Meta Let the Battles Begin! - Cloud Matchup Thread

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

this thread shouldn't be organized as pros vs cons. who cares about establishing the ratio. that should come last. it should be organized as what to do when. way more important imo.

 

[~Skelly~]

This thread shouldn't be organized as pros vs cons. Who cares about establishing the ratio? That should come last. It should be organized as what to do and when. Way more important imo.

Gonna have to disagree with you somewhat. It's best if you know the pros and cons of your character as well as that of the other character in the MU before you decide how to deal with them, otherwise you aren't going to be using your character to their fullest in the MU.

 

[Stylo Ren]

this thread shouldn't be organized as pros vs cons. who cares about establishing the ratio. that should come last. it should be organized as what to do when. way more important imo.

If you understand the pros and cons of the matchup, unless you're incredibly daft, you should understand what to do.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

Gonna have to disagree with you somewhat. It's best if you know the pros and cons of your character as well as that of the other character in the MU before you decide how to deal with them, otherwise you aren't going to be using your character to their fullest in the MU.

pros and cons actually come FROM considering specific situations. zoning, footsies, air game, ledge, approaching, being approached, etc. those are situations. you get pros and cons about the MU in general from considering those.

If you understand the pros and cons of the matchup, unless you're incredibly daft, you should understand what to do.

this is unrealistic. in any game situation, the opponent can choose from a myriad of complex options and maneuvers. its pretty difficult to think of how to counter any option when playing because you're under pressure. the whole reason we think about MUs is to brainstorm how to counter specific options so we can draw on that knowledge in game. also refer to what i wrote above. understanding pros and cons COMES FROM considering the different sectors of gameplay

 

[Stylo Ren]

pros and cons actually come FROM considering specific situations. zoning, footsies, air game, ledge, approaching, being approached, etc. those are situations. you get pros and cons about the MU in general from considering those.



this is unrealistic. in any game situation, the opponent can choose from a myriad of complex options and maneuvers. its pretty difficult to think of how to counter any option when playing because you're under pressure. the whole reason we think about MUs is to brainstorm how to counter specific options so we can draw on that knowledge in game. also refer to what i wrote above. understanding pros and cons COMES FROM considering the different sectors of gameplay

And have you read all of the matchup discussion? I feel like we pretty handily discuss the matchups and within our discussions talk about what sections of the MU are good and bad, and why.

If you can't take that information and learn how to apply it, thats your problem. We shouldn't have to spell everything out to a tee

 

[Tobb99]

I really like the discussion here but looking at the OP it looks really good looking but it's completely empty. Maybe someone could try to fill in with some info from the discussions.

 

[GHNeko]

That would require a proactive mod lol.

 

[~Skelly~]

ros and cons actually come FROM considering specific situations. Zoning, footsies, air game, ledge, approaching, being approached, etc. Those are situations. You get pros and cons about the MU in general from considering those.

You're only half right. The INITIAL pros and cons come from looking at a character's base stats (i.e. the range and frames of moves, movement speed, etc.) first and then building off of that. If you believe that ALL of the pros and cons of characters only come to light AFTER what you just mentioned, then you are exaggerating a character's potential.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

And have you read all of the matchup discussion? I feel like we pretty handily discuss the matchups and within our discussions talk about what sections of the MU are good and bad, and why.

If you can't take that information and learn how to apply it, thats your problem. We shouldn't have to spell everything out to a tee

oh i think you misunderstand. the posts here good. quality always varies whatever. i'm talking about the original post, and its organizational structure. i don't think pros/cons are the best organizational system for MUs

 

[Stylo Ren]

oh i think you misunderstand. the posts here good. quality always varies whatever. i'm talking about the original post, and its organizational structure. i don't think pros/cons are the best organizational system for MUs

The OP has also never been updated once despite the various discussion and I think this thread, although the discussion is good, is inherently unsucessful and we should lock this and make one that will be properly managed

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

The OP has also never been updated once despite the various discussion and I think this thread, although the discussion is good, is inherently unsucessful and we should lock this and make one that will be properly managed

the second poster provided a pretty good structure i feel. i pm'd them but no reply yet

 

[Stylo Ren]

the second poster provided a pretty good structure i feel. i pm'd them but no reply yet

Thats because they left the community

 

[Zetox]

The OP has also never been updated once despite the various discussion and I think this thread, although the discussion is good, is inherently unsucessful and we should lock this and make one that will be properly managed

I second this. Although I do not contribute much(or at all so far), I learn quite some bits of info from this thread but I feel like it's ultimately not leading anywhere with a significant way of documenting and charting the MUs.

 

[GHNeko]

I'll prob make a new MU thread and Video thread once I get into contact with the mod here.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

I'll prob make a new MU thread and Video thread once I get into contact with the mod here.

if you do my vote would be a structure similar to the second post here. organizing MU's by game sectors/how the tools of the two characters interact in those sectors. its really just the most relevant way to look at it imo.

 

[GHNeko]

if you do my vote would be a structure similar to the second post here. organizing MU's by game sectors/how the tools of the two characters interact in those sectors. its really just the most relevant way to look at it imo.

Do you mean OP? Cuz 2nd post in this thread is a reserved for later post.

 

[Zetox]

Do you mean OP? Cuz 2nd post in this thread is a reserved for later post.

Yeah I believe he is talking about the OP along with the guidelines set in the 3rd post.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

Do you mean OP? Cuz 2nd post in this thread is a reserved for later post.

Yeah I believe he is talking about the OP along with the guidelines set in the 3rd post.

yeah sorry i meant the third post. not OP. i think OP structure is bad.

tools / counter-options by gameplay sector is really the most relevant MU analysis structure.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

i actually think i prefer dedicated single-character MU threads. keeps things better organized and focused, and then we can collect it later.

 

[RenoInMO]

A few other character boards look at say, 5 characters at a time, then fill the chart in with those. I think that's a good idea, and someone should get started with that. I've just recently picked up Cloud, so I'm in no position to do so, unfortunately.

 

[Xavix]

Hello! I'm somewhat late to posting this but the Megaman boards are discussing cloud up until Sunday 4/10/16, any input would be appreciated! The thread is right here.

 

[8383d3 90 90 10 hundred]

A few other character boards look at say, 5 characters at a time, then fill the chart in with those. I think that's a good idea, and someone should get started with that. I've just recently picked up Cloud, so I'm in no position to do so, unfortunately.

what ive noticed in threads like that is people spend more time talking about what MU to analyze than they spend actually analyzing MU's.

 

[Zetox]

I'll prob make a new MU thread and Video thread once I get into contact with the mod here.

Any word on an update?

 

[GHNeko]

Mod has not contacted me back on Discord. I'm trying not to bug him about it so I've only messaged him like 1-2 times since we last talked.

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

How does Cloud do against Meta-Knight?

 

[GHNeko]

MK is a huge pain in the ass who gets in easy and gimps just as easy and is small so he's technically a smaller target to hit so falling uairs and bairs are more likely to whiff, letting MK whiff punish. Even without the ladder combo.

Most people will either say 55-45 or 50-50; but I'm more of a 45-55 guy lel.

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

I'm looking to sort matchups and determine when to switch out Ike. Right now, I feel the two prominent matches to make the switch on are Diddy and Cloud. Diddy because he overall beats out Ike and Cloud because he has insurmountable advantage on Ike on Battlefield, Dream Land, and Lylat Cruise.

That being said, for matchups Ike CAN beat, but struggles against, like Jigglypuff and Little Mac, Cloud shuts them down completely. I'm looking for more matchups that Cloud can overall shutdown or outperform Ike in. Donkey Kong may be another.

I think Ike does better against characters, like Bayonetta, due to grab confirms. However, Ike also struggles with characters, like R.O.B. and sometimes even Yoshi, whom I also heard Cloud beats out.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Attention all Clouds, Rosalina is finally analyzing her match-up against Cloud Strife at her sub-forum.

http://smashboards.com/threads/435225/

Also, please be sure to read the directory thread to know the overall rules for the match-up discussions.

http://smashboards.com/threads/404194/

 

[LiL.Will]

Diddy Kong boards are discussing Cloud any amount of tips would gladly help!!!

@Emblem Lord I would love to especially hear your insight on this MU as I am a big fan of many of your articles on footsies,spacing,etc.

 

[Mattatari]

What would you say the absolute worst MUs for Cloud are? Just curious what everyone has to say.

 

[IcyWind]

What would you say the absolute worst MUs for Cloud are? Just curious what everyone has to say.

Any rush-down characters without a lot of room to punish, like fox.

Speaking of which, let's go back to that for a second. The last two tournaments I went to, I got knocked out by fox players. Both times, I tried playing super slow, putting an emphasis on charging limit and shielding everything I could. I found out quickly approaching wasn't working, and grabbing after on-shield hits didn't last for long before he started doing mixups. Whenever I got kills, it was off bair/upair, they were too fast to do limit setups on. What could I have been doing differently?

 

[Stylo Ren]

IMO Fox, MewTwo and MK are two of his worst matchups. MK gets so much on us for free and can kill us off of one mistake, while being small and fast. He can rufio us if we mess up one thing, and offstage he can do any one of his options to kill us. If you want to win that matchup, you need to stay on stage for the entirety of the match and never get grabbed or dash attacked.
Also protip, don't try to punish his forward smash on shield, MK's fsmash is frame positive on shield.
To win the MU you'll have to heavily space him out and play very safe. Once you get limit the MU becomes a bit easier, but not by much.

Fox is very difficult for Cloud to deal with, especially without limit. In limit the matchup is still bad, but more manageable as you can keep up with Fox. You'll have to play very safe and lame, and bait and punish. Abuse your safe-on-shield Usmash when you can, if you space it right most characters cant punish you. You can't really play slow against Fox, as he dictates the flow of the match. I'd say CP him to Lylat or T&C, and then play a safe aerial game. Try not to play ground game against Star Fox, because we lose that most of the time. Blade beam in neutral helps a bit as it can stuff some of foxes approaches. Fox is heavy, so juggling him will be easy once you can get him in the air. You can seal the deal by juggling him off stage, and then punishing his linear recovery. Dair beats out fire fox, and if your timing is perfect, you can fair-spike or finishing touch fox out of his side b.

MewTwo after the buffs is a monster for Cloud to deal with, easily one of his worst matchups. Mewtwo beats us handily in neutral, and his offstage game is supreme. His airdodge is the best in the game, so unless you're percise and frame perfect with punishing it, he can get out of our juggles pretty easily. The good thing about him is that he's very light, and he cannot punish Usmash on shield, if spaced perfectly. His recovery is too good for us to punish (unless you can spike the 2 frame vulnerability consistently, which is hard as ****) and fighting him offstage is almost certainly death for us.
The matchup becomes much better in limit, but Mewtwo still wins neutral and still beats a lot of our options.
One tip I can give: if he uses uncharged shadowball more than once in a row, we can punish him from across the stage. Jump over shadowball and throw out an aerial like fair or bair.

 

[Virum]

MewTwo after the buffs is a monster for Cloud to deal with, easily one of his worst matchups. Mewtwo beats us handily in neutral, and his offstage game is supreme. His airdodge is the best in the game, so unless you're percise and frame perfect with punishing it, he can get out of our juggles pretty easily. The good thing about him is that he's very light, and he cannot punish Usmash on shield, if spaced perfectly. His recovery is too good for us to punish (unless you can spike the 2 frame vulnerability consistently, which is hard as ****) and fighting him offstage is almost certainly death for us.
The matchup becomes much better in limit, but Mewtwo still wins neutral and still beats a lot of our options.
One tip I can give: if he uses uncharged shadowball more than once in a row, we can punish him from across the stage. Jump over shadowball and throw out an aerial like fair or bair.

I don't agree with this at all. As somebody who has played this match-up quite a bit against the best Mewtwo in Europe, Cloud absolutely wins this match-up. Mewtwo does not have the stronger neutral by any stretch of the imagination due to overall inferior frame data in key places coupled with a mediocre oos and anti pressure options. Cloud's speed and mobility is more than enough to keep up with Mewtwo and he becomes even faster than Mewtwo with Limit, coupled with Cloud's superior disjoint I see no way in which Cloud loses neutral in this match-up at all. Mewtwo has strong neutral options, with DTilt (always amazing and should always be kept in mind), Shadow Ball (less effective in this match-up than vs most due to Limit camping and Cloud having an ideal set of physics to get around them) and FAir being the key ones (NAir loses hard to Cloud's NAir) but Cloud's neutral is arguably one of the best in the game.

Mewtwo's airdodge is definitely fantastic, but with the area in which Cloud's UAir covers alongside it's duration it's not too hard to catch it. It doesn't even require too much precision, you can basically do it on reaction because of Mewtwo's size. Mewtwo does have various methods of landing, but aware Clouds can catch him a lot of the time. Meanwhile, Mewtwo himself has to be pristine with how he goes for his punishes and can only commit to what he knows is absolutely true, as DI away+UAir for Cloud can easily reverse the situation vs Mewtwo.

Of course Mewtwo does have areas where he thrives in the match-up. Superior offstage presence and the pressure of being able to reliably and consistently kill off of both a grab (UThrow obviously) and relatively fast and powerful normals (FAir and USmash) make his endgame rather threatening but overall this match-up is definitely in Cloud's favour if only slightly. Mewtwo cannot be slept on, but at the same time he does not in any way beat us in this MU. Again, I say this as somebody who regularly plays against what most would say is the best Mewtwo in Europe and a player who is overall quite a bit better than I am.

 

[Stylo Ren]

I don't agree with this at all. As somebody who has played this match-up quite a bit against the best Mewtwo in Europe, Cloud absolutely wins this match-up. Mewtwo does not have the stronger neutral by any stretch of the imagination due to overall inferior frame data in key places coupled with a mediocre oos and anti pressure options. Cloud's speed and mobility is more than enough to keep up with Mewtwo and he becomes even faster than Mewtwo with Limit, coupled with Cloud's superior disjoint I see no way in which Cloud loses neutral in this match-up at all. Mewtwo has strong neutral options, with DTilt (always amazing and should always be kept in mind), Shadow Ball (less effective in this match-up than vs most due to Limit camping and Cloud having an ideal set of physics to get around them) and FAir being the key ones (NAir loses hard to Cloud's NAir) but Cloud's neutral is arguably one of the best in the game.

Mewtwo's airdodge is definitely fantastic, but with the area in which Cloud's UAir covers alongside it's duration it's not too hard to catch it. It doesn't even require too much precision, you can basically do it on reaction because of Mewtwo's size. Mewtwo does have various methods of landing, but aware Clouds can catch him a lot of the time. Meanwhile, Mewtwo himself has to be pristine with how he goes for his punishes and can only commit to what he knows is absolutely true, as DI away+UAir for Cloud can easily reverse the situation vs Mewtwo.

Of course Mewtwo does have areas where he thrives in the match-up. Superior offstage presence and the pressure of being able to reliably and consistently kill off of both a grab (UThrow obviously) and relatively fast and powerful normals (FAir and USmash) make his endgame rather threatening but overall this match-up is definitely in Cloud's favour if only slightly. Mewtwo cannot be slept on, but at the same time he does not in any way beat us in this MU. Again, I say this as somebody who regularly plays against what most would say is the best Mewtwo in Europe and a player who is overall quite a bit better than I am.

Cool. I play regularly with the best Mewtwo's in the midwest, one of which I play on a bi-daily basis.
Anecdotal evidence doesnt make your argument much stronger, and the "best mewtwo in europe" doesnt mean a lot. Your mewtwo player could just be bad at the matchup. Similarly, my anecdotal evidence doesnt make my argument stronger

Any matchup that involves one loss in a neutral interaction leading to an easy death is not a good matchup by any means.

If mewtwo wins one normal interaction, he can kill cloud for free. His neutral game is great, especially at shutting down Cloud. If Cloud isnt in limit, he loses neutral. Mewtwo is faster and can punish any mistake very, very hard. Sure, we can play a heavy spacing game, but he can shut us down and out easily. Once he gains advantage, he can convert it to a kill near instantly, gimping us easily with fair or shadowball. His fair is also ridiculously strong, and can kill relatively early.

Upair is five frames less than M2's intangibility, which is frame 2. Mewtwo's airdodge. Mewtwo's 22 frame intangibility beats out our 17 frame upair. Ontop of that, we have nearly no indication of where M2 is going to be, he can escape our juggles easily. Its free for him, and he can bait out one of our options and punish. He is so mobile and floaty that without limit, its hard for Cloud to keep up and punish his airdodges consistently. This allows him to punish our aerials and get us offstage.

Also, Mewtwo thrives on punishing unsafe/bad options, and Cloud is not safe on shield with a lot of his options. Mewtwo gets a hell of a lot off of grab. His OoS options are somewhat limited, but OoS nair on an unsafe aerial is a lot of percent. Grab or dashgrab to punish a badly spaced or unsafe aerial on shield.

I really dont understand how we could possibly when a matchup where a mistake leads to losing a stock, and we can't go offstage at all unless mewtwo ****s up.


Also, even Komokiri acknowledges that the matchup isnt in our favor. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CgVVDSbUEAAA7E2.jpg:large

I disagree with a lot of his list (him saying our bad matchups other than bayo are even, I think is a bit silly, and I've already expressed my feelings on Ryu-- plus Japan doesnt really have a strong ryu)

 

[Virum]

Cool. I play regularly with the best Mewtwo's in the midwest, one of which I play on a bi-daily basis.
Anecdotal evidence doesnt make your argument much stronger, and the "best mewtwo in europe" doesnt mean a lot. Your mewtwo player could just be bad at the matchup. Similarly, my anecdotal evidence doesnt make my argument stronger

Any matchup that involves one loss in a neutral interaction leading to an easy death is not a good matchup by any means.

If mewtwo wins one normal interaction, he can kill cloud for free. His neutral game is great, especially at shutting down Cloud. If Cloud isnt in limit, he loses neutral. Mewtwo is faster and can punish any mistake very, very hard. Sure, we can play a heavy spacing game, but he can shut us down and out easily. Once he gains advantage, he can convert it to a kill near instantly, gimping us easily with fair or shadowball. His fair is also ridiculously strong, and can kill relatively early.

Upair is five frames less than M2's intangibility, which is frame 2. Mewtwo's airdodge. Mewtwo's 22 frame intangibility beats out our 17 frame upair. Ontop of that, we have nearly no indication of where M2 is going to be, he can escape our juggles easily. Its free for him, and he can bait out one of our options and punish. He is so mobile and floaty that without limit, its hard for Cloud to keep up and punish his airdodges consistently. This allows him to punish our aerials and get us offstage.

Also, Mewtwo thrives on punishing unsafe/bad options, and Cloud is not safe on shield with a lot of his options. Mewtwo gets a hell of a lot off of grab. His OoS options are somewhat limited, but OoS nair on an unsafe aerial is a lot of percent. Grab or dashgrab to punish a badly spaced or unsafe aerial on shield.

I really dont understand how we could possibly when a matchup where a mistake leads to losing a stock, and we can't go offstage at all unless mewtwo ****s up.


Also, even Komokiri acknowledges that the matchup isnt in our favor. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CgVVDSbUEAAA7E2.jpg:large

I disagree with a lot of his list (him saying our bad matchups other than bayo are even, I think is a bit silly, and I've already expressed my feelings on Ryu-- plus Japan doesnt really have a strong ryu)

The comments you've made here more suggest to me that you're playing disadvantaged state and offstage incredibly wrong more so than Cloud struggling vs Mewtwo in these instances. As strong as Mewtwo's punish game is, Cloud is not a character who should be concerned with losing his stocks that quickly vs Mewtwo. Good DI combined with opting for the correct anti pressure options once he opts for his true combo sequences can help you to reset to neutral again rather swiftly. Good aerial movement physics and fast disjointed aerial buttons allow for this despite Cloud's size and fall speed making him susceptible to combos. We're not Little Mac.

Mewtwo doesn't get nearly as much off of grabs as you're suggesting, and his grab itself is pretty awful. He gets good raw damage and positioning, as well as kills at high percent of course but he doesn't get any true follow-ups from his throws either. Cloud has more than enough moves that can safely tackle Mewtwo's shield. All 5 of his aerials can work around Mewtwo's shield grab as well as spaced FTilt due to Mewtwo's poor traction and again his poor grab. Unless he's powershielding everything Cloud can easily apply safe pressure vs him provided he's playing fundamentally solid enough.

That's not to say there aren't things to remain concerned about in the match-up, there absolutely are. But I feel your examples are misguided and exaggerated and undermine just how good of a character Cloud is.

 

[Stylo Ren]

The comments you've made here more suggest to me that you're playing disadvantaged state and offstage incredibly wrong more so than Cloud struggling vs Mewtwo in these instances. As strong as Mewtwo's punish game is, Cloud is not a character who should be concerned with losing his stocks that quickly vs Mewtwo. Good DI combined with opting for the correct anti pressure options once he opts for his true combo sequences can help you to reset to neutral again rather swiftly. Good aerial movement physics and fast disjointed aerial buttons allow for this despite Cloud's size and fall speed making him susceptible to combos. We're not Little Mac.

Mewtwo doesn't get nearly as much off of grabs as you're suggesting, and his grab itself is pretty awful. He gets good raw damage and positioning, as well as kills at high percent of course but he doesn't get any true follow-ups from his throws either. Cloud has more than enough moves that can safely tackle Mewtwo's shield. All 5 of his aerials can work around Mewtwo's shield grab as well as spaced FTilt due to Mewtwo's poor traction and again his poor grab. Unless he's powershielding everything Cloud can easily apply safe pressure vs him provided he's playing fundamentally solid enough.

That's not to say there aren't things to remain concerned about in the match-up, there absolutely are. But I feel your examples are misguided and exaggerated and undermine just how good of a character Cloud is.

If even Komokiri, one of the best Cloud's in the ****ing world can see that this is at least an even matchup, i dont know why you're so adamant to overestimate Cloud.

We arent safe on shield, and Mewtwo gets a lot off of punishing shielded options. He can respond to our disjoint with his superior mobility and bait and punish, and also get out of any of our juggles proprely and take advantage from us. All it takes for mewtwo to kill us is nair offstage. We cant respond to that when we're forced to recover. If Mewtwo plays the ledgegame properly, we lose every interaction without limit. People arent perfect robots, though.

You're falling into the trap of assuming Mewtwo is not playing perfectly, and Cloud is. Thats not how matchups are determined. You're also letting anecdotal evidence blur your judgement.

Abadango, the BEST MEWTWO IN THE WORLD was in Chicago recently, and was playing against one of Chicago's better players, who happens to play Cloud. Abadango said he finds it either even or slightly in mewtwo's favor. Im willing to say its not as bad as I said, but Cloud does not win this matchup outright

 

[Nice_FZPSC.42]

Which characters beat ? He's my toughest match up and a good cloud kicks my ass. I use and I'm looking for a 3rd and I need a solution for Cloud. I like But am open to other suggestions. I really just wanna know which characters beat or atleast go even with Cloud. Any help?

 

[Virum]

If even Komokiri, one of the best Cloud's in the ****ing world can see that this is at least an even matchup, i dont know why you're so adamant to overestimate Cloud.

We arent safe on shield, and Mewtwo gets a lot off of punishing shielded options. He can respond to our disjoint with his superior mobility and bait and punish, and also get out of any of our juggles proprely and take advantage from us. All it takes for mewtwo to kill us is nair offstage. We cant respond to that when we're forced to recover. If Mewtwo plays the ledgegame properly, we lose every interaction without limit. People arent perfect robots, though.

You're falling into the trap of assuming Mewtwo is not playing perfectly, and Cloud is. Thats not how matchups are determined. You're also letting anecdotal evidence blur your judgement.

Abadango, the BEST MEWTWO IN THE WORLD was in Chicago recently, and was playing against one of Chicago's better players, who happens to play Cloud. Abadango said he finds it either even or slightly in mewtwo's favor. Im willing to say its not as bad as I said, but Cloud does not win this matchup outright

I find it ironic how you're critcising what I'm saying for being anecdotal yet are basing what you've just said here over what top players have said (and for what it's worth your statement on Abadango contradicts the Mewtwo MU spread he made after he came back from Chicago). The foundation for my entire argument doesn't assume perfect play on either side (if it did, Little Mac would have a near perfect MU spread for example but I digress), it assumes standard high level play and awareness from both sides. For Cloud at the very least that's spacing your aerials on block with a good amount of consistency, and Mewtwo is not punishing any of them with the oos data he has.

NAir is -9/-2 on block, FAir is -8/-1, BAir is -5/+2 and UAir is -7/0. Provided you remain outside of shield grab range (which isn't hard for Cloud at all considering his range alongside Mewtwo's poor grab and low traction) Mewtwo should not be punishing you on block, and generally his punishes will come more from you whiffing something above or around him. Mewtwo's fastest oos option is his frame 9 USmash (which will only really serve to punish attacks above him), alongside frame 11 FAir, frame 12 NAir and frame 13 jab/DTilt which as you can see are a tad too slow to punish.

This is demonstrated largely in this set. No one would argue against Aba in general being the stronger player. His placings on a national level are far stronger and as you said he is arguably the best Mewtwo in the world. Ned, as solid a player as he is, doesn't have the same level of credentials but the majority of stuff he did on Mewtwo's block here wasn't punished unless Aba perfect shielded it (which isn't relevant in this argument as basically everything is punishable if perfect shielded) or it was done approaching and really poorly spaced (and even then Aba wasn't able to punish every poorly spaced move). You cannot seriously tell me that we're unsafe vs Mewtwo then have nothing to justify that point.

While this set does demonstrate the bait and punish ability of Mewtwo alongside his ability to hard punish Cloud's whiffs (which for what it's worth Cloud is also capable of doing vs Mewtwo as he's no slouch in terms of mobility or range either), it also goes against a lot of what you're attempting to argue. Most of what you're saying is hyperbolic and based on theory that doesn't necessarily apply in practice.

 

[Stylo Ren]

I can see that, but I think what I saw in the set doesnt really support your theory of mewtwo being a positive matchup for Cloud. Im definately changing my stance a bit, Im going to say this matchup is relatively even or maybe tilted slightly in Mewtwo's favor. I believe if Mewtwo is patient and plays safe in this matchup, he can win somewhat easily. As Cloud we have to force him to be a bit more aggressive and force him to play the air game more, because his grounded options are better. He can also force us to use limit rather easily and edgeguard us with incredible ease.
We definately can't sleep on mewtwo, and we don't outright beat him.

 

[Nice_FZPSC.42]

How do do against cloud?