Guide Sonic GUIDE/FAQ: ASK QUESTIONS HERE

[EyexSore]

Oh well. I was just going by what I've seen. Sorry, I didn't know it was crap.

 

[Camalange]

It's okay. There are a lot of things that are wrong on the internet.

 

[VKatana]

Eventscrubs is not a reliable source generally. Their UMvC3 tiers are pretty solid, but most of their other ones are garbage because contributions to them are limited. As far as I know, no really big names vote for tiers on Eventhubs. Dabuz and the subreddit make solid tier lists.

 

[Gregory2590]

*sees mewtwo in top 10 in that tier list"

lol

*sees anyone trying to make a proper tier list at this point of the game especially with patches up the ass*

hah

 

[Seagull Joe]

I know Seagull Joe runs a good secondary Sheik to cover those bad MUs (which Sonic seems to have a lot of these days...) so maybe give Sheik a go. Defensive characters are basically going to be your worst MU against Sonic most of the time, so perhaps consider what characters you can easily penetrate defensive play with. Personally, I've been polishing my Falcon in the lab. I feel like Falcon has better chances against Sheik and Fox because his combos are generally grab oriented rather than spindash oriented. If you've ever tried to play Sonic against REALLY skilled high tiers, you know how difficult it can be to get any hits, much less a spindash combo. Sheik, Fox, Diddy, etc. rarely leave themselves too open, but you can catch them slipping with a grab.

EDIT: IMHO, Sonic/Pikachu is 40/60 in Pika's favor now that the backthrow has been nerfed for Sonic. Pika is another one of those quick characters that's hard to spindash and is generally too quick to get a smash attack on for the kill. Killing good players is too damn hard as Sonic now.

I go all . I never even use my except sometimes in doubles.

only loses to , , , and possibly (This matchup goes back and forth thanks to rage playing a huge factor). cannot kill with any setup. It's a slow paced matchup, but I don't think loses it by any means.

Stop being bad and only trying to kill with Bthrow lmfao. can definitely still kill with Bthrow regardless. You should, however, be trying to kill with Bthrow, Bair, Fsmash, ledgetrump Dsmash, and Uair. Let the situation present itself. Don't force kills in any game or you will be punished.

Ok, so Sonic's bad match ups right now are Ness and Pikachu, among the obvious Sheik and Rosalina. Countering Sheik and Rosalina is a pipe dream right now. Zero Suit appears to be good at countering Ness and Pikachu, so that's a good place to start. Sheik is a safe bet for anybody at this point.

What's your basis? Mid/Low level gameplay?

 

[VKatana]

Stop being bad and only trying to kill with Bthrow lmfao.

Easier said than done, it's a bad habit I'm still cracking post-patch. Triple or double up air and tech chase up smash are still basically my main killing options, but neither of them are particularly reliable, and I'm still working on improving my reads. Angled f-smash at the ledge is another thing I'm working on achieving consistently. And you bring up a good point about the Pika MU, I never took to much thought to it from the Pika's point of view.

Which reminds me, I don't wanna sound desperate or anything, but I was wondering if anyone would be willing to add me on Wii U so I can send them 2 or 3 replays to analyze and give me some pointers? I'm writing down Sonic notes based off my own matches, Joe's, 6WX's, and Manny's, but I feel like my notes are lacking.

 

[Camalange]

Only the B R A W L B O Y S know the pain of elaborate kills with Sonic.

Kids these days...

 

[YoYoFantaFanta]

Are there any guaranteed setups for f smash, u smash, and bair? If we have good setups for our kill moves, than we don't need back throw so badly.

 

[EyexSore]

Only the B R A W L B O Y S know the pain of elaborate kills with Sonic.

Define elaborate, lol

 

[Gregory2590]

Are there any guaranteed setups for f smash, u smash, and bair? If we have good setups for our kill moves, than we don't need back throw so badly.

Sour spot nair into Fsmash works at moderate percentages.

 

[Seagull Joe]

Are there any guaranteed setups for f smash, u smash, and bair? If we have good setups for our kill moves, than we don't need back throw so badly.

The ole 08 combo never fails.

 

[Camalange]

Are there any guaranteed setups for f smash, u smash, and bair? If we have good setups for our kill moves, than we don't need back throw so badly.

Soft hits, like Greg suggested, can sometimes combo into Fsmash/Usmash.
You can create situations that make them easier to land, but for the most part, still don't really have any "guaranteed" set-ups outside of like, Spin to Bair combos, lol. Falling Nair can pop up and lead into another Nair or Bair though.

Define elaborate, lol

Here's the list, but also take every kill move we have now, and basically cut it's knockback in half.

• Spring > Uair was very rarely a true combo.
• Usmash had low knockback and was even easier to break out of, in addition to basically every kill move we have now (Bair, Uair, etc.) having lower knockback.
• Nair or Ftilt never killed like they can now. Never.
• Dair didn't have a spike, so we relied on janky spikes that could be avoided completely just by DI'ing up.
• Kill throws would've been a dream in Brawl. Uthrow was the best option for that at maybe like 180%+ and even then that wouldn't kill heavyweights.

I mean, the list goes on… We had to invent next level gimmicks to make things work, usually all revolving around Fsmash.

• Jab > Fsmash
• Run/Walk behind > Fsmash
• H Y P N O S M A S H (charging Fsmash and praying they got hit)

You can see how desperate we got that these were all probably our best KO options. They also all required reads. We didn't have set-ups, really, except for maybe jab-lock if we got one going...

 

[EyexSore]

So what I'm getting here is that it was a stretch to make some good kills out of sonic.

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

That's part of the reason why I feel sonic is considered so much better than people make him out to be. Mainly because pls lot of us placing high had hardwired ourselves to have to make unorthodox or really good reads and maximize them just to keep up with the higher tier characters in brawl. And now that sonic has has many of those moves buffed has made all those tactics far more lethal right out of the gate for our character.

The way sonic is perceived right now is definitely moreso due to the people using him rather than the character himself being overwhelmingly strong.

 

[Gregory2590]

Pretty much. but holy **** if he had the techs that he had in brawl..

ASCSC.

SHIFFL Bair

actually rewarding kills

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

i still am pretty sad that platform canceling was taken out. Given how fast sonic can maneuver around stages now just due to the engine alone i feel he could have been an absolute monster on town and city and SV. And yea if ASCSC was in the game we would have so much better landing options and some pretty nasty kill setups on ASC hit confirm. Not to mention BSBS would happen as often due to the fact we would not be forced to commit as much. Too bad ZSS stole our old bair's landing lag -____-

 

[EyexSore]

Isn't platform canceling a bit situational to really worry about anymore?

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

well platform canceling i found to be a good tool for instilling platform pressure as well as helping to mixup your approve options. Given that you we able to jump to a platform while being able to reset yourself to neutral quickly, on top of the fact sonic could use SDSC platform drops to help him drop from a platform quick incase he needed to escape. I never really saw sonic's abuse platform canceling too much but i feel in smash 4 it would've seen much more use due to the way running off ledges allows you to maintain your ground speed as soon as you hit the floor.

 

[EyexSore]

Ok, so I just Fair'd a rosa player straight off the stage. Like, just over and over. Short hop to Fair over and over. Coincidental victory, or great tactic?

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

well depending on weight and height you can fair wall certain characters. Just getting a bit greedy with them can lead to some pretty unfavorable situations.

 

[J.APS]

Well in brawl Uthrow+Spring+Uair can kill up to 60% sometimes...and the most powerfull attacks was Fsmash and Bair...
Sonic was very lame...The changes he gain in Smash4 are amazing and now is top10.
Platform canceling is there..in some strange way...

 

[YoYoFantaFanta]

Sour spot nair into Fsmash works at moderate percentages.

Where is the sweetspot and sour spot of nair?

 

[YoYoFantaFanta]

The ole 08 combo never fails.

What's the ole 08 combo?

 

[Camalange]

Sonic was very lame...

Wrong.

 

[J.APS]

you need to combine a lot of things and do more that another characters, that's what I mean when I say he was lame in brawl

 

[EyexSore]

Funnily enough, a lot of my friends said sonic was cheap in brawl.

 

[Camalange]

Yeah, a lot of scrubs thought that.

But now that Sonic is actually pretty good, people can complain about him for the wrong reasons.

 

[YoYoFantaFanta]

Some of my friends were spewing **** about Sonic being OP and wouldn't explain why but wouldn't be convinced otherwise. It's one of the most frustrating arguments out there.

 

[VKatana]

I feel you guys, my friends do nothing but whine and complain about Sonic. Even my friend who mains Yoshi who has a pretty good MU against Sonic. They are salty complainers 24/7 and I am so tired of it tbh.
But anyway, what I actually hopped on to post: someone was asking about good kill set ups, and I think d-tilt might actually be a good set up against most characters at 100%-ish for a running up-smash. @ Camalange do you know if the tripping effect is random, or is there a sweet spot or something?

 

[Camalange]

@ Camalange do you know if the tripping effect is random, or is there a sweet spot or something?

I'm not 100% certain tbh, but I'm pretty sure you can't get the trip at that high of a percent. I noticed it happening the most at low percents.

Like, I could almost always guarantee a Dtilt > Trip > Grab at around 10-15%.

 

[Gregory2590]

Has anyone found anything interesting with a short hopped SJ? I remember orochi posting some data related to that before the patch, but I'm talking like..setups or some ****.

 

[EyexSore]

I've only ever gotten off D-tilt trip once when I was messing around in training mode. I've never gotten it again.

 

[Arma_]

I go all . I never even use my except sometimes in doubles.

only loses to , , , and possibly (This matchup goes back and forth thanks to rage playing a huge factor). cannot kill with any setup. It's a slow paced matchup, but I don't think loses it by any means.

Stop being bad and only trying to kill with Bthrow lmfao. can definitely still kill with Bthrow regardless. You should, however, be trying to kill with Bthrow, Bair, Fsmash, ledgetrump Dsmash, and Uair. Let the situation present itself. Don't force kills in any game or you will be punished.


What's your basis? Mid/Low level gameplay?

Hm, Seagull care to weigh in on the MU? I have always heard it was a poor matchup for mostly due to needles being able to zone him and shutdown his approaches. Part of the reason I have never really picked up is because it felt like just another character that was fodder.

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

main thing vs sheik that i've found useful is staying within range where charging needles is unsafe. Which would be about within bouncing fish range. She has a lot more bread and butter strings than we do but we can maximize damage output within a shorter time than she can which makes up for her long combo strings. Only real downside that we have in the MU is that again she gets long strings which in most cases allows her to take total stage control in the process.

But we can KO her much earlier than she can potentially KO us at, so long as we play the MU in a way where we aren't over committing to get in her face and as long as we try our best to reset the neutral position frequently to where we force her to retreat, or jump in on us with things like nair or fair.

ZSS handles in a similar manner, where we are constantly forced to try and reset neutral while forcing her to try and commit to things like a dash grab or nair that we can predict. Only difference between the two is sheik has a stronger neutral game while ZSS's aerial game is far more lethal. Also these two MUs are probably the only MUs besides say marth/lucina where you rely on using Spin attacks excessively can lead to your downfall.

 

[kj22]

main thing vs sheik that i've found useful is staying within range where charging needles is unsafe. Which would be about within bouncing fish range. She has a lot more bread and butter strings than we do but we can maximize damage output within a shorter time than she can which makes up for her long combo strings. Only real downside that we have in the MU is that again she gets long strings which in most cases allows her to take total stage control in the process.

But we can KO her much earlier than she can potentially KO us at, so long as we play the MU in a way where we aren't over committing to get in her face and as long as we try our best to reset the neutral position frequently to where we force her to retreat, or jump in on us with things like nair or fair.

ZSS handles in a similar manner, where we are constantly forced to try and reset neutral while forcing her to try and commit to things like a dash grab or nair that we can predict. Only difference between the two is sheik has a stronger neutral game while ZSS's aerial game is far more lethal. Also these two MUs are probably the only MUs besides say marth/lucina where you rely on using Spin attacks excessively can lead to your downfall.

And shulk. And Rob. And fox. Or anyone who knows how to avoid and punish spindash

 

[kid craft 24/sonic master]

well i wasn't trying to say that abusing spin dash is something you should be doing but just that vs these characters especially if your hoping to approach with spin attacks in a blatant way your going to get your approach option stuffed.

 

[EyexSore]

I feel like abusing spin dash is fine as long as you're crafty with which you use and how you mix it up.

 

[ROOOOY!]

Its not charged needles that are the problem. Its single ones that disrupt any momentum you've got.

 

[Mr. Potatobadger]

Heya.

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask, but here seems the most appropriate.

The only matchup I have any sort of trouble with whatsoever is Sonic.

Of all the Sonic's I've played, all of them play almost identical. Some differences, generally. Despite this, I have a lot of trouble with the matchup.

Do you guys have any tips on overcoming the Sonic matchup? (I play Marth and Lucina, depending on the matchup. Sonic is the only character where I haven't decided whether or not to use Marth or Lucina.)

For example, when Sonic does dair at a height where you receive no landing lag, reacting to and reading what the player will do is extremely difficult for me.

Obviously, dealing with Sonic's spindash and his ridiculous combos is difficult as well.

The thing that's hardest about dealing with Sonic is his sheer speed. You whiff one move, and you get punished. I spotdodge an attack from sonic, and he's fast enough to punish it...

Here's some things I've tried:

Obviously playing defensively. I can't imagine not playing defensively against a Sonic.
Playing aggressive doesn't really get me anywhere either.
Playing patiently doesn't really work either...
I've also tried only playing Sonic while facing Sonic. This usually works well, but only if I play like most other people play, which I don't like. The way I play sonic is... Different...

Anyways.

Any tips?... Any advice at all would be /greatly/ appreciated.

Also, is anyone willing to play their sonic against me? Some extensive hands-on practice would be great.

If anyone is interested, my NNID is mrpoetatoebadger. My skype is Mr. Potatobadger.

Thanks in advance!

 

[EyexSore]

Finding a hole in Sonic's defenses on the fly can be difficult because of his fast movements. But the best way I've seen is to watch your opponent (and this applies to everyone) and see if they have a pattern. Notably if they use bairs close to the ground, dairs of any sort, or spin dash frequently, they can be decently easy to dodge or shield, and follow up with a knuckle sandwich Fsmash. Try to keep your distance if they're an aggressive player. They're bound to make some mistake. I've never really seen a defensive sonic player, so that's out of my knowledge, sorry to say.

EDIT: Punishing with a dash or spindash of your own can be a decent strategy as well. Careful on the spindash though.

EDIT 2: Realized you were talking about Marth/Lucina. (I'm so stupid) Playing defensively is probably your only option tbh. If you stand any chance at all, you're going to have to read him like nobody's business. Though tbh if you're going against sonic, you shouldn't be using Marth/Lucina to begin with. No offense.