Meta Mastery of the Arts - Greninja Matchup Thread Archive

[Calvonta]

In the MU vs being that he's got multiple moves that comes out less than 10 frames this matchup has to be played an out fighter-ish type style due to fox's strong in fighter. I believe no ranged characters such as Fox has trouble against Greninja if played right after observing Ally vs aMsA due to having the sameish play-style. I also notice how he has trouble with Greninja (He had problems with Some).

Greninja has moves to snuff out "run-at-you" characters in this game

 

[TheRealDonquavious]

I believe that fox beats us pretty easily, probably our second worst matchup and I believe if to be around 4:6. Fox is a character that struggles heavily against shielding with his lack of a kill or combo throw, but Greninja hates to shield so he cant abuse fox's main weakness. Fox is fast enough to keep up with us while still forcing us to approach through lasers and the lasting reflector that we can't mix up charge times to beat with shurikens. Fox's dash attack destroys us, it is lingers, beats most of our options up close, and can catch our landings quite easily. However, it helps us a lot that fox stuggles to kill, so that our up throw is a very effective kill option. So long as you don't let him hit a soft Nair or down air, you shouldn't die early at all and should be able to he a kill first through edgeguarding, an up smash read on a nair/dair attempt, or up throw. The first kill is extremely important here. If you die early to a setup, coming back will be near impossible. If you get the kill first and can avoid setups and up smashes, you should have a much easier time from there. Up throw up air is also a true 50/50 here because fox falls so fast, as well as possibly guaranteed with the right amount of rage and percent. Use this very well- on town and city you can get a very early kill off of this, and that is EXTREMELY important. This is why I believe we should pick town and city here given that fox will likely leave it unbanned and I think it helps us much more than him in this matchup.

 

[ZeroJanitor]

Fox main here. I have experience against a really good Greninja player.

I'd say Fox wins the matchup in most areas. His frame data is better overall than Greninja's, he doesn't have to worry as much about shurikens since he's very fast and can cancel them out with his normals, and his combo game is even more effective since Greninja is a fast-faller.

Greninja's most significant advantage in the matchup is edgeguarding. Hydro Pump is very good at disabling many of Fox's recovery options, and makes them afraid to edgeguard you as a result. Dthrow-Upair is a good kill option on Fox due to his fall speed and light weight (I don't know at what percent it's true though).

 

[Calvonta]

Let's start with neutral vs .


In this position, has a couple of options in neutral that literally has properly shield pressured due to shield changes and 's actual landing lag on his Fair and Nair (couple of moves that can be used in neutral)

Both of which is actually kinda safe on shield and fox's only good OOS punish is USmash.

He might be able to use OOS moves if powershielded but that's not very reliable and it can be applied to any sort of attack on shield.

's moves comes out slower does not mean the matchup is bad for him. We seem to forget that is also a sword user and can outspace certain things without trading with it.

In the realm of footsies in neutral 's moves are certainly faster but 's has more range and actual hitstun.

Example: 's Ftilt vs 's Ftilt. If he's in range it beats us out but if its not I doubt it being fast matters.

In this video Techei vs Furry Tension the first match of the set on FD

Despite him playing neutral game to the best of his ability not 's he still put up a great fight.

because he can rush us down does not mean its a good matchup for him, Notice how in the first stock he canceled out 's with a jab.

At absolute worse ratio fox is even with greninja, I have no Idea how he has an advantage in this matchup. Is it because of utilt or something? I see no extreme anti gameplay every time I see this matchup.

I believe that fox beats us pretty easily, probably our second worst matchup and I believe if to be around 4:6. Fox is a character that struggles heavily against shielding with his lack of a kill or combo throw, but Greninja hates to shield so he cant abuse fox's main weakness. Fox is fast enough to keep up with us while still forcing us to approach through lasers and the lasting reflector that we can't mix up charge times to beat with shurikens. Fox's dash attack destroys us, it is lingers, beats most of our options up close, and can catch our landings quite easily. However, it helps us a lot that fox stuggles to kill, so that our up throw is a very effective kill option. So long as you don't let him hit a soft Nair or down air, you shouldn't die early at all and should be able to he a kill first through edgeguarding, an up smash read on a nair/dair attempt, or up throw. The first kill is extremely important here. If you die early to a setup, coming back will be near impossible. If you get the kill first and can avoid setups and up smashes, you should have a much easier time from there. Up throw up air is also a true 50/50 here because fox falls so fast, as well as possibly guaranteed with the right amount of rage and percent. Use this very well- on town and city you can get a very early kill off of this, and that is EXTREMELY important. This is why I believe we should pick town and city here given that fox will likely leave it unbanned and I think it helps us much more than him in this matchup.

Greninja's shield pressure is fine in this matchup. Ftilt, Fair, Nair, Dtilt. These things can also be used in neutral.

Since when is 's lasers a huge problem in this matchup?

Getting hit by Dash-Attack.. I can only see him hitting it as a landing frame trap. Or if he randomly throws it out close range.

he has to run before dashattacking, so there's two options he might throw out both of which you can snuff out with pivot grab or jab or even ftilt.

literally has more kill setups than .

 

[Illusion.]

I'm gonna be the next one to say that vs. is a 50:50 MU.

Linking this video because I feel Gibus did a great job playing the MU, only complaints I have is the lack of edgeguarding, unsafe usage of Shuriken, and unsafe usage of smash attacks (in game 2): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-REGpa84I8

Neutral:
You should be playing against the same way you play the MU, the bait & punish game. In the MU, however, you want to be using your shield more often than you would vs. . is fast and is going to be trying to rush you down and doing a lot of jumps. You are just as capable of doing dancing around him with your speed and using jumps as well. You can stuff him out with shorthop spaced Fair and play the footsies game with him quite well. As always, jab is our best OoS punish (if you read his jump, OoS Usmash works too and will kill if his % is high enough), the same goes for him as well. His frame data is overall better, yes.

Nair is a great way to punish as it leads to good follow-ups that do a good amount of damage, but keep in mind that it is best used as a punish, don't get reckless with it.

Combos/Kill Confirms*:
*Obviously, I'm not going to list all the combos has, I'm just listing the ones that demonstrate how well we can punish and kill Fox. Kill confirms will be italicized.

Nair > footstool unfortunately doesn't work until around 23%, so it is very situational in this case. Instead, I would go for Nair > jab (0-21%ish) or Nair > dtilt > dashgrab uthrow > uair > uair (0-44%ish). Nair > usmash starts working at 30% (30%-60%), Nair > shorthop Fair starts working at 38% (deals 25%), Nair > fullhop Fair starts working at 57% (also deals 25%), and Nair to fullhop Fair works starting at 73% when on or close to the ledge. The same thing goes for Dair > Fair. Sourspot Nair > usmash starts working and kills at 79% on FD/Omegas, on stages with lower ceilings it will be even sooner than that. Utilt > uair starts working and kills at 95% on FD/Omegas if you can catch them while they're in midair, from the ground it starts working and kills at 100%. Utilt lock starts working at about 47% and they can stay locked until about 75% when done correctly, finish it with a fullhop uair for maximum damage. Dtilt > jump cancel Usmash starts working at 88%. Uthrow starts killing at around 155% on FD/Omegas with no rage.

In total, 5 things italicized, and it doesn't even include the fact that our Fsmash kills at the ledge at 81% or Usmash killing him at 87% on FD/Omegas.

's main methods of killing are Usmash (kills starting at 100% on FD/Omegas), Uair (starts killing at 115% on FD/Omegas if he catches us our jump), Utilt > Uair (starts working at 95%, it all depends on DI though), Bair (starts killing at 115% on the ledge), sourspot Nair > Usmash (starts working and kills at 115%), and Dair > Usmash (starts working and kills at 110%).

That's only 3 kill confirms compared to our 5. We both have options to destroy each other, but we have the edge when it comes to having more kill confirms. I'd also like to mention that we can Shadow Sneak Cancel 's utilt >utilt combos and hit him with it.

Edgeguarding:

has such an easy time edgeguarding due to how linear his recovery is. is at a high risk of being stage spiked, spiked by dair, or not being able to reach the stage due to Hydro Pump. Hydro Pump is your best friend here as you can mess up Fox Illusion and Fire Fox when you land it, it isn't hard to hit either. 's only two safe options of edgeguarding are Dsmash at the ledge and ledge trump > Bair. Going offstage to try to edgeguard us is pretty much suicide as any of the 3 things I mentioned earlier can happen to him. If you're on a stage without walls or a curved edge (i.e. Battlefield, FD), go for the stage spike. If 's only resource left to recover is Fire Fox and you're off-stage close to him already, get above him while he's charging it and go for the Dair. Hydro Pump can help in getting either of those 2 options, or it may push so far back that he won't even be able to make it to the ledge.

 

[M@v]

Tagging @Space thing because he plays me all the time in this MU. Greninja's jabs and tilts do really well against Fox, but Fox generally has a much easier time securing the kill. I think FD is Greninja's best stage in this matchup imo. FD and either T&C or Halberd (because Jank) should be fox's bans, and FD or T&C should be your counterpick if Fox leaves one of them open.

 

[FullMoon]

I don't think either character has an easier time securing a kill than the other.

Greninja has trouble starting his kill combos on Fox since his frame data makes it hard to really get something started, but at the same time Fox has to rely mostly on reads to kill us and overall his grab is really not that threatening to us outside of him doing a tech chase Up-Smash on us.

Meanwhile Greninja has a kill throw that works anywhere on the stage so once Fox reaches a certain percent and gets grabbed he's dead. Edgeguarding Fox's up-special also allows Greninja to get earlier kills since Fox struggles to edgeguard us.

From my experience in this MU it's really easy for both characters to end up getting at very high percents especially if they're playing carefully.

 

[Illusion.]

I'm gonna go ahead and say that Greninja vs. Sheik is 35:65, definitely our worst MU.

Not gonna go into a lot of detail since it's obvious, everything we can do, she does better. Better projectile, better frame data, better mobility, better range, better combo game, and a better recovery. It also doesn't help that the range of our Shuriken is the range she can hit us with Bouncing Fish.

Skip to 3:56 of this video: http://youtu.be/itlbC-X_atI

Only way he was able to secure a kill against Void was with a throw, a throw that first takes 14 frames for the grab to come out. Greninja just gets shut down.

 

[Coffee™]

I'm gonna go ahead and say that Greninja vs. Sheik is 35:65, definitely our worst MU.

Not gonna go into a lot of detail since it's obvious, everything we can do, she does better. Better projectile, better frame data, better mobility, better range, better combo game, and a better recovery. It also doesn't help that the range of our Shuriken is the range she can hit us with Bouncing Fish.

Skip to 3:56 of this video: http://youtu.be/itlbC-X_atI

Only way he was able to secure a kill against Void was with a throw, a throw that take first takes 14 frames for the grab to come out. Greninja just gets shut down.

I think this is a bit over exaggerated. The biggest issue Greninja has against shiek is not having consistent non-read kill option, which was demonstrated in that set against Void. Shiek doesnt exactly have it easy in that department either. She can really struggle to kill a Greninja playing safe as well. She has more options overall for the scenario though so it still leans a bit in her favor.

That one match isn't the best indicator either as Megafox looked like he was playing on tilt after the sd first stock and made a lot of bad decisions after that. Its likely 60:40 / +1 shiek.

 

[Codaption]

It's also worth noting that Greninja's dash grab is much, much better than his horrid standing grab.

 

[bc1910]

There's no point writing off Greninja's throws as bad because they come off a 14f grab, because that's completely ignoring the fact he has arguably the second best dashgrab in the game lol.

Greninja's mobility is better than Sheik's in almost every way. Jump height, air speed, run speed, you name it. Sheik's mobility is boosted artificially by Bouncing Fish but that's hardly a safe mobility option in the same vein as, say, Quick Attack.

His range is not worse than Sheik's. Aside from Fair (which, yes, cannot be brushed aside because it's her most important move, but I'm just making a point) Sheik's range is nothing to write home about and Greninja's is generally higher thanks to his water swords and massive frog legs.

No-one's saying this isn't a bad MU, but let's not pretend Sheik outdoes him in every area.

 

[C0rvus]

The Fox MU has always been a tough one for me. My favored Greninja playstyle has always been very patient Shuriken play and ambush-style offense. In my experience, this doesn't get much traction against Fox. He has the tools to control the flow of neutral. You don't want to box with Fox (lol) because his boxing options are stronger than Greninja. You're sort of forced to play at mid range; spacing fairs and f-tilts and dash grabs. You can really press the advantage against Fox offstage, though. Push your edgeguards as hard as you can! With other characters I would say at kill percent don't be afraid to abuse shield due to Fox's lack of kill throws, but don't push it with Greninja because his shield does him few favors...

 

[Gunla]

The discussion will be left open for the time being, but keep in mind the changes that Greninja has received.

 

[bc1910]

The changes to Greninja don't affect any MUs drastically. I have, however, felt the difference in Fsmash's knockback. I tested it pre and post-patch at a variety of percents and positions. It kills Mario about 3-4% earlier than before, which isn't a big difference, but I've been surprised how often I've nabbed KOs with it and known it wouldn't have KO'd before.

Shadow Sneak back kick is also pretty absurd. It kills Sheik at around 70% when she's close-ish to the ledge (from the training mode spawn point). It's a brutal airdodge punish if you can land it.

As for changes to other characters, Lucas got more annoying because he can fish for kills with grabs a lot more safely. Nair stales really quickly but the damage boost makes it do 12% on the initial use, which makes it painful to get hit by Nair strings. Luckily Greninja is a fast faller and doesn't have to worry about Nair strings until he starts going into tumble. Lucas is still fairly easy to zone with shurikens and his CQC still isn't good, just slightly safer and more rewarding. Annoying, but I think Greninja still has the edge.

Bowser has a new hoo hah. It's a 50/50 from what can tell but kills early-ish, around 95%. We fight Bowser in the same way as before, just be wary of this powerful new option.

Biggest new threat to us is actually Mewtwo IMO. His Fair was already safe on our shield, but it coming out a bit faster combined with his new movement specs is really annoying. Lower landing lag makes it safer to whiff. Mewtwo is looking dangerous, as this was already a shaky MU.

 

[Steve.Stone]

Based on the Clouds I've played so far, it seems like it could be a difficult match up since Cloud has such huge range andsurprisingly little lag on his aerials and tilts. But he does have a lot of lag on his smash attacks and special attacks and they don't do much shield damage so he's open if you shield them. Also as threatening as his limit seems, it actually doesn't do much damage or knockback, seriously I got hit with limit cross slash and climhazard and thought 'wait that didn't kill me, it barely did anything...' So all in all, I think with just practicing and learning how to fight him as a new character, Greninja will still be able to beat him.

 

[bc1910]

Fight Cloud like Ike, and do everything in your power to throw him offstage when he has Limit Break as he'll be forced to waste it when he uses Up B. Without LB his kill potential is horrible.

Way too early to put numbers on it but I don't think we have much trouble with Cloud.

 

[Steve.Stone]

Yeah hisbjab is just like Ike's and I HATE that. X(

 

[Lawliet626]

I think we lose to cloud, His punishes are much lower risk than ours, I feel like camping him is just giving him space to slowly charge limit, he can stuff out jump ins pretty nicely, and our fair does outrange his aerials by a bit but in return his do more damage and come out faster, and to top it all off, with limit charged, he's pretty much faster than us both on the air and on the ground. We can SS cancel off his normal side B and his Dthrow at low percents (ill test the percentages later on and update my thread later). and I think we can vary the combos we do on him depending whether he has limit charged or not due to his fall speed changing. Plus he's a joke offstage, not as hopeless as mac, but still a joke.

 

[Steve.Stone]

Maybe 60-40 Cloud? It just seems to me as long as you play it safe and try to fake him out you can get in easily, but he is pretty fast. Oh well, probably too early anyway!

 

[BigHairyFart]

His recovery is a lot like Ike's, in that he can't sweet spot the ledge without LB. So we get an easy Hydro Pump gimp once he's offstage.

 

[Lawliet626]

I think we can also go for Dairs, but idk, neutral seems like a pain against cloud, especially with lagless limit charge

 

[TTYK]

His sword hitboxes are large and annoying. Shuriken and hydro pump are the zoning tools you will want to use often. Watch out for forward smash; that **** is rough. As a mixup try countering his neutral B if he tries to out camp you. If he gets limit charged throw him offstage and make him waste it. 55:45 our advantage imo. He has not been out for long which is probably why he seems overwhelming in the neutral. Especially with those big ass hitboxes.

 

[WolfieXVII ❂]

Cloud rewards both defensive and aggressive play style
The former with Limit Break charge and a transcendent neutral B, so camping him isn't always the answer
While his neutral B doesn't snap, it's also very very vulnerable to hydro pump and down smash, even dair
Once you take his jump, he's pretty easy offstage and prone to stage spikes with or without a jump
Cloud does have great aerial presence with wide, low lag aerials like NAir, FAir and DAir which all auto cancel
UAir should never be challenged btw
You always want to make sure you tech against Cloud and be careful about hitting his shield as Up B is a great option, and Limit Break Up B kills as early as 120 with no rage
Ledge Trump Side B w/Limit Break kills as early as 60, so be careful guys
You can also Shadow Sneak out of regular side B at most percents
As it stands, Cloud cant do much about combos once you get in, and has great trouble landing against Greninja's array of moves
A passive Cloud is best so be careful with your approach options
He cant do much on shield either
Treat his neutral b like Pika's thunder jolt on the ground imo, ez sub
You'll probably get most of your kills off of getting in, punishing his okay landing options, or offstage gimps
It's still early to say a lot
tl;dr I think this MU is pretty evenish atm due to Cloud's beastly onstage presence, Greninja's gimp game, Greninja's projectile game
Just to say I've played both characters, played opposite sides of the Greninja - Cloud MU against pretty good players so far, especially the former character
yeah yeah I've probably missed a ton but the character has been out for 3 days
(◕‿◕✿)

 

[Lawliet626]

Before i forget, Cloud is able to beat our Up smash with his dair, which is pretty scary

 

[elusiveTranscendent]

It still says it's the week of Fox and Sheik, so here's that write up that I never got around to

50:50
:

Both have very good mobility, so it's really footsie based.

Both fast fallers, so Gren and Fox both are able to rack up damage and combos really easily.

Fox doesn't have any pokes and we can punish his ground approach with retreating short hop fair.

Conscious water shuriken use is key here. You can still use it in the match up, just need to be smart when using them. Almost never use fully charged water shuriken in this match up.

Fox doesn't have a reliable kill set up other than dair into usmash. Other than that, he'll just rely on his fast, hard-hitting moves such as uair and bair. That or just a smash attack to punish. Patience is key.

Gren has multiple kill set ups out of dtilt and dthrow. If you can't seem to land either of those, chip damage with shuriken and one grab and then uthrow is a kill throw. We're more solid in the killing aspect. Just don't over commit and get punished by uair or bair.

For recovery, Fox has a variety of options cause side b and up b, as well as when he'll use his second jump. Hydro pump can mess both of these options up pretty well.

I don't feel like we should have a problem recovering against Fox.

Look out for his fair, uair or bair when recovering high. Then again, recovering high isn't very worth it in this match up, due to his good ground speed, he can catch our landing with a running usmash much of the time.

When recovering low there's not much he can do other than try and bair stage spike, which is still risky for him because, since he's a fast faller, it puts him in a bad position as well if he whiffs and/or we tech it.

This is all over the place, oops. :s

Edit: Oh yeah, I TOTALLY forgot Illusion wrote a write up, pretty much rendering this opinion null. Oopsies.

 

[Codaption]

Jumping in to debunk some stuff concerning Cloud. Keep in mind that I just tested this now, I literally have my 2ds out in front of me as I'm typing this.

Cloud does have great aerial presence with wide, low lag aerials like NAir, FAir and DAir which all auto cancel

This is kind of true and not true at the same time. Yes, Fair and Dair technically autocancel, but that hardly matters when they don't frame cancel out of a shorthop. Dair doesn't have low lag but the long duration of the move means it's still pretty punishable, and Nair has a fairly decent amount of lag on it.

I don't know who told you Fair had low lag, but they're a filthy liar. It has deceptively low landing lag, but there's still a decent amount there and the thing takes years to end proper.

with limit charged, he's pretty much faster than us both on the air and on the ground.

I think we can vary the combos we do on him depending whether he has limit charged or not due to his fallspeed changing.

This feels like a bit of an exaggeration. Cloud's boost to his movement is so minuscule that it really shouldn't make that much of a difference in the matchup, though his normal movement is still definitely something to be considered.

 

[Lawliet626]

This feels like a bit of an exaggeration. Cloud's boost to his movement is so minuscule that it really shouldn't make that much of a difference in the matchup, though his normal movement is still definitely something to be considered.

Its pretty noticeable, Its either on par or better, Im basing this off this one match i fought a cloud and i was running away from him as he was chasing after me with limit charged, and he pretty much caught up to me

I had much more MU practice today, Now i think Its more even-ish, but i still its a bit rough.
Respect him in the air and don't bother challenging his aerials unless you're pretty sure Fair is going to hit and outpace from the position you plan on using it. Don't challenge Uair unless you're ok with a trade in which case sometime dair trades with it.
Shield works pretty nicely against him since you can release it quick and jab. Don't be scared of getting grabbed after 30% which is when he has no follow ups unless he's gonna throw you off stage to start edge guarding of course.
Be wary of dtilt due to it being mix up and setting up for Uair juggles, But if you shield then you can get a punish of some sort.
As mentioned before, We can SS cancel his Dthrow (until 21%) his side B and His Ftilit at low percents. In regards to SS cancel out of his Side B, Try doing it on either the 3rd or 4th hit since doing on the last hit will give cloud enough time to punish you.
A well timed Dair will be pretty useful when it comes to edge guarding cloud and his crappy recovery (I haven't being able to test if Dsmash works as well).
Try to figure out the pattern or way your opponent charges his limit and how good he is at it.
Now in regards to his neutral B, if you notice that the cloud player is projectile happy, You can either jump over the proyectile, spam shurikens at the right distance (my least favorite option) or you can get close and cancel his projectile with either a well timed fair, bair or nair in which case greninja will have time for a free punish due to Cloud's neutral B's endlag.

 

[Steve.Stone]

Blade beam is actually not very scary, it can clash with any move and disappear,. Uncharged shuriken, Dair, Nair, or you can just jump over it.

 

[Lawliet626]

Jumping over them is easier when its grounded, but i think a short hop blade beam requires us to full hop over it, although i doubt cloud mains are gonna continuously use it out of a short hop.

 

[Codaption]

That's not because Cloud gets a big boost from limit breaker, it's because he's really friggen fast. He's only three spots away from Greninja normally in terms of run speed, I could see Limit Breaker's miniscule buff being able to close the gap.

 

[TTYK]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeHHJl5aiuQ
@istudying could you give us your thoughts on the sheik match up?

 

[Rubiss]

That's not because Cloud gets a big boost from limit breaker, it's because he's really friggen fast. He's only three spots away from Greninja normally in terms of run speed, I could see Limit Breaker's miniscule buff being able to close the gap.

Cloud is very difficult to deal with. His landing game and juggling game is very good. His aerials are very safe and cover him well. It can be tricky to play footsies with him due to his range. A defensive Cloud is the best way to play Cloud against Greninja. Spacing and camping against Cloud is risky because he can just freely charge his limit gauge. Cloud himself benefits from defensive opponents.I would say against Cloud, the matchup is probably 55:45, maybe 60:40 in Cloud's favor. It's also worth nothing that his Cross Slash (side B) cannot be punished by Greninja and that his down special kills Greninja grounded at around 50 - 60% without rage very close to the ground.

 

[Illusion.]

I like how we're discussing Cloud even though the title says Sheik and Fox.

 

[Lawliet626]

Cloud is very difficult to deal with. His landing game and juggling game is very good. His aerials are very safe and cover him well. It can be tricky to play footsies with him due to his range. A defensive Cloud is the best way to play Cloud against Greninja. Spacing and camping against Cloud is risky because he can just freely charge his limit gauge. Cloud himself benefits from defensive opponents.I would say against Cloud, the matchup is probably 55:45, maybe 60:40 in Cloud's favor. It's also worth nothing that his Cross Slash (side B) cannot be punished by Greninja and that his down special kills Greninja grounded at around 50 - 60% without rage very close to the ground.

He feels overwhelming at first (basically mostly everyone sucks at the MU atm so) but once you get some good MU practice then it doesn't feel as overwhelming.

 

[Ludiloco]

I think we will end up beating Cloud pretty solidly. But it's early, of course.

May I request discussion of Yoshi next? I don't have a preference on the other character, but I have a lot of thoughts about this matchup and I've gotten pretty good at it. I think Greninja has a lot of stuff that beats standard Yoshi play and would like to talk about it.

 

[Lawliet626]

May i also suggest if we can discuss bowser?
Personally I've never been good at the match up and now he has a new bread and butter.

 

[BigHairyFart]

I also vote for Yoshi/Bowser, as both are played in my area by strong players, some advice would be great.

 

[Illusion.]

I'd recommend using this set for the MU example for when the discussion is over: http://youtu.be/Rmgdjza29sc

 

[Gunla]

The (long) week is over. Hope you all had a good Holiday/whatever you may celebrate.

Spoiler: Week 5 Results

50:50 Even - As of late, there's been plenty of information and examples set that show that the key to this MU is really down to footsies. Short Hop followups and responses will make or break games.
Stages to Avoid: Dreamland 64 & Battlefield - Fox benefits from the platforms much better than Greninja does.
Stages to Pick: FD/Town & City/Halberd - FD gives us the space to work with, and Halberd/T&C benefits Greninja with the low ceiling on a greater level than Fox.

40:60 Moderate Disadvantage - It's still pretty clear that this is still a disadvantage; while our worst MU, it is still one that is definitely manageable. Capitalizing on Sheik's mistakes and punishing accordingly is central to victory.
Stages to Avoid: Smashville - Sheik's best stage, and one that will work against you. Usually should be banned immediately.
Stages to Pick: T&C - Unlike Smashville, the layout doesn't overwhelmingly benefit Sheik; if you can get here, do so; it's Greninja's best stage.

Onto Week (Week might be pushing it, to be honest) 6:

Greninja VS The Other Tongue Fighter: Yoshi!
Yoshi has had quite the transition from Brawl to 4. In addition to standing upright, he got a slew of buffs to his moves and has landed himself into a high tier position. With solid frame data and attacks, he can make quick work of some characters; however, Greninja VS Yoshi appears to be more of an even match. Both characters have good abilities that can exploit the other's weaknesses. While Yoshi received no changes last patch, has a breakthrough came through?
Current Rating: 50:50 Even
Stages to Avoid:
Stages to Pick:


Greninja VS The Turtle Without a Proper Home Stage: Bowser! (seriously, where's Bowser's Castle?!)
The Lighting Bruiser, Bowser, has become a new force with the latest changes to him. While he's still victim to combo-heavy characters, his newfound tools in his Up-Throw allow him to better follow up moves and actually get some results. However, we've had the advantage in the past, due to a solid projectile and his hurtbox being exploitable; has the new patch potentially evened it up, or is it a slight advantage for us yet again?
Current Rating: 55:45 Slight Advantage
Stages to Avoid:
Stages to Pick:

 

[Ludiloco]

Okay I'm bored so I'll do my write up. We have two PR Yoshis here in Michigan, so I get decent practice in this matchup. They both play a little differently as well, so I have experience against several playstyles.

Something to note is Yoshi likes to spend a lot of time in the air. Yes, he may occasionally back off and throw eggs but our shurikens (especially when we get that magic short hop height that we can clip his head with them if he stays grounded OR catch his jump) are basically going to put the onus on him to approach in the matchup, and Yoshi generally approaches from the air. This is fantastic for us, but we have to abuse it correctly. Up smash is such an amazing tool in this matchup, and if the Yoshi you're playing is overly aggressive you can seriously just run under them as they're trying to land and up smash when they run out of options. Nair is also amazing for covering Yoshi landings, as well as pivot smashes and grabs. I believe when it comes to the neutral, we win this matchup.

When it comes to edge guarding things get a little hairy. Yoshi's fair is incredible offstage and I highly suggest you be incredibly careful when going up against it (read: don't go offstage). Against a Yoshi with rage I have been hit low enough where I was unable to recover at 40%. This means very sparingly should you be shadow sneaking to the ledge, and you should be mixing up your recovery to stay as far from Yoshi as possible. A Yoshi that knows the matchup can trade his fair with shadow sneak and spike you every time.

The good news is, however, we don't have to go offstage against Yoshi to edge guard him. Yoshi REALLY struggles to grab the ledge, and most Yoshis will just use their heavy armor jump to power past the ledge while usually taking not much more than minor damage. We, however, have two very fast, disjointed, and powerful smash attacks that can hit him for devastating effect regardless of how he chooses to come onto the stage. If the Yoshi is trying to egg and snap the ledge, f smash breaks his eggs and smacks him out into the blast zone, hopefully for him he saved his jump! I find walking away from the ledge is a good way to bait this. If he tries to super armor jump, up smash covers it really well if you time it right. Just be careful that if you do it too early Yoshi will be able to armor through hit one and nair you before you can get hit two out. Annoying. If Yoshi is choosing to ignore both of these options and recover high, hydro pump can really screw with his momentum and cause him to do unsafe things (if you can catch a down b with hydro pump, oh man is it hilarious). Offstage play Yoshi dominates, but edge guarding is even or maybe in our favor. Another option to consider! Yoshi can double jump past the ledge and neutral b you if you're too close. This puts you offstage and in great danger of death at high %. Learning how to mash out of the egg and avoid a potential f-air is good, but it's better just to avoid this situation entirely.

Yoshi is somewhat annoying to combo, but the good news his he isn't really able to armor jump out of up air unless you barely have him in the hitbox. So our combos work pretty well on him. Just be careful about overextending, down B will kill you super early if you go for greedy up airs. We are a delight for Yoshi to combo too, but a little more awkward than the other fast fallers. Just be aware of f-air in neutral and its ability to pop you up if you don't block it or miss the tech. You must also be aware of his jab setups, do not give him an air dodge and do not block for too long (down b will break your shield). If you mash jump Yoshi shouldn't be able to kill you with anything guaranteed. Yoshi's main combo starters on us are jab 1, up tilt, fast fall aerials (especially up air, fair), and egg lay.

Okay so I think that covers a lot of the matchup. Just be patient and punish his landings, then cover his attempt to get past the ledge and you have a good shot at victory. We have a lot of things Yoshi hates: range, mobility especially. Remember to make them count.

I think this matchup still is even, but has the potential to be as good as 55:45 Greninja favor.

Oh right, stages.

Stages to go to: Game 1 get rid of Lylat and Battlefield. Doesn't matter where else you end up. For your counterpick go either T&C or Duck Hunt, the latter is especially good against Yoshi. The tree and walled edges make recovery for Yoshi really awkward, and the lack of platforms gives him very few landing options against our up smash. T&C is more even, but I feel with our setups killing off the top favors us a little more. Inconsistent platforms also make life annoying for Yoshi.

Stages to avoid: Here is the thing about Yoshi - Duck Hunt may be the only stage he kind of sucks on. So when banning, ban what you feel most comfortable with because Yoshi has 3 amazing stages and he will take you to one of them: BF, DL, or Lylat. If DL is banned in your region you still have to take a 50:50 on what the Yoshi prefers but I will tell you what I ban every time right now:

Lylat is a nightmare against Yoshi. Shuriken camping is hard, landing safely is nearly impossible (up smash through platform), and the annoying edges and blastzones just amplify Yoshi's offstage game. It's basically like the flipside of Duck Hunt for us. Unless you feel INCREDIBLY comfy with Lylat I'd flag this as maybe the worst stage in the matchup. Battlefield is more doable, Yoshi loves the platforms and his offstage game is still really good because of the huge blast zones, but our combo game works well here and we can edge guard him pretty effectively as well. Dream Land is best case scenario, we get the low ceiling mixed in with the better platform height, but most Yoshis don't seem to prefer it over BF.

Ok I think that's it for real this time.