Who does Cloud lose to?
There was a time not-so-long ago where the top tier was defined more clearly than usual. In no particular order, it was clear (possibly only in hindsight) that Sheik, ZSS, Bayonetta, Cloud and Rosalina were all a cut above the rest of the cast (if you follow the Japanese scene you may argue Sonic belonged in this upper echelon as well). There was a seriously underrated character who boasted near-even or perhaps even unthinkably almost positive matchups against the first three characters listed (potentially #1, #2 and #3 respectively). This character was Diddy Kong, and he was in a very good place as far as the game was concerned by being somewhat anti-meta, potentially THE answer to the top 3 characters in the game but also someone who struggled against various other top and high tier characters. Since then, the substantial nerfs to Bayonetta, Sheik and ZSS have only served to accentuate Diddy's strengths and it's no wonder people are finally giving him some of the credit he deserves, but it seems that in general those who don't play the character are overlooking some of his more difficult matchups which aside from Cloud have barely been altered via patches.
The nerfs to Sheik, ZSS and Bayonetta are somewhat of a double edged sword for Diddy Kong, as while he now has an overall better matchup spread and does better against these specific characters it also means he goes from having some sort of niche as a "counter" to the top 3 characters in the game (1.1.4) to very possibly having losing matchups to the top 3 characters in the game (1.1.6, assuming no changes other than Bayo). Diddy was only ever really a contender for best in the game when he was theorized to have a "winning" matchup against the only other obvious contender, now he's back to being a solid top tier and nothing more. The transition from 1.1.5 to 1.1.6 will likely also hurt Sonic and Megaman in a similar way, they each go from having a decent (POSSIBLY ADVANTAGEOUS) matchup with a super popular and extremely powerful character to having a decent matchup with a character that was nerfed to the ground and either dropped by many or significantly less threatening.
I think, and this may be difficult for people to come to terms with at this stage until they've actually seen it in writing a few times as it's a little foreign to Smash, but I think it's very likely that the best character in the game in version 1.1.6 will actually have more than one disadvantageous matchup, so randomly being countered by MK or Rosa isn't enough to rule anybody out at this stage. Let's have a look at some matchups.
Characters that beat Diddy - generally agreed upon to be our worst, some very optimistic players sometimes think we go even-ish against one but not the other though (personally I think Fox and Mario are much harder than Cloud, but that's an unpopular opinion):
Characters that make Diddy struggle - it wouldn't surprise me if we were disadvantaged against ALL of these guys, but they may also be a mix of evenish matchups. Results are typically not in Diddy's favour here between evenly matched opponents, although I don't know if we've seen the Fox or Luigi MUs at a high level in a long time:
Characters that force Diddy mains to actually
think instead of just pushing buttons - it wouldn't surprise me if we were disadvantaged against some or even most of these guys as well, but all these matchups seem evenish. Diddy struggles with zoning and anti-zoning characters a little more than you would expect, and characters with good edgeguarding can really make him pay (seriously, that recovery is STILL very exploitable). Characters like Pit and Toon Link might also belong here:
We can do the same for other characters, Rosa for example. I'll be less in depth about her sadly but I'm sure someone will help me fill in the blanks with regards to characters they're more familiar with.
Characters that beat Rosa:
Characters that make Rosa struggle:
Characters that force Rosa mains to actually
think instead of just pushing buttons:
"Disjoint" apparently, and probably characters that just generally do well at removing Luma and don't get edgeguarded, maybe still Pika/ZSS? Heard mixed opinions about Wario, Falcon is often claimed by both sides to be difficult, Mewtwo might actually belong in this category, does Ryu kill Rosa at 30%, Olimar? etc. How many of these MUs does Rosa actually lose, and how many are just not-free? No shade towards Rosa players, at some point you must realise that having to play a matchup slightly differently with your ultra good top tier character doesn't necessarily mean it's disadvantageous or even (see: Diddy players struggling with [random zoner]).
I think the biggest question worth asking is "Who does Cloud lose to?", but it's worth looking at all the top tier's MU spreads in this sort of manner as well. Is Sheik still a candidate for number 1? Who does Sheik lose to? Is Sonic the best character in the game, or is he hurt by the Bayo nerfs in the same was Diddy is? Does Sonic have any losing matchups at all, aside from possibly ZSS? Does Fox get wrecked by Sheik? Who else beats Fox? Is Ryu severely underrated? Does Ryu actually lose any matchups aside from Diddy/Sonic? When will people learn to edgeguard Diddy properly? How long will it be until someone suggests Pikachu is the best character in the game in 1.1.6? When the patch drops, will there be secret buffs for Jigglypuff and King Dedede? Which low-mid tier is going to be the next flavour of the month?
Edit w/ vague at best ordering:
Top:
High+:
???:
Completely unrelated to the rest of my post but I figure I should put it in writing after that ultra vague "tier list": If 1.1.6 is never released and 1.1.5 is the last version of Smash 4
ever, Ryu has nowhere to go but upwards as long as people keep putting him around that 8-12 mark. Even though he's not there yet, with the right players behind him he's going to be an absolute top threat by the end of the game's lifespan.
