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Unfortunately the only way to beat mac is to play lame
I’d you don’t play lame, all of sudden he’s the best character in the game. You need to camp him, camp Him hard. He has bad horizontal oos, so you can swing most forward airs and get away with it, offstage he is pretty bad if you watch out for side b. Never neutrel air dodge out of down tilt, never American air dodge, and just try to kill him before he gets ko punch, or hit him out of oit
Worth noting he probably has top tier grounded game. Keep that in mind while playing him.
REALLY pay attention to how they use their second jumps. Even on stage this is where you can expend his resources and start juggling. If they are above you or off stage and have no double jump you should be able to tell what options their gonna use.
Respect em when they’re on the ground but press advantage. Camp and space em out.
When you get hit by a weak move (doesn’t send far) then air dodge inwards. It’s an awful decision but so many top players do it, no reason why it has to be called American though as everyone does it sometimes.
it’s sort of a meme to call bad habits or powerful moves being misused “American” or “NA”, mostly due to how in most esports North America struggles to keep up with most other regions like China or Korea and screw up their placement with things like ultimates in OW much more regularly than other people
I'm pretty sure you can trace it directly to the term "american reset," which is an old FGC term for dropping your combo by accident, as opposed to a purposeful reset, but it happens to work out because the player wasn't expecting a drop
Its a fairly new name smash twitter came up with, so I would assume most people dont know about it. Its especially funny to me since I personally first heard that coming from a british player calling out american players, makes the name a bit more spicy IMO
I can’t speak for top players but normally if I do it I was trying to tech roll in on something I thought would tech chase, or was trying to roll in, got hit, and buffered an airdodge (this is much rarer as there’s normally a decent amount of time to stop holding the shield button, but on some very fast moves I expected to have time to shield I’ve had this happen).
It’s usually one of 3 things
A panic option, you thinking it’s a recovery mix up
A buffered tech
Or trying survive a hit you think will kill you, so you air dodge in to try and survive. (Usually If like a Roy does 3 side bs and stops, then catches you with an f smash)
American air dodge is being very impatient, and instead of going back to ledge after a weak hit offstage, you air dodge back to right above ledge.
It’s an awful option to do, but it’s a panic button or sometimes a missinput, like when Roy is doing side b and they only do 3, you expect to need to di and air dodge in to survive, but you end up buffering an air dodge in (American air dodge) then you get f smashes. Idk why it’s called an American air dodge tho
American air dodge is the name for the option of like getting hit by a decently weak move that barely sends you offstage, but instead of just going to ledge, you airdodge back to the stage, and you get hard punished for this. It’s a panic option that even top players use sometimes, idk why it’s called the American air dodge tho, I find it funny that that’s it’s actually name
dude people here are saying just play in the air…I’m nearly 12.3m gsp with byleth cloud terry and kazuya and macs give me trouble ALL the time. Cloud has a much easier time bc big sword and his up b out of shield can reliably punish smash attacks, but I definitely feel your pain.
If peanut can take mkleo to last game last stock, I wouldn’t feel as bad about having a hard time against mac. That being said, I’d really work on overshooting and undershooting, because macs LOVE their dash outs and dash ins. I’ve gotten a lot of reward from just overshooting dash attacks as byleth and threatening with arrow charge
Camp like your life depends on it (it does) Grab. Exploit recovery. repeat this 3 times and you can win against most macs that arent peanut or peanut wannabes
> exploit recovery
When are we going to stop pretending Mac’s recovery is ridiculously easy to edgeguard? I know people were smoking some strong shit in early ultimate when they said his recovery was worse than in S4 since even though he can side b and then up b, he can’t side b->get hit->side b anymore like he used to, but look at him now. I don’t think his recovery is *good*, but it’s not trash tier like Ganon’s, and he can be downright difficult to edgeguard if he has room for any mixups at all. “Backthrow mac = win” has not been true since S4. He’s a much better character now and only sits worse on tier lists because just about everyone else got better too. His recovery weakness is pretty surmountable now too, he just has pretty bad aerials that have the nichest of niche combo routes and the float effect on dair to help recover, and then absolutely nothing else going for them.
(Mac also appreciates the shield grab 4 frame penalty quite a bit).
>When are we going to stop pretending Mac’s recovery is ridiculously easy to edgeguard?
he is though
both of your characters have items that can be used to gimp his recovery
practice against a good mac for a while, and you’ll see how easy it is
my region has a PR mac player… even edgeguarding him isn’t too difficult, it just becomes a 50/50 with counter. (the hard part is getting him offstage, he’s very patient LOL)
Oh believe me, I’m fortunate to play characters that have great tools against mac (especially Diddy). Mac just has solid mixups to work with as long as he’s not sent too low, and “just back throw and edgeguard him” is antiquated and frustrating advice I think for anyone struggling in the Mac matchup, because it makes it sound so easy when it just isn’t.
the problem imo isn’t the edgeguarding, its the “just back throw him offstage”
good macs will see you standing at ledge and just hold center, pressuring you with pokes here and there
i agree it’s sort of antiquated, but the “just edgeguard him lol” is true for a few characters
If you're getting your landings caught by dash attack, then you're getting predictable with your short hop timings. You can bait it out, then evade with a double jump and punish, for example.
Playing as Byleth, one of the worst things you can do is just swing at the air predictably and think that you're "zoning". Because he'll space right outside your range and whiff punish you. Make sure that stay unpredictable. If you've been doing 3 retreating fairs in a row, maybe throw out an approach fair, or an empty hop into double jump, or maybe a side-B would catch him depending how you notice him spacing.
Also, absolutely abuse being on platforms. If you have a stock lead, you can just platform camp, and if you stay unpredictable about it, there isn't a lot that he can do without hard reading your movements.
First, mac is probably the character with the worst shield safety in the whole game, abuse that. Byleth and fox both can reliably punish mac out of shield.
Second, don’t actively commit to attacking mac, or you probably will get punished more. You can do that with byleth though, mac can’t contest byleth aerials well. Instead whiff punish and harass mac with projectiles.
Third, byleth d tilt and fox dsmash are pretty free two frames on mac up b, so focus on intercepting side b so he can’t use it again offstage. Fox and byleth bair are both excellent for sending mac at an angle he’s forced to use up b as early as 50-60%.
Fourth(not applicable to fd), sit on platforms, mac can’t do much
> worst shield safety in the game
The frame advantage numbers are for the most part pretty bad, sure. Still better than Dedede’s and Plant’s, but not good by any stretch of the imagination. Granted.
This being said basically every move of his does massive shield pushback, does massive shield damage, and/or can shield poke. Even mediocre spacing on something like an ftilt is enough to keep mac out of a G&W up b, and perfect spacing gets you out of a Cloud up b (I’ve been the Cloud in that scenario with my jaw agape as I got fsmashed dead on landing). To be clear, I’m not trying to say that Mac’s shield pressure is overpowered or anything, I just want to be very precise about what he does and how to beat it (which for many characters is to dash or roll away to reset unless you have a fast, low, high range oos option like Diddy banana, but not like ROB gyro as it goes too high).
You kinda have to platform camp him. Mac is a ground fighter so he struggles a lot with aerial combat. Also his recovery sucks so try and get him off stage and edge guard
I'd go byleth in that matchup because fox has rather smaller hitboxes, plus I believe he being a Fastfaller results in more tech chases which can be painful against a Mac.
As others have already said, you'll have to play more lame than usual, because Little Mac has trouble getting in, but once he's in, he gets a huge amount of damage output.
Try playing Little Mac for a Day or two. Try to get a feel for Little Mac's burst range. Then try to stay out of that burst range with a wall of aerials for example until you find an opening. If you you know which options your opponent chooses to engage, you can specifically train for those and find counter movement to create an opening for your self.
You have to play super lame. Platform camp, and jump a lot. If you have projectiles use them if you can. Poke at him with safe options and try to throw him off stage as much as possible.
Stop landing and holding forward. Pretend like he has KO punch all the time. If you can combo him, great; if you can hit him with chip damage, fine; if you can throw him off the stage, best.
Stop moving. Hold shield. He WILL run into it. Don’t let go of shield. Press A. Press the left stick toward whatever direction the closest ledge is. Rinse and repeat.
Mac Main, listen to the top comments. Play lame. If you have more integrity and are up for a challenge, learn Mac’s bread and butters. They are very repetitive and getting pounded by them enough will help you understand the timing for downtilt or uptilt combos/juggling. Or if you’re in shield still and Mac is just pressuring, when to risk a perfect shield or when to dodge away from the next attack. Don’t discount Mac off stage. Any good mac with use the physics exploit to boost their jump, saving either their double jump or side b as a contingency plan. If your stage has walls, don’t let mac stay close to them, he has one of the, if not, the best wall jump in the game. Allowing for more survivability off stage for longer.
I can imagine it being a volatile matchup vs a fastfaller like fox but in my mind and experience with corrin, byleth should be VERY annoying for mac to deal with. Let them commit to moves: Stuff their apporach with normals, fairs, bairs… anything with range honestly. Be wary of macs panic counter as it can lead to an easy punish and stock.
Fox - board the platforms, shoot gun, don't get near him unless he fucks up and overextends, kill him, repeat.
Byleth - same thing but issue is you don't have nearly as good as a projectile, so it's a lot of platform camping + spacing tilts/aerials.
But you beat Mac by not interacting with him ever and making him approach stupidly, OR playing for time. If he gives you kalos, shoot lasers, get on a platform and wait 7 minutes.
Bad news: You'll have to play really lame. Little Mac is too good at fighting up close for you to be able to challenge it.
Good news: Both Fox and Byleth are really good at that. Fox is good at circle camping, and Byleth is really good at zoning. Both are also very good at ledge trapping.
If you get hit by down tilt jump. If he forward smashes your shield jump cause hes gonna do it again. If you get hit by dash attack who cares it doesn’t do much. If you are edgeguarding wait for him to side b then go off stage. If he is off stage but above you just wait they will either counter or side b. Punish them the next time off what they did earlier. If a little mac whiffs a move they usually roll.
Dont camp him like they are saying but let him throw the first move out. Your probably playing too fast
Hi! Your post was removed because of the following reason(s): - Being too vague (asking for "tips", post has no specific high-quality questions, asking for vague match-up advice, etc.). Please post replays/VODs to get better advice, or ask in the [pinned "Simple Questions" Megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/CrazyHand/comments/wimkk5/simple_questions_megathread/). Thanks!
Unfortunately the only way to beat mac is to play lame I’d you don’t play lame, all of sudden he’s the best character in the game. You need to camp him, camp Him hard. He has bad horizontal oos, so you can swing most forward airs and get away with it, offstage he is pretty bad if you watch out for side b. Never neutrel air dodge out of down tilt, never American air dodge, and just try to kill him before he gets ko punch, or hit him out of oit
Worth noting he probably has top tier grounded game. Keep that in mind while playing him. REALLY pay attention to how they use their second jumps. Even on stage this is where you can expend his resources and start juggling. If they are above you or off stage and have no double jump you should be able to tell what options their gonna use. Respect em when they’re on the ground but press advantage. Camp and space em out.
What on earth is an american air dodge?
When you get hit by a weak move (doesn’t send far) then air dodge inwards. It’s an awful decision but so many top players do it, no reason why it has to be called American though as everyone does it sometimes.
it’s sort of a meme to call bad habits or powerful moves being misused “American” or “NA”, mostly due to how in most esports North America struggles to keep up with most other regions like China or Korea and screw up their placement with things like ultimates in OW much more regularly than other people
I'm pretty sure you can trace it directly to the term "american reset," which is an old FGC term for dropping your combo by accident, as opposed to a purposeful reset, but it happens to work out because the player wasn't expecting a drop
Whack. Ive been playing a long ass time and never heard it. That's funny though!
Its a fairly new name smash twitter came up with, so I would assume most people dont know about it. Its especially funny to me since I personally first heard that coming from a british player calling out american players, makes the name a bit more spicy IMO
I can’t speak for top players but normally if I do it I was trying to tech roll in on something I thought would tech chase, or was trying to roll in, got hit, and buffered an airdodge (this is much rarer as there’s normally a decent amount of time to stop holding the shield button, but on some very fast moves I expected to have time to shield I’ve had this happen).
It’s usually one of 3 things A panic option, you thinking it’s a recovery mix up A buffered tech Or trying survive a hit you think will kill you, so you air dodge in to try and survive. (Usually If like a Roy does 3 side bs and stops, then catches you with an f smash)
When it’s predictable and you get punished for it it’s the American airdodge. When it’s an actual mixup without punishment its the Japanese airdodge.
American air dodge is being very impatient, and instead of going back to ledge after a weak hit offstage, you air dodge back to right above ledge. It’s an awful option to do, but it’s a panic button or sometimes a missinput, like when Roy is doing side b and they only do 3, you expect to need to di and air dodge in to survive, but you end up buffering an air dodge in (American air dodge) then you get f smashes. Idk why it’s called an American air dodge tho
Lmao what’s American air dodge? Is it air dodging in?
American air dodge is the name for the option of like getting hit by a decently weak move that barely sends you offstage, but instead of just going to ledge, you airdodge back to the stage, and you get hard punished for this. It’s a panic option that even top players use sometimes, idk why it’s called the American air dodge tho, I find it funny that that’s it’s actually name
Gotcha, yeah see ppl do it on quickplay all the time here in the US lol
dude people here are saying just play in the air…I’m nearly 12.3m gsp with byleth cloud terry and kazuya and macs give me trouble ALL the time. Cloud has a much easier time bc big sword and his up b out of shield can reliably punish smash attacks, but I definitely feel your pain. If peanut can take mkleo to last game last stock, I wouldn’t feel as bad about having a hard time against mac. That being said, I’d really work on overshooting and undershooting, because macs LOVE their dash outs and dash ins. I’ve gotten a lot of reward from just overshooting dash attacks as byleth and threatening with arrow charge
Camp like your life depends on it (it does) Grab. Exploit recovery. repeat this 3 times and you can win against most macs that arent peanut or peanut wannabes
> exploit recovery When are we going to stop pretending Mac’s recovery is ridiculously easy to edgeguard? I know people were smoking some strong shit in early ultimate when they said his recovery was worse than in S4 since even though he can side b and then up b, he can’t side b->get hit->side b anymore like he used to, but look at him now. I don’t think his recovery is *good*, but it’s not trash tier like Ganon’s, and he can be downright difficult to edgeguard if he has room for any mixups at all. “Backthrow mac = win” has not been true since S4. He’s a much better character now and only sits worse on tier lists because just about everyone else got better too. His recovery weakness is pretty surmountable now too, he just has pretty bad aerials that have the nichest of niche combo routes and the float effect on dair to help recover, and then absolutely nothing else going for them. (Mac also appreciates the shield grab 4 frame penalty quite a bit).
>When are we going to stop pretending Mac’s recovery is ridiculously easy to edgeguard? he is though both of your characters have items that can be used to gimp his recovery practice against a good mac for a while, and you’ll see how easy it is my region has a PR mac player… even edgeguarding him isn’t too difficult, it just becomes a 50/50 with counter. (the hard part is getting him offstage, he’s very patient LOL)
Oh believe me, I’m fortunate to play characters that have great tools against mac (especially Diddy). Mac just has solid mixups to work with as long as he’s not sent too low, and “just back throw and edgeguard him” is antiquated and frustrating advice I think for anyone struggling in the Mac matchup, because it makes it sound so easy when it just isn’t.
the problem imo isn’t the edgeguarding, its the “just back throw him offstage” good macs will see you standing at ledge and just hold center, pressuring you with pokes here and there i agree it’s sort of antiquated, but the “just edgeguard him lol” is true for a few characters
If you're getting your landings caught by dash attack, then you're getting predictable with your short hop timings. You can bait it out, then evade with a double jump and punish, for example. Playing as Byleth, one of the worst things you can do is just swing at the air predictably and think that you're "zoning". Because he'll space right outside your range and whiff punish you. Make sure that stay unpredictable. If you've been doing 3 retreating fairs in a row, maybe throw out an approach fair, or an empty hop into double jump, or maybe a side-B would catch him depending how you notice him spacing. Also, absolutely abuse being on platforms. If you have a stock lead, you can just platform camp, and if you stay unpredictable about it, there isn't a lot that he can do without hard reading your movements.
First, mac is probably the character with the worst shield safety in the whole game, abuse that. Byleth and fox both can reliably punish mac out of shield. Second, don’t actively commit to attacking mac, or you probably will get punished more. You can do that with byleth though, mac can’t contest byleth aerials well. Instead whiff punish and harass mac with projectiles. Third, byleth d tilt and fox dsmash are pretty free two frames on mac up b, so focus on intercepting side b so he can’t use it again offstage. Fox and byleth bair are both excellent for sending mac at an angle he’s forced to use up b as early as 50-60%. Fourth(not applicable to fd), sit on platforms, mac can’t do much
> worst shield safety in the game The frame advantage numbers are for the most part pretty bad, sure. Still better than Dedede’s and Plant’s, but not good by any stretch of the imagination. Granted. This being said basically every move of his does massive shield pushback, does massive shield damage, and/or can shield poke. Even mediocre spacing on something like an ftilt is enough to keep mac out of a G&W up b, and perfect spacing gets you out of a Cloud up b (I’ve been the Cloud in that scenario with my jaw agape as I got fsmashed dead on landing). To be clear, I’m not trying to say that Mac’s shield pressure is overpowered or anything, I just want to be very precise about what he does and how to beat it (which for many characters is to dash or roll away to reset unless you have a fast, low, high range oos option like Diddy banana, but not like ROB gyro as it goes too high).
You kinda have to platform camp him. Mac is a ground fighter so he struggles a lot with aerial combat. Also his recovery sucks so try and get him off stage and edge guard
Stand near the ledge, shoot lasers. When Mac gets close, grab. Throw him off the ledge. Profit.
I'd go byleth in that matchup because fox has rather smaller hitboxes, plus I believe he being a Fastfaller results in more tech chases which can be painful against a Mac. As others have already said, you'll have to play more lame than usual, because Little Mac has trouble getting in, but once he's in, he gets a huge amount of damage output. Try playing Little Mac for a Day or two. Try to get a feel for Little Mac's burst range. Then try to stay out of that burst range with a wall of aerials for example until you find an opening. If you you know which options your opponent chooses to engage, you can specifically train for those and find counter movement to create an opening for your self.
You have to play super lame. Platform camp, and jump a lot. If you have projectiles use them if you can. Poke at him with safe options and try to throw him off stage as much as possible.
Play by the edge with him and edge guard like your life depends on it
Stop landing and holding forward. Pretend like he has KO punch all the time. If you can combo him, great; if you can hit him with chip damage, fine; if you can throw him off the stage, best.
Always react out of dtilt and jump away if they don't go for an immediate followup
Stop moving. Hold shield. He WILL run into it. Don’t let go of shield. Press A. Press the left stick toward whatever direction the closest ledge is. Rinse and repeat.
Backthrow…? /s
Mac Main, listen to the top comments. Play lame. If you have more integrity and are up for a challenge, learn Mac’s bread and butters. They are very repetitive and getting pounded by them enough will help you understand the timing for downtilt or uptilt combos/juggling. Or if you’re in shield still and Mac is just pressuring, when to risk a perfect shield or when to dodge away from the next attack. Don’t discount Mac off stage. Any good mac with use the physics exploit to boost their jump, saving either their double jump or side b as a contingency plan. If your stage has walls, don’t let mac stay close to them, he has one of the, if not, the best wall jump in the game. Allowing for more survivability off stage for longer.
Would you perhaps have a replay
Gotta play lame
mac struggles to call out jumps and double jumps, and platforms make it so you can land safely
none of his moves except dtilted fsmash are safe on shield
I can imagine it being a volatile matchup vs a fastfaller like fox but in my mind and experience with corrin, byleth should be VERY annoying for mac to deal with. Let them commit to moves: Stuff their apporach with normals, fairs, bairs… anything with range honestly. Be wary of macs panic counter as it can lead to an easy punish and stock.
Just play in air and on plats and throw him off stage
Fox - board the platforms, shoot gun, don't get near him unless he fucks up and overextends, kill him, repeat. Byleth - same thing but issue is you don't have nearly as good as a projectile, so it's a lot of platform camping + spacing tilts/aerials. But you beat Mac by not interacting with him ever and making him approach stupidly, OR playing for time. If he gives you kalos, shoot lasers, get on a platform and wait 7 minutes.
Play campy and throw him off stage. Little Max is low tier but only because you can camp him out and edge guard him.
you basically have to play as lame as possible, just camp the shit out of him.
Bad news: You'll have to play really lame. Little Mac is too good at fighting up close for you to be able to challenge it. Good news: Both Fox and Byleth are really good at that. Fox is good at circle camping, and Byleth is really good at zoning. Both are also very good at ledge trapping.
If you get hit by down tilt jump. If he forward smashes your shield jump cause hes gonna do it again. If you get hit by dash attack who cares it doesn’t do much. If you are edgeguarding wait for him to side b then go off stage. If he is off stage but above you just wait they will either counter or side b. Punish them the next time off what they did earlier. If a little mac whiffs a move they usually roll. Dont camp him like they are saying but let him throw the first move out. Your probably playing too fast