Project V/Marie



Marie (Skullgirls) "I will wipe all horrors from this world, starting with you."

Marie is one of the fifteen selectable fighters in Project V, representing the Skullgirls franchise. She had been selected due to her wide variety of attacks and the different ways she can pull off a battle, and her countless amount of "cheap shots" that would make her fun to play. In Skullgirls she was the current "Skullgirl" and resided as the final boss for most characters in the game. With her arsenal of attacks, she can rush down her opponents, summon skeletons to distract foes, or send out a shadow to aid her in combat. She takes attacks from all three of her phases. While not the greatest with combos, she can cause lots of individual damage against inexperienced players. In competitive play, she can wall opponents and zone them out.

As Project V is unreleased, the competitive scene is dependant on the game's demos for the moment. Marie has been predicted to be 12th on the tier list; while she has great range and an ability to wall out foes like Greedy, Little Mac and K. Rool, she has predictable attacks and it's very easy to tell what she'll do next because none of her attacks are exactly identical. Because of her slow speed, she struggles against the agile Poison and the heavy, brutal Pirate Man, and her projectiles are easy to reflect and dispose of. On top of that, she has a high learning curve because of how precise her attacks need to be in order to be effective. Once the player has a hang on her though, she can stand a chance against any foe in the game.

Attributes
Marie is a lightweight fighter with very strong attacks, which can push opponents away with their high knockback. While Marie suffers from her slowness, her attacks can be dished out fast and without much effort. Her projectiles can easily pressure opponents and force them to stay away from her. Marie has very slow walking speed, below average dashing speed, slow falling speed, average air speed, and high jumps. While this renders her ineffective as far as being mobile goes, she has some of the best recovery in the game thanks to her slow falling speed and high jumps, which often make using her recovery move rather redundant. Marie has a large arsenal of attacks, from her Mass of Skulls to her Shadow attack, and from her Skull Array to her ability to grapple opponents with skeletons from underground. Marie's most useful ability is to zone out opponents and guard her body from attacks.

Marie suffers, however, from moderate to high landing lag on several of her attacks and her high learning curve, which results in her being difficult to use and an unpopular choice in the Project V metagame. As she is a lightweight and her speed is abysmal, she is also easy to take a stock off of, especially when Poison or Ganondorf are fighting her specifically. However, she is very rewarding when used correctly, as her attacks are hard to pull off with perfection but result in impressive KOs when done correctly. As a bonus, she can also KO really early if her attacks are aimed properly. Her recovery is also very good thanks to her big jumps and her impressive up special, and with the proper directional input after being threatened with stock loss, she can survive matches for a long time.

Moveset
Marie has both close combat and long range strategies, which she can switch around constantly without issue for an effective zoning game. Punishing opponents is something Marie can do well thanks to her potential to KO early. A lot of her attacks can reach out a far distance, including her smash attacks, giving her some of the best range in the game. When using a lot of her attacks, she has "armor" that prevents her from instantly flinching. Her grab can also reach a long distance on the ground, making it one of the better grabs of the game if Marie can properly land it. Her gameplay is about zoning out opponents and walling them out, and trying to avoid being punished whenever possible.
 * Neutral Special: Skull Array.  Marie will sent out an array of skulls that don't move in any particular direction other than going forward in front of her.  They often move in a way as to home in on the player or projectiles, although these can easily be destroyed with attacks or simply ignored with moves that use super armor.  When this attack is charged, all of these skulls will directly home in on the player and any projectiles, and they will each have super armor, making it difficult to dodge them appropriately.  All of these skulls can be reflected, although they won't damage Marie.
 * Forward Special: Scythe Slash.  Depending on if most of her opponents are on a horizontal or diagonal angle, she will go out quickly with her scythe.  She is rendered helpless after using the attack, but it can be used to end a game or shoot opponents high up, or simply give her a place to run.  If she goes diagonally up, she can cause good damage and knockback, same for going horizontally forward or backwards.  If she goes diagonally down, however, she can meteor smash.  Charging the attack won't render her helpless and will do more damage than before.
 * Recovery Special: Shadow Rise.  Marie will create a shadow to launch herself upwards with that attacks opponents that were just at where she was last standing before using the move.  After moving up, Marie can choose to burst left or right to make it back onto the battlefield.  After doing the burst, she will be rendered helpless.  She will not be able to sweetspot ledges, and her initial rise isn't very high.  If this attack is charged, she loses the ability to burst, but gets the ability to instead freefloat for as long as ten seconds after her stronger shadow strikes out at her opponents.
 * Crouch Special: Skeleton Guard. Marie summons a skeleton in front of her, which explodes on contact with the player.  This can be used to space her out or pressure foes.  If the skeleton does not get touched, it will automatically explode after a short period of time, damaging Marie unless she shields it just in time.

In competitive play
Due to time constraints, this is incomplete.