A2ZOMG
Smash Legend
- Joined
- Oct 13, 2007
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- 12,542
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- RPV, California
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- A2ZOMG
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I searched this forum. Didn't find what I was looking for. So I'll make this topic, since my teams partner is a Snake, and there is enough information to warrant a mini guide for this.
To sum up Snake in a nutshell:
+Weight makes him a good stock tank
+Tilts and aerials are very very powerful, alone are enough to make Snake a valuable partner
+Can control a lot of space with explosives and mortar slide
+Isn't horrible at making 1v2 comebacks, since grenades make him hard to rushdown when used correctly
-Is easy to juggle, and has a fairly slow recovery, so sometimes isn't always able to support his partner when in trouble
-It is VERY tricky to do team grab combos with Snake due to how closely he holds his opponent when he grabs
-Explosives must be used with care. Killing your partner with a badly placed grenade or an improperly timed C4 shenanigan is the last thing you want to do in teams.
Snake is both easy and tricky to use in teams. He does great in 1 on 1 situations with his tilts, but the trick to making the most of this character in teams is being able to reliably support your partner (without killing them) when the opportunity comes up. I feel this aspect of teams is more important for Snake to learn in particular than someone like Metaknight or G&W, so most of the things I will cover will have that topic in mind.
Where to get started:
Often times, things may be fine and dandy as long as you and your partner don't hit each other too much, and you let your tilts and the occasional explosives do the work. However in most situations, you do not want to be cornered next to your partner. There are two ideal positions you want to control in teams. A team needs an offensive player who has a threatening approach and is willing to get in the middle of the commotion, and a defensive player who supports from a safe distance behind the offensive player and works to minimize the risks his partner goes through. Snake can play both roles fairly well, but the important thing both you and your partner should keep in mind is that your options primarily control the ground. Given that, your strategies work best when your partner controls the air, and Snake punishes people who stay on the ground.
For a Snake who takes a more offensive role, he can be very surprising when he approaches thanks to his mortar slide, which can move him to the other side of the stage rapidly. This is one option you have for giving your partner space to use more attacks. Given that your partner is aware of this, having a good aerial pressure tool can conjure very interesting results when combined with Snake's mortar slide. Provided you have a partner who is able and willing to do this, let them pressure one of your opponents from above. Then proceed to mortar slide under your partner. This can be a cool and effective way of approaching and breaking the defenses of one of your opponents. Say Metaknight or G&W was hitting the upper part of someone's shield with Tornado/B-air. That opponent would probably be likely to be angling shield upwards, and if you mortar slided at that opponent, they would likely get shield poked and possibly comboed into the explosive.
Snake's ability to support defensively is also quite viable. Both you and your partner need good spacing, but the raw punishing power of item tossing grenades and Snake's tilts can definitely work to your advantage. The simple tactic of waiting for an opponent to attack your partner and then punishing their ending lag is very effective, but again it's highly important that you and your partner are not cornered on the same side when you're attempting this strategy. Depending on which direction your opponent hits your partner, it can be worth noting the potential for some gimmicky juggles by hitting them towards your partner, under the assumption your partner has quick high priority aerials to abuse in this situation. Be careful that your partner doesn't accidentally hit you when knocking an opponent towards you though, since unless your opponent is directly above or behind you, it can be difficult to retaliate against a lot of characters who have faster aerials than you do, not to mention the fact that your F-air is slow as balls, and D-air/N-air can be punished with SDI.
Also of importance when supporting defensively is grabs. Which brings me to the next section.
How to support your partner with grabs:
The classic tactic in teams is you getting a grab, and your opponent doing a Smash for the kill. This works best if you as the Snake player are player 4, but let's not assume this will always be in your favor.
This tactic as mentioned can be really annoyingly hard to do normally especially on small characters since Snake holds his victim really close to his hurtbox. I'm not suggesting that your partner isn't able to practice good spacing, but you do have two options however to work around this. The first is D-throwing. D-throw does great damage, and if you have your partner cover the options on one side, you can basically get pretty much guaranteed damage by covering options on the other side.
But what's even BETTER is waiting for your partner to charge a Smash, and you F-throw/B-throw them into it. When you F-throw and B-throw, it completely solves the problem of the victim being too close to Snake's hurtbox. The animation of the throw is plenty long enough for your partner to react with a released Smash attack.
If your partner gets a grab, or has rapid Jabs, or something of the sort that sets up easy combos:
Keep an eye out for this. Obviously as Snake, if you can find an opportunity to land a big move like your F-smash or N-air, go for it. U-tilt may be more practical if you don't have enough space to get out a laggy move. The great thing about U-tilt is that spaced well, you don't usually have to think too hard to get a combo out of your partner's grab release as long as you can react to it.
In 2v1 situations, if you have a partner that reliably does a ground release after grab, simply repeat F-tilt 1 on your victim. Done correctly, team grab release -> F-tilt1 -> regrab is a reliable infinite due to the meteor properties of F-tilt1. U-tilt them into oblivion once you're ready to win your match.
C4 Gimmicks:
Mostly only worthwhile if controller port priority is in your favor, but C4 is self explanatory in teams. Stick it on your partner, and get your partner to either be a suicide bomber, or a delivery guy. The infamous omnigay tactic where you blow up someone after doing MK or Kirby's U-throw is pretty obvious.
If you're really observant, you could definitely try to get away with delivering a C4 to an enemy in 2v2s, although simply sticking the C4 to a strategic location instead of your partner might be safer and easier. Be slightly cautious of sticking C4 around mindlessly if you know one of your opponents is able to chaingrab you into a dangerous edgeguard situation, but hopefully your partner should be able to lessen the risk of that.
Conclusion:
For the most part, Snake in doubles is great, but benefits obviously from a partner who spaces in synch with him and can help control the air while he controls the ground. I'm not going to claim that this is by far everything you need to know as a Snake user. Definitely there are some character specific things I have not covered. However if you are a player who was looking to use Snake in doubles, I hope this helped you.
To sum up Snake in a nutshell:
+Weight makes him a good stock tank
+Tilts and aerials are very very powerful, alone are enough to make Snake a valuable partner
+Can control a lot of space with explosives and mortar slide
+Isn't horrible at making 1v2 comebacks, since grenades make him hard to rushdown when used correctly
-Is easy to juggle, and has a fairly slow recovery, so sometimes isn't always able to support his partner when in trouble
-It is VERY tricky to do team grab combos with Snake due to how closely he holds his opponent when he grabs
-Explosives must be used with care. Killing your partner with a badly placed grenade or an improperly timed C4 shenanigan is the last thing you want to do in teams.
Snake is both easy and tricky to use in teams. He does great in 1 on 1 situations with his tilts, but the trick to making the most of this character in teams is being able to reliably support your partner (without killing them) when the opportunity comes up. I feel this aspect of teams is more important for Snake to learn in particular than someone like Metaknight or G&W, so most of the things I will cover will have that topic in mind.
Where to get started:
Often times, things may be fine and dandy as long as you and your partner don't hit each other too much, and you let your tilts and the occasional explosives do the work. However in most situations, you do not want to be cornered next to your partner. There are two ideal positions you want to control in teams. A team needs an offensive player who has a threatening approach and is willing to get in the middle of the commotion, and a defensive player who supports from a safe distance behind the offensive player and works to minimize the risks his partner goes through. Snake can play both roles fairly well, but the important thing both you and your partner should keep in mind is that your options primarily control the ground. Given that, your strategies work best when your partner controls the air, and Snake punishes people who stay on the ground.
For a Snake who takes a more offensive role, he can be very surprising when he approaches thanks to his mortar slide, which can move him to the other side of the stage rapidly. This is one option you have for giving your partner space to use more attacks. Given that your partner is aware of this, having a good aerial pressure tool can conjure very interesting results when combined with Snake's mortar slide. Provided you have a partner who is able and willing to do this, let them pressure one of your opponents from above. Then proceed to mortar slide under your partner. This can be a cool and effective way of approaching and breaking the defenses of one of your opponents. Say Metaknight or G&W was hitting the upper part of someone's shield with Tornado/B-air. That opponent would probably be likely to be angling shield upwards, and if you mortar slided at that opponent, they would likely get shield poked and possibly comboed into the explosive.
Snake's ability to support defensively is also quite viable. Both you and your partner need good spacing, but the raw punishing power of item tossing grenades and Snake's tilts can definitely work to your advantage. The simple tactic of waiting for an opponent to attack your partner and then punishing their ending lag is very effective, but again it's highly important that you and your partner are not cornered on the same side when you're attempting this strategy. Depending on which direction your opponent hits your partner, it can be worth noting the potential for some gimmicky juggles by hitting them towards your partner, under the assumption your partner has quick high priority aerials to abuse in this situation. Be careful that your partner doesn't accidentally hit you when knocking an opponent towards you though, since unless your opponent is directly above or behind you, it can be difficult to retaliate against a lot of characters who have faster aerials than you do, not to mention the fact that your F-air is slow as balls, and D-air/N-air can be punished with SDI.
Also of importance when supporting defensively is grabs. Which brings me to the next section.
How to support your partner with grabs:
The classic tactic in teams is you getting a grab, and your opponent doing a Smash for the kill. This works best if you as the Snake player are player 4, but let's not assume this will always be in your favor.
This tactic as mentioned can be really annoyingly hard to do normally especially on small characters since Snake holds his victim really close to his hurtbox. I'm not suggesting that your partner isn't able to practice good spacing, but you do have two options however to work around this. The first is D-throwing. D-throw does great damage, and if you have your partner cover the options on one side, you can basically get pretty much guaranteed damage by covering options on the other side.
But what's even BETTER is waiting for your partner to charge a Smash, and you F-throw/B-throw them into it. When you F-throw and B-throw, it completely solves the problem of the victim being too close to Snake's hurtbox. The animation of the throw is plenty long enough for your partner to react with a released Smash attack.
If your partner gets a grab, or has rapid Jabs, or something of the sort that sets up easy combos:
Keep an eye out for this. Obviously as Snake, if you can find an opportunity to land a big move like your F-smash or N-air, go for it. U-tilt may be more practical if you don't have enough space to get out a laggy move. The great thing about U-tilt is that spaced well, you don't usually have to think too hard to get a combo out of your partner's grab release as long as you can react to it.
In 2v1 situations, if you have a partner that reliably does a ground release after grab, simply repeat F-tilt 1 on your victim. Done correctly, team grab release -> F-tilt1 -> regrab is a reliable infinite due to the meteor properties of F-tilt1. U-tilt them into oblivion once you're ready to win your match.
C4 Gimmicks:
Mostly only worthwhile if controller port priority is in your favor, but C4 is self explanatory in teams. Stick it on your partner, and get your partner to either be a suicide bomber, or a delivery guy. The infamous omnigay tactic where you blow up someone after doing MK or Kirby's U-throw is pretty obvious.
If you're really observant, you could definitely try to get away with delivering a C4 to an enemy in 2v2s, although simply sticking the C4 to a strategic location instead of your partner might be safer and easier. Be slightly cautious of sticking C4 around mindlessly if you know one of your opponents is able to chaingrab you into a dangerous edgeguard situation, but hopefully your partner should be able to lessen the risk of that.
Conclusion:
For the most part, Snake in doubles is great, but benefits obviously from a partner who spaces in synch with him and can help control the air while he controls the ground. I'm not going to claim that this is by far everything you need to know as a Snake user. Definitely there are some character specific things I have not covered. However if you are a player who was looking to use Snake in doubles, I hope this helped you.
