Flames of Pherae: The Roy Video Thread

[TFerg]

Hey fellas, this is a mm with me vs #2 (really tied with df tbh) in our state. I feel that I really had extremely poor recoveries overall, and didn't properly save my double jump a lot of the time. Basically I'm looking for intermediate advice in the neutral game here, and also potentially conversions that you didn't see me optimally take advantage of (such as spot dodges)

*sorry for the obnoxious behavior lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JP_UoCnxoE

 

[TFerg]

Sup all. Haven't asked for a video critique in abssolute ages, so this should be fun!
I'm a SoCal Roy, maining him since v3.0 came out last January. A few weeks back I had the pleasure of attending a fest hosted by @AznGamer405 and played a bunch of games on stream - I'm hoping to get some insights on what I'm doing correctly, what I'm missing, and how I can improve in both the short and long term.

Links:

Vs. Crux (Zelda) - PS2
Vs. Crux (Zelda) - BF
Vs. Lobo (DK) - Green Hill
Vs. Lobo (DK) - Norfair
Vs. Lobo (DK) - Skyworld

Shoutouts to Lobo and Crux - two incredible players who are, in my eyes, the best players of their characters in our region. Glad I was able to keep up in my games versus them, however, I know I have a very long way to go. Some areas of focus that I'd like to work on:
-Maximizing punishes off of grabs
-Effective space/air control
-Heightened neutral game awareness (conditioning the opponent, responding reactively)

So with that, thanks in advance all!

I don't know if I'm qualified for this or whatever but I think some basic things to consider:

-In your Zelda games, there were often times when she would teleport in an unsafe manner, and you would rush to get the punish as soon as possible instead of waiting for a free f smash etc. Waiting against Zelda overall is really useful, especially if you can dd between the zone of her din's and her personal zone. Her moves are generally quite an investment, but they're kinda trappy at the same time. So while your uses of WD oOs were solid, there were many times when you were simply stuck in the WD animations and accidentally getting punished. Also a really strong combo on zelda that you missed a few times is fthrow>fthrow>dash attack>up air or nair. A really solid conversion that is also quite simple.

Against DK, there were multiple times in each game where you would simply approach extremely unsafe. Such as running in and fairing a DK shield. This got you grabbed a lot, which is the opposite of what you want vs DK. It also seemed you were getting dash dance grabbed by him a lot as well. Essentially your major focus of this matchup is to:
1. Not get grabbed
2. tech chase like a beast

DK's tech options are fairly slow, so it's really easy to follow them for long conversions. If you're too hasty with your combos though, you miss opportunities and just end up wildly going for reads instead of reacting. I think tech chasing in general is something you may like to practice, (I'm still kinda poor at it myself), and just conversions in general. DK has long reach and combos roy well, but Roy is extremely fast and also combos extremely well. In order to achieve this though, you simply need to be more grounded and "dance" with DK, instead of throwing out flurries of aerials because you can. I thought your options from the ledge and overall movement were solid, but you really needed to be using less fairs and aerials in general (although admittedly, nair is quite good vs DK.)


I think your DK player was a little better, but I got some decent conversions on DK in this game that may give you an idea.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tNqXJFePhw#t=339

 

[Smolder]

Hey fellas, this is a mm with me vs #2 (really tied with df tbh) in our state. I feel that I really had extremely poor recoveries overall, and didn't properly save my double jump a lot of the time. Basically I'm looking for intermediate advice in the neutral game here, and also potentially conversions that you didn't see me optimally take advantage of (such as spot dodges)

*sorry for the obnoxious behavior lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JP_UoCnxoE

So I don't exactly have any advice for you at this moment because I am way too tired to do any analysis, but.

...

YOOOOO THAT FULLY CHARGED FLAREBLADE HYPE FOLLOWED BY A NASTY COMBO MADE ME WANT FLY DOWN TO LOUISIANA AND GIVE YOU THE HIGHEST OF FIVES.

EDIT: One thing I did catch, though: When you come off a platform towards an opponent, you tend to throw out a fair. This, if I recall correctly, was working heavily in your favor early on, but once he got the adaptation, you were getting punished for it fairly consistently. Platform drop fair or run off fair is a great tactic when your opponent doesn't know about it. If they do know about it, you either have to space it so that you only hit with the tip or just not do it at all. I had a bad habit of doing this a lot, so I know how hard it can be to break seeing as you get some amazing conversions off of it.

 

[TFerg]

So I don't exactly have any advice for you at this moment because I am way too tired to do any analysis, but.

...

YOOOOO THAT FULLY CHARGED FLAREBLADE HYPE FOLLOWED BY A NASTY COMBO MADE ME WANT FLY DOWN TO LOUISIANA AND GIVE YOU THE HIGHEST OF FIVES.

EDIT: One thing I did catch, though: When you come off a platform towards an opponent, you tend to throw out a fair. This, if I recall correctly, was working heavily in your favor early on, but once he got the adaptation, you were getting punished for it fairly consistently. Platform drop fair or run off fair is a great tactic when your opponent doesn't know about it. If they do know about it, you either have to space it so that you only hit with the tip or just not do it at all. I had a bad habit of doing this a lot, so I know how hard it can be to break seeing as you get some amazing conversions off of it.

Thanks! That is good advice and it is undeniably a movement auto-piloting bad habit of mine. The best players tend to pick up on it really quick, I'll have to start making my own adjustments into like empty landing grabs or just wd back for reads etc.

 

[InfamousLuffy]

I need help with my Roy, heres a video.

 

[Taytertot]

I need help with my Roy, heres a video.

Was your connection in this match really laggy? because if not then there were several times where the marth player got behind you and you just stood there. I also didnt notice any DI when marth was comboing you. Correct me if im wrong but i dont think marth should be able to chain 3 fthrows together on roy. You also made the assumption that marth would run in from across almost the whole stage into your sideb. Id say work on trying to control space and cut off spacial options rather then trying to make big reads. the thing with roy is that while he has a great combo game he doesnt have the ability to be super successful by throwing out attacks completely raw. He has to have an opportunity to punish and they way that he gets that opportunity is by cutting off space until the other player makes a mistake that roy can punish (generally punishing with dtilt). Because roy has good range he can cut off space just by his presence without needing to throw out a move because the other player knows that if they move into roys space he can punish them so most other characters have to respect that space roy controls. If the dash dance back you should move forward to take the space they gave up and always be ready for them with dtilt or a quick aerial if the enter your space.

I also noticed that you would dash dance without being ready with anything when his marth came at you. I also cant stress enough that you cant just throw out fsmashes hoping that your opponent will simply run into them. I hope this helps and i hope that others will touch on things that i missed.

 

[Smolder]

Okay guys. I have a set for everyone to review. I wasn't playing well at all this tourney, but I believe having something for you guys to help me with is better than nothing. On this note: please don't call out the obvious. >.< (I.E mis-spaced fairs and nairs as well as teching away and in place instead of teching towards the Wario.) Anyways, go ahead and help me out! Gonna be aiming for top 8 at the next tourney, so any help would be appreciated! http://www.twitch.tv/morris1605/b/627912846?t=23m20s
EDIT: Oh yeah, the quality isn't all that great, so there will be moments where the frames drop heavily and there's a bit of graininess in the video quality.

 

[Taytertot]

Okay guys. I have a set for everyone to review. I wasn't playing well at all this tourney, but I believe having something for you guys to help me with is better than nothing. On this note: please don't call out the obvious. >.< (I.E mis-spaced fairs and nairs as well as teching away and in place instead of teching towards the Wario.) Anyways, go ahead and help me out! Gonna be aiming for top 8 at the next tourney, so any help would be appreciated! http://www.twitch.tv/morris1605/b/627912846?t=23m20s
EDIT: Oh yeah, the quality isn't all that great, so there will be moments where the frames drop heavily and there's a bit of graininess in the video quality.

I didnt have time watch all of it but some things i like to point out is that wario gets a lot out of baiting other characters from the air because his aerial mobility is so good that he can dodge just about anything in the same way that many other characters can bait and dodge an attack with dash dancing, so if you werent already aware of that then I'd suggest being very patient when trying to anti-air him. Im unsure of whether or not wario has any options to handle someone who commits hard to meeting him in the air with an aerial that outranges him other then to read that ahead of time. Basically, if the wario autopilots when hopping in to bait and always jumps in and then moves back in hopes that you'll throw something out to punish or to just repeat if you dont then maybe jumping at him with a quick fair that is pretty close to him so he cant avoid it, but again if the wario knows your going to do that then he can simply try to throw out an attack first without pulling back in the air. (I hope my explanation made sense).

If you havent already seen them, then id recommend check out sethlon's videos against strong bad's wario because strong bad has been at a few IaB's lately, which may give you some ideas.

Again, if this stuff is all already known to you then i'll have to watch more when i have time and try to give you more feedback (i'll try to do that regardless).

 

[Smolder]

I didnt have time watch all of it but some things i like to point out is that wario gets a lot out of baiting other characters from the air because his aerial mobility is so good that he can dodge just about anything in the same way that many other characters can bait and dodge an attack with dash dancing, so if you werent already aware of that then I'd suggest being very patient when trying to anti-air him. Im unsure of whether or not wario has any options to handle someone who commits hard to meeting him in the air with an aerial that outranges him other then to read that ahead of time. Basically, if the wario autopilots when hopping in to bait and always jumps in and then moves back in hopes that you'll throw something out to punish or to just repeat if you dont then maybe jumping at him with a quick fair that is pretty close to him so he cant avoid it, but again if the wario knows your going to do that then he can simply try to throw out an attack first without pulling back in the air. (I hope my explanation made sense).

If you havent already seen them, then id recommend check out sethlon's videos against strong bad's wario because strong bad has been at a few IaB's lately, which may give you some ideas.

Again, if this stuff is all already known to you then i'll have to watch more when i have time and try to give you more feedback (i'll try to do that regardless).

Ah, I see now. So his aerial mobility works similar to that of Jigg's. I'll keep that in mind for future matches. Now, the next question would be how would I go about countering his baits? Is there any way to actually punish his baits or do I just have to let the neutral game play out and hope I get the first hit? Your stuffing idea sounds like a pretty good idea. Maybe I'll give that a try out. I noticed that when he comes down with an aerial, he tends to prefer either throwing out a quick dtilt or jab or even just shield. Maybe I can make it look like I'm going to punish him with an aerial and instead do an empty jump into grab. Hmm. Thanks for the info! If you have any more, it would be much appreciated. =)

 

[Broccoli]

Hey fellas, this is a mm with me vs #2 (really tied with df tbh) in our state. I feel that I really had extremely poor recoveries overall, and didn't properly save my double jump a lot of the time. Basically I'm looking for intermediate advice in the neutral game here, and also potentially conversions that you didn't see me optimally take advantage of (such as spot dodges)

*sorry for the obnoxious behavior lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JP_UoCnxoE

One thing I did notice. 2 ledgehops > ledgedash > dtilt EVERY.SINGLE.TIME!

And another thing. At 12:36, just before you lost, you got the dtilt and then you dair spiked him? Why not bair and send him off the ledge, put the pressure on.

The second one is rather specific, but there were a few times that you opted to continue a combo where you could have gotten him off the ledge instead.

Do note, that I don't use bair nearly as much as I should lol.

 

[Taytertot]

Ah, I see now. So his aerial mobility works similar to that of Jigg's. I'll keep that in mind for future matches. Now, the next question would be how would I go about countering his baits? Is there any way to actually punish his baits or do I just have to let the neutral game play out and hope I get the first hit? Your stuffing idea sounds like a pretty good idea. Maybe I'll give that a try out. I noticed that when he comes down with an aerial, he tends to prefer either throwing out a quick dtilt or jab or even just shield. Maybe I can make it look like I'm going to punish him with an aerial and instead do an empty jump into grab. Hmm. Thanks for the info! If you have any more, it would be much appreciated. =)

Well unfortunately, my internet connection is somehow too slow to watch the video without it lagging every few seconds (comcast for the win). I did however catch some of it and noticed that you teched away from wario at one point and got hit with the side B for it. I dont know if you did that accidentally or didnt see the side B coming or dont know much about wario's sideB but in case you dont know about it, its one of few moves that does more damage the longer wario travels (i.e. teching away from it is going to make it much more powerful when it hits).

As far as the whole air bait thing goes, my assumption is that wario has several options after jumping toward you. He can go right in with a fair, nair, uair or above you and dair (all of which i imagine can be blocked and punished with something quick). He can make it an empty hop, land and grab you (which you could counter with a quick move or wavedash back and punish). He can try to bait out an option and pull back (because all of his aerials have short range and your roy) and then punish you if you take the bait (which you could either wavedash back and just wait to see what he does or meet him in the air with a quick fair or uair, which i cant imagine he has an option for, though i might be wrong). Or he can hop in and pull back to land safely away just to see how you'll react which does nothing really. Im uncertain if this is all true because i dont know wario that well, but i think it is.

 

[TFerg]

One thing I did notice. 2 ledgehops > ledgedash > dtilt EVERY.SINGLE.TIME!

And another thing. At 12:36, just before you lost, you got the dtilt and then you dair spiked him? Why not bair and send him off the ledge, put the pressure on.

The second one is rather specific, but there were a few times that you opted to continue a combo where you could have gotten him off the ledge instead.

Do note, that I don't use bair nearly as much as I should lol.

Ledgedash is so addicting because it's SOOOOO GOOOD. That being said that's good feedback, I've actually started mixing up my ledge options a lot more now.

The dair at that point was definitely not optimal I agree. Even more so, my followup afterwards was super unsafe and sloppy LOL. Basically cost me that game along with my early double jumps. I was proud of my followups in game 2 but that's also probably one of the best stages for me in the matchup.

 

[Smolder]

Ledgedash is so addicting because it's SOOOOO GOOOD. That being said that's good feedback, I've actually started mixing up my ledge options a lot more now.

The dair at that point was definitely not optimal I agree. Even more so, my followup afterwards was super unsafe and sloppy LOL. Basically cost me that game along with my early double jumps. I was proud of my followups in game 2 but that's also probably one of the best stages for me in the matchup.

Actually ledgedash is good enough to where you don't need any other option. The few things you do need to learn, though, is to:
1) Mix up your options out of ledgedash.
2) Try not to regrab the ledge into a ledge dash.

My first piece of advice is pretty obvious because if you keep going for the same option out of ledgedash, you will eventually get punished for it. (Much like platform drop options) This is why you need to go for different options like grab out of ledgedash, fsmash out of ledgedash, or even just keep running and reset to neutral out of ledgedash.

My second piece of advice is a little bit less obvious, but my reasoning is that if you can learn grab ledge out of anything (wavedash, up-B, Side-B, etc.) and then instantly ledgedash, you can usually catch your opponent off-guard. Most people aren't used to that kind of speed, so you can get a plethora of punishes out of it. However, learning to do this is ... very painful. You will SD many times before you can train your hands to be that quick on the draw. Plus, if you are able to do it the moment you grab the ledge, then chances are you will be able to do it any time. The only times I prefer to go for the regrab ledgedash is when my opponent has invincibility and I want to wear it down, or my opponent is off stage and I want to keep refreshing invincibility.

 

[Eagle Smash]

ES| Doppelganger:

1 match vs Wulf's Wolf : http://www.twitch.tv/eaglesmash/c/6300727

1 match vs Garr's Mewtwo : http://www.twitch.tv/eaglesmash/c/6300819

Please make jokes about how bad these players are and then crticize me for not burning these two guys in particular even worse than I did. Dropping easy 4-stocks. : /

 

[Smolder]

http://www.twitch.tv/stockcancelgaming/v/5116831?t=0h28m11s There was spaghetti everywhere in this match. Regardless, I think it would be nice to get some outside critique on it. What do my fellow Roys think about this match? It was an exhibition match to see whether I or Zinth (I think he's OK's second best Marth) made it out of pools and into bracket. Personally, I don't think this match is a good representation of Zinth's or my skill level, but I'm just glad I squeaked out the win.

 

[Taytertot]

http://www.twitch.tv/stockcancelgaming/v/5116831?t=0h28m11s There was spaghetti everywhere in this match. Regardless, I think it would be nice to get some outside critique on it. What do my fellow Roys think about this match? It was an exhibition match to see whether I or Zinth (I think he's OK's second best Marth) made it out of pools and into bracket. Personally, I don't think this match is a good representation of Zinth's or my skill level, but I'm just glad I squeaked out the win.

You seemed pretty solid that match. There were a few situations where he kinda gave you stage control with his DDing and i saw you DD in and then SH into an aerial and I think in some of those situations it would have been better for you to have DD in and then just crouched waiting for an opportunity to dtilt because you were using dtilt really well when you had the advantage but i didnt see it working for you nearly as much in neutral and its a powerful tool in neutral, so id say work that into your game more (though maybe you usually do that more and it just didnt happen that much for that particular match.)
The other thing i noticed you do was when you hit him offstage and he was going to be able to recover you were just kinda DDing around the stage and WD instead of threatening his recovery options. It seemed like you were trying to be unpredictable but i think in that situation its always going to be better for you if you give yourself time to really setup your microspacing and just hang around there (not to say that you shouldnt be moving at all but that you should be sticking close to the ledge) so that your giving yourself more time to cover his options as he gets closer and is forced to commit to a specific recovery option. If you had then i think a lot more of your edgeguards in that match would have given you a stock lead. Again, maybe you where just playing a little off and usually do that. Im just pointing out stuff based on what I saw in that match.

 

[Smolder]

You seemed pretty solid that match. There were a few situations where he kinda gave you stage control with his DDing and i saw you DD in and then SH into an aerial and I think in some of those situations it would have been better for you to have DD in and then just crouched waiting for an opportunity to dtilt because you were using dtilt really well when you had the advantage but i didnt see it working for you nearly as much in neutral and its a powerful tool in neutral, so id say work that into your game more (though maybe you usually do that more and it just didnt happen that much for that particular match.)
The other thing i noticed you do was when you hit him offstage and he was going to be able to recover you were just kinda DDing around the stage and WD instead of threatening his recovery options. It seemed like you were trying to be unpredictable but i think in that situation its always going to be better for you if you give yourself time to really setup your microspacing and just hang around there (not to say that you shouldnt be moving at all but that you should be sticking close to the ledge) so that your giving yourself more time to cover his options as he gets closer and is forced to commit to a specific recovery option. If you had then i think a lot more of your edgeguards in that match would have given you a stock lead. Again, maybe you where just playing a little off and usually do that. Im just pointing out stuff based on what I saw in that match.

Yeah, after watching the video, I noticed that I wasn't going for raw dtilts very much. I don't know why I was preferring aerial approaches during that particular game. As for the "DDing by ledge" comment you made, you are very correct. For some odd reason, during a tournament set, I tend to respect my opponents recovery too much. I think it's because I try to play too safe rather than going for that slight risk for a big reward. I probably should have opted to just grab the ledge and see what he does.

Thanks for the information, man. I think my neutral leaves a lot to be desired right now, so that's the first quality of my play style that I will be fine-tuning. My next match will probably be posted at the end of May. That upcoming set will probably tell me exactly how much of my neutral I have fixed and I'll definitely share it with this thread again to get yours, as well as others' opinions.

 

[Taytertot]

Yeah, after watching the video, I noticed that I wasn't going for raw dtilts very much. I don't know why I was preferring aerial approaches during that particular game. As for the "DDing by ledge" comment you made, you are very correct. For some odd reason, during a tournament set, I tend to respect my opponents recovery too much. I think it's because I try to play too safe rather than going for that slight risk for a big reward. I probably should have opted to just grab the ledge and see what he does.

Thanks for the information, man. I think my neutral leaves a lot to be desired right now, so that's the first quality of my play style that I will be fine-tuning. My next match will probably be posted at the end of May. That upcoming set will probably tell me exactly how much of my neutral I have fixed and I'll definitely share it with this thread again to get yours, as well as others' opinions.

Im glad i could help. You can threaten youre opponents recovery more without being unsafe depending on where you are. I tend to crouch far enough away from the ledge so that a dtilt would just barely poke my opponent once they get up from the ledge so that i can cover regular getup, ledge attack, ledge roll if i turn around and (assuming that my reaction time is on point) ledge dash. and if my opponent tries to ledge jump theyre in a bad spot and i can, in most cases, easily punish with uair, fair or nair depending on positioning. Its a pretty good way to cover all the bases without being in very much danger though its not always as easy to cover all those options in practice as it is in theory and it can get predictable if you space that way every time.

 

[Smolder]

Hey, guys. It's me again. Could I please get some analysis from my fellow Roy mains? This match is a little cut off. The very beginning is at the end of the thirty-minute video before this one if you want to see it. (That video also contains me shield-breaking then doing a fully-charged flareblade on someone. Jus' Sayin') Any analysis would be welcomed! =)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHmWQbvJ-gw

 

[Taytertot]

Hey, guys. It's me again. Could I please get some analysis from my fellow Roy mains? This match is a little cut off. The very beginning is at the end of the thirty-minute video before this one if you want to see it. (That video also contains me shield-breaking then doing a fully-charged flareblade on someone. Jus' Sayin') Any analysis would be welcomed! =)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHmWQbvJ-gw

i noticed at the very beginning of the video you got a dtilt on the marth player which knocked him up on the platform and then you returned to DDing and WDing. While you did end up getting the read with that usmash, you gave him the room to reset to neutral when you could have pressed your advantage by going under the platform he was on with a SH uair a cutting off a lot of his options, which would most likely force him to have to play more risky and give you more free damage.
shortly after, you get a grab, fthrow into dash attack and then get a fair which sends him across the stage onto the opposite platform and then you go for a dacus it looks like but miss. The dacus isnt bad but i feel again, that you'd be better off doing run up SH uair pressure while marth is on a platform instead of dacus or usmash because uair has better follow ups. alternatively, i think jumping up to be at the platform level and doing nair would also be a better option then dacus because it covers all tech options on the platform.
at about 1:20 the marth goess for a super risky counter while returning to the stage and you pause a moment and dsmash. fsmash would have put him in a worse position even if he was prepared with the correct DI and possibly taken the stock.
Also just a side note, with good timing you can catch marth during his upB recovery with the tip back end of dair which is a pretty good way to get a gimp/set up an easy edgehog (Edit: just watched you finish the match with tipper dair).
I dont see you use nair much. its a really great tech coverage option, one of roys very few multihit options and is great at boxing people out when youve got them near the ledge since it covers most grounded options they might try and aerial options depending on your timing.

All that being said your roy's really good and im very jealous of your tech skill and movement. Hope my advice helps.

 

[thechosenjuan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8BMv1fFDSM
Here's a set of me against the 3rd ranked player in the state.
Some feedback would be appreciated.

 

[Smolder]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8BMv1fFDSM
Here's a set of me against the 3rd ranked player in the state.
Some feedback would be appreciated.

So I'm pretty tired right now, so take my advice with a grain of salt: I'll just list off the stuff as it comes up in the video.

1.) I noticed that you would try to go with the tech trap off dtilt to cover the tech in place followed by a regrab if they chose to tech inwards. This tech trap, while useful against most of the cast, is not useful against Fox due to his relatively fast-ending tech roll. Instead, I would suggest going for dtilit to cover the tech in place, and if they tech inwards, follow up with a DED. This puts them in a bad position of having to shield the DED and either roll out or look for an opportunity to shield DI is inwards and buffer a shine OoS. Luckily enough for all of us, not many Foxes know of the second option.

2.) This one is obvious and you probably noticed it while watching the video yourself, but you're messing up the DI on Fox's up throw. I can understand why, though. The Fox wasn't even bothering to pummel. This is why you just need to keep an eye on what the Fox is doing and if you throw out a move that is a little too laggy or you put yourself in a situation where you've been grabbed before, just buffer your DI in the direction where the Fox isn't facing. This will make sure that, when he gets the grab, he at least won't be 100% guaranteed a followup.

3.) It seems like you were messing up some combos on the Fox. This could have been tournament nerves, though. Fox is an amazing combo weight for Roy if you know the right combo paths. For example, dtilt knocks them into tumble, but if you SH early-fair, you can knock them out of tumble and force them to land (laggily?) to which you can get a grab into an uthrow into either a chain grab or whatever your want.

4.) SDI the uair. If you had SDI'd the uair in both matches, you would have had a chance to win.

5.) You're using a lot of platform drop aerials. Although Roy's platform drop aerial game is amazing and doesn't get as much praise as it should, it can become predictable. If you're constantly coming down with platform drop aerials, the options that the Fox (and many other characters) has is to either shield it and get a grab or CC it can get just about anything. Your other options include doing an empty-land grab, empty-land ditlt, or you can just empty-land and re-assume stage positioning. Sometimes having better positioning is more advantageous than going for that possible followup that a platform drop aerial provides.
EDIT: This is a problem that I have as well. You may see it in some videos I'm posting in a moment.

Overall; you have a great tech trap game and your spacing is far better than mine. You've really come a long way, man. Keep up the good work and that Fox won't have a chance.

 

[Smolder]

Ok guys. I have some videos for my fellow Roy mains to look at and critique. Choose any of the following:
Vs Dyl's Link (Second best in state. He's actually a Luigi main) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ox-WndkM-IQ&index=1&list=PLzRHR2a6K1uqN3VawCftDUXUxZEMQPNXn
Vs Gnosis' Fox (First in state. Winner's Finals) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FHk-88gs7c&index=2&list=PLzRHR2a6K1uqN3VawCftDUXUxZEMQPNXn
Vs Hona's Shiek and Ness (4th best in state. Loser's Finals) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9D8rUFGbQQ&list=PLzRHR2a6K1uqN3VawCftDUXUxZEMQPNXn&index=4
Vs Gnosis' Fox (Grands) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8L6LA13hPUI&index=5&list=PLzRHR2a6K1uqN3VawCftDUXUxZEMQPNXn

Any advice would be very much appreciated. I always love hearing advice from other Roy's!

 

[CyberZixx]

i'm glad this thread is still around.

 

[Taytertot]

Im probably going to get to your games in parts because i dont have enough time to talk about all of them now.

Vs Dyl's Link (Second best in state. He's actually a Luigi main) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ox-WndkM-IQ&index=1&list=PLzRHR2a6K1uqN3VawCftDUXUxZEMQPNXn

The first thing i noticed was that you moved forward and then backed up to respect him which is good but i think you didnt need to give up so much stage control when you backed away because by around 0:07 he had stage control which gave you very little room to move around and threaten him and several seconds later he got a 64% on you. I think if you had started the match by moving forward to pressure and then did a single WD back you would have respected his space without giving up a lot of your own space because link does have projectiles to pressure from far away but hes not very fast and so he cant get the meaty sword hits in unless you dont have the space to avoid them. Link's general gameplan i feel can be summed up in that manner; hes looking to pin you in the corner with projectiles and then get sword combos on you. So as roy you need to respect his projectiles but also avoid giving link what he wants. if youre crouched at a medium distance then you have enough time to react to the boomerang, arrows or bomb pull. obviously boomerang is probably the main tool hes going to use since hed have to jump to reliably get a bomb out at mid range which would put him in a horrible position and arrows are weak at mid to close range and will just be crouch canceled. Idk if boomerang can be crouch canceled or what percents you can do that up to if it can but you can definitely ftilt through them on reaction which will clank with the boomerang sending it back and hit link if hes close enough. if you use that too much he'll probably punish the ftilt but throwing out a little will probably help to pin link down where roy can destroy him.
I think of this MU as being similar to bowser in the way you want to approach it. Once youve closed the gap give him enough space that you can react to what hes going to do but dont give him enough space to safely throw projectiles. A lot of this match seems to be more player based though which i guess comes down more to the way you adapt to him and he adapts to you because i definitely wouldnt have assumed that hed throw out 3 dsmashes in a row and catch you with the third.
Id say a fair amount of the percent you took was due to either giving him too much space or trying to press too many buttons when you were close and therefore not giving yourself the chance to block or avoid his options. You have really good tech skill and im not saying you shouldnt use that but more that you should carefully choose when to use a lot of it because as im sure you know roy doesnt have a whole lot of stuff thats safe on block unless you only hit with the tip of dtilt, sometimes tipper ftilt or maybe a late tipper nair.
I liked that youve started using a lot more of nair. that counterpick to battlefield was a great choice as youre obviously more comfortable there and it kept him from being able to use a lot of his FF FH shenanigans and his projectiles where less useful. All in all, i dont have much to say about game 2 since it looked pretty good other then the SD. I did see a couple time where fair would have been a good choice since it forces link offstage where he doesnt have a lot of good options but it wasnt a big deal.

He seems to use fair a lot as link when he approaches from the air and sometimes you didnt give yourself enough time to avoid it or you werent expecting it and so you didnt block which could have gotten you a few more grabs throughout the 3 games. At around 9:09 you had him in shield tried to poke at him and then ran away which gave him a free space when you had him in a bad spot. If you had just chilled and maybe backed up slightly to avoid upB OoS (Idk what the actually range on link's upB OoS is) then you would have gotten a free punish as long as you where ready with a specific punish in mind for each of the options OoS that he had to choose from. Otherwise, that set looked good man. Im surprised that he didnt switch to luigi if thats his main since luigi is a very annoying MU for roy and link vs roy is much more straight forward and allows roy to play his usually gameplan for the most part where luigi requires a lot more poking and less comboing.

 

[Smolder]

Im probably going to get to your games in parts because i dont have enough time to talk about all of them now.

The first thing i noticed was that you moved forward and then backed up to respect him which is good but i think you didnt need to give up so much stage control when you backed away because by around 0:07 he had stage control which gave you very little room to move around and threaten him and several seconds later he got a 64% on you. I think if you had started the match by moving forward to pressure and then did a single WD back you would have respected his space without giving up a lot of your own space because link does have projectiles to pressure from far away but hes not very fast and so he cant get the meaty sword hits in unless you dont have the space to avoid them. Link's general gameplan i feel can be summed up in that manner; hes looking to pin you in the corner with projectiles and then get sword combos on you. So as roy you need to respect his projectiles but also avoid giving link what he wants. if youre crouched at a medium distance then you have enough time to react to the boomerang, arrows or bomb pull. obviously boomerang is probably the main tool hes going to use since hed have to jump to reliably get a bomb out at mid range which would put him in a horrible position and arrows are weak at mid to close range and will just be crouch canceled. Idk if boomerang can be crouch canceled or what percents you can do that up to if it can but you can definitely ftilt through them on reaction which will clank with the boomerang sending it back and hit link if hes close enough. if you use that too much he'll probably punish the ftilt but throwing out a little will probably help to pin link down where roy can destroy him.
I think of this MU as being similar to bowser in the way you want to approach it. Once youve closed the gap give him enough space that you can react to what hes going to do but dont give him enough space to safely throw projectiles. A lot of this match seems to be more player based though which i guess comes down more to the way you adapt to him and he adapts to you because i definitely wouldnt have assumed that hed throw out 3 dsmashes in a row and catch you with the third.
Id say a fair amount of the percent you took was due to either giving him too much space or trying to press too many buttons when you were close and therefore not giving yourself the chance to block or avoid his options. You have really good tech skill and im not saying you shouldnt use that but more that you should carefully choose when to use a lot of it because as im sure you know roy doesnt have a whole lot of stuff thats safe on block unless you only hit with the tip of dtilt, sometimes tipper ftilt or maybe a late tipper nair.
I liked that youve started using a lot more of nair. that counterpick to battlefield was a great choice as youre obviously more comfortable there and it kept him from being able to use a lot of his FF FH shenanigans and his projectiles where less useful. All in all, i dont have much to say about game 2 since it looked pretty good other then the SD. I did see a couple time where fair would have been a good choice since it forces link offstage where he doesnt have a lot of good options but it wasnt a big deal.

He seems to use fair a lot as link when he approaches from the air and sometimes you didnt give yourself enough time to avoid it or you werent expecting it and so you didnt block which could have gotten you a few more grabs throughout the 3 games. At around 9:09 you had him in shield tried to poke at him and then ran away which gave him a free space when you had him in a bad spot. If you had just chilled and maybe backed up slightly to avoid upB OoS (Idk what the actually range on link's upB OoS is) then you would have gotten a free punish as long as you where ready with a specific punish in mind for each of the options OoS that he had to choose from. Otherwise, that set looked good man. Im surprised that he didnt switch to luigi if thats his main since luigi is a very annoying MU for roy and link vs roy is much more straight forward and allows roy to play his usually gameplan for the most part where luigi requires a lot more poking and less comboing.

Interesting. So play more of a stage control game against Link, cutting off both his Melee and Zoning options. I'll give that a try out next time.

 

[Taytertot]

hey guys i know the roy threads have been dead for some time now but despite that im curious if anyone would be willing to do some analysis of a couple matches of mine (feel free to just do one). i did flub a lot of stuff in both games (sorry i know its a john) but any thoughts would be awesome. as a side note im very sorry that i take so long with stage picks/bans so you may want to skip that stuff in between the games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIMoOQmNqIg&index=2&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOMeo9GuvXE&index=8&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

 

[BoyBloodRoy]

hey guys i know the roy threads have been dead for some time now but despite that im curious if anyone would be willing to do some analysis of a couple matches of mine (feel free to just do one). i did flub a lot of stuff in both games (sorry i know its a john) but any thoughts would be awesome. as a side note im very sorry that i take so long with stage picks/bans so you may want to skip that stuff in between the games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIMoOQmNqIg&index=2&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOMeo9GuvXE&index=8&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

for your neutral, try to integrate fox trots and cactuar dashes. you wanna be dash dancing/foxtrotting just inside/outside the range at which you can do a runcancel Dtilt. once you get that down, you can start integrating pivot dtilts/aerials into your dash dance/fox trots to catch approaches. your dashdances right now dont really threaten your opponent, it just looks like you're running back and forth waiting for them to come in all the time. Roy isn't particularly fast so you're not gonna get too much benefit from that, instead you should use your dash range to try and threaten the space just outside of the range that they can safely get a hit from. The way that you poke with Ftilt currently is the way you should be poking with dtilt. its pretty safe on shield, so you can dash out of it and go back to dash dancing in their face to force an option or you can try to catch an option by following the Dtilt with an aerial, a jc grab, or a dash back into DED/pivot fsmash.

when you're covering platforms from underneath you typically want to use up airs rather than up smash because it covers more area, you can also use an uptilt after an up air hits, but just before they're able to tech so you can force them to miss the tech window and they will missed tech the fall from the up tilt. you can usually get some sweep punishes off that with a Bair or a Nair. rising Nair is also a good way to cover rolls on a platform.

vs sheik, you want to DI all her pokes straight out, so she cant get immediate Fair follow ups. when you have her off stage, you just about always want to grab the ledge before she does and, if you're below 100%, use the regular get up to get you into position to punish her after she poofs.

When you're edge guarding, it can be really tempting to just throw out an Fsmash, but if you miss, they get to punish you or take center stage for free. if you see the correct opening, go for it, other wise you want to use something less committal. your main goal is to keep them cut off from the middle of the stage by stuffing approaches and limiting options and eventually setting up a combo, as well as using your superior position to space any approaches that they would try and punishing. grab is usually a good go-to option to punish someone's ledge option, assuming it isnt an aerial. lots of people like to play scared and shield as soon as they pick their option, especially if your position threatens where they end up.

When you're recovering and you do an early UPB, you can hold back toward the ledge and drift back to it, instead of landing on the stage and having all those lag frames. the drift isnt much, but you can do it sometimes, you'll have to learn to get a feel for it.

Try using aerials out of shield for punishes, instead of just shield grab or a roll

 

[Binary Clone]

hey guys i know the roy threads have been dead for some time now but despite that im curious if anyone would be willing to do some analysis of a couple matches of mine (feel free to just do one). i did flub a lot of stuff in both games (sorry i know its a john) but any thoughts would be awesome. as a side note im very sorry that i take so long with stage picks/bans so you may want to skip that stuff in between the games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIMoOQmNqIg&index=2&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOMeo9GuvXE&index=8&list=PLOBypeeN7Jw_iMmPEzCsOI0v4E6OTFpGX

You really need to work on your neutral and punish games. They're pretty lackluster.

As the above post pointed out, your dashdances don't threaten your opponents at all, 90% of the time. You're just kind of running back and forth instead of applying positional pressure. I think one of your main problems is you never really apply pressure at all - you're dropping lots of conversions, you never tech chase, and you just back off out of staggers and give your opponents free resets into neutral. You need to push things farther, especially your throws, which you never get mileage out of at the moment.

When you fthrow or dthrow, you need to be preparing for a tech chase situation. That means dashing towards where your opponent is going to land and preparing to either try to read their tech option with a dtilt or I guess fsmash if you're feeling lucky and they're at high percents, or react to their tech with a regrab or dtilt and convert to a combo. Way too often I'm seeing you throw somebody and then just... stand there.

You also panic jump offstage all the time and go really, really high where it's incredibly easy for someone to edgeguard you just by tapping you with whatever aerial they please. As Roy, getting hit offstage without your double jump means death almost every time. Try to either jump directly to ledge, or use your upB. Burning your jump so early is getting you killed, and will get you killed much, much more against better players.

You OoS game is also lacking. I think I saw you aerial OoS like maybe 3 times in those two sets, and I don't think any of them hit. Everything else was either a shield grab, or a roll. Against players who know what they're doing, this will absolutely get you destroyed. Learn to wavedash OoS and apply it liberally. It's typically your best OoS option.

Again as the above post noted, you're poking with ftilt the way you should be poking with dtilt. Dtilt is Roy's bread and butter. It's one of the best combo starters in the game, and you need to use it to have success with Roy. Ftilt, on the other hand, has little more use than as a poke that's more of a get-off-me than anything else. It's good for edgeguarding too, and sometimes for picking up kills very late in percents when you're struggling to combo into a bair. In neutral, there's not much use for it when you could be dtilting or grabbing instead. You'll almost never get a combo off of ftilt.

Then there's movement. I already briefly talked about your dashdances, but you're also just not moving a lot of the time. Not moving kind of seems good when you're first starting out because it feels like you're keeping all your options, but it's actually really bad. You have a static threat range, can't pressure your opponent, and often will require more reaction time for your decisions. You play extremely passive in a lot of scenarios when you should always be applying pressure and moving purposefully.

Another note would be that you overuse DED and often overcommit to it, too. I'm seeing you kind of pseudo-reset opponents with the first hit to try to get a conversion when you really should be just dtilting. I'm seeing you go through 3 or even 4 hits when none of them are hitting or your opponent is much too far away to be threatened at all. In the set against Sheik there was even a moment where you just sat in the middle of the stage charging fsmash while he stared at you from the other side of the stage. Honestly, that Sheik has an awful punish game, and was constantly missing large opportunities to punish you for your overcommitments in neutral.

I could write about more stuff but I don't want to flood you with too much stuff. Hope this helps.

 

[Taytertot]

this all certainly helps. though it isnt stuff that i necessarily am unaware of, its more that im unsure of how to counteract the mixup options of my opponent, for example since you both are talking about the game against that sheik, i dont know how to both be more active in my pressure game against sheik (its a mu that i struggle with more then most) and avoid situations where sheik can needle me as im getting into a range that creates pressure and then mixup me up with either more needles, dash attack or boost grab since those are kinda rock, paper, scissors answers to how i act after sheik throws needles out to keep me at a distance.

i can explain in more depth if youre not sure what im talking about.

so i definitely want to get in on my opponents more but i dont always know how to safely and the sheik mu is one that makes that especially obvious for me. id say any character that has projectiles that cause hitstun are more difficult for me so if you guys have any thoughts on how i can more effectively counteract projectile based neutrals that would really help me to improve my neutral, cause i feel much more free to move around and pressure people when they cant put me in hitstun from far range (falco is also an mu that i struggle with for the very same reason.)


i definitely agree with my punish game being weak. im working on it and it is certainly stronger in matchups that i understand better like lucas or fox. its still pretty bad but that is easier to improve on and work with.

 

[BoyBloodRoy]

powershield the projectiles, ideally. but you can run in then, without taking your thumb off the control stick, press shield (its slower if you stop running and then shield) and block the projectile then wavedash out of shield forward to keep going in. if its like a falco lazering you, you can keep holding down the shoulder button to shield as soon as you're out of the wavedash animation and then wavedash out in whatever direction works. you can also do an aerial out of shield to try to swipe their approach after you block the first projectile. just remember what space you should be occupying (runcancel dtilt range) and don' give it up. at low % (crouch cancel range) you should look for grabs or dtilts, almost exclusively, if they're gonna stay on the ground, you can always swat away an aerial that you see coming with one of yours. as for your punish game, you just have to learn where people can possibly land after you hit them and try to get to those spaces as they're in hitstun to set up your next hit. just about any sweet spot hit that you get can be followed up on and you can always tech chase a throw. you just gotta be thinking about doing anything that you can to get the next hit

 

[Binary Clone]

this all certainly helps. though it isnt stuff that i necessarily am unaware of, its more that im unsure of how to counteract the mixup options of my opponent, for example since you both are talking about the game against that sheik, i dont know how to both be more active in my pressure game against sheik (its a mu that i struggle with more then most) and avoid situations where sheik can needle me as im getting into a range that creates pressure and then mixup me up with either more needles, dash attack or boost grab since those are kinda rock, paper, scissors answers to how i act after sheik throws needles out to keep me at a distance.

i can explain in more depth if youre not sure what im talking about.

so i definitely want to get in on my opponents more but i dont always know how to safely and the sheik mu is one that makes that especially obvious for me. id say any character that has projectiles that cause hitstun are more difficult for me so if you guys have any thoughts on how i can more effectively counteract projectile based neutrals that would really help me to improve my neutral, cause i feel much more free to move around and pressure people when they cant put me in hitstun from far range (falco is also an mu that i struggle with for the very same reason.)


i definitely agree with my punish game being weak. im working on it and it is certainly stronger in matchups that i understand better like lucas or fox. its still pretty bad but that is easier to improve on and work with.

I probably wouldn't advise trying to powershield that much, though it is ideal, since it's just hard and it's more likely that you end up just getting hit. The big thing is being able to wavedash OoS after shielding the projectiles like needles. Grounded needles aren't that great for anything besides tacking on damage, since they're so laggy for sheik. There's a space that you can occupy with your dashdance, that's close to shiek without being quite close enough that they're comfortable dash attacking, and too close for them to be able to want to needle you. For good examples of this, you should probably watch old videos of Sethlon vs. Umbreon or something, like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wM1BxUAnNU

You can see there that Sethlon is pressuring Umbreon very heavily with his dashdance and his pressure, while consistently threatening to dtilt approaches or cc into dtilt. The rock paper scissors answers are actually pretty much all bad for sheik - when she hits you with grounded needles, especially uncharged, there's not much she can do, and there are no true followups for her. If you're in a good range of her, she can't afford to needle you because you're too close and she runs the risk of you SDIing the needles towards her and dtilting, or just... dtilting out of it anyway. In truth, two of the three options in that RPS you listed lose to dtilt. Boost grab? Not if you dtilt it. Dash attack? Not if you dtilt it. More needles? Well you should've wavedashed out of the first needles hits if you were that far away, so SDI in and... dtilt. Alternatively you can escape to platforms or something where he can't do any of those things either, but you either end up above her or have to react to an aerial from her.

Honestly a lot of your problems will be solved by using dtilt more and effectively, since it's just such a good bread and butter move that you're really underutilizing. It's a really good neutral tool and a really good punish tool, it works out of crouch which means you can CC dtilt or runcancel dtilt. It's very, very good.

Safely getting in is different from applying pressure, too. Applying pressure is how you get in, in some ways. Pressure by virtue of presence and spacing and poking.

 

[Smolder]

this all certainly helps. though it isnt stuff that i necessarily am unaware of, its more that im unsure of how to counteract the mixup options of my opponent, for example since you both are talking about the game against that sheik, i dont know how to both be more active in my pressure game against sheik (its a mu that i struggle with more then most) and avoid situations where sheik can needle me as im getting into a range that creates pressure and then mixup me up with either more needles, dash attack or boost grab since those are kinda rock, paper, scissors answers to how i act after sheik throws needles out to keep me at a distance.

i can explain in more depth if youre not sure what im talking about.

so i definitely want to get in on my opponents more but i dont always know how to safely and the sheik mu is one that makes that especially obvious for me. id say any character that has projectiles that cause hitstun are more difficult for me so if you guys have any thoughts on how i can more effectively counteract projectile based neutrals that would really help me to improve my neutral, cause i feel much more free to move around and pressure people when they cant put me in hitstun from far range (falco is also an mu that i struggle with for the very same reason.)


i definitely agree with my punish game being weak. im working on it and it is certainly stronger in matchups that i understand better like lucas or fox. its still pretty bad but that is easier to improve on and work with.

I know it's been said before, but shield -> WD OoS to steal more space gradually against a needle-camping Sheik. The beauty about dealing with that rock, paper, scissors situation is that you can be in range for her dash attack, but not in range for a boost grab that you can't react to. I think your largest issue, if this situation is a problem for you, is spacing. You have to make yourself understand threat zones, what can and cannot reach, and what can be reacted to in a given situation during neutral. If only dash attack can reach, but boost grab can't, that means you can shield the dash attack and grab or do dair OoS. If she throws needles, you are now in range where you can easily WD OoS and dtilt to, at the very least, put her in a pressure situation. The moment you reach that perfect spot that is out of range of BG but in range for punishable needles and dash attack, you then have better control over that RPS scenario.

EDIT: Oh, and don't forget to shield DI needles inwards. You may be able to shield DI dash attack outwards to set yourself up for a shield grab in a situation where it otherwise wouldn't happen.

EDIT2: Also, the general rule of edge guarding a recovering Sheik: hold ledge, wait for the up-B's hitbox to almost come out, then do a neutral getup. As long as you are at sub-100 percent, this is almost an omni-tool for edge guarding Sheik. If she tries to sweetspot, she dies. If she is forced on stage, you get to go watch a movie with a girl you like, take her to a fancy restaurant, learn the meaning of "Love", marry her, have a family of 5, grow old together, then come back and fsmash the **** out of that Sheik.