Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[Vyrnx]

Samus's original f-tilt allowed tech chases situations with CS in the 3DS days. Sakurai responded by nerfing Samus's f-tilt to the ground.

It never went away but the damage changes to ftilt meant there were many different windows for the tech chase and they were all less reliable than the ones at release because of the precision required. The issue was that the new 8 damage tipper hitbox was challenging to hit with at a specific percent range for the tech chases i.e. unreliable (it's only been a couple weeks but I can't believe sweetspot ftilt did 8 damage before lol). The 5/6 damage sourspots close in replaced the old reliable tech chase setup hitboxes, and they didn't set up tech chases till very late (like 180ish).

But anyway, the buffs in 1.1.5 to ftilt means that the 8 damage hitbox that was hard to hit with prepatch is now the sourspot and sets up highly reliable tech chases just like when the game was released. And it's easy to land in neutral or off of falling uair. The new 10 damage sweetspot sets up earlier tech chases as well and kills... Like actually kills at very reasonable percents, especially near the ledge. Samus has a super ftilt now, it's really very good. Also for what it's worth, like 5 of Samus' moves set up tech chases, so even when her original ftilt tech chase setup was "removed", it didn't eliminate Samus' tech chase setups.

 

[Pazzo.]

Sakurai's probably worried that hit confirms lead to imbalance of skill across players.

It's a shame, but I suppose no other fighting game can be as specially oriented and strategic as Smash.

 

[Trunks159]

Well when you kill confirm off of a grab or frame 4 or something move, its almost like you have a frame 4 smash attack (that can't really be punished). This cant really be seen as balanced when hardly any character has any.

Kill confirms are cool when they are situational though. Ex: 's ladder, 's AS >JC Upsmash, 's Rising Needles to Bouncing Fish, 's shenanigans.

Basically Sakurai and the developers hate formulaic gameplay.

 

[[BROF]]

I don't think Sakurai is even involved in balancing anymore. I recall seeing something regarding that, but don't quote me on it.
Especially regarding how "development stopped" (now obviously related to DLC and new content only) and he took a vacation from anything Smash.

Also I don't think Sakurai hates formulaic gameplay, or else the physics, hitstun formula, and various lag cancelling options would have remained through-out the series. He has the "use random smash attacks to kills in a free for all" kind of vision for Smash.
When he saw Nairo doing the ZSS ladder combo, he was surprised at how he had never seen that before. Combos, kill confirms, and other things were mostly accidental and discovered by the players, not planned by the developers.

 

[thehard]

I think it's more likely the devs knew about the ladder combos but didn't like how they were the main source of kills or how quickly they killed.

On that matter, I find it funny that people beg Nintendo to balance for top level play and then complain when they DO, as was the case with the patches following the two tournaments Sakurai attended.

 

[C0rvus]

Meh, generalizations about who's asking for what and who's complaining are pointless. All I can account for is myself.
At any given point in the meta, people were complaining about the best character. This makes sense, and it is something not unique to the Smash community, and it will not go away. That's why games that get retroactively patched tend to die sooner than those that do not.

In a game like Brawl or Super Turbo or Marvel, complaining about balance absolutely still happens. But it doesn't flood forums and Twitter and Twitch chat. At a point early in the game's life cycle, it might have (y'know, if Twitter was a thing when Marvel 2 was big). But complaining was fruitless. The game isn't changing, so put up or shut up. Yes, broken stuff was worth getting mad over or ranting about from time to time, but it's not everywhere all the time.

The big thing about Smash 4 is that we have no contact with the guys making this game. They might be looking mostly at Japanese tournaments, or listening to what people complain about, or just changing the game based on gut feeling, or a mix of all three. We don't know who is doing it. When people complain, they still have that hope that them posting what's wrong with Bayonetta will help get it fixed. Who knows, maybe it does. I wish we knew.

At least we aren't MKX. That game is a goddamn mess, balance-wise. There was a point where it was bi-weekly balance patches. Yuck.

 

[ぱみゅ]

I'm pretty sure that a lot of the Dthrow>Aerial kill combos added via patches are intended.

Oh, and the Bowser combo still works, but the window is tighter.

 

[sedrf]

https://www.twitch.tv/vgbootcamp
this weeks xanadu has around 120 members today.
Might be cool.
http://vgbootcamp.challonge.com/SAX03292016SSB4

 

[L9999]

Not this **** again.

The reason I suggested banning of Up Throw ->Thunder talk. It goes nowhere.

I think it's more likely the devs knew about the ladder combos but didn't like how they were the main source of kills or how quickly they killed.

On that matter, I find it funny that people beg Nintendo to balance for top level play and then complain when they DO, as was the case with the patches following the two tournaments Sakurai attended.

People are going to complain anyways.

 

[Das Koopa]

The spirit of Pac-Man lives on in Zage.

 

[ぱみゅ]

I still can't watch Pac-man without spending 80% of the time thinking the opponent could've avoided whatever Pac-man hit them with.

 

[my_T]

I think sakurai wants us to follow his "Throw out a smash attack and hope it hits!" mentality.

Seriously, he just doesn't like kill confirms. Maybe he wants the game to be more read based or something.

guys, believe it or not, characters have to have some kind of weakness. The way I see it is that most of the characters with ****ty neutral get rewarded a lot when they manage to win neutral or punish successfully.

example: DK, Bowser, and Ness's neutral game is kinda ass while they all have distinct weaknesses in other areas (ness recovery, DK and Bowsers abysmal disadvantage stage). Therefore they are balanced out by being strong in other areas like they're punish tools and advantage state; Ness and bowser good OoS options, DK's advantage state is very good, they all have solid kill options and a variety of moves that just kill.

On the other hand you have characters with solid neutrals, recoveries, or disadvantage states. These characters more than likely don't have that good of kill options or kill power.

Characters like Sheik (good neutral, good recovery, good disadvantage, good advantage), Sonic (good neutral, good recovery, good disadvantage state), Meta Knight (decent neutral, good recovery, good disadvantage state), Pikachu (good neutral, good recovery, good disadvantage state). There are other examples in the roster but im going to focus on these four.

Pikachu is pretty balanced IMO. Pikachu's kill options/power are kinda ass but he's pretty good in every other area.

Sheik (up to 1.1.4), MK (before elevator nerf), and Sonic (before back grab nerf) were ****ing dumb. They were far too good in too many other areas to warrant them having good/reliable kill options. Imagine ness with a good neutral and a recovery like lucas's, or DK with a good neutral, a frame 5 nair, and good ledge get-up options...wait...dont do it...you might have nightmares.

 

[juddy96]

The S@X weekly tonight is the 9th weekly of 2016 to have 100 or more entrants, the 64th tournament in 2016 overall. Pretty crazy.

 

[Das Koopa]

I'm gonna add S@X to the list

I figure if I add a high-entrant Shockwave I should do that for S@X since MD/VA is a higher tier region than DFW

also dfw will be destroyed by storms tomorrow so we gotta have something to replace it kappa

 

[Trunks159]

I don't think Sakurai is even involved in balancing anymore. I recall seeing something regarding that, but don't quote me on it.
Especially regarding how "development stopped" (now obviously related to DLC and new content only) and he took a vacation from anything Smash.

Also I don't think Sakurai hates formulaic gameplay, or else the physics, hitstun formula, and various lag cancelling options would have remained through-out the series.

I seriously remember him specifically saying he wanted to avoid formulaic gameplay in one of those articles. Doesn't want everyone remembering combos and whatnot.

 

[juddy96]

Why even add weeklies at all. Players often don't take them as seriously and it skews the results

 

[Luco]

For not liking misinformation you sure do like spreading it.
Please refer to previous posts on how this is not a kill confirm.
Do not bring up uthrow>thunder again. It is not DI reactable and many other users have gone a long way explaining why it doesn't work.
No, uthrow>RAR thunder does not work on reaction either.
Learn your frame data.

He's being semantic - that's probably why he was warned. But technically, yes he's right. Shaya's analysis concluded that in terms of raw frame data it IS a guaranteed kill combo. It's just obviously not realistic because the frame window to react to the opponent's DI is so stupidly tight that it's never actually going to work that way.

Anyway, M2K made a video saying pretty much exactly what I was saying before about threatening someone offstage in order to bait and punish their reaction. What really interests me about M2K's analysis though is ROB. I remember he was abnormally high on Thinkaman's results-based tier list a while back, and now top players are starting to recognise him. I remember there was a time when he was in the high tier guard along with Falcon and Yoshi and friends and then everyone kinda started pushing him down the roster. I don't really know who his top players are, but I wonder if he belongs in high or even top tier potentially. I was definitely surprised to learn his Uair beats Cloud's Dair clean and Dthrow --> Uair is obviously still a thing. His main issues seem to be juggle-food, large hurtbox and problematic recovery. I don't know good or bad his MU spread is either.

On a tangentally related note, I see people all the time talking about how awesome the nerfs to Sheik or MK were for their character's MU spread and how that makes them so much better, but tbh it makes every character better. Some maybe more than others (such as where his only real roadblock was removed), but for most characters you still have another gatekeeper or three to your viability so you probably didn't achieve the goal of being any more solo main viable than you were, or rather you did but at the average pace of everyone else who also got slightly more viable. tl;dr everyone has slightly better MU spreads now, you're probably not special.

 

[Das Koopa]

Why even add weeklies at all. Players often don't take them as seriously and it skews the results

I wouldn't normally but it's capped at 128 in a decent region (at least as good as France or Germany, whose nationals were placed on the list)

And idk what metric you'd use to determine "taking things seriously" especially when they consistently use their primaries. Pink Fresh switched to Dark Pit at one point but that's after he already bodied somebody game 1

 

[Mr. Johan]

Bold statement: a Ryu that doesn't bother with FA and just abuses his aerials and cross ups is top 5.

Actually no, that isnt bold. It's just true.

 

[Shaya]

He's being semantic - that's probably why he was warned. But technically, yes he's right. Shaya's analysis concluded that in terms of raw frame data it IS a guaranteed kill combo. It's just obviously not realistic because the frame window to react to the opponent's DI is so stupidly tight that it's never actually going to work that way.

More like it's a guaranteed combo if people don't DI properly.
People who've set up controllers to hold away and mash shield weren't aware that culls a character's aerial mobility during knockback.
If close to any form of non-jumping dash is required to follow DI after the throw, it shouldn't work out if the opponent reacts properly.
At least, that's what the last conclusion that was made while talking to honourable lab-pika and there has been no further clarification, it could be character dependent still, but characters with good aerial mobility are very likely immune.

So it's basically the same tier of "usability" as Up Throw Thunder was in Brawl; "baddies (including top level players) mash air dodge or an attack to momentum cancel and get cheesed". Except it was better and easier and seen significantly more often in Brawl; it doesn't just require your opponent to mess up, it also requires near frame PERFECT execution from the Pikachu.

 

[C0rvus]

Bold statement: a Ryu that doesn't bother with FA and just abuses his aerials and cross ups is top 5.

Actually no, that isnt bold. It's just true.

Why not both? FA is a useful landing tool in many matchups. Are you saying it would be better to land with a spaced cross up aerial instead?
I just don't see your point. Ryu not using one of his unique tools at all makes him better? I feel like his aerials are strong but you can't really abuse them. They either aren't safe or are just a big commitment because of Ryu's airspeed and the inherent commitment involved in jumping.

 

[[BROF]]

He's being semantic - that's probably why he was warned. But technically, yes he's right. Shaya's analysis concluded that in terms of raw frame data it IS a guaranteed kill combo. It's just obviously not realistic because the frame window to react to the opponent's DI is so stupidly tight that it's never actually going to work that way.

As far as it's known around here a "kill confirm" is truly one if it's 100% guaranteed ( Checkmate for example), or forces a 50/50 situation at least ( old setup). If you can avoid all death danger by just using DI, it's not a confirm into anything but maybe stage control. Tons of characters can do Dthrow into Uair kills, but they only work if the opponent does literally 0 DI. for example can do that. Doesn't mean that it's a kill confirm, because throws are very slow and easy to DI.

 

[Charoite]

Actually , is the only character with his Dthrow into Uair intact since release , and funnily enough the first heavyweight with one.

 

[Luco]

More like it's a guaranteed combo if people don't DI properly.
People who've set up controllers to hold away and mash shield weren't aware that culls a character's aerial mobility during knockback.
If close to any form of non-jumping dash is required to follow DI after the throw, it shouldn't work out if the opponent reacts properly.
At least, that's what the last conclusion that was made while talking to honourable lab-pika and there has been no further clarification, it could be character dependent still, but characters with good aerial mobility are very likely immune.

So it's basically the same tier of "usability" as Up Throw Thunder was in Brawl; "baddies (including top level players) mash air dodge or an attack to momentum cancel and get cheesed". Except it was better and easier and seen significantly more often in Brawl; it doesn't just require your opponent to mess up, it also requires near frame PERFECT execution from the Pikachu.

I remember you mentioning this earlier but I don't remember how tight the window needed to be. Is it viable to assume you can jump/AD out between coming out of hit-stun and getting hit by the thunder? Also I thought you could only jump/AD after hit-stun, and with Sheik at 130% the window was about 45 frames which gave this combo a 2-frame window to achieve.

Of course, blatantly unrealistic, and I know the hearts of Pika mains everywhere are shattering in two just listening to this, and it's total theory, but I thought the technicality of the statement 'it's a true combo' rang true, we just as a community need to make distinctions between 'it's a true combo' and 'hey guys this is a viable kill option that actually makes some difference to my character'.

 

[Big-Cat]

A hear a lot of people argue that Sonic is Bowser's worst match up, typically noting that Sonic exploits Bowser's lack of landing options better than anyone else in the cast and how his strings are virtually effortless to connect because Bowser is a scaly John Goodman on the battlefield. I don't play either character but it seems to make sense on paper.

Add in: And then I suddenly realized that Bayo exists in this game... Haven't seen any arguments for it but she absolutely destroys most of the other heavy weights in the game.

It's kind of hard for me to gauge Sonic as my experience is honestly laggy FG Sonics. No one plays him here. But honestly, I just keep myself grounded against him and do not pursue.

Bayo is closer to even than straight up destroy when it comes to DK and Bowser. Their big damage comes from throws which witch time has no answer to. Combos destroy them, yes, but that's everyone with Bayonetta.

 

[HFlash]

The S@X weekly tonight is the 9th weekly of 2016 to have 100 or more entrants, the 64th tournament in 2016 overall. Pretty crazy.

Are you including Versus Gaming Center there? (West Palm Beach, Florida) They regularly have 100+ people show up.

 

[Trifroze]

Considering that Sakurai didn't know about ladder combos but patches are adjusting and adding things of that nature in quite specific ways suggests the team as a whole knows what's up, every adjustment just has to get through Sakurai. Just maybe the latest one didn't thus Sheik and ZSS were finally touched?

Also can confirm Greninja MU is definitely bad for ZSS and probably her worst. Paralyzer doesn't work, sourspot dsmash doesn't work, fair doesn't work, up b doesn't work, fsmash doesn't work. Not sure about usmash, but ZSS' only realistic kill option is bair which is really hard to space against Greninja's low profile especially when the opponent knows it's your only good option. ZSS struggles vs opponents that mostly stay grounded and don't approach, and Greninja can do that with his shurikens and DA/dash grab giving him a good burst ground game. First matchup where I'm seriously considering Falcon, as for reference it was a lot easier with him. Probably at least even.

Is shadow sneak out of non-tumble hitstun intentional? I've wondered when this thing is going to get fixed.

 

[Browny]

Bold statement: a Ryu that doesn't bother with FA and just abuses his aerials and cross ups is top 5.

Actually no, that isnt bold. It's just true.

FA is the best move in the game and if other characters like bowser were given it, theyd jump up to top of high tier.

Its the ultimate landing mix-up tool and Ryu needs it.

 

[Shaya]

And this conversation has been going on for a while now, but I'm pretty sure EL was referring to TOP/HIGH TIERS with reliable kill confirm set ups.
~_~

I remember you mentioning this earlier but I don't remember how tight the window needed to be. Is it viable to assume you can jump/AD out between coming out of hit-stun and getting hit by the thunder? Also I thought you could only jump/AD after hit-stun, and with Sheik at 130% the window was about 45 frames which gave this combo a 2-frame window to achieve.

Of course, blatantly unrealistic, and I know the hearts of Pika mains everywhere are shattering in two just listening to this, and it's total theory, but I thought the technicality of the statement 'it's a true combo' rang true, we just as a community need to make distinctions between 'it's a true combo' and 'hey guys this is a viable kill option that actually makes some difference to my character'.

You can only jump/use specials after raw hit stun is over. So there is no jumping away from this.
However, assuming you don't DI, the combo is guaranteed (and quite easy).

Assuming some mathy-magic (hitstun is complicated), there could be up to 7 frames leeway at 130% (being able to air dodge from frame 45). Those 7 frames have to be filled in with dashing, b-reversing, etc.
Generally one should assume an opponent can start air dodging after frame 40 though.

At this rate though I'll have to be reexplaining every little thing, ughh #_#

Considering that Sakurai didn't know about ladder combos but patches are adjusting and adding things of that nature in quite specific ways suggests the team as a whole knows what's up, every adjustment just has to get through Sakurai. Just maybe the latest one didn't thus Sheik and ZSS were finally touched?

Also can confirm Greninja MU is definitely bad for ZSS and probably her worst. Paralyzer doesn't work, sourspot dsmash doesn't work, fair doesn't work, up b doesn't work, fsmash doesn't work. Not sure about usmash, but ZSS' only realistic kill option is bair which is really hard to space against Greninja's low profile especially when the opponent knows it's your only good option. ZSS struggles vs opponents that mostly stay grounded and don't approach, and Greninja can do that with his shurikens and DA/dash grab giving him a good burst ground game. First matchup where I'm seriously considering Falcon, as for reference it was a lot easier with him. Probably at least even.

Is shadow sneak out of non-tumble hitstun intentional? I've wondered when this thing is going to get fixed.

Difficult & annoying, but I wouldn't say our worst... although maybe I wasn't really feeling/seeing the whole idea of Greninja shadow sneaking through everything from my own experiences.
Basically it's a stale mate for both characters. We can't just rush in against him, but he can't rush in against us at all either.


He has a very hard time dealing Marth fair though, so I would probably opt for that.

 

[HFlash]

Also can confirm Greninja MU is definitely bad for ZSS and probably her worst. Paralyzer doesn't work, sourspot dsmash doesn't work, fair doesn't work, up b doesn't work, fsmash doesn't work.

Mind explaining why?

ZSS struggles vs opponents that mostly stay grounded and don't approach, and Greninja can do that with his shurikens and DA/dash grab giving him a good burst ground game.

I always thought ZSS' worst MU is Pikachu for that exact reason. Enough so, that I have used ZSS in a past tourney to counter pick shiek (after getting destroyed as Falcon) and in turn, having Pika counter picked for my ZSS. Nair and bair are alot harder to land on pika as opposed to the rest of the cast. I don't have the most ZSS experience, but Pika was always one MU I never really figured out. Was greninja/ZSS MU disadvantageous for ZSS before 1.1.5?

Off topic note: Thanks for the tip about the controller! Finally replaced my 5 year old GC controller, and can now consistently perfect pivot!

 

[juddy96]

Are you including Versus Gaming Center there? (West Palm Beach, Florida) They regularly have 100+ people show up.

I am. The weeklies that have hit 100+ this year are S@X, VSGC, and Shockwave

 

[Das Koopa]

S@X 3/29/2016 Top 16

1st: Pink Fresh ()
2nd: Remzi (, )
3rd: Zage ()
4th: Mr. Eric ()
5th: Mik ()
5th: DunnoBro (, )
7th: Seryender ( )
7th: Logic ()
9th: Zephyr ()
9th: Dexter (,)
9th: Boss ()
9th: NSM Nika ()
13th: Snow ()
13th: Techei ()
13th: AoH|Nature ()
13th: Kaboom ()

 

[FullMoon]

Considering that Sakurai didn't know about ladder combos but patches are adjusting and adding things of that nature in quite specific ways suggests the team as a whole knows what's up, every adjustment just has to get through Sakurai. Just maybe the latest one didn't thus Sheik and ZSS were finally touched?

Also can confirm Greninja MU is definitely bad for ZSS and probably her worst. Paralyzer doesn't work, sourspot dsmash doesn't work, fair doesn't work, up b doesn't work, fsmash doesn't work. Not sure about usmash, but ZSS' only realistic kill option is bair which is really hard to space against Greninja's low profile especially when the opponent knows it's your only good option. ZSS struggles vs opponents that mostly stay grounded and don't approach, and Greninja can do that with his shurikens and DA/dash grab giving him a good burst ground game. First matchup where I'm seriously considering Falcon, as for reference it was a lot easier with him. Probably at least even.

Is shadow sneak out of non-tumble hitstun intentional? I've wondered when this thing is going to get fixed.

Funny because I find Falcon a lot easier to fight than ZSS and find it to be in Greninja's favor.

And I hope you don't mean that those moves don't work because of SSHC, the only way Greninja is going to be able to use it in time to escape those moves is if the player sees those coming ahead of time (Up-B takes long enough that it can be done semi-reliably though), I can't see it being possible to do on reaction. I'm pretty sure he can't escape Paralyzer after he hits a certain percentage either.

If you fought a Greninja that could get out of all that stuff consistently like that, then I'll be legit amazed.

 

[Trifroze]

Mind explaining why?

Greninja can shadow sneak out of non-tumble hitstun and the moves I listed are all multihits where the first hit does that (or second last hit in the case of up b).

Difficult & annoying, but I wouldn't say our worst... although maybe I wasn't really feeling/seeing the whole idea of Greninja shadow sneaking through everything from my own experiences.
Basically it's a stale mate for both characters. We can't just rush in against him, but he can't rush in against us at all either.

The main thing is that while the neutral doesn't exactly favor anyone, Greninja straight up invalidates half of ZSS' tools several of which are some of her most important ones. Can't finish bnbs with up b or bait out airdodges with down b since Greninja has no reason to be scared, can't follow up on sweetspot dsmashes with fsmash or up b, can't paralyzer or sour dsmash in general, can't combo with fair and can't up b OoS either.

It's not any sort of a niche (which I originally thought it could be), from what I experienced recently Greninja can escape all of these things consistently. I guess you can bait a shadow sneak out of paralyzer or sour dsmash at least, but having to guess what he does and in which direction is still really disadvantageous. It's really silly to the point I was surprised and now can't believe such a mechanic exists.

I always thought ZSS' worst MU is Pikachu for that exact reason. Enough so, that I have used ZSS in a past tourney to counter pick shiek (after getting destroyed as Falcon) and in turn, having Pika counter picked for my ZSS. Nair and bair are alot harder to land on pika as opposed to the rest of the cast. I don't have the most ZSS experience, but Pika was always one MU I never really figured out. Was greninja/ZSS MU disadvantageous for ZSS before 1.1.5?

In addition to what I said above, Pikachu's ground game isn't on the same level as Greninja's. In fact I think Pikachu's ground game is pretty suspect at least in comparison.

Off topic note: Thanks for the tip about the controller! Finally replaced my 5 year old GC controller, and can now consistently perfect pivot!

You're welcome, I happened to figure this out when perfect pivots were discovered. Was practicing them for the first time and it was going fine, then some time later it literally became impossible till I tried a different controller.

If you fought a Greninja that could get out of all that stuff consistently like that, then I'll be legit amazed.

I don't actually know the specifics of how the SSHC mechanics work, it's just that I indeed did fight someone who did this.

 

[FullMoon]

I don't actually know the specifics of how the SSHC mechanics work, it's just that I indeed did fight someone who did this.

To be honest I don't think even Greninja mains fully understand how SSHC works. I tried labbing it once but I didn't get much out of it.

But still, wow, I wasn't expecting SSHC to be that consistent against ZSS, I'm gonna have to lab the MU later. So far I've always put the MU as even.

 

[Aaron1997]

Das Koopa Only in MD/VA that you will see Pacman ,Rob ,Duckhunt, Olimar and Jiggs get top 8 at a 120+ event.

 

[bc1910]

Trifroze You can easily react to SS out of paralyzer. Sort of turns it into a 50/50 but I hardly see that as MU-breaking. Not sure how often you hit sour Dsmash but same goes. The only move he can consistently escape on reaction to limit its use is Boost Kick (you cannot escape Fsmash on pure reaction, only in retaliation to being hit with one of its hit confirms). The hitstun cancel only works when Greninja is aerial so if you hit grounded paralyzer you still get a free grab. Fully charged paralyzer cannot be cancelled after mid percents (though he won't be getting hit by it much).

Greninja is hard for ZSS to kill and while I could be persuaded it's very slightly in his favour because his ground game is superior, I'm not sold. She's still laddering him on Battlefield, she's still comboing him to death with Flip Kick and she's still getting T&C game 1. I find it unlikely that he'd be her worst MU.

Again I don't know which Greninjas you're fighting but Falcon should be easier to fight than ZSS (though not necessarily in Gren's favour either).

Outside your mains, if you want to CP Greninja with a pocket your best bet is Sonic. Marth Fair is annoying but he doesn't have the advantage state to make the frog scared. MU's even but I think you need to be well-versed with Marth. If he had a better way to set up tipper Fsmash he would win, though that's probably true for many of his MUs.

 

[Trifroze]

Fsmash is frame 13, but ZSS never throws out raw fsmashes and instead it's always a hit confirm from either paralyzer or dsmash. Now that hit confirm is gone along with up b. Stray paralyzer into up b is a really good option for ZSS, but vs Greninja that's double out.

The only things you have left from dsmash are bair and flip kick, the former being unreliable and the latter being considerably weaker unless hit on the ground where it's stronger (which you can't do from dsmash) or near the ledge with the meteor hitbox. As for forward air, it functions as a follow up move from nair, dthrow and sometimes uair, so that's not an option either.

Up b OoS and spotdodge into up b both seem heavily underused by ZSS players and I don't know why, maybe they aren't confident in what they can and can't punish? Obviously those options are out which I think is a huge thing.

If the Greninja knows the matchup and thus understands ZSS' options and follow ups, SSHC seems like a much bigger deal than people give credit for. Even if only up b was affected I'd say this now.

 

[Shaya]

But are you guaranteed to be hit on these follow ups ?
The amount of time one has to punish him whiffing is also somewhat considerable, is it not?

 

[bc1910]

You can't vaguely write off Dsmash to Bair as unreliable. I don't see why it would be. You have ample time to follow up. It won't kill from centre-stage until kinda late but I don't see a real weakness with that setup.

You can get a guaranteed punish on SSHC out of Fair by fast falling and using a tilt. You can sometimes Uair him before you land as well.

A read SSHC can always be punished with a grab, which leads into death much of the time anyway.

A guaranteed break (and punish) on Boost Kick OoS/Spotdodge is nice, no doubt. But any character can DI out of grounded Boost Kick if they read ZSS' movement accordingly, and sometimes they just pop out. It's like, okay, Greninja can do something 100% of the time, but it happens vs other characters 33-50% of the time anyway and it hasn't really held her back.

I honestly don't mean to patronize but it sounds like you got janked by the SSHC a few times and are now venting about it. I really don't think it breaks the MU as badly as you think. ZSS is one of Greninja's best top tier MUs and always has been, but I would be shocked if he did better than Pikachu or Bayonetta. He probably does better than Sheik though (I think this is true of quite a few MUs now).

I will concede that you aren't the first ZSS main to say that Greninja is her worst MU. One particular ZSS main, and an experienced user at that, came into our MU thread saying the same thing.