ZSS - Roy Match-Up Discussion

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Navigation Links​

• The Directory
• ZSS Matchup Thread

Roy Frame Data References​

• KuroganeHammer's Roy Frame Data
• Mastercore v3 Roy Dump [1.1.1]
• LordWilliam1234's Roy Frame Data Reference [1.11]

ZSS Frame Data References​

• KuroganeHammer's ZSS Frame Data
• Mastercore v3 ZSS Dump [1.1.1]
• [szerosuit_cockpit] [szerosuit_gunship] [szerosuit_laser] [szerosuit_paralyzer] [szerosuit_paralyzer_bullet] [szerosuit_whip]
• LordWilliam1234's ZSS Frame Data Reference [1.11] (currently unavailable)

 

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Score|
Overall|-1
Neutral|-1
Roy at Advantage|+1
Roy at Disadvantage|-1
Roy Edge/Ledge guarding|0
Roy on Recovery|0
Far Away|0
Mid Range|-1
Close Combat|+1

Preferable Stage Choices:

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Stages to Avoid:

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Notable Posts:

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General Posting Guidelines​

• Quality Posts: Post relavant, detailed responses when possible. Avoid posting simple matchup ratios/scores. Providing data or tournament replays to support your post is always appreciated.
• Civil Discussion: A discussion has more value when conducted in a civil manner than one with personal attacks. Please stay respectful of other posters.
• Full Potential: Always assume that both characters are being played to their full potential. Don't base your position on sub standard play.

Analysis Guidelines​

• The Overall Matchup Score: Which character has the advantage over the other, and by how much. See below for definitions.
• How The Matchup Should Be Optimally Played: How to fight the opponent more efficiently and deal with them. General do's and don'ts of the matchup.
• Relavant Data: Frame data and tournament replays, among other things.
• Stage Choice: Which stages should be chosen against the opponent, and which stages should be avoided. Also, how the stage elements factor in to the matchup.

Gameplay states to consider in your analysis​

• Neutral - Neither character have any significant positional advantages
  
• Roy at an Advantage - How does Roy establish an advantageous postion, and how does he optimize keeping his opponent at a disadvantage?
  
• Roy at a Disadvantage - How does Roy minimize damage while at a disadvantage (i.e. optimal DI while getting combo'd / juggled), and what tools can he use to escape?
• Roy Edge/Ledge guarding - What tools does the opponent have while recovering, and how does Roy convert edge guards into stocks?
  
• Roy on Recovery - What edge/ledge guarding tools does the opponent have, and how does Roy avoid them while recovering?
  
• Roy far away from the opponent - What tools does the opponent have when Roy is far away from them, and how does Roy optimally close the distance? Is this a neutral position, or disadvantageous to Roy?
  
• Roy at mid range away from the opponent - What tools does Roy and the opponent have when Roy is mid range away from them, and what can Roy do to convert into an advantageous position?
  
• Roy in close combat - What close combat tools does Roy and the opponent have? Is this a more advantageous position for Roy or the opponent, and what should Roy do to space optimally to convert into an advantageous position?

Matchup Scoring​

+4 = decisive advantage for Roy
+3 = large advantage for Roy
+2 = medium advantage for Roy
+1 = small advantage for Roy
±0 = even or insignificant (dis)advantages for Roy
-1 = small disadvantage for Roy
-2 = medium disadvantage for Roy
-3 = large disadvantage for Roy
-4 = decisive disadvantage for Roy

 

[Mayday]

Picked up Roy relatively recently, but I'll give it a shot:

Overall: -2
Probably Roy's hardest MU. ZSS can out space Roy. Roy needs to look for whiffs and use his incredible ground speed to close in on ZSS. Dthrow follow ups racks up percent very quickly. Fair, Nair, and Dash attack can kill at high percents. Fsmash can take a stock at mid percents. WATCH OUT FOR GRABS. ZSS can convert dthrow -> Utilt chain -> Up B on Roy very easily. One grab by ZSS at mid percents can end a stock. ZSS combos Roy fairly easily

Neutral: -2
To be quite blunt about it, ZSS has the tools (neutral B and Zair) to effectively zone and keep Roy out. Roy has to work much harder to get into an advantageous position than ZSS. ZSS' extremely fast jab, Nair and quick Utilt OoS are great at pushing Roy back and ZSS can catch any poor spacing from Roy with grab.

At an advantage: +2
Dthrow + really any follow up is going to be your bread and butter punish against ZSS at low percents. Look for re-grab opportunities to extend the punish. At higher percents, dthrow -> Uair (fair depending on DI) is the safest combo to build percent. Recommended tech chase options are Fsmash, Fair, Dash attack

At a disadvantage: -4
Not really surprising considering ZSS has probably the best punish game. Roy is very heavy and easily combo'd. Watch out for grabs. Uair -> Up B is very consistent on Roy and can kill very early

Edge guarding: +1
Tether makes it difficult for Roy to consistently chase ZSS offstage and gives ZSS her safest recovery option. If you can get her out of tether range, Fair and Nair are great at catching all of ZSS' recovery options and can kill around 80%+.

On recovery: -1
ZSS doesn't have too many options that covers low recoveries. Watch out for Flip Jump spikes and Dsmash traps when trying to recover from the ledge. Mix up get ups/jumps from ledge

Far away: -3
Roy has no options at long range

Mid Range: -1
ZSS out spaces Roy with Nair, Zair and neutral B. Landing neutral B immediately puts ZSS in an advantageous position. Roy has to rush ZSS so look for whiffs to effectively get in.

Close Range: +2
All of Roy's options come at close range. Grabs lead to heavy damage. ZSS will try to use jab/utilt OoS or jump back Nairs to push Roy back. Catch jumps with Nair and Fair.

Stage Choices:
Personally, my favorite stages to fight ZSS on are Lylat, Dreamland and Battlefield. Platforms make it easier to get close to ZSS. ZSS does get the added benefit of platforms for Uair strings. Stages I avoid are FD and Smashville. Very hard to get around decently spaced moves from ZSS.

 

[ZeroKarma]

For Roy-Zss, Roy on the ground has an advantage if he applies pressure. We have to keep in mind her paralyzer, plasma whip and Zair. A good starter combo is Grab>Dthrow>Jab>DED (Double Edge Dance, down side). We also should remember to not go recklessly because Roy’s Nair is not as reliable due to Zss's Zair or Nair. On the ledge, Zss has an advantage so we’ve got to be careful because flip kick can hit and be followed up by a boost kick. Be careful to do ledge trumps, it can be either useful or dangerous, Zss has many tools to get back to the stage such as tether and flip, which can be dangerous to us out of a ledge trump. Try to not go for an offstage fight, Roy has a big disadvantage on the air against Zss. Both sides have an advantage in stages with platforms but it is also a risk for Roy, Zss can start using her aerials as well as her Utilt, which can be used as an anti aerial or as a combo starter.

Advices:

• Dodge grab and follow with Fair (if far) or Fsmash (if close)
• Avoid any offtstage or aerial fight
• In case of flip kick, shield it or counter it, if the flip kick doesn’t hit but lands nearby, don’t drop your shield too fast, that flip kick sometimes can be followed by a Ftilt
• Some ways to dodge paralyzer: it can be Nair (to make it disappear) or shielding it, by shielding it we must remember that Zss has a nice grab range, try to spot dodge or make Nair instead to avoid the grab
• If you get buried due to back flip, do Blazer (Up B) or counter when you escape, this is to not get hit by Zss’s Boost kick (Up B)

Note: There are also 2 kind of Flip Kick, the fist one, activated by the Zss player, the second flip kick to land on the opponent (not activated, based purely on position) , both can be punished, but they have different kind of endlag, approach with caution.

With help of: Thomsa –Serew-

 

[#HBC | ZoZo]

I'd say 55:45 ZSS favor. We win neutral but Roy has the speed and reach to get through our zoning, esp since his sword eats paralyzer shots. It's very hard to pressure Roy's shield cuz of his UpB and he can kill ZSS really early if he has rage cuz ZSS didn't find the kill (which can be as simple as a non-finished UpB). Very swingy MU as are most of ZSSs MUs against good killers, as it all depends on whether Roy gets to rage or not.

I've played it a good bit with @LuLLo , maybe he cares to give his perspective.

 

[EnGarde]

Special thanks to ZeroKarma , @Serew , and Mechaglacier for their insight and helping with brainstorming this MU and helping with this post.

Neutral -1

Spoiler

ZSS wants to keep you in midrange until she can hit confirm you into a combo or string. She has the zoning tools to do this, but her primary zoning tools still have enough commitment that we can sneak in and punish, since our mobility is on par with hers. She can't generate a lot of shield pressure, and with a tether grab, a big part of her game is conditioning around shield, and either scaring or baiting you you out of shield, or hard reading that you'll stay in shield. Learning the conditioning habits of the player is critical, so you can work around them. For example, here is a video tutorial from the ZSS side that details some of the mindset of a ZSS that is trying to condition you (he refers to it as sequencing, and yomi).

From personal experience, some of the conditioning habits I've experienced is a ZSS that would mix paralyzer > dash grab with paralyzer > hipcheck/run-past pivot ftilt, to catch my defensive options. I've also experienced a ZSS using sh zair once or twice in succession to condition me to stay on the ground and shield, and then going for a dash grab. There are other potential patterns, not to mention safe spacing and pressure with moves like nair, which can also string into a combo at low-mid percents.

Roy Advantage +1

Spoiler

We can do a lot of damage with a few hits, and her moves have enough endlag that we can punish whiffed attacks, especially incautious approaches, fairly easily. Be aware that she does have down+b to escape and reset to neutral, so be cognizant of that.

Since shield is so strong against ZSS, out of shield options are similarly strong, and ZSS doesn't have as many tools to deal with that. If we can avoid her kill setups (which all work only on certain percent ranges), we can live for a long time until she can land a kill move, which means we can more easily get rage, and if the ZSS makes a mistake at the wrong range, we have a lot of KO potential, and she's a pretty light character, meaning stocks can end early for her. Here is a video tutorial of how ZSS will try to prevent landing traps.

Roy Disadvantage -1

Spoiler

Roy is prone to combos for a long time, and the ZSS MU is no exception. However, the quirk of her combos is that her combo moves have relatively high KB, but because she has high jumps and good airspeed, she can keep up to maintain the combos. This means that good DI mixups can make it harder for her to actually land the following hits, as there's a bigger difference in DI on a higher KB move (i.e. ZSS's combos) vs a lower KB move (i.e. Mario's combos). Uair and nair can situationally allow us to combo-break, but it is spacing and timing dependent. Counter is not advisable, as it is too slow to combo break successfully, and it isn't effective against landing traps as ZSS's upsmash has a huge disjoint which can solidly beat out counter.

ZSS has a few kill setups that can end stocks early, such as dthrow > uair > uair > up+b in the 60-80 percent range. If you can avoid her KO setups, though, she only has a few kill moves, such as up+b oos, sweetspot bair near the edge, or hard reading with fsmash, which can be more difficult for her to land, so we can live to some high percents in those situations.

Roy Edge-guarding 0

Spoiler

While a skilled Roy can cover individual options, if the ZSS is skilled at mixing up options, it can be difficult for the Roy to guess which recovery option she will use. ZSS has several extra tools she can use on recovery, including tether, down+b, and a wall jump (fun fact she can also down+b wall jump) but her up+b doesn't have as much vertical distance travelled (though this is somewhat made up for by her high double jump). Down+b on the way up has invincibility, but on the way down she is vulnerable to edgeguards, though watch out for the spike or the activated kick on the flip jump. You can also airdodge into the flip jump to force her into the "on hit" endlag, and punish that. Tether grab has no invincibility until she grabs the ledge, so that is punishable with an aerial offstage, though she can cancel tether instead of reeling it in as a mixup option.

Roy Recovery 0

Spoiler

ZSS doesn't have a lot of tools for hitting below the stage, so low recoveries are harder for her to edgeguard. Watch out for run off fairs and bairs, or down b spike attempts. ZSS can attempt to use ledge trumps/tether trumps (tether trumps have a slight frame advantage and different trump timing, but you can still buffer a ledge option to avoid a punish) or down smash on the ledge to catch your ledge options, both of which can be deadly if successful (trump > bair, downsmash > run off bair; don't miss your tech!), however these are still only situationally useful, and a smart Roy can avoid these options by mixing up when you activate up+b, and by buffering ledge options.

Far Range 0

Spoiler

ZSS has a midrange projectile, but it doesn't cover the whole stage. Fully charged covers more distance than uncharged. There are no guaranteed followups from an uncharged paralyzer hit, as you will exit hitstun before the ZSS can get to you. Fully charged paralyzer is easy to react to at this distance.

Mid Range -1

Spoiler

ZSS has more tools in midrange than Roy does, and has negligibly better mobility stats than Roy. ZSS wants to keep us here, nice and far away, using setup tools like paralyzer and nair to catch our approaches and hit confirm into combos and strings before pushing us back out. In addition, she can use zair as an aerial spacing tool. It's best used to intercept/deter short hops and condition us to shield. Our low dash can duck under it in most cases, and it's much harder for her to hit us when we full hop. Don't commit to full hop too often, only as a mixup, as she can do a running jc upsmash under us, which has huge vertical disjoint.

Close Range +1

Spoiler

In this range, shield is super strong against ZSS. She has a few good OOS options, particularly a frame 1 jab and a killing up+b oos, both of which we have to respect, but both of these options lose to shield. Moreover, both of these options lose to Roy's oos options, particularly our up+b oos, which has super armor on startup, though that move is high commitment, and so should be used with caution. Saving it as a kill option in the later stages of a match is a good idea. We can also use shield-grab, or ftilt oos (if the ZSS committed to the jab sequence), or jump oos aerials, to catch her as she tries to reset to neutral. Sweet spot ftilt is a kill move at med-high percents, grabs lead into good damage combos, and jumping and doing an aerial will allow you to catch her retreats in a more safe manner.

Remember, ZSS is fundamentally a conditioning character, so try to keep track of how you responded to her sequences before, and what sequences she's been using, and mix up your options in order to avoid becoming predictable and letting her get that high damage grab+combos she wants. Sometimes using an unexpected sub-optimal option will allow you to avoid a high damage punish on a read.

 

[ZeroKarma]

Mostly thanks to you, En! There are also a few other members from the Roy chat that helped too ^-^

 

[Mechaglacier]

It wouldn't be possible without you En <3

 

[Jenna Zant]

I'd say it's slightly in our favor. We can punished whiffed grabs pretty well, and ZSS's projectile is terrible for stopping our approaches. Be wary of up-bs and make sure you're mixing up your DI and you should be good. If Delfino is legal, that's not a bad choice to go to, but you have to keep in mind the low ceiling. Otherwise, Smashville is pretty good for you.