[Xrd] Ramlethal vs Faust

[Sakaku]

Discuss the matchup here.

[coil]

having problems...
his pokes... its hard to keep enough space to deploy swords
his antiairs... H+ j.H its one of the best but its difficult to continue it if i throw it at a safe height...
Against a good footsies player, even without using his damaging combos, i have a lot of trouble to deal with him

[Complexity]

Played against Faust at a-cho and it was a horrendous nightmare. Even Zato and Millia were winnable at times but Faust is a completely different ball game with his f.s and j.h. Not to mention 6h completely whiffing on him crouching is also very annoying.

Help needed on fighting Faust in neutral. Feels like once he throws mini-Faust or meteors, my game is lost.

[Killey]

Yeah, I definitely think this match up is in Faust's favor during the neutral game and your oki tends to be limited since certain combos seem to not work very well against him. I usually have problems getting c.S, f.S, 6S, dash c.S, etc... to work on Faust properly after a long combo starter. Tend to have to end combos after wall splat with a 2D knockdown or c.S, 5HS reset. The only that makes this match up manageable is Ramlethal's damage out put if you can maximize it with IAD loops. I've seen Karinchu and Batako struggle in this match up greatly during the neutral game as well. 

 

The major problems with the neutral game is that he out ranges your best pokes with his far S, 2HS, and maybe 5K. The randomness of his item tosses is another problem because it can make the match inconsistent for both players. If RNG is bad and he gets a lot of food, spring boards, helium then you have more opportunities to find an entry point and apply pressure. However, if RNG is in his favor and he gets black hole, meteors, and mini-faust then the momentum instantly changes and a good Faust player is going to be on top of you and your defensive options are limited. The randomness also messes up your timing of approach or make you second guess your approach altogether. For example, you might want to counter poke after far S xx item toss and if they get something like helium or food you'll be able to push offense. If they happen to toss out a hammer you could get counter hit into a fat combo. If they toss food out you generally don't want to pick it up because Faust cannot throw another item until the food is gone. You can use that information to push offense knowing that they can't special cancel their attacks into item toss. You can also camp the food and prevent them from picking it up if they want to expedite the process and get their item tosses back.

 

You can't really stick to the air with sword deploys as your approach because he'll just 6P, or 5K to anti-air as you're falling. If not, he can use j,HS to go air-to-air with you at farther ranges. Faust can also use drill FD cancels to prolong his air time and wait out your swords at super jump height. This also means you can't throw out Toranshi without locking them down with a block string first. Based on my experiences and what I've watched of Karinchu/Batako matches you generally want to keep the swords equipped so that you have some range in your attacks otherwise you end up in too many scrambles or playing defense if the swords are out. The start up of sword deploys are too slow against Faust's run speed and far range pokes. He'll usually force you to block something at a far enough range to cancel out your swords.

[Complexity]

I'm also very used to playing Ramlethal with S sword equipped and H sword deployed, which sucks against Faust because of the aforementioned 6h whiffing and that f.s isn't as dominant as it is because of Faust's superior f.s.

A friend told me it might be better to go ham on Faust completely instead of playing footsies with him, because Ramlethal only needs one hit to potentially win while Faust needs to chuck a lot more scalpels at Ramlethal before she dies.

[g1Gilgamesh]

A friend told me it might be better to go ham on Faust completely instead of playing footsies with him, because Ramlethal only needs one hit to potentially win while Faust needs to chuck a lot more scalpels at Ramlethal before she dies.

 

I have the same feelings on the matter. Against any Faust that know what they're doing trying to play the footsie game has never really given me a stellar success rate. Neither of these characters really have good defensive options so I feel the person who gets in and stays in first tends to fare better.

[Complexity]

After labbing for a bit around Faust's f.s, I found out that pretty much anything beats it as long as your move is faster since Faust's f.s extends his hurtbox so much. What do you guys think about throwing random equipped 5h from time to time since it's active for 9 frames and will hit Faust if he tries to do a f.s as long as it is active. Of course you get smacked if you miss but you will most likely eat a scalpel if it does miss while if you hit you get a 5h CH into huge damage.

[Killey]

I don't think that's a reliable enough game plan because all it takes is for the opponent to adapt and then delay their timings or throw different normals out to beat the 5HS. The fact that you say random means it's already not a solid game plan. Feel free to try it in matches and see how it works but I think in the long run against a good player it won't be reliable enough to counter poke Faust consistently enough.

[Complexity]

It's more of playing the risk reward game with Faust and scaring him out of using f.s. CH 5h leads to corner and 200 damage while his scalpel does 40 or so. Indeed it isn't a solid game plan but based on risk reward alone, Faust needs to guess correctly 5 times while Ramlethal just needs 1 to get it all back. For sure the chance that you get that 5h CH is way lower than Faust getting his f.s, but if you do get it not only does Ramlethal get into the optimal position to destroy Faust, but Faust also just lost half his health. Once he's scared out of using f.s in neutral, the ground game becomes a lot easier and that's when Ramlethal can move on to bullying Faust with her own f.s since Faust is deprived of using his own f.s in fear that he's going to lose the round just because he presses it.

[Killey]

5HS has some pretty bad recovery though so it feels like Faust can just whiff punish with 2HS xx 236S into going my way (depending on spacing) or if he lands a CH 2HS he can cancel into his 41236K and get bigger damage.

[Destin]

Even if not with 2h, he can Definitely whiff punish with 5s. So it's not a guess, not risk reward.

[Complexity]

Even if not with 2h, he can Definitely whiff punish with 5s. So it's not a guess, not risk reward.

 

What are you talking about? It is a guess, the guess being that he will do f.s during the active frames of your 5h. There is also a very lopsided risk reward game involved, in that the chances of Ramlethal getting 5h CH being way lower than Faust getting a f.s in, but on the other hand it is also a 200 damage and potentially death in corner reward versus getting stuffed with a scalpel for 40 damage.

 

Obviously it doesn't work against people who aren't f.s happy in neutral, but the point being that if Faust doesn't use f.s in neutral, the ground game is much easier to play, and then you can start using your own f.s to beat out Faust's other pokes, which aren't as long as his f.s.

[coil]

cassius its good against his pokes and aproaches sometimes 

[Destin]

I meant it's not a guessing game for the most part for faust, because he gets a clean punish by doing nothing. It's like a sf jump really.

[GokaiRed]

I had been led to believe this matchup was close to 5/5 or at least momentum based, but I had to wonder about this matchup after playing my roommate and then going right into some online matches afterward against another rando Faust. He seems to have a good number of ways to keep Rammy guessing, or at least me anyway and that's when I noticed I was at a greater disadvantage; like someone else mentioned about going in on him it's almost as if I had a better chance when I could get into a rushdown state and sort of fluster Faust rather than trying to counter poke/whiff punish.

 

A lot of this probably speaks to my inexperience at the game as a whole though, gotta break a lot of Street Fighter habits that I've had for some years. I don't do enough basic shit that I should be doing like her 2D Dauro punish and stuff like that; her weak neutral game combined with my overall shitty GG tech allow my roommate to item mash out of a lot of shit.

[Syklone]

Weak neutral? Rammy's neutral is great my man. Sword control, J.P, and F.S are great neutral tools. Oh yeah and fireball is pretty solid too

[Complexity]

Weak neutral? Rammy's neutral is great my man. Sword control, J.P, and F.S are great neutral tools. Oh yeah and fireball is pretty solid too

 

Her neutral isn't weak, but her limited gatlings make her weak in neutral compared to other characters. It's just that players get destroyed by Ramlethal after 1 hit that in the end you don't see much of the neutral game being played out at all.

 

As for the matchup against Faust, after a couple of games I feel that it is pretty damn even, although it is more on Faust to make a fatal mistake and then get hit once into death.

[Syklone]

I agree the gatlings are shit

[GokaiRed]

You're right, I guess I should've said weak-ER neutral game. j.P IS pretty godlike with it being 4 frames, chainable as fuck and plus on block but that short range leaves a bit to be desired (can't have it both ways, right? lol). I usually play this matchup with S equipped and only the HS deployed, so my sword control is pretty limited by the cool down and start up of j.2HS and 6HS at least for now as I don't have a great concept of locking opponents down with normals in between sword swipes.

[Nyaa]

Ok, with recent patch this matchup is VERY in Fausts favor. Ram lost her neutral options while Faust... is still the same Faust. I got to play a ton of casuals today, including a ton of Faust matches. Now, the player I played against isn't the strongest (I was on a 82 winstreak against his Faust and Leo before we took a break) but I got to test out some stuff.

 

If you're in Faust fS range you can do an OS by doing 6P xx Dauro. If he throws out a fS you will lowprofile it, hit him counterhit and combo with Dauro. If he doesn't fS you just whiff a 6P which isn't catastrophical. This also beats the fishing rod, and will certainly dismay Fausts from throwing out fS all the time.

 

Lowprofiling Faust fS isn't anything new, but Ram gets very respectable damage from it and it's a great tool in an otherwise stupid matchup.

[Complexity]

You don't have to low profile Faust f.s to beat it. Any move will do as long as it hits his extended hurtbox while he's doing it.

[Syklone]

His tip does actually work though. It worked pretty well for me at least. The hurtbox isn't the problem either. His F.S outranges ours easily. So lowprofiling it is the best option we have so far. You said it isn't necessary, but you didn't propose any other options. Don't just shoot his shit down without making a valid contribution to help with the MU or the button. Seems counter productive.

[Complexity]

Alright alright let's see why 6p and f.s have both their advantages if you insist on some theorycraft.

 

Comparing Ramlethal's f.s and 6p:

 

They both have the same 9f startup.

f.s is active for 6f. 6p is active for 4f.

f.s is 18f on recovery. 6p is 22f on recovery.

f.s has no invul. 6p has upper body invul that can beat Faust f.s if it's not active by the time you do 6p.

f.s has a way better hitbox than 6p.

 

First of all, let's assume for the sake of argument that nobody in the world can react to a 10f move. In other words, if you use either 6p or f.s, you are guessing that the Faust will press f.s.

 

If you use 6p, Faust's f.s will be low profiled and it doesn't matter whether his f.s is already active, because by the frame 1 that you hit 6p, your hitbox would already have vanished. You can press 6p 9f slower than Faust presses f.s and it would still hit him.

 

Using f.s on the other hand is much riskier, because using f.s means that you don't have the luxury of an upper body invul, and hence you must press your own f.s at the same time that Faust presses his f.s, because Faust's f.s is a frame slower in terms of startup.

 

Of course, this means that Ramlethal 6p overall is a better move versus Faust f.s because it gives you a lot more chance to hit him out of it. If that's the case, when is 6p worse than f.s? Obviously, when it whiffs.

 

Now why would 6p whiff if you have a much higher chance of it hitting than if you use f.s to hit? Because you are guessing that Faust will use f.s, not reacting to Faust f.s.

 

If you use 6p and it misses, you are in greater recovery than if you use f.s. You can argue that 4f recovery difference isn't a big deal. True enough. You probably still get hit by Faust f.s if you whiff either. There's also other things to consider. For instance, you hit 6p and it whiffs, but just at the same time that your 6p loses its active frames, the Faust hits f.s. This is the part where f.s would have saved you because f.s has more active frames than 6p. Okay it's a small window difference of 2f that doesn't make a lot of difference. Fine. Faust's neutral game also doesn't revolve solely around his f.s. If he hit something else entirely other than f.s, your 6p is probably going to be inferior to your f.s in every way unless the move he pressed was 5p, and I know that because I keep getting my f.s stuffed by Faust 5p.

 

In the end, you can think about it in this way. 6p carries a lower risk and is more consistent at beating out Faust's f.s, but only if he uses f.s. Your own f.s on the other hand is much riskier at Faust's max range f.s range but get in a bit closer and it shuts down other things that 6p wouldn't have hit. I didn't even count the extra meter you get from using f.s if it hits, and you sure as hell don't want to throw out S sword in this matchup anymore in neutral because there's no point when the Faust is going to press f.s and hit both you and your sword anyway.

 

However, all this theorycraft is actually useless because at the end of the day, you are still guessing whether Faust is using f.s at the point in time that you press whatever move you use to counter it or not. This is why I proposed using 5h as an earlier example in this thread because if you are going to gamble, you might as well gamble with the greatest risk reward in your favour. 6p lowers that risk by giving you more leeway in terms of when you press it, but nevertheless it's still a gamble because you are not reacting to a 10f move. Mashing 4pppp used to be one of my favourite options against Faust in neutral, but the reward sucks and with the chaining slowed down I don't even know if it's a viable option any more.

 

Beating up fishing rods with 6p sounds good though, since you can react to it. I'll buy that.

 

Correct me on anything that I might have wrongly theorycrafted. I haven't played against much Faust since the patch dropped so I might be incorrect in some aspects.

[Nyaa]

At the range where I suggest using 6P over fS it's not possible for Faust to react. It's relatively safe to throw it out, in case Faust uses fS a lot. If he does, 6P is great, and it will make him think twice before using it again which is what we want. fS doesn't give Faust a lot in terms of damage but it gives him great space dominance which is what really hurts Ramstein.

 

Anything you do in GG is a gamble.

 

To win an unfavorable matchup you have to control your opponent. Show him you aren't afraid of his tools. Make him think you know the matchup. This will make him hesitant and this gives you the chance to get in.

[Complexity]

6p has 9f startup, 4f active and 22f recovery. That would mean that a 6p has 8+4+22=34 frames of whiff animation. Faust f.s is 10f startup, so he has 34-9=25f to punish Ramlethal for whiffing 6p.

 

Faust has 25f to see your 6p startup, go active and punish it whiffing. By the time the Faust actually notices that you whiffed your 6p, it's active frames are already over and Faust's f.s will be a clean, although weak punish. Of course, it depends on whether you think 25f is reactable to. That's the startup of an equipped 2h.

 

Some things in the game aren't gambles, but often the safer plays in a game do not reward you very highly for doing so. For instance, you can space yourself outside Faust's f.s range, wait for him to use it, see it whiff, dash in followed by dash break to your f.s range to get into a more favourable position and then react to whatever he presses next until he does something dumb and gets punished for it, but obviously nobody is going to try and do that because why do that when you can just hit him out of the f.s anyway.