Use of Side-B reversal at edges (instant return SDR)

[Superhacker75mil]

I'm training more and more with my Sonic lately, since he's my main and stuff, and I'm trying to learn as much as I can about every facet of his game. I've got an MM with a high-ranking player coming up the 17th (he'll be Marth), and this other Sonic and I (he's also MMing) are determined to have one of us win. Go Sonic, yay steak, all that crap.

So, one of things I've been looking into is his ability to instantly return after running right to the end of the stage with an SDR, due to side-B reversal and that jazz. Is there anything extra that I can add on to this aspect of Sonic's game, or is it pretty cut and dry once you have the timing down?

...

It's all I could think of asking, really. I just want more high-level Marth tips, more than what the match-up topic is currently providing, and I can't think of how to ask. I've already read most of the literature here, especially the awesome Spin Dash/Charge topic (a couple times I've read that now), but I don't know what else to do other than practice against CPU Marth's hurtbox (and its ******* recovery attempts). There just aren't any good Marths for me to play nearby.

 

[Boxob.]

Marth?

Just dash attack.

Don't worry about being fancy, just don't get hit, marth's slow. Pressure is all you need.

Grab release to ftilt will clash with his Fsmash/Dtilt if he tries to do that instantly.

Forget that the player is good, realize you're playing marth, and feint him to death. Get his to smash attack, and punish.

 

[Superhacker75mil]

Slow movement wise, yeah, but that doesn't a Marth player won't have good defense with side-B, fair, and occasional f-tilt. I get what you're saying, because baiting any of the smashes is great, but I don't know how smash-happy this guy is. I'm worried on how best to apply the pressure game. Grabs, yes, they're my favorite way with Sonic, but dash attack alone won't cut it.

F-tilt clashes, though? Really? I can't remember if I've done it on my own before against the Marths I've played. That'd be useful out of a grab-release, but wouldn't I probably just see another d-tilt (probably not another f-smash)?

Anywho, feinting to death is Sonic's gameplan most of the time, utilizing his fantastic erratic approach strategies with SD cancels and ASC cancels and mid-air SDs and running and stuff. Nothing more specific?

 

[Tenki]

He'll be alot tougher to beat if he plays campy.

Granted, you can probably run between double F-airs and counterattack, as long as you're starting within 1/4 level's range from him.

If you dash attack at a low % you'll probably eat a D-air or F-air though.

 

[Superhacker75mil]

That's what I was thinking, on dash attack. Not good except for hassling at mid-high percents, maybe throwing them off guard for something better.

I can almost guarantee he'll play campy, especially against Sonic. Inui knows what he's doing.

 

[Tenki]

oh, that kind of player.

well, you'll have to test the waters yourself. Sonic is disadvantaged to Marth in the first place, so you'll want to take advantage of Brawl's mechanics as much as possible. Everything ranging from "easier power shields", to normal shield's low release time (don't waste time in shield) to grabbing before the 3rd/4th dancing blades (if you shield it), to the low hitstun (keep in mind his options as well as yours) and spotdodge/airdodge system.

Run (don't spindash) to approach. Spindashes are just for punishment.

Also, see how he reacts. If he's attacking when you run, shield. If he's dodging when you run near him, jump and do a slightly delayed B-air or shield in front of him and grab. If he jumps back, then keep running, or turn around and run back and forth. Avoid rolling unless it's away from a D-tilt or some move that keeps him in place.

Again, Sonic is disadvantaged to Marth, so you'll really have to be able to outplay him.

 

[infomon]

ohhhh man..... eat steak beforehand, and I hope it goes well. Make sure you come back and post the outcome... and deffo record the matches if you can!! We'd love to see them, and study what worked and what didn't.

At least I would. I can't handle Marth at all. He hard-counters me as a person, the way that Sonic is reported to have once countered Inui (I doubt it's the case anymore, but w/e).

Here's what one of our wiser Sonics has to say about this matchup:

yeah man i got alot better against marth after fighting dan for so long. another thing u wanna do is outlive marth....and bait alot of f-smashes. the move is highly punishable. up tilt is his safest kill move and u can survive that until about 150 or so. dan/any marth i play always tells me that i dont die. its because his kill options really revolve around u either messing up ur spacing....attacking his shield blindly or well timed f-smashes. and this may sound...super....super....super weird cause every marth will telll u that BF is their best neutral but take them ALL to battlefield. its his best neutral if he can control the bottom platform....but with the up throw u can put him on the platforms ALOT and put him at his weakest point (below him) alot more frequently. also....dancing blade 101...if he goes for the last hit with 10000 little pokes SDI into him as hard as you can. you will end up behind him b4 the move finishes....thus ensuring the f-smash since the move takes 4ever. also do not roll behind dancing blade. u will take an up-b. also if u r shielding dancing blade and u SUSPECT the downwards one is coming....grab. the downwards dancing blade is able to be grabbed inbetween the 3rd and 4th hit. the upward one as well...the regular one is not. other sonic players will tell u its all about tilts and w/e....but marth is a characters BASED ON SPACING and TRAPS....sonic really loves to **** ppls spacing and up-p out of dtilt traps or walls that he cant find a sensible way around. so really running is the best offense.

My own thoughts (but I'm fairly scrub):

Marth's moves are fast; some of them have punishable ending lag. Good Marths won't be swashing away at nothing, so you'll have to approach, or convince him that you're approaching, which is hard.... side-B shieldcancels get old very fast, and ASC shieldcancels are tooootally punishable if they get in range. Try not to spindash a lot. If you're shieldgrab-happy (as you probably should be, as a Sonic), this is really dangerous... Marth will be spaced to tipper, and you really can't punish him at that range; you certainly can't grab, and clashing with a Marth does indeed mean he gets a free dtilt, afaict.

Boxob's suggestion about dash-attack is actually a good one, at least when he's at mid-high percents... it works really well at punishing anything the Marth does, but you prolly want to run away after. Either get in at very close range + jab/grab, or stay awaaaay. Dash turnaround pivot cancel stuff is good for faking out approaches while carefully staying just out of tipper range.

Spotdodging near Marth means you eat a dancing blade. Learn to (S)DI it to get out!!

Never get on a platform anywhere above a Marth, it's insta-tipper If a Marth is really high and you want to Uair juggle, remember that his Dair has crazy ending-lag, so if you can bait that you win. More likely, the Marth will try to airdodge your attack, and/or Nair instead.

Marth's recovery always looks to me like it should be really punishable, but it's actually very good..... but it can be very predictable; it's a guessing game about when they'll finally do their up-B. If it doesn't sweetspot the edge, we have a good chance at punishing it. Marths can ledgecamp very well, it's tempting to dive in with a Bair or Dair but that doesn't work very much since their up-B has invincy frames and tends to stagespike us in exchange. Dropping springs is safe and can mess them up rather often, IMO. I hope you can instant-edgehog, because that's your tool when a Marth doesn't sweetspot the edge; Sonic's fast enough to pull this off way better than any other character, and he might not expect it.

 

[Superhacker75mil]

Hooray, advice from MalcolM! It's good stuff...definitely the kind of specifics I was looking for. Hopefully I'll get to see him play in person at BBC finals, since he's probably the best Sonic (Blue's good too, but MalcolM's better at following up) in our area and watching YouTube vids of his matches is great.

Yes, it's true Sonic no longer counters Inui. He seems to have gotten over his issues with f-smash and whatever. Or at least, that's what I've heard.

Anywho, your advice is great, even if you say you're a scrub (I'm pretty scrub-a-dub too).

Marth's recovery always looks to me like it should be really punishable, but it's actually very good..... but it can be very predictable; it's a guessing game about when they'll finally do their up-B. If it doesn't sweetspot the edge, we have a good chance at punishing it. Marths can ledgecamp very well, it's tempting to dive in with a Bair or Dair but that doesn't work very much since their up-B has invincy frames and tends to stagespike us in exchange. Dropping springs is safe and can mess them up rather often, IMO. I hope you can instant-edgehog, because that's your tool when a Marth doesn't sweetspot the edge; Sonic's fast enough to pull this off way better than any other character, and he might not expect it.

This stuff right here is very true. It's easy for a Sonic to think he can stage spike Marth, but only rarely is it really the case. It's true that Marth's got some beast ledge camp moves in u-air and n-air, and f-air for actually coming back (I'd rather deal with Pit or ROB ledgecamping by far). In the air, Marth's b-air is potent, even if he can only really use it once off the edge, and good Marths can go for the dair should you hang around too much, though Sonic's pro at coming back from spikes. ^o^ I did play an okay Marth enough to pick up a few of these things, and yeah, I got on the whole insta-hog thing fast a ways back.

The only off-edge Sonic tactic I never really got the hang of was proper use of d-air...I tend to just use b-air or alternate cancel/non-cancel Homing Attack, sometimes f-air.

 

[Jim Morrison]

"Sonic is a good counter against Inui!"

Taken from Sonic WCD thread.

All you need to know.

 

[Tenki]

You know they lied :<

 

[Jim Morrison]

SBR would never lie to Sonic boards. Absolutely no way!

 

[memphischains]

SBR would never lie to Sonic boards. Absolutely no way!

<3 if i ever had to rank quotes, this one in my book would be WAYYYY on top

 

[Superhacker75mil]

So SBR still doesn't take this place seriously, huh? Practically every post or thread I've read has made mention of that somewhere.

Sissy little vegans, all of 'em (no offense to actual vegetarians, mostly)!

 

[aeghrur]

Huh, MMing Inui? Hehey, send us some vids, lol.

 

[Superhacker75mil]

It's in almost a week and I still don't have any recent human Marth practice! ;_;

But I refuse to be made into ground beef...I WILL SEAR THE BOLD, JUICY FLAVOR OF MY SKILL INTO MY FOE.

 

[Suna]

It's in almost a week and I still don't have any recent human Marth practice! ;_;

But I refuse to be made into ground beef...I WILL SEAR THE BOLD, JUICY FLAVOR OF MY SKILL INTO MY FOE.

go on Gamebattles lots of Marths there....and the kill my Sonic too

 

[Superhacker75mil]

No online, no way no how. Sorry, I'm offline only...trying to develop a skill-set online is counter-intuitive to having lag-free skills, and for some reason I ALWAYS have awful lag on my end, even if my connection seems good. It sucks.

 

[infomon]

But I refuse to be made into ground beef...I WILL SEAR THE BOLD, JUICY FLAVOR OF MY SKILL INTO MY FOE.

This quote is amazing

OK, so let's say a Marth is 1/4 distance of FD away and he just starts Dtilting in place (sloooowly moving forward lol). What do you do?

 

[Superhacker75mil]

First, I'd say he listens to SBR too much.

Then, I'd ask you which stage we were on (FD, I assume, or was that just a measurement?) and where we were positioned.

But I think there's a good chance I'd jump backwards into the air, spinshot over to the other side (probably with a bair) and see what he does in the interim, if I don't connect. I'd be too afraid to try and shield cancel ASC or a run for the grab, since he's got options out of d-tilt.

 

[Tenki]

No online, no way no how. Sorry, I'm offline only...trying to develop a skill-set online is counter-intuitive to having lag-free skills, and for some reason I ALWAYS have awful lag on my end, even if my connection seems good. It sucks.

Do you have 56k or DSL?

Anyway, green/yellow connections (the circle on the right side of their name box if you look at the wifi friend list) are pretty adaptable, though IMO yellow sucks.

I don't know if it works this way for most people, but even for me, who pretty much started off as wifi-only, there's a sort of progression where I kind of perform better as the connection gets better, and finally, when it gets to offline, I play at my best. So it's not like I expect people to not be able to punish me if I do a F-smash lol. As long as you're aware of and avoid doing bad habits online (like spotdodging after every move >_>) you should be fine offline. but I digress.

This quote is amazing

OK, so let's say a Marth is 1/4 distance of FD away and he just starts Dtilting in place (sloooowly moving forward lol). What do you do?

Why don't you run towards him, shield/pshield a D-tilt and shieldgrab?

it's really straightforward, but hay, it works. It's only a single-level move though. If you wanna cover more than that, maybe RAR B-air or just a SDSC dance (side-B cancel left and right lol) to get a feel for what kind of reaction i should be looking for.

 

[Superhacker75mil]

As far as online is concerned, I have DSL, with my Wii working a wireless connection a significant distance away from the source. I'm just too discouraged playing online, anyways...I can't adapt to the lag.

Anyways, I rush forward for the shield-grab a lot on relatively campy attack strats, but I'm just not sure that I can get away with that at his level of play. It'd probably just be baiting, after all.

Then again, I may be overestimating how much I'll get camped. I have little respect attached to my name after all, so I guess I wouldn't be so surprised by a more aggressive playstyle from the opponent.

I dunno'.

 

[infomon]

I'd be too afraid to try and shield cancel ASC or a run for the grab, since he's got options out of d-tilt.

Sounds correct to me.

Marth's Dtilts in succession are actually pretty fast and disjoint, I think it's actually pretty risky to try and run in and shield-grab... your timing to get far enough in to grab but without getting poked would have to be pretty good. And Superhacker's right, the Dtilts are probably baiting. Then again, I was able to dash-attack between Marth's Dtilts at my last smashfest, but I only tried it twice, so idk.

Marths like to poke low to force you to come in from above (ex. spinshot) so they can just Ftilt / Utilt as you come in So liek... yeah... be careful.

but I suuuck against marthas so anyone can feel free to tell me I'm wrong or add any suggestions about this playtime-scenario

 

[Superhacker75mil]

I meant more a spinshot out of aerial down+B...I don't usually do it from the ground since it's easier from the air. I know you can C-stick it out of side+B, but that's awkward finger positioning.

I doubt he'd be able to catch me at that height, even with an up-air.

Thing about dash attack too is that it's an attack moving forward, not a shield coming to a quick stop, so chances are much better of making it through/connecting.

 

[infomon]

Yeah ok fair enough

I don't think down-B can spinshot from the ground, I think only side-B can do that... tho I could be wrong. An SDR can spinshot as it rolls off a platform tho.... and that usually happens to me by misteak lol

 

[Superhacker75mil]

It can't (down+B SS from ground)...I meant spinshotting from the ground in general. If it could, that'd make ground spinshotting so much easier.