How to approach the Cloud match-up as Greninja

[Rubiss]

I understand that the meta with Cloud is pretty young right now but he is pretty dominate online. You run into Clouds all the time and they are all, mostly, quite good.

Here is what I noticed about the match-up as Greninja.

1. Cloud is very hard to approach and punish in the air. All of his aerials, save for his dair comes out before ours. His attacks cover him well making them quite safe for him. His dair should not be challenged by uair or up smash at all. From what I've been reading, apparently, his dair's hitbox is not just the sword, but his entire body. His fair and dair both spike. All of his aerials auto cancel. His fair is not safe on shield (but be warned, if you're not quick on the punish, his dtilt can avoid a lot of attacks and is quite fast
   
2. Cloud is pretty easy to gimp. His recovery is predictable, however it is not an easy gimp. His aerials have immense priority over Greninja's. In all of my edge guarding attempts, I've only able to get him with bairs against the side of the stage on his way up. This could just be me being bad though, but based on his frame data and range, as well as a spiking fair, one should be careful when trying to gimp Cloud.
3. Cloud can't really approach on the ground. From what I've noticed, he likes to jump around a lot, since he excels in the air. However, nothing he actually does in the air, from what I can tell, is safe on shield. Blade Beam is always canceled by a shuriken.
   
4. Cloud's grab game has no followups. It's just there to rack up damage and get you off-stage. There is nothing to really fear here.
5. Cloud likes to charge his limit break. Cloud is very hard to deal with if you play defensively. A smart Cloud will just take the time you spend spacing and zoning to charge his limit break. While the move does have diminishing returns in terms of charge speed, you will probably see it at least 2-3 on a two stock match. The idea is to get him off-stage asap and have him waste it. However, his down-b is overpowered and should be feared. Kills most characters at around 50-60% easily without rage. I notice that most Clouds try and use Blade Beam or Cross-slash. (Do note that you can SSHC (http://smashboards.com/threads/shadow-sneak-hitstun-cancellable-moves.426941/) out of Cross-slash's final hit, avoiding the knockback. This is not possible with the limit-break version.
   
6. Cloud likes to space. His sword has no restrictions. Anywhere his blade hits you does the same damage as anywhere else. I find using shurikens usually forces him to close the gap (which he is not very good at.)
7. Cloud's down smash can whiff. During the second hit, it is possible to DI out of his smash completely. I did it twice by accident and actually have no idea how to do it, nor what the timing is. I just know it is possible.
8. Respect dtilt, uair and dair. Seriously.

That's pretty much what I've noticed from facing Cloud's on For Glory. He is very easy to pick up and play. His aerials are very good, he has range, he is strong, fast and his limit break is rather scary. However he is pretty easy to gimp, in theory. I think the way to approach Cloud is to be defensive. You may give him more limit breaks, but it'll mean nothing if he can't use it. Rushing in against Cloud is not wise. He excels at spacing, does a lot of damage and can kill pretty early.

If anyone else notices anything and wants to share, by all means. I would have posted this in the match-up thread, but Cloud is not the current topic of discussion and I feel like he is a problem right now.

 

[elusiveTranscendent]

We already have a match up thread:

http://smashboards.com/threads/mast...read-s3-week-6-yoshi-bowser-12-28-1-4.369356/

Though we may not be discussing Cloud at the moment, please put your write up there instead of creating unnecessary threads.

 

[Rubiss]

We already have a match up thread:

http://smashboards.com/threads/mast...read-s3-week-6-yoshi-bowser-12-28-1-4.369356/

Though we may not be discussing Cloud at the moment, please put your write up there instead of creating unnecessary threads.

I was hoping to discuss Cloud sooner rather than later. Furthermore the matchup thread itself said that posts that discuss matchups that are not part of the week's rotation are considered to be spam. So I think I will keep my write up here unless told otherwise by a moderator.

During these weeks, the topic at hand is the only one which may be discussed. Off-topic discussion or nonsense discussion (such as discussing MUs outside the rotation ) will be treated as spam. This is being done to jumpstart the MU metagame of Greninja; we're working towards trying to find his place within the roster and this is the first step towards it.​

 

[Snasen]

Cant you just use up b to Edge guard/gimp him?

 

[Rubiss]

You should be able to. I do admit, I am trying to improve with it but I am still not very good.

 

[HakuryuVision]

I managed to hydro-gimp a lot of Clouds online, but that was around the time of his release. (meaning that's when everyone was rather new to using Cloud)

Overall, i find it difficult to apporach Cloud as Greninja.
Most of his attacks outranged me, and i had to (sometimes overly-)rely on shurikens a lot.
That pesky u-air + u-tilt of Cloud also made me avoid trying to approach him from above most of the time.
(-i do have to admit i'm not the best at using Greninja though)

 

[Gunla]

Cloud will eventually be done (probably the next session in the MU discussion); it's been about a month since his release and I know people are chomping at the bit to do him. I've wanted to wait a while to prevent early impressions from affecting the results as they could be inconclusive.

We do have a matchup thread, as well (it was linked by Elusive earlier in the thread). When Cloud is done, he'll be done there.

This thread will be locked.