I seem to have caused quite a stir.
I'm KirbyKaze. The best Melee Sheik main and 2nd best Sheik player for the game in the world. Good evening, gentleman.
Clow directed me here to address some of the responses people have posted here to my criticisms of the new Sheik throw model. I assure you, I only mean to provide constructive input and do not intend to step on anyone's toes. That said, I won't pretend that I like what you've done to my favourite FG character. So let's begin...
Like I said, I agree with the 50-50 of Bthrow or Dthrow being a dumb way to do things, and given the direction of CG's other characters have, but what I'm saying is for Dthrow specifically what is worse about it in P:M than in PAL? From what I understand, it's PAL angles but with less lag for Shiek. That's an improvement over PAL. She should have the same punishes, maybe a few more. If you are only looking at Dthrow, I don't see where the same consistency is lacking or how the PM Dthrow all of a sudden gives the defender more options. Which is why I asked what if Bthrow was reverted or they took away the janky throw mixup would he be happy? Would basically mean it's Shiek, but a slightly better Dthrow since she can move faster from it. It wouldn't really satisfy the desire to give her a more guaranteed throw game, but the parts about PAL Dthrow being better or more consistent or making her feel more top tier than PM Dthrow? I'm having a hard time seeing that unless I'm wrong about launch angles/some janky mechanic that floors people too early/etc.
The difference is that in PAL the Sheik understands the opponent's options as she's doing the throw and immediately assumes whatever degree of control she has over the opponent given factors like percent, character, and stage positioning. Because of this, her handler can then pick the appropriate action in response to the defender. The throw functions predictably and it gives Sheik's handler room to create strategies to combat these circumstances and attempt to enhance outcome. This is basically how the low percent game vs Peach in PAL out of d-throw has become so refined. Compared to a few years ago, the stuff that has become standardized is unreal. And further innovation is still happening (as seen in Over vs Armada from their last set). Innovation like this is largely encouraged because the throw reliably does... whatever it does... and behaves in that predictable manner, there is a consistency to the punish and players can build off that. Consistency in punishment - the reliability of her combos and finishes - is basically Sheik's defining characteristic in SSBM. This is what makes her Sheik and not Fox (Fox is the one that gets screwed by random SDI and such, not Sheik).
So in this respect, if I were in charge of PM Sheik, I would naturally gravitate towards making a throw close to PAL d-throw quality to function as her primary (and possibly sole) combo throw because it reflects the history of the character far more accurately. Sheik is one of the least random characters among the Melee playables and promotes very low variance in virtually every aspect of her game. In addition to linear design, she's also an incredibly simple character in that she plays by the conventions of traditional fighters more than the other playables. For instance: she has to respect to shield-attack-grab RPS more than any other playable. Another example? She doesn't have an ultra powerful all-purpose move that auto-counters crouch, like a shine, Falco dair, or Peach's float & d-smash suite so she has to use its direct counter (grab [I suppose one could argue needle grab, but that's ultimately a grab setup and I'd add that it's not comparable quality to those listed of the others anyway, which was one of the main points I was making - her grab is her quality anti-crouch & anti-block tool]). She has a punishable recovery that behaves predictably. Everything about Sheik in terms of mechanical structure and how she plays within the game is predictable and simple. Her throw (in both its NTSC broken glory and more subdued PAL incarnation) is the ultimate reflection of this.
In PM, this model has been changed radically. Rather than having one combo throw, she has two. Sheik can d-throw or she can b-throw. She effectively has two cards she can play. The opponent, in contrast, has DI A and DI B. DI A counters d-throw (free escape), but gets him **** comboed by b-throw. DI B is the opposite. This effectively gives the defender arguably as much say in whether they can comboed or not as the attacker because you've broken whether the throw works or not down to a 50-50 (since the defender has 2 cards, and the attacker has two cards). This shrinks if they can react to the throw animation and begins to favour the defender (this happened with Marth's f-throw and d-throw in Melee over time, except he got a consolation of creating tech chases when they DIed to escape - this may be one way to remedy her throw btw if you're really attached to the two throw model). That said, as it stands (defender with 2 cards, attacker with 2 cards) I do not feel this is good character design.
There seems to be some confusion regarding my quality analysis. I never said I'd made up my mind over which throw was better and even stated I felt that quality comparisons in the context of PAL throw vs PM throw are probably pointless. Upon reading your summation, I agree with you to some degree; PM Sheik's throw game is probably is better than the PAL one from an objective standpoint simply because the sped up d-throw is just functionally PAL d-throw with a speed buff. And I certainly can appreciate the punishment potential off the current PM throws (when it doesn't fizzle). Some of the combos look close to on par with some of my own NTSC d-throw combos (and the PM ones can probably be refined to go 0-death vs some characters). However, quality isn't the issue - it's reliability and consistency. The current PM throw game is creating a 50-50 system where there doesn't need to be one. And because of how her b-throw and d-throw work (the speed also forces Sheik's handler to respond faster out of grab - it works both ways) this invariably leads to combos fizzling prematurely. The flipside is you sometimes get a big combo but that's not how Sheik has ever functioned. She has almost always been a character of incremental advantages and building up towards a simple finisher. The current PM Sheik plays closer to Falcon, ICs, or Ganon.
When you add that her Melee playstyle doesn't transfer into this new game as smoothly as some of the other former Melee titans as a result of her method of space control being weakened in the presence of uniformly faster characters with comparable (or even superior) range to her... you wind up with a character who seems to have been nerfed heavily for no real reason. It is doubtful she's a top 5 character (I don't think she's top 10 to be honest) and I'm just not sure why she got altered to such a high degree when so many other characters in her tier group didn't. I'm not going to play dumb - I understand her CG is too powerful in Melee and polarizes gameplay in a bad way in the MUs where it's a big factor because of how badly you have to avoid it (or else) but I feel that tweaking her throw to be a watered down version of her NTSC one (that still works reliably) would have been a far better adjustment rather than putting Marth's d-throw & f-throw mixup on her. It doesn't suit her and it's troublesome to lose your combo to a good guess or reaction by the opponent. Not only is she often fighting uphill, but one of her potentially best moves for keeping pace with these characters, and a pivotal part of how she combats basic combat mechanics (crouch & shield) often just does not work simply because it has faulty mechanics. When placed in comparison to the dominant characters right now (Ike, Lucario to some degree, etc) she just seems so flimsy.
I have a lot of suggestions as to how a new throw could be made that prevents her from getting out of control. I think using Melee Doc's d-throw (or Melee GaW's d-throw) as a frame of reference for knockbacks and trajectories is a good start. For better or worse, Sheik's power as a character will invariably be heavily influenced by her grab's quality because of how much she uses her grab for (beat shield, crouch, build damage, etc) and because she has a cohesive game that allows her to condition people into giving her grab opportunities and ways of comboing into it. This is just the nature of her. That's what I care about capturing though. How she feels in Melee, but adjusted for a more balanced game. She doesn't need to be top tier, she just needs to be Sheik.
Right now, she's not Sheik.
