Important Carefully Ask PPMD about the Tiara Guy

[Bones0]

Not all but quite a few of those dash attacks were supposed to be run canceled dtilts. I would agree with you that I need to bair off the ledge more, I'm just sometimes scared of going too far out for it. Dash attack and forward throw I can understand are generally bad because they are pretty situational but still have uses. Dash attack covering people's run away and forward throw to combo into fsmash for bad DI. But why don't you think nair is good to use in this matchup?

YES! My attempts to change some of Melee's flawed terminology is not entirely in vain.

 

[Metal Reeper]

What would you guys say is Marth's best punish? I usually try to punish with late uair or maybe a dair and try to combo off of that and ideally hitting them off stage.

 

[Mahie]

Well how long of a punish window are we talking about ? spacies sideBing on stage or puff missing a rest ?

 

[Deleted member]

What would you guys say is Marth's best punish? I usually try to punish with late uair or maybe a dair and try to combo off of that and ideally hitting them off stage.

if it kills them, whatever the kill move is. probably fsmash or dair.

if not, whatever sets up the best advantage. so probably upthrow.

if it's a sleeping jigglypuff from a missed rest, the reverse tip hit on charged dsmash is hilarious. not as good as shield breaker, but hilarious. kills at like 60 lol

 

[Dr Peepee]

I've never posted here before and I haven't exactly read through any of these posts so don't hate me for asking, but...

PP, what are your thoughts on how "tournament feasible" Marth really is?

My "smashboards" answer:

Any of the top characters can be viable given the right player. Look at Armada with Peach! Also, Marth's metagame could be fleshed out more, so his current worth may look a little skewed to someone that is looking only at TOURNAMENT RESULTS and what current Marths do in videos.


More of a skewed opinion because I like honesty:

I don't actually know. I haven't played Marth vs M2K's Sheik enough times and if that is somewhat consistently winnable then I'd say there's nothing else stopping this character. But honestly, he needs to develop more for me to see. My gut feeling says yes, but that also changes sometimes.


Especially with a powerful Fox secondary(for Sheik), I don't think this character can really suffer much at full potential. That secondary thing may not actually be necessary, but I'm throwing it in for thought.


If you prefer a simple answer PPU, I will say that, at the moment of writing this post, I do believe Marth is quite tournament feasible. He may even be more feasible than Sheik, and is certainly more feasible than lolpeach.

 

[Niko45]

the whole marth vs sheik thing is so overblown

 

[AustinRC]

Wat'chu talking about willis?

 

[Deleted member]

the problem with marth vs sheik isn't so much the MU but the stage. like, you can go FD if for some reason the sheik doesn't ban it and thats fine, but the other 4 suck for marth. DL64 is just...no, and battlefield isn't much better for the same reasons but to a lesser degree. the margin of error that marth has to play at is ridiculous. if you go to YS or fountain to solve the problem, you risk getting blown out by sheik's WD OOS or better platform game. so really, would you rather lose on the macro game or the micro game? personally i'd rather lose on the micro game (strike DL64 and BF from the neutrals) than the opposite because at least there you have a chance to just "get them" randomly and kill at 60 a couple times, which is basically never going to happen if you strike YS or FoD instead.

i think another problem with marth's tournament development is his answers to falco's shield pressure. the usual answer is to buffer a roll dodge out early, and marth could probably replace this with WD OOS away from falco to mimic a WD back to cover fade aerials or misplaced shield spacing. i'm not really sure how falco would go about pressuring a marth that did WD OOS away from falco to react to his actions at about the same timing that sheik can nair oos, but the more experienced falco players would have to answer that one. but either way, marth's ability to react to falco's developments from the past 3 years is also going to be a major component of his tournament viability.

 

[Bones0]

lol wut? Marth's already use WD OoS as a staple option vs. Falco pressure.

As a Falco, I deal with it either by:
1. Laser out of shine: low risk; keeps pressure since they'll usually be at the ledge after the WD; potential for illegitimate followups if they go antsy and tried to SH fair or something after the WD; won't work if Marths ever decide to learn to PS
2. Waveshine into overshot aerial: if they have stage to work with, they can usually pivot grab after the WD to grab you, but it has super high reward if you can hit a dair/nair obviously (again, especially because they are usually by the ledge after the WD)
3. Waveshining towards them into another shine: I doubt it's fast enough if they did the WD OoS asap, and you can get grabbed for this if they react to it; very safe if you are convinced they will shield since once you get on Marth's back he loses his best counterattacks OoS

 

[Metal Reeper]

Bones be quiet we don't talk about those dark times

 

[odinNJ]

the whole marth vs sheik thing is so overblown

It is marths only losing ( i dont consider spacies losing or winning, there are no winners in that matchup 40:40) matchup. Thus people focus on it alot because it is the "only" roadblock for marth (besides being underplayed by good people).

 

[Niko45]

I just dont think one single matchup can/should define a character's viability (or else no one would play IC's right?) but I guess maybe if you're talking about the super highest of levels then maybe its different

 

[Deleted member]

I just dont think one single matchup can/should define a character's viability (or else no one would play IC's right?) but I guess maybe if you're talking about the super highest of levels then maybe its different

this is a good point, but i think it's more like "prepare for what you expect to play against". no one practices vs 26 characters, and i'm not so sure it's a good idea to even practice against 7 or 8 of them when like 70%+ of tournament play is only represented by 2 characters.

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

I just dont think one single matchup can/should define a character's viability (or else no one would play IC's right?) but I guess maybe if you're talking about the super highest of levels then maybe its different

Its might be true and even worse at lower levels how a single match-up can redefine a character's viability. I think you could argue that low level match of Marth vs fox/falco is a huge roadblock to the spacies. Mistakes are more frequent for a spacie and punishes are not as heavy. Unlike Marth where something like dthrow -> tipper -> random edgeguard attempts work.

At a higher end, mistakes would be far less frequent. Execution and punishments are better. All of that goes to showing how bad a character's options is compared to another. Sheik's frequency in tourney versus pretty much any low tier should immediately cut their viability.

 

[Stylez]

I really like this video and think it says a lot about Marth v Spacies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAmthNm61PA

Feel like the window to punish Marth is so much larger and simpler than it is for spacies

 

[odinNJ]

i think it says alot about how marth gets wrecked in neutral game then lands a grab and presto fox is dead

 

[Bones0]

I think it's pretty dumb to worry about Marth's viability. Just use him as best as possible and let the chips fall where they may. If Axe can get top 8 with Pikachu, I'm pretty sure Marth can win nationals as long as the player using him is the best in the world.

 

[Deleted member]

I really like this video and think it says a lot about Marth v Spacies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAmthNm61PA

Feel like the window to punish Marth is so much larger and simpler than it is for spacies

i thought it was a great example of the neutral game. both sides punish each other so hard, it really captures the importance of positioning and establishing some kind of advantage.

 

[odinNJ]

The point is people think (for some reason) that if your skill challenges that of PP or the other top 5 that your character is going to matter that much.

Sure mango + PP falco all over the place but armada uses peach and is still the (second) best smasher.

On the other hand, I think discussing his viability promotes more discussions than "hey guys I like utilt"


the statement in quotes is still really true though

 

[Bones0]

Idk why you put "(second)" in there.

I don't think viability has promoted any useful discussion. The theory to determine a character's viability is vastly more complicated than the theory behind using a certain move or tactic. The more theory you are using, the less meaningful the conclusion you come to is. If someone theorizes Marth is unviable because of whatever reasons they have, it is pretty irrelevant because in order to come to any conclusion about viability you are making an insane number of assumptions including, but not limited to, what Marth is capable of, what other chars are capable of, what humans are capable of doing consistently, and what works consistently or will work consistently in the future. If you're just theorizing ways to use utilt, that's infinitely more simple. In fact, it's so simple you can test your theories just by playing and get pretty reliable feedback (with some slight variation depending on how good your opponent is, obviously). You can't test Marth's viability outside of maining Marth and putting in thousands of hours of work and becoming a top player. That's why I think people should just do that instead of worrying about the theory behind it.

 

[odinNJ]

I agree to this, i get why i was misguided.

also I personally love talking about specific moves/tactics dont get me wrong.

also (second) because I still believe in Mango

 

[Deleted member]

also (second) because I still believe in Mango

Mango is a fantastic player because he sets himself up for victory. His tech skill is practiced and fluid, his neutral game is phenomenal, and he obviously puts in testing work to come up with great ways to preserve his advantage any time it is possible in any way.

The strong adherence to the fundamentals has little to do with the character he picks or that character's viability. Don't believe me? Watch his neutral horizontal movement and placement with mario and compare it to his falcon, they're nearly identical until he transitions to a punish.

Any player could at least partially mimic his success with any character by putting in the hours, mastering the fundamentals, and playing to them. Marth is no exception.

 

[odinNJ]

"Any player could at least partially mimic his success with any character by putting in the hours, mastering the fundamentals, and playing to them. Marth is no exceptio"

this was a point i made in my original post regarding the viability of marth a page back. the fact that his success happens regardless of character (to an extent)


edit: 1111 posts lol

 

[knightpraetor]

I really like this video and think it says a lot about Marth v Spacies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAmthNm61PA

Feel like the window to punish Marth is so much larger and simpler than it is for spacies

all i see is a marth playing badly, throwing out random grabs, failing to recover properly, failing to reverse gimp fox properly when he misses his attempted shine spike...

i couldn't watch the rest i hate watching marths play well for a stock and then wreck themselves by failing so hard at basics.

 

[knightpraetor]

Idk why you put "(second)" in there.

I don't think viability has promoted any useful discussion. The theory to determine a character's viability is vastly more complicated than the theory behind using a certain move or tactic. The more theory you are using, the less meaningful the conclusion you come to is. If someone theorizes Marth is unviable because of whatever reasons they have, it is pretty irrelevant because in order to come to any conclusion about viability you are making an insane number of assumptions including, but not limited to, what Marth is capable of, what other chars are capable of, what humans are capable of doing consistently, and what works consistently or will work consistently in the future. If you're just theorizing ways to use utilt, that's infinitely more simple. In fact, it's so simple you can test your theories just by playing and get pretty reliable feedback (with some slight variation depending on how good your opponent is, obviously). You can't test Marth's viability outside of maining Marth and putting in thousands of hours of work and becoming a top player. That's why I think people should just do that instead of worrying about the theory behind it.

i would say that it's more just an issue of assuming that other character's will be more consistent with their options in the important situations than you think marth needs to be. if one player can tap A in a situation and get the same output as the other player's 9 inputs with all 2-frame links, then you don't need to make any assumptions about consistency other than to assume that 100% consistency is impossible. Once you've assumed that it just naturally follows that the consistency on the harder sequence will be lower.

Anyway you're right that arguing about these things has little point. It has too many factors involved and is even broader than tier list arguments. Just make your own personal decision based on that.

I do find it amusing though that everyone who keeps arguing about marth being viable doesn't even play marth. The marth mains themselves seem to keep quitting marth. it's so funny; a year ago I was mad at niko cause i felt like he was underrating marth cause he thought he was a bad character. I still think he exaggerated things cause he made his post sound like marth was bad in every matchup, but i've come around and switched off of marth. IB was probably top 5 marth for a long time and then switched off of marth. Azen quit marth, m2k basically quit marth except for fox, PP pretends to play marth but at the locals he dropped so many matches vs sheiks that would normally be considered 1/3 of his skill level as well as a vs ICs match. None of this helps build confidence that marth is viable.

Pewpewu is the only marth to have performed decently in the recent past, and he avoided fighting sheik to get there as well and still couldn't handle top level falco.

If Pewpewu had actually beaten a top sheik to get where he is or if PP's marth had been able to handle mango, then I might have believed. But as it is, I would rather play peach. Marth seems to have the potential to beat every character, but that isn't the same as saying he is as good as the other characters. His game is too heavily based on reads, leading to too much variance in his matches.

Peach on the other hand, everyone thinks they are staying even with her when they keep the game within a stock when in reality they were just consistently down the whole game. but who knows, maybe i will just end up playing peach vs falco and actually use marth vs fox like m2k does.

however, i think what PP said about marth being extremely viable with a good secondary may be correct. But it is a lot easier to just play a character who is good all around than to play someone at a high level and somehow find the time to keep your secondary up to speed as well.

 

[Bones0]

I'm pretty sure if M2K only used Marth he would be just as good as he is now in terms of dealing with Falco and Sheik mains. He lost Zenith, but people forget he took PP to the last game on his cp, which he honestly just choked on with PP simultaneously be clutch as ****. 9 times out of 10 M2K would have landed his cgs and won the tourney. I just don't see any of Marth's matchups being that big of a problem except maybe Sheik, but I haven't seen any vids of M2K or PPU's Marth vs. Sheik. I also realize most people think the spacies have no losing matchups, but I have a hard time believing it, and even if they don't, they are still much more prone to getting upset because they get death-touched constantly. No one claims Falco is bad vs. Peach despite the fact that PP has only beaten Armada in 3 of their many sets, and Mango won't even go Falco vs. Peach. Claiming Marth loses to Sheik because M2K prefers Sheik dittos and PP's secondary Marth is jank is horrible reasoning. Especially when you realize PP has gone Marth vs. M2K and Mango, and hasn't even taken a game when it mattered most. Obviously his Marth is still amazing, but to base Marth's metagame off of two players who don't even play Marth most of the time is ridiculous.

 

[knightpraetor]

I claim falco is bad vs peach, m2k claimed falco was bad vs peach for from 2009-2011. I am pretty sure that there are quite a few people who still think that matchup is bad.

Anyway marth is still good, but why settle with marth??

 

[Bones0]

Just because Marth seems not the best right now doesn't mean he won't be the best sometime in the future. People will always doubt the underdog characters until they're no longer underdogs. I'm sure plenty of spacie players were advised to pick a different character vs. M2K back when he JV5'd all of them with Marth. lol

 

[Niko45]

^This is very true. I remember when Eggm quit Falco loooooooool.

It's easy for me to back down from that old rant now cause I'm not playing right now and don't have any built up salt. I think realistically he's viable but he is really variable and requires a lot of maintenance to be consistent with.

I dont see why Falco is bad against Peach. At Apex last year PP did better against Armada than Mango's fox did

 

[knightpraetor]

true true; it might shift..but it certainly hasn't been shifting in that direction for a very long time. that and (two) falcos know how to laser now. I don't really think powershielding and eating lasers perfectly at the right spacing is that good of a solution either..and if m2k were still maining marth, then foxes would still be wishing they played someone else. Even as it is they get nervous when he pulls out a character he really plays.

anyway, these kinds of arguments are kind of pointless; everyone has to make their own decision. My decision was to start playing peach falco cause they are the characters that have shown the most potential in the last 3 years. Jiggs Fox and sheik have also done a decent job, but I would say they have more proble matchups, just like marth. More power to them when they do well of course, but even though my vs falco is probably my 2nd best matchup after jiggs, I still think the matchup is in falco's favor, and i don't really want to play a char who has two bad matchups.


Plus, i mostly played marth originally cause i wanted to demonstrate that flawless marth could run circles around the boards that at the time thought fox was some god-level character with no bad matchups. But honestly, these days marths aren't even struggling with foxes that much, except mango. And we never get to see m2k's marth vs mango's fox in tourney, so i doubt anyone will ever know how it is currently at top level play.

and I am not going to say names, but there are quite a few marths here that suck at this game that still managed to take down high level foxes. It's falco and sheik that are knocking marths out these days. Plus, no one believes in peach, so it's fun to play someone I feel is underrated. My conception of tiers is also different because I weight very heavily based on the player base rather than judging all matchups as equally important. peach's problem matchup is practically non-existent and I have more experience vs jiggs than 90% of the players on these boards, so a move to peach is logical for me.

I am debating whether i will learn fox or falco vs jiggs but both are doable. Marth is also doable, but in my opinion a bit harder than fox, while my judgment on falco is out cause falco is too bad to really know.

anyway, to all the aspiring marth players I wish you luck and a grand journey filled with ken combos and reverse fairs, with a touch of reverse up b out of shield to the top platform for old times sake.


anyway that was all boring tier list talk. Real talk, TALES OF GRACES IS THE MOST AMAZING GAME EVER. The combat system is sooo good; the script kind of sucks, but omg the combat is so good. Playing it on first runthrough on Chaos difficulty while underleveled. I keep spending like six hours per boss fight but man is it satisfying. i am kind of particular and don't like to go back to pick up healing bottles (what kind of hero goes back to town to pick up med packs when they are in front of the boss room).

Last night I was playing against bryce and I finally managed to get him down to 16000 hp but ran out of healing bottles and my healer went down. I was so frustrated at the wasted time I went into god mode and starting wrecking him and barely getting touched, but without a healer guarding attacks kept lowering my health and I ended up with him at 10k hp and all my characters within 2-3 guards of death. I was about to give up but then while looking through my inventory I saw this new item, Arcane bottle, that instantly charges your eleth bar. So i deal another 6000 damage and he is almost dead but now i have to play perfectly to have any chance. He comes in swinging, I impact guard the first hit, dodge behind him, impact guard his wide swing, and then i swing, praying that my attack hits (because if he guards it I know I will wipe)....50/50 odds but it hits and the boss goes down. Best feeling in the world.

But yeah, that game is good. give up on melee and play tales of graces. You won't regret your decision

 

[Stylez]

all i see is a marth playing badly, throwing out random grabs, failing to recover properly, failing to reverse gimp fox properly when he misses his attempted shine spike...

i couldn't watch the rest i hate watching marths play well for a stock and then wreck themselves by failing so hard at basics.

Ya, that's why I like it - it has so many bad Marth habits in a short little video. It also showcases how well he can punish fox...if you play it perfectly.

People always say spacies' Achilles heel is how hard they're punished. I just think Marth is punished harder

 

[odinNJ]

marth can be shine killed from zero is fox is on top of his punishing and isnt afraid of the ledge.

that being said, most foxes are afraid of marth turning things around when hes near the edge.
cc grab is dangerous

 

[Niko45]

Tho I don't think sheik is an unwinnable road block for Marth I don't think its his only losing matchup. ICs and Jiggs beat him too imo cause you can't work your grab game efficiently. People argue that you need to zone them but I think so much of his zoning game is set up by the threat of his grab game. Idk, always found those two MUs super hard as well.

 

[knightpraetor]

i don't really believe jiggs beats marth. I don't know where this idea comes from, certainly not tourney results. you don't need a grab game to beat jiggs, just a poke game and spacing out his landings properly. going for grabs is a bad strategy unless they whiff. People also do stupid dashdances when playing against jiggs too much. She's not a fox

i think ICs only beat marth when wobbling is on, but ICs disagree. As i've gotten better (read: as i played ICs for two weeks straight), i have realized it is not that easy to grab marth. Looking back I feel like most of my problems vs ICs were from fear of things they could do without understanding their limitations. Also after i mained ICs for two weeks and maybe 100 hrs of playing them, I easily 3 stocked the IC i was struggling with before. Maybe if I play falco or peach long enough against high level marth I will go back to marth who knows.

Ya, that's why I like it - it has so many bad Marth habits in a short little video. It also showcases how well he can punish fox...if you play it perfectly.

People always say spacies' Achilles heel is how hard they're punished. I just think Marth is punished harder

I guess the video is pretty good for that. I didn't realize that was what you were going for. the chaingrabs were so on point. The neutral game not so much.

edit:
actually PP dashdances vs jiggs quite a bit, though i am not as big of a fan cause it gives up too much stage space on the small stages. Big stages it is really good. Also the risk reward of a good wide stance dash dance is a good bit better when jiggs is at low percent than when she's at high percent. I can't really remember the last time i watched a marth play vs a jiggs without wanting to close my eyes. It's like they don't have any percents memorized at all or any awareness of how to recover. If you want to get good at it you should just watch PP play it, but I don't think he's practiced it since that one night a year ago

 

[ShroudedOne]

Why not just play a character because you like playing them, not because "I'll have more success with them" or something?

How do people not "believe in Peach?" If anything, more people believe in her now, since Armada.

 

[Bones0]

People feel like Peach is a good character, but then they Theory Bros. themselves into thinking she loses to Fox, Falco, Marth, Sheik, Jiggs, and Falcon so they change their mind. Like KP said, people also suck at judging her matchups because she tends to win through attrition. Yes, Amanda can do sick crazy combos on spacies, but most Peaches win with heavy trading and smart shielding. So with all that emphasis on trades people think they are close to beating her, when in reality she's "playing to the stock count" much more than most characters.

That's how it seems to me, at least.

 

[knightpraetor]

everyone seems to think that peach has 4 or 5 bad matchups and that armada is just some god that wins regardless of matchups, not that armada demonstrates peach's real potential.

also, if you put in the time to go to tourneys then you want to be successful. If you just want to play for fun, then why not play the chars you think are fun in friendlies and play the ones that are good in tourney?

edit: marth dittos define fun.

 

[Bones0]

Marth dittos aren't fun until you're good at them. I was playing in a rotation with M2K and Ether on Saturday and felt so lame that I couldn't go Marth because I would have been exposed (and my Falco was already getting exposed pretty hard lol).

 

[ShroudedOne]

Marth dittos are also really hard for some reason. Perhaps they require a weird mindset.

 

[Bones0]

You have to tip everything and DI everything or else you get spazzed on.