SSBU/Ryu/Matchups

This page includes write ups and various other notes from Shotocord. This will include matchup notes geared towards Ken and Ryu. The names of who wrote the matchup write up will be listed.

Young Link
https://twitter.com/ssb4_saboten/status/1188236320214138880?s=21

From SHORYUKEN:

Focus is bad. Punish whiffs with your fastest move because his grab, dair and grounded up b don’t have as much lag as you think. I wasn’t able to focus in time to beat up b > uair so it might just be a true combo at kill percent, should probably DI it diagonal up.

Low recovery from too far away will get you naired and you die.

Hadoken is pretty good at the right distance for canceling his projectiles or chipping on damage, which matters since he’s light.

Ryu is obviously better than Ken for having reliable combos, tatsu kills, a better projectile war and collarbone to punish excessive defense.

Drop down nair against his recovery before his up b can come out.

Response from Bill Bill Bill:

Focus is bad here, yes, but it can help a lot in juggling here since it can make upb miss by only hitting once, always tanks through uair and will avoid dragdown fair (last one is less consistent). Though, this only really applies of you are falling down and not in a combo. In those situations, you might as well airdodge.

Zelda
From mo!:

in general: zelda is a very patient MU for the shotos, all about keeping your distance. imo you should time your approaches and keep center stage. don't challenge zelda in the air unless you're in advantage. recommended stages: small battlefield, ps2

specials: din's fire is really not a problem at all. it's slow, can be focused through, and very easy to punish. dashwalk and you should be fine. nayru's love is annoying but not a huge issue if you know what you're doing. you can bait it out with a light hado and then punish her for it. also be careful when approaching her as she can mess you up with this. farore's wind is not a huge deal either. it can be difficult to deal with offstage if that's what you're going for, but if you can read teleports you can read farore's wind. despite that said, be careful challenging this move on shield. it's 6 frames. phantom is where this MU becomes a bit of an issue. phantom can eat focus 3 when fully charged (it has 6 stages) so its optimal to destroy it as soon as you see it. if not, spotdodge or FADC through it before it's fully constructed. zelda can also RAR dair to make the phantom appear in front of her.

standard stuff & aerials: zelda is a rather slow character on the ground, with a 15-frame dash startup and only a little faster dash than dr. mario. that doesn't mean she's not a threat. she has a rather long and disjointed pivot grab and dash grab (see tornado's hitbox image above) but it barely goes above her head, and has a 14-frame startup, meaning you could punish it with a sh jump-in if need be. her forward smash is also rather disjointed, so watch out for that. really, zelda can be rushed down quite easily on the ground unless she buffers a shorthop.

it's when zelda gets in the air where the MU becomes pretty problematic. zelda's aerials are very good, have huge hitboxes, and two of them have a sweetspot. combined with her up smash and up tilt, they are also potent juggling tools. DI and SDI as best as you can and make sure you get back on the ground. you can FADC but watch out for nair on the way down.

zelda is also very dangerous on shield. her oos options are very good and fast, and she can catch you off guard with a sh fair. don't try and break her shield and instead poke. which shoto? both shotos can deal with her in different ways. ken can rush her down on the ground and ryu can challenge her in neutral. either way, they can get the job done.

From Bill Bill Bill:

For ken: condition the hell out of zelda. Heavy tatsu works well at mid percents since its like -2 on hit at most? Maybe? Dont do it early percent, ever. They may instinctively neutral b and if you shield it, its a free punish. Obviously, dont spam it, cause their grab game is pretty good. Light tatsu isnt super good here because her floatiness makes it easy for her to tech if she gets into tumble. Mix up your recovery OFTEN. Dins fire is extremely strong (sweetspot). I think it may break early focus too, not sure. Her edge guarding isnt super great but she cant get punished for it. Do not ever tatsu immediately when recovering unless you read their dins fire somehow. Focus or recover low. Though i dont see many zeldas do this (fortunately), their dair is really good for spiking us, since the sourspot also spikes. Time your ledge options right if they use phantom, roll or even attack might work against it. DI out might mess with her upb and may make her miss the 2nd part of the move if she uses it oos. It kills really early too if you DI it wrong, so be careful

Zero Suit Samus
From Beek: https://twitter.com/DVN_Beek/status/1212508677418209283

From Nito:

Can roll under her Zair approach for big punishes.

But avoid tech rolling into her down smashes cuz you'll get big punished, typically tech rolling away is best because she'll only get a dash attack on you which wont kill you until like 150+ or something dumb.

You'll have to shield a bit in this match up because of her Flip Kick (you can punish in between but not start up of it with things like fair/back air or up air) and potentially out of shield punish if she lands on your shield aggressively with it.

If she starts running away don't chase her too hard. You have a projectile and so does she, the thing with hers is the end lag she has after using it is almost as bad as ours and is very telegraphed so you can punish it by jumping over and down airing her (However if you mistime it and hit her shield you need to special cancel so you don't get Up B'd punished so Tatsu away or try to poke her with Shoryu special cancel.

She doesn't have any kill throws until like 170 either so eating a grab is fine she doesn't have true combos out of them, however if she does grab a lot if you're able to dodge it you get big punishes on it every time. Super light, should be killing her around 70-80 all the time.

Make your punishes worth it and you'll kill her in 2 exchanges.

She can do the Shulk edgeguard on us if you don't time it, where she'll drop down and reverse up B facing away from stage so be aware of that and stall when you need to with Focus/Hado to avoid it, or just wait on your Shoryu to meet her halfway through her Up B and force a stage tech situation on her.