Hey guys, I’m having major trouble fighting Painwheel players. They just rush down the hell out of me. I’ve tried push blocking but that only helps minimally, and they’re right back to pressuring me almost before I’ve recovered from the push block. Even when I manage to guard against their offense Painwheel remains so close to me that she can walk up and grab me almost instantly. I really need some help finding a way through this offense, or a way to negate her constant pressure. My team is Ms. Fortune(M fiber uppercut)/Valentine(Mortuary Drop)/Double(H Hornet Bomber), and I am 100% dedicated to using Ms. Fortune and Valentine and pretty much dedicated to Double as well, so anything that is character specific to these three characters would help even more. Thanks for any help guys(:
Push block and call Hornet Bomber. Problem solved.
No really, as a Painwheel main myself I know how much of a pain that is to get through.
Yeah the problem with Painwheel is that she doesn’t have to respect a lot of stuff. Auto block/armor on some most of her ground normals and even one of her air normals, the ability to fly above assists like hornet bomber and her crouch is so low that she can duck under hornet bomber also. Anti air assists like Filia’s HP Updo or Parasoul’s Napalm Pillar are more annoying for Painwheel specifically than Hornet.
If you want something immediate that works I would say just add in a character with a strong AA assist (HP Updo or Napalm Pillar) where once she gets within a certain range she’s forced to block no matter how high she is in the air or how low she is to the ground. Painwheel basically can move around every dead spot of hornet bomber with ease so you’re not going to get a ton of mileage with that against her unless the point character is doing their own work to pressure her first.
With your specific characters…I don’t really know a lot about Ms.Fortune but I know she has some solid AA attacks that you could try to keep her honest and maybe call hornet bomber during those to keep those AA’s safer.
The main issue with Valentine is that she’s a strong pressure character with really powerful normals and pressure but, when it comes to her solo options for dealing with pressure they’re not particularly awesome outside of reaction/anticipation c.HP, air throw or counter super. Once people start pressuing you you better have an invincible assist, alpha counter or meter for counter super or it’s rough times with her. She only has 2 special moves that count as physical attacks and neither are going to really help you against hard painwheel pressure. Valentine probably has the least scary special moves for the neutral of the entire cast. Which is most likely due to her having 5 super moves where the level 1 and 2 versions have great utility (but of course you need meters first).
You’ll mainly just have to use your strong normals and take it to her before she takes it to you basically. Try to get an air throw in if you can as a last minute option also. Sitting on hornet bomber works to some degree but unfortunately like I said…Painwheel can really just not give a fuck about that assist being able to fly over it, crouch under it or absorb the hits with hatred guard.
Double probably has the most immediate options for dealing with Painwheel though AFAIK they would probably just revolve around her cat head super protecting her from her shit while setting up other crap. Don’t really know enough about her in general either to really say.
**Long story short easy way to do it just get HP Updo or Napalm AAA’s on your team. **Past that…just play patient and use the hornet bomber sparingly so there’s more of a chance you can catch her in those small times that she may actually put herself in a position to get hit with the hornet bomber assist. Not a lot of Painwheel players I’ve seen have really optimized her high/low/cross up game (mainly just high then low, high then low off flight shit etc). so just keep block high first as something to remember and try to air grab if she gets predictable with the flights.
On FinestKO tournament, Cooper was able to shut down Dacidbro’s Painwheel very hard using Cerebella’s AA Command Grab, Dacid even said it himself on the stream, that people should not bandwagon on Hornet Bomber and instead adapt their assist to the situation they are facing, in this case, shut down Painwheel’s superior air dominance.
I’m guessing the super armor thing isn’t that much different from fighting Baiken in guilty gear. You just need to play the matchup in a unique way, with a lots of bait attempts, and capitalize on good damage when you nail a hit.
Preventing yourself from getting in that cornered situation is really important, so first and foremost, avoid that situation at all costs, because her pressure is way harder to deal with in the corner.
Like DJ said, napalm pillar is really good for shutting her down, or atleast making her block in the air. Also, her air moves have a good bit of startup, so you can pretty easily air throw her in a lot of situations. That will make them have to commit to quicker, less dominant moves, which can be easier to grounded anti air.
Push block in this game honestly sucks ass though. If you push block a move and she goes into flight, it just negates the push block.
Painwheel is the truth. People are gonna sleep on her and get cut. I haven’t manned up to play her yet but soon I will.
Its ok if you lose to her, she is a damn boss.
Yeah the pressure in this game reminds me a lot more of Melty Blood. The push block at best will just help you punish certain strings but it’s not the push people away shit that it is in Marvel. This was probably done on purpose so solo characters don’t get owned by pushblock all day and block strings can have more importance.
You guys have been mentioning using a good anti-air assist to counter her pressure, and i was wondering if ms. fortune’s medium fiber uppercut would work for that as an assist?