MU discussion: Sheik

[Nikes]

Discuss the Sheik matchup here. It's ninja vs ninja

Matchup ratio: Coming soon.

Notes:
*We can grab release > dash attack her apparently (I'm not consistent with this myself but it's still worth playing around with)
*Her needles disrupt everything of ours, and can't be canceled out, just shield or jump over them.
*Need to vector upwards to avoid her Dthrow > Uair. At higher %'s you can completely avoid the Uair.

 

[jeck95]

Something else to note: Nair can combo break sheik's ftilts

 

[Slice~]

Something else to note: Nair can combo break sheik's ftilts

Not if you are playing a decent Sheik that can space the combo properly.
FAir both outranges and denies Yoshi's NAir.
I tried it for a long time too, since there are a many Sheik mains over here. But dropped it during my last tourney since it didn't work anymore after the pool matches.

Sheik's FAir and her Bouncing Tunar (Down B i guess, that flippedy flop thingey...) are pretty much her strongest moves which you have to be aware of while facing her.
If she tries to FAir string you, vector away from her and interrupt it (if needed, DJ).
If you want to interrupt her string by being more aggressive, DJ into her FAir while getting ***** and NAir her after sucking up her FAir with the superarmor.

I wouldn't try to fight her FAir strings by brawling in melee range.
Try to kite and punish her with Egg Tosses and Egg Lays.

I wouldn't recommend to fight her Bouncing Fish engages either.
Its hitbox is ridunkulous big and hits hard. Also her hurtbox is ****in' weird while bouncing around, which makes her almost untargetable.
Try to punish her landing lag, if you can read the move. Also, better not try to pivot grab it, cause you will miss, and the fishy fish will rek you.

Try to keep being airborne, as her only ranged poke tool are her needles.

Don't try to pressure her shield with moves that make you land next to her. All of her moves have very little startups thus making you pay for your engage.

Don't ever try to gimp her, just throw eggs.
Her Up B is ridiculously good in this game. It both makes her hurtbox friggn' weird (again), and its first knockback is a very good kill move.
The combination of dodging almost all of Yoshi's attacks and killing/stealing his DJ, makes this move too strong.


These are just my 2 cents and the experience i got so far.
You may now proceed.

 

[jeck95]

I was talking about sheik's ftilts, not her fair. Sheik's fair is amazing against yoshi and shouldn't be challenged. Sheik's ftilts on the other hand, i have been able to combo break consistently.
Yoshi has to make sheik's down b whiff if yoshi wants to properly punish that move.

 

[Slice~]

Ah, my bad.

The other stuff still stands though! :D

 

[chipndip]

Her main advantage is her mobility. She can easily just throw out 1 or 2 needles to throw off your momentum, then start up herself, or just approach from under you if you happen to jump because that's usually a safe, powerful option for most characters, but this one especially. I just finished playing against a friend of mine that's a Shiek main (and hates Yoshi). Won with , lost with , won with ...and I main . Weird, I know, but the thing is...Slice is right. I tried chasing him off the stage, we both recovered, but the wind-box from his move wasted my stock WAY early out of nowhere since I slid offstage without touching the ground (it was weird...) + I already used the first egg throw. It's better to just toss some eggs, and if they get hit, THEN go for something. If they don't, that teleport is gonna screw something up.

Side note: I don't even use . We got in this debate about strong characters in the game, and his main gripe was while mine was . Another friend told us to settle it in Smash, so I used against his :4shiek: and . Won both of 'em. Rosalina's so stupidly strong that I can beat people's mains with the little I picked up from just 2 good players a month or so ago that I never truly practiced on my own time.

 

[Sinister Slush]

The flailing whale looks strong, and because of the flopping flounder I don't think it'd be as easy to gimp her anymore by constantly pressuring her offstage horizontally solely cause of the fluttering carp.
Still looks like just going in her face is much better than egg camping or maybe even using Egg roll in some MU (this one includd) might be good now for anti-air or just in general when both at neutral position.

 

[Boshi PV]

I was able to beat out her flopping fish thing with Nair on most if not all occasions in my 7 or so For Glory matches against. Still think baiting or shielding and taking advantage of landing lag and then punishing is the best way to handle it, but Nair is my panic button when I'm in the air and floopy flounder is coming at me.

 

[Dyz]

I had a lot of matches with a Sheik player recently, his name is Darkzephr and from what we both noticed...

*Yoshi Uair beats her Dair,
*Her Bouncing Fish hitbox seems to destroy projectiles and go trough it, ( we assume this because i tried damaging him while trying to recover he unleashed the kick, destroyed the egg and still hit me )
*Sheiks Dthrow combo can be vectored, it could have been lag but he barely ever got his throw combos to work on me regardless of %, it did set me up for follow ups though, that he sometimes would miss the chance to either grab me again or attack due to my landing lag
*One way of countering Sheiks recovery is to Uair her from below, since her bouncing fish is more likely to miss and she doesnt have any attacks to hit yoshi from below her, so she only really has one option and thats to air dodge, which can mess up her horizontal recovery

thats all the notes i have for now, not sure if this all well known but just adding my two cents, otherwise all the regular approaches and strategies from yoshi mains still work, which are like egg toss approach/spacing, dash grabs/attacks, and all that other good stuff

 

[Lukingordex]

Important things to consider:

- Respect her fair, if you're being comboed by it just try vectorying away and don't try to react with any move since it will not work.
- Don't attack her carelessly or else you're going to get shield grabbed
- It's very risky to challenge her offstage

Good tools against her:

- Dair oos does massive % and shield damage and is a good response against pressure.
- Nair/Nair oos is a good option to escape pressure too.
- Fair is good to punish her if she decides to regrab the ledge, but you must be aware that she can Up b by surprise.
- Down B and Usmash kills her really early, save it.
- Egg lay, B-reversed egg lay and grabs are very good punish tools, but don't be carelessly with them though.
- Egg throw is very good for occasional camping and approach

 

[GSM_Dren]

I feel that Sheik is easily one of my unfavorable match ups. She is fast and has a lot of tools in her arsenal to shut down Yoshi. My friend @gsmVoiD uses Sheik and absolutely annihilates me.

- Her Fair needs to be respected. It follows up after a downthrow and can be chained.
- Her needles can be charged easily and be spammed, halting any of Yoshi's momentum.
- Her grenade adds a new element to her projectile game and can be used for keepaway.
- Bouncing fish adds a new kill and recovery move which I find can be hard to punish.
- Up B is extremely hard to punish and more often than not Sheik will recover back on the stage with ease.

I find eggs to help with approaching, but with sheik's quick movement, she can easily negate and punish. OOS Jump + Nair is a saving grace if she catches you in shield. Like Lukinhasss said above, do not attack carelessly or else you're going to get punished big time. I need much more practice with this match up, but out of all the characters I've faced so far, I think Shiek is definitely Yoshi's bane of existence.

 

[ATH_]

Sheik is a tough one to face, I mention her a lot in my Yoshi guide because she tends to be the problem with a decent chunk of Yoshi's solid strategies. You have to play differently when facing Sheik.

That said, on top of what others have said:
- FAiring for the Meteor while she's recovering isn't that great of an idea, Bouncing Fish will go past you and her UpB will hurt
+ One of the best options on the edge is to space slightly away from it, and throw an egg to waste her double jump (which can make her have to freefall for the ledge, allowing you to FAir)
+ Stay close, but make sure you aren't in the range of a grab in most instances, she likely won't use needles if you're in this range
- You can't challenge her FSmash as she moves with it, unless you purposefully charge yours and try to time it
- Her DSmash is quicker, so if you get stuck in a situation of dodging each others attacks in close-quarters, jump out and back in
+ Your side-B is surprisingly useful, since Sheik has a hard time breaking it, she'll end up shielding. Applies pressure for her trying to run away

 

[Augi Jr.]

Short Hop Down Air works very well. Everything else has been said by others.

 

[Boshi Kafka]

Short Hop Down Air works very well. Everything else has been said by others.

Defintely. Especially OOS.

Poor Yoshi, it's always Sheik. It's the same in Melee. When I face a Sheik in any game I focus on punishing and I can usually grind it out. Using dairs OOS to maximize damage and good juggling, as I love being under Sheik. If she dairs or air dodges to the ground, just punish its landing lag.

 

[ividal]

try to predict, as many people have said already sheik doesnt have ways to punish yoshi from below, so you can use that to chain a bit of Uair.
Dair can be superguarded so go for it if sheik uses it frequently.
dont fear the grenade, if you keep moving its more likely to not hit you with the explosion and if you get your timing right, you can punish shiek for it.
thats all the info i can afford, hope it helps

 

[Sinister Slush]

Wanted to bump since discussing this even though nobody reads smashboards these dayz. People vote for sheik and don't come to talk about her....
Plz.
It's not +1 her favor tho

 

[Bonds]

Play really safe and double jump away from all the vanish setups, don't get hit by soft nair at high percents and you're probably ok.

Yoshi is doomed to eat a gazillion damage from the get go, but from my experiences he's one of the most difficult characters for sheik to kill due to his floaty yet heavy physique. If you don't airdodge, sheik will have extreme difficulty killing you, the rage will build up, and then you can kill her pretty low yourself. Also, as mentioned, nair combo breaks her really well. You can get punished harder for using it if sheik baits it out (vanish) but if you throw it out every once in a while you'll keep her honest. I don't think the matchup is as bad for yoshi as it looks at face value, but it shouldn't be easy by any means.

Also, eggs are fantastic. They don't nullify needles entirely, but if sheik is trying to needle camp you, you win the trades by a lot unless she has a full salvo, which is difficult to get if you are constantly throwing eggs at her.

 

[Sinister Slush]

I retract my statement on it being even, Sheik vs Yoshi is +1 her favor.

 

[Delta-cod]

Explain, Slush. It might help start discussion.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Most our aerials are of course inside our body or have long wind ups so all Sheik has to do is either space to wait out the move or beat it with fair or bair before it even comes out.
I didn't even really have a problem with needles and I avoided bouncing fish well, but holy god is it impossible to hit a Sheik that knows how to move.

It's like she's invincible during bouncing fish and even if all her moves hit like marshmallows, if she just keeps being slippery and spacing well she can get the damage she needs just by getting grabs cause fthrow and bthrow do 9-12% I believe, which is basically 3 or 4 fairs from Sheik lol.

She's fast so camping when neutral isn't an option even with our mobility, our neutral b is too slow to get Sheik half the time, only moves I reliably got whether CQC or from a range was Eggs jab Dair and DownB, I couldn't even get tilts now that I think about it while all our aerials are beaten out purely cause too long to come out or just spacing from Sheik can beat them with her fair once the move is done or before it even begins (attempting to use nair during her fair chains for example) and vanish is dumb.
There was 4 occasions I threw out a move that should've hit but I guess when she's doing her animation before she even disappears (air and grounded) she's invincible as well.
Only died to vanish once out of the 8 or so attempts and 3 times it did land from my last two sets in Loser's being against Sheik mains, but why...

Gimping Sheik seems neigh impossible too, her recovery is way too good and any attempts we try at getting a lucky fair offstage will most likely result in us getting a stuffy nose from bouncing fish since we can't really challenge it. Eggs too since it can destroy those and it actually helps her recovery half the time.

The old "She can't kill thing" is true still, sometimes I got hit by bouncing fish or even bair around the 85+% range near the right blastzone on SV where it showed black n red electric after getting hit, but I still lived.
It doesn't matter though if she can't kill when we can't land a kill on her either cause she just slaps us away with fair or flailing whale or too slick for us to get a hold of.
Most of the kills that Sheik only gets on me is Bair Uair or Vanish. I only died to Vanish once or twice during my 2 sets against 2 different Sheik's yesterday in losers, but I'm sure you can probably guess which moves killed me the most then from my 10 stocks. (one of the games went to game 3)


In terms of stages, really not sure what might be good. Everyone of course chooses SV but I'll just say it's bad. Stages with platforms that're a decent size might do well, Delfino (and in this case skyloft and wuhu island as well) don't seem like good stages either so my best guess is Kongo Jungle if we want to never die while killing her early, stages with platforms like BF and T&C (or god forbid Lylat) and maybe just ban flat stages like FD or SV cause it's already hard to kill her, last thing she needs is a flat stage to do whatever she wants just like Little mac.

 

[Delta-cod]

Mmm, you basically summed up my opinions on the character. People were always saying she's bad because she can't kill, but ultimately it doesn't matter if she can't ever get hit either.

 

[Nikes]

This isn't exactly going to be MU changing, but there's a very small part of her vanish when she's reappearing where she's vulnerable that you can intercept for a stage spike if she chooses to recover with that instead of bouncing fish.
I'll see if I can get anyone to bring out their Sheik at the next meet and try and help out more here.

 

[Sinister Slush]

I take fishing to a whole new level off stage. My hunger off stage is at a greater level than Raptor's back in brawl, literally a shark. I could not get fairs on Sheik whenever she UpB'd.
So if you do get it some more, good luck.

 

[Collective of Bears]

Mmm, you basically summed up my opinions on the character. People were always saying she's bad because she can't kill, but ultimately it doesn't matter if she can't ever get hit either.

Essentially this. It may take her till 150% to kill you, but she won't have much of a problem getting there.

Has anyone tried using Egg Lay against the Filet-o-Fish? In my head it would make sense, but I haven't really had the chance to use it.

 

[Lukingordex]

Having a better experience against Sheik nowadays, i'd like to say that i'm my opinion, Sheik is -1 for us.

She's basically better than us in neutral and long range, and hacks damage faster than us for that reason. However, she has a hard time killing, which makes this match up a little less problematic.

Just try to not die, and you'll at least give a little trouble for her.

 

[Delta-cod]

@ Sinister Slush Nikes said stage spike, not Fair spike. It's probable that throwing Nair out to cover the ledge is what he had in mind.

@ Collective of Bears I haven't tried Egg Lay against Floundering Whale, but I was wondering why you thought it would work? The move typically puts her above the plane where that move would connect. Plus, no grab armor makes that really risky.

Regarding the MU ratio: Any MU where a character has basically ZERO OPTIONS IN NEUTRAL is automatically -2 AT LEAST, unless that character has some sort of infinite or other ridiculous thing to make up for the fact when they finally win neutral. Seeing as how we don't have that, I'm going to say Sheik is AT LEAST -2 against us.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Well fair is our main spike move, but I've tried Nair and bair off stage but because sheik's are grabbing the ledge the moves almost never hit and even if she goes a bit above the ledge to drop down and grab it, the hit pushes us away cause the windbox it has or just plain hits us.

 

[Lukingordex]

Regarding the MU ratio: Any MU where a character has basically ZERO OPTIONS IN NEUTRAL is automatically -2 AT LEAST,

But yoshi doesn't have "zero" options in neutral in this MU, she's better than us there but that doesn't mean we have "zero" options lol (actually I can kinda agree that against sheik, yoshi may have "zero" neutral options in flat stages, but I highly believe a yoshi main would want to ban fd/omegas against sheik, right?)

 

[Delta-cod]

But yoshi doesn't have "zero" options in neutral in this MU, she's better than us there but that doesn't mean we have "zero" options lol (actually I can kinda agree that against sheik, yoshi may have "zero" neutral options in flat stages, but I highly believe a yoshi main would want to ban fd/omegas against sheik, right?)

Sorry bro, but we actually don't have an option against Sheik's movement that doesn't require hard reads. Her empty SH can literally pin us in place. We have nothing fast enough to challenge Fair, and she's fast enough to get around whatever movement tricks we come up with.

 

[Lukingordex]

but but...

 

[Nikes]

Sorry bro, but we actually don't have an option against Sheik's movement that doesn't require hard reads. Her empty SH can literally pin us in place. We have nothing fast enough to challenge Fair, and she's fast enough to get around whatever movement tricks we come up with.

Even if it meant trading, shouldn't our own retreating Fair work against this since retreating Fair is pretty safe on shield and if she does anything else we trade but we do more %?

 

[Delta-cod]

If you get the trade, sure. But I find that option to be gimmicky, recognizable, and beatable by any Sheik worth her salt. Then you end up whiffing (and retreating), and now you're at the edge. Guess you're not trying that again, time to try to reclaim the stage - oh whoops Sheik already cornered you hahahahahahahaha.

I used to try abusing run in > Shield > OOS Nair, but that loses to spacing, so we can't do that either.

 

[Sinister Slush]

It's a MU where she doesn't wanna fight basically, punting us away all game when we try to approach for -5%, by the time it's 3 minutes left in the match we're down 1 stock at 600% while sheik is 3rd stock still around 80%, that's how this MU is.

 

[Lukingordex]

Your guys where right, this MU is worse than I though.

I almost lost to a Sheik player that's actually a pretty good Melee/PM player but doesn't know much about smash 4, but he still managed to give me a lot of trouble by just using fundamentals...

At first I though he was better than i imagined in Smash 4. I switched to Ness thinking I would have the same trouble, but I actually wrecked him, that made me realize how hard that MU is for Yoshi and how ignorant I was by saying Yoshi "may have a little chance if he doesn't die".

 

[Delta-cod]

Welcome to the Enlightenment Dark Ages. Please enjoy your stay as you slowly realize Yoshi is mediocre.

 

[Yikarur]

I don't think theory is how you should approach this MU. Yoshi in general has to swift in and out all the time trying to force mistakes. You shouldn't commit much and so you shouldn't get beaten that hard as explained in this thread before. It's a long and nerve-racking MU and the patience you need for this MU is enormous. It's relatively possible that this is our worst/hardest MU but Yoshi is solid overall so I think we can get this if we put enough effort in it.

 

[GSM_Dren]

I feel that Sheik is easily one of my unfavorable match ups. She is fast and has a lot of tools in her arsenal to shut down Yoshi. My friend @gsmVoiD uses Sheik and absolutely annihilates me.

- Her Fair needs to be respected. It follows up after a downthrow and can be chained.
- Her needles can be charged easily and be spammed, halting any of Yoshi's momentum.
- Her grenade adds a new element to her projectile game and can be used for keepaway.
- Bouncing fish adds a new kill and recovery move which I find can be hard to punish.
- Up B is extremely hard to punish and more often than not Sheik will recover back on the stage with ease.

I find eggs to help with approaching, but with sheik's quick movement, she can easily negate and punish. OOS Jump + Nair is a saving grace if she catches you in shield. Like Lukinhasss said above, do not attack carelessly or else you're going to get punished big time. I need much more practice with this match up, but out of all the characters I've faced so far, I think Shiek is definitely Yoshi's bane of existence.

Here is a grand finals set against Sheik, with me being in Loser's side and I managed to reset the bracket. Not much has changed since my last post, but this matchup is at least a -2 for us. Yoshi has no problem tanking %, but we have a much more difficult time killing overall because Sheik is just so mobile. It is difficult to hit sheik because she's always dashing around and never stays in the same spot.

For this matchup, I think we'd have to fight fire with fire. If we are too defensive, sheik has more than enough options to overwhelm us if we just decide to sit back and toss eggs or stay in shield. Her fair is fast and pretty safe on shield so she can keep fairing even when we try to retaliate. Egg lay does work, but the sheik may just wait patiently for it to finish or just jab/ftilt/fair to swat us away. This is for against any player, but at (07:08) if we're recovering off stage and the sheik is running toward us, egg laying them off is pretty satisfying if they're too slow to whack us first.

Dthrow -> fair/Vanish is tricky because we may air dodge the expected fair, but instead get killed with Vanish.Sheik is more than likely going to recover back because vanish is just that good. Off stage we can try to intercept Sheik with a fair/nair but that usually doesn't work out in our favor .

Needles to bouncing fish is no fun, actually anything into bouncing fish is no fun either. Yoshi has to be just as mobile as shiek because otherwise she'll run circles around us.

 

[Delta-cod]

I've found that mashing Nair out of the Dthrow setup is moderately effective. If you mash Nair and drift away, they have to overcommit to the vanish, and I think you'll have time to airdodge the explosion, since they'll need to get around Nair. Initial hit Nair might even clank with the explosion, I can't quite remember.

At higher percents, Nair will trade with Fair unless they wait. But like, honestly, eating a Fair stops mattering at a certain point.

 

[GSM_Dren]

I've found that mashing Nair out of the Dthrow setup is moderately effective. If you mash Nair and drift away, they have to overcommit to the vanish, and I think you'll have time to airdodge the explosion, since they'll need to get around Nair. Initial hit Nair might even clank with the explosion, I can't quite remember.

At higher percents, Nair will trade with Fair unless they wait. But like, honestly, eating a Fair stops mattering at a certain point.

Nair and drifting sounds like a good idea that I'll have to try test. I guess also DJ immediately after getting Dthrow works as well. Dodging after the dthrow just makes it a 50:50 situation in favor of sheik @_@.

 

[Yikarur]

DJing away is an important option or a lot of situations. Like getting dthrowed by Diddy. DJing away is always the best solution.