Yeah thats one of the big issues i face as well. She really makes you commit hard to punishing her D4 and if she reads it she can jump obviously, or back up and D4 whiff punish. Even if you block it who cares your at +1 with all the BS.
You have to be sooo on point in this match its ridiculous. She blows up close smoke bombs the worst imo which makes fishing for counter pokes really risky. The worst thing is that her d4 recovers really fast so raw smoke bomb wont cut it so like you mentioned you have to take a leap of faith with b2 and if she baits you GGs dive kick combo reset. Since smoke is a heavy poke based character it opens up a lot of options for her to jump back instant air dive kick. I share your hatred for sonya she is brutal. I pick kitana in the MU at this point just because of the risk involved in the B2 as compared to just playing footsies and blowing up d4 with f21.
yeah i think i'm going to pick someone else in this MU as well. Not worth the trouble at ALL to try and win this one, especially because i'm not very comfortable in the MU like i am vs. Kabal :\
Haha my lame ass name
I played kabal for ONE GAME in tournament already, the streak is broken ;_;
I have played some excellent Sonya's but not Death. If you let Sonya get in it can be a rough time. Life lead is pretty key and keeping her away + forcing mistakes on her way in is pretty much the way to fight it. If you can get a good read on when she wants to d4 to move in I try to space it where I can back dash and punish with SB.
Ya I think it is 6-4 Sonya but personally Lao and Kabal are much tougher to deal with. Nomad Dash let's Kabal get in Smoke's face pretty much whenever he wants. You said you were comfortable in the Kabal MU, what are your tips there?
GamerBlake90 do you know this? I would like to get an answer as well because I am not 100% sure on the frame data on this move and how it exactly works.
According to this thread here...
I just noticed someone doing the bernie at 9:54 on the right.
What do you all think of the Sonya match-up? I honestly think it horrid and feel it is probably worse than Kung Lao.
I've played Death both online sequentially over the past year or so and i had the honour to play him offline at T13, and he definitely won more than i did. I also play two other Sonya players online, one of which is @Khaotik. Now, why i think this MU is so bad?
D4~MS and Divekick makes our life hell. Her dash speed allows her to move in super fast and even if you do read a D4 and try to SB if she does a dashing D4 it will whiff. Smoke's damage isn't much of an issue in this match-up, she does 50% BnB off jip and 40% off of a DK. Her armor makes it literally impossible to pressure her, it's not like even if you block the armor you get anything good to follow it up with. (I.e Cage's F3) And because we don't have anything to armor back with she has ridiculous pressure options against him.
She really doesn't need to respect on hit after ANYTHING besides 2, D4 and d3 vs. crouch. She can divekick interrupt with a full combo punish, so the threat of Dk is always there. Things that normally are viable like D3, B2 get slapped in the face. Even a D3, 2 gets slapped in the face via divekick.
And the kicker: Any time she knocks you down she gets a free D4~MS. It blows up Smoke Away and towards, teleport whiffs because of her lowered hitbox.
Overall i think she has all the tools to make Smoke stop throwing out SB's (and building meter) from far with her DK and D4. She destroys him up close. Armor is a pain because Smoke has no quick mids to check her up even on block.
I may be wrong and i just need more MU xp and practice, but i just thought i'd see everyone elses opinion because this is personally my most hated MU. I'd rather fight Kabal than her any day of the weeklol
Like mentioned previously, the best is 10. You can test it yourself by making Skarlet use wakeup attacks and try to punish dual upslash (-8).
D4 is a great tool in this MU but it seems like the F413 string can be a pretty big problem with Smoke's hitbox. I don't play a lot of high level Jax's anyways so my opinion is pretty worthless here. I do main Smoke and Cage, and even though I feel like Smoke is my best character playing good Jax players is SO much easier with Cage...for what that is worth.
I think Smoke is a tough MU for Sektor. All the good ones I have played struggle to win in that MU. I can't see Sonya being 7-3 because that would scare me to think of what Kabal/Kung Lao are because I personally feel those 2 characters are way more of a problem. Sonya at least has to guess on the way in and risk eating a combo where as Kabal can dash to get right in your face and pressure you whenever he wants to. Maybe the LK MU is unexplored a bit, but I still think that is pretty even and I would be surprised to see it shift definitively in one direction or the other.
Like I said, I'm not an expert on the subject nor am I questioning Somberness's efforts. I'm merely asking because I felt curious.
I'll give that a shot, thanks.
I am not sure. I personally have that match as a 5-5after all I've played with Moe
Yep, force push can be pretty annoying in this MU, and it is a great tool... but what happens when I stand at the end of your push range and you throw one out, whiff, and I punish it with Smoke bomb? A mistake like that can cost you more than half your life bar and you would have to come in and take major risks to do so. Also it is not too difficult to escape Ermac pressure and his specials are pretty negative on block. With this said I just think it is a 6-4 in Smoke's favor so it isn't a monster disadvantage.
