How do you fight against a Marth?

[MorpheusVGX]

I fought a Marth and he destroyed me. I wasn't able to go past his sword... He mixed jump, Fair while going up (on a small jump), Fair while going down, Dattack, Fsmash. I was overwhelmed... Also he did I think Dthrow and immediately Fsmash and he got me with a sweetspotted hit.. WTF.. Any advice?

 

[Blistering Speed]

As with almost any Marth matchup, the key is spacing. Always be cautious of where you are in comparison of Marth's sword and once you get inside, make sure you overwhelm with your speed, Double Jab to Grab, general tiltage etc, these are all god sends. Marth won't kill for a long time without a tipper, though probably still earlier then you. HOWEVER, Marth has a very gimpable recovery (especially for Shiek, she was designed to gimp Marth lol), standard F Air and B Air offstage are both great for pushing him out of DS linear recovery line. Tether edgehog is also fantastic (time the invincibility frames). F Tilt to U Smash as always kills very well but fully decaying F Tilt against Marth is difficult, gimping should still be your primary way of killing.

Shiek can only combo with F Tilt when fully decayed, otherwise the Marth will Dolphin Slash out (it's invincible frame 1-4 and hits frame 5), so finish your lock quickly, after two F Tilts usually with D Smash, N Air or U Tilt (Marth can actually DS out of the second hit of U Tilt but I very much doubt they are that frame perfect or react quickly enough). You can also test your opponent's DS patterns and then bait the DS for a free anything.

Abuse the **** out of needles. Marth doesn't have a projectile, you do. This normally isn't much of a problem for Marth thanks to his great manouverability and ability to cancel many projectiles with his sword, however he can use neither effectively in this matchup. Needles don't get cancelled by sword and Shiek has the pace to run away. Needle's also aren't exactly easy to see coming and shield, making them the perfect tool to mess up Marth's spaced tilt's and F Air walls and generally whenever he's far enough away that he can't reach you.

For your specific move problems:
Dash Attack: Shield it, Marth has to commit and it has punishable ending lag.
F Smash: It's range isn't anything special anymore, be very conscious of if you're in tipper position at kill percentages, otherwise it's punishable on shield and it can't kill for **** without the tipper.
D Throw to F Smash: DI appropriately and Airdodge, it's not a guaranteed follow up.
F Air: This move is always going to be a problem, it's a brilliant spacing aerial. However, I find Shiek's Dash Attack very useful against double jump F Air, intercepting between the two. Dashing Shield can also be great to mess up spacing. Needles should always be your primary response however, running away to needles deal very effectively with Marth's F Air spacing.


Marth still has an advantage in this matchup (60:40 IMO) due to his general ability to space with his range, however he isn't as effective at shutting down Shiek as with many characters due to her speed, it's a very winnable matchup.

 

[Flamingo]

Don't be too predictable with chasing off-stage either, he will counter you. If he does it one time, next time bait him, then punish the missed counter with bair stage spike or sumthin. Also, if you are fighting an inexperienced marth that doesnt use diag-up+B toward stage,m you can turn him around with needles and gimp him sometimes.

 

[Blistering Speed]

Don't be too predictable with chasing off-stage either, he will counter you. If he does it one time, next time bait him, then punish the missed counter with bair stage spike or sumthin. Also, if you are fighting an inexperienced marth that doesnt use diag-up+B toward stage,m you can turn him around with needles and gimp him sometimes.

1) Counter whilst trying to recover? I very much doubt it.
2) Giving information about things which only work against bad/inexperienced players isn't really helpful. You can become dependant on those tricks and soon enough your opponent's caught on or your facing a better player.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

Wow, you know a lot. I thank you very much for your wise answers. Any other advice is also welcome.. I am gonna punish those Marths! xD

 

[silver0p]

1) Counter whilst trying to recover? I very much doubt it.
2) Giving information about things which only work against bad/inexperienced players isn't really helpful. You can become dependant on those tricks and soon enough your opponent's caught on or your facing a better player.

I agree with speed for the most part but it still is good to tell this knowledge because even if it might not work on a strong opponent, you aren't necessarily going to be fighting someone who is strong all the time and a trick like that could come in handy. so in Flamingos defence i believe that what he said was still good advice even if its not the most practical advice to be giving out.

then again what do i know

 

[demodemo]

since this is brawl, the more options you know for every situation, the better you are. nothing is guaranteed in this game, so you basically have to be completely unpredictable all of the time (which is stupid imo, dammit brawl)

 

[silver0p]

well i like it gives your brain a work out. alot better then fighting games where you have to punch in buttons to do w.e attack you want like x, y, a, b, c down ,c up, b, BUP, = normal jab and you have a set number of possible moves!

 

[Rawr_]

marth.... *sigh* shield, jabs, and a ****load of needles. mix in a few grabs but not too many, any decent marth player will know how to stay at a safe (aka ungrabbable) range when pressuring; shieldrun a ton, just keep mixing it up and throwing needles whenever possible. when you go for the gimp, be really careful, and never edgeguard the same way twice or your face may end up making good friends with the bottom of the stage.
also, pressure him harder than he can pressure you. if you lose control of the tempo, it can cost you dearly. just keep those hitboxes moving and don't give him a chance to get aggressive

 

[jc_off_the_heezay]

What he did was a forward grab.
Most good Marths do this.
It's annoying but can only be done at low percentages.

 

[Leafplayer452]

If you ask me, its all about mindgames, spacing so he wont get the tipper off, using needles wisely, and pulling off a DACUS when not expected

 

[Flamingo]

If you ask me, its all about mindgames, spacing so he wont get the tipper off, using needles wisely, and pulling off a DACUS when not expected

All about mindgames? You must have mastered Sheik. Congratulations.

 

[FrozenFire13]

All about mindgames? You must have mastered Sheik. Congratulations.

^Win^
10mindgames

 

[PentaSalia]

All about mindgames? You must have mastered Sheik. Congratulations.

lol no need to give such a response like that
it's what he thinks
if you're not being sarcastic,my apoligies

i kinda agree with him,i think it is all about needles lol D:

i dont play shiek much but thats how i see it x_X

 

[Flamingo]

...Who bumped this??

lol no need to give such a response like that
it's what he thinks
if you're not being sarcastic,my apoligies

i kinda agree with him,i think it is all about needles lol D:

i dont play shiek much but thats how i see it x_X

I am not joking/sarcastic/being a douche. You cannot rely solely upon mindgames and DACUS to win a match, sorry.
In this match you need to do efficient things. NEEDLECAMP, 1ftilt->dsmash, etc. Geez.
I'm no noob, thanks.

(And needlecamping is NOT mindgames.)

My rant about mindgames... I think mindgames are only effective and necessary if you know your opponent fully, and likewise your opponent knowing what your character can do against him. Mindgames and mix-ups allow you to differentiate approaches/attacks in general, so that your opponent is unsure how to defend against them. Conversely, if your opponent knows nothing of you and you know nothing of your opponent's character/style, mindgames can work too because they will be confused. My solution: DONT ever RELY upon mindgames. Just play.

 

[Corjha]

This is coming from the guy who plays brawl Sheik exactly the same way as he does in melee, so you may wish to take this with a grain of salt.

You are faster than Marth. Always keep this in mind. If he's countering, grab him. If he's sheildgrabbing, grab him. If he's attacking, attack first. If he's off the edge and going to counter any nair or bair that could kill him, move and wait for counter to end.

Really it comes down to thinking and moving faster than your opponent, and that's easier to do with Sheik. Yeah, I realize that I just technically said that you have to be the better player by more than a small margin, but that's one of the things a Sheik user has to be to survive. You need to see that Sheik's lack of a fancy metagame like Snake's or Falco's doesn't mean anything, Sheik has strong basics and if played right she can fight with the best.

 

[Zankoku]

Marth has more grab range than Sheik, so he can easily grab you if you attempt to run up and grab him.

Marth should also not use Counter so predictably, as Dolphin Slash is typically a much stronger option.

 

[Voyeur]

F-tilt spacing and shield baiting.

Other then that I'm pretty sure Marth beats Sheik out in a lot of the other areas, you can always time your chain tether-hogs really well against Dolphin Slash but...

Would Chain (locking) work well against Marth? I'm pretty sure they can jump in and Counter it, retracting the chain....

 

[FrozenFire13]

It wouldn't just retract the chain, you'd get hit. Chain locking a Marth = counter/DS = bad.

 

[slickmasterizzy]

usually you can catch a marth using dolphin slash to recover with an explosion. because marth is a "floaty" character you can get some easy kills off the top of the stage this way.

the problem with marths up+b is that it moves kind of vertically towards the point.

on some stages if they time it perfectly so that they instantly grab the edge they are likily to get stuck under the stage and die.

counter is a pain, i love jumping at marth air dodging going through him then using the opposite sided attack.

like for example jump at a marth whos jumping towards you air dodge through him then hit back-air.

i dont like to play around on the ground against a marth. i just sense the delay on marths attacks from his sword then mess around with him in the air.

 

[Sinjihn]

walking helps, sheik can change direction faster than Marth can, making it easier to run from him, don't roll or else youll get ***** by his Dancing blade, try to keep out of his Fsmash, and punish all his mis-attacks with well placed Dash attacks. Other than that, you don't have much of an offensive game because of the fact he can dolphin slash out of all your ftilt utilt strings, and whiffing or hitting his shield is death as well, poking with Fair and Bair while escaping helps, but I'd say this is mostly an evade and counter match.

 

[SinkingHigher]

From my perspective there is a specific way of fighting Marth. The same goes for most characters, but imo you need to adapt if you want to beat a Marth, MK or Snake.

I've learned that Marth has two... "personal bubbles", let's call them. Bubble one is his 'personal space'--about half a sheik away from him. From this point he can't tipper you and it becomes hard for him to get f-air combos and such that you can't DI out of quickly. This is a good place to be, but BEWARE of his grabs. If he grabs you you'll have to start all over again after getting punished. I play extremely aggressive (sometimes ignorantly so), so I find it easier to stay near him and ALWAYS be attacking. iirc, almost every Sheik attack can be linked to another one fairly smoothly, so keep that in mind and don't let down, but be careful not to stale moves like tippers, Vanish and n-air. B-air and f-air are somewhat expendable.

The second bubble is his tipper's range. It's generally a circle about 2 Sheik's away from him. More of an oval. Eitherway, this is where he tries to space to, so don't let him keep that distance. You want to be out of that range or between the edge of the circle and Marth.

Basically, to sum this all up, more than anything spacing is key here. Marth is dependant on it. He doesn't have projectiles and his moves are very linear. Coming at him from on top of a platform works well. Don't run at him. Dash > Sheild works, but if he catches on he'll grab you sooner or later.

He's faster than Sheik with better range. Those are his pros. If you negate those, it's fair game. Eliminate those by being agressive and spacing yourself well (so you can counter/punish. You want to be defensive here, but in the sense that the best defense is a good offense.)

Note: This is just from my experience. It works for me. Granted I am yet to meet a Marth that ***** me (though I am sure there are many of them out there).

 

[Villi]

On mind games... If you can put your opponent into situations that are familiar to you, you can use those to get to know him. If you can recognize recurring instances, you can use those to your advantage by being aware of your capabilities. Needles is mind games. They makes the peoples jump and shield.

 

[stealth3654]

I seem to have trouble getting back on the stage when I am hanging on the ledge. Any tips on getting back on?

 

[SinkingHigher]

Ledgedrop > jump > f-air or U-air.
Jump > needles.
Ledge attack.

 

[Canvasofgrey]

Adding to Sinking's speech about Marth's bubbles. (I call them Zone of Vulnerability since everyone has one). All of the sword characters have two Zones of vulnerability. One outside their range, and inside the arm of their swing. Inside the swing of the sword, a character can actually walk into them, as as they swing their sword, they tend to lurch forward, causing you to shift behind them, and leaving them open for attack. Of course, this depends on the character. Link, Marth, and Ike are the ideal kind of characters to do this on since they move forward the most, while Meta Knight and Toon Link hardly move at all, making their inner zone of vulnerability quite smaller than the other characters.

Spacing is the biggest weapon against characters like these, as stated before. And to Sinking, isn't it suppose to be "A good offense is the best defense" in this case since we want to be rather agressive with Marth? =?

 

[Incurable_Necrophile]

Don't get tippered or stage spiked, needles should be abused, and gimp as much as possible.. Really, just fight dirty and cheap.

 

[SinkingHigher]

And to Sinking, isn't it suppose to be "A good offense is the best defense" in this case since we want to be rather agressive with Marth? =?

lulz. Probably. I lose track of all these proverbs.

Anyway, I would say yeah you want to be aggressive in terms of spacing, not attacks. If you're just attacking all the time Marth can still get through your attacks.

In a way, you want to be aggressively defense, if that makes sense. i.e. Keep yourself in a position out of his range, camp needles, wait/bait his attack and counter it, etc...