Tips Against Ermac

Kogia

New member
I wasn't sure whether to put this in the Ermac thread or not, so feel free to move this if needed.

He's a character I've hardly touched and when me & my family fight offline none of us play as him very often, but online he seems to be quite popular and my inexperience is making fighting him a real struggle.

I fought one player today and literally if I wasn't blocking he'd get me with what I think was his Force Lift move, (unless I got lucky and got into a combo assault), the matches were me blocking his other moves and then as soon as I stopped blocking I'd get Lifted. I was amazed at how good the move seems to be and how fast he was able to get me with it. The minute I lifted my finger off block I'd be up in the air in green haze.

I mostly play as Kitana or Smoke, but also gave a go with Skarlet and Cyber Sub, help appreciated.
 
With kitana, throw fans at him. He will either jump forward (and thus you will be able to assault him with every quick attack you can) or teleport (most likely he will do this after the second fan or so). Simply defend the teleport and destroy him. Once he is on the ground, BLOCK! If he is a mediocre ermac, he will ALWAYS try to use force lift/force push in a wakeup attack. Block it and punish him. If he is a good ermac or at least a little smart, he will sometimes do a force push, rarely a force lift and will try to avoid wakeup attacks so he doesn't get punished.

Always try to maintain control of the space. NEVER jump at him midscreen unless you are absolutely sure he will not lift you. If he is throwing fireballs at you, just duck without blocking until he:

1 - Teleports
2 - Jump forward.

Also, a useful tip: if he uses an x-ray and it gets you, DON'T TRY TO DO A WAKEUP ATTACK AFTER IT! BLOCK! Many Ermacs will immediately do a force push as soon as the x-ray animation stops. If you try do anything but blocking, he will have a free 12% (I think that's the damage).

Also, you can have a HARD TIME with ermac if he uses his forward + B/Circle attack often and you are not prepared. Always block low, as ermac has very few overhead attacks. If he hits you with forward + Circle, he will mostly try to do it again OR use a grab attack, because he will think you will not see it coming. In fact, I play ermac a lot, and it is not easy to see it coming...

Basically, block a lot and maintain space. If you are playing in the PS3 and if you want to train with someone who plays ermac moderately good, talk to me. If you play a lot, you'll get the hang of it.
 
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The only advice I can give you is to get up in his face with the dash blocking. You have to read your Ermac opponent. If he likes to keep you away with the Lift or Push then Dadh block instead of jump. His recovery for both moves should allow you to get a combo outta him or whatever you choose to punish him.
 
If you're talking about your typical nooby basic ermac They like to do 3-4 things.

Zone: They spam their projectile and force push your jumps or you when you're midscreen. only naked duck them far away. About mid distance you have to start dash blocking. Because you may "duck" a projectil but you can't duck his force push. So you're forced to dash block his projectiles mid screen because you never know when a force push is coming.

Always block when you are near them and you knock them down. noobs will spam force lift wake-up. After you block the initial hit. Drop block dash in and combo.

and they grab ALOT.



A really good Ermac player or basically what I like to do.

Is I like to keep you somewhat just barely out of sweep range. I keep you scared of lift, by being very very lightly reckless with it. Once I realize you are afraid. I will dash in and pressure your block. The trick to this is.

at the end of my strings if you try to jab me out of my pressure, but I chose to cancel into lift. You will eat a big combo. If you kept blocking though I eat a big combo. High risk high reward High punishment. But if I think you're gonna keep holding block waiting for lift. I get another round of free pressure. My best mix ups are using My unblockable to scare you out of block and dash cancel it into a string. or I can Charge my unblockable and dash back away from you out of it. To avoid a poke I think that's coming. And punish your poke with a lift. If I think you're gonna be too scared to poke or drop block. I will keep charging it to full. Ermac only has good LOW mixups. He's got 1 overhead, but it's kind of easy to see coming. Just watch for ermac's feet leaving hte ground. If they leave the ground. go back to standing block.

Basically it's up to you against a good ermac what you want to call out. Is he gonna throw out a risky lift randomly after his string? or is he gonna keep pressuring? is he gonna grab?

Once he starts his pressure. He chooses when you can get out. You just have to call out the openings he gives you. The openings HAVE to come. but he can mix up where they are at.

IF you have any SPECIFIC scenario questions I'll be happy to help.

I main Ermac so I know a good deal about him.


Funny this comic should relate to you VERY well. I drew this a while back for LOLs

ragepaint.png






EDIT:

OH one more loop I forgot to mention that I never use.

If you see Ermac floating in the air. Don't ever jump. It's better to eat his ground unblockable for a little bit of damage, than to risk jumping into the air. because if he teleport punches. He's getting a 30% combo.
 
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Thanks very much to all of you for those very useful pointers.

I'm definitely not a very good fighter, I've done no training on combos at all (I've promised myself to do that this week) and I came close to beating the main Ermac in question in one round, so I don't think they were a pro, but what was frustrating was there were no whiffed moves for me to punish. My brother was watching with me and we were both amazed at how this guy seemed to know the exact moment I'd be letting go of block! The match was a lot of blocking, both of us just sitting there blocking, then right at the random moment I'd decide to try and do something, he'd throw out the lift and it would get me, it was uncanny. Clearly I was either hugely predictable with when I'd let go of block or I started to wonder if there is some way for Ermac to spam the motion for the lift but not actually do the move if in block stance?? Meaning that he was just spamming the controller motion and then just at the right motion letting go of block for the move to actually come out? Kind of like buffering the move whilst in block?

Oh and Critical-Limit, that cartoon could have been taken from my mind during the matches.
 
It's just usually possible to tell about when they are going to unblock. I can't explain the timing, but I've just learned it from experience. It's mainly because most people have about the same reaction time to know that it's safe, about a second or two, then they unblock.
 
You can cancel dashes by pressing block, and since you're having trouble getting passed his telepathy moves you're probably having trouble getting in close to hit him. Stay on the ground (since they will invariably try to grab you out of a jump) and dash-block until you can get in to pressure/punish him.
 
I find that I need to be extremely defensive against Ermac.
They will almost always either start a match with a Push or they will forward jump into a teleport.
I will not release my block at all until they throw me. All I need is one knockdown and I'm setup for the rest of the match. There is very little do Ermac can do on wakeup without being punished. Ermac craves his green combos, so I dash towards him as he is on the ground and laugh as he tries to force push my character's forearms. Then he eats a devastating corner combo. And I'll go for the occasional wake assault when I think he's too afraid to wake up special me.


at the end of my strings if you try to jab me out of my pressure, but I chose to cancel into lift. You will eat a big combo. If you kept blocking though I eat a big combo. High risk high reward High punishment. But if I think you're gonna keep holding block waiting for lift. I get another round of free pressure.


I've noticed many of them do this. I try to predict them based off of their meter.
At first I'll block no matter what just to see if they have the balls to do it. And then I act accordingly the next time.
If they have enough for the breaker, they will usually cancel into it.
 
@OP: although what Immortal says is true. Also add in that When you're "being unpredictable" Be sure you're doing it in a safe way.

don't be "unpredictable in unsafe manners" like "lol random roll after my first jab as a mileena player.

It's ok to be risky once in a while so your opponent can learn to respect that option thus giving you more options.


For instance. getting off the ground and spamming grab is probably a very unsafe bad idea. But if you use once in a while risky moves like lift on wake up. or Kung lao's spin on wake up.

You will condition your opponent to want to block your wake ups. Once you think they will try this. You can just get up and spam grab. You CONDITIONED them to put themselves in a state to be open to that.

Risky "very midly VERY midly"

Try to be a safe player.

As a great player named Isai once said. "Don't get hit" act like every hit you take will take a full life bar away from you. The sooner you play like you don't want to take any damage. The sooner you will come to playing it safe.
 
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