Ganon matchup trouble

[Arrogant Commander]

Having trouble with puff vs ganon. I imagine that puff has the advantage, but I always do really bad. Help?

 

[Mtank]

I can definitely understand how people can struggle with the match up, here's my advice: learn the rest setups, ganon is hella easy to rest cause hes really big, hes heavy, and he's not a floaty. My go-to setups are uptilts, falling up-airs (and regular up airs), and pound. All of these can lead to guaranteed rests that aren't terribly hard to execute. HOWEVER ganon does have one of the best rest punishes in the game, his up-tilt, but you really shouldn't let that scare you off from trying all the rests you can, cause that's the only way you'll get better at hitting them. What I do as shield pressure a lot is falling up-airs (if you catch them with it, free rest) then fall next to them and try to shield poke with an uptilt (you actually have a better chance at poking ganon from behind, and an even better chance when they are facing the left.. I think.) This gives you two opportunities for rests, with almost no risk involved.
In neutral with ganon, you have to play pretty safe, since if he reads your movement, its not hard for him to jump fair you. I usually space bairs, once one lands, just take use your frame advantage to pressure him more, or keep him where he is. Stage control is also very important. If you have center stage you shouldn't over-commit with anything, just keep him caged in that corner until he makes a bad decision trying to get out, and punish him accordingly.
Edge-guarding is very simple, yet very crucial. When hes off stage, I highly recommend chasing him with bairs/fairs. If you can get a good bair on him when hes far off stage/with no jump, that could easily be the stock. If you wait to hit him till he's near the stage, he'll probably live and get another chance, and the situation will reset giving more opportunities for you to **** up/him to find a way back on stage. All I really use for edge-guarding is bairs, fairs, f-smash (sometimes dash-attack) when I'm on stage, and an occasional dair from ledge when I'm in a bad situation. However, this is all for gimping, but if you can force him to up-b on stage, GO FOR THE REST.
Another note is that ganon's down-grab leads to a guaranteed fair or bair, depending on which DI you choose, so keep that in mind.
Hope some of this helped!

 

[Crossie]

Hungrybox said somewhere something really simple that helped me a lot with this matchup: "he has to come down some time." You can't challenge ganon in the air, his aerials have decent range and hit too hard. Wait for him to land and punish it hard. All he can do on the ground is jab. If he catches you above him, his up air beats everything you have and fair/bair kills stupidly early. Wait for him to land. Also, up tilt rest is amazing on ganon. Try throwing out up tilt after autocancelled nairs or if he ever happens to be shielding next to you. Edgeguards are super free. Make sure not to get spiked by the down-b, but other than that just throw out safe bairs, force him to recover on stage with up-b, and then either rest him or throw/bair him back off and repeat. It's a good matchup for jiggs, it's just one of those matchups where if you make a few mistakes you can quickly get destroyed.

 

[-ACE-]

This is seriously one of Ganon's hardest matchups (fox/sheik are BS tier, falcon/falco/puff are the next tier of difficulty).

Abuse your aerial mobility. Every time you run away you can watch his habits for free. Abuse bair. Watch hungrybox, as he is literally the only puff to watch for this matchup (Floridorf). Zone him. Don't fear his fair.

Utilt rest is big. Platform techchase with rest when you're under 15%, or anytime once you truly learn it. Good Ganons punish missed rests with utilt, and dair +followup at very low%.

 

[Massive]

It's been my experience that Gannondorf players spend a lot of time jumping back trying bait you into getting hit by fair. Once you realize that this is happening, it's pretty easy to avoid it.

Also, Gannondorf absolutely can't grab you if you're ducking.

 

[Xtra_Crispy]

Don't give him yoshi's, and pretty much every other stage benefits puff or is neutral. Ganon can kill you in 4 hits but none of his moves combo very easily against puff so that's 4 big wins in neutral.

Like Crossie said, great places to poke are when he lands, or is in waveland lag. Poke some upairs through platforms when you think he might try to trick you with some wavelands and just make sure to not get stomped through the platform.

If you get the lead, make him approach you. Ganon thrives on finding a spot onstage and refusing to budge by walling you out. Take that away from him and his life becomes way more difficult.

Also, be smart about your techs in this matchup. There are several situations where Ganon simply isn't fast enough to cover tech away, yet you see a lot of players teching in anyways and eating a fair/ dair for the stock. Really watch what he is doing and if he jumps in a direction early, be prepared to switch up your tech roll because of it.

 

[flmo]

You have to give ganon lots of respect, cause if you don't he's going to kill you at 50% cause his moves knock puff so far.

Like massive said, ducking is pretty good too. You can also duck most smashes or tilts that aren't angled downwards I believe, in addition to his grabs

 

[Xtra_Crispy]

When you duck, the ONLY things he has to hit you are dtilt, low angled ftilt, dair, or some prime spaced bair/ fairs. Jab, grab, max range ftilt and upair (unless he gets reverse upair but you'll be crouching and you will be able to punish it) all are neutralized.

Just don't be too predictable with WD back out of duck because that's what he will be looking to fair.