New to comptitive melee and looking for a main (marth, sheik, peach, or fox)

[Alex Herrington]

Hi guys: I've been playing casually and following smash since melee released in 2001, but I've recently divorced my competitive game of choice (don't ask). I now want to focus on smash bros. melee. I've "mained" a few chars since 01, but I'm torn on which char I should pick up at a competitive level:

Fox: Is 20xxx. Has a crazy high learning curve (I have the dexterity to SHDL/WD/SHFFL after a few hours), but seems to have the highest reward factor of any char. I see a lot of Magic the Gathering Storm Decks here: You can roll everyone if playing well/unhindered, but good luck doing it for 8 straight hours. Glass cannon embodied.

Sheik: My main from launch-2006. I love the way she edge guards and flows into combos. Just seems so natural to play, but is really hard to learn at high levels of play given her complex edge game and follow ups. (see m2k)

Marth: My main since 2006: I love his tipper spacing and combos. Nothing is more satisfying than dumpstering someone with fair->dair (ken combo). I prefer aggro Marth and would probably play him that way (The Moon is my favorite player besides Mango right now. #mangonation).

Peach: Requires a lot less tech skill than the rest as far as I can tell. Her Dash attack is stupidly strong and she has the air game to match. I find her float combos almost second nature to me. She just seems like the "Why do people who don't want to perfect tech skill not play her? character".

As far as my play style in other games: I focus on defense and wait for my opponent to mess up so I can capitalize on their mistakes. Being always in control and having a way out at all times has been my play style.

So, who should I main? Any advice?

 

[Twinkles]

Honestly speaking, any of the above characters could work for you.

Your best bet would be to try out all of their more involved tools, play against other players, and figure out which one feels most right to you in terms of how you like their tools, both in moveset and movement. Ideally, should be a character you would not get tired of practicing/playing with cuz of how fun they are.

 

[roflJumper]

All those characters are really good. I'd simply pick the one I think is most fun.

 

[Varist]

Pick Sheik if just winning against other people brings you joy

Pick Fox if winning isn't enough and you want to be flashy while you do it and make people around you go "oh **** we got a technical fox in here"

Pick Marth if you find yourself ****ing up tech skill and you want to win through quick reactions and calculated movement

Pick Peach if you hate the USA and you want Mango to come to your house and drag his balls across your face like he is within his rights to do because you play Peach you ****ing down smash spamming ****

 

[SuperShus]

I have the dexterity to SHDL/WD/SHFFL
I love the way she edge guards and flows into combos.
I love his tipper spacing and combos. Nothing is more satisfying than dumpstering someone with fair->dair. I prefer aggro.
I can capitalize on their mistakes. Being always in control and having a way out at all times has been my play style.

So, who should I main? Any advice?

Falco. He's everything you like about your characters combined (except Peach)
Become a monk and learn the ways of PPMD.

All those characters are really good. I'd simply pick the one I think is most fun.

That would be Falcon.

 

[X WaNtEd X]

It seems you like to play a heavy punish game. In that case go peach. You can learn a lot from Armada, who emphasized his punish game a lot.

Peach: Requires a lot less tech skill than the rest as far as I can tell.

Uhhh yeah about that....

If you want to be a good peach you're going to need some serious tech skill. "Peach requiring less tech skill" is a myth. Maybe at a lower level you won't need it as much, but once you play better players you'll discover how important it is.

 

[Zoler]

Those characters are all great for defense.

Pick Marth if you like to dash dance and keeping your opponent above you infinitely.
Pick peach if you like to float and dash attack lol.
Pick Sheik if you like to tech chase a lot.
Pick Falco if you like to laser and do "cool" shine combos.

 

[EpixAura]

Truthfully, you can just play all of them and eventually one will just start to stand above the rest for you. It shouldn't take too long to figure it out.
As far as recommendations go, I would just go with Fox. When stuck between mains, decide via tier list. You said you like punishing and Fox's punishment game is incredibly strong. I feel that in the past year that's what most top Fox mains have been improving on.
At the very least, you can keep Marth/Sheik around as a secondary as neither require too many character specific advanced techniques and are relatively 'low maintenance' characters, allowing you to use them without focusing on them. The only Marth-specific techniques are really spacing (not that other characters don't space. They just don't have to be hitting with the tip of the hitbox 24/7) and CGing spacies. Sheik just requires knowledge of edgeguarding and good fundamentals. Obviously I'm leaving things out here, but I'd rather not drag on.

Peach is also a good choice, as Armada has pretty much made "Peach' and 'punishment' synonymous (that sounded kind of awkward). That said, Peach gets surprisingly technical at high levels and is incredibly dependent on reaction time because of how much she likes trading.

 

[Calabi]

Do yoshi!

But seriously, the world has too many shiek/fox/marth mains, and not enough peaches. If the floaty combos come second nature, play her.

also, it might just be me, but less people are prepared for peach, so you catch a lot more people by surprise.