Countering (Projectile) Spam - Ultimate

[kinbobbobkin]

I'm sorry (for this very late post) but zoners are suppose to zone people; hence using the projectile to space you out. Not everyone is nor not everyone wants to be a rushdown character. If you think people who use projectiles is cowardly fine, but I feel like you're not going to learn if call it "cowardly".

 

[J.I.L]

I'm sorry (for this very late post) but zoners are suppose to zone people; hence using the projectile to space you out. Not everyone is nor not everyone wants to be a rushdown character. If you think people who use projectiles is cowardly fine, but I feel like you're not going to learn if call it "cowardly".

I've only seen one other campy falco. Most falcos I play against are rush down players.

 

[1FC0]

I've only seen one other campy falco. Most falcos I play against are rush down players.

It seems like a waste to not use his laser, though. It seems like it could really help him in some matchups (Like the FE cast or heavies).

 

[J.I.L]

It seems like a waste to not use his laser, though. It seems like it could really help him in some matchups (Like the FE cast or heavies).

100% agreed. But they only use laser occasionally to stun people so they can just do more combos.

 

[kinbobbobkin]

I've only seen one other campy falco. Most falcos I play against are rush down players.

I don't get what you're trying to say.

 

[Sucumbio]

I prefer rush down strategy myself which is why my main and secondaries are almost all non projectile characters. Using Falco as a rush down character is counterintuitive though because you'd expect his laser traps and zoning to be his strong suit unlike say, Fox who really likes to get in close and uses lasers to punish opponents who run away.

 

[Love Tap]

If they dedicate to camping you, there's nothing you can do, in my experience, unless your opponents projectiles are kind of slow. Zelda, for example, is not really a character that can consistently hard camp puff. One other tip that I haven't seen people mention is that a hitbox can snuff out a lot of projectiles, like Isabelle's sling shot, Ness's PK thunder, etc.

It really depends on how committed they are. Most people kind of get tired of their own game after awhile and say "screw it" and approach. So, one thing you can do if you notice your opponent isn't being methodical and counting your jumps is just play the same game. Camp them. Bob and weave around all their spam and just don't approach until they get annoyed and go in.

Anyways, puff can kind of deal with zelda, can kind of deal Samus and some others but if you're going up against a character like link, a good one, where projectiles are pretty much their entire kit, I'm sorry that's just an L short of some clutch, God like play.

Anyways, if you're looking for a character that doesn't spam projectiles and has enough pressure to break through projectile spam, Wario, Bowser, and the swordsmen come to mind.

 

[1FC0]

Anyways, if you're looking for a character that doesn't spam projectiles and has enough pressure to break through projectile spam,

Fox is pretty good for this too. With his projectile and reflector he can force almost anyone to approach him but at the same time he cannot stop that approach from a distance and thus after forcing the approach he will have to fight up close. It seems to me like Fox is the "anti-projectile spam" character.

 

[stixie]

If they dedicate to camping you, there's nothing you can do, in my experience, unless your opponents projectiles are kind of slow. Zelda, for example, is not really a character that can consistently hard camp puff. One other tip that I haven't seen people mention is that a hitbox can snuff out a lot of projectiles, like Isabelle's sling shot, Ness's PK thunder, etc.

It really depends on how committed they are. Most people kind of get tired of their own game after awhile and say "screw it" and approach. So, one thing you can do if you notice your opponent isn't being methodical and counting your jumps is just play the same game. Camp them. Bob and weave around all their spam and just don't approach until they get annoyed and go in.

Anyways, puff can kind of deal with zelda, can kind of deal Samus and some others but if you're going up against a character like link, a good one, where projectiles are pretty much their entire kit, I'm sorry that's just an L short of some clutch, God like play.

Anyways, if you're looking for a character that doesn't spam projectiles and has enough pressure to break through projectile spam, Wario, Bowser, and the swordsmen come to mind.

I'd love to play your puff with Zelda. Puff is one of her BEST matchups. Phantom and up smash snuff her out HARD. How does she get around Phantom? She's too slow. Also it's incredibly difficult to gimp Zelda offstage as Puff because of her floatiness and teleport recovery. Honestly can't remember the last time I lost to a puff with Zelda.

 

[1FC0]

I'd love to play your puff with Zelda. Puff is one of her BEST matchups. Phantom and up smash snuff her out HARD. How does she get around Phantom? She's too slow. Also it's incredibly difficult to gimp Zelda offstage as Puff because of her floatiness and teleport recovery. Honestly can't remember the last time I lost to a puff with Zelda.

Puff is pretty bad but R.O.B.'s Robo Beam can probably pierce Zelda's Phantom and he can even reflect it with Arm Rotor. So you better watch out when you are facing this superior character!

 

[Love Tap]

I'd love to play your puff with Zelda. Puff is one of her BEST matchups. Phantom and up smash snuff her out HARD. How does she get around Phantom? She's too slow. Also it's incredibly difficult to gimp Zelda offstage as Puff because of her floatiness and teleport recovery. Honestly can't remember the last time I lost to a puff with Zelda.

She can just jump over it. In my experience at least, the only situations in which phantom is particularly threatening is when it's being used to edge guard, or on platforms. If you're just using it to camp, it's not very effective, since puff gets in pretty quickly because of her air speed, and you'll be forced to make a defensive decision, which can be called out.

I didn't say Zelda is easy by any means, I was speaking with in the context of camping, so the "fight me" flex is a bit weird. I'd call the MU even. Speaking as someone that hangs out in the puff discord quite a bit, literally none of us complain or are upset about zelda.

Yoshi on the other hand...

 

[stixie]

Yoshi on the other hand...

Funnily enough Yoshi is one of Zelda's worst matchups as well. I HATE fighting that character.

As far as jumping over phantom, it's not easy if puff is on the ground when zelda starts charging. If puff is already in the air I never charge phantom because it's a waste of time. Honestly though I pretty much hate all the fighters that spend 90% of the match at the top of the screen. It's infuriating.

 

[stixie]

Puff is pretty bad but R.O.B.'s Robo Beam can probably pierce Zelda's Phantom and he can even reflect it with Arm Rotor. So you better watch out when you are facing this superior character!

HAHA!! Yes Rob is an AWFUL AWFUL matchup. Probably Zelda's worst matchup in the entire cast. Yes that stupid laser goes right through phantom.

 

[Silask20]

Puff is pretty bad but R.O.B.'s Robo Beam can probably pierce Zelda's Phantom and he can even reflect it with Arm Rotor. So you better watch out when you are facing this superior character!

Honestly cant stand robs.

 

[MacSmitty]

I will say that as a Terry user, dealing with projectile spam is so annoying. Whenever I have to go up against a Samus or Link I just groan.

 

[LittleGamer]

I will say that as a Terry user, dealing with projectile spam is so annoying. Whenever I have to go up against a Samus or Link I just groan.

Shotos and Terry can have some real trouble against projectiles users, but they have some weapons to deal with it.
You have to be confident with your tools and use the maximum of your character's agility. Firstly, and this apply to most characters, don't forget a projectile can be avoided with several methods : Jumping, shielding, dodging, rolling, parrying (probably the hardest tho), crouching (sometime), hitting, catching (with objects), air-dodging ; these are the tools you got with almost everyone in the cast. Virtually everybody can do it, but some options are less effective with some characters : Jumping with a character that have a low full jump asks for more timing and can be way harder ; on the other hand some characters have options more effective than most of the cast. Snake can pass under many things while crawling.
Before everything, you have to think about all of this when fighting a projectile character. Against mid level or beginners, this will be enough.

Good players will know all of these possibilities, and you'll have to surprise them, varying your methods and follow-ups. Patience will become the most important thing there. As someone said before here, at some point the opponent will lose patience too.

Terry happens to have several way of moving around, with his specials doing some weird movement. This can be used at your advantage in some situational conditions. Maybe using the power dunk and crackshoot can be a way, and forcing the opponent to react with some power waves alongside your movements can also put him in a urge.

Still, with all of this, it's an hard match-up. I'm playing Ness and even with all my projectiles, I don't like facing a Link (I feel more confident against Samus but I might never have played with a very good one). Don't forget these are not so fast characters (except Link when it comes to fast fall), you might need to capitalize on the rare moments you have advantage.

 

[Silask20]

Shotos and Terry can have some real trouble against projectiles users, but they have some weapons to deal with it.
You have to be confident with your tools and use the maximum of your character's agility. Firstly, and this apply to most characters, don't forget a projectile can be avoided with several methods : Jumping, shielding, dodging, rolling, parrying (probably the hardest tho), crouching (sometime), hitting, catching (with objects), air-dodging ; these are the tools you got with almost everyone in the cast. Virtually everybody can do it, but some options are less effective with some characters : Jumping with a character that have a low full jump asks for more timing and can be way harder ; on the other hand some characters have options more effective than most of the cast. Snake can pass under many things while crawling.
Before everything, you have to think about all of this when fighting a projectile character. Against mid level or beginners, this will be enough.

Good players will know all of these possibilities, and you'll have to surprise them, varying your methods and follow-ups. Patience will become the most important thing there. As someone said before here, at some point the opponent will lose patience too.

Terry happens to have several way of moving around, with his specials doing some weird movement. This can be used at your advantage in some situational conditions. Maybe using the power dunk and crackshoot can be a way, and forcing the opponent to react with some power waves alongside your movements can also put him in a urge.

Still, with all of this, it's an hard match-up. I'm playing Ness and even with all my projectiles, I don't like facing a Link (I feel more confident against Samus but I might never have played with a very good one). Don't forget these are not so fast characters (except Link when it comes to fast fall), you might need to capitalize on the rare moments you have advantage.

Ill tell u whats not fair. The terry player has to go through hoops and bounds, refine his reflexes and utilize unorthodox methods to overcome some button mashing spammer and EVEN STILL he may not win.

The spammer is using 1/10th of his brain while terry player goes full steven hawkings mode and still is being given difficulty.

Thats why projectiles need limitations

 

[Superxav12]

When ever I come up against a spammer I just try to find a pattern in how they play and work around it. It can be hard though, especially with lag. Sometimes the Samus vs Ridley Match up is not even worth playing.

 

[LittleGamer]

Ill tell u whats not fair. The terry player has to go through hoops and bounds, refine his reflexes and utilize unorthodox methods to overcome some button mashing spammer and EVEN STILL he may not win.

The spammer is using 1/10th of his brain while terry player goes full steven hawkings mode and still is being given difficulty.

Thats why projectiles need limitations

In the case of a spammer using 1/10th of his brain, it's actually easy to outsmart him. Analyse his patern to find openings. The thing with Terry and the buttons is not really entering in account : a good Toon Link will have to know how to use wave bounce to be more efficient and that's an hard technique too, probably harder than doing Terry's moves (which are honestly not so hard to do for anyone who played another fighting game).

If the opponent is doing a serious work on where he wants to place you with his projectiles, then yes, you are scewed until he does a mistake or unless you are super precise and patient. But once again, by capitalizing on the moments you have advantages, it's not an unwinnable match-up (though being in advantage to most projectiles users). And disadvantageous match-ups are part of any fighting game. Having a secondary might be a solution too (I firmly believe that some characters cannot be fully viable and that you need to have a secondaries for some match-ups if you want to win sets in tourneys, and shotos and Terry are part of the characters that need it in my opinion).

 

[1FC0]

The spammer is using 1/10th of his brain while terry player goes full steven hawkings mode and still is being given difficulty.

The Terry player must be pretty terrible compared to the spammer if the spammer can beat him using only 1/10 of his brain.

 

[Silask20]

The Terry player must be pretty terrible compared to the spammer if the spammer can beat him using only 1/10 of his brain.

Obvious exaggeration however the point stands. If im samus all i have to do is spam projectiles, set up a forced situation and grab/fair and there would really be nothing the terry could do about it unless he has god like spot dodge/DI skills, incredible fast fall timing and knows how to use his abilities in conjunction with weaving through my brain dead spamming, and on top of all that has to find an opening where im vulnerable rae and for what? To do 20% damage? Only to have to do all that over again once i create some distance.

Without a limit on how many projectiles i can use and how often its far far easier for the projectile spammer than the melee based characters.

 

[meleebrawler]

Obvious exaggeration however the point stands. If im samus all i have to do is spam projectiles, set up a forced situation and grab/fair and there would really be nothing the terry could do about it unless he has god like spot dodge/DI skills, incredible fast fall timing and knows how to use his abilities in conjunction with weaving through my brain dead spamming, and on top of all that has to find an opening where im vulnerable rae and for what? To do 20% damage? Only to have to do all that over again once i create some distance.

Without a limit on how many projectiles i can use and how often its far far easier for the projectile spammer than the melee based characters.

What kind of Terry does only 20% damage when they get in?

 

[1FC0]

Obvious exaggeration however the point stands. If im samus all i have to do is spam projectiles, set up a forced situation and grab/fair and there would really be nothing the terry could do about it unless he has god like spot dodge/DI skills, incredible fast fall timing and knows how to use his abilities in conjunction with weaving through my brain dead spamming, and on top of all that has to find an opening where im vulnerable rae and for what? To do 20% damage? Only to have to do all that over again once i create some distance.

Without a limit on how many projectiles i can use and how often its far far easier for the projectile spammer than the melee based characters.

So you want to base game balance solely on Terry's matchups? What makes Terry special?

 

[LittleGamer]

Obvious exaggeration however the point stands. If im samus all i have to do is spam projectiles, set up a forced situation and grab/fair and there would really be nothing the terry could do about it unless he has god like spot dodge/DI skills, incredible fast fall timing and knows how to use his abilities in conjunction with weaving through my brain dead spamming, and on top of all that has to find an opening where im vulnerable rae and for what? To do 20% damage? Only to have to do all that over again once i create some distance.

Without a limit on how many projectiles i can use and how often its far far easier for the projectile spammer than the melee based characters.

As said by Meleebrawler I think you don't get enough of the situations where you are in advantage. And it's not about having god like spot dodge or di skills, it's about varying all the options I listed above and taking advantage of their variety. Just jumping over a projectile is already a good choice in many situation (As a Ness main I can say that it is really efficient against PK Fire as I'm vulnerable after throwing it).
Don't play like a robot, doing the most efficient choice everytime is not actually that efficient, be surprising : not only it's a way to conditionning your opponent but it is also a good way to make him do a mistake or lose advantage. Even further, don't let him take advantage, harass him with hits and combos, play super agressively if you need. There are ways to surpass the projectiles, especially since most of them are not fast enough to keep you away without any chance of going to your opponent (particularly with Samus).

Also, some skills are not about inputs and strategy. Patience is really useful against this kind of adversary.

 

[Silask20]

So you want to base game balance solely on Terry's matchups? What makes Terry special?

Goes for terry, DK, bowser, little mac any of the more melee face to face based characters. I do believe they take alot more skill than spamus for example, or even my secondary main, krool whos pretty easy to play overall because projectiles at the end of the day make life alot easier

 

[Sucumbio]

Samus may have lots of projectile options but they're all weak hitting except for charge shot which is kinda obvious when it's coming. Getting around samus as a Marth / Ike user was originally very difficult but adapting has led to the match up being more balanced.

Terry, like mac, hits HARD, and he has an interesting projectile of his own to force some approaches, and his insane comeback mechanic. Yeah I don't feel too bad for Terry right now. Maybe as the meta progresses we'll learn that he's trash (I doubt he is though).

 

[1FC0]

Goes for terry, DK, bowser, little mac any of the more melee face to face based characters. I do believe they take alot more skill than spamus for example, or even my secondary main, krool whos pretty easy to play overall because projectiles at the end of the day make life alot easier

I doubt projectiles make it that easy. Projectiles require mindgaming just like everything else and considering the fact that projectile users do not dominate tournaments, apparently those mindgames are not heavily in favour of the projectile users.

And then there are also projectile users like R.O.B. who are actually weak to rushdown. If projectiles get globally nerfed again than R.O.B.'s matchup against rushdown is going to get even worse. You might not enjoy projectile users but that is IMO not a good reason to have them nerfed to the point of them becoming nonviable.

Though projectiles do tend to require less practice. Projectiles often make you play against your opponent and not against the game. E.g. with Ice Climbers you play against the game for a large part. Desynching requires skill but the amount of skill it requires is determined by the game and not by the opponent. So an Ice Climber who's trying to desynch is for a large part playing against the game. When using proectiles the playing-against-the-game part is skipped entirely and how effective someone's projectiles are depends almost entirely on how their skills stack up to the opponent. This makes using projectiles succesfully often as difficult as one's opponent can make it instead of having the game add a fixed amount of challenge to it.

I think that is what makes projectiles seem unfair even though really they're not since they still require the projectile user to outplay the opponent.

 

[Starssb]

How do I beat Greninja down b when I hit them. I play young link and like to shoot arrows and when I hit greninja, he does counter. How do I deal with this

 

[1FC0]

How do I beat Greninja down b when I hit them. I play young link and like to shoot arrows and when I hit greninja, he does counter. How do I deal with this

Substitute does not protect against grabs and it has some cooldown lag which you can punish with regular attacks as well. Either way you'll probably need to outmindgame him.

If he's very predictable with his counter then you could just charge a Smash and keep charging it while he counters and then release it when he's in cool-down lag. Though if he's less predictable then it might be better to go for a safer punish such as trying to grab him or delaying a safer attack.

 

[Starssb]

Substitute does not protect against grabs and it has some cooldown lag which you can punish with regular attacks as well. Either way you'll probably need to outmindgame him.

If he's very predictable with his counter then you could just charge a Smash and keep charging it while he counters and then release it when he's in cool-down lag. Though if he's less predictable then it might be better to go for a safer punish such as trying to grab him or delaying a safer attack.

Also, when do I know if he is in cooldown lag?

 

[1FC0]

Not sure. Many counters seem to flash when they're active but I'm not sure Substitute does that. If not then you should just learn it's timing.