Tips for Beating Sheik?

[FE_Hector]

So, I might have created a monster... My brother used to be a Samus main (the contest wasn't too great), but I suggested, due to similarities in Sheik and Samus aerial games, that he switch over to Sheik, and I haven't been able to beat his Sheik as of yet. Yeah, I'm responsible for this, but I'm getting closer. Below is the best rundown I can give you of how he beats me

Rolling, and a lot of it. When we fight, we both tend to roll away a lot, and typically in the same direction. I would punish him there, but with the distances and timing from it, I don't have options. I would try to grab him during the fight, but Sheik's lightning speed has been making it into a pain. He likes to use Sheik's Needles to get in my way, too. As soon as I miss with ANYTHING, he punishes me so hard, and it's tough to get out of. After I escape, it just takes a single dash hit for him to KO me, which gets repetitive. My biggest defense so far has actually been in remaining a bit more static and waiting for him to land. When he lands, I can normally get some good damage with ftilt, utilt, or fsmash upon occasion, but it's rough. Once I get him in the air, chasing him is such a pain because of Sheik's aerial volatility overall. This is where I struggle a lot, but I've been getting a BIT better if I use fair or nair attacks, but he's definitely a pain.

I'm planning on posting a video of one of our fights to the Marth Critique Thread probably tonight or tomorrow, and I'll post the ref code in here whenever I get that up, but if you can give me any tips before then, that'd be great! (I have a tournament Saturday, so I'm cramming improvement as much as possible lol.)

 

[Life]

You were probably right to tell your brother to switch. The Sheik matchup is incredibly useful for a Marth player to know, and Sheik is generally a better character overall than Samus as well as being much easier to use.

Replace rolling with wavedashing as a movement option. Wavedashing is significantly less laggy than rolling, which means if he rolls and you wavedash you'll have just a bit of time in which you can hit him.

Beating Sheik as a character is largely about winning in neutral positions. Sheik's combos on Marth are relatively easy and can go for a long time, whereas Marth's combos on Sheik are more difficult (you can still destroy her with the right combos, I've seen PPMD do it, but it's harder). However, Marth has a reach advantage, which he can press with wise use of down tilt. Until you get to a level where Sheik players wavedash out of shield, Sheik's only answers to it are crouch canceling (which doesn't work as well at high percent), throwing needles (which can only go so far), and jumping (where she's significantly less mobile and vulnerable to stuff like up tilt, forward air, et cetera). Marth also has a dramatically more useful dash dance than Sheik, which gives him an edge in horizontal movement.

So your goal in the Sheik matchup is to come out on top in as many interactions as possible, because Marth has the tools to do that to Sheik, but Sheik gets rewarded much more than Marth does on average for getting a hit.

The video will help a lot, as it's hard to help someone when you don't know what their weaknesses are, but that's the gist of it.

 

[FE_Hector]

Alright, I've got the 3 vids ready. Since I've already gotten tips in here, I'll post them in here as well as in the Rate my Marth thread. Please don't be afraid to rip my Marth to pieces, he's definitely got work left to do. Also, I know that you can use the dash dance as a way to confuse your opponent, but you made it sound like it's useful even past that. There's very little high-level play in these videos except for my numerous short hops (I'm slowly working on implementing the wavedash and dash dance into the battle), but please, any critique you can give me would be excellent.

Note, if you have the sound on, there is some... PG-13 commentary in there. It's a 16-year old manning Marth and a 15-year old manning Sheik, so just a heads-up.

Here are all 3 battles:
http://youtu.be/Tyn1FzEvKqQ
http://youtu.be/824OUJmAs0s
[URL]http://youtu.be/aoUGSjaoDfc[/URL]

Anyway, please let me know of anything and everything that you can tell me. I'm prepared for some harsh feedback.

 

[AirFair]

The one thing I remember most about the matchup is to stay grounded. If you can keep Sheik above you then that's an advantage for you, since you have a good air game, and it denies her more stage.

 

[FE_Hector]

Any other tips based on the videos? He rather enjoys the ground...

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

I watched the first couple stocks of one video. It seems to me Sheik is not the most inherent issue in your matches. Most of it I think comes from wanting to know how to use Marth more effectively. Once you have better control of Marth I think the matches with Sheik will improve as a result.

Short Reply:
My bit of advice is to look at stuff from other players and try to copy it. Once you have more ideas on how to use Marth you can practice getting your execution of your movements and timing of attacks down.

Long Reply:
From what I saw you stuck with these few patterns. If Sheik is nearby go into Fsmash, roll, or counter. If Sheik is far away on the ground you went with dash attack. I know you used other moves, but this was the common response most of the time. This is not the most effective strategy. I think you need to work out a few guiding principles which will form a strategy and use that to guide most of your actions.

Here is what I believe you want to try focusing on. Some of it is pretty obvious, but its useful to take a step back on some of this stuff and see the whole picture and how it spreads out.
Your goal is to get people into the blast zone
That is the main goal of smash bros. in general.

Figure out how to get the person into the blast zone
You are Marth and want to get people to the blast zone as effectively as you can. This sets up the whole ideas of juggling characters, combo'ing people, and edgeguarding them. The first step should be figuring out how to dislodge a person from the stage. Once you dislodged them from the stage you need to keep them there until they are in the blast zone.

How to do carry a person to the blast zone
The last two points are pretty obvious. You want people KO'd and you need an effective way to go about doing it.

First off, Marth's main strength is he has a sword which disjoints the hitbox from his body. This means you can pretty much attack a person in the air without trading if they decided to attack. Additionally, Marth gets more hitstun and knockback on the tip of the sword.

You want a person in the air where they cannot block/evade sword swings as easily. Plus, you want to aim for the tip of the sword. However, that is not quite enough as you might very well be knocking a person back and forth across the stage for a long time. Its more effective to put the person into the air and guide them offstage. You can do this by either flat out using a move that puts them closer or you prevent them from getting close to the center of the stage.

Need a way to get people into the air
You need good ways to put people into the air if you can. This can be achieved by using Fsmash, but there are better options to choose from. Given the past discussion Grab is really, really good at putting a person some place. You only get 4% off Uthrow, but the benefit is that the person is in the air and it leads into more things. Marth has other moves to get people into the air, but they are not as good or situational. For example, if someone is on a platform already you do not have to bother using grab. Use Utilt or a SH Uair instead.

These also leads into discussions of how to set-up for getting grabs. But, I am not going to get into that right now.

Keep a person away from the stage
Once you got a person offstage or in the air you need to keep them there until they are KO'd. Generally, you never want to let a character touch the stage or get to the ledge as they can get their airdodge or 2nd jump back. So, put a sword in their direction. Some times special things occur like in Shieks case where you can grab the ledge force them to UpB onto the stage and punish the lag by wavedashing onto the stage. Otherwise, do not let them back.

-------------------------------

There is more stuff to always consider, but I think this might be a good enough starting point. Several of these things are pretty obvious, but I want to make note them so you can reevaluate several choices you made in the matches. When Sheik was offstage in those matches you often times stood at the ledge trying to charge a Fsmash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tyn1FzEvKqQ&feature=youtu.be @2:46 reconsider this situation. Could there have been a more effective option you could have chosen? Perhaps, wait until Sheik gets closer to the stage, then use Fair to provoke Sheik into either getting hit, jumping, or airdodging. But, if you SH Fair low to the ground you should be able to still cover those options of jumping or airdodge despite your SH Fair would have missed.

The other important part to all of this is better execution. Despite the fact that this charged Fsmash did not do anything Shiek was in enough lag for using UpB that you could have punished the landing. But you ended up making a mistake and shielded and rolled away. Playing the CPU I think would be beneficial simply to practice your timing, avoid making input mistakes, and better execution in general.

 

[FE_Hector]

I've been getting a lot better from fighting CPUs recently, especially in input. The downside is that I then bring my habits against CPUs into a normal fight and get whipped.

I'll take your advice into account and try fighting my bro more. Once I feel my skills have improved, I'll probably post more videos in order to get more critique. Hopefully I'll be winning those ones. I think I'm understanding his Sheik better anyway.

 

[Smashing Turnips]

Since they covered a lot of information on the Sheik/Marth MU, I won't go in to too much information, but I will suggest watching sets from PPU and Shroomed. Kevin plays the MU really well, and puts pressure on Shroomed through his movement, causing him to do risky spotdodges.

Here are some sets:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AmELCed44c
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0MH-VLIDjs

 

[FE_Hector]

Since they covered a lot of information on the Sheik/Marth MU, I won't go in to too much information, but I will suggest watching sets from PPU and Shroomed. Kevin plays the MU really well, and puts pressure on Shroomed through his movement, causing him to do risky spotdodges.

Here are some sets:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AmELCed44c
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0MH-VLIDjs

Thanks. That gave me a few new ideas to try vs. Sheik. I've been able to get pretty good against my bro's Sheik, though. We do a lot of infinite time matches until whenever he gets tired of it, and I'm always in the lead in terms of KOs by the end. It's still really close, but I'm generally winning.

 

[Smashing Turnips]

A few other tips:
-Staying grounded is what wins you this MU. Sheik can shield grab any poorly placed aerial, and higher level Sheiks will abuse the chain grab she has on Marth.
-Down Tilt is amazing. Along with Dash Dancing (Marth's best tool for applying pressure), d-tilt is amazing for throwing off Sheik's control of the area, and it helps push her towards the edge.
-GRAB LEDGE. This is super important. It forces her onto ledge, and you can punish her large ending lag on her recovery. If you don't, she gets the ledge for free and can stall.
-Know your follow ups.

 

[FE_Hector]

A few other tips:
-Staying grounded is what wins you this MU. Sheik can shield grab any poorly placed aerial, and higher level Sheiks will abuse the chain grab she has on Marth.
-Down Tilt is amazing. Along with Dash Dancing (Marth's best tool for applying pressure), d-tilt is amazing for throwing off Sheik's control of the area, and it helps push her towards the edge.
-GRAB LEDGE. This is super important. It forces her onto ledge, and you can punish her large ending lag on her recovery. If you don't, she gets the ledge for free and can stall.
-Know your follow ups.

I'm working on staying grounded-- my bro and I play the neutral game in an odd manner.
Dtilt implementation has been improving a ton.
My edgeguards against him are nearly flawless. A lot of times, he'll just fastfall down and say "I was dead anyway"
Follow ups can be difficult to get, but they're coming along nicely. 0-60 combos are seen probably once a match.