X vs. Snake : Your Opinions?

[Kashakunaki]

Hello and greetings to the Olimar board. I've posted here and there, but I'm not nearly as large a contributor to these boards as others have proven themselves to be (examples that come to mind are Echo and TrueRedemption).

However, I'm no scrub and I know my stuff. I second Olimar and main Wolf.

So my question to you is, what do you think of the match up? That is Olimar vs. Snake.

I can see many advantages and yet many disadvantages and I'm still unsure as to whether I need to:
A. Use Olimar in this match up
B. Use Wolf or
C. Get a good third character that does well

So, let me start off by listing my opinions of advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages
1. Snake likes to be on the ground

A. Olimar has a good aerial game and can rack up massive damage in the air (Fire Pikmin uair anymore?)

B. Snake performs better on the ground so if you can keep him in the air, great. Not to mention Olimar has the range and grabbing ability (omg yes grabbing ability) to put him and keep him in the air.

2. Snake is a heavy character.

A. Olimar can rack up the damage nice and quick with Pikmin latch, uair, and some grabs to fair among other things. This is nice because you can approach ko percents a lot faster.

B. Despite being super *** light, Olimar has some ****ing punch to him. Between WACing, Usmash, Back throw (blue), up throw (purple), and dsmash (I say this because of the trajectory it sends you at and you can hit with both Pikmin causing extra damage and difficulty DIing).

3. Snake likes gernades... so?

A. I think Olimar players game should focus around grabbing, like the Ice Climbers do or Mewtwo in Melee. This more or less nullifies that annoying *** "hit the Snake in the shield and get your **** messed up by a gernade" stuff.

B. Red Pikmin are immune to explosions. This is nice because they are one of the best and that Uair is a beast for damage racking.

4. Olimar has detatched hit boxes. Also another thing nice against his gernades (and Pikmin stop nikita).

Pretty nice *** list of advantages, ya? Well... one super terrible down fall that I find.

Disadvantages

1. Olimar is light... I mean, real light guys. Snake KOs him at the drop of a hat. And if he isn't going to KO him horizontally or vertically (most likely) then he sure as hell is going to gimp him by edge hogging.

And those disadvantages are assuming I keep him in the air. Otherwise I have to deal with lots of gernade toses and Snake dashing and ftilt and Snake dashing and Snake dashing and ftilt and more Snake dashing and ftilting.

Yeah... thoughts?

 

[Jarri]

All depends on the style of the Snake, according to me. If he's very agressive, you got yourselves a problem. The DACUS is really a pain in the *** when the other guy knows how and when to use it. When the Snake is rather passive, you won't have many problems.

What do I suggest... eh, of course shieldgrabbing. Try to throw his bomb back to him by throwing a Pikmin against it. Snake is pretty good in the air (including nasty uSmash), so watch out there. If a Snake doesn't use it recovery completely, he can still attack, keep that in mind as well (right?). I suggest to hit Snake when he is actually recovering instead of when he "has" recovered, if you know what I mean. If he grabs you (dGrab is that, I believe), and puts you on the ground again, watch out for his fSmash. If it's a smart Snake he will do a fSmash on one of the two sides and has a 50% chance to hit you with it. Kabooom!

Good luck. =)

 

[TrueRedemption]

Snake is a very interesting matchup for sure. Unfortunately I only have limited experience against a less than competative snake. Jarri certainly has it right about passive snakes, they are rarely a threat to most players/characters though as long as you can avoid getting flustered. Aggressive snakes I'm curious about, I actually spent a little time in training mode to get a better feel for it. The dash attack does have nice range/speed, but its not disjointed, hit snake during it and hes knocked back, % up, attack interrupted etc. However theres a bit more required of the timing than normal, snake is a very slow runner which is contrasted by the sudden very quick forward dive. Just anticipate it and bite on it. Snakes options when dashing at you and approaching i found are surprisingly limited. His SH gets very little height which doesn't offer much distance/di if he tries to jump over your attack and use an aerial. Also hes simply not fast enough to quickly punish most moves of Olimars before you can dodge or shield. One last catch though, his dash attack actually completely lifts him from the stage, enough so that Grabs will miss for part of the animation. Because of that I suggest FSmash spam, it out ranges anything Snake has, it pauses at that max distance to preserve spacing, its high enough the dash attack doesn't avoid it, and it does good damage. Don't worry about move degradation on it, FSmash shouldn't really be your go to KO move, and your opponent shouldn't be repeatedly getting beaten running into your FSmashes enough to make the damage too low. Best news, if your opponent knows/uses the dash attack -> USmash thing, hes still just as vulnerable. Again its a game with the timing, cause hes likely to come fast from further away using that, but hes vulnerable throughout.

As for Aerial approaches, Snakes aerials in general have so much shield knock back that hes asking for an Olimar shield grab, its long range can still quickly cover the distance between you, an Olimar specific advantage (maybe other long range grabs, but not interested in testing). Snakes DAir is something to watch out for, his SH isn't big enough to make it a quick immediate approach threat, but it has some priority on it, so much so that he'll come down through your USmash with it every time.

FTilt i did see had deceiving range to it and was a solid 1 2 combo, however its not the fastest move out there, and its range still can't compare to FSmash/Grab. Just don't let him settle that close to Olimar and it shouldn't cause you much trouble. Olimar is faster and can run away even to keep spacing if things get hairy. Just protect your bubble with FSmashes and UpBs when applicable, you don't really wanna get caught directly under him as DAir comes through USmash with ease it being a multi hit attack.

Once you can dominate the near spacing game with your superior range, the biggest threat is the projectile stuff. Here in videos i've seen some real trouble develop. It seems like a slippery slope situation, so long as you don't get hit you'll be dominating, but once something connects and breaks rhythm, one grenade turns into two missiles some c4 3 gernades and a land mine of trouble. So what can you do to avoid that? Mostly like i said above don't get flustered, just be aware of where things are planted, and what hes throwing at you. He can't really have THAT much out at once that its unavoidable, just needs maintained focus and good control. Don't be afraid to catch/throw back gernades, it really turns the table, Red Pikmin also help out a good bit. All pikmin can deflect a grenade and help keep your cool. Most importantly though is a good latched pikmin, if snake is resorting to a projectile heavy play style, they stay relatively stationary, not completely but in the same area, which is all that is needed for latch to be effective. Once a pikmin connects, snake has to either pause his barrage or take the damage, which we all know can add up quickly if you connect with a few. As jumping can effectively avoid things as well, fitting a toss in here or there isn't too hard, even if it doesn't connect it can disrupt something, just be sure to find windows to pluck more if this goes on for a while.

All in all thats mostly the infamous Don't Get Hit theory, but the answers i found i'm pretty sure will work and shouldn't be too difficult to put into play, its simply relying on Olimar's fundamental advantages. Avoid double jumping you'll get caught with a quick dash->attack->USmash, apply pressure when snakes not prepared but know that you can beat him at range as well. I've heard that aggressive Olimars are particularly effective, perhaps getting in there with a bunch of FSmashes just out of his range, SH FAirs, and the like will prevent Snake any room to work with. When you do get hit be aware that usually something else, be it snake or some explosive, will be close behind to keep up the pressure, do whatever you can to reset the situation to neutral, snakes not great at neutral but brutal with a bit of momentum. Oh also in closing, intended to put this up above and forgot, as i've advocated so much of lately but especially against characters with good recoveries, save your USmash till right about KO range, then look for the opportunity to end his stock ASAP, dinking around with snake above 120% is asking for trouble, a couple connected grenades is enough momentum for a should be dead snake to really put damage up on your stock.


-True

 

[shrinkray21]

Thanks true - I honestly know NOTHING about this matchup!

 

[DanGR]

u basically cleared up the whole matchup. good job. just one thing though, would you say olimar or snake has the advantage in this one?

 

[BlackWaltzX]

I'd say Olimar has the advantage. If it's passive as others have said, you can just latch grenades away while having 5 more to follow up the explosion. (Not recommended to throw all 6 at once, of course.) When he shields, you can do nair to his face to knock him out of it if I remember as well.

For aggressive sakes, they usually start out with a sake dash or whatever.. SO I'd just latch once or twice and then prepare for the grab to interrupt the dash.

I believe true said everything....