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Playing against people much better than me...

Valkyrie8492

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jan 11, 2015
Messages
15
Self-explanatory title. Yesterday I started my bracket at a local against someone who bodied me so hard it looked like one long combo video. This isn't really a Sheik specific question necessarily but I figured you guys would be able to help. He went Fox then Falco and I wasn't able to win in neutral even the slightest. Obviously Sheik generally isn't as good as either in neutral but it still felt hopeless.

So what to I do and what can I take away from it? Should I just move on? There's quite a few guys that go to this local I like who generally are just a whole tier above everyone else so it's bound to happen again. How can I take anything away from something like this?
 

djmath

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Jan 14, 2014
Messages
123
Location
marth
don't give up! Fox and falco are definitely characters that can run over you if you're inexperienced (and even if you are experienced). When you play against someone that's better than you, you have to work really hard to play at their level, but that's the best part; you're not going to beat them by doing a dumb gimmick, you'll take stocks from them by doing top-level things. High pressure situations against good players, at least for me, bring out a very high level of gameplay.

that being said, think about all of the ways sheik can win the neutral; what are sheik's tools? amazing grab game, good dash dance, early % kos on spacies, good tilts, disjointed aerials, needles, the list goes on. But if you aren't using these tools correctly you'll have a very hard time winning against anyone.

The thing about fox and falco is that they don't need a lot of time or space to run in and start wrecking you. But really aggressive play is punishable; if you call your opponent out on an overreaching approach you can get a free punish, and with sheik you have a lot of good punish options out of grab or even just an ftilt.

I suggest that you spend more time thinking about what you want to do in a match. ask yourself, "What can I do to take this stock?" The answer will be using the tools your character has to win the neutral to start a combo to either get the KO or create an edgeguard scenario. Be patient, sheik is only as good as you are.
 

1000g2g3g4g800999

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Jul 21, 2012
Messages
368
Location
Earth
How exactly are they winning in neutral? As a general rule, you're going to have to call/cover movement choices and options, or get into certain ranges where you can just do moves to beat certain options.

Are they lasering to force an approach then punishing the approach? Run, or walk up, ready to cover pre-emptive attacks, keep advancing or wait if they do nothing, try to get a grab (at least at lower percents). Over shoot the grab on a dash dance if they aren't fox trotting back multiple times, and if they are, just run them into the corner, crouch when you're comfortably close, and utilt or uair to catch a jump, dsmash if they stay to the ground, or grab. If they aren't crouch cancelling but keep moving, run up jab is low commitment, and if they actually think they can punish the first jab, you can probably get the second, but only do it when they come back in, and beware of moves like usmash.

Are they attacking relentlessly and beating out whatever you do to defend? If they're jumping super close, you can ftilt them out of it, and if they're shorthopping with something that's not drill, at the worst, you'd trade favorably with dsmash, especially when farther, but if they're coming from farther, dash or wavedash back and grab it. You can also crouch under the closer aerials, and CC the higher ones. In the event of ftilt, try to shield DI in and grab. You can also spotdodge almost all of these if you do it early enough and punish. If you're not concerned with getting a punish, you can roll in whichever direction sets you farthest from where they will be actionable at the end of their move, or if they're doing something laggy enough that they couldn't catch you either way, you could take the direction for better stage position.

Are they dashdancing a lot to bait out moves and punish? Needle, or, walk forward until you can hit them. This makes it easier to react to them trying to hit your advance, and you might catch them shielding or spotdodging with any kind of movement forward, like if you dash attacked or dash grabbed.

For Falco, is he doing laser->aerial/tilt/grab? If laser-> aerial, you can block the laser and wavedash immediately and whiff punish the aerial, but try to do this in reaction to the jump so that you don't just get lasered continuously. If laser->tilt, try to DI in and grab the tilt, or get closer when they're lasering and hit them out of the jump (or if near the ledge, grab so they grab break and go flying). If laser->grab, you can absolutely hit them before they land at the ranges that should work at.

For Fox. Expect a lot of dash dances and grabs. A well timed spotdodge can allow you to punish most of the more common approaches. Being smart with OoS, knowing when you can punish something and not challenging when you can't, but always acting immediately when not in a frame trap are important. But try to avoid doing either as much as possible. You can usually challenge his approach with ftilt or dsmash or movement when he's staying low, and if he ever fullhops, you can make him suffer from utilt or uair. Rising uair (try to hit with the tip of the initial hitbox, and later in the strong hit if possible) to nair can lead into a lot of things, like grab dsmash or ftilt at lower percents, and dash attack and grab at more mid percents. Fullhop the uair if not from a platform you're going to land lower than. Challenging Fox from below is much better than against Falco, but you can also just position yourself so they can't hit you coming down and punish their landing from their.

Get them offstage early if possible.
 

Valkyrie8492

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jan 11, 2015
Messages
15
To add, it didn't feel like I was losing neutral too often but I had serious difficulty starting anything at all. Generally though I have little idea how to get out of really aggressive pressure since I get almost no practice against it. The experience I have is mostly against Marth, Falcon and in the ditto. Also, this guy had really good punish game on top of that. He was very technical and was able to convert most every major hit or grab into death or big damage.

Can anyone offer tips as to how to get out of some basic combos I can expect from the spacies? I really have very little matchup experience against both of them so I haven't found hardly any tricks to help me in certain situations. I'm only familiar with basic **** like using nair to interrupt aerials quickly. Any advice is much appreciated
 

Scroll

Smash Ace
Joined
Jun 15, 2014
Messages
559
I am gonna go ahead and suggest the more fun part. The harder punish.
Instead of focusing on getting away, getting out, minimizing damage, and keeping defensive, you also need to get that damage in.
This can be pretty good way of improving your game too.
Against spacies that's deffinatly tech chasing. I know you can get a grab in :)
Both off of an initial grab or a knock down that happened in neutral. You need to follow that up. On early percents that means regrabbing and later on following up with DA or hard reading / estimating with JC Upsmash and either continuing the tech chase or setting up for edge guarding.
I like the pummel because it makes me able to get in the zone of the tech chase.

No matter how good a fox is he still have the same limited options once knocked down as anyone else. The only thing he can do well is mixing up "smart" and "dumb" options.
 
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ChivalRuse

Smash Hero
Joined
Jun 13, 2007
Messages
8,414
Location
College Park, MD
To get out of combos, DI down and away and smash DI the hits to put even more distance between you and them and make sure you DON'T MISS YOUR TECHS when you hit the ground.
 

phili

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Oct 6, 2014
Messages
173
NNID
phili11
I am gonna go ahead and suggest the more fun part. The harder punish.
Instead of focusing on getting away, getting out, minimizing damage, and keeping defensive, you also need to get that damage in.
This can be pretty good way of improving your game too.
Against spacies that's deffinatly tech chasing. I know you can get a grab in :)
Both off of an initial grab or a knock down that happened in neutral. You need to follow that up. On early percents that means regrabbing and later on following up with DA or hard reading / estimating with JC Upsmash and either continuing the tech chase or setting up for edge guarding.
I like the pummel because it makes me able to get in the zone of the tech chase.

No matter how good a fox is he still have the same limited options once knocked down as anyone else. The only thing he can do well is mixing up "smart" and "dumb" options.
Agreed. I was able to take a game off a MUCH better player recently by maximizing the punish I got on him every time I landed a grab (it was a ganon main and I chaingrabbed him with no mercy lol). I was also able to keep games close that I had no business winning against higher level foxes and falcos in the same tournament due to the fact that my tech chase from dthrow was reasonably good. I still got combo'd all day by them and wrecked in neutral, but at least I was taking stocks and consistently building damage by focusing on getting grabs and maximizing the impact of those grabs.

I honestly think this is the thing all newer or lower level sheiks need to practice in order to improve the fastest. Its really not that hard to practice, especially with 20XX, and it makes a huge difference in your gameplay. Great advice man!
 
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