Match-up Discussion Reptile Matchup Discussion Thread

hmm raiden has to dash in after f2,4 against kitana, he doesn't have to dash in against reptile, im suprised kitana can interupt that, nice to know though

So decided to play Expert with Reptile today. Won 2-0 against Jax due to zoning beating his zoning, lost 1-2 then won 2-1 against kenshi because I was still trying to zone, won 2-1 vs Johnny Cage (again zoning), then lost 0-2 Ermac twice before winning 2-1 due to learning 3,2,1 is as good of a rushdown string as Scorpion 3,3,4, especially when combined with an Oki elbow dash crossup. Same with Cyrax because, hell, I thought I could actually zone Cyrax.

And then Liu Kang. Lost 0-2 twice, but that's not what's bugging me. Its the fact I can't do anything against him. Zoning is impossible because low fireball ducks under acid spit and is quick enough to cancel force ball. Can't fight up close due to parry and mix-up loops.

Any advice for the Liu Kang matchup?

I reaaly doubt Reptile has the smoke matchup. Its a 5-5 max, but i think its in favor of smoke, even if by a little. Smoke has very good tools vs reptile, as he has a 30% off a blocked elbow, can shut down most of his projectile game and the ex- counter can be thrown in in clutch scenarios to shift momentum.

Mileena is for sure tough, but 3-7 might be off. And you can punish telekick off stand block if you do crouching jab into ex fb into a combo that can lead up to 31%. Its not an easy match, but baiting is key

Updates for everyone.

After playing a LOT of offline and online matches against good Mileena's and smokes.

Mileena is a seems to be still anoying, though i found some ways in which works Solid fine! shall explain later. i would give this match 5.5 - 4.5 Mil favor

Smoke Vs reptile....Prepare for the shock!! this is a reptile favor ,worst case scenario 5 - 5.

So for smoke, i change the matchup for 5.5 - 4.5 Reptile favor. Not because of Footsies, Not because of the mix ups smoke has.....just thank god Reptile got something called Elbow dash and cr+4~ special traps

Ohhh teef. We need to play again. I think its 5-5, just my opinion and based on my wins i feel its the most balance match up there is. I love playing against reptiles. Just feels fair.

yup yup! sure thing boss add me up man. also two things, i heard ur attending Summer jam 5 ?

secondly, actually when we fought i was experimenting a LOT to be honest....i have to learn! their has to be people were i can experiment against! and they have to be good players as well haha

but hey!! u only owned ma kenshi >_> ...bastardo! kenshi shall take his own revenge from smoke soon, instead of cryin to reptile for help (rofl at Kenshi .....man >_> )

i would agree it's 5 - 5 for now to be honest. though i will keep this match in progress along with kabal! they feel that reptile has MUCH more potential that we actually thought at the begining

Yeah I'm going to Summer Jam. Not going to win it, but going for the experience and to level up. Bringing my monitor so if you guys want to play we can do that. Lol

Nice man! dude i live in philadelphia. so whatever u want that i can bring, tell me about it. and i didnt notice, ur in NY? where in NY?
am not their to win, but to gain experience as well! and hoping to win maybe lol....will be my first Fighting game tournament in YEARS! (really rusty)

also i was just chating with mike in MKU. he's coming to summer jam!! so it will be fun to play against u guys and meet u in real life for sure

The Bronx 30 mins(train) from Manhattan. Sucks that all the mk9 players are scattered. At least the good ones anyway. I've been in tournaments before, but not for fighting games. I know NY is going to be in there deep. So many from NYC are going to go over there. It's going to be tough. So I'm much more looking foward to the casuals. You know gauge my level.

best of luck man

Honestly the only things I can do against Mileena is bait a roll or teleport and quickly charge a forceball to catch her. But it seems totally random because sometimes her telekick still goes through it. I've hit her multiple different times of the charge; right when I satrt charging, a second or two while charging but it seems totally random if it will hit or not.

I'm still convinced Mileena has abig advantage. Her zoning completely owns our zoning. Upclose you can't do much and if she starts feeling pressured she can just telekick and reset how the match was going. I'm pretty good at reading Mileena's but in the end reading her only leads to successful blocks and maybe some elbow dash punishes. It's hard to really combo her and nearly impossible to zone her. Basically fighting her you need to rely on always having meter and baiting. I don't think that makes for a close matchup at all when she can outzone, bait and pressure you.

Personally for me Smoke is about a 5-5. Maybe with more practice I will understand why people are saying it's 6-4 Reptile but for now it's hard for me to consistently beat a very good Smoke player.

I am still at a loss how to beat Cage. If someone can tell me when I can escape his frametraps and how, then I will greatly appreciate it. Seems like I can elbow dash at points but I am at the complete mercy of the Cage player since he decides if he wants to go that route, or just block or throw.

So F0xy picked up Sonya the other day, and I've been playing against him a bit lately. Now of course I acknowledge the fact he is a much better player than me, but that matchup can be a total bitch. If you throw out a forceball anywhere but fullscreen you're eating a divekick combo, and her divekick is also that fast it's hard to bait EX FB jump in traps. Her projectile completely messes up reptile, there is so little he can do inbetween them, shes just one of the few characters than makes Reptile look like a putz.

I'm pretty new to actually fighting sonya, but I didn't think it would be so hard to cope with. ATM I reckon it's 6-4 in Sonya's favour, but it's hard to tell in my position, since the only sonya player I know is F0xy.

I agree, Sonya is a bitch to fight and I was also slaughtered by f0xy granpa. In like 6 or so games I only beat him once. Seems like she can outzone Reptile too... or it at least was happening to me. Might jsut be one of those cases of whoever zones first wins the zoning war. But I just kept forceballing like an idiot when he was about to wakeup and then he'd always divekick combo me. I think it's mostly due to me not having much experience against Sonya and that he happens to be a beastly player but I think the matchup might favor Sonya or be 5-5

XteefX, 3-7 Shang tsung? Shang tsung is useless once block stringed. add pressure to shang and its deffy 7-3 in reptiles favor.

as for the vs kabal matchup i really think it's at least 6-4 for reptile

projectile war is pointless because:

1- reptile's low hitbox make iaGBs harder to land, he can simply dash under and reach close range where kabal can only sit and risk exNDs
2- forceball trade is a victory for reptile, even if hit by a gas blast or a buzzsaw from fullscreen he can often recover, double dash and 321
3- reptile can place 3 projectiles on screen (slow, fast, spit) while kabal can't exND through all of them, even if he was able to he would have eaten 15% or more damage before the retarded spin damage scaling
4- kabal can exND ONLY after a forward dash against a slow forceball for what, 20% damage?
5- reptile can dash over a buzzsaw and jumpin from midscreen into combo due to 3's HUGE range and hitbox

dash battle is pointless because:
1- elbow wins over nomad everytime won't matter if landed before or after ND is out
2- and it's a piece of cake for a 6 frames special moves to interrupt NDC pressure
3- have i mentioned that kabal's db2 block string finisher is punishable by elbow on block?not sure for the buzzsaw i'll give it a try later
4- kabal fastest/safest punisher/combo starter is 9 frame f4~spin, have i already used 'retarded damage scaling'?dash can also be punished by b212 launcher but the frame window is so strict and in addition to the dash animation it's too much hard and risky to even try

i think someone might add more

I think the match-up is 5-5, or possibly even in kabal's favour. Ex nomad stops a lot of reptile's forceball pressure, and the only way hes going to get more than one projectile one screen from any range over than fullscreen is if he uses meter. Iagbs/buzzsaw shenanigans completely wreck Reptile since his regular dash is snail pace, the only chance reptile has is when he blocks a buzzsaw and has that small window to get a forceball out. Reptile escapes NDC pressure well, but I think he needs that in the matchup considering at range it's like fighting in an uphill battle. The problem is against kabal is that you can't jump 90% of the time, and Reptile needs the jump-in advantage because his strings are so abysmally slow. Reptile has to be hasty with his projectiles if Kabal has meter, but at the same time he can't rush in because Kabal's zoning is just so good.

I'm not sure about Elbow dash beating Nomad, I'm sure they just run through eachother. Also, Kabal always seems to have a breaker, he builds meter like it's coming from a tap.

well, the most reliable way to exND a forceball is to dash at 1/2 screen distance and do the move
it's risky since the armor lasts only few frames and works only against some forceball setups

i've already said that reptile's hitbox is so small that you have to be very precise on iaGBs or he can walk or dash below them
if kabal trade a bs for a fb it's back to square one, if kabal throws out another bs reptile can dash on the startup and jumpin combo

kabal can't jump back at reptile either
mistimed jumpin are eaten alive by forceballs juggle and wakeup pressure if you don't end the combo with the slide
you can't bait FBs by jumpin~GB since the slow one still juggle

according to the current frame data
reptile's combo starters 1 and 3 are respectively 11 and 13 frames 3 have such incredible reach
kabal's f4 is 9 and f3 is 13, f4 have such short reach, long whiff animation and it's unsafe on block unless NDCed making it worth only as a punisher, its hit box is low and can be easily crossed up into combo

forceballs recover instantly and make a 3/4 screen distance exND worthless unless done only to close distance and try to NDC pressure

well, since most of my statements come from the matches against your reptile (and boriz's, very different playstyle from you)
i recall my ND beaten 100% of the time while done in anticipation to elbow dash
we can test this better if you're up to sparring later today

I'm a little late to this party, but I'd respectfully disagree with this. Forceball pressure, in my experience, makes Kitana's fans redundant. Her ground fans are slow, and if she attempts an IAF there's a big risk of being caught with a ball. As Kitana's launcher strings are slow, they are usually done via a punish (18/17f attacks won't punish anything Reptile does) or a jump in punch, which is avoided by dashes. The only way I have been consistently successful in starting full combos is by burning meter in a 11/21~exfan string, and that's not optimal in any match. From there, I feel like Reptile's rushdown beats Kitana's, and would keep the 6-4 in Reptile's favor.

THTB: Can you break exactly why Mileena beats Reptile? Thanks bud

Mileena is such a bitch matchup for Reptile. It's so frustrating lol.

Also, during casuals Eric Warda told me that Kabal is a terrible matchup for Reptile. He said it's 6-4 in Kabal's favor and I'm starting to think that's true. At the best it's 5-5. The only time Reptile wins this matchup is if he holds health advantage and then proceeds to zone the entire match.

And does everyone agree with Sektor being favored over Reptile? Or 5-5? I'm leaning towards Sektor advantage but I'm not too sure yet.