Sonic The Hedgehog: Community Matchup thread

[ShadowLink84]

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=213892

Done and done, it has every character's possibilities from air release and ground.

Hmm the only problem I have with it is that it doesn't catalogue whom SOnic can perform it upon.
IN spite of the 50 frames of immobility, some characters go farther away than others and So the 20 frames of movement Sonic has is not enough to allow him to catch the character.

Interestingly enough, you can perform a re grab on MK.
Umm brb gotta get some ice cream.

 

[Blistering Speed]

Hmm the only problem I have with it is that it doesn't catalogue whom SOnic can perform it upon.

Errm, you mean it doesn't catalogue who Sonic can regrab?

Anyway it's pretty inconsequential because Sonic can't force an air release unless the other person is hanging over the ledge.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Errm, you mean it doesn't catalogue who Sonic can regrab?

Anyway it's pretty inconsequential because Sonic can't force an air release unless the other person is hanging over the ledge.

Actually it does, unless the opponent hits only the the C stick and control stick down, they will be air released after a pummel.
THe only character that can be re grabbed is MK and Wario

 

[Blistering Speed]

Actually it does, unless the opponent hits only the the C stick and control stick down, they will be air released after a pummel.
THe only character that can be re grabbed is MK and Wario

So they'll just do that. Sonic still can't FORCE it.

 

[ShadowLink84]

So they'll just do that. Sonic still can't FORCE it.

You have 40 frames to escape from a grab initially. So if you are simply mashing the C stick and control stick down, you won't be escaping any throws.

You won't even escape DDD's throws despite his pummel being slow. So its more like, they mash those buttons toe scape earlier, or I get a few more pummels in and a throw.

I am not arguing with the fact that Sonic cannot force an air release, I am saying though that the issue isn't a major one.

 

[Chis]

Can we move onto King Dedede now?

This is getting boring.

 

[ROOOOY!]

Yeah, let's get this onto the next page.

Neutral for Lucas?

 

[RenegadeRaven]

There was barely any discussion.
Where are the Lucas Mains anyway?
lol did anyone call them?

Oh well, it seems neutral regardless

 

[Chis]

Actually, can we just skip King Dedede and move on to Ike, then return later? I feel we'll get more discussion from that.

 

[Browny]

^^^ what he said

also, last post on this page

 

[Chis]

Ike ~Character Matchup 33

I fight for my friends

Character Behaviour- How does this character act against a Sonic, do they play defensive or try to counteract Sonics natural offense. How do they go about beating Sonic?

Ike is a character that relys on his obsurd power, his crazy range, and jabs. Ike will need to play defensive to beat sonic, because Ike trying to keep up with sonic is a bad and dumb ike, most likely dead too. Good Ikes may jab spindash. All ikes aerials have crazy range, and fair, nair, and bair (I think) all have transcendant priority so he will attempt to beat your moves with his, and kill him early to lessen the chances of him getting gayed somehow. sonics goal is to bait ikes moves, and than punish their ending lag. Many of ikes moves seem unpunishable, but for sonic, they are very assuredly not.



Commonly Used Moves- What moves are mostly likely to be in the 9 move queue. What do they spam and what do they need to survive?

~Jab
Ike jab is the best in the game, if you dont DI out of it, it sets up for almost every other move he has. The optimal way to SDI away from jabs is up and away.
Jab to down tilt at the ledge for super early kills which can kill sonic even with his spring if you arent careful starting at about 50-60%.

Jab up tilt is guaranteed and will kill around 120, maybe below.
jab f tilt will kill at like 100 at the ledge but can be jumped out of regardless of percent. If you DI out and jump away from ike, he will follow you with either an up smash, more jabs or a dash attack. If you try to jump forward over ike while he is jabbing you, he will try to hit you with a lagless Sh bair. Note that if he decided to simply do all three jabs to you, its almost impossible to SDI out of. A little used tech for ike is on a platform, to jab you and than buffer a turnaround, fall through the platform and bair you.
All three jabs have an ascending level of punishability on shield. jab 3, is medium difficulty, you can punish it with f tilt, down tilt, fair oos, or a running grab oos if you are fast about it, if you dont react fast enough, he will just jab you again. Good ikes know this and will be smart enough not to let jab 3 hit your shield. Jab 2 is hard but with good timing and reaction you can fair or maybe up air out of shield to hit him after jab2 hits your shield. Jab 1 is almost impossible to punish on regular shield. the best bet is to try and get away because Ike has too many mixups out of jab 1. but if he reads you he will hit you no matter what. if you roll behind ike, he will retreat a fair, do a turnaround jab, or in the case of a super hard read, turn around f smash. if you roll away, he can dash attack you. just mix it up tho, he cant cover all your options at once.
jab will clank with spindash and than they will jab again. his jab is 3 frames, and we dont have anything that fast with that kind of range to combat it, so in that situation powershield punish it with f tilt or fair.
dont ever spotdodge in close quarters against ike, he will hold the a button, and you will eat 16% percent. at least.

~nair
Their main approach will be with nair, because it has very good range, it comboes hard as balls and next to no lag. Its very hard (but still very possible) to punish.
-on hit.
like I said, nair is a massive combo starter for ike. at low percents, it comboes into jabs.
At low-mid percents it has that slight knockback where most people will airdodge into the ground on reaction and they punish this with more nairs or more jabs. basically a situation reset
the sword goes in basically a 300 degree arc, so it hits behind him as well, and if he hits you from behind, it comboes into bair at mid percents. and can kill with bad DI, watch out for this.
-on shield
Ikes nair has very little lag, so if it hits your shield you will only be able to hit him with the fastest of moves. up air oos is the only move i have seen success with for sonic for this. anything else, or even taking too long to up air will only get you jabbed
-on whiff
Ikes nair is usually used as a baiting move to get people to try to punish its non-existant lag. If you are too slow in your timing, ike will spotdodge or jab you. the only real way to get a guaranteed punish, is to dash attack him as soon as he hits the ground. From there you can get into some nasty followups on him.

~Spotdodge
Screw frame data, ikes spotdodge is semi broken. Its stupidly good. If you try to hold rapid jabs to beat his spotdodge, which works on everyone else, he can spotdodge and still get his jab out in between our jabs. (ps. if you try to jab him, and even if you hit, he can easily jab you inbetween getting hit by our jabs) he will use it to avoid any moves that hes not attempting to beat with jab. and you can buffer turnarounds during spot dodge so he can immediately punish attacks in either direction with his jab.

~fair
good Ikes no long approach with this move. but they will short hop it backwards to stuff any of your approaches.
If it hits your shield, its very hard to punish due to its deceiving lag and unless you are close enough to f tilt it out of shield or dash attack, youll probably get jabbed or spotdodge jabbed trying.
One of ikes tricks is when you are in the air, after a jab combo or fair hit is to full jump a fair after you, if you airdodge it, 8 times out of 10 you will airdodge right into ike, who can fast fall after his fair laglessly and jab your landing.
Dont try to roll behind his fair, it will hit you anyway.

~grab
Ike can combo into his grab from a jab.
most likely ike will go for back throw to dash attack. but ikes dont know the specifics on what percents it works at. (about 65-120 for sonic) so at times they may go for it before the % it works at, which will net you a free powershield if you just hold shield. its either a free grab, or if you are desperate/dairing, you can go for a powershield down smash, which SHOULD work.
fthrow is mainly used to bait a defensive reaction that they can punish, if you get fthrow, try counter attacking them with a fair. if you spotdodge or roll in youll get faired and if you hold shield, youll get regrabed, and if you roll back, youll probably get dash attacked.

~Aether
most Ikes will always aether to recover if possible because quickdraw is bad. you can spring/eat/airdodge through quick draw for a free kill on the ike far enough offstage.
Aether is very hard to work around. Be careful with it. If you make a mistake, you will eat 5-20% and possibly a jab combo.
you can beat aether with spring, but it wont knock him far enoguh to kill untill about 130 with good DI spring is easily the safest way to deal with aether.
if you want to be risky, you can:
attempt to bair ike after he teleports to the sword and is spinning around.
if the top of the aether is high enough above the ledge. sonic can run underneath the sword and grab the ledge before him.
note ike can only aether to the ledge 5 times in a row before he has to touch the stage, abuse this if possible.

~bair
Sh retreating bair is lagless and unpunishable on shield. it kills probably a bit earlier than our f smash. You can duck and avoid it. and you can dash attack it on whiff.
san likes to quickdraw to a platform and than fallthrough/run off the plat with a bair. avoid that. even with out ACing, it has very little lag, about the same as fair.

~ up smash
Dont airdodge into the ground, ikes body has a hitbox with this move, so trying to airdodge past it will never work.

~up air
watch out that you dont airdodge into this.

How to Win- How can Sonic overcome this character, what aspects of Sonics game should be emphasising and what should he try to avoid?

wtf, now I know why nobody ever does full write ups, Ive been doing this shiz for 2 hours and Im not even close to done.

sonic needs a very strong grasp on all of his ground options to beat a good ike. he has to be timing his dash attacks perfectly. they are a very strong asset to the matchup. most of ikes moves can only be punished by dash attack, and a big weakness to ike is that there is a certain air positioning (between the height of sonics SH and FH) where if you hit ike into it, (dash attack does this very well) that makes ike virutally defenseless. all of his aerials will take too long to come out, and then the only option is airdodging into the stage which is very very easily read and punished with grab, which can potential give you a situation reset.

punishing moves with spindash camping is also very important, use that alot.
ASC is a very good option against him, and even if he reads it and retreats a fair, many times you can shield cancel it before you get hit.
the biggest part of this matchup is what sonic does when ike is offstage.
when ike is falling to the stage, he has 2 options. try to fair, and try to airdodge through any gimping attempt you make.
what you do, is you jump at him but you fall below him and bair or nair him in his AD or fair lag. When he eventually gets to the postion he wants to be in (next to the ledge but far below the stage) you go into the process of beating aether using the above methods.
when ike is on the ledge try to goad him in to aethering back to the ledge and using up his five aethers. which really limits his options.

when ike has sonic on the ledge, be VERY careful, as that is a very dangerous position that you may be in more often than youd like due to back throw dash attack.
ike can crush any attempt sonic makes to get on stage. with fair and up smash. the trick is to bait the ike into whiffing a laggy attack so that you can ledge hop a spindash of some kind to hit him or get past him. just dont wait too long. cause ikes are not afraid to do run off dairs at people on the ledge and offstage.

Recommended Stages- What are the best stages for Sonic to play this character on? Simple!

Ban delfino, he has wall infinites, water camping with aether, and back throw dash attack kills stupid early on the walk offs.
avoid battlefield for the first neutral, ike traps people on platforms far too easily.

Avoid castle siege as well if possible. second stage is too good for ike. back throw dash attack will kill early. and statues lengthen the eruption hitbox, which will kill you at as low as 30 if you run in stupidly.
ps1 can be a good stage as long as you avoid the places and times on the map where ike can wall infinite you.

If possible counterpick norfair and time his balls off. there is almost nothing Ike can do to catch a sonic that is running away from him on norfair.
for the first neutral, try to go for FD or smashville, but on smashville, just watch out for back throw to f tilt on the moving plat.
Counter picking ike is pretty much a matter of personal preference.

Matchup Summary:


50:50 Even

By da KID

 

[ShadowLink84]

I would have to say Sonic has an advantage in this matchup, a minor one like 60:40 but an advantage.

This primarily stems from the fact that Sonic takes advantage of one of Ike's major flaws, his speed.
Not only is Ike rather slow movement wise, but his attacks on average are slow as well.
IN spite of the fact that Ike has some of the greatest overall range in the game, it is hindered severely by that low attack speed.

Of course this doesn't mean SOnic can just rush in and smack Ike around, that is hardly the case.
While Ike certainly is unsafe most of the time, he still has decent tools at his disposal.
One of his best assets is his jab. Its quick, has good range and priority, and can be canceled into a variety of moves all of which hurt.

His Fair has incredible range so aerial approaches can be difficult especially since Sonic does not have as much speed and the area it covers is great allowing him a greater margin of error than most characters.

IF Ike successfully reads Sonic he will punish much more harshly than other characters. Nor does he need to inflict very much damage because of how incredibly powerful his moves are.

The key for Sonic to win this match is simply to abuse his incredible speed and agility allowing him to punish Ike and maintain pressure.
When Ike is on a neutral position with Sonic, he is hoping to maintain the spacing where he can keep you at a distance where he can remain safe and allow himself to play defensively, fortunately because of Sonic's speed, he cannot perform this behavior as well as he normally could.

As such he will restrict himself to using his jabs and Nair and Fair (if you are in the air since you can't punish it ) which does work rather well. Once Sonic is inside of Ike's defense he can maintain pressure and rack up damage quickly since Ike lacks the ability to deal with pressure.

It is very highly advised to throw Ike off, not only because Sonic is one of the few characters that can gimp his aether (never will they side B) but because it simply adds to the pressure on Ike. Even if Sonic does not gimp Ike, this prevents Ike from regaining his spacing and playing defensively.

I do think Sonic has an advantage simply because Sonic's ability to pressure really does aid him as does his ability to harass Ike offstage. Not many characters can hit Ike out of his aether or have the speed to shield Ike's Fair and then grab him.

 

[Browny]

Get ike offstage and footstool. none of his aerials finish quick enough if he tries to hit you away, and if he airdodges he is most probably not going to be able to recover as he falls too fast. failing that, drop springs on his head, it can easily hit out of an airdodge since it lasts a while. Ikes recovery is pretty predictable, aim aether for the edge. You should be able to get at least one gimp KO per stock, just dont get u-aired lol

 

[Tenki]

So, Ike has a pretty awesome jab game.

And also, if he DI's D-throw downwards, he will ALWAYS land in front of Sonic for any reasonable % (I tested up to 150%) and get a guaranteed jab if he techs the floor.

awesome.

 

[ShadowLink84]

So, Ike has a pretty awesome jab game.

And also, if he DI's D-throw downwards, he will ALWAYS land in front of Sonic for any reasonable % (I tested up to 150%) and get a guaranteed jab if he techs the floor.

awesome.

Don't D throw, Uthrow him. its better.

 

[Tenki]

Of course.

Just encouraging Ikes to take advantage of it, and making mention for the Sonics that don't know about it <3



==========
courtesy of KID du six points:
Ike's jab, when timed correctly, can beat out spindash.

Not that you should be directly approaching with spindash anyway.

But on that note, Ike's jab is a little slower than Falcon/Snakes' auto-jab, so it's easier to hit between his jabs than it is to hit between theirs.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Of course.

Just encouraging Ikes to take advantage of it, and making mention for the Sonics that don't know about it <3

Good point. I mentioned the jab game of Ike's earlier =p.

 

[HeroMystic]

Spring gimps are ghey. That is all.

Spoiler

full analysis tomorrow

 

[Ussi]

Ike's aether is gimpable by... over half the cast. Sonic is not of a few.. I wouldn't be surprised if Sonic could fsmash Ike's apex of Aether... I've been hit out by Pikachu's fsmash...


In this battle, Ike will be using nair more often than fair so that Sonic cannot punish his aerial approach. Ike will be spacing his nair so that the tip hits putting Ike in a very good spot and out of Sonic's grab range. Nair also is easily followed up by a jab or grab. Fair will be more used if Sonic comes into the air against Sonic or just to mix up approaches. Fair also has IASA frames so do be careful when trying to punish a fully spaced Fair.

Ike will sparing use any of his smashes. Sonic is too maneuverable to be hit normally by a smash but usmash can sometimes be used when Sonic happens to be in the air, but never will Ike use a smash when Sonic is on the ground. Thats just giving Sonic free damage.

Don't know if Sonic will approach himself, but if he does, I believe you can shield from behind and shield grab spindash?

If you don't gimp Ike, which is possible to happen, He'll survive till 150% generally.

I'll leave the rest to others....

 

[Superhacker75mil]

I would think Ike's would use their up-tilts to protect against Sonic's air game, for the most part. Same as others say about nair...that's the basis of Ike's air game, next to fair spacing.

But yeah, grabs, u-air, and fair are rock solid against Ike. Sonic's grab game, f-throw and u-throw, should have any Ike reeling and wanting to get the hell away. Should they manage to, fooling them into non-jab/nair moves is key, using spin-based fakeouts. Same as any other character, but more easily punished with Ike.

Oh, and scrub advice I suppose, but don't roll behind Ike, even (especially) if he's charging at you. Up smash hurts something awful. Spotdodges? Also risky, and pretty much unnecessary for Sonic.

 

[MarKO X]

I find that spotdodging a non-jab ground attack from Ike is great, provided you know it's going to happen (i.e. ftilt). You look godly doing that.

Spring out of jabbing maybe safe if they try to cancel it to something else and you're sure you can land safely.

Here's a question... other than the end of the jab at high percentages, what is Ike's safest kill move? Last I played a good Ike in a friendly, I lived up to at least 130 per stock because his smashes are slow, ftilt is dangerous if you don't DI (and I DI, so...), and I steered very clear of his bair...

Edit: wait, the initial hits of usmash and dsmash aren't that slow, are they?

 

[Chis]

I would say Ike edge guards Sonic well.

His Dair can kill you, his Fair out range all of Sonic aerials, eruption, Dtilt and Aether.

More analysis later.

Yeah, Ike doesn't deal with pressure well, but don't expect a **** feast. Ike should be using his faster attacks on the ground, to leave less room for punishment. Plus don't be predictable or Ike will punish you badly. Sure you can kill Ike early by gimping him every now and then but he'll be killing you early much more often so yeah. Up tilt > Sonic's aerial approaches and it's not early to juggle Ike due to his Dair and eruption. Up smash can be charged and reversed to punish air dodges and rolling. 50:50

 

[Ussi]

I find that spotdodging a non-jab ground attack from Ike is great, provided you know it's going to happen (i.e. ftilt). You look godly doing that.

Here's a question... other than the end of the jab at high percentages, what is Ike's safest kill move? Last I played a good Ike in a friendly, I lived up to at least 130 per stock because his smashes are slow, ftilt is dangerous if you don't DI (and I DI, so...), and I steered very clear of his bair...

Edit: wait, the initial hits of usmash and dsmash aren't that slow, are they?

to answer your question:

Ike's safe kill moves are bair, utilt, and uair for this match up. Utilt is set up by a jab. There have been some things going on about following a jab with a bair too o_o.. but its a WIP for now. Uair is a tough move to land and tougher on a smaller target. However it does eat AD and can shield poke the top of a shield. Uair also has the 2nd least landing lag for Ike.

Usmash is slow on start up and release, but it starts charging by 10 frames. Ike's dsmash is faster than two of his tilts. Comes out in 13 frames, just like his utilt. however dsmash leaves Ike open for so long and its job is usually covered with usmash.

Tidbit: Usmash has 20 frames of IASA, so do keep that in mind if he hits you from the front of Usmash that he doesn't jab you all of a sudden when you attempt to punish.

 

[Tenki]

Don't know if Sonic will approach himself, but if he does, I believe you can shield from behind and shield grab spindash?

If you don't gimp Ike, which is possible to happen, He'll survive till 150% generally.

I'll leave the rest to others....

Sonic's best approach is his run.

Spindash is a crappy approach that should only be used for punishing lag (startup lag, ending lag, landing lag, reaction lag [lol], internet lag [lol2])

Spindash>aerial, which is a common habit, is highly punishable out of shield, and Ike can use shieldgrab/pivot grab/jab to get Sonic out of it.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Ike's aether is gimpable by... over half the cast. Sonic is not of a few.. I wouldn't be surprised if Sonic could fsmash Ike's apex of Aether... I've been hit out by Pikachu's fsmash...

I mean in terms of how easy it is to perform, I haven't Fsmashed any Ike's out of their aether more than a handful of times.
Maybe its just me.

Don't know if Sonic will approach himself, but if he does, I believe you can shield from behind and shield grab spindash?

Yep. You can always grab him normally too, the timing isn't ahrd once you get used to it.
The main issue being that most sonic's don't really spindash as a direct approach. Its moer of spindashng and then feinting with a jump cancel afterwards.

If you don't gimp Ike, which is possible to happen, He'll survive till 150% generally.

I'll leave the rest to others....

I totally forgot this >.< sorry

 

[Ussi]

Well if Sonic approachs by just running, it's a matter on who predicts the other. Ike can nair or jab while Sonic can use an aerial to hit Ike before he can. Spacing is crucial to Ike. sonic general plan should be to mess up ike's spacing.

 

[Chis]

What about a dash > sliding shield? Then Sonic punished the Nair/Jab?

 

[ShadowLink84]

Well if Sonic approachs by just running, it's a matter on who predicts the other. Ike can nair or jab while Sonic can use an aerial to hit Ike before he can. Spacing is crucial to Ike. sonic general plan should be to mess up ike's spacing.

Well the thing is that Sonic can switcfh his form of approach. He can cancel his running with side B then spincharge.
So in terms of prediction, I think Ike may have a harder time since SOnic has more options approach wise and does have the ability to deal with jabs and Nair.
HIs dash shield grab is unusually good and can push through Ike's Nair and jabs.

Its a bit difficult seeing as how little time there is between Ike's Nairs and jabs but it acan be done. I actually found when I use Ike I use Fair a bit more, mainly cause of the range and how it seems to deal with aerial approaches better than Nair.

But I suck as Ike so ignore that part.

 

[Chis]

da K.I.D in sBR

some one tell the matchup thread that SC can punish an ike f-air from out side the range, and have them use my vids vs kirk to analyse the matchup.

http://www.youtube.com/results?searc...rch_type=&aq=f

sonic can also spring out of many of ikes jab setups

Done and done.

 

[Ussi]

I did mention fair for aerial approaches.

Ike's nair I believe when spaced fully is outside Sonic's grab range. But dash > shield can work. Depends on slide.

But Ike can also grab if you keep dash shielding. And Jab cancels to grab and grab can follow nair.

 

[Tenki]

Yeah.

To simplify, the matchup is pretty much down to what happens when Sonic is in jab range lol.

Will Ike jab or grab?
Will Ike jab, get shielded, and grabbed by Sonic?
Will Sonic stop momentum and avoid/counter the grab?


It's really weird. Sonic has somewhat effective approach and counter-counter-approach options. As long as the Ike player avoids moves that require more than say, 15 frames of commitment (that's 1/4 of FD in Sonic speed lol), it'll keep the match from being completely tipped in Sonic's favor.

 

[Napilopez]

I did mention fair for aerial approaches.

Ike's nair I believe when spaced fully is outside Sonic's grab range. But dash > shield can work. Depends on slide.

But Ike can also grab if you keep dash shielding. And Jab cancels to grab and grab can follow nair.

Depends if Sonic powershields it or not. I always bring up this example, but Sonic can powershield DK ftilt or fsmash, and slide into a shield grab all in one motion. It would be much harder though if Ike is retreating with his aerials.

Anyways, I think the match up is quite even, maybe slightly in Sonics favor because of the safety of spring gimps. But you can DI those a bit, even if they are hard to see coming.

EDIT:

Umm lets see, Ike is also pretty easy to Uair juggle. Doesn't have the most aerial mobility, and uair beats out virtually anything above it, so yea. Although I suppose Ike could just use aether to escape it, but if he does, he leaves himself vulnerable to grabification.

Jabs are a serious pain. Spindash for approach only if you are doing it immediately after landing an ASC, when it seems to have more priority, or right at the beginning of the move. You may also want to SideB shield feint alot, and then use the actual sideB hop's invincibility frames to get past jabs. but either way, jabs are still a pain.

The only problem I see with Ike surviving for high percentages against Sonic is that even if Sonic doesn't kill Ike at 110%, he will send him far offstage. Once he's far offstage, Ike might not even make it back. Sonic covers the entirety of FD in less than a second, and rarely will he be that far from you anyways, so chances are the Sonic will chase you offstage to go for the spring gimp, some other form of gimpage, or be the edgehog hedgehog.

Sonic also isn't very succeptible to Ike spikes. But still, Ike can flat out kill you with relative ease.

 

[Tenki]

strangely enough (well, this is more of a per-player habit thing), I have more trouble fighting people who just up and go for a grab/dashgrab than people who try to hit before jabbing lol.

seriously, those are really annoying.

 

[Ussi]

Depends if Sonic powershields it or not. I always bring up this example, but Sonic can powershield DK ftilt or fsmash, and slide into a shield grab all in one motion. It would be much harder though if Ike is retreating with his aerials.

Anyways, I think the match up is quite even, maybe slightly in Sonics favor because of the safety of spring gimps. But you can DI those a bit.

I believe Ike's 2nd jab would nullify a PS (reaction lag maybe?) and the 3rd jab nullifies a spot dodge. IDK about PSing Nair to interrupt the jab following, sounds risky, but there are some frames to punish :\ Still grabs can't be PS so don't get predictable with PSing.

Yeah.

To simplify, the matchup is pretty much down to what happens when Sonic is in jab range lol.

Will Ike jab or grab?
Will Ike jab, get shielded, and grabbed by Sonic?
Will Sonic stop momentum and avoid/counter the grab?


It's really weird. Sonic has somewhat effective approach and counter-counter-approach options. As long as the Ike player avoids moves that require more than say, 15 frames of commitment (that's 1/4 of FD in Sonic speed lol), it'll keep the match from being completely tipped in Sonic's favor.

Now the whole battle won't be on the ground. There is the air too. Ike handles himself in the air fairly well since nair makes a good aerial shield. Fair outranges anything Sonic has in the air. Bair is fast in general. And dair and uair are lingering hitboxes.

Ike is also pretty much immune to spring > uair since Ike has eruption. It kills Sonic at 20% up there. (You can ask dNes when I did it to him when he was that low xD) and the SA protects him from being killed by uair.

 

[Tenki]

Now the whole battle won't be on the ground. There is the air too. Ike handles himself in the air fairly well since nair makes a good aerial shield. Fair outranges anything Sonic has in the air. Bair is fast in general. And dair and uair are lingering hitboxes.

The reason I didn't quite mention Ike's airgame was because it's somewhat exploitable.

Like, you have Ike's rising time, then the aerial startup lag (it's really noticeable D: ), ending lag, landing lag and such. Like KID mentioned, Sonic can run in and F-air Ike from out of retreating F-air range (let's say 6 frame startup for jump startup+F-air startup time - not counting the time it takes for Sonic to close distance from the ground before he jumps). So if we don't wait until after your aerial comes out to punish you, we can still close distance/ruin spacing while you're moving upwards - even get under or behind you, depending on which aerial you use.

When you jump, it gives us openings to use spindash/spincharge, because we can either use its lessened height to get under your aerials or hit you from below while setting up for a combo/followup hit.

Ike seems to have trouble defending from around shorthop height, in front of/below him. His N-air and F-air all sort of begin from the top and have to make their way downwards. More often than not, I'll have to deal with an airdodge.

But you know what though, here's what you can do that worked for metroid (the Ike player) for a few games (he 2stocked me pretty consistently before I caught on): If the Sonic player tends to run in and SH F-air when you jump, don't airdodge (TRAP!), double jump and do a falling/long-reaching aerial.

If I'm wrong, you can go ahead and correct me, but that's just what I've seen lol.

edit:
I'm not exaggerating Sonic's speed lol.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bljZ8SL8EXk

 

[Napilopez]

I believe Ike's 2nd jab would nullify a PS (reaction lag maybe?) and the 3rd jab nullifies a spot dodge. IDK about PSing Nair to interrupt the jab following, sounds risky, but there are some frames to punish :\ Still grabs can't be PS so don't get predictable with PSing.

Well, this is not a normal powershield though. This is a powershield slide shield grab super power ranger chaos emerald tech. Lol jk. But basically, Sonic powershields the jab while sliding into grab range from a run. Its not the same as just standing and powershielding. Still, its hard to time, but I am quite certain its doable.

Now the whole battle won't be on the ground. There is the air too. Ike handles himself in the air fairly well since nair makes a good aerial shield. Fair outranges anything Sonic has in the air. Bair is fast in general. And dair and uair are lingering hitboxes.

Likewise, as I edited my previous post to include, Sonic's Uair(second hit) outranges virtually anything above him, and we mean like, anything. Sonics fair uair and nair come out quickly, although nair has poopy range/disjointedness. Also, the issues is that Sonic can get himself out of tough situations in the air easily and safely with spring. Your points still stand though. Retreating Fair is especially difficult to deal with. Uair is scary powerful.

Ike is also pretty much immune to spring > uair since Ike has eruption. It kills Sonic at 20% up there. (You can ask dNes when I did it to him when he was that low xD) and the SA protects him from being killed by uair.

Hmm, I'm not totally sure about this. I suppose Ike has to time it well to use the SA frames, because I am quite sure in terms of pure range, Uair beats out erruption hitting from below. Also, if Ike is safe from Uair with eruption, Sonic can also use Spring>bair, which is just as effective, if not more so. Still, Sonic should be careful.

EDIT: What Tenki said. Any Ike's up for some matches to get a feel for the matchup? Post here, in the Wifi thread, or PM me.

 

[Tenki]

because I am quite sure in terms of pure range, Uair beats out erruption hitting from below. Also, if Ike is safe from Uair with eruption, Sonic can also use Spring>bair, which is just as effective, if not more so. Still, Sonic should be careful.

Eruption (from the FRONT) is massively disjointed from below. If you get tipped with it, you get spiked downwards.

Well, it's not as strong as his D-air, but yeah, prett much that.

I wouldn't doubt that he has countered a spring> U-air with eruption - especially if it's a spring > 2nd hit U-air - since that leaves quite some dead time that you can use to get past Eruption's startup lag and into the charge/release time [=counterattack mode]

But a spring > first hit U-air should be able to hit Ike during startup lag/before he can attack [= no SA frames! airdodge or DI!]

Luckily, most Sonics now only go for the spring > 2nd hit U-air, so yeah.

Also, even though Sonic's U-air is disjointed at the top of 2nd hit, don't forget it also extends his hurtbox, and Ike's Eruption has a massive hitbox that will most likely hit the extended U-air.

 

[Chis]

Spring > Uair is silly anyways. All you have to do is DI left or right and air dodge :?

 

[Napilopez]

Spring > Uair is silly anyways. All you have to do is DI left or right and air dodge :?

Well, you can always trick them by not immediately following up with spring>uair, but rather running, chasing their DI, and then using spring to Uair or Spring to bair.

And frankly, I'm still surprised at how often I land spring to Uair kills

 

[Ussi]

Sonic's speed can easily put him under Ike if Ike DIs. I've never seen how long Sonic's 2nd uair is, and it sounds long (I'd like a visaul of it [like a snapshot and like so a general. Hit box area]). Still if SA comes into play Ike will usually be FALLING so if he SA the 2nd hit of uair he will fall down to hit Sonic if his uair is that long.


About the dash fair beating a retreating fair. I'd say to beat that is to do a RAR retreating fair. It goes farther.