Volasko
Smash Ace
Ok this all started a few months back when bored at work I decided to help someone out who was having problems with Samus. The original 800 word post can be seen here:
http://smashboards.com/showthread.p...522#post1170522
Anyways recently I have been having lots of problems with Samus so I decided to turn my original post into a mini-guide for just dealing with Samus. Its a bit of a long read but I believe I have covered most of the situations pretty well. Anyways Im curious to see what others think and hopefully we can continue to add to this and maybe(if time permits) I can create other Character specific guides for Marth.
NEW AND IMPROVED SAMUS GUIDE
I probably have more matches against my buddies samus with my marth than any other match up, so ill lend my advice on this topic to the best of my abilities.
Note:: Marth is all about his range and his ability to space himself properly to take advantage of it. This guide is for those very specific situations that only really come up while facing Samus. They are not intended to replace Marth tried and true range game, just suggestions on how to deal with Samus and her crazy bag'o'tricks.
Enjoy,
Dealing with Projectiles:
Samus will most likely be spamming missles and charged shots because marth doesnt have a long range game. The best solution of missles are IMO f-tilts and N-attacks(quickest move if standing still). You can walk(not dash) towards a missle/charge shot spamming samus and f-tilt through the missles.. They come from the bottom and have a huge sweeping hitbox, plus its a clash animation which means you have no lag after the clash(you will then have the frame advantage), so you can just swing again. It is to be noted that a f-tilt will cancel everything but a fully charged shot, so be weary of that. When recovering, dont be predictable!! Try to save your second jump so you can quickly jump over/away from her missles/charged shots. F-airs work well for chopping through missles, this helps to give u the frame advantage and forces samus to be defensive/evasive. Also I tip I have found is that if Im recovering and the samus is tossing all sorts of firepower at me, instead of watching your self, watch the samus. You will be able to see exaclty whats coming and how to react. I find it easier to dodge when I am focusing on her, with Marth in my peripheral vision. There is nothing more frustrating than getting edgegaurded while the biatch is on the other side of the MAP!!
Grabbing:
When you do get a grab on her always throw her forward. If you can catch your opponent off gaurd and thus DIing poorly(wont happen often when facing pros) usually a f-throw can lead to a f-smash tipper. In most cases your opponent will be DIing away from you so then follow up with some offensive airials or a WDed f-smash(if her life gets high enough so she cant DJ away, around %80 +). She is just too floaty for any other direction. You can throw her up when she is at low percentage, and follow up with some shuffled u-airs, but she might be able just double jump out of range, so this is situational. Marths grab game isnt nearly as good as other chars just because you cannont combo samus out of a grab due to her floatyness.
What to do with her CC:
Samus is the heaviest character, thus she has one of the best CC's in the game. It is extremely frustrating to deal with. The best solution to this is jump cancled grabs out of a dash dance(DD). The idea of the DD is to fake out samus into doing a d-smash, by dashing in and out of her range. When she misses you can punish her in the lag after the d-smash by doing a wavesmash(IMO the quickest way to punish anyone at moderate distance away from you). Also Marth is all about range, you need to learn to exploit this to the best of your abilities. F-tilts and N-attacks are a real good way of keeping samus at bay without leaving your self open. F-b combos dont work for a CC samus, unless you can catch her off gaurd in the air or not CCing. Another good trick for a CC sammy is too do SHUFFLed f-airs but hold the shoulder button after the L-cancel as this will bring your shield up ASAP. The idea is that you know Samus is gonna absorb the hit and counter with a smash/tilt(down or forward), and u wanna predict that by sheilding the smash ASAP and sheild grabbing her in the lag.
Husband Pro Tip: If you find that the samus is CC your double f-air SH approaches and countering with D-smashes/tilts you can try this. Instead of doing your second f-air, double jump away from samus to dodge her CCed counter move and punish with a FFed d-air while she is in her smash/tilt lag. Also because the d-air is a spike she cannot CC it, so you will have the frame advantage when you land. This is a great mind game as its essentially a counter to a counter(the first counter being samus CCing ur approach) and will get your opponent double thinking if CCing is even worth it, and that is always a good thing
. You can see Husbands original advice in post 13.
Edgegaurding:
The one good thing about playing samus is that you will improve your edgegaurding skills very fast just because she is soo hard to edgegaurd. You have to use every trick in the book with her; ledge-dropped b-airs, jumping charged b's, double jumped f-airs, ledgehogging, ledgedopped to d-air back to stage, and of course the usual d-tilts and fsmashes. Remember that once she uses her plasma beam once she has to touch the ground to get it back. If you see going for the plasma beam, try a ledgedropped b-air(practis this timing as it can get u killed if you drop to low) to swat her away then ledgehog because she has to u-b recover. Marth has the best edgegaurding game and samus has the best recovery so this usually ends up being a long cat and mouse game. As much as I love Marth's spike(d-air) its pretty hard to pull on samus as an approach attack. She will usually be too far away to safely to this. Also if she is above you and you try and double jump to d-air, she can counter with her d-air and will own with its massive range and power. Just full jump to f-air when under her to take advantage of weakness underneath(this weakness is explained in General Tips and Notes). A general rule i like to follow, if she is recovering from above the ledge, stay on the stage and use jumping f-airs, charged b's, jumping b-airs, d-tilts and f-smashes to edgegaurd. If she is bomb jumping below the ledge i like to drop down to the ledge and use ledgedropped b-air's, ledgedropped d-airs to stage, and ledgehogging to get the kills. Watch out though for the plasma beam, if your hangin and she hits you with it IMMEDIATLY use your up-B, dont go for the slower f-b to up-b, as usually samus will already be on the ledge and you will get counter edgehogged. You can always keep ledgedropping to 2nd jump back to ledge as this will give you your invincibility frame back, practis the timing though.
General Tips and Notes:
Marth's Air game >> Samus's air game. Your range owns samus in the air. Lots of Fast falled, l-cancled airials help contol the match(especially SHUFFLed F-airs as there is basically no lag so u cant be punished) by keeping her in the air. Always try to keep her airborn as this takes away from her ground/CCing/projectile spamming game. She has a big weakness underneath her as her d-air is very laggy. You can easily full jump/double jump to f-air/u-air underneath a falling samus, as she wont have enough time to d-air. This helps rack up the damage. Its a hard matchup no doubt, but once you take away her projectile game with walking f-tilts, youll find it gets much easier.
I was always under the impression that Marth>Samus from what I have read in other treads (http://smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=60031), but from experience its a pretty even match up. Remember, Samus has one of the laggyest shield grabs, thats why they resort to CCing to Dsmash, so L-cancel every airial and block as best as possible, then punish in thier lag. Also I find Wave-shielding (wavedashing into/out of a shield) works wonders if you u wanna play the reactive game. Just wave shield right up to her, block the melee attack and sheild grab. If you see her going for the laggy grab just spot dodge it and punish in her lag (WDing back into a tipper is nice, or even a sweetspotted dolphin Slash
)
Just trying to be complete but this is another lil trick I found to add to the collection of options marth has. I have noticed is that when samus is bomb jumping back to the stage she can be very predicatble as ur opponent will be trying to use the bombs and hence in a predicatable spot for a few frames. If you can pick up on this and are fast enough you can intercept her right after her bomb jump and go for a d-air. The idea is that if you time it right you will hit her just after she comes off her bomb and finish her then. The beauty of this is that if you time it right you will just FF right into her bomb canceling your d-air lag and allowing u to f-b back to stage with ease. Now it does take some getting used to as Samus can fake you out by DIing left and right as she Bombjumps but its just somethign to consider if you have an extra stock(or two ) and dont mind the risk if it means u can finish the match right then and there.
This all started from one simple request and now has turned into a pretty solid guide against samus. Im looking for any tips people want to add that I may have missed, as I still am having problems dealing with Samus as well and I'm looking for anything that will help.
Thanks for reading,
V
http://smashboards.com/showthread.p...522#post1170522
Anyways recently I have been having lots of problems with Samus so I decided to turn my original post into a mini-guide for just dealing with Samus. Its a bit of a long read but I believe I have covered most of the situations pretty well. Anyways Im curious to see what others think and hopefully we can continue to add to this and maybe(if time permits) I can create other Character specific guides for Marth.
NEW AND IMPROVED SAMUS GUIDE
I probably have more matches against my buddies samus with my marth than any other match up, so ill lend my advice on this topic to the best of my abilities.
Note:: Marth is all about his range and his ability to space himself properly to take advantage of it. This guide is for those very specific situations that only really come up while facing Samus. They are not intended to replace Marth tried and true range game, just suggestions on how to deal with Samus and her crazy bag'o'tricks.
Enjoy,
Dealing with Projectiles:
Samus will most likely be spamming missles and charged shots because marth doesnt have a long range game. The best solution of missles are IMO f-tilts and N-attacks(quickest move if standing still). You can walk(not dash) towards a missle/charge shot spamming samus and f-tilt through the missles.. They come from the bottom and have a huge sweeping hitbox, plus its a clash animation which means you have no lag after the clash(you will then have the frame advantage), so you can just swing again. It is to be noted that a f-tilt will cancel everything but a fully charged shot, so be weary of that. When recovering, dont be predictable!! Try to save your second jump so you can quickly jump over/away from her missles/charged shots. F-airs work well for chopping through missles, this helps to give u the frame advantage and forces samus to be defensive/evasive. Also I tip I have found is that if Im recovering and the samus is tossing all sorts of firepower at me, instead of watching your self, watch the samus. You will be able to see exaclty whats coming and how to react. I find it easier to dodge when I am focusing on her, with Marth in my peripheral vision. There is nothing more frustrating than getting edgegaurded while the biatch is on the other side of the MAP!!
Grabbing:
When you do get a grab on her always throw her forward. If you can catch your opponent off gaurd and thus DIing poorly(wont happen often when facing pros) usually a f-throw can lead to a f-smash tipper. In most cases your opponent will be DIing away from you so then follow up with some offensive airials or a WDed f-smash(if her life gets high enough so she cant DJ away, around %80 +). She is just too floaty for any other direction. You can throw her up when she is at low percentage, and follow up with some shuffled u-airs, but she might be able just double jump out of range, so this is situational. Marths grab game isnt nearly as good as other chars just because you cannont combo samus out of a grab due to her floatyness.
What to do with her CC:
Samus is the heaviest character, thus she has one of the best CC's in the game. It is extremely frustrating to deal with. The best solution to this is jump cancled grabs out of a dash dance(DD). The idea of the DD is to fake out samus into doing a d-smash, by dashing in and out of her range. When she misses you can punish her in the lag after the d-smash by doing a wavesmash(IMO the quickest way to punish anyone at moderate distance away from you). Also Marth is all about range, you need to learn to exploit this to the best of your abilities. F-tilts and N-attacks are a real good way of keeping samus at bay without leaving your self open. F-b combos dont work for a CC samus, unless you can catch her off gaurd in the air or not CCing. Another good trick for a CC sammy is too do SHUFFLed f-airs but hold the shoulder button after the L-cancel as this will bring your shield up ASAP. The idea is that you know Samus is gonna absorb the hit and counter with a smash/tilt(down or forward), and u wanna predict that by sheilding the smash ASAP and sheild grabbing her in the lag.
Husband Pro Tip: If you find that the samus is CC your double f-air SH approaches and countering with D-smashes/tilts you can try this. Instead of doing your second f-air, double jump away from samus to dodge her CCed counter move and punish with a FFed d-air while she is in her smash/tilt lag. Also because the d-air is a spike she cannot CC it, so you will have the frame advantage when you land. This is a great mind game as its essentially a counter to a counter(the first counter being samus CCing ur approach) and will get your opponent double thinking if CCing is even worth it, and that is always a good thing
. You can see Husbands original advice in post 13.Edgegaurding:
The one good thing about playing samus is that you will improve your edgegaurding skills very fast just because she is soo hard to edgegaurd. You have to use every trick in the book with her; ledge-dropped b-airs, jumping charged b's, double jumped f-airs, ledgehogging, ledgedopped to d-air back to stage, and of course the usual d-tilts and fsmashes. Remember that once she uses her plasma beam once she has to touch the ground to get it back. If you see going for the plasma beam, try a ledgedropped b-air(practis this timing as it can get u killed if you drop to low) to swat her away then ledgehog because she has to u-b recover. Marth has the best edgegaurding game and samus has the best recovery so this usually ends up being a long cat and mouse game. As much as I love Marth's spike(d-air) its pretty hard to pull on samus as an approach attack. She will usually be too far away to safely to this. Also if she is above you and you try and double jump to d-air, she can counter with her d-air and will own with its massive range and power. Just full jump to f-air when under her to take advantage of weakness underneath(this weakness is explained in General Tips and Notes). A general rule i like to follow, if she is recovering from above the ledge, stay on the stage and use jumping f-airs, charged b's, jumping b-airs, d-tilts and f-smashes to edgegaurd. If she is bomb jumping below the ledge i like to drop down to the ledge and use ledgedropped b-air's, ledgedropped d-airs to stage, and ledgehogging to get the kills. Watch out though for the plasma beam, if your hangin and she hits you with it IMMEDIATLY use your up-B, dont go for the slower f-b to up-b, as usually samus will already be on the ledge and you will get counter edgehogged. You can always keep ledgedropping to 2nd jump back to ledge as this will give you your invincibility frame back, practis the timing though.
General Tips and Notes:
Marth's Air game >> Samus's air game. Your range owns samus in the air. Lots of Fast falled, l-cancled airials help contol the match(especially SHUFFLed F-airs as there is basically no lag so u cant be punished) by keeping her in the air. Always try to keep her airborn as this takes away from her ground/CCing/projectile spamming game. She has a big weakness underneath her as her d-air is very laggy. You can easily full jump/double jump to f-air/u-air underneath a falling samus, as she wont have enough time to d-air. This helps rack up the damage. Its a hard matchup no doubt, but once you take away her projectile game with walking f-tilts, youll find it gets much easier.
I was always under the impression that Marth>Samus from what I have read in other treads (http://smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=60031), but from experience its a pretty even match up. Remember, Samus has one of the laggyest shield grabs, thats why they resort to CCing to Dsmash, so L-cancel every airial and block as best as possible, then punish in thier lag. Also I find Wave-shielding (wavedashing into/out of a shield) works wonders if you u wanna play the reactive game. Just wave shield right up to her, block the melee attack and sheild grab. If you see her going for the laggy grab just spot dodge it and punish in her lag (WDing back into a tipper is nice, or even a sweetspotted dolphin Slash
)Just trying to be complete but this is another lil trick I found to add to the collection of options marth has. I have noticed is that when samus is bomb jumping back to the stage she can be very predicatble as ur opponent will be trying to use the bombs and hence in a predicatable spot for a few frames. If you can pick up on this and are fast enough you can intercept her right after her bomb jump and go for a d-air. The idea is that if you time it right you will hit her just after she comes off her bomb and finish her then. The beauty of this is that if you time it right you will just FF right into her bomb canceling your d-air lag and allowing u to f-b back to stage with ease. Now it does take some getting used to as Samus can fake you out by DIing left and right as she Bombjumps but its just somethign to consider if you have an extra stock(or two
) and dont mind the risk if it means u can finish the match right then and there.This all started from one simple request and now has turned into a pretty solid guide against samus. Im looking for any tips people want to add that I may have missed, as I still am having problems dealing with Samus as well and I'm looking for anything that will help.
Thanks for reading,
V
