Okay my complete opinion on the Sheik Match Up
This MU is BAD. But its not unwinnable as, lets say Ness vs Rosalina.
We have the same weakness as Ness besides of one thing. We are floaty and the right size, so we can be comboed easily. We have limited spacing tools in our aerials, so it is hard to hit Sheik Safely. Literally everything we do can be punished by Sheik that would be safe on shield. It is hard to PK Fire Spam and Zair Spam because of needles(WHHHHY????). And, Sheiks Frame data is just so much better than ours. We also have trouble killing aside from hard reads and grabs, so we are on the same boat as Sheik when it comes to killing.
We do have one advantage, and that is our recovery. Sheik can still edgeguard us for days, but we will almost always make it back unless she straight up kills us.
Okay we start with on thing after another.
The Neutral Game
Is it a surprise Sheik wins the neutral game? Nope. Superior frame data, better camping tools, easier kill set ups, more reliable edgeguarding, she just beats us with that. Needles hurt our ability to zone with PK Fire and Zair and PK Freeze, and we have to use Wavebouncing PK Fire to avoid punishes(except for needles, to easily b reverse, set your C Stick to Specials. It is the most effective with Lucas.) Our best way to punish is mainly through our tilts as we can't grab Sheik at all unless from hard reads or covering landing options. Our aerials lack speed, so it is hard to punish with that. So we really need to rely on our tilts to punish moreso in this MU. We can get grabs from Zair or Dtilt if the Sheik messes up, so that is good news I say. Because Sheik is a fast faller, it won't work at lower percents(Correct me if I am wrong). And Don't forget Lucas has great tilts and disjointed tilts to use. You are basically going to have to keep spacing and respecting all of sheiks moves because of how stupid her endlag and frame data is. You can't hold shield because she gets a grab. You can't spotdodge because she covers that even if she misses(LIke seriously?). Seriously, the needles as this makes the MU so much harder for us. Whenver we use PK Fire, she can just throw needles out if we hit her shield.
Many characters can decently punish Sheik with Nair OoS or grab on certain moves, but we certainly lack that. We do not have good OoS options because we suffer end lag on shield drop if using a grounded move(I think) and our grab is waay too slow. So we are not going to be able to punish her at all until we get a read and Zair spacing.
The Things that we excel in is what is difficult against Sheik:
1. PK Fire + Zair Zoning(Beaten by Needles)
2. Edgeguarding her(Beaten by her amazing recovery)
3. Hard Punishes(Beaten by her nonexistant endlag on many moves)
It isn't all lost for us. For her 50/50 Down Throw, we can use PSI Magnet to heal about 30%(Sometimes lower if staled) of our health back which makes things difficult. That would make Sheik go for Fair/Uair more often than Vanish, which can usually be beaten by airdodge or Jump+Airdodge, but if she notices the habit, she will probably go back to Vanish again, so be wary or bait out the airdodge and then put a even harder punish on us or just Uair us. We can also use PSI Magnet to recover health against Sheik when she is trying to recover/Have to recover with Up-B for another free 30%. Unlike Ness, she can't gimp us as easily as him, though we may take some percents if we don't have our double jump or she catches us before we can recover. So if you read a Vanish, HEAL From it. 30% makes a huge difference, especially in this Match Up.
Sheik is a fast faller, so Nair will work longer on her than other characters, which is great. Problem is getting the Nair lol. Also because of her fast falling, Down Throw to Nair to Uair at 0% will work twice and work once at max rage. Not to mention once a Lucas masters the footstool combos, this will be a bit scary for Sheik as Down Throw to Footstools will work at higher percents than other characters. Problem, is getting the grab. Which is easier said than done with her frame data.
One last benefit is Rage. Oh Boy do we love rage, and Sheik causes us to have Rage. UThrow kills stupidly early at Max Rage and our attacks will have stupidly good knockback. Though, we really hate Rage when we just killed Sheik. Great when Sheik is around 80%, bad when Sheik is at 0%. UP smash, if we somehow get, will kill pretty early with Max Rage as well as Down Smash. Rage can really help us in this MU if we live that long.
TL;DR
(Lucas POV)
Advantages
-Healing 30% From Vanish can really help us.
-Sheik is a fast faller, so that it is easier to combo her.
-Rage really helps us in this MU unlike other Match Ups.
-We our decently hard to edgeguard due to our ability to Mix Up recoveries.
Disadvantage
-Her Frame data is much more superior to ours.
-Getting the Grab is super hard against Sheik, our most reliable way to get damage.
-Needles hurt our zoning ability.
-Extremely hard to edgeguard Sheik aside from reading a Bouncing Fish and Bair her or get a one Frame Punish when she grabs the edge with Vanish.
-She can interrupt our recovery consistently.
-Really hard to Punish anything Sheik throws out at us.
What I rate the MU?
42.5(-1.5):57.5(+1.5)
