Pikachu vs Cloud Matchup Information Needed

[NinjaPotato]

So I got cloud a few days back and his attacks have a lot of knockback (which may be bad for pika). I've been doing some testing on FD and Cloud's Fsmash can kill pika on the edge at around 50 percent depending on spacing (Cloud has a sweetspot on his Fsmash maybe? Idk). And obviously we can get Cloud on his recovery but is there anything else people have found out?

 

[Emuchu]

Can't say much this early after release, but Cloud appears to have the same problem Ike does: He can't land on Pika with his aerials. Only Nair and Bair autocancel out of a short hop, and they have to input early, making it quite vulnerable to OoS Nair and Utilt. The next question would be, "how well can Cloud wall Pika out?" Cloud's Utilt is pretty quick, and he can get two Nairs / Bairs / Uairs out of a full hop when playing defensively,but I haven't fought a good one, yet, so thus far I can still Quick Attack all over him. It's also tough to gauge the efficacy of Limit Break, since most Clouds inadvertently waste them this early, especially considering how good Pika is at getting people off the stage. Cloud is scary-strong, but no one plays him well, yet, so all I have to go on is comparisons to Ike and Shulk.

 

[Thor]

Too early to tell, but one piece of advice: be EXTREMELY wary of Cloud's fullhop dair. You can't duck it if they space vertically correctly [Puff, Kirby, and GnW can't duck it], and FH AC dair -> Finishing Touch is a true combo on Sheik from 50%-120% according to the training mode meter, and kills in that range. If you see a Cloud fullhop dairing all over the place in Limit Break mode, shield or avoid it entirely, but do NOT contest the dair unless you like dying at 50.

 

[TheGoodGuava]

Too early to tell, but one piece of advice: be EXTREMELY wary of Cloud's fullhop dair. You can't duck it if they space vertically correctly [Puff, Kirby, and GnW can't duck it], and FH AC dair -> Finishing Touch is a true combo on Sheik from 50%-120% according to the training mode meter, and kills in that range. If you see a Cloud fullhop dairing all over the place in Limit Break mode, shield or avoid it entirely, but do NOT contest the dair unless you like dying at 50.

Don't try and contest it even without limit break, you can combo literally anything off of it including a spike.

 

[Pikabunz]

Anyone want to play my Cloud on wifi to see what the mu is like?

 

[Thor]

Anyone want to play my Cloud on wifi to see what the mu is like?

I could try if you want, thought I don't know how big the skill gap would be [that is, if you're way better than me, it's not gonna be very enlightening for either of us lol].

I could also play Cloud and face off against your Pikachu. We could use nametags to indicate who is who.

What times would work for you? My NNID *should* be ThorTB3, Mii name Thor [haven't played online since August but I can double check that soon].

 

[Pikabunz]

I can play anytime. We can even play now if you want.

 

[Thor]

I can play anytime. We can even play now if you want.

I'm eating dinner soon, but does 8pm central standard time work for you tonight? [For me it's 7:20 right now, so in 40 minutes or so.]

 

[Pikabunz]

That sounds fine to me. I'll have a room up at 8.

 

[Thor]

After playing several rounds as both characters, my biggest takeaway from this is that Cloud has a much easier time killing Pikachu than Pikachu does Cloud. In about an hour and a half, I won a single game as Pikachu and none as Cloud. However, I got 3-stocked several times as Pikachu, but only 2 or 3 times as Cloud, and those almost all involved SDs. Some other notes:

- I got 2 fair spikes, but Pikabunz got multiple offstage limit cross-slashes. Neither of us really landed any dair spikes that killed. So being careful offstage as Pikachu is important – Cloud hits hard if he reads what you are doing.

- Both of us whiffing easy OoS punishes [many Cloud dtilts had the punish powershielded, and sometimes Cloud’s fsmash had the dash grab punish whiffed] was a reminder that lag was making both of us worse [although the input delay was not awful, it was there]. I also got hit by several blade beams in part due to this [and it likely was why some of the SDs occurred].

- I got one shield break via Cloud’s cross-slash, but it’s likely not reliable. It seems to do about half a shield’s worth of shield damage, but can be punished on block [the super one is hard to punish on block].

- I did not land any FH AC dair -> finishing touch, but punishing it didn’t seem too easy for Pikabunz [lag, actual safety, or something else?]. Pikabunz hit me with a few non-lethal finishing touches, but neither of us got killed by the move once.

- Pikabunz gimped me only a few times, and I didn’t gimp him at all really, but that suggests that as MU knowledge increases, Cloud will become more and more gimpable. One effective setup was jabbing ledge -> runoff bair that he did – Cloud fell out of the bair and died, but Pikachu can make it back easily.

- Climhazzard is a somewhat risky but effective combo-breaker, especially if Cloud loses his jump [you can reset the situation with it at least].

- Our Clouds were definitely a little different – I went for more cross-slash, but Pikabunz was a lot better with nair.

- I need to use fair more as Pikachu… I could tell playing as Cloud that I wasn’t using fair correctly on the other side of the MU [it was extremely useful for Pikabunz, netting several grabs and extending combos more than I was as Pikachu]. I also need to get better at intercepting Pikachu’s Quick Attack - mine was intercepted several times, but outside of the one fair on startup, I rarely intercepted the move.

If I had to guess, I'd say Pikachu wins the MU, mainly because he can gimp Cloud, but at this point in time, the MU doesn't seem horribly lop-sided [although Pikabunz may think otherwise].

Pikabunz I had a lot of fun and if you wouldn't mind playing more in the future, it's great practice for me at least. I definitely have some bad habits to kick [fsmash is almost safe as Pikachu, but definitely not Cloud], but I enjoyed our games [and I'll play either side of the MU or just general friendlies]. I understand if you'd rather not though...

P.S: Although we each had several cool moments [including Pikabunz getting a zero-to-death where he combo'd me offstage and finished with offstage thunder], I didn't save as replays any of our games.

 

[Pikabunz]

We could play again anytime. Even though I won almost every match, it was still fun and I was learning a lot about the match-up. You played Cloud much better than all the for glory players I've played.

I'd say that Pikachu wins the match-up but only slightly because of Cloud's bad recovery. Cloud can keep Pikachu out with his range fairly well. He just needs to space his nairs and never approach without limit. You can sh ff nair with him and still be safe if spaced correctly. Once Cloud gets his limit he becomes very scary. He can punish your jolt camping with blade beam, so be careful with how you use your jolts. Doing uthrow to thunder on Cloud can be very risky, because if you miss, he can hit you with finishing touch during your lag which will kill at like 30%, maybe even earlier. Cross-slash is his most dangerous limit just for how fast, strong, and safe it is. If you hit his shield with any of your smashes, he can punish with cross-slash which can end your stock.

As Pikachu, you need to be aggressive while his limit is down. Never give him time to charge it and be careful when approaching him while he's charging it. He can cancel it anytime and throw out an attack immediately. When he has his limit, do your best to get him off stage and make him waste it on his upb. Don't use QA too much on stage as it's easily beaten by nair. If he ever gets you in the air, don't air dodge. Always jump out to avoid getting hit by uairs and nairs.

 

[NinjaPotato]

Any suggestions for approach options as pika?

 

[Coro_]

Here's my two cents on the matchup after playing lots on both sides:

- Cloud has a ton of lingering hitboxes so yes, QA is risky, particularly due to how hard he hits
- Safe distance for stalling him with jolt is pretty far for Cloud, since his dash is so fast; if you can do it though, he might be susceptible to it due to Blade Beam not being a particularly good projectile (they cancel each other out if they hit)
- Cloud may not have as long a sword as Shulk, but Cross Slash reaches really far, so for goodness sake be careful with your pokes. Cross Slash is also safe if they don't do the whole move on shield. I think not even fadeaway fair is safe against him, we might need to rethink how we approach him if both jolts and aerials don't work
- His fsmash has a ton of endlag, enough to consistently get him in dashgrab after shielding it. His dsmash on the other hand... don't try punishing it.
- Cloud can limit cancel his dash and his landings, so in my experience even getting him on landing is tough. Stopping him from charging limit is also next to impossible since he can basically be charging whenever he's not attacking and cancel it in time to react. With limit, if he holds on to it, his ground and air movement is further buffed, so be aware of that.
- He's susceptible to being edgeguarded, as we all know. If he has limit, easiest way to get rid of it is to force him offstage.
- He's got no fast attacks to break combos, so go wild on him.
- Please please please watch out for his aerials in the air, particularly fair
- Cloud's dash attack is painful, so incredibly painful. I think it's punishable but for the life of me I can't ever do it cause I'm never ready for it

overall it's been a painful first week of fighting Clouds and not knowing how to do so but I think I've figured out better how to play around him
he still kills early though so it's one of 'those' matchups where you can work really hard and feel good and suddenly die to a mistake and then feel miserable :/

 

[A10theHero]

I read this on the Character Competitive Impressions thread: If Cloud is over 40%, you can tech the first hit of his down smash. Just hold down and tech. This works for pretty much any character no matter what. Height, weight, fall speed, and such do not affect this. Cloud's rage doesn't make a difference either.

 

[Thor]

Here's my two cents on the matchup after playing lots on both sides:

- Cloud has a ton of lingering hitboxes so yes, QA is risky, particularly due to how hard he hits
- Safe distance for stalling him with jolt is pretty far for Cloud, since his dash is so fast; if you can do it though, he might be susceptible to it due to Blade Beam not being a particularly good projectile (they cancel each other out if they hit)
- Cloud may not have as long a sword as Shulk, but Cross Slash reaches really far, so for goodness sake be careful with your pokes. Cross Slash is also safe if they don't do the whole move on shield. I think not even fadeaway fair is safe against him, we might need to rethink how we approach him if both jolts and aerials don't work
- His fsmash has a ton of endlag, enough to consistently get him in dashgrab after shielding it. His dsmash on the other hand... don't try punishing it.
- Cloud can limit cancel his dash and his landings, so in my experience even getting him on landing is tough. Stopping him from charging limit is also next to impossible since he can basically be charging whenever he's not attacking and cancel it in time to react. With limit, if he holds on to it, his ground and air movement is further buffed, so be aware of that.
- He's susceptible to being edgeguarded, as we all know. If he has limit, easiest way to get rid of it is to force him offstage.
- He's got no fast attacks to break combos, so go wild on him.
- Please please please watch out for his aerials in the air, particularly fair
- Cloud's dash attack is painful, so incredibly painful. I think it's punishable but for the life of me I can't ever do it cause I'm never ready for it

overall it's been a painful first week of fighting Clouds and not knowing how to do so but I think I've figured out better how to play around him
he still kills early though so it's one of 'those' matchups where you can work really hard and feel good and suddenly die to a mistake and then feel miserable :/

Cross Slash is frame 10, making Cross Slash OoS frame 17 [or 14 if he really does have a 4 frame jumpsquat], so fadeaway fair is safe on shield [not sure about spacing constraints on a pure whiff]. I personally don't feel Cross Slash has tremendous range... it seems shorter than his ftilt [although his ftilt is solid].

You can punish the front side of dsmash easily [it's very unsafe], but the back half is something like -11 on shield [and I think that's after a shield drop, so I think it's -18 on shield], so it can be punished with probably a very quick dash attack. Otherwise, you should often have a 50-50 with punishing with a dash grab or punishing spotdodge/roll.

Stop limit by being close to him - just because he can cancel limit at any time doesn't mean that a Pikachu who is within dash grab range isn't applying significant pressure by being there [our grab game is as potent as ever on Cloud]. If they jump away, look for uair or even a Thunder, depending on where they are, just be wary of his dair.

Nair is frame 5 behind him, and Climhazzard is frame 7, so be careful of those when comboing - I mentioned above that I used his up+B as a combo-breaker, since it was very easy for me to b-reverse it as needed. That said, Climhazzard is obviously very punishable, and when I combo broke with it, I only did so to regain my second jump [using the downward swing immediately to touch the ground ASAP]. It's also a good OoS option [far more threatening to our fair on shield than cross-slash, since it can be jump-cancelled].

You should be able to dash usmash a dash attack out of shield, but the move is frame 9 [not terribly slow] and lingers a bit, so be careful of that.