing it, and again, don't hesitate to give me some criticism or disagree with my thoughts on how to play Sheik!
Table of Contents
Introduction
Sheik Overview
-Pros
-Cons
-Playstyle
Moveset (Will probably be a while before I start working on this...)
Important/Useful Tech
Sheik Trials
Stages (Will go through each stage)
-Notable Features
-Counterpicking
Match-ups
-Marth
-Captain Falcon
-TBD
Sheik Overview
Just a note about this section. Every character has his/her strengths and weaknesses. To recognize and understand those strengths and weaknesses, I think, is very important. From there, you can you can choose what parts of your game you would like to show more of and which parts you would like to try to avoid. Or, if that part of the game is unavoidable, you can figure out how you can train/practice so that your character's weakness becomes your strength.
With that said, I think it is important to note that during this day and age of Melee, characters don't really "win" in certain match-ups. Let's take Sheik vs Falcon for example. I often hear that Sheik wins that MU, and that it's like 60-40. People that say this mean that if 2 equally highly-skilled players played each other, Sheik would win 60% of the games.... Maybe that is the case, but the MU is much more complex than that.
Pros
-High juggling and tech chasing potential (strong grab game)
-Combo game is reliable and fairly easy to execute
-Strong options for edge-guarding due to air properties as well as needles
-Many large and disjointed hitboxes on aerials and tilts
-Strong OoS game
-Good ground speed
-SH height makes it easier to dodge and counter projectiles as well as certain SHFFL'ed approaches
-Needles allow for campy-ish playstyle, but more importantly, opens up a couple more defensive/offensive options
-Strong CC game
-Strong ledge game
-Low lag on aerials (when L-cancelled)
Cons
-Weight and other properties make Sheik ideal for juggling for much of the cast
-Combos end fairly quickly and are difficult to extend
-Big landing lag on UpB makes edgeguards easy when she is forced to recover on stage
-Low aerial mobility
-Short dash
-Lack of a quick aerial that quickly hits below her
-Lack of fast SHFFL approach
-Many of her attacks can be CC'ed
-Lacks a strong+reliable punish (eg Marth fsmash or Fox usmash)
Play-style
First, a quick lesson on offense and defense!
Competition is a contest over limited resources. In Melee, the most important resource is stocks, and percentage being second, but there are other resources that can lead to the loss of stocks, such as space, positioning, or attack options. So, even if you are not racking up % on your opponent, you can attack less obvious resources that will still help lead to victory. With that said, offense is taking action to eliminate resources from an opponent, and defense is trying to prevent the loss of one's own resources.
Neutral game:
Now, with THAT said, Sheik is more of a defensive character. In other words, she is not really an approach character. She lacks great offensive tools that much of the other top tiers have. Much of the time, her neutral game revolves around baiting out aggression from the opponent and counter-attacking accordingly. Not to say that Sheik should NEVER approach in the neutral. In fact, there are many situations that Sheik should be approaching, but most of the time, Sheik should want to stay patient and wait to react to the opponent's aggression.
Combo/Punish game:
Sheik's combo/punish game is of the strongest in the game. Her combo tree is very simple, but still quite effective. However, do not be fooled. Though it is easy to understand what Sheik SHOULD do, the execution can still be very difficult. It's not as simple as "lololol one grab > tech chase > you die." In theory that's how it works, but how often do you see that happen? Just like how in THEORY, a marth grab on spacies on FD should mean death, but how often does that happen when it's not M2K? Nonetheless, I would say a hit for Sheik can generally mean about 30%+, which I think is realistic and relevant.
Edgeguarding:
Often seen getting gimps, Sheik has a lot for tools for edgeguarding. Her falling properties and recovery allows her to jump offstage very far, or drop very low for her edgeguards. Also, her aerials have a lot of active frames, as well as long ranged, disjointed hit boxes, which help with avoiding being hit by the opponent's recovery. Oh, and she also has needles
, which she conveniently has the ability to throw them horizontally as well as diagonally.
Recovery:
Unfortunately, Sheik is at a weight that she can be combo'ed quite well by pretty much all of the cast. In many situations, the opponent can combo off a hit regardless of your DI. Thus, you will often want to just mix up your DI to make combo'ing more difficult for your opponent. Similarly, on recovery, Sheik will almost certainly be hit after upB'ing onstage due to the landing lag of the move. Her upB can be pretty tricky to edgeguard sometimes, but in general, it's pretty easy to edgeguard Sheik as long as you know how. Knowing this, you generally will want to upB onto the stage and be ready to DI the punish in a way that you won't have to upB onto the stage again.
Movelist (Will ACTUALLY work on this later)
Here is a summary of frame data and a brief description of each move. All frame data is taken from these 2 links:
http://smashboards.com/threads/sheik-hitboxes-and-frame-data.299984/
http://smashboards.com/threads/sheik-shield-pressure-info-more.293859/
Some useful things to note are that most grabs come out in 7 frames and none come out any faster and jump speeds vary between 4-7 with only Bowser at 9.
Jab 3-4%
Total: 17 Hit: 2-3 IASA: 16 (second jab: 10) Shield Stun: 4
Jab (second) 3-4%
Total: 18 Hit: 3-5 IASA: 17 (rapid jabs: 10) Shield Stun: 3
Total: Hit: IASA: Shield Stun:
Sheik Trials
Stage Knowledge
This is one of those things that I feel is just intrinsic to a lot of players, but I think there is a lot of value in turning that intrinsic knowledge to extrinsic knowledge. My goal is to open up possibilities for movement and tactics available for you to explore as you go into your "Smash Lab."
Battlefield
Ahhhh, Battlefield. Often considered as the most neutral stage, Battlefield is the stage you will probably most often play on... Let's get started.
Let's start with he obvious. There are 3 platforms placed in the shape of a triangle. Below the edge, there is essentially nothing, so you can't wall-jump for that extra recovery option. I think that's about it for the obvious things...
Now let's talk about side platforms. The side platforms are at a height low enough that in MU's vs floaty-midweight characters, when you dthrow them, they can get above the side platform and tech on that, instead of giving you the guaranteed combo. This can make you drop your combo if you're not aware of your surroundings. But if you predict or react to your opponent DI'ing towards a side platform to tech on it after a dthrow, it is low enough that you can jump>WL on and get a tech chase on the platform and go for a DA follow up, or another grab, or even an usmash.
Another way you can tech chase if you value keeping stage position is with your short hop. The side platforms are high enough that your SH will not reach the platform, but your aerials will go through them still. This way, you can tech chase on platforms in a Marth-esque fashion. If you react too slowly to the tech, at worst, you're opponent is stuck on the platform with their shield up... Actually, at worst, they shield drop, and you get hit with something... but generally, this option is safe! D= But yeah, if your opponent is teching on a side platform, if you position yourself with a SH towards the middle of the platform, you can cover all options with fair and bair, and occasionally get an uair for a combo.
This ALSO means that you can safely pressure people with fairs and bairs when they are trapped in the corner. A lot of players, when they get stuck in the corner of BF, like to WL onto the side platform and try to get center stage from there. As soon as I see this, I SH fair into them, and since their mindset is usually to dodge my attacks and regain center stage (rather than shield on the platform), I usually get a hit.
The side platform is also a fairly safe place to be. It is a "disadvantageous position" because it is above the ground and not in the center of the stage. However, you can avoid pretty much any approach from the ground with a full jump>double jump when you're on the side platform (though this burns your double jump, which means less option as you try to get down from the air). You also have easy access to the top platform, which makes it not too difficult to regain center stage because of your options for movement. You can also camp needles here. These platform tricks are also tactics available to your opponents. Sometimes, Falcons and Falcos like to stand on the side platforms and bait your approach to hit them, but they'll just jump above your attack, and then they get a free dair. Look out for that.
The last thing about the side platforms that I would keep in mind is that if you try to SH needle, sometimes you just land on the platform and end up throwing a horizontal needle if you let go of B at the right (or wrong, however you wanna look at it) time.
Now let's talk about the top platform!
Match-ups (MU)
Before, when I would try to learn a MU or improve at it, I would watch videos of the MU and see how the Sheik player is getting their hits, paying close attention to their movement, as well as what attacks they were using. I think this approach is fine, but I want to open up other options. As I've said in the intro, I've started playing a bit of Ultra Street Fighter IV recently, and I realize that my approach to learning a character is different from Smash in that I start by learning the combos. I've noticed that in tournament play, for USF4, having your combos down is analogous to being able to WD and L-cancel everything in Smash. They are both standard skills in tournament.
I light of that, for this match-up section, I will format each MU as follows:
1. An overview of the MU as to how you might be able to expect things to go
2. How you should be building racking up kills or building %, titled as "combos/follow-ups" or "edgeguards"
3. Strategy and tactics to you use to set up your big combos or edgeguards as well as ways to avoid the threads the oppenent has
4. Stage counterpicks/bans
Also, I want to start with the MU's that are considered "good MU's" for Sheik because I feel that I fell into the trap of thinking that because the MU is "easy," I don't need to know what I should be doing to win. I'm going with the logic of "take what's yours" and saying that I wanna start with being able to win the MU's that I should be winning. On paper, I think those MU's are Falcon and Marth, but I'll start with Marth because I know that MU WAYYYYY better since my "training partner" or simply, my friend that I learned the game with, is a Marth main.
Marth
This MU is traditionally thought as good for Sheik. This is probably because a lot of the combos Sheik has on Marth are kind of guaranteed, especially if she gets a grab or dash attack. Marth, on the other hand, has to read Sheik's movement if he wants to get his hits and follow-ups. It's not as bad as people think though, and I'm glad to see more resources and hear more commentary of people agreeing so.
Let's take the combo game for example: Let's say that Sheik gets a dthrow>ftilt>fair (Marth can DI the ftilt to avoid the fair btw, but let's just go on with this example). Dthrow does 8%, ftilt 6%, fair 13%. That's a total of 27%. It's a lot, but Marth doesn't typically die from it, and once you get the fair, it's pretty difficult to follow-up on the combo. Typically, the game goes back to neutral position. Depending on the positioning of where you get these grab combos, you would need 3 of these combos per stock + an edgeguard. Or maybe 4 - 5 raw grab combos to kill. Of course, you're probably building % from other things like pokes and needles and such, but just be aware of how strong your punishes are. They are strong, but they aren't THAT strong.
I will go into these topics in depth, but in short, this how I think the MU goes:
-Marth combos hard, Sheik combo's harder
-Marth has slight advantage in neutral
-Marth makes more use of his positional advantage
-Edgeguards are slightly easier for Marth, but slightly stronger for Sheik
If I HAD to give numbers for the MU, I would say somewhere around 55/45 Sheik, but it's tough to say...
Combos/Follow-ups
Check out KK's post on combo'ing with dthrow:
http://smashboards.com/threads/a-qu...ic-d-throws-combos-under-construction.312070/
Just to reiterate some things about comboing with dthrow:
-ftilt tends to end the combo as long as Marth knows how to DI it. Your main options should usually be utilt, usmash, DA, or regrab. Also, it may be useful to know that utilt does 8% on the first hit, while ftilt does 6%. The extra 2% can matter (which is also why I always get at least 1 pummel before throwing)!
Some other notes about combo'ing after dthrow:
-At 0%, you get a guaranteed chain grab. You can keep chain-grabbing up to around 30-40% if he always DI's away.
-If you're too nervous to execute, you can mash ftilt in the direction Marth DI's. You often won't get a follow-up after the ftilt, so it's definitely not optimal and you should learn to control your anxiety, but that's there.
-At kill %'s, you should follow up the dthrow with SH fair or uair.
Besides dthrow, your other combo starters are DA and tilts. DA and tilts can combo into each other as well as themselves at lower percents depending on the DI. Sometimes, Marth will DI in a way that DA can hit but won't combo, so Marth can jump out. In these cases, you can run at Marth and predict this jump to avoid your DA, and go for a rising fair instead. Fair will typically end your combo.
To end this section, I just want to restate what I said in the intro of this MU. I think it's pretty rare to get a 0 to death combo with Sheik on Marth. If Marth knows how to DI the combos, they shouldn't go for that long, and Marth has really good air mobility so he can land back on the ground or the edge safely. BUT, after that, you Sheik should have the positional advantage. Once your juggle ends, Marth should be somewhere in the air, you should be taking center stage, maybe you got Marth to burn his double jump, or he was able to get down safely to a platform or the ledge.
I'll talk more about those kinds of situations in a later section, but for now, try to get about 30%-40% per dthrow or DA, and I would say that that is pretty standard/decent, and then be aware of the positional advantage you get after the combos and that there are more resources to be mindful of besides stocks and percentages!
Edge-guarding
When recovering, Marths will typically try to get below the stage and DJ or upB to sweet spot the edge. If he's not trying to fall below the stage to sweet spot, he is either looking to challenge you with an aerial or airdodge on. If he is looking to challenge you with an aerial, Marth will typically use rising DJ fair/nair or a falling dair. And in case you haven't noticed what I was trying to imply, Marths will usually try to conserve their DJ and intially recover with just sideB.
When edge-guarding Marth, in general, if you have time, you want to grab the edge. Sheik's bair is awesome for edge-guarding. Your goal will usually be to try to get below Marth and then hit him with a rising DJ bair. Sheik has pretty good recovery with her upB, so don't be afraid to drop down really low below the stage if the situation calls for it.
But sometimes, Marth will just drop low enough below the stage that Sheik cannot safely go down to edgeguard him, or he is too far to be able to get below him in time. In these cases, I would go for a falling nair fromt he ledge, or a rising nair or bair. It is noteworthy to know that Sheik's bair also has a hitbox below her on the leg that doesn't stick out. It is a weak hitbox, but it's good enough for the purpose of edgeguarding, since you're just trying to hit the Marth away fromt he edge. So the move you decide to go with depends on the positioning of Marth when he's recovering, and where you want your hitboxes to be.
Finally, if you have enough time, you can try to hog the edge at the right time and force Marth to upB past your ledge invincibility onto the stage. If you can do this, you can get a free dair from the ledge to combo into w/e, or if you think it will kill, go for a reverse fair, which I recently saw Shroomed do pretty consistently, so I will probably start practicing that.
OH! And don't forget that you can throw needles. More useful to hit if you can hit him before he gets into position to upB.
Neutral Game (goals + tactics)
So, keeping in mind what has already been gone over in this MU, what would be the game plan for Sheik?... Well, our most damaging combos start with dthrow, and then we get pretty good combos after DA (once Marth is at a high enough %) as well, so I would say Sheik's game plan is to get a grab or a DA. There are many other goals that Sheik should have in this MU that are pretty relevant such as being below Marth, getting Marth off-stage, or even poking with certain aerials, but let's try to keep this simple for now and only think about getting a grab or DA.
Now, before I go into some tactics, I want to go into Marth's goals in the MU. For starters, Marth wants to avoid Sheik's goals, that is, avoid being grabbed or DA'ed. He will use a lot of zoning tactics to do this. Offensively, I would say that Marth wants to get a grab, get under Sheik, or get Sheik of stage. I actually do not want to simplify these goals for Marth because I think they are more relevant than the extra goals that said I will be ignoring for Sheik. And to continue the pattern, Sheik will have some added goals of avoiding these goals of Marth.
So now that we have goals of each character, let's talk about the tools that each character has to accomplish these goals:
Marth: His speed, range with sword, grab range, even his SH heigh allows him to dodge Sheik's grab+DA and punish
So knowing this here is my most used tactic in this MU. Dash>WD back. Why is this tactic so threatening?
First of all, dashing forward threatens Marth with grab or DA. Typically, the correct response to this would either be to dash away, SH over the approach> aerial, or dtilt to prevent the approach. So if you can't tell, the tactic is low risk, high reward! If Marth dashes away, you have gained stage positioning. If he SH aerials, you should be able to whiff punish his aerial with a dash grab. If he dtilts, you pretty much stay in neutral position.
Another tactic I like to do is to add a SHFFL'ed fair to the end of the last tactic. This will allow you to beat the dtilt option, and can lead to a follow-up. It should also beat Marth's SH aerial option since your WD back should have still made his aerial whiff. Often, Marth will have time to shield and block your fair approach, but I would still count this as a win, because then you get to pressure his shield. The only problem is that if you commit to a SHFFL'ed fair, you would lose to the dash away because then you would be the one whiffing an attack, and Marth might be able to to punish your whiffed fair.
TO BE CONTINUED... THANKS FOR READYING SO FAR!!!
Last update on 3/26/15
Added a personal blog section in the post below this! Check it out if you're interested in my progress!
Introduction
Greetings, reader! Welcome to my Sheik guide! I go by Bonbon. I'm a NorCal (408) Sheik main, currently attending UC Davis. I would consider myself about a low-mid level player (I tend to go 3-2 or 2-2 in tournaments), so I'm not exactly the most ideal person to be writing a guide. Not to mention, I sort of lost my passion for Smash a little back and stopped attending tournaments, due to a combination of some disappointing performances (including going 2 and out at EVO), learning how to play Ultra Street Fighter 4, and just becoming REALLY busy with school and other important things in life. However, I still love Melee, and often find myself still daydreaming about the game during class and such. I have found that one thing that I REALLY enjoy about Melee is learning the strategies and understanding the key components of match-ups, which can help lead to victory! As a result, I've actually been getting back into playing again. I think I am too busy atm to attend tournaments as much as did before, but I am still working on my game knowledge just by playing with my housemates, which I would call "recreational" players.
So, as sort of a "side project" kind of thing, I will be working on this guide! I will be giving MY thoughts and opinions on how I think Sheik should be played, and would appreciate getting some advice from you all. And hopefully, as a result, we can all become better Sheik players!
To reiterate, this will be a WIP! I don't know how much attention this thread will be getting, but I will be trying to update it at least once a week. IMO, there is not a whole lot of resources for Sheik (at least compared to other characters), and there isn't an up to date Sheik guide atm, so I will be mostly relying on comments, which again, I am not sure if they will show up and if this will be popular, as well as information from other threads! Whatever the case, I hope you enjoy this guide as much as I hope to enjoy writing it, and again, don't hesitate to give me some criticism or disagree with my thoughts on how to play Sheik!
Table of Contents
Introduction
Sheik Overview
-Pros
-Cons
-Playstyle
Moveset (Will probably be a while before I start working on this...)
Sheik Trials
Stages (Will go through each stage)
-Notable Features
-Counterpicking
Match-ups
-Marth
-Captain Falcon
-TBD
Sheik Overview
Just a note about this section. Every character has his/her strengths and weaknesses. To recognize and understand those strengths and weaknesses, I think, is very important. From there, you can you can choose what parts of your game you would like to show more of and which parts you would like to try to avoid. Or, if that part of the game is unavoidable, you can figure out how you can train/practice so that your character's weakness becomes your strength.
With that said, I think it is important to note that during this day and age of Melee, characters don't really "win" in certain match-ups. Let's take Sheik vs Falcon for example. I often hear that Sheik wins that MU, and that it's like 60-40. People that say this mean that if 2 equally highly-skilled players played each other, Sheik would win 60% of the games.... Maybe that is the case, but the MU is much more complex than that.
Pros
-High juggling and tech chasing potential (strong grab game)
-Combo game is reliable and fairly easy to execute
-Strong options for edge-guarding due to air properties as well as needles
-Many large and disjointed hitboxes on aerials and tilts
-Strong OoS game
-Good ground speed
-SH height makes it easier to dodge and counter projectiles as well as certain SHFFL'ed approaches
-Needles allow for campy-ish playstyle, but more importantly, opens up a couple more defensive/offensive options
-Strong CC game
-Strong ledge game
-Low lag on aerials (when L-cancelled)
Cons
-Weight and other properties make Sheik ideal for juggling for much of the cast
-Combos end fairly quickly and are difficult to extend
-Big landing lag on UpB makes edgeguards easy when she is forced to recover on stage
-Low aerial mobility
-Short dash
-Lack of a quick aerial that quickly hits below her
-Lack of fast SHFFL approach
-Many of her attacks can be CC'ed
-Lacks a strong+reliable punish (eg Marth fsmash or Fox usmash)
Play-style
First, a quick lesson on offense and defense!
Competition is a contest over limited resources. In Melee, the most important resource is stocks, and percentage being second, but there are other resources that can lead to the loss of stocks, such as space, positioning, or attack options. So, even if you are not racking up % on your opponent, you can attack less obvious resources that will still help lead to victory. With that said, offense is taking action to eliminate resources from an opponent, and defense is trying to prevent the loss of one's own resources.
Neutral game:
Now, with THAT said, Sheik is more of a defensive character. In other words, she is not really an approach character. She lacks great offensive tools that much of the other top tiers have. Much of the time, her neutral game revolves around baiting out aggression from the opponent and counter-attacking accordingly. Not to say that Sheik should NEVER approach in the neutral. In fact, there are many situations that Sheik should be approaching, but most of the time, Sheik should want to stay patient and wait to react to the opponent's aggression.
Combo/Punish game:
Sheik's combo/punish game is of the strongest in the game. Her combo tree is very simple, but still quite effective. However, do not be fooled. Though it is easy to understand what Sheik SHOULD do, the execution can still be very difficult. It's not as simple as "lololol one grab > tech chase > you die." In theory that's how it works, but how often do you see that happen? Just like how in THEORY, a marth grab on spacies on FD should mean death, but how often does that happen when it's not M2K? Nonetheless, I would say a hit for Sheik can generally mean about 30%+, which I think is realistic and relevant.
Edgeguarding:
Often seen getting gimps, Sheik has a lot for tools for edgeguarding. Her falling properties and recovery allows her to jump offstage very far, or drop very low for her edgeguards. Also, her aerials have a lot of active frames, as well as long ranged, disjointed hit boxes, which help with avoiding being hit by the opponent's recovery. Oh, and she also has needles
, which she conveniently has the ability to throw them horizontally as well as diagonally.Recovery:
Unfortunately, Sheik is at a weight that she can be combo'ed quite well by pretty much all of the cast. In many situations, the opponent can combo off a hit regardless of your DI. Thus, you will often want to just mix up your DI to make combo'ing more difficult for your opponent. Similarly, on recovery, Sheik will almost certainly be hit after upB'ing onstage due to the landing lag of the move. Her upB can be pretty tricky to edgeguard sometimes, but in general, it's pretty easy to edgeguard Sheik as long as you know how. Knowing this, you generally will want to upB onto the stage and be ready to DI the punish in a way that you won't have to upB onto the stage again.
Movelist (Will ACTUALLY work on this later)
Here is a summary of frame data and a brief description of each move. All frame data is taken from these 2 links:
http://smashboards.com/threads/sheik-hitboxes-and-frame-data.299984/
http://smashboards.com/threads/sheik-shield-pressure-info-more.293859/
Some useful things to note are that most grabs come out in 7 frames and none come out any faster and jump speeds vary between 4-7 with only Bowser at 9.
Jab 3-4%
Total: 17 Hit: 2-3 IASA: 16 (second jab: 10) Shield Stun: 4
Jab (second) 3-4%
Total: 18 Hit: 3-5 IASA: 17 (rapid jabs: 10) Shield Stun: 3
Total: Hit: IASA: Shield Stun:
Sheik Trials
Stage Knowledge
This is one of those things that I feel is just intrinsic to a lot of players, but I think there is a lot of value in turning that intrinsic knowledge to extrinsic knowledge. My goal is to open up possibilities for movement and tactics available for you to explore as you go into your "Smash Lab."
Battlefield
Ahhhh, Battlefield. Often considered as the most neutral stage, Battlefield is the stage you will probably most often play on... Let's get started.
Let's start with he obvious. There are 3 platforms placed in the shape of a triangle. Below the edge, there is essentially nothing, so you can't wall-jump for that extra recovery option. I think that's about it for the obvious things...
Now let's talk about side platforms. The side platforms are at a height low enough that in MU's vs floaty-midweight characters, when you dthrow them, they can get above the side platform and tech on that, instead of giving you the guaranteed combo. This can make you drop your combo if you're not aware of your surroundings. But if you predict or react to your opponent DI'ing towards a side platform to tech on it after a dthrow, it is low enough that you can jump>WL on and get a tech chase on the platform and go for a DA follow up, or another grab, or even an usmash.
Another way you can tech chase if you value keeping stage position is with your short hop. The side platforms are high enough that your SH will not reach the platform, but your aerials will go through them still. This way, you can tech chase on platforms in a Marth-esque fashion. If you react too slowly to the tech, at worst, you're opponent is stuck on the platform with their shield up... Actually, at worst, they shield drop, and you get hit with something... but generally, this option is safe! D= But yeah, if your opponent is teching on a side platform, if you position yourself with a SH towards the middle of the platform, you can cover all options with fair and bair, and occasionally get an uair for a combo.
This ALSO means that you can safely pressure people with fairs and bairs when they are trapped in the corner. A lot of players, when they get stuck in the corner of BF, like to WL onto the side platform and try to get center stage from there. As soon as I see this, I SH fair into them, and since their mindset is usually to dodge my attacks and regain center stage (rather than shield on the platform), I usually get a hit.
The side platform is also a fairly safe place to be. It is a "disadvantageous position" because it is above the ground and not in the center of the stage. However, you can avoid pretty much any approach from the ground with a full jump>double jump when you're on the side platform (though this burns your double jump, which means less option as you try to get down from the air). You also have easy access to the top platform, which makes it not too difficult to regain center stage because of your options for movement. You can also camp needles here. These platform tricks are also tactics available to your opponents. Sometimes, Falcons and Falcos like to stand on the side platforms and bait your approach to hit them, but they'll just jump above your attack, and then they get a free dair. Look out for that.
The last thing about the side platforms that I would keep in mind is that if you try to SH needle, sometimes you just land on the platform and end up throwing a horizontal needle if you let go of B at the right (or wrong, however you wanna look at it) time.
Now let's talk about the top platform!
Match-ups (MU)
Before, when I would try to learn a MU or improve at it, I would watch videos of the MU and see how the Sheik player is getting their hits, paying close attention to their movement, as well as what attacks they were using. I think this approach is fine, but I want to open up other options. As I've said in the intro, I've started playing a bit of Ultra Street Fighter IV recently, and I realize that my approach to learning a character is different from Smash in that I start by learning the combos. I've noticed that in tournament play, for USF4, having your combos down is analogous to being able to WD and L-cancel everything in Smash. They are both standard skills in tournament.
I light of that, for this match-up section, I will format each MU as follows:
1. An overview of the MU as to how you might be able to expect things to go
2. How you should be building racking up kills or building %, titled as "combos/follow-ups" or "edgeguards"
3. Strategy and tactics to you use to set up your big combos or edgeguards as well as ways to avoid the threads the oppenent has
4. Stage counterpicks/bans
Also, I want to start with the MU's that are considered "good MU's" for Sheik because I feel that I fell into the trap of thinking that because the MU is "easy," I don't need to know what I should be doing to win. I'm going with the logic of "take what's yours" and saying that I wanna start with being able to win the MU's that I should be winning. On paper, I think those MU's are Falcon and Marth, but I'll start with Marth because I know that MU WAYYYYY better since my "training partner" or simply, my friend that I learned the game with, is a Marth main.
Marth
This MU is traditionally thought as good for Sheik. This is probably because a lot of the combos Sheik has on Marth are kind of guaranteed, especially if she gets a grab or dash attack. Marth, on the other hand, has to read Sheik's movement if he wants to get his hits and follow-ups. It's not as bad as people think though, and I'm glad to see more resources and hear more commentary of people agreeing so.
Let's take the combo game for example: Let's say that Sheik gets a dthrow>ftilt>fair (Marth can DI the ftilt to avoid the fair btw, but let's just go on with this example). Dthrow does 8%, ftilt 6%, fair 13%. That's a total of 27%. It's a lot, but Marth doesn't typically die from it, and once you get the fair, it's pretty difficult to follow-up on the combo. Typically, the game goes back to neutral position. Depending on the positioning of where you get these grab combos, you would need 3 of these combos per stock + an edgeguard. Or maybe 4 - 5 raw grab combos to kill. Of course, you're probably building % from other things like pokes and needles and such, but just be aware of how strong your punishes are. They are strong, but they aren't THAT strong.
I will go into these topics in depth, but in short, this how I think the MU goes:
-Marth combos hard, Sheik combo's harder
-Marth has slight advantage in neutral
-Marth makes more use of his positional advantage
-Edgeguards are slightly easier for Marth, but slightly stronger for Sheik
If I HAD to give numbers for the MU, I would say somewhere around 55/45 Sheik, but it's tough to say...
Combos/Follow-ups
Check out KK's post on combo'ing with dthrow:
http://smashboards.com/threads/a-qu...ic-d-throws-combos-under-construction.312070/
Just to reiterate some things about comboing with dthrow:
-ftilt tends to end the combo as long as Marth knows how to DI it. Your main options should usually be utilt, usmash, DA, or regrab. Also, it may be useful to know that utilt does 8% on the first hit, while ftilt does 6%. The extra 2% can matter (which is also why I always get at least 1 pummel before throwing)!
Some other notes about combo'ing after dthrow:
-At 0%, you get a guaranteed chain grab. You can keep chain-grabbing up to around 30-40% if he always DI's away.
-If you're too nervous to execute, you can mash ftilt in the direction Marth DI's. You often won't get a follow-up after the ftilt, so it's definitely not optimal and you should learn to control your anxiety, but that's there.
-At kill %'s, you should follow up the dthrow with SH fair or uair.
Besides dthrow, your other combo starters are DA and tilts. DA and tilts can combo into each other as well as themselves at lower percents depending on the DI. Sometimes, Marth will DI in a way that DA can hit but won't combo, so Marth can jump out. In these cases, you can run at Marth and predict this jump to avoid your DA, and go for a rising fair instead. Fair will typically end your combo.
To end this section, I just want to restate what I said in the intro of this MU. I think it's pretty rare to get a 0 to death combo with Sheik on Marth. If Marth knows how to DI the combos, they shouldn't go for that long, and Marth has really good air mobility so he can land back on the ground or the edge safely. BUT, after that, you Sheik should have the positional advantage. Once your juggle ends, Marth should be somewhere in the air, you should be taking center stage, maybe you got Marth to burn his double jump, or he was able to get down safely to a platform or the ledge.
I'll talk more about those kinds of situations in a later section, but for now, try to get about 30%-40% per dthrow or DA, and I would say that that is pretty standard/decent, and then be aware of the positional advantage you get after the combos and that there are more resources to be mindful of besides stocks and percentages!
Edge-guarding
When recovering, Marths will typically try to get below the stage and DJ or upB to sweet spot the edge. If he's not trying to fall below the stage to sweet spot, he is either looking to challenge you with an aerial or airdodge on. If he is looking to challenge you with an aerial, Marth will typically use rising DJ fair/nair or a falling dair. And in case you haven't noticed what I was trying to imply, Marths will usually try to conserve their DJ and intially recover with just sideB.
When edge-guarding Marth, in general, if you have time, you want to grab the edge. Sheik's bair is awesome for edge-guarding. Your goal will usually be to try to get below Marth and then hit him with a rising DJ bair. Sheik has pretty good recovery with her upB, so don't be afraid to drop down really low below the stage if the situation calls for it.
But sometimes, Marth will just drop low enough below the stage that Sheik cannot safely go down to edgeguard him, or he is too far to be able to get below him in time. In these cases, I would go for a falling nair fromt he ledge, or a rising nair or bair. It is noteworthy to know that Sheik's bair also has a hitbox below her on the leg that doesn't stick out. It is a weak hitbox, but it's good enough for the purpose of edgeguarding, since you're just trying to hit the Marth away fromt he edge. So the move you decide to go with depends on the positioning of Marth when he's recovering, and where you want your hitboxes to be.
Finally, if you have enough time, you can try to hog the edge at the right time and force Marth to upB past your ledge invincibility onto the stage. If you can do this, you can get a free dair from the ledge to combo into w/e, or if you think it will kill, go for a reverse fair, which I recently saw Shroomed do pretty consistently, so I will probably start practicing that.
OH! And don't forget that you can throw needles. More useful to hit if you can hit him before he gets into position to upB.
Neutral Game (goals + tactics)
So, keeping in mind what has already been gone over in this MU, what would be the game plan for Sheik?... Well, our most damaging combos start with dthrow, and then we get pretty good combos after DA (once Marth is at a high enough %) as well, so I would say Sheik's game plan is to get a grab or a DA. There are many other goals that Sheik should have in this MU that are pretty relevant such as being below Marth, getting Marth off-stage, or even poking with certain aerials, but let's try to keep this simple for now and only think about getting a grab or DA.
Now, before I go into some tactics, I want to go into Marth's goals in the MU. For starters, Marth wants to avoid Sheik's goals, that is, avoid being grabbed or DA'ed. He will use a lot of zoning tactics to do this. Offensively, I would say that Marth wants to get a grab, get under Sheik, or get Sheik of stage. I actually do not want to simplify these goals for Marth because I think they are more relevant than the extra goals that said I will be ignoring for Sheik. And to continue the pattern, Sheik will have some added goals of avoiding these goals of Marth.
So now that we have goals of each character, let's talk about the tools that each character has to accomplish these goals:
Marth: His speed, range with sword, grab range, even his SH heigh allows him to dodge Sheik's grab+DA and punish
So knowing this here is my most used tactic in this MU. Dash>WD back. Why is this tactic so threatening?
First of all, dashing forward threatens Marth with grab or DA. Typically, the correct response to this would either be to dash away, SH over the approach> aerial, or dtilt to prevent the approach. So if you can't tell, the tactic is low risk, high reward! If Marth dashes away, you have gained stage positioning. If he SH aerials, you should be able to whiff punish his aerial with a dash grab. If he dtilts, you pretty much stay in neutral position.
Another tactic I like to do is to add a SHFFL'ed fair to the end of the last tactic. This will allow you to beat the dtilt option, and can lead to a follow-up. It should also beat Marth's SH aerial option since your WD back should have still made his aerial whiff. Often, Marth will have time to shield and block your fair approach, but I would still count this as a win, because then you get to pressure his shield. The only problem is that if you commit to a SHFFL'ed fair, you would lose to the dash away because then you would be the one whiffing an attack, and Marth might be able to to punish your whiffed fair.
TO BE CONTINUED... THANKS FOR READYING SO FAR!!!
Last edited:
