Shield stun desynchs have been a concept for intentional setups and combo starters for years (and they’ve been done accidentally since the beginning of the game
).
*
I'm going to say shieldstun in this post a lot and ignore hitlag. For all intents and purposes hitlag on a shield is included in the shieldstun phrase
The concept behind a shieldstun desynch is that if Nana and Popo’s shields are hit at the same time, they suffer the same amount of shieldstun, starting and ending on the same frame. We can desynch from this because, although Popo will not listen to our inputs in shield stun, Nana will still remember the inputs and try to execute them with her 6 frame delay. If everything is executed correctly Popo’s shieldstun eats the inputs, and 6 frames later when Nana receives them we are out of shield stun so she’ll do whatever we said to do.
One commonly talked about application for this is the “
6 frame grab.” A Dair comes out in 3 frames, IC’s jumpsquat is 3 frames, do some magic math and you can see a jump -> Dair hitting in 6 frames.
IC’s grab is 7 frames, so Dair OoS is actually faster than shieldgrabbing. However Dair sucks, even if you hit with two. So what’s better than two Dair? One desynched Dair :D
Essentially you get hit by a move and Dair OoS while in stun, then grab once the stun seems over. Nana will Dair OoS due to a shield stun desynch, and Popo will grab the opponent from the Dair hit. You hit the opponent on frame 6 and got a grab, thus it’s essentially a “6 frame grab.”
https://gfycat.com/LiveBlueArmedcrab
Doing aerials out of shield with Nana while not making Popo do an action is difficult. It takes 4 frames if you get an instant aerial since you have to have the jump input on frame 1, 2 frames of wait, then the aerial input on 4. Even if you get lots of stun, this is a
3 frame window, so it’s difficult to execute. This was assuming your aerial was instant too.
Special moves
can’t be done while in shield though, so having Nana jump out of shield and iceblock or blizzard will keep Popo in shield even if the special move input is done after Popo’s shieldstun wears off.
It’s worth noting that pressing down for the blizzard will still make Popo spotdodge pretty frequently in practice, so hitting down at the very start of long shield stun will avoid this, but it might make Nana spotdodge if the shield stun is too small. A consistent method is to press down right after you input jump and Popo is still in stun or to have your shield tilted down before a hit. Also you can slowly tilt the stick down during Nana jumpsquat so you can get a blizzard and only make Popo tilt his shield down slowly.
Assuming shield tilting and everything is done correctly, this gives you a 6 frame window* when doing shieldstun jumps -> special moves since you only have to worry about the jump. This makes shieldstun desynchs way more viable.
*
if the attack on your shield does very little damage, the window can be decreased to 5 frames since the hitlag + shieldstun only give you that much time.
Anyway here’s w̶o̶n̶d̶e̶r̶w̶a̶l̶l a gfy. This is shieldstun desynch being applied against Peach FC Fair, a very common scenario in the Peach/ICs MU.
Here, the IC reacts to Peach starting a Fair, holds down during stun, makes Nana FH blizzard using the shieldstun desynch. The Popo waits for about 11 frames after the Peach has landed and goes for a grab. This grab will get lazy stuff like jab -> dashback and such. The grab is slow enough that a D-tilt or D-smash will hit shield before the grab comes out and lock Popo safely in his shield. If a double jab interrupts the grab then Popo can ASDI down and grab again.
Link in case Gfy doesn't load here:
https://gfycat.com/NegativeNegativeDog
This isn’t perfect option coverage and it’s heavily execution reliant on both parties end, but it’s a neat demonstration of shield stun desynch’s potential option coverage.
https://clips.twitch.tv/DaintyCloudyCockroachBleedPurple
https://gfycat.com/UnawareAlarmedInganue
Here’s some cool stuff people have done.There’s obviously tons more stuff you can do. Good luck and thanks for reading ^_^/
