Well, Noob Saibot is my favorite character and I was always good with him in Ultimate MK3, especially if I could trap people in the smoke cloud-->tp uppercult-->uppercut-->clone throw-->smoke cloud-->tp uppercut-->etc chain ot cheap attacks, teehee. Noob was always real confusing to play against, and the confusion factor only rose exponentially with the Noob-Smoke pairing. However, I still can't quite figure out how to play them properly. It also doesn't help that I've had some terrible luck with PS2 controllers and they don't seem to input the moves I'm telling them to (of the controllers that actually had working buttons, that is).
As of right now I find myself mainly meleeing with Noob and coming in with Smoke if I want to be chap and then coming back to mostly doing plain Monkey style attacks with Noob. However, most of the combos and tips people have posted about Noob-Smoke have done the opposite. They focused primarily on Smoke and used Noob as minor backup. I gotta admit this is unsettling to me because I like Noob far more than Smoke although I realize that it seems Smoke has much better attacks this time around. Perhaps, though, Noob's ability to turn invisible can give him an advantage in doing some free damage against confused opponents.
I've beaten Arcade mode on Novice, Easy, and Medium as Noob-Smoke, but I find that I can beat the boss much easier with other characters (like Scorpion or Liu Kang) and had trouble beating him on Hard as Noob Smoke (finally switched to Liu Kang and won first try). So I'm not sure what the problem is. I mean, obviously I suck as Noob Smoke, lol, and not being able to fully control their specials doesn't help any. But right now I don't care that I can buttonmash strikingly well with Scorpion's sword or that Liu Kang's specials are damn easy to pull off... I just want to get better with Noob. ^_^
From what I gathered, Noob Smoke has to be played very differently from other characters. He is perhaps the most straighforward character to play (only two styles, easily memorizeable moves and basic combos), and the most confusing to play against, and has enormous potential for complex strategy and setups. It also seems to me that his/their moves and combos come in short quick bursts but have longer recovery in between than other characters do (I can buttonmash other characters nonstop, but N-S I can only get to lunge in short bursts of attacks... that and I don't buttonmash N-S cause I did memorize all their moves... actually getting the controller to cooperate with them is another story.... and it's disturbing to me that I can win something easier by buttonmashing than by using actual strategy of moves I know).
Given this tendency for short bursts, I figure that in order to optimally utilize this, you have to keep switching them in and out (and not with "style shift" but with their persona-switching attack specials whenever possible). This would also enhance the confusion/disorientation effect that I believe their character and strategy rests upon. Keep on hopping all over the screen to catch your opponent offguard and then do a short burst combo and pop back out. And, of course, on occasion do long combos, especially if they involve stance change again.
While this possibly works against other humanoid characters, it does no real good against the boss who is near immune to a lot of specials. Which is a problem because since Noob-Smoke are very short range (have no weapon form), they rely on their specials more than any other character, and often use them as the main form of attack. So how would one handle that kind of situation? Is their lack of range meant to be compensated by their high mobility (multiple teleports, etc)?
Anyway, I'm just babbling my head off and throwing out ideas. Really I wanna hear how others use Noob-Smoke, if you've encountered the same issues or problems that I have and so on....