The Kirby Matchup Thread

[SSS]

What do you guys consider as Kirby's bad MUs?

I play Marth/Falco and I feel like dash attack is really tough to punish and i'm having trouble edge-guarding kirby.

Any advice for someone trying to battle kirby?

I also think its hard to get in on kirby in general but once i'm in theres not much combo potential. If i'm juggling him he just uses DownB and because of the cancel it becomes hard to punish at least for me.

While juggling with Marth, you should predict the rock and bait it out. The best option for kirby when being juggled is to rock into the attack, then jump out and punish you during your afterlag. However, if you never do an attack, he will have to pop out at some point, at which point you will be the one punishing him in his popout animation instead of him punishing you after he rocks the attack.

 

[ImpossiblyRood]

My practice partner mains Martha and I usually find the matchup to be terrible unless you can get in on her space. If Martha can successfully space you, you're boned. She can juggle you and make you generally sad. Once you get in Martha's space, however, I feel like Kirby can successfully out-pressure Martha's normal defensive options. Not to mention the relatively easy gimps, what with Marth's relatively straightforward recovery. In my experience (which, granted, isn't supremely extensive) the best way to beat a Martha is to avoid the neutral game and to try and abuse inhale to get Martha into a defensive position. In general, I don't see this matchup as a good one, especially if Martha can be on the offensive. It seems to be rather hit-or-miss on whether or not you have the right pressure.

 

[OhBizzle]

I agree, my playing partner who mains kirby is very aggressive and constantly applying pressure. During neutral he controls the space with dash attacks and using his up-b to keep me away, i've been getting better at punishing the up-b but on maps like FD its not always easy

 

[WinterKirby]

Learn the timing for the Cutter projectile, and powershield it.

 

[OhBizzle]

Learn the timing for the Cutter projectile, and powershield it.

I'm pretty good at powershielding it, but if i'm respecting the dash attack spacing if I powershield it i'll be too far away for reflecting the cutter to actually hurt him

 

[Cray Z]

Really struggling with against my friend who is playing a defensive mewtwo. He literally does not ever approach. He pressures with shadowballs on ps1/2 and fd. He will shieldgrab me if I approach with forward aerial or roll away if he can't. If I dash attack, we will just clank with down tilt. approaching with absorb is okay, but its predictable; I can easily get uptilted or oos upair. Any tips on punishing if I do manage to get him absorbed? If he mashes out hes too far away to hit so I usually just take the 10 damage from spewing him.

grounded and aerial fc is the only thing that works but I'm having trouble starting combos with it. If I space it so the end would hit him, he shieldgrabs me (even if I'm in the air). If I end up behind him, he just rolls or something he will reverse forward smash. regular fc sometimes catches him off guard but i haven't been able to follow up on that(the projectile). Am I doing something wrong? lol clearly...

and empty hop approach worked 0times. he really out ranges me in tilts, smashes, and grab range. + he has that safe roll

Then the even worse part... edge guarding mewtwo. I don't even need to elaborate here.

 

[Jethroo]

Mewtwo does have annoying range on a lot of his attacks and is hard to get in on and in my opinion a hard match up for kirby. For a campy person play mewtwo you going to have to stay close to him and wait/bait for an opening. I know it is hard to force yourself not rushing in, but your in luck since you play the character who can duck under a lot of projectiles (NOT FULLY CHARGED SHADOW BALLS THOUGH).

1. Dash dancing. If your not use to dash dancing it will take sometime and may seem like you are hit a lot for it, but once you get use to it you can bait out his attacks and punish him for it. There may be enough time to dash attack between dtilts.
2. If you are close to him he will think twice about full charging a shadow ball and will most likely either run to charge it, not use it, or spam uncharged shadow balls which kirby can DUCK under and punish.
3. Inhale is the best shield pressure tool kirby has, use it. Short hop it. Also don't worry if it is only 10 damage it all adds up.
4. If your close enough and he start spamming dtilt or is waiting for the dash attack you can short hop a cutter dash (upB forward). You will be above the dtilt and if he does shield it you will be behind him and if he tries to pivot grab you can hit him with a Bair since you are in the air behind him. You can also waveland out of the cutter dash if you choose to.
5. I believe kirby can duck under Mewtwo's standing grab.

Mewtwo's rolls goes a stupid distance, but you "may" be able to catch him with a dash attack.

Unlike other characters, flying to him off the stage to edge guard mewtwo will most likely be pointless and will lose you stage control (their are exceptions of course). His upB also doesn't put him in a helpless state after using it. However, that doesn't mean you can't edge guard him.

Look for his teleport habits, remember that his teleport will always go the same distance, and be over the same period of time. Familiarize yourself with these three things because if you do you can be waiting right there to knock the !@#$ out of him when he appears. Assuming the he has to use the upB to recover you can judge how close to the edge you will need to be and which side of you he will appear. He can perfect spot the edge then this will make edge guarding he much more difficult.

Don't be over aggressive and focus on baiting out openings. This person isn't Link, so crush his campy play style and he will be forced to play differently.

 

[Ogopogo]

I'd go as far as to say that Mewtwo is Kirby's hardest matchup. Difficult to get in, no gimps, tough to techread. All of Jethroo's suggestions are good. Baiting a teleport can work, but it's extremely hard to punish.

 

[SSS]

Would Snake or Ike be a better counter to Mewtwo, then?

 

[Cray Z]

#4 should be a great help

If only kirby got his shadowball. Would work so well against him.

 

[Jethroo]

Would Snake or Ike be a better counter to Mewtwo, then?

Not sure. However, the mewtwo Cray Z describe is not the typical tourney mewtwo, but a person relying on projectiles, running away, and shield grabs basically a very campy style. It works until the person fighting them figures out how to deal with it then it becomes ineffective unless they are Link. I hate dancing around all his projectiles i mean serious it is so annoying. Also against Link you can duck under is "solve every problem move" you know ... his upB.

 

[Jethroo]

Anyone have thoughts on the G&W MU. I had no answer for the one i played in a tournament.

 

[FreeGamer]

I dunno either... Kirby would probably have to play an extremely safe neutral game. Once you get him off the stage he's pretty easy to gimp though.

 

[Phan7om]

Get bacon, SH Triple Bacon, and make it so that he cant use bacon against you.

 

[JRad]

That sounds troll but kirby with GW power is really strong

 

[FreeGamer]

That sounds kinda bad considering he can use them to fuel a decently strong Oil Panic...

 

[SSS]

That sounds kinda bad considering he can use them to fuel a decently strong Oil Panic...

it's worth it.

 

[TSM ZeRo]

How's the Kirby vs Pit match up guys? Couldn't find any info on this. Anything on it would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Jethroo]

I don't know any pits players in my area and apparently nobody else in this SMALL group of Kirby players knows either, so not much info. WE NEEDS MORE KIRBYS TO SPEAK UP!

 

[SSS]

How's the Kirby vs Pit match up guys? Couldn't find any info on this. Anything on it would be greatly appreciated!

Let me play my friend KiraFlax this Friday and I'll get back to you.

Glad to see you're using your talents on a better game, Zero.

 

[Jethroo]

Saw zero's pit play chu's kirby yesterday and the main thing i took from that is that Pit doesn't have a hard time comboing kirby at low % and his Usmash kills kirby around 100% probably lower. Pit can still do his combo where he carries people off the level with Fair and arrow to kirby, but with kirby's great recovery he may be able to mix his DI up more to escape (adding DI ing down). This seems like it could be in heavy favor of pit, but to soon to tell from 1 set.

 

[JRad]

Do you have a link or was it not recorded?

 

[Jethroo]

I believe is was losers finals at this week's Xanadu tournament. I looked for like a minute for it, but didn't find it. They will probably eventually post it on youtube.

 

[Jethroo]

Do you have a link or was it not recorded?

http://www.twitch.tv/vgbootcamp/b/528582198?t=5h8m55s
Looked a little harder for it this time.

Edit: I heard that you may be able to smash DI out of pits Usmash before the hard hitting blow hits.

 

[Phan7om]

Just spitballin here but I think the matchup is in Pits favor if Kirby doesnt have arrows, and around even if Kirby does AND knows how to use them. So Zero, just try your best to not let me, or anyone copy the arrows.

 

[\Apples]

I've taken up Kirby as my secondary recently. I've been checking him in tourney matches where I can and he's won me some fights I didn't think he would. Took him to grand finals vs Silent Wolf at GG in Portland, OR last weekend.

My matchup knowledge with him isn't as extensive as my knowledge of Wario, but I'm getting very comfortable with him and I'll try and start discussing him on the boards here from time to time, seeing as there isn't a whole lot of Kirby discussion going on.

Anyone have thoughts on the G&W MU. I had no answer for the one i played in a tournament.

So, this matchup really sucks IMO. I haven't done it much, I'll sum up the exposure I've had to it.

Compare: Kirby and GW are about the same size/weight and have about the exact same size-range ratio as one another.

Contrast: GW has hella disjoints, where Kirby does not. So Kirby loses just about every trade. Kirby has multi-jumps and multiple recovery options whereas GW has a relatively linear recovery. Kirby's aerials come out faster than GW's. Kirby has super consistent defense via super armor, GW has higher kill potential on more of his moves.

Strategy: Get GW offstage and gimp him ASAP. GW has a terrible shield but an incredible OOS option. I don't think Kirby wants to spam inhale because GW can react while in shield with Up+B and be pretty safe while falling, so it's probably better to swallow GW than spit him. Bacon can neutralize bacon too, so that could help your neutral game a lot. Since Kirby's aerials come out faster than GW's, Kirby should be able to follow up off bacon very easily. Both players are going to want to stay below. Kirby's rock is a godsend but you'll have to be very careful using it. Kirby can't fall through bacon without it and GW knows it and has exactly the tool to deal with it because the bacon has no landing lag, allowing him to match Kirby's horizontal position and be ready for the rock fall and the punish. I never got a chance to really dissect throw options, but D-throw is tried and true, it always gives ya something to work with at the very least.

 

[SSS]

Kirby with Pit Arrows. Discuss.

 

[Phan7om]

Arrows are imo Top 5 projectiles in the game, and they are basically infinite. I think if someone got really good with Arrows, people would scream broken and arrows would get nerfed. Someone needs to be as good as Cyve and Yass were with arrows in Brawl.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCl-EuSc2GE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdmSwchOE_o
There are arrow tricks like looping, of course, and rain. Arrows can possibly help with the combo game as well. Idk if they have the same hitstun as pits right now, but im confident they will in the future. Arrow direction is only affected if you hold a direction that isnt parallel to the direction is going. And direction is only influenced by the control stick. Meaning that if you shoot an arrow horizontally and dash/walk/run it wont affect the direction, and if you use arrow rain and you hold up or down the direction wont change. You can also shoot arrows directly at your opponent when you are using arrow rain. You can do all of your smashes when arrow looping/rain and it wont change direction. If someone got really good they could use them to hit after a grab or a throw. There is actually a TAS video that versat uploaded, though its Brawl, where Kirby can shoot two arrows and combo it with up-throw which kills Pit at basically 0%. Ive only been able to combo 1 arrow into it, so its really hard and probably never going to be used in tournament unless its after a sheild break or something.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFGVfnmCFdM

 

[SSS]

I think if someone got really good with Arrows, people would scream broken and arrows would get nerfed.

inb4 Armada

 

[Phan7om]

Someone should make a thread/edit this thread so its a lot more organized. I dont wanna have to look through pages to find matchup help.

 

[SSS]

Someone should make a thread/edit this thread so its a lot more organized. I dont wanna have to look through pages to find matchup help.

I will do that later tonight. I'll change the original post.

 

[\Apples]

Another thing you should add to my GW post is that while Kirby's multi-jumps normally give him a great baiting ability in the air, he loses much of that to GW to his bacon. Kirby's neutral game is difficult on GW because of this and losing trades.

 

[SSS]

I officially have no idea how to spoiler things properly. pl0x halp

 

[Phan7om]

@ SSS
make a spoiler by [spoiler ] [/spoiler ] ,no spaces... you got this step down
inside of the 1st spoiler box put [spoiler = name ] [/spoiler ] ,no spaces
Ex.[spoiler = Gohan ] [/spoiler ] w/o spaces would be

Spoiler: Gohan

Just put stuff in between the spoiler brackets... you got this step down as well

and then if you wanted to put a picture over that just do
Ex.

Spoiler: Bowser

Do this this and this against Bowser. Watchout for this. etc.

(: bowser 2: [spoiler = Bowser ] [/spoiler ]

 

[SSS]

@ Phan7om thank you i'll do that

 

[Comet7]

How's the kirby and pikachu matchup? I couldn't find anything in the pikachu matchup thread.

 

[Jethroo]

Just throwing it out there, but if you stay in the air against snake players, they will hate you. That means using kirby's dash attack basically to only extend combo's and using SH cutter dash and SH aerials to approach.

Kirby's dash attack will be punished with a sleep dart most of the time

 

[SSS]

Just throwing it out there, but if you stay in the air against snake players, they will hate you. That means using kirby's dash attack basically to only extend combo's and using SH cutter dash and SH aerials to approach.

Kirby's dash attack will be punished with a sleep dart most of the time

also mines :/

 

[Jethroo]

also mines :/

The sleep dart is just phase one of the punish.
Step 1: sleep dart.
Step 2: ???
Step 3: death.

 

[SSS]

The sleep dart is just phase one of the punish.
Step 1: sleep dart.
Step 2: ???
Step 3: death.

Step 1: Sleep dart.
Step 2: Sticky C4
Step 3: Upthrow
Step 4: Upair
Step 5: Detonate
Step 6: Death

Don't mess wif me I secondary Snake.

edit: Also if you do Final Cutter sideways dart doesn't work. It'll stop it but won't put you to sleep.