Comboing fast-fallers

[Foo]

My biggest bane against spacies has been my complete and utter inability to combo them. It seems that almost every single move just knocks fast fallers over. The only moves I've found that knock them up enough to start a combo of any sort is grab, side-b, uptilt, downsmash and backwards forward smash. Needless to say, none of these moves are nearly safe enough to to be bread and butter (especially since two of those can just be crouch canceled and one isn't viable at all). Is there anything I'm missing? As of right now, I'm pretty much limited to spacing back air, reading my opponents jumps and just trying to get them off stage for a gimp any way I can.

 

[ph00tbag]

Tech chase.

One set-up that I like that works more into the mid percents is timing a SHFFL nair to punish missed techs, then reacting to the tech if they don't miss. Utilt beats techs in place, dash attack beats sideways techs. You can probably also use early nairs in place of dash attack.

Figure out some other tech traps, and means of manipulating your opponent on wake-up. Wait until the later percents to focus on the combos.

 

[Daftatt]

Yeah, tech chases are your best option. Learning to D-smash out of run is really useful for this. Personally I find spacies too much to handle with ZSS so I go squirtle or marth. But holy crap she so good against capt falcon.

 

[Foo]

That's what I was afraid of. I do know how to crouch cancel dsmash out of run, and it is my favored tech chase, but it is too inconsistent to make the matchup bearable. Looks like I need to git gud with Roy and ravage my opponents with teh phyre.

 

[ph00tbag]

Or you could learn how to tech chase because it's pretty much important with everyone.

 

[Foo]

Or you could learn how to tech chase because it's pretty much important with everyone.

I know how to tech chase, it's just inherently worse than comboing. I understand it's a very valuable and important skill, but no one can tech chase 100% of the time. However, if I land a nair on a floatier character (within reasonable %), I can land nair 100% of the time off of it, and probably more afterwards. If my only follow up is tech chase, I feel like I have to play much much better to win against spacies. In normal matchups, landing a solid hit leads to guaranteed follow up that usually winds up sending them off stage (unless I mess up, not uncommon). If I land a solid hit on a spacy, I have a 33% chance of getting a solid follow up unless I want to punish with dash attack, which lets me cover two options if I react perfectly. If I read my opponents techs, I can increase the odds, but reading them consistently means I have to outplay them.

The spacie matchup is just bad bad bad.

(Roy is better at techchasing anyway, imo)

 

[ph00tbag]

I'm not talking about reads, though. I'm talking about utilizing the reduced options a teching character has in order keep an opponent locked down, and even guarantee follow-ups. In many ways, some tech traps are better than combos in their follow-up potential. Rather than give up, you could explore ways to use ZSS's mobility to find guaranteed stuff on knockdown.

And that nair > dash attack trap I told you about does not require perfect reaction, by any stretch. I can do it, and I have terrible reaction times.

 

[Foo]

I'm not talking about reads, though. I'm talking about utilizing the reduced options a teching character has in order keep an opponent locked down, and even guarantee follow-ups. In many ways, some tech traps are better than combos in their follow-up potential. Rather than give up, you could explore ways to use ZSS's mobility to find guaranteed stuff on knockdown.

And that nair > dash attack trap I told you about does not require perfect reaction, by any stretch. I can do it, and I have terrible reaction times.

Against spacies, nair and dash attack have almost no difference, but I guess nair is a little better because it's less laggy. However, if you dash towards them and they roll the other way, it's easier to dash the other way and dash attack. Also, the timing being "perfect' is a slight exaggeration, but I am referring to tech chases where the opponent is far away from you, which is generally the case if I nair or bair them.

EDIT: Roy has to tech chase against spacies too, and it's really easy to set up for them as roy. It's just I also have the ability to combo them like crazy, which means one solid hit leads to a TON of damage and or a stock rather than stage just setting up advantage.

EDIT 2: Also,the zss vs fast faller matchups aren't really fun. Landing combos is probably my favorite part of this game.

 

[CrypticJav]

Try dash attack to down tilt. Then SHFFL nair. That usually works on almost every character at low percents.

 

[Ouroboro]

Learning to pivot down smash or dtilt out of your dash animation helps me alot with tech chasing. Dashing forward I can either downsmash/dtilt a tech away, or pivot and dsmash/ dtilt a tech in place. Also, i find dtilt to be amazingly useful against fast fallers. Nair\dtilt tech chase or even a down smash can get things rolling.

 

[MLSword]

Against spacies, nair and dash attack have almost no difference, but I guess nair is a little better because it's less laggy. However, if you dash towards them and they roll the other way, it's easier to dash the other way and dash attack. Also, the timing being "perfect' is a slight exaggeration, but I am referring to tech chases where the opponent is far away from you, which is generally the case if I nair or bair them.

EDIT: Roy has to tech chase against spacies too, and it's really easy to set up for them as roy. It's just I also have the ability to combo them like crazy, which means one solid hit leads to a TON of damage and or a stock rather than stage just setting up advantage.

EDIT 2: Also,the zss vs fast faller matchups aren't really fun. Landing combos is probably my favorite part of this game.

Well Foo... So what you are telling me is instead of Marth I need to go Falco vs you

 

[Foo]

Well Foo... So what you are telling me is instead of Marth I need to go Falco vs you

Falco's not that bad because he's so easy for ZSS to gimp. It's mostly wolf and fox

 

[MLSword]

Falco's not that bad because he's so easy for ZSS to gimp. It's mostly wolf and fox

TBH tho I would feel more confident in the neutral vs ZSS with Falco than any other character as we all know how Falco's neutral is As long as you can control your Falco well and not put yourself in a position to be offstage, I feel like Falco slightly beats ZSS, and tbh I am tired of losing with Marth XD But in PM I actually am considering using Fox and Falco more, as I feel like Marth just can't really stack up to other characters in PM. I mean he is still ok, but just not the force to be reckoned with like how he was in Melee

 

[Thane of Blue Flames]

TBH tho I would feel more confident in the neutral vs ZSS with Falco than any other character as we all know how Falco's neutral is As long as you can control your Falco well and not put yourself in a position to be offstage, I feel like Falco slightly beats ZSS, and tbh I am tired of losing with Marth XD But in PM I actually am considering using Fox and Falco more, as I feel like Marth just can't really stack up to other characters in PM. I mean he is still ok, but just not the force to be reckoned with like how he was in Melee

Give it 24 hours.

 

[MLSword]

Give it 24 hours.

? Don't understand.

 

[Foo]

? Don't understand.

3.5 coming out today.

 

[MLSword]

3.5 coming out today.

OHHHHHHHHHH XD Can't wait for the new Marth costumes, and I hope they buffed him, or maybe they nerfed some of the chars. that make up some of his harder MU's.

 

[ThreeSided]

So, in a tech chase, how useful could side-b be? I can't help but feel that it could cover multiple options at once, but then the hitbox might not stay out long enough to do what I'm thinking about it doing.

 

[Foo]

So, in a tech chase, how useful could side-b be? I can't help but feel that it could cover multiple options at once, but then the hitbox might not stay out long enough to do what I'm thinking about it doing.

Not exceptionally good. IF you guess right and time it perfectly, it's great, ,but if you miss your opponent can punish you with anything faster than falcon punch.

@ ph00tbag (Below me) You can't really cover tech in place because crouch cancel beats weak side-b at almost litterally any %

 

[ph00tbag]

On some characters, you could probably cover tech in place and tech away, if you timed it right. You'd have to be sure your set-up timing was solid, though.