Ultra Street Fighter IV

[df0]

Ooh ooh, can we make suggestions? Ban Yang. And Sakura, I hate her vocal "bye bye" emote.

[JLM]

Personally I think combos are pretty cheap if they're hitting me, but massively underpowered when I'm using them. I suppose that is the definition of balance.

I wrote a response but have nowhere to post it. Also I sound like I'm writing to Points of View. Here it is anyway:

You're highlighting a problem that doesn't exist because you personally don't find a particular playstyle interesting to watch. The tournament wasn't won by a projectile character and seven characters (Gen, Hakan, Adon, Makoto, Balrog, Fei Long, Ibuki) were represented in the top 8 who don't "spam" projectiles at all.

Infiltration was cheered for switching to Hakan because he's an under-represented character who you wouldn't expect to see in top 8, he's one of Infiltration's known pocket counter pick characters and it's exciting when a world class player feels obligated to switch from their main.

It's worth noting that Hakan is not under-utilised because he is dominated by projectile spam, but rather because he takes a lot of work to use, he is relatively unexplored and has some problem match ups. People choose many other characters over Hakan, not just projectile users, so please don't suggest that the way to give low tier characters their shine is to put projectile users in a separate bracket because this is grossly inaccurate.

Painting it as the audience cheering because he switched to a non-fireball character is hugely misleading. If a player switched from Akuma to Cammy, who is an exciting rushdown character, they would not have been hailed as a hero for dropping the fireball game.

The diversity of the roster, the wide variety of playstyles on offer and the ways these playstyles match up against each other is a big part of what made Streetfighter 2 such a huge success, so compartmentalising them in the way you suggest would be hugely detrimental to the series' appeal. Watching a non-projectile character fight for space and work their way in against a projectile user can be very exciting to watch, and watching a projectile user fight for every inch against a rushdown character knowing that they're dead if the attacker gets in just once can be thrilling as well.

Personally I also find high level Sagat mirrors to be an intense and engaging tactical game where every pixel of life and meter matters and every decision is made to count, and this match up is one that would be dismissed by many as "fireball spam". Throwing lots of projectiles is not the same as "spamming" them, so if you are aware of the difference then perhaps you shouldn't use the incorrect derogatory term.

Your article makes you seem very ignorant, so you can perhaps forgive people for misrepresenting you if they're only going by this piece which is at best misguided and at worst deliberately misleading.

[Plopboy]

A real nice response there Mr J, I think people get salty because they either don't learn from their mistakes or just expect to win without the practice.

I know myself every time I get salty about being beaten by a shoto it really is my fault for not dealing with their play style or adapting to their play style on the fly. Adapting to the other player is such a big part of this game and I really suck at it as I tend to have my one tactic and stick to it even if I am being DP'd for the n'th time, silly scrub

I think any character is viable in good hands, I'm sure Infiltration was caught trolling with Sean and Sean really is bottom of the barrel, I think Shend once said that Sean's basket ball was above Sean in the tier ranking. Point being the game is about being good with your character of choice not picking the best character.

Anyway well done JLM for your 4th, I know you are disappointed but hey I'm sure it will make you more determined next time and well done.

Anyway here are some Dan combos I saw earlier

Oh and it looks like Elf may be getting some buffs for Ultra, hooray for the cooking man.

[JLM]

Thank you for your kind words Mr. Plopston and, as always, happy birthday.

I remember Dawgtanian's tricky Elf from the Vanilla/Super days before he switched to Gen. Very tricky it was. I don't know what you can do with Fuerte because he is such poorly designed character. You can't completely re-invent him and make him play Streetfighter, so it mostly comes down to giving him more damage and improving his escape options, but I feel like they don't want him to be too good because it would be horrible if he was actually strong. I suspect there are some folks at Capcom who would rather he had never been created.

Also I have questions about the non-fireball fighter:

1) Is Honda vs Bison really more entertaining than Ryu mirrors?

2) Is Dan allowed in the non-fireball bracket?

3) Can you play a projectile character in the non-fireball bracket but agree to instant DQ if you throw one?

[Plopboy]

Also if people think that projectile characters are so powerful, then perhaps they should learn to play one as there are quite a few to choose from, but obviously Dan is best and is in the Awesome bracket

I think Elf is fine, I like his Q-Bomb charge to be shorter, as it is a nightmare to charge and still try and splash people, only to let go at the wrong moment and look like a right melon. Maybe a better escape option, but really any changes aren't going to make me a better player. I think my main advantage with Elf against people, is when they don't know how Elf plays which can lead to some very silly matches.

[JLM]

Oh that would be good, and maybe more things he can do after the EX Q bomb wall bounce. I'd be fine with them giving him more silly things that are fun if they're content to keep him low tier. What did people ask for on Capcom Unity?

[joffocakes]

I practiced RSF for about fifteen minutes with El Fuerte last night and only once hit it three times. Twice a few times but mostly once into a useless splash. I need to practice it more then never use it. I need an easier damage confirm for those small holes in an opponent's defense.

Got Abel to B rank. Was having fun with his cr.hp x roll, hp juggle x roll resets.

[wretcherd]

I think there's a surprising amount of variety among the shotos, they all have different properties on their tatsu, dp, and fireball.

[JLM]

Indeed, and they have different/extra special moves, ultras, supers, normals and playstyles. Shotos haven't been interchangeable characters since SF2.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

Thing is the man who wrote that article is almost certainly an armchair fan who plays a bit on the side. So things like footsies, spacing, zoning probably don't really mean a whole lot to him. So while people who play the game at a higher level can appreciate what's going on, to him it's all just fireball spam. Similarly he might find watching a seth blowup entertaining, while I'd just sigh because seth is bullshit and I don't find watching guessing games all that entertaining.

It's all just relative really. Some people enjoy watching chess, I find it dull. I quite like watching televised poker now and then, and have at least a small appreciation of things like image building, semi bluffing, value bettering, but other people just watch to see people shove all their chips in.

I mean, christ, I can be riveted by 5 days of a cricket test match that ends in a draw, which would be other people's idea of hell.

I guess my point is that while his no-fireballs suggestion is a bit silly (side tourney?), I don't think his views on the infiltration/laugh match are necesarilly wrong, because it's all just relative yo.

[joeplus]

Street Fighter should have a test match mode. Still first to three rounds, but the default stamina is 1,000,000.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

Anyway, I watched a really ace documentary on crabs last night. Crabs are amazing!

[Plopboy]

I practiced RSF for about fifteen minutes with El Fuerte last night and only once hit it three times. Twice a few times but mostly once into a useless splash. I need to practice it more then never use it. I need an easier damage confirm for those small holes in an opponent's defense.

cl.hk xx Super

or

cl.hk EX Guac Leg throw

These are the simple, i.e. easy to pull off that I try to land, there is a better combo involving a hp forward dash mk canceled into super but obviously need meter. So I stick with mashing c.lp into shower kick, which is about as safe as a rusty nail and does bugger all damage, but does seem to annoy people

oh and here is more on that Elf buff I was on about earlier

Dawgtanian: Fuerte was my original main, I'm putting extra care into his changes.

UltraDavid: Combos are great but any better midrange options?

Dawgtanian: How about st.MP xx Quesadilla Bomb?

UltraDavid: Quesadilla Bomb safe on block?

Dawgtanian: Not quite, but right now it is combo-able into with a st.MP which is huge for Fuerte.

UltraDavid: Alright yeah I can see "buffering" st. MP into button release! How far away can he be for that to work?

Dawgtanian: Right now, not max range but pretty good range. How vague does that sound lol.

Dawgtanian: Yeah, st.MP is actually quite good for that. Can also combo cr.MK xx Quesadilla Bomb too.

UltraDavid: I mean is Quesadilla Bmob itself fast enough to be be used as a whiff punisher?

Dawgtanian: It's not been sped up that much in all honesty, it's still got a rather long start up.

Dawgtanian: So… 2nd hit st.far HK, cr.MK xx Quesadilla Bomb

from here http://www.eventhubs.com/news/2013/jul/29/dawgtanian-el-fuerte-can-combo-standing-mp-and-crouching-mk-quesadilla-bomb-usf4-more-info-hugo-expected-next-month/

[Camel]

My fighting buddy came over last night to play Street Fighter, but we hardly touched it because Mount Your Friends is amazing. As are Hidden In Plain Sight, One Finger Death Punch and youtube clips of Silent Library.

Got Abel to B rank. Was having fun with his cr.hp x roll, hp juggle x roll resets.

I love Abel so much but I can never really get started with him and then when out of the blue a cr.HP suddenly hits I freeze up and do nothing.

So high level.

Focus taunting with that taunt where he slaps his face is awesome.

[Camel]

Also: Who is going to the Gamerdisco thing? I'm all set.

Also also: Hegg added me on Facebook, but I didn't accept his request for ages because I don't know his surname so I kept scrutinising the profile picture, not recognising the person in it at all and wondering if we'd met. I have definitely never met Yuri Gagarin

[JLM]

Haggs, I thought the same thing after I read the article and was therefore not fussed about responding to it. However, I then saw the writer getting extremely defensive in the comments and getting quite angry at people for suggesting that he's a casual observer who doesn't follow the scene/study the game closely.

[freezycold]

I gotta say I was getting very tired of seeing Daigo trading/FADCing into his ultra over and over and over.

[Camel]

Talking of Daigo - during his matches he often throws out a lk from the other side of the screen instead of a fireball and I was under the impression that this is to fool an opponent who might be listening to the clunking of his stick as a clue to when he is going to chuck a fireball. Sort of a dummy fireball move. Is that correct? It's just that I've noticed some people doing it online now and if that is the reason, then well, duh. But it's probably something else, right?

[ah]

SFO stuff you probably don't want to read:

Your match against Sprint was good. I thought it was going to be the one you lost but you adapted really well and stopped doing all the things I thought were going to get you killed (basically just walking into random stuff and neutral jump roundhouse getting consistently anti-aired), so that was good. He was doing some weird stuff, not sure if on purpose or just because he's only recently starting to use Cammy. I know I wouldn't have been able to adapt.

The Dom match was really fun right up until the veeery end! Fully aware of the risks of giving advice to a salty man, I'd say that next time I think you should do more [poke, poke, frametrap] and less [poke, poke, throw], because he was teching 80% of those, and getting hit by 80% of the frametraps once you started doing it more in the third game. And then I guess just don't choke it up in the final five seconds :-(

I have been playing other games. Rogue Legacy is pretty hateful. Fez isn't nearly hateful enough, though I just got stuck so maybe this is where it gets hateful. Strike Suit Infinity is somewhere in the middle, plus you get to fly spaceships around.

If anyone wants to play fighting games some time today, just let me know.

[ah]

Talking of Daigo - during his matches he often throws out a lk from the other side of the screen instead of a fireball and I was under the impression that this is to fool an opponent who might he listening to the clunking of his stick as a clue to when he is going to chuck a fireball. Sort of a dummy fireball move. Is that correct? It's just that I've noticed some people doing it online now and if that is there reason, then well, duh. But it's probably something else, right?

It works better in person because of the button noise (and the stick if you do the qcf motion too, because Ryu doesn't have a qcf+K special), but the st.LK motion can also look enough like fireball startup to fool a particularly skittish opponent into reacting online. Also some people do it just to remain active and keep the opponent thinking about as many different things as possible.

[IgTerminals]

If anyone wants to play fighting games some time today, just let me know.

I'm gonna be online in a couple of hours, bout 2-2:30.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

You'll also see daigo do st.lk a lot when he's cornered too. This is useful against characters like bipson, or akuma or other characters with decent low pokes, because it shrinks ryu's lower body hurtbox and their annoying low attacks whiff, which you can react to and punish or something I guess.

[Camel]

Cheers folks. All makes sense.

I got really bored of Fez really quickly.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

Could you say that your interest in it fezzled out?

[geldra]

Nah, he just wasn't fezzed.

[Camel]

Could you say that your interest in it fezzled out?

Yep. Just like that.

[JLM]

Yeah, the standing lk fireball feint still works online for sure. Alex Valle has a good one that only works in person where he'll get a hard knockdown with Ryu, jump over the opponent and then do quarter circle back + fierce punch. So the opponent sees/feels him inputting the cross up tatsu motion, blocks accordingly and then gets fierce punched in the face instead. So wily.

Re: Allystahnalysis:

I was chuffed to beat Sprint as Cammy is a horrid opponent for Chun. I noticed that he wasn't reacting to Chun's absurd walk speed and started exploiting it quite hard towards the end. I'm not used to Cammy players being good enough to consistently standing fierce neutral jumps (K Brad is extremely consistent at this) so it took a while to adjust to that.

I did need to do more frame traps against Domihy as he's a crouch tech monster. One of the reasons I didn't is that in one of my matches (possibly that one) I went for cr. jab - > close standing roundhouse counter hit set up and got far standing roundhouse instead and ate damage for it. When that happens to me in a set I tend to lose faith in my counter hit set ups and get extra tick throw happy.

I would love to see a change for Chun where close standing roundhouse still comes out when the opponent is a little further away. There is quite a large gap for Chun where far standing roundhouse is useless but will still come out if you press it. Alternatively it would be nice if close standing roundhouse was a back + roundhouse command normal to make sure you get it when you want it. It's a 4 frame move that's special cancellable and perfect for frame traps and I don't like being afraid to use it in high pressure situations. What I need to do, particularly against people who crouch tech, is have faith in Chun's walk speed and take an extra beat to step forward between the jab and the roundhouse, but it's not always easy to do that when nerves kick in.

Aside from that monumental choke against Domihy (could have done Super against the sweep, could have traded my U1 when he did random U2, could have not eaten a jump in for no reason etc. etc. etc.) I'm most annoyed about the round I lost against Ghost where he killed me with meaty low jab xx EX hands. I knew he was going to do it, went for EX SBK to take the round but ended up inputting it so hard that I moved my stick slightly and ended up getting hit instead. Bah.

I'm also a little bit salty that the stream worked fine this month but didn't during my much much better performance last time. Guess I'll just have to do better at the next one and have a stream archive to be proud of.

[Qazimod]

I haven't had much time to browse today so I've only just caught up with the Venturebeat article. It seems like quite a few people in the comment stream are a bit more clued-up than the writer...or they at least knew that many of the people making progress in the tournament didn't rely on the kind of projectile spam described in the article. Heck, if it was really that easy then everyone would be entering but the new tech discovered over the years has helped to make things like this year's Evo much more varied and interesting to watch. Like JLM says, it sounds more like a personal gripe the writer has than a fundamental flaw in the game.

[ah]

JLM, I think that's more a measure of the standard to which you're now holding yourself than anything else. But yes, by all means do even better next time!

[JLM]

I will do it for the sponsors!

Also if you are slightly less weighed down by chaotic house-movery then come down next time. It's looking like it'll be on the 1st of September in order to accomodate Loz and Benners. They were definitely missed this time; Benners being one of the top three or four players at SFO and Loz being one of my favourite tournament opponents and quite possibly the nicest man in Yorkshire.