Let me try my hand at this, at least a bit.
Sheiking - A Competitive Guide
Hello, and welcome to the world of Sheik. I'm actually going to suggest you look elsewhere for your main before we begin. Sheik has a very potent weakness that is difficult to overcome - an inability to easily KO. When playing Sheik, you are going to have to put a lot of effort in to compensating for this weakness. It's not unusual to see someone get to nearly 200%, and there's nothing keeping Sheik from getting killed at under 100% by some of the top tier characters. Because of this, Sheik can be incredibly frustrating to play.
Still with me? Ok, good. Because now comes the part where I talk about Sheik's strengths, which are fairly numerous. Number one is Sheik's ability to rack up damage. Forward Tilt Combos, Up Tilt combos, Chain Dragging, and even the simple Jab combo are all capable of fairly quickly racking up the percents. The most potent of these is the Forward Tilt Combo, which I will go more in depth on in a minute. Sheik also has an incredibly competant aerial game. Her Up, Back, and Neutral Aerials are all essentially Sex Kicks, having a powerful initial extension and then a weaker hit that hangs around for a while. Her Forward Aerial is an incredibly fast swipe, and at percentages over 100%, it knocks the opponent almost entirely horizontal, with a slight downward push. This makes it a great attack for gimping. And because of its speed, it's also a great attack for comboing. Additionally, the Forward, Neutral, and Back aerials, unless initiated basically as you hit the ground, will autocancel and have essentially no lag, allowing any move to be used immediately.
First we're going to cover Tilt Locking, as this is the most important Technique for competitive Sheiking. It is performed by hitting your opponent with a Forward Tilt and then again immediately hitting them with another, and another, and another. Because of the low knockback on the move (which is accentuated by its repeated use), if performed properly, the opponent is trapped in the tilts. This does not work on all characters, however, but it works on a lot of them. In general, the heavier and faster falling a character is, the longer they are trapped in the tilt lock. A light, floaty character like Jigglypuff will be able to escape immediately or almost immediately. The faster falling characters like Fox can be trapped up to (or over) 100% unless they properly DI.
Performing the Lock: The tilt lock is performed by using Forward Tilts repeatedly. But it is not as easy as it sounds. If you simply mash A while holding Forward, the Tilts will complete one by one before starting the next, giving your opponent time to react and escape. The Forward Tilt must be Interrupted as soon as it can be. If you are watching Sheik's model, the next Forward Tilt must be hit to start as Sheik's kicking Foot is about to touch the ground. If this is peformed correctly, Sheik will never return to having both feet on the ground, and the foot will continue to rotate around Sheik, hitting the opponent again and again.
Escaping the Lock: The lock is not foolproof. It is, in Magic the Gathering terms, a "Soft Lock". That is, if your opponent knows what they are doing, they can escape. Second Jumping, Air-Dodging, and any sort of Attack will not work, nor will DI'ing away from Sheik or DI'ing Upwards (at least for most characters). Attempting any of the above actions will result in the Lock continuing. The lock can be broken by DI'ing only one way - towards Sheik. This may throw people off, as it seems counter-intuitive, and it guarantees that several tilts will hit the Locked opponent before they can escape. In fact, a very skilled Sheik can alternate the direction of the forward tilts, keeping the opponent locked even with this DI, but it is incredibly difficult to keep up, even for the best of Sheikers. Also, when the opponent reaches a certain percentage (it again varies based on Weight, Size, and Fall Speed), they will be knocked back too high for the lock to continue, and will be able to escape.
Following Up the Lock: If the opponent is at too high a percent for the lock to continue and are escaping above it, there are still some options to add some more damage. The uptilt is very quick and will hit an opponent above you, racking up up to 13% in additional damage. If the opponent was DI'ing towards you, an Upsmash used at this point should result in a Tipper (which we will discuss later when we talk about Killing, but just trust me that it is a good thing). A Downsmash used at this point should connect, and a Forward Smash may connect as well. Additionally, depending on how high the opponent is knocked, a Shorthopped or Fullhopped Aerial (Nair or Fair Probably, though Uair or even Bair might work if they were DI'ing towards you) should hit them.
Setting Up the Lock: The most broken thing about Sheik's Tilt-lock is how easy it is to set up. The first two hits of Sheik's jab can be cancelled by hitting Crouch or Shield, and will leave the perfect opening to hit the opponent with a Ftilt. Downtilt at most percentages will pop the opponent up to where the Forward Tilt can hit them. At low (near 0%) percentages, the Uptilt sets up the opponent perfectly, as does the Forward Throw. At low to mid percentages, the Weak hit of Sheik's Nair or Bair or the regular hit of Sheik's Fair all leave the opponent in a position to Ftilt. With so many options and a little practice at them, it won't be long before you will be tilt-locking your opponents with the best of them.
Next comes the dubious topic of Killing with Sheik. This is not the easiest thing to do, and it will take patience to do so. My main suggestion is actually to ignore percentages until you get used to killing with Sheik. It's best to chase every stage knock-off as if you can get a gimp kill and just rack up damage as best you can, killing with just anything when the time comes. But I will cover Sheik's various kill moves and edgeguarding techniques. If you can become intensely familiar with all of these, killing no longer seems like a chore.
Upsmash: Sheik's upsmash is far and away the best Kill move. If you hit with the Tipper (Which is admittedly difficult to do), it will launch your opponent entirely vertically, and can kill Mario from the center of Final D (with no DI) at a scant 90%. You're probably thinking "wow, if Sheik can kill at 90, how do we have problems getting kills?" Too bad that the upsmash tipper is Sheik's most difficult to connect move by a long shot. And if you aren't able to pull that off, Sheik's other KO options are, quite frankly, terrible (at least on paper). Her Vanish is the second-strongest move, capable of killing at 130% from the center of Final D (again on Mario, sans DI). Again, however, this is one of Sheik's more difficult to connect moves. After that point, just about everything has a Center of FD, Mario, No DI kill percent of around 150%. And by "just about everything" I mean Nair, Bair, Uair, Dmsash, Fsmash, Usmash (non-tippered). The Fair kills in the same conditions at around 180%. Everything else (tilts, jabs, dash attack, throws, specials other than the Vanish, Dair) doesn't kill until around 200% or far beyond. So really, learn to connect that Tipper. There are several techniques which make this easier to do. The "Hyphen-Smash" is the most basic of these. All it consists of is dashing forward and using the Upsmash, providing a slide. The "Boost Smash" is much more difficult, but adds an even longer slide to the Upsmash. It consists of performing a dash attack and then immediately Upsmashing. This likely requires a controller setting change, as it is easiest to perform said Upsmash with a trigger button set to attack. Dash dancing can allow either of these techniques to come out in either direction, providing a huge area of potential coverage for the upsmash.
Edgeguarding: Now, reading the kill percentages of the aerials is likely disheartening. However, keep in mind that those kill percentages are from the center of Final Destination. When used at the edge of a stage or off of the stage, they can kill at much lower percentages. A good Sheik player must be comfortable chasing their opponent off of the edge and striking them with an aerial. The forward aerial is the best for this, as it can be used while moving forward, is incredibly quick, has more hit frames than any of the "Sex Kick" strong hits, and ends quickly, allowing another move to be used. However, its knockback is lower than that of the Bair or Nair. A Strong Hit Nair or Bair off the stage will result in a kill almost every time, but this can be difficult to pull off. Sheik's double-jump and Up B are fast and long enough that Sheik can get back from almost anywhere after attacking, so your biggest worry is that your opponent cannot do the same. Grabbing the ledge after hitting them once is a great way to do this, as you can ledgedrop or hop into a Bair, which is often fatal. Even better than this often is using the Side B, which is a tether recovery. This can allow Sheik to grab the edge before your opponent gets a chance to and dangle for as long as needed, pulling in at the proper time if invincibility frames are needed. There are a few strategies for edgeguarding from the stage as well. The Chain can be hung off the edge to hit those who can't sweetspot the ledge, similar to how the Flamethrower is used by Charizard. Alternately, if the opponent can grab the ledge, Sheik can start charging a downsmash near the edge. It is long-ranged enough to catch someone who sticks on the ledge, someone who just gets up, someone who jumps, or someone who rolls, cutting off your opponent's options. It will also clink with most getup attacks. A third option is the Vanish Glide. If Sheik runs at the edge and uses Vanish at the last second, Sheik will glide a fair distance out before vanishing. This allows the explosion of the vanish to hit a recovering character, and the Vanish teleport can be directed to allow Sheik to edgehog, in case the explosion misses.
Smashing: If all else fails, a good smash will kill players at a high enough percent. The best smash for this is the downsmash, due to its incredible speed and multiple hits. The forward Smash can work, as it has better range, but it is more easily punishable due to its longer startup and ending lag. A Hyphen-Smashed upsmash, even if it isn't a tipper, can still kill at around 150%, and you lose all of the warmup in the dash, making this another decent option. But really, a downsmash from a sidestep or shield is probably the easiest.
Grab Game: Sheik does not have any throws with Kill power, nor does Sheik have any chaingrab potential. Sheik's throws also do a fairly pitiful amount of damage: 5% down, 6%, and 7% forward or back. However, her moves are good set-ups. At near-0%, Forward and Back throws can set up a tilt lock. At higher percentages, they have a "DI Trap". If the opponent attempts to DI towards Sheik, they will simply go straight up in the air, allowing an aerial to be used immediately afterwards. Similarly, the Downthrow sets up the opponent for most aerials if it is not DI'd. Varying these throws up will leave your opponent guessing whether or not DI'ing is the proper choice, often leaving them to be hit when they make the wrong decision. Additionally, Sheik's pummel is fairly good, dealing 3%, so it should be used whenever possible. A pummel can be used for every 20-30% the grabbed character has without possibility of escape. If your opponent is fervently trying to break the grab, simply downthrow them after a conservative number of pummels and hit them with an aerial, as they will have missed their chance to DI.
Chain-Dragging: The Chain is actually a potent tool, capable of racking up 20-40% in an instant. This is acchieved by quickly moving the joystick between Down and Down-Forward while the chain is being held, which drags it along the ground, causing its hitbox to move (and thus hit) very quickly. This is most useful against an opponent who sidesteps or who is trying to Shield. Thus, the best way to use this is to encourage one of the above behaviors and then punish it with a switchup. The best way to encourage a Sidestep is to repeatedly Dash-Grab (preferably Dash-Shield-Grab, as this is faster). When they come to expect it and sidestep, do not attempt a grab but instead hit B as you move forward in the same spot. This should cause the chain to come out, and it will hit them as they come out of their sidestep. To encourage Shielding, repeatedly shorthop an aerial agains them. When they expect this behavior, throw out the chain close to the ground (close enough that it won't retract on landing) and chew through that shield.
Approach: Sheik's approach game is subpar. On the ground, Sheik's best option is the running grab. Throwing out the chain occasionally is another decent option, as is shield-canceling a dash into a Downsmash. Dash Attacking, Forward Smashing, or Hyphen-Smashing are all poor choices due to the ending lag on these moves. In fact, walking into a Jab or Tilt is often a more potent approach than dashing into anything. Aerially, Sheik shines, however. Due to the negligible lag on her Nair, Bair, and Fair, these are all good approach options. Especially the Bair, due to its immense range. Upon landing, a Downsmash can be thrown out immediately to catch people trying to Shield-grab. Again, the chain can be thrown out as a mixup, as can the Bair, but neither of these should be common things. As it has been said by better Sheik players than myself, "Sheik doesn't approach. Sheik punishes bad approaches". This is a decent adage to take to heart. Due to Sheik's limited approach options, it is often better to wait for your opponent to try something and then to punish the ensuing lag as badly as you can.
Projectiles: Sheik has but one projectile, though it is potent. The Needle is its name, and harrasing is its game. If the B button is pressed, Sheik will begin to charge needles. Pressing again releases the needles charged. Up to Six can be stored by pressing shield while charging. If six are stored, they are released the next time B is tapped. If less than six are stored, more will be stored. Double-tapping B will throw stored needles, or will throw a single needle if none are stored. Needles deal 3% each fresh, so a full batch of Needles can deal up to 18%. Knockback on needles is negligible, instead just stunning the opponent in place for a second. A full burst of needles can stun an opponent who is a fair distance away long enough for Sheik to start an attack. Fully Charged needles are great for punishing back-rolls. If used right when the opponent back-rolls, the full burst will catch them as soon as they leave the roll, leaving them stunned and vulnerable. Good needle use makes Sheik a powerful opponent who is annoying at long ranges and devastating up close.
Well, that's all I've got for now. I'm open for suggestions as to things to add to this, but the only things I can think of are things like the Shield Pressuring Guide and the Frame Data.
