Mario's Matchups! Updated May 15, 2007! Only missing Zelda!

[Airwalkerr]

I frequently play a Zelda main. The key to success is basically to stay under Zelda, SHFFLing uairs, nairs and bairs. Her airspeed is pretty slow, so as long as you can predict her direction, its easy to keep juggling her. My friend loves to mix up full hop and short hop fairs/bairs to keep good spacing, but this allows me to time an attack just as she lands, when you don't have to fear the LIGHTNING kicks. Its easy for her to predict this and smash you though, so its best used sparingly. Reflector and fireballs are not a problem to deal with, as a Mario who is good at wavelands will never get hit by his own reflected fireball nor Zeldas fireball. ****, I need to start recording my smash matches...

 

[Airwalkerr]

After a bit more reflection (my puns suck, don't they?), I've decided on some counterpicks to use against Zelda. FD is the best stage against Zelda, as she is very easily gimped by the ledges, provided she tried recovering from a diagonal angle. Its also very easy to knock her back off the stage if she manages to get on, due to her very small amount of options to recover (ledge or onto the stage). Unless she is below the ledge, intercepting her in mid-air is a bad idea, as her lightning kicks are fast enough to hurt you bad. FD is a great place to juggle Zelda, as her slow air speed thwarts her from getting to the ground easily. I find DL64 to be a bad place to CP Zelda. Unless you are amazing, and I mean AMAZING at comboing floaties 0-death, Zelda will live to very high percents. back throw kills at 150 here, and F-smash kills around 120. Which is still too high for Zelda. Its not a terrible stage to take her, just be aware that she will kill you way before you can kill her, due to your bad recovery. The other noteworthy stages for Zelda are; Yoshis and Pokemon Stadium. Poke stadium is a lot like FD, it gimps her recovery with the edges and is a very easy stage to keep Zelda offstage on, due to her lack of options. She fairs slightly better here though, as it is also very easy for her to jump out and gimp your recovery. I'll test a bit more on Poke before I say more. As for Yoshis, only take Zelda here if you can evade really well. Lightning kicks = KO at 50%-70%, depending on the strength of DI and where you are on the stage. Although, back throw and f-smash kill at similiar percents, though they are harder to land. Hope that helps anyone (but really, how many good Zeldas play anymore? How many good Marios play, for that matter?)

 

[Cojomo]

I'm working on my Mario right now, I'll keep this info in mind

 

[j3ly]

she wont kill us on 64 if you have decent DI

seriously, marios recovery is awesome. One if the best imo. you have easy access to high/low, cape for mixup, down B for mixup, fireball for both stopping edgehogging AND getting random gimps from stage spikng sometimes. Di up , or up and towards for power his, and Mario can live for a long time. His real failing is when he is sent away from the stage, on the same level as the stage, it should be (and is) almost impossible to recover from that against a really good player. But hopefully that situation wont arise because you remeber to DI

 

[Airwalkerr]

My Zelda friend has developed a technique of repeatedly bairing from the ledge and regrabbing instantly. Trust me, this takes down B recovery out of the question. It's easy to say "DI good and you'll survive" but Lightning kicks send you FLYING at any percent over 70. CC them reduces her chance to sweetspot and lets you stay on the stage about 40 extra percent, but if your at a high percent and she lightning kicks you while CCing, your gonna be exactly in the place you don't wanna be.

 

[j3ly]

isit a proper stall ie is she invincible the entire time? still di up and fire fireballs at the edge. can usually get 2 in, line up, fireball, fastfall, rising fireball

also zelda doesnt have a high enough 2nd jump to actually do anything if you recover high, or you could save the cape and fake her out, confuse with fastalling and jumping and whatnot. i manage to almost always di myself into the high sky, allbeit i dont play zelda.. i wouldent imagine it would be that hard to get around her edgeguards as mario with all of our options (options dont exist wirhout DIing high) against her hard to sweetspot, slow bair stall

im sorry i can offer no more advise, but the repetition of DI up

 

[A2ZOMG]

If anyone else is up for it, I want to rediscuss some matchups.

I want to start with say...Luigi.

Vs Luigi I think will give a lot of Mario users trouble since it forces you to play a bit differently, but in reality the matchup should be neutral imo.

If you try to do the standard U-throw U-air juggles that will get you nowhere since they don't combo well on Luigi due to his weight and floatiness. Instead all you really need to do is just WD around a lot and U-tilt. His poor air mobility makes him a pretty easy target for that, and U-tilt (and U-smash for that matter) outprioritizes all of his aerials and should still be advantageous even if he tries to dodge past it or something. The trick I guess is dealing with his ground mobility in the first place...

Combined with fireball camping, careful usage of smashes, and smart edgeguarding, Luigi should be pretty manageable.

 

[Monk/Honkey/Banana]

Combined with fireball camping, careful usage of smashes, and smart edgeguarding, Luigi should be pretty manageable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHotwr_QjzY

1:47-2:03 = Smart edgeguarding

 

[Professor :3]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHotwr_QjzY

1:47-2:03 = Smart edgeguarding

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHotwr_QjzY#t=1m45s

Srsly, more people need to start doing this.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Oh yeah and Marth is not harder than Samus.

Marth has to take more risks to deal damage to Mario and score kills as long as you DI well, and D-throw U-tilt is super amazing for juggling him. Samus is much harder to combo than Marth due to her weird physics and gay Nair/Bombs, lives longer, and never gets gimped. And her D-tilt is ****ing stupid.

 

[j3ly]

i would be happy to discuss matchups with you, if we do it other people will join in. i can provide consistency if you can.

cons:
grabbing a good marth is very, very difficult.
marth is (imo but im pretty sure its a fact) marios worst matchup.
marth can break many of marios combos with fair, and marths nair beats out every one of marios approaches (save wavedash jab) on reaction.
in my opinion fd is marios worst stage against marth. this is a shame, cos its normally one of marios best stages. Fireball camping works abit better on this stage which is good, but the way marth can just calmly keep underneath you and smash (once you have been launched into the air) makes platforms an essential imo.
its hard to edgeguard marth with ledgehopped bairs, he has a very good mixup game. i always thought nair like shiek does is the best option anyway.

tons others, but the main issue here is spacing. marth outspaces mario to a horrible level, it really is hard to deal with. mario must constantly be faking out to get a hit.

whats your opinion of the other side of the matchup?
i might write my opinion on the samus matchup tomo, one of the best players in our crew plays samus. father samus if you will, for he sow the seed that grew into the smash fiending monster i am now.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Grabbing a good Marth is hard, but it's much much easier than grabbing a good Fox or Falco player, the latter of which is in my opinion Mario's worst matchup.

Yeah Marth outspaces Mario, but he's overall a slower character in terms of attacking speed. When Marth does moves, he doesn't have zero ending lag. Getting in his range is actually very easy with proper application of wavedashing although it requires you to read him, which is of course why Mario is disadvantaged. I must stress that it is extremely difficult for Marth to actually wall you out if you know your mobility options.

D-throw U-tilt/U-air juggles can't be broken by F-airs easily. He has to resort to a risky D-air or Counter for a better chance of breaking that. He doesn't really combo into kill moves easily if you know how to DI, and the kill moves he does have are very unsafe when not comboed into. Landing D-air on him also combos just fine.

Samus overall has less aerial ending lag than Marth, is much harder to combo due to her physics, bombs, and quick N-air, and while she really isn't better at killing than Marth, her F-smash still outranges you and is safer than Marth's. Her D-tilt is also a VERY gay attack that can destroy a lot of Mario's approaches, as well as her D-smash.

Generally speaking I think Samus is better at capitalizing on Mario's weaknesses and minimizing his advantages. While Mario can survive pretty long against Samus and try to poke his way around stuff, he really can't do anything gay to her that will work consistently. Against Marth, you can **** him from directly below and when you get a grab, and he's gimpable, and you can also survive fairly long against Marth as well. You aren't exactly forced to approach Marth either, while Samus on the other hand definitely forces you to approach.

Falco however is I believe Mario's worst matchup, since really, I just never feel like Mario has any really safe options against Falco. You can't shieldgrab Falco's rushdown if he does it right, his lasers stop your approaches extremely well, and his B-air and D-air guarantee that recovering against him will be very difficult. I mean yeah, it's not unwinnable since you have a chainthrow to like 80 that can end in F-smash, but man...it's just a demoralizing matchup if they don't mess up.

 

[a rookie]

Marth: Yes, this match-up is hella tough! I mean, he has a super long range sword with a long range grab? Omg! It's too good to be true. It's NOT EASY to approach unless you bait him or jump all the way over him for a back-air and then hopefully get something started. You have fireballs, but those can only do so much, especially against someone that knows how to maneuver their way around them fairly easy. Remember, when you're against a Marth that f-airs way too **** much but it actually works and you can't get in, that's when you crouch cancel --> down smash. It works, just don't do it TOO MUCH. It'll become predictable and they'll get free percentage on you. Also, remember, when they up-b and you mess up and they end up hitting you, you can always crouch cancel and retaliate with a down tilt. Hey, it's percentage right? Food for thought.

Falco: Ok, A2ZOMG is right about this....maybe! I don't believe it's his worst match-up but it's at least in his top 3 worst match-ups for sure. You have the chain throws to (insert move here) and you also have the cape, which is good. I mean, you can always mind game by caping them one stock so next stock they'll expect the cape and then switch it up. Falco's not TOO TOUGH to edgeguard. You just have to know what you're doing against that particular player. About the lasers, SPAM YOUR CAPE! And when they get into range for attacking you, defend yourself! If a good falco puts shield pressure on you, just roll away at the right time or else you'll get punished or nair them if you can catch them off guard. Falco is **** hard you guys, trust me. I played Mango's Falco in friendlies, but I beat it for the most part consistently. So, it's not impossible =P

Samus: She's actually not TOO TOUGH. I mean, HugS is the only samus that has beaten my in tourney. I've beat ycz7 and death(I think that's his name). Mario can freakin' duck under the missiles, I mean come on ;D And cape them of course. When it comes to edgeguarding, just f-smash(aim it downwards) or cape just to get more damage. Samus is fairly easy to approach. It's not a Marth or Falco, so you're good.

But yes, grabbing any good player is very difficult. Catch them off guard! Do something unexpected! Switch it up! Trust me, it'll work (: I got a lot of grabs on Lucky's(Mango's former partner) Fox, so you guys can get a lot of grabs on anyone! Don't give up!

 

[MaNg0]

u bragging about beating my falco albert?

u ***

lol

now ima have 2 baby try against u and *** u up

<3

 

[HugS™]

LoL @ Baby try.

I gathered 2 things from Albert's post...

He beats mango's falco for the most part, but can't beat my Samus.

****

 

[A2ZOMG]

So if Hugs > Albert and Albert > Mango and if ppl have been saying Mango is the best Smasher, then that means Hugs actually is the best Smasher by transitive rule of inequality? lol jk

I wish I could get to tournaments more often man.

 

[a rookie]

u bragging about beating my falco albert?

u ***

lol

now ima have 2 baby try against u and *** u up

<3

Lmao! Remember that 3 stock comeback *****? xD Haha!
Yeah, HugS is **** =D Haha.
I need to go to a tournament, school's sucking out my soul o____O
You can't say my Mario sucks Mango if it beat you FOR THE MOST PART! xD
Yo, when you gonna come down Joseph? (x

 

[MaNg0]

never said ur mario sucked

cant come into threads saying you won majority of friendlies

then people douche it up LOL


and i dunno sometime <3

 

[a rookie]

never said ur mario sucked

cant come into threads saying you won majority of friendlies

then people douche it up LOL


and i dunno sometime <3

Oh shoot, you're right. My bad o_______O
I didn't mean to be all cocky or whatever.
I just wanted to say that it's not impossible, lol.

 

[j3ly]

its pretty much impossible tho

playing gay > mario which is unfortunate. thats why 2nd mains are there!

 

[NJzFinest]

Hey Mario mains.

We're talking about Mario's Matchups in the MU thread atm:
http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=257235&page=347

It would be awesome to have Mario mains to give us some insight.

 

[mellowD]

i beat mango, hugs beats me

i cant beat either you must be good huh? but hey imo pp has the best mario lol

 

[j3ly]

but hey imo pp has the best mario lol

-fuzzyness has the best mario in the world. its ***** professor pro.

i beat mango, hugs beats me

- i beat fuzzyness who beat kage who beat mango so therefore me > mango.

AND i was drunk.