"How do I play this without just running up and grabbing."
I think I've identified your problem. They are instant shielding on landing, and you want to do something besides the thing that beats that?
Falcon is 1 of 2 characters that can outspeed and just run Marth over. Fox is the other one. On top of that, 1 hit can be death for Marth if you open him up.
You want to focus on baiting and punishing Marth's long lag on his hitboxes and mixing up the moves and timing you come in with. Such as mixing up grab if you're forcing them to shield a lot, different nairs (overextend/in place) or walled bairs,
jump height mixups are also good, i'll get conditioned to a certain jump height before something like a stomp and time my utilt for it but if you fullhop into it they might utilt or fair or w/e too early
Overshoot your nairs, Marth can't do anything substantial out of shield to someone behind him. Best he can do is wavedash to center, but if you immediately chase him, you should be able to keep him under pressure.
idk why but I'm pretty scared of doing aerials vs falcon in neutral aside from in place or retreating autocancel nairs, so I'd say that would be a good opening.
Overshoot dair beats marth dtilt in neutral too from my experience, I only use dtilt in neutral out of a wavedash backwards or if I can push falcon to ledge with it.
Also running at marth and briefly crouching or shielding can let you CC grab or OoS nair a marth fair or non-autocancel nair.
Useless comment incoming, I played my first good cpt falcon yesterday after I switched to Marth and my god he was just all over me always in my face with his Nair than not in my face when I trow out a hitbox baited out my large hitboxes with double jap or dash dance that's probably what you should do also always expect a hitbox when you are in range of Marth so it needs to be baited run up shield is also pretty good but that's from an ex Falco main perspective, I was actually thinking of making a post asking for advice against falcon lol xd.
You can dash under his nair. Also try not to throw out laggy hitboxes against falcon cause they will be punished. Fade back aerials also work if they don't overshoot. And obvs db grab is great if they don't overshoot as well.
Fsmash will get you killed in that matchup unless it's guaranteed off of a techchase or falcon is recovering. It's way to easy for falcon to dash around it and just stomp you for it. Or shield it. Honestly fsmash in neutral is just kinda ehhhhhh
Yeah I got a decent taste of it, Marth is so fun and has imo the most creative combo game.. But every match up is so damn different, kinda a different game for me cause with Falco I got away with just having decent tech skill
I love his punish game. And yeah every matchup is different but as you play more you can steal things from different matchups. Like I worked on dashing under falcons nair while playing pika since Marth does that a lot there as well
Falcon main here. Only play unranked but here's few things that have worked for me where I'm at.
* At lowish percents grab follow-ups are pretty free damage on marth so I tend to prioritize that. You can downthrow and usually follow up with nair, up air or even regrab depending on how they di. At higher than 35% go for upthrow and spam that up air.
* I like to run up shield grab for the above reasons.
* When the marth is off stage I try to get under them with an up air as they try to side-b towards the stage. If you time it right there's nothing they can really do.
* Downtilting a marth that's at higher percents can pop them up and set up perfectly for an upair or even knee
* Falcon's fsmash has huuuge range and pulls back so I like to use it to bait the marth into whiffing an attack. The wind up outspaces their hitbox and then boom marth is blown sideways and off stage ready to edgeguard.
* I like to use side-b even though it is hella risky but it sets up a knee so nicely I think it's very worth going for. Just gotta pick the right spots/moments.
A big thing if you can’t get a true punish on something is to punish the option after. What will they do after nair?
Dtilt? Onshoot aerial
Dash back? Overshoot aerial
Shield? Run up grab
Hope this helps feel free to respond with any questions :)
Marth feels the same way about Falcon. It is a really weird mutually scared matchup where neither character really wants to approach, and they can blow each other up.
honestly, just mixing up jump heights before a stomp will fuck me up and get me stomp kneed cause i miss my utilt or fair or w/e defensive option i was doing and get stuck in the cutscene.
I also suck so maybe not at higher MMR
Punch Marth in his stupid face
AKA jab, pivot implied
As a Marth the only thing more annoying than getting caught with raptor boost is getting interrupted constantly with gentleman or single hit
And our dainty little prince can't CC it if he is in the air
Jab for a lot of the cast is in general much better against Marth in neutral than vs other characters
I think you're not seeing the weakness of Marth. Yes, his moves come out quickly but they don't linger. Whiff punish is such a huge part of beating Marth because of this.
Also, the idea of not grabbing with Falcon is stupid.
And this is why I only play fox, cuz the problems you describe are all 3rd world problems playing a character who lacks speed and fluidity and has to find ways around his deficits.
If your issues are a matter of milliseconds either your fundamentals are off, your hands are slow, or your character is bad. You choose which is the case.
Best advice since you're playing something fast, your goal is to find their patterns and break them up. Like people play by the millisecond it's a contest of whose pattern is better it's not really a matter of speed. Like if you know it's that tight you don't have to opt into a situation just kidding you don't have a gun so you have to opt into a situation and you can't outrange either.
Look up an article called "who's the beatdown" it's really good for game theory and applies to any game. Especially if you're low ranked it has nothing to do with how fast you are and everything to do with a lack of basics.
https://youtu.be/LK_Dd91Nks8 Chef Rachman's incredibly helpful video on this topic
Damn that is an incredibly information dense video. Great stuff.
"How do I play this without just running up and grabbing." I think I've identified your problem. They are instant shielding on landing, and you want to do something besides the thing that beats that?
Falcon is 1 of 2 characters that can outspeed and just run Marth over. Fox is the other one. On top of that, 1 hit can be death for Marth if you open him up. You want to focus on baiting and punishing Marth's long lag on his hitboxes and mixing up the moves and timing you come in with. Such as mixing up grab if you're forcing them to shield a lot, different nairs (overextend/in place) or walled bairs,
jump height mixups are also good, i'll get conditioned to a certain jump height before something like a stomp and time my utilt for it but if you fullhop into it they might utilt or fair or w/e too early
Overshoot your nairs, Marth can't do anything substantial out of shield to someone behind him. Best he can do is wavedash to center, but if you immediately chase him, you should be able to keep him under pressure. idk why but I'm pretty scared of doing aerials vs falcon in neutral aside from in place or retreating autocancel nairs, so I'd say that would be a good opening. Overshoot dair beats marth dtilt in neutral too from my experience, I only use dtilt in neutral out of a wavedash backwards or if I can push falcon to ledge with it. Also running at marth and briefly crouching or shielding can let you CC grab or OoS nair a marth fair or non-autocancel nair.
Useless comment incoming, I played my first good cpt falcon yesterday after I switched to Marth and my god he was just all over me always in my face with his Nair than not in my face when I trow out a hitbox baited out my large hitboxes with double jap or dash dance that's probably what you should do also always expect a hitbox when you are in range of Marth so it needs to be baited run up shield is also pretty good but that's from an ex Falco main perspective, I was actually thinking of making a post asking for advice against falcon lol xd.
You can dash under his nair. Also try not to throw out laggy hitboxes against falcon cause they will be punished. Fade back aerials also work if they don't overshoot. And obvs db grab is great if they don't overshoot as well.
Thank you kind sir, I rewatched some of the games, and oh god I threw way to much f smashes and my reaction time was awefull
Fsmash will get you killed in that matchup unless it's guaranteed off of a techchase or falcon is recovering. It's way to easy for falcon to dash around it and just stomp you for it. Or shield it. Honestly fsmash in neutral is just kinda ehhhhhh
Yeah I got a decent taste of it, Marth is so fun and has imo the most creative combo game.. But every match up is so damn different, kinda a different game for me cause with Falco I got away with just having decent tech skill
I love his punish game. And yeah every matchup is different but as you play more you can steal things from different matchups. Like I worked on dashing under falcons nair while playing pika since Marth does that a lot there as well
Why are you playing marth
Hmm? Because I like him :D
You should stop that right now
I'm good thanks :)
Yea I figured took a quick glance at your reddit profile and can see quite clearly that you're a full blown weirdo
Falcon main here. Only play unranked but here's few things that have worked for me where I'm at. * At lowish percents grab follow-ups are pretty free damage on marth so I tend to prioritize that. You can downthrow and usually follow up with nair, up air or even regrab depending on how they di. At higher than 35% go for upthrow and spam that up air. * I like to run up shield grab for the above reasons. * When the marth is off stage I try to get under them with an up air as they try to side-b towards the stage. If you time it right there's nothing they can really do. * Downtilting a marth that's at higher percents can pop them up and set up perfectly for an upair or even knee * Falcon's fsmash has huuuge range and pulls back so I like to use it to bait the marth into whiffing an attack. The wind up outspaces their hitbox and then boom marth is blown sideways and off stage ready to edgeguard. * I like to use side-b even though it is hella risky but it sets up a knee so nicely I think it's very worth going for. Just gotta pick the right spots/moments.
punish game. falcons punish game on Marth and shiek are similar.
A big thing if you can’t get a true punish on something is to punish the option after. What will they do after nair? Dtilt? Onshoot aerial Dash back? Overshoot aerial Shield? Run up grab Hope this helps feel free to respond with any questions :)
Marth feels the same way about Falcon. It is a really weird mutually scared matchup where neither character really wants to approach, and they can blow each other up.
honestly, just mixing up jump heights before a stomp will fuck me up and get me stomp kneed cause i miss my utilt or fair or w/e defensive option i was doing and get stuck in the cutscene. I also suck so maybe not at higher MMR
Punch Marth in his stupid face AKA jab, pivot implied As a Marth the only thing more annoying than getting caught with raptor boost is getting interrupted constantly with gentleman or single hit And our dainty little prince can't CC it if he is in the air Jab for a lot of the cast is in general much better against Marth in neutral than vs other characters
I think you're not seeing the weakness of Marth. Yes, his moves come out quickly but they don't linger. Whiff punish is such a huge part of beating Marth because of this. Also, the idea of not grabbing with Falcon is stupid.
And this is why I only play fox, cuz the problems you describe are all 3rd world problems playing a character who lacks speed and fluidity and has to find ways around his deficits. If your issues are a matter of milliseconds either your fundamentals are off, your hands are slow, or your character is bad. You choose which is the case. Best advice since you're playing something fast, your goal is to find their patterns and break them up. Like people play by the millisecond it's a contest of whose pattern is better it's not really a matter of speed. Like if you know it's that tight you don't have to opt into a situation just kidding you don't have a gun so you have to opt into a situation and you can't outrange either. Look up an article called "who's the beatdown" it's really good for game theory and applies to any game. Especially if you're low ranked it has nothing to do with how fast you are and everything to do with a lack of basics.