Shanks

## Introduction

Captain of the Red Hair Pirates and a yonko, **Shanks** sails the seas doing something.

Shanks is a strong character because of his quick low endlag attacks. He finds success in never letting the opponent feel safe enough to leave block and eventually finding an opening to deal out some damage with his strong punish game.

### **Pros & Cons**

+ Fast jabs with low endlag, nearly unpunishable with lag cancelling
+ Insane pressure on block
+ Strong punish game
+ Fast R+A that's great for keeping pressure going
+ AB super is fast and has many ways to confirm it, also has a stun on the second to last hit giving Shanks stun combos
+ AA super has amazing range and some i-frames
+ Ben Beckman is a great assist that helps Shanks deliver even more pressure and better combos
+ X>A sends you into the air with a jump and an aerial, giving it options on block and on hit
+ Strong counter on his R+B that can confirm into full combo

- No projectiles besides a sword throw that goes straight down on his X aerial that can only be done while rising
- His counter has a late hit that doesn't confirm into a combo
- Terrible unblockable that is so laggy, it sometimes can't confirm into the second jab
- Lack of range on a lot of his combo starter moves can make it hard to play against characters who can keep him out

## Supports

### **Lucky Roux**

Jump support. The usual jump support only Lucky causes knockdown. Shanks can work with knockdowns but he's very niche and outclassed by Ben.

### **Ben Beckman**

Dash support. Ben has moderate speed but an amazing attack. Ben will perform a three hit combo when he attacks the opponent. The first two hits are true and the last hit usually doesn't connect and if it does, it ruins combos most of the time. Similar to Crocodile's Mr. 1, having Ben out at all times increases your neutral game success a ton. The only issue with Ben is he can be hard to work with if you don't know what you're doing or what the timings you should be doing combos with him are. This is your go to assist in all matches.

### **Yasopp**

Ranged support. Yasopp will shoot three delayed bullets. The bullets are slow and don't have great synergy with Shanks. Avoid.

## Combos

* A>A (LC), A>A (LC), Grab, X(>A, j.A>A if OTG against wall)
* A>A, L+(A>B), L+Y (Second to last hit), j.X>X, A>A>A>A

## Strategy

### **Vanilla**

Use Ben spam to your advantage. The more you have Ben out, the more you can lock down your opponent. Keep them in pressure so you starve them of meter and eventually HP. Make sure you don't do combos that would leave you unsafe since there's a lot of meter in vanilla meaning a lot of combo breaks.

### **Modded**

Shanks has a better time in the mod edition because assist spam and combo breaks aren't as common, meaning he's free to apply as much pressure as he needs. You will want to blitz the opponent before they can get anything started and so you can start snowballing with Ben and your strong supers. Once you get ahead as Shanks, you'll have an easy time staying ahead. If you can't get a strong lead, Shanks plays just fine without meter thanks to some great lag cancelling. It's possible to get ~10 hit combos consistently with no meter or support because your combo ability is just that flexible. If your opponent feels like they have a chance to leave block or punish you, you gotta pick up the pace.

## Matchups

### **General Information**

The most important thing Shanks has to do is get in. He has no projectiles and no disjoints on a lot of his moves so characters who make it hard to start your pressure game will be the biggest threat.

#### **Kuina**

Her one advantage against you is her disjoints, otherwise she has about the same game plan as you but with 500 less HP. She's melee only just like you making her an easy target to your strong counter.