@gdsandstorm I saw you playing against wrenchd's sword and I know why you're losing to it. You clearly aren't playing the matchup very well and I'm here to help. As someone who knows the ins and outs of Sword and particularly this matchup I think I could help using this thread

You try exerting your pressure too hard(in neutral). I don't know if this is a friendlies thing with you trying to have fun but the fact you aren't really playing bait and punish/campy vs Sword hurts me physically. Sword's commitments are absolutely massive.Even gc dLight is 8f(2

meaning that you can very easily just hit him out of most things. Most of his moves are 24+f whiffs and the ones that aren't huge on endlag are big on startup, such as his spear ssig being a f12 move, later if Sword wants it to be meaty on hit and safe on spotdodge with nLight.(3

You need to bait these options out and punish them where they are slow. When I saw you getting hit by all those sword gc dLights I just thought "man Sandstorm ain't ever had to antiair in his life." You keep pressing your buttons on wrenchd's Asuri when that just won't work,(4

especially since any sort of whiff can and will lead to your stock. 2. You aren't exerting enough pressure in advantage. Although your lance strings are fine, what comes after isn't nearly what it should be for Sword. You don't have to respect Sword for the most part, its(5

options are soooo limited and seeing you fail edgeguards and ledgetraps on wrenchd hurt me physically. If the sword character is forced to use recovery, you can just go slightly above and to the side of him and just hit him with anything you want. At worst you'll trade with the(6

strong hitbox and get put onstage. If he isn't, you'll have to be Slightly more careful, but if you're fast enough you generally won't have to worry about reversals if you're smart. Vector lance dSig and sSig can be good edgeguarding tools, but using aerials will lead to(7

Asuri's stock sooner and will have a higher success rate if you know what you are doing which I would assume you do. KEEP IN MIND I'M SOME RANDOM SWORD MAIN TRYING TO GIVE TIPS TO THE BEST PLAYER IN THE WORLD, I MOSTLY WROTE THIS THREAD BECAUSE I SAW SANDSTORM SUCKS IN THIS

MATCHUP AND MOST PEOPLE IN GENERAL SUCK AT IT. I STG IF Y'ALL COME AT ME FOR TRYNA HELP I'MA STRANGLE

I ALSO KNOW I'M COMMENTING ON FRIENDLIES WHICH CAN CHANGE HOW YOU PLAY A MATCHUP, I JUST REALLY WANNA HELP PEOPLE UNDERSTAND THIS MATCHUP SO THAT SWORD PLAYERS ARE PREPARED FOR