Cloud (SSB4)/Down aerial

Hitbox visualization showing Cloud's down aerial.

Overview

A downward stab with the Buster Sword that boasts a large, powerful sweetspot and decent speed. It serves as a threatening edgeguard due to its size and spiking capability, and an effective deterrent for juggling because of its surprisingly wide and long-lasting sourspot. This combined with its ability to autocancel out of a full hop or a short hop off of a platform make it deceptively difficult to intercept or punish.

Autocancelling the move allows the low knockback of the sourspot to offer combo potential into a variety of finishers, such as any of Cloud's aerials or specials, and even a footstool. When it comes to followups from down aerial's sourspot, neutral aerial is the easiest and works at the widest percent window, due to its high speed and infamously massive coverage. Forward air, Limit Break side special, Finishing Touch, and another down air are the most potent but also the most situational finishers, able to take stocks off of the top, bottom, or side, but requiring precision and/or the use of a Limit Break. Up and Back aerial are fairly reliable and easy options that can lead to high damage or kill confirms, while footstooling is difficult and won't work at many percentages, it can make for a powerful combo extender.

When using down aerial for edgeguarding, one can't simply drop off the stage with it. The move lasts so long that even with a double jump on hand, Cloud's recovery usually won't suffice. Instead, Cloud players will grab the edge of the stage after knocking an opponent off. Once their enemy is about recover, the player will drop from ledge only to double jump immediately after while performing a down aerial at the same time, placing a large, spike right where the opponent is headed while jumping safely back onstage. Alternatively, Cloud players may instead attempt to pierce the ledge with their down air, short hopping and landing with a down air right when they think their opponent is about to grab the edge. The timing is tough, but it can KO very quickly if timed correctly, while requiring little risk on Cloud's end.

Hitboxes

ID	Part	Damage	SD	Angle	BK	KS	FKV	Radius	Bone	Offset			SDIx	H×	T%	Clang	Rebound	Type	Effect	G	A	Sound	Direct
Clean hit
0	0	15%	0		10	100	0	3.6	25	0.0	11.0 to 12.5	0.0	1.0x	1.5x	0%							Cloud Hit
1	0	13%	0		30	105	0	4.5	25	0.0	7.0 to 13.0	0.0	1.0x	1.2x	0%							Cloud Hit
Late hit
1	0	8%	0		80	55	0	3.5	25	0.0	9.0 to 11.0	0.0	1.0x	1.2x	0%							Cloud Hit

Timing

Attack

Initial autocancel	1-4
Clean hit	11-13
Late hit	14-42
Ending autocancel	43-
Interruptible	60
Animation length	77

Landing lag

Animation length	26

Legend (1 square = 1 frame)

Lag time

Hitbox

Hitbox change

Autocancel

Interruptible

Trivia

• Like Cloud's up aerial, the immediate auto-canceling of this move is possibly a coding error caused by the wrong type of timing function being used. In the move's scripts, the hitboxes are deleted on frame 43, then a timer with a count of 37 is placed in the next line for the auto-cancel window. However, this is an asynchronous timer, which enables the auto-cancel on frame 37, rather than a synchronous timer, which would enable it 37 frames after the hitboxes are deleted (on frame 60). As a result, the auto-cancel is instead enabled on frame 43, as the line is still read after the timer for deleting the hitboxes.
  • A very similar error can be seen with Sonic's up aerial.
  • Since this error was not addressed in any updates, it remains unknown whether the move's instant auto-canceling property was intentional or not. However, like with Cloud's up aerial, it was eventually fixed in Ultimate, where the move's auto-cancel properly uses an asynchronous timer on frame 46 (in addition to the hitboxes ending earlier, on frame 40).

Cloud's moveset

Neutral attack (1 · 2 · 3) · Forward tilt · Up tilt · Down tilt · Dash attack · Forward smash · Up smash · Down smash
Neutral aerial · Forward aerial · Back aerial · Up aerial · Down aerial
Grab · Pummel · Forward throw · Back throw · Up throw · Down throw
Forward roll · Back roll · Spot dodge · Air dodge · Techs
Floor attack (front) · Floor getups (front) · Floor attack (back) · Floor getups (back) · Floor attack (trip) · Floor getups (trip)
Edge attack · Edge getups
Neutral special · Side special · Up special · Down special · Final Smash