Social The Pond - Greninja General Discussion

[NinjaLink]

I guess no one mentioned using hydro pump on spindash? Anyone? lol

 

[Snackss]

I just play Zero Suit because she's fun and kind of similar. I'm not good enough with either character to compete anyway.
If you go pocket Sheik against a Sheik main, what's the point though? You might still be at a disadvantage since they probably play Sheik more than you. Definitely useful against Sonic.

I mained Falco

 

[bc1910]

There's not much logic in that statement. If you go pocket anyone against a dedicated Sheik main, you are probably going to lose because Sheik has no bad MUs. A pocket won't be good enough. Picking Sheik herself doesn't put you at an extra disadvantage.

Regardless, you should learn your secondary beyond the level of pocket. The effort you put in to all of Greninja's MUs, you should put in with your secondary in the MUs you need them for. So if you choose Sheik for your secondary, the Sheik ditto should not be a MU where you think "oh, Greninja loses, I'll try my pocket Sheik". It should be a MU you learn inside out, and get good at.

 

[FullMoon]

I honestly don't feel the need for a secondary with Greninja. He does have some bad MUs but they're all manageable and quite possible to win. I'd much rather invest my time on him than a secondary just to beat 3 characters he does bad against.

Granted that I'll be picking up Lucas as a secondary once he's released, but that's more because I love the character than anything else.

 

[mimgrim]

I like to have 2 characters that I use the most just to keep myself from getting burned out.

I'm actually thinking Link might be a decent choice.

 

[bc1910]

Mhm. Emblem Lord said he thinks Link goes roughly even with Sheik and beats her in neutral, so there's that. That's a really bold statement though and he didn't back it up either.

 

[Snackss]

There's not much logic in that statement. If you go pocket anyone against a dedicated Sheik main, you are probably going to lose because Sheik has no bad MUs. A pocket won't be good enough. Picking Sheik herself doesn't put you at an extra disadvantage.

Regardless, you should learn your secondary beyond the level of pocket. The effort you put in to all of Greninja's MUs, you should put in with your secondary in the MUs you need them for. So if you choose Sheik for your secondary, the Sheik ditto should not be a MU where you think "oh, Greninja loses, I'll try my pocket Sheik". It should be a MU you learn inside out, and get good at.

I don't know. Obviously you can't go wrong with Sheik, so it's fine. You're just still going to need to outplay them and have more experience than them, so it feels a little weird to beat someone's main by having their character as your secondary and being better at it than them.

 

[momochuu]

i hate smash ladder. why does everybody on this thing run so much. e_e

 

[Snackss]

I tried to play on ladder like, twice. I realized it took over an hour just to get two sets, so now I add people elsewhere and play with them indefinitely whenever they're available.

 

[FullMoon]

A lot of people seem to have bad experiences with the ladder while I for the most part get mostly good matches

I guess I'm just lucky lol.

 

[bc1910]

I don't know. Obviously you can't go wrong with Sheik, so it's fine. You're just still going to need to outplay them and have more experience than them, so it feels a little weird to beat someone's main by having their character as your secondary and being better at it than them.

I do see what you're saying. It's a strange concept but I believe you can get as good as a dedicated Sheik main at the ditto if you thoroughly learn that MU. The whole thing is just tricky because no-one really beats Sheik, otherwise there might be better choices for a secondary. Or we wouldn't need one at all (although as I said I don't think we NEED a secondary, it's just useful to have other options for bad MUs).

 

[momochuu]

takes like 2 hours to get a game and 99% of the ladder plays keepaway. fun times.

 

[elusiveTranscendent]

i used to use smash ladder but then

whooo smash skype groups yeahh

 

[carlos11]

I can vouch for Pikachu being a good choice for a main alongside Greninja. Pikachu and Greninja are my mains.

 

[bc1910]

So ZeRo just released this video on his current top 5. In descending order they are Sheik, Rosalina, Luigi, Ness and Diddy.

I'm sure few (if any) of us actually agree with this top 5 but I'd rather not go down that discussion route, we can at least agree that these 5 characters are powerful + relevant to the meta.

We lose to Sheik, but do very well against Luigi and Ness and should go even with Rosalina. We lost to Diddy prepatch, and I haven't seen enough footage of other players to have an informed opinion on the current ratio, but what I'm certain about is that Diddy really struggles to kill Greninja without Hoo Hah and is extremely susceptible to being edgeguarded (this was always true, but edgeguarding him is less risky now because you won't die to random Uairs at high %).

Greninja is looking like a strong pick in the current meta, it seems like he has one of the best MU spreads against ZeRo's top 5; beating 2, maybe even 3 of those characters and only losing to 1 is not something a lot of others can boast.

 

[FullMoon]

I don't think Greninja beats Ness particularly, feels even more than anything.

Diddy can go either way but I think the nerfs allow us to stay alive for longer so I'd say even as well. Diddy can still kill us at good percentages with F-Air and his bananas can very easily set us up for one as well.

Rosalina I'm pretty sure goes even with Greninja

Luigi we certainly win

Sheik is Sheik.

So Greninja is not a bad pick but he's not anything special really.

 

[bc1910]

Pretty sure NinjaLink thinks we beat Ness. I agree with him. We should win that MU for a bunch of reasons.

Even so, your opinion of one loss, one win and a bunch of evens is still way more special than your typical "mid tier" MU spread against the top 5. Looks a lot more like a high tier spread. Falcon boasts a similar spread, for example.

Greninja's definitely pretty special here.

 

[FullMoon]

I suppose. I don't think we win against Ness but I do see why some might come to that conclusion.

I can't really agree with ZeRo anyway. Luigi and Ness are not as good as Fox and Sonic and it's not due to bias. Luigi and Ness just have far more exploitable weakness than those 2 to be top 5

 

[NinjaLink]

I dont see why we dont win against ness. Feel free to explain so we can come to a definite conclusion for that.

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

FG fun happened today. What the heckk do I do against a Bowser Jr. riding its cart, then running away with up B?

 

[FullMoon]

I dont see why we dont win against ness. Feel free to explain so we can come to a definite conclusion for that.

Well, this is coming mainly from personal experience but...

Ness's aerial game is probably better than ours what with his F-Air coming faster than most of our attacks while also being disjointed and being a great combo move. Ness also has very damaging combos that can be set up with PK Fire or D-Throw (or both) and N-Air is a great tool to escape juggles. Not only that but he can kill us early by just using B-Throw on us.

Our main advantage against Ness is that we really mess with his recovery for free and we have a faster projectile with more range to it, as well as superior mobility and I guess a better ground game.

I can't see this MU being anything above or below even myself.

 

[bc1910]

Greninja's fastfaller physics let him out of PK Fire for free, you should honestly never get comboed by that thing. Just SDI away and shield, or jab if you see Ness running towards you for a grab.

DIing away makes Ness' Dthrow stop comboing really early. This isn't just a benefit for Greninja, that throw is overrated in general.

Fair, Nair and Bthrow are undoubtedly Ness' best tools against us. All three them have to be respected. They are the reason we don't totally body Ness IMO. But they're not enough to let him go even.

We're agreed on Greninja's advantages in this MU, which is enough for now. I could say more but I'll save that particular wall of text for the MU thread. Suffice to say I think our advantages outweigh the disadvantages heavily.

I hate to resort to using a ratio but I think this is 55:45 our favour (small advantage) at worst.

FG fun happened today. What the heckk do I do against a Bowser Jr. riding its cart, then running away with up B?

Shield the cart dash. When he hits your shield and jumps, do Usmash out of shield. You should hit him every time (if you don't, it's down to slow reactions and/or lag). When he uses Up B, just wait for him to land then dashgrab his landing. Make sure you shield or dodge the hammer swing as he lands.

 

[Kace Mono]

FG fun happened today. What the heckk do I do against a Bowser Jr. riding its cart, then running away with up B?

I like to Dtaunt it. its hilarious aslong as its timed properly and you can follow up with an Utilt at low percentages. it will make them think twice about spamming it.

 

[FullMoon]

Okay so I thought I was the best Greninja in Anther's Ladder.

... Nope. I just got crushed beyond recognization in a Greninja ditto there.

 

[mimgrim]

Or maybe you just suck at the ditto MU.

Ditto MUs don't actually prove anything beyond a player maybe being better at that particular MU. But they certainly don't prove who is the better player of a character.

 

[FullMoon]

I'm not bad at the ditto MU actually. I think I won most dittos I played until I got really wrecked in this one lol.

 

[Coffee™]

I guess no one mentioned using hydro pump on spindash? Anyone? lol

I believe I mentioned it like no less than a few pages back. lol

So guys, about the Sonic MU...

Has anybody tried to use pivot grab as a countermeasure to Spin Dash? It's disjointed with a really good range and since we'll be running away from Sonic we get some distance from him when using it. I tried to do that while playing with a guy that was helping me learn the MU and while it's faaaar from being flawless, it is kind of a neat trick.

It's decent, hard to time tho considering Sonic can just jump if you do it preemptively or they predict it.

Anyway's after grinding out the Shiek matchup some more I think it's probably even at a high level (definitely way easier for Shiek at low and mid levels though) and likely stage dependent as well. Greninja wins imo on larger stages.

And on a random note. I think Fox vs Shiek is like 40:60 for Fox. He doesn't really have good answers to what makes Sheik such a big threat for him. He just punishes her hard so it's more dependent on the Shiek player messing up than the matchup really being close imo.

 

[bc1910]

Greninja's pivot grab has 15f of startup. That's reactable (offline) for a good player. It can be used as a punish but if they're in the middle of Spin Dash they will just react and jump. As you said it's decent, but not something to rely on.

Yeah Fox loses to Sheik for sure. They combo the **** out of each other but his survivability is a lot worse. His normals are great, but Fox doesn't have a good answer to a defensive Sheik, because his grabs blow past like 30% where he gets Dthrow -> Fair. Whereas Sheik can threaten Fox a lot with her throws and normals.

Also, high level Fox players often lament the fact that Fox cannot kill someone who shields a lot at high %. He can get around this in a lot of MUs because characters have to take risks to start combos or kill him, and he can capitalise on those risks to get his own kills. Sheik, however, never has to take those risks. Even when the time comes to kill Fox, she just edgeguards him or annoys him to death with Fair. She doesn't have to overcommit to kill him and make herself vulnerable to his kill moves, unlike most characters.

Hydro Pump has no effect on grounded Spin Dash. If Sonic just keeps moving he will frame trap the ending lag of a horizontal grounded Hydro Pump and hit Greninja before he can shield. From here he can jump and get a full Spin Dash combo. Hydro Pump is good if they jump pre-emptively or don't know what to do, but if they know to just keep moving through it then it doesn't help much.

It's somewhat dependent on how much charge Spin Dash has (and thus how fast it moves) and also on your spacing when you use Hydro Pump, but the best case scenario if Sonic knows not to jump is that you shield Spin Dash and get 2% damage. And more often than not you'll just get hit. It's not a BAD option per se, but I don't think it saves the MU. If they have no idea what to do and just keep jumping out of Spin Dash then you'll probably save yourself from a lot of combos but that's player related, not MU related.

 

[Coffee™]

Also, high level Fox players often lament the fact that Fox cannot kill someone who shields a lot at high %. He can get around this in a lot of MUs because characters have to take risks to start combos or kill him, and he can capitalise on those risks to get his own kills. Sheik, however, never has to take those risks. Even when the time comes to kill Fox, she just edgeguards him or annoys him to death with Fair. She doesn't have to overcommit to kill him and make herself vulnerable to his kill moves, unlike most characters.

This is pretty spot on.

To add to this. Fox ideally doesn't want to take his opponent to a high percent because he only has a few moves that actually kill even with rage. As a Fox player you'll tend to start looking for kills on most characters a little after 100%. After that the additional percent doesn't make a whole ton of difference as you're going to be killing with the same moves.

Hydro Pump has no effect on grounded Spin Dash. If Sonic just keeps moving he will frame trap the ending lag of a horizontal grounded Hydro Pump and hit Greninja before he can shield. From here he can jump and get a full Spin Dash combo. Hydro Pump is good if they jump pre-emptively or don't know what to do, but if they know to just keep moving through it then it doesn't help much.

It's somewhat dependent on how much charge Spin Dash has (and thus how fast it moves) and also on your spacing when you use Hydro Pump, but the best case scenario if Sonic knows not to jump is that you shield Spin Dash and get 2% damage. And more often than not you'll just get hit. It's not a BAD option per se, but I don't think it saves the MU. If they have no idea what to do and just keep jumping out of Spin Dash then you'll probably save yourself from a lot of combos but that's player related, not MU related.

Spindash does not go through Hydro Pump, the windbox slows it down. Once it's spaced well, he can't punish you either which frankly isn't too hard considering you can move with Hydro Pump.

 

[bc1910]

I tested it in training to make sure before I posted that, using the whole hold L for 1/4time thing. Honestly, Spin Dash just went right through Hydro Pump with no regard for the windbox. It's possible the windbox is slowing him down but it's not enough, I was just frame trapping myself unless I spaced HP really far away, at which point I was forced to shield and would get hit otherwise.

The same thing happens with DK's Up B, Hydro Pump has no effect on that.

I may be able to provide video evidence.

 

[Coffee™]

I tested it in training to make sure before I posted that, using the whole hold L for 1/4time thing. Honestly, Spin Dash just went right through Hydro Pump with no regard for the windbox. It's possible the windbox is slowing him down but it's not enough, I was just frame trapping myself unless I spaced HP really far away, at which point I was forced to shield and would get hit otherwise.

The same thing happens with DK's Up B, Hydro Pump has no effect on that.

I may be able to provide video evidence.

I just tested it briefly after you posted this. It appears if you hit the startup of spindash before Sonic starts hurtling towards you it will cause him to slow down considerably but if the spindash is already initiated he only gets a minor speed decrease. It's enough to shield as you pointed out or possibly Jab so yeah my bad. I thought it neutered the whole spin.

Either way you generally going to want to use it preemptively against Sonic anyway. Greninja has too much start up lag on Hydro Pump to throw it out in retaliation for Sonic initiating a spindash. It's more of a movement option that prevents Sonic from getting in consistently.

 

[NinjaLink]

VS Sheik theres really only one thing we need to know. What can we do to reliably smack her for jumping? She wins matchups just cause she constantly shorthops.

Also I see ppl attempt to use substitute on her recovery bouncing fish. Anyone has footage of that? I need some clarity on that lol

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

This is a bit frustrating, copy and paste from another thread:
In FG, do both players have the exact same input lag? At this point I'm convinced both players do not. In person, I can punish certain characters after a missed move. Online, they shield a few moments before my input is registered. Considering the wifi connection where my Wii U is located sucks, am I seeing things or is it a possibility?

I really felt this against King Dedede. Couldn't punish a single thing. When I got past the hammer, he just shields. I don't have this much problem in person. I feel like Greninja really suffers from input lag, especially considering his already high startup lag. What do you guys think?

 

[Gunla]

Greninja performs much worse under input lag due to the execution and timing of some of his abilities.

I tend to use Doc if I ever go into FG.

 

[bc1910]

This is a bit frustrating, copy and paste from another thread:
In FG, do both players have the exact same input lag? At this point I'm convinced both players do not. In person, I can punish certain characters after a missed move. Online, they shield a few moments before my input is registered. Considering the wifi connection where my Wii U is located sucks, am I seeing things or is it a possibility?

I really felt this against King Dedede. Couldn't punish a single thing. When I got past the hammer, he just shields. I don't have this much problem in person. I feel like Greninja really suffers from input lag, especially considering his already high startup lag. What do you guys think?

I can't pretend to understand the inner workings of the netcode. What you're saying seems unlikely, because most creators of online games try to iron out instances of one player receiving more lag than the other because it's blatantly unfair. Also Sm4sh has no host advantage issues. It's still possible I guess.

But what's more likely is simply that both players are experiencing the same amount of input lag and it's simply easier to buffer shield after an attack than it is to punish, because the buffer can eat up the input lag frames whereas the input lag will affect the punish.

Liberation is right too, Greninja is just bad under input lag. You should only use him in good connections. In fact if your Wifi does suck (as you said) I'd recommend trying to get it upgraded, but I understand tha may not be possible/cost effective. Otherwise Wii U LAN adapters are really cheap. I have crappy internet at my college house but I recently went wired and even though the net is the same speed, it's made a big difference.

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

Thanks for the replies. My Wifi problem is that the connection is weaker where my Wii U is located (the basement) as I've stated. I'm working on getting a range extender to try to strengthen the signal, hopefully that fixes the problem. The shield buffering makes a lot of sense and explains it.

 

[FullMoon]

If there's one thing that is ever going to make me drop Greninja, it's lag and not being able to play anywhere else but online.

 

[momochuu]

lan adapter should be mandatory at this point tbh. annoys the hell out of me to find a laggy smash 4 match because the only excuse should be distance.

 

[FullMoon]

I don't have a LAN Adapter because they don't sell those here in Brazil for some reason. Or at least I never found one.

 

[NinjaLink]

Amazon is your friend