hmm I think it doesn't really suck but MK can do so much more to Snake then just sitting back and wait out the timer. It actually gives snake space to set up his traps. If MK puts smart pressure on snake and takes momentum once he can you can pretty much combo him to 50% en get him off-stage with some good reads.
And yeah I know the host of that tourney and his brother. actualy played them. they john a lot about MK and Snake and trash talk about the characters a lot. Funny how everyone in EU thinks they are baised xD
also This is the first time I tried it so it might not be complete or mis some important stuff. But I tried to make an write-up about the MK ditto. Like I said it's far from perfect but I had the time and made this so I as well just post it here.
If there are more people having trouble with the same mu I might try to make a 2nd one for that mu. But this is my best mu so it might not be this long =V
Hope people can use it took me like 3 hours to make =)
MK Ditto:
By far my best mu. I believe that the MK who takes the first stock has a really big advantage. Even a big % difference can do a lot of wonders. Why? Because this mu heavily depends on the which player is able to bait the other in to something. Basically this mu is hit or get hit. If you hit him you can build some nice damage and momentum but if you miss an attack that was mend to hit, you will probably get punished. MK can punish all of his own options. Being patient is key in this mu. If the match starts the most important thing to do is to get a small lead. This will give you a lot of advantage because your opponent now has to take the initiative. This is the point where you need to start baiting. The more % difference you built the more your opponent will try to land a hit. Play with this. Let him come for the hit and punish. I’ll go into good options for that later. So the bigger your lead the more advantage. That’s of course in every match but in this particular mu it’s key. If you have the lead expect dash attack, Dash grabs, Fair’s, f and d tilt and GSL. If your opponent has a lead be really careful. Don’t hesitate and don’t rush things. He is going to try and bait you. And because he has a lead he has the advantage in this. Your main goal is to get him in a position where you have the advantage. Above you or on the ledge are great places to put him. And 1 single dtilt poke can be enough for this. But again play it safe. You have to make reads in this position. Dash grab is great to beat MK’s who like to stay in shield a lot. But if they can easily catch up if you do this to much by just dodging it. Tilting you before you grab or to land a GSL. Especially the last thing is really bad. You are now above them which is a place you never want to be(Above MK). Even if your opponent has a lead you have to try and bait him into something you can punish. A lot of players get greedy even with a small lead and still go for anything to make a bigger lead. This is where you can get some nice comeback.
Once you manage to land a small hit you can do 2 things. Reset the situation and go for safety or get your momentum you just earned and try to go for some combo’s. the 1st option is always good but that doesn’t mean it’s always the best option. Once you land something like a dtilt another dtilt or even ftilt can be nice follow ups. You can also follow up with Nair, Fair or Dair. Even though the last option is dangerous because you are now above your opponent. Grab also gives you a lof of nice follow ups. Great mind games are throwing with any throw and punish your opponents reaction to it and shield to regrab him. This is rather safe and give great reward. Out of Ftilt you don’t want to do too much. You can walk in and ftilt again but this again is dangous.
Another great thing a grab can do is getting your opponent in the air for Uair strings. Sounds weird but MK is actually really good in juggling himself. His Uair is faster than his own Dair and Air dodge is really punishable with Nair, Dair or FF Uair. When you are juggling MK watch out for a few things. Even though your uair is faster he still has a Dair. If he manages to land this on you all your momentum is gone. And if you have bad luck he can grab momentum for himself due to him landing earlier then you . Even though his air doge is punishable if he manages to get though you he will be under you and then you have to land safe while he is juggling you. Seems quite easy right? But it isn’t as easy as it seems. MK also has 5 midair jumps. MK can easily punish mindless thrown out Uair by using 1 midair jump and then use his dair. Then MK also has his glide. Which is fast and will get him aways from you. If you actually see him going for it and you r still in range don’t be afraid and nado him if he can’t cancel it in time. Don’t do this mindless though. You can get punished badly once you miss this due to free fall. MK can also go for a fast fall Nair in-between your Uairs. This is easily punished with Uair though so once you see him going for this punish it simple and fast with uair.
The last thing MK can do is trying to get on same height as you and fair or bair you. This will not happen often but if he reads your jump and falls a little away from you this kind of things can happen. If this happens and he faces you with his back go for Fair. Your fair is faster than his Bair.
If you are the one facing with the back. The best choice is to move away. You can’t AD Bair because it’s long lasting so don’t try to do that unless you or he is fast falling and the other is not. You can also use 1 mid Air jump and dair him. This however brings you above him which isn’t a good position.
There is also the scenario where you are the MK who has to land. Once this happens the safest way out is to glide away. Watch out though. If you get to close or if you glide away to obvious you will get punished by nado or any Arial that MK has to reach you at that moment. If you can’t glide away safe try to read his Uair’s and try to get an dair in. It’s not the most safe option but if you manage to land it you can land safely. Fast Fall Nair can be a nice mind game but be really careful because it’s pretty easy to punish this. Other than that try to get away from him as much as possible. His Uair is answer to most of your options. Take in mind that he always has the advantage in this situation. Sometimes it’s way safer to just get the **** out. Landing safe is the most important.
If you are in the position to juggle him or when he has high% overall you can try to get hi off-stage. Good moves to get him off-stage are dair, ASL, fair, Dthrow, Bthrow. You can get him on the ledge with Dtilt as well which is also really helpful but I go into that later. Once you manage to get your opponent off the stage which you can do out of reads or combo’s you have an advantage. He has to recover. You can cover all of his options here. If he goes for low recovery. You can wait him up @ the ledge and try to shuttle loop him. It’s really a great and rewarding option. However. He can beat it with moves like Tornado. Keep in mind that if you space it properly you can beat his tornado with ASL.
Do never go too far in this. It’s really dangerous. He can also use his shuttle loop at some spots. And stage spike you. IF you think it’s not safe to go off-stage don’t do it. Your intuition is right most of the time. If you feel like it’s too dangerous stay on stage and let him recover. He will go to the ledge which is also an advantage position for you if you are on stage. Gimping MK when he recovers low is possible but it’s also really dangerous. You can go for this though when he is farther away from the stage. If you read his shuttle loop recovery you can simply punish by waiting above him and nado. It’s and simple and great option.
If MK decides to recover on stage height you also have a few options. You can glide to him to go for an GA. This is an pretty good option but honestly I think it’s not really worth it if he isn’t in kill % since he can shuttle loop punish you for it and with some bad luck you get killed He can also just nado you if you get too close to cancel in time. You also have the option to go for a fair or dair. To kill him. Again it’s not 100% safe and can lead to a death. You also have options like getting below him for Uair strings but again it’s not safe.
If he is recovering high you should wait and go for juggling when he is getting closer to the stage. He just lets you play below him which is in your advantage. I am not going into juggling again
If you have to recover it’s just the other way around. Do not go low. He can just shuttle loop you and the range it has is pretty big. So it’s not that good at all. If you go low try to go as low as possible. This way it’s harder for him to land a shuttle loop. He will likely predict the shuttle loop and start nadoing above you. Safest is to get close to the ledge and use your down special. Really it’s fast and probably your safest recovery. Don’t recover with nado ever. Unless he is gliding in your direction. It’s really punishable. The safest is to glide around stage height and cancel it as soon as the opponent gets close to you. You have to read him. He can cover all of your options when you recover. Nothing is 100% safe. You have to bait/Adapt well to whatever he plans to do. In general the safest is to glide as close as possible until he comes for you. Then avoid him and go for the ledge a.s.a.p. with downB. Even if you have to angle it down and left or right. It’s better than getting ASL’ed. Try to avoid SideB as well. It’s easily punished with any properly spaced move. It’s still an option so if you need it use it.
Next I am going to cover general grounded gameplay and good ways to bait. Your most important tools on the ground and probably the entire mu as well are Dtilt, Ftilt, Grab and Fair. Since both MK’s want to stay grounded this is going to be an huge part of the mu. You want to have at least 1 dtilt length between you and your opponent. This is where the bait game starts. You and your opponent are going to throw out Dtilt, Fair,s and Ftilf1. What you want to do to get though this is baiting this. Get as close as possible without getting hit by any of his moves. Watch out though. He can dash grab if he baits you to this. You want to get as close as possible. Once you get close you want to shield one of the moves. So go into his range shield the move and punish. Like I said he can go for a dash grab. The first 50% will probably go like this at least if both MK’s are patient. If you manage to block his move. You have to use the correct punishing toll. If he is grounded Dtilt him. If he is in the air go for the fair or Ftilt. So punish Ftilt and Dtilt with your Dtilt and Punish Fair with Ftilt or Fair. Dsmash
Front hit might as well be fast enough not sure about that to be honest. If he goes for the complete ftilt you can basically punish with everything. Another good option is to GSL him. It’s an great option because you can abuse your Super armor. However if he blocks it you will be above your opponent. Which is really bad especially at low%. If he spaces his moves wrong you can grab him. Do this. It does more damage than Fair and Dtilt and has much better follow ups then Ftilt has at least in my opinion. And it beats shield. Out of grabs your unless you can throw him off-stage Dthrow is your best option. It has great follow ups. You can try to get an 2nd grab you can try to buffer an Ftilt. You can run in and GSL him which I love to do at high%. Uthrow is nice for kills. You could try to get some nice ASL read out of F or B throw. Don’t spot dodge unless you predict an Grab. He can easily punish this by ftilting. Or just wait and grab. What I like to do to beat Spot dodges is Ftilting really slow. Most players expect you to throw all 3 hits as fast as possible. If you do this slow you will catch spotdodges. Or some rackless approaches. You also don’t want to roll much in the ditto. You could do it to avoid Ftilt. But I personally don’t like rolling in this mu.
Last I am going to go into how to get kills. And how to avoid them.
You have a few ways to kill or get killed. Most important kill moves are GSL, ASL , Dsmash, Nair and Glide attack. There are always situations where moves like dair, Bair or other moves can kill. This however is off-stage or your opponent has a lot of damage. First GSL, this move kills around 100% depending on the stage you are playing. This move has the advantage that it is extremely good OOC. This move be really helpful due to invincibility frames. You can counter like every move with this. If he tries to Dsmash you and you can react in time this move can be really good. You can also punish bad spaced fairs, or tilts with this. This move is also really hard to predict because it’s really fast and it can serve well with a lot of mix-ups. However a lot of MK players tend to throw out more of them if they manage to land more than 1 in a short period of time. Don’t do this. It will get predictable and once you miss you are in a bad position(above you opponent). This move should be used a lot but be cautious with it. The second kill move is actually the same move but now in the air. ASL is great to kill an opponent who isn’t ready for it really early. Most of the times you will catch your opponent with this move out of a juggle read or off stage if they decide to recover low. This move can beat tornado if you hit the very first hitbox. If your opponent recovers bad this move is really good to punish. Watch out though if you try to space it that way that you catch the ledge. If you miss space it your probably dead if the opponent recognizes it. Then we have or good old Dsmash. This move is really good. It’s fast and if not used to much really unpredictable. However if you land it on his shield your opponent can Dsmash you. The back hit from the Dsmash is much stronger. If you catch your opponent in situations where you can choose which side if the dsmash you land, land the back hit. Think of situations where he got too greedy with ARL or Tornado and where he is freefalling onto the stage. Then again The front hit is really fast and good for gtfo. But watch out since he can hit you with it if he shields yours. This move is also great for catching landings, spot doges or rolls. We also have that wicked Nair. This move is great. This move can punish Air dodges, Arial’s, bad spaced F and D tilts and combo’s really well at low%. Honestly I like this move more as combo tool then as kill move But that’s your decision. You can use it for both I guess but it gets stale so be aware of that. Last we have the Glide attack. This move is really good because it clashes with every move. The disadvantage is that multi hit moves beat it if they space it correctly. This move has really good mix ups like slow gliding on the stage to get from the ledge or gliding past the ledge and catch your opponent who doesn’t expect it. This move has great range so don’t be afraid to use it. However don’t try to go 1 on 1 with your opponents Fsmash. It’s really dangerous especially at high%. Those are the 5 main kill moves you have. You can decide for yourself which one you like the most. However those are not our only kill options. We have Fsmash. It’s our strongest move. It has a lot of range and it’s cool down is really low making it hard to punish. This move is great to catch an opponent that approaches to much with nado. GSL can also serve in this role well but Fsmash hits harder and you won’t stale your GSL So if you find the hole to land it do it. Fsmash is also an amazing edge guarding tool. Impatient MK’s who get on the ledge to fast find themselves getting hit by this pretty often. We also have our Dair. This move is great to punish bad recovering MK’s of stage. At high % this move is good for killing or sending your opponent of stage. Last you could kill with Uthrow If you get a grab around 170% or higher. Try to land it on the highest platform of the stage that way it kills earlier.
Now I’m going to tackle avoiding those moves Since he also has them.
First the GSL. GSL is hard to avoid consistently. It’s fast and it can punish a lot of your moves. If you find yourself at kill% stay out of it’s range. Your probably only save moves are perfect spaced Dtilt and Ftilt. Use these but be careful with them. You shouldn’t approach you opponent if he can kill you with this move. It’s really hard to get around it and you should almost always let him do a move to punish aka baiting. This move is a pain to avoid really I can’t say a lot more about it. Actually if your opponent has Patterns with this move or uses it really predictable you should be able to adapt to it and punish it with Uair to bring him in juggling position. Then we have ASL. Ok 1 really important thing never use AD if it’s not 100% needed. He can easily punish you with this move if you do it too often. Off-stage don’t recover low in this moves range. Your dead if it hits you. It’s really deadly you should always try to recover out of this moves range. Other than that don’t do punishable things in the air this move will punish them if your opponent gets the read. Dsmash is the next move. Don’t use spot dodges or rolls it high%. It really makes this move less dangerous even though it’s still dangerous. Don’t use your dsmash or ftilt3 on his shield. He can easily Dsmash this. Last don’t land near your opponent. Dsmash can easily punish you if you do this. Next up is Nair. This move is punishable with GSL if you shield it so be aware of that. This move is mostly used to kill you out of Air dodge reads, spot dodge reads, roll reads or off-stage. Again don’t use to much air doges or spot doges. Don’t use any rolls without reason and don’t do any random move off-stage.
That’s about it I guess.
To play this mu correctly you need to play really patient and you need to bait your opponent to do moves. This mu requires that you think about every move you use since every move is punishable and especially at kill% this can be really dangerous. This mu is really hard to learn and play consistently. This is because almost every MK knows this mu really well and it can really depend on who guesses right. However staying alert at every moment, being able to adapt well to your opponent and staying patient no Mather what really change this mu.
