Lock On Technology! Sonic Match Up Discussion

[Ariyo]

Actually, I keep hearing around the Sonic boards that Sonic is the only bad match-up for Fox; like it's 55-45 or 60-40 in Sonic's favor. The trick is mastering on dragging your opponents across the stage with Side B, Jump Cancel, and then Side B again. There's also the Blast Attack to set them up for stronger hits like Fair or Nair. Fox's Neutral Game is pretty strong, but Sonic can play the whole Dash Dance/Wave Dash movement better than Fox. If the problem is that you keep getting trapped in your shield by Shine to Nair pressure, then you gotta buffer a roll away from Fox.

As for Falco, I am not sure.

I'll have to try this on a decent fox. As for Falco, that does not seem to work. He can DI out.

 

[Wizzrobe]

Well, I think the match-up for Mario vs Sonic is still 60-40 in Mario's favor with the edge going to Mario in terms of edge-guarding Sonic and preventing himself from being edge-guarded.

How about we discuss the Sonic match-ups with the new additions like Samus?

Also, Tero. Sonic is 10x better than what he was in 2.6, so stop trying to ask the PMBR to make him Brawl MK broken like he was in 2.1 and 2.5. He has more killpower and more aerial momentum to help chase his combo'd opponents now which is what he needed.



Actually, I keep hearing around the Sonic boards that Sonic is the only bad match-up for Fox; like it's 55-45 or 60-40 in Sonic's favor. The trick is mastering on dragging your opponents across the stage with Side B, Jump Cancel, and then Side B again. There's also the Blast Attack to set them up for stronger hits like Fair or Nair. Fox's Neutral Game is pretty strong, but Sonic can play the whole Dash Dance/Wave Dash movement better than Fox. If the problem is that you keep getting trapped in your shield by Shine to Nair pressure, then you gotta buffer a roll away from Fox.

As for Falco, I am not sure. I know that the Side B Jump Canceling technique is very useful for all three spacies. Whether you lead it into another Side B, a Jump Canceled Grab, or maybe even a FSmash. I hope this helps you a little bit.

Ive been doing the side b dragging thing on spacies since the beginning of 2.5, You can side B them, then wavedash forward as soon as it ends to extend it and side B again, it usually works.

 

[Neptune Shiranui]

Spacies are basically guaranteed dead once they're offstage due to how easy it is to gimp them with homing attack, nair, spring and other options.

 

[DireDrop]

So, should we talk about the Pit matchup? I feel like we're going to see more of them now.

 

[Wizzrobe]

So, should we talk about the Pit matchup? I feel like we're going to see more of them now.

Were not, because pit is going to get nerfed.

 

[DireDrop]

Do you have some inside information?

 

[Ariyo]

So I see I should work on side B'ing then. Other than that, how do I fight fox/falco correctly?

 

[Alex Night]

Were not, because pit is going to get nerfed.

That's what's sad about the Project M community... Well, not all of the community. Although I doubt that they will nerf Pit because Armada is a well known player and everybody knew his Pit is god-like, the whole idea of having a team of people who can make adjustments given by the feedback of the community is what really hurt Zelda players. I can honestly not see anything about Zelda that needed nerfing at all; she takes skill and creativity to win. I'm one of those guys that thinks that Fox needs some adjusting because let's face it, it's not that hard to play as Fox in comparison to his Melee counterpart but I digress.

 

[DireDrop]

I doubt we'll see any nerfs. The game is very well balanced right now and the PMBR are very sensitive to the importance of a stable meta-game. Nerfs and buffs do not help and they're aware of that. Sonic was a unique exception.

At any rate, I think Pit is OP God tier off stage, but I think Sonic is stronger on stage. I've never fought a good Pit before though, so I'd be curious to know what others think.

 

[Alex Night]

Pit is not an easy character for Sonic to deal with. I should know, I got knocked out of Round 1 Winner's Bracket by a Pit player although this was back at 2.6b when Sonic got shafted. You stay too far away from him with Dash Dancing or Wavedash camping and he'll just throw Arrows at you to encourage you to come to him. You have to be careful on your spacing with him since a lot of Sonic's attacks are in his hurtbox and Pit has plenty of range to play with to stuff your approach. Gimping Pit won't be easy since he is a multi-jump character, so you'll have to settle on racking enough percent for a star KO or a hard hitting Nair or Sour spot Fair. Once you're off stage against Pit, you'll have to move unpredictably in order to keep his fast flying arrows off you. That means mixing up your approach to the stage between Spinshots, Blast Attacks, and your spring. You need to play a little near his range in order to discourage him to try and fire arrows at you since Pit players know that Sonic can close the gap very quickly, but you also gotta watch out for Pit's Side B glide which allows him to use any Aerial he wants.

 

[DireDrop]

You mentioned this was from 2.6b. I wonder how much the Uair, and aerial mobility buffs help. Star KOs aren't out of the question in 3.0, especially with how good spring is at chasing high opponents. Maybe a good game plan would be to get Pit up in the air and keep him there. Sonic's Uair may beat Pit's Dair. And even if it doesn't, it'll make life difficult for the Pit.

 

[GabPR]

ok guys i need help here. I have been having the worst of times with the peach matchup, most of all since she can crouch cancel most of my attacks to punish me and her floatcancel making it hard for me to punish mistakes, any suggestions?

 

[DireDrop]

SPIN FASTER!

 

[KiNGMONiR]

ok guys i need help here. I have been having the worst of times with the peach matchup, most of all since she can crouch cancel most of my attacks to punish me and her floatcancel making it hard for me to punish mistakes, any suggestions?

Hey Gab, I'm no where near as good as you, but in my local community I play a friend who plays a very good Peach and I've found the best approach is baiting an approach then punishing in the air. Whether she's floating or on the ground, I try to bait an approach and then knock Peach in the air either with a grab or with a spin dash.

Short-hop nairs come in very handy as well when approaching because it covers multiple options such as floating or crouch cancelling Peach.

 

[Alex Night]

Hey Gab, I'm no where near as good as you, but in my local community I play a friend who plays a very good Peach and I've found the best approach is baiting an approach then punishing in the air. Whether she's floating or on the ground, I try to bait an approach and then knock Peach in the air either with a grab or with a spin dash.

Short-hop nairs come in very handy as well when approaching because it covers multiple options such as floating or crouch cancelling Peach.

The problem is that you gotta be careful with those short hop nairs since she will CC Sonic if you don't hit her with the hard hit of Nair and one Peach man I know loves punishing Sonic's spin stuff with Dsmash. Fair can space her out very well as well as do some good damage on her. I'd actually suggest to keep her on the ground as much as possible until higher percentages because Peach will flat out end your air combos with nair and reset it back to neutral game or send you flying off stage. Short hop Down B can rack some pretty good percentage on Peach if you hold the Spin for a bit and then release for more damage since Peach players usually look to punish that with CC Dsmash which won't work on a smart Sonic player who knows when to stop shredding her dress.

 

[DireDrop]

I'd wager Uair would be a great punish if you can land it. It gets Peach up where she's more vulnerable. Then you can juggle, or even kill with it if her % is high enough.

 

[cmart]

Were not, because pit is going to get nerfed.

Except he's not. Sorry Wizzy

 

[KiNGMONiR]

Guys I need help against Link. Granted I'm not a top player, but it's embarrassing to admit that I even have trouble approaching a level 9 Link.

My main problems are how to avoid a flurry of projectiles and how to recover when he is Up-B camping the ledge (I suck at sweet spot). Any other general tips would be amazing.

 

[Alex Night]

If you have trouble approaching a Level 9 Link, then you'll hate players like Hylian or Harrythechin. I'm a dedicated Link player, so I can tell you that Link is very slow in comparison to Sonic. The trick is to mix up your approaches since Link can very well do the same in Project M. You have to play either mid-range or close range if you're feeling ballsy. You give him too much room and Link will able to throw all three projectiles onto the field. However, Sonic has his amazing speed and Link is just at the right combo weight. He's not as vulnerable as Capt. Falcon or Spacies, but he can be combo'd. You gotta beware of his multi-jab pokes as they are a good way to get pressure off of Link and you definitely don't want to CC them. Link will straight outprioritize Sonic's moves with the exception of maybe Sonic's Up Air. Hit Link with strong hit Nairs or he will punish Sonic hard at close combat.

EDIT: Here is a quote from a question that I asked Harrythechin on the Link boards.

"I haven't gone up against many Sonic mains recently but I sure did get bodied by one at my first tournament experience lol.

From what I recall, he was straight up taking advantage of Link's slow ground game. Pretty much you have to constantly be in Link's face with spindashes, neutral bs, and Sonic's faster aerial attacks (Nairing OoS, Uair, etc). Sonic should be fast enough to space/avoid most of Link's projectiles and punish with grabs or something else.

Again, I'm not much of a Sonic main myself (I've only played him a couple of times due to the sake of selecting Random at the character select screen lol).

But some general things to consider:
- What stages benefit Sonic more than they benefit Link?
- What moves clank/trade/out-prioritize against Link's projectiles and aerials?"

There's your answer to help supplement my explanation. Also, don't go to Battlefield as Sonic since the platforms forces him to play a two dimensional game that almost everybody can take advantage of against Sonic.

 

[TwicH]

Link may have better recovery but it is still limited. You need to get through his projectile game and get him off stage. The stock is in your favor once you do that. Dair is probably my favorite move for gimping link since he can't cover well above him.

 

[GabPR]

Nairgoes trough a great variety of projectiles in the game in the first half of its frames, if you see links attempting to throw boomerang at close quarters, try going at him with nair to both get through the boomerang and hit him in the process

 

[TwicH]

So I'm trying to figure out the MK match-up. What good options does Sonic have against him?

 

[Nazo]

So I'm trying to figure out the MK match-up. What good options does Sonic have against him?

Sonic doesn't really have many good options against Metaknight. Just utilize speed to avoid getting grabbed > tech chased; bait out attacks and (as stupid as it may sound) run right into them, but be sure to crouch cancel as you do so in order to punish his incredibly low cooldown frames on attacks. Crouch cancel into Side-B JCG is a good option. Also make sure you're tech chasing Metaknight as much as possible, he has an extremely short tech roll. You can follow his tech roll with Down-B which leads into kills.

Here are some videos vs. Metaknight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3XKvP366-U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adcwkW7IEeA



I don't know everything about the Metaknight MU, but I play it enough times a week to give some kind of input on it.

 

[Alex Night]

Sonic doesn't really have many good options against Metaknight. Just utilize speed to avoid getting grabbed > tech chased; bait out attacks and (as stupid as it may sound) run right into them, but be sure to crouch cancel as you do so in order to punish his incredibly low cooldown frames on attacks. Crouch cancel into Side-B JCG is a good option. Also make sure you're tech chasing Metaknight as much as possible, he has an extremely short tech roll you can follow his tech roll with Down-B which leads into kills.

Here are some videos vs. Metaknight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3XKvP366-U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adcwkW7IEeA



I don't know everything about the Metaknight MU, but I play it enough times a week to give some kind of input on it.

Yeah, it's incredibly hard for Sonic to go on a direct offensive with Meta Knight since Nair just punishes almost anything that Sonic throws out. The straight bait and punish game with CC'ing is the best option that Sonic has against Meta Knight.

 

[TwicH]

Watching your videos taught me how useful Side-B JCG is. I'm gonna practice this when I get home from work tomorrow. Is it easy to execute?

 

[Nazo]

It's fairly easy as long as you're well practiced with jump canceled grabs.

 

[jtm94]

Hello Sonic thread:

Please help me fill this out all, trying to complete it as moderately accurate as possible.

I know some MUs won't be agreed on, if there is enough disagreement they can be left blank and we will ask the character on the other side.

I filled it in based on my moderate knowledge of some characters, but I don't get to face every char a lot, or use every character at the optimal level.

green: advantageous
light green: slightly advantageous
grey: Even or tbd
yellow: slightly disadvantageous
Orange: disadvantageous

 

[Vino.]

Can anyone give me some advice on the Marth match up?

 

[TwicH]

Lots and lots of spacing then go for as many grabs as you can. When at 100+% go for up-throw into up air.

If you get him off the stage you can gimp with spring or Dair. Fair, Bair and Nair can work too, but it's a little more difficult due to Marth's aerials and Dolphin Slash being faster to react to.

 

[JbrockPony]

Lots and lots of spacing then go for as many grabs as you can. When at 100+% go for up-throw into up air.

If you get him off the stage you can gimp with spring or Dair. Fair, Bair and Nair can work too, but it's a little more difficult due to Marth's aerials and Dolphin Slash being faster to react to.

How about a way to avoid getting chain grabbed? At what percentage does it not work?

 

[TwicH]

You mean Marth Chain Grabbing Sonic? I think at only low percentages. I don't get grabbed enough to know really XD

 

[JbrockPony]

You mean Marth Chain Grabbing Sonic? I think at only low percentages. I don't get grabbed enough to know really XD

Well here in my local scene we have some pretty good marths. Approaching is an uphill battle for me because of that sword and the stupidly good grab range >_>. How do you avoid not getting grabbed enough? Homing attack? lol

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

What's the Marth MU like? It looks like its even, maybe a little in sonic's favor, or maybe once you show the preha that's what makes the MU feel like it's in Sonic's fav. Also, is it me, or the fight against MK on several characters just a camp fest?

Marth's Fthrow CG works on a good amount of characters, especially if you just Di away. Gotta mix it up with up, down and away. Remember the right Di for one, is always the worst for another in most cases.

 

[JbrockPony]

MK is for precise patient players. With MK being combo heavy, the waiting game is half the battle >_>

 

[TwicH]

MK is definitely not balanced imo.

It's easier to space Marth's long range grabs and attacks on bigger stages. FD and PS2 are good examples.

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

M2
Feels like sonic can handle him. I just need a platform and some space to make it happen.

 

[Fortune]

What do you guys think of the Sonic vs Kirby matchup? I'm having some trouble with it.

 

[TwicH]

I only played against a casual Kirby once. Racking up damage isn't so hard. Killing him is when it becomes a pain due to being small, floaty, and hard to gimp.

 

[JbrockPony]

Kirby is a painful matchup for me. I have a few people at my local scene that would abuse the crap of crouch cancel and grabs with some aerial combos. They also have good use of his forward smash on the edge, I think they may be get priority invincibility on the edge.

Soo be mindful of that... Oh and kirby is really easy to air chase with U-air, probably the best way to take kirby down.

 

[TwicH]

Well CC is OP at the moment so hopefully they will change that in the future.