Guide A Link Between Duels : SSB4 Zelda Matchup Thread: [Upd2] Diddy Kong

[JigglyZelda003]

i was going to say cloud as well since he's grown since the ban shiek patch and become very common now

 

[PGH_Chrispy]

I'm on the cloud train; might as well throw out some initial thoughts to start discussion.

I feel like Zelda has potential to push Cloud offstage and ledgeguard really effectively, if properly optimized. Tools like dtilt>dsmash/ftilt and dthrow>bair are enough to get cloud offstage, nair and neutral special can challenge his jump, and dair, nair, down special, and neutral special are all good tools to try to seal the deal. Unfortunately, Cloud kinda has stupid good aerial movement, so picking the right option is hard - committing to a special move is essentially a 50/50 shot you push a little further off stage or get put in a bad position yourself.

On stage, cloud's aerials and jab are stupid good at neutering Zelda. I honestly don't know what options to go with other than shield and try to punish most of the time. If the Cloud double jumps or you perfect shield an aerial, you could secure a punish, but otherwise don't expect to get much from the Cloud's mistakes.

An interesting note I don't think many know about - this is one of Zelda's few matchups where dthrow>up-B can consistently link and kill, limit or no. It takes some practice to get down (starts working around 90-100% from what I remember) but makes a stale dthrow>uair a non-issue.

 

[BJN39]

I feel like getting a grab with Zelda is something you can't mess up, especially in MUs where it won't be easy, and I'd say stick with NAir BnB followups for the reliable damage as long as you can. I would rather not waste a precious grab connect with a missed LK. As it is, I think LK hit angle can be a tad too high at times to lead for a ledgeguard. I'd say the same for trying to spend a grab on Dthrow -> Up B.

A big thing in this MU which can seriously influence the difficulty is whether you have a Cloud that will spar with you, or one that runs and charges limit. Cloud can run away and charge limit--Zelda's projectiles will be a very, very minor deterrent. During one of those rare cases I actually make it to a tourney, I had the displeasure of [losing] playing against a Cloud that ran away--regardless of %--and charged limit. (Spoiler alert: I lost HILARIOUSLY hard)

Then Zelda left to do the approaching.

Getting juggled is a terrible thing, and Cloud has way too many dirTy ways to put Zelda in a bad spot. Utilt/UAir with each other quickly adds damage up, Dtilt, while punishable, gives him a moving-in slap to put us in the air (Read: HELP), then his jab, quick, not short-ranged, knocks down at 0%, a quality I despise. Also, despite it likely missing or being shielded, BAir spam by Cloud is something to respect. It does kill at lower mid 100s if it lands near-ish to an edge. (Add: a check shows that though his aerials are dumb, their landing lag is bests of 14F, 15F or 18F. If he spaces in your shield, you are a potential go to punish landed aerials. ATCH NAir/BAir; those can SHAC though!)

DAir could gets its own paragraph for its obnoxious design. Powerful and fast meteor, but more blaring is the 6-year hitbox, which you can autocancel nearly the frame after the hitbox ends. It has a pretty little pop up of KB that makes getting hit by it into a potential followup for him, which is disgusTing. Well spaced and timed, it is perfectly safe on shield as we all know. The hitbox is too big to challenge with most things Zelda has, so basically shield or hope he misses? I remember claims that Ftilt or Pivot grab MIGHT work. Though they're both a little slow, and I definitely don't trust Pivot Grab to outreach his DAir. You CAN use Nayru's to parry it now, since the intangible period lasts until the hitbox is actually out now BLESS PATCHES. But I'd comment that you ARE still commiting for 60 frames. You wanna know it's been the right moment to parry DAir, otherwise it could lend him a perfectly safe landing/etc good for him things.

Something I'd note is that Cloud doesn't seem to have anything that makes him uniquely terrifying making getting up from the ledge a pain, (bar Limit. reg cross slash is kind of a heaux too, but not like Corrin Fsmash control levels of annoyance.) so I'd recommend heading for ledges to escape if he's trying to take up all of your landing space.

Returning to another thing about running and limit charging, I don't think Clouds would be necessarily optimizing the MU fully by doing this even at the very beginning. Any time when he or you both have low%, a recovery situation is slightly less of a concern. He's very solid at piling on some good starter damage. As long as he ain't stupid and charges in like a fool. If he gets Zelda up to 50-60% while having a percent lead, he can start the nasTy running and really make Zelda unhappy. After she's at high percent, Zelda is easily dispatched by a Limit Cross Slash, not because hitting her is free, but just that she's a tad light, and then every situation where he has limit and Zelda is at ~90-100% becomes scary as hex.

It only gets worse once we're at what, 120%? when Limit up B is a kill option now too, and it's got a defensive use OoS, as well as being 'I believe' quicker (check shows 3F quicker, so just a bit, BUT it can be done OoS, so keep that in mind.). I mean, it's a given at all times, but don't even think about using a point-blank option that gives him any chance to up B when Zelda's hit the high percents.

I know I say Clouds can start off with some sparring, but I'll also remind everyone that when he's got limit, it half-neuters that main quality Zelda can claim in the MU. No longer is gimping necessarily a thing when he gets one free recovery (NOTE: Not like Zeldas haven't trolled limit up Bs via 2-frame). Any time Cloud decided to hold back, get a limit, then he can go in on Zelda feeling safe that a sudden conversion in her favor has a significantly smaller chance to become a gimp KO.

----

OOP, well, I've got to get back to this, because I was gonna go into some other, more positive or useful MU notes to add as well, but...dinner calls!

I'll come back with percents when Cloud gets Finger Bang KO'd or something too.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

since we are starting would one of our sisterns like to venture out to discord to see if the girls would like to join us? I may just go and join the Facebook group and see if any of them would like to come for tea.

recently I watched Cloud use his Dair by the ledge by poking it through the floor on slanted ledges to hit Rosalind before she could grab the ledge since Dair was already out. Rosalind is generally easy to 2f so idk how effective this might be on Zelda but it's something to keep in mind on recovery if Cloud is standing by the ledge and we are coming from below.

cloud running is the big problem cause we don't really have a good option to stop it other than reading his actions and even then we may end up just chasing him to the other side of the stage as he plays hit and run and Spams limit charge.

I would like to know if Clouds hurtbox is attached to his sword or is it complete disjoint.

 

[BJN39]

I would like to know if Clouds hurtbox is attached to his sword or is it complete disjoint.

Oop I can answer this jusT now. There are no hurtboxes on the sword, and hands in general don't have their own hurtboxes (the "tube shaped" arm hurtboxes usually just extend from should to elbow and elbow to wrist) so as long as Cloud isn't holding his arm out very far during a move (see: Dash attack, where he does in fact have on if his arms pretty extended iirc) then it's a lot of disjoint.

It's why we used to say he basically invalidated sword users upon release

 

[JigglyZelda003]

Oop I can answer this jusT now. There are no hurtboxes on the sword, and hands in general don't have their own hurtboxes (the "tube shaped" arm hurtboxes usually just extend from should to elbow and elbow to wrist) so as long as Cloud isn't holding his arm out very far during a move (see: Dash attack, where he does in fact have on if his arms pretty extended iirc) then it's a lot of disjoint.

It's why we used to say he basically invalidated sword users upon release

so powershield and pray is the name of the game I suppose

 

[evmaxy54]

MU talk is pretty stagnant both here & in the discord. I for one would support if both sides came together, put whatever bad blood behind us to further press on what little of Zelda's meta she has.

I know it isn't really saying much like but there needs to be some contingency between the too sides since we both have a common goal.

 

[BJN39]

MU talk is pretty stagnant both here & in the discord. I for one would support if both sides came together, put whatever bad blood behind us to further press on what little of Zelda's meta she has.

I know it isn't really saying much like but there needs to be some contingency between the too sides since we both have a common goal.

Then if we came together would there be at least enough interested Zeldas to hold good discussions? Do yew still have a doorway in there to call them over? I realize we sorta started talking about Cloud but haven't actually confirmed that the discord knows we started.

 

[evmaxy54]

Then if we came together would there be at least enough interested Zeldas to hold good discussions? Do yew still have a doorway in there to call them over? I realize we sorta started talking about Cloud but haven't actually confirmed that the discord knows we started.

I'll see if I can get a few biting. Worth a shot IMO. Just pick a character officially & I'll start plugging

Someone on discord of using https://ssbworld.com/characters/usage/ as the basis of ordering what MUs to do

 

[KlicKlac]

I haven't posted here in a while, but I still lurk and check up on this place regularly. I hope discussion starts up again as I have nothing against posting here, but discussion kinda died for a while so I didn't have anything to post.

I'm pretty familiar with cloud now as people have started counter picking to cloud against me at my locals. Perhaps making the PR has now made me a bigger target to fall lol

Cloud can really camp zelda out. Especially on platform stages where cloud can run from platform to platform and charge limit. You basically have to give up letting Cloud charge limit completely. Sometimes I'll try to pressure with the phantom when cloud is limit camping, but it doesn't do anything except make cloud move somewhere else.

Shield is our saving grace against cloud. At close to 0 percent, zelda can mash out a bair or nayru's love if cloud tries to dthrow into cross slash. And of course at high percents, cloud gets nothing off of grab.

It sucks because cloud wants to charge limit, but you really got to let cloud approach. Otherwise you might get hit by a full hop fair or cross slash read. Watch for cloud's full hop dair and short hop rising upair autocancels when he approaches as they auto cancel and cloud can follow up with something quick like dtilt or jab.

The worst part of this MU is cloud's ability to juggle zelda. Cloud can spam short hop/ full hop fast fall upairs to cover all options, even airdodges. It's so bad that I would recommend zelda just fall towards the ledge and getup there instead of falling on stage. However, cloud is super good at keeping zelda from getting up onto the stage from the ledge too. Got to watch out for bairs if doing jump getups and of course limit cross slash is scary at the ledge. Games are often even until cloud gets zelda in the air, and then zelda racks up 50% getting back on stage.

At least cloud is the right weight and fast fall speed so he's combo bait. Dies easily to dtilt upair, dthrow upair, and dtilt fair.


This is a MU I really need to improve as I can still get beat hard by good cloud mains. I may post a vid of me getting destroyed by a cloud player in bracket to analyze, if that ever gets uploaded I think this MU is at least 60:40 in cloud's favor. One of zelda's worst MUs because of all the kill options cloud has and cloud's tremendous ability to keep zelda off the stage. Zelda cannot make one mistake when the game gets to last hit last stock.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

Well since we started Cloud lightly i figured why not just continue on into discussion since we already have some post about him, and how common he is all over the places except the irrelevant poor lol

I think this MU is at least 60:40 in cloud's favor. One of zelda's worst MUs because of all the kill options cloud has and cloud's tremendous ability to keep zelda off the stage. Zelda cannot make one mistake when the game gets to last hit last stock.

personally if Cloud is really adamant about being a run away this is looking like a -2 at best. We don't have an approach, forced to approach, and our disjoints don't matter cause Clouds hurtboxes are tucked away. Being able to gimp and kill when we play our cards right keeps it from being completely unwinnable but it's an uphill battle on game start.

I'll see if I can get a few biting. Worth a shot IMO. Just pick a character officially & I'll start plugging

Someone on discord of using https://ssbworld.com/characters/usage/ as the basis of ordering what MUs to do

this is actually really nice to follow. So I say we do another day or so on cloud and then move onto diddy and follow the list from there

 

[SM Mystic]

From my experiences with Cloud, it just takes him missing a landing to be punished. Cloud's kind of like Zelda in terms of landing ability. One false move and you get punished.

 

[PGH_Chrispy]

I haven't been able to try it out against humans too much, but I've been practicing punishing aerial approaches with up-b OOS. It only does a little bit of percent, but it's pretty safe on whiff or hit when used to retreat.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

seeing as discussion has died down I belive we should move right along.

so gorls, for those of you who haven't would you like to give a number rating for Cloud? You can just edit into the bottom of your post unless you have some last remaining comments

we will move to Diddy tomorrow

 

[JigglyZelda003]

welcome to tomorrow

moving along, what do you gurls think about Diddy now? Personally I feel he's obnoxious and all we really have is disjoints that if we play our cards right he has to respect our power but sometimes he feels like Yoshi and just does stuff and it's too fast for Zelda to react too lol

 

[TarriestMetal27]

If it's ok I would like to talk about Mewtwo. I've been going on some MU threads asking about how Mewtwo fairs against this character and how this character fairs against M2. I would really like to know about the Zelda MU since I always have problems with Zelda. I want to know why this happens and how M2 can fight this to have a biigger understanding of how Zelda plays.

Also, I feel like the Diddy Kong MU, Diddy wins 50:40 even though Nayru's Love has intangibility frames to stop some Monkey Flips and I lso feel it's easier to gimp Diddy. However, Diddy's combo game is strong on Zelda and he has a lot of approach options on her as well. Also the BANANA (god I hate that item so much) would hurt Zelda extremely. Finally, Diddy is small so lightning kicks are much harder to do against him.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

If it's ok I would like to talk about Mewtwo. I've been going on some MU threads asking about how Mewtwo fairs against this character and how this character fairs against M2. I would really like to know about the Zelda MU since I always have problems with Zelda. I want to know why this happens and how M2 can fight this to have a biigger understanding of how Zelda plays.

Mewbroke is ass to fight and I would rather go eat used cat litter

like forreal Mewtwo runs circles around Zelda and the only thing she really has going for her is he's light and floaty enough to die early if she can outplay him. But she's also light, floaty, and Slowda lol.

his tilts out reach and out speed her, he juggles her, mewtwos damage output in his chains do alot of damage so being juggleable doesnt help Zeldas survivability. Zelda tends to block alot and metwo has two Kill throws. He can't mindlessly camp her but a running Mewtwo has Zelda feeling like the fat kid playing tag around the stage.

get a lead on Zelda and watch what she does and just counter it. She doesn't have much to comeback from if your out defending her and she's forced on the aggression.

Also, I feel like the Diddy Kong MU, Diddy wins 50:40 even though Nayru's Love has intangibility frames to stop some Monkey Flips and I lso feel it's easier to gimp Diddy. However, Diddy's combo game is strong on Zelda and he has a lot of approach options on her as well. Also the BANANA (god I hate that item so much) would hurt Zelda extremely. Finally, Diddy is small so lightning kicks are much harder to do against him.

honestly Banana can be fun if you can wrestle it from Diddy since it can be an opener for her to get a follow up. Nayrus shouldn't be used on monkey flip so much as its still possible for Diddy to trade out the kick on her

 

[Rickster]

Pivot Grab, Jab, or Fsmash should be used against Monkey Flip. Grab is the most consistent (and offers good reward), Fsmash is tricky since he might go over the multihits and only be able to be hit by the last hit, Jab will probably trade, but sometimes it doesn't. It's a good option if you don't wanna commit to the other two (so basically use Jab as usual lol).

 

[JigglyZelda003]

Fsmash is tricky since he might go over the multihits and only be able to be hit by the last hit.

I mean the last hit does a nice bit of damage so its not so bad if he only gets caught by the final hit lol.

main thing i have with Diddy is the aggression and grab pressure. Like his Dtilt is so stupid and his aerials are too good so it feels like I can't hide in shield or ill be grabbed but unless I hit him before he gets too close I'm stuck trying to avoid a juggle situation lol

 

[Rickster]

(apologies for the structuring of this post. when i do MU discussion i kinda just write a bunch of notes as i think of them)

Oh yeah it's nice if it hits but it sucks when you mistime it or something and he only gets hit by one of the multihits/just barely misses the hitbox.

And yeah Diddy's neutral just kinda...walks all over us lol. I find the Phantom to be useful against banana spam though. It will also beat his Monkey Flip if you release it fast enough. Really I think this MU is all about (attempting) to wall Diddy out since once he's in, it's hard af to get away. Kinda like Falcon. Then punish their over extensions hard. Very "classic smash zelda" style of play.

On the bright side he's a good weight for combos (especially Dthrow), and has average killing power so you have a chance to rage cheese the match. His recovery can also be intercepted on the chargeup. I wanna experiment with sourspot LKs knocking his barrels off after he starts flying though. That could be useful. Remember, Dsmash is your friend in this MU.

Don't be afraid to Dair on your way down from landing. It intercepts his Uair fairly well. Nayru's is also good against him since he has Fox/Sheik syndrome where his disjoint isn't a major problem. Use that to your advantage by using Zelda's disjointed transcendedness (lol that word) to keep him away.

Zelda shouldn't be getting edgeguarded too badly either. It's getting up off the ledge that she has problems with. The only advice I can give here is to not be predictable.

His Fair is a *****. If you think you're safe at medium distance you're not. You'll be faired. If you feel confident you can trade a LK with it however, as you can with many characters. That might also discourage them from mindlessly throwing it out in the future, which is very good.

If you can actually get a hold of the banana, uhhhh....do stuff with it? Using it isn't particularly difficult imo. Or run away. I like to run away with it to tilt them because I'm terrible like that. That depends on how good you are at specials only Zelda though. If the other player knows anything about Zelda's moves at all it probably won't work.

His Dtilt is just kinda...well you can't really do anything about it. Maybe clank with our own down moves, or space an Ftilt. You reaaallly don't wanna get hit by it though. Especially at about 110% or so since that'll usually mean a stock (unless sakurai blessT you and you fall out lol). Also, do not airdodge his throws at higher %. You can just jump away instead of dying to nerfed Diddy Uair. Oh, and Zelda can sometimes fall out of Fsmash too if you're double blessT. It's pretty rare in my experience though and you might be too surprised to even punish it.

That's all I can think of for now. Sorry I haven't posted much. I'm rarely in the mood to do MU discussion tbh.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

His recovery can also be intercepted on the chargeup. I wanna experiment with sourspot LKs knocking his barrels off after he starts flying though. That could be useful. Remember, Dsmash is your friend in this MU.

if it's anything like bowser Jr we should be able to intercept it with a fub kick but I have t tried it myself.

His Fair is a *****. If you think you're safe at medium distance you're not. You'll be faired. If you feel confident you can trade a LK with it however, as you can with many characters. That might also discourage them from mindlessly throwing it out in the future, which is very good.

hmmm, how viable is that? Daddy's Fair has more reach than Marth so I normally just try to avoid it or PS it close so I can grab as most of my attempts at AAing it with like Utilt havent worked out lol.

 

[Rickster]

if it's anything like bowser Jr we should be able to intercept it with a fub kick but I have t tried it myself.





hmmm, how viable is that? Daddy's Fair has more reach than Marth so I normally just try to avoid it or PS it close so I can grab as most of my attempts at AAing it with like Utilt havent worked out lol.

Honestly

Probably not viable lol

It has been something I do out of desperation though. You pretty much have to anticipate it like...really far ahead of time so you don't get knocked out of startup. Is the fair actually disjointed? If not then it should work in theory.

 

[JigglyZelda003]

Honestly

Probably not viable lol

It has been something I do out of desperation though. You pretty much have to anticipate it like...really far ahead of time so you don't get knocked out of startup. Is the fair actually disjointed? If not then it should work in theory.

there is a video of Diddy fairing a bomb and not getting blown up and Marth does so i think it is disjointed, but I think I have traded woth it before so idk lol