Ultra Street Fighter 4 Discussion Thread

GorySnake

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

I have never, EVER seen an Adon punish Sonic Boom with Ultra 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkqkLzLdlyo

@ 1:48

Fergus_

^

Disgusting

Danonino.

Azza wrote: »

Latest Tier list from Arcadia magazine.
S (Cammy, Fei-Long, Seth, Adon)

A (Ryu, Vega, Sagat, Viper, Rufus, Ibuki ,Makoto, Juri)

B (Ken, Honda, Zangief, Guile, Dhalsim, Balrog, Bison, Abel, Gouki, Sakura, Rose, Gen, Dee Jay, Dudley, Cody, Yun, Yang, Evil Ryu, Oni)
　
C (Chun-Li, Blanka, El Fuerte, Gouken)

D (Dan, Hakan)

E (T.Hawk)

Super hidden ninja tier (Guy)

Also some opinions from top Jap players.
Mago: Cammy, Fei, Ryu, Seth, Adon can be said to be the five strongest, although there is no clear separation between them and the rest. Ibuki, Gouki, Sakura, Makoto and Rufus are almost as strong as them. Sagat, Abel and Viper are pretty strong too.

Tokido: Seth, Gouki, Fei and Cammy are the best characters.

Fuudo: Fei, Adon, Gouki and Seth are the top characters. Cammy too.

Guy... super ninja...
:rolleyes:

I could use some advice in choosing a main. I seem to have a love hate relationship with this game, but I haven't played regularly in about 12 or 18 months now, and i miss street fighter, so am planning to try to get some practice in and visit a casuals or two in the next few weeks to get beaten to a pulp (but hopefully learn something and have some fun).

I'm trying to decide who to put time into (re)learning. When i was playing 4 more often a while back, i mained ryu (i know, groan) and deejay in super and Arcade Edition before the 2012 update hit, with a little bit of Bison, who i mained solidly in older games. Ive since decided bison is just not for me in 4, as his SFIV iteration just doesn't suit my playstyle, and he's limited in terms of advanced motions FADC, etc. I also liked akuma for his massive versatility and mobility, but felt his health and damage sucked too much to make him a runner for me, particularly if i made a mistake and fell behind on life(which i often do:D). It seems too easy to play defensively and keepaway in 4, and chasing a lead from behind sucks. Also Evil Ryu and in particular Oni in AE seemed very versatile, but i never got much experience with them before i stopped playing regularly.

I notice from the most recent tier lists after the 2012 balance patch that ryu seems to be solid A tier, and a lot of the shotos are bunched in there too, as well as deejay, who i love playing with, but who never seemed competitive at all in this game. The A tier in general seems rammed with very many wide-ranging characters, which is probably good for the game's overall balance.

So my question is, for someone who likes a versatile character, firebally, not too attack oriented, but not extremely limited defensively either, and capable of playing mixup and mind games and being as mobile as possible around the stage, who should i opt for as a main to get back into the game?

My feeling is to go with a shoto, first of all, because chargers seem more limited in terms of FADC and the more advanced stuff, and also because they are more interchangeable based on matchups and stuff, and there's loads of them in the roster now. Also, i like the look of Oni, he seems to have a lot of options that might suit me. My first instinct is to go with ryu, because I'm probably most comfortable with him in IV, and maybe use akuma or oni as an alt, or maybe E.Ryu, but i'm wondering whether i'm at a disadvantage, as Ryu players are so common and he's more likely to have been figured out fully by now.

Also, is it just me or has he jumped up the rankings since the 2012 update? I don't remember him being regarded as top of the A tier, but it's been a while since i was paying any attention....

Any pointers on who might be a good option to pick up for v.2012 would be appreciated.

FutureGuy

I played Ryu for ages but switched to DeeJay about 18 months ago. I have more fun with DeeJay and do better online with him than Ryu but I don't do as well in tounaments with DeeJay.

If I were you, I'd probably just learn a shoto. Ryu is the obvious choice but, as you said, everyone knows how to play against him. I have seen some great Oni players so you could give him a go.

I'd be happy to have some games with you.

UberPrinny_Baal

@Mackdaddi:

Juicebox Abel actually did a really great series of podcasts, one of them was specifically about picking your character. I tried to find you the link, but it looks like he either left BLG, or they're not hosting his old content anymore. Anyone have a working link to his stuff?

You can pretty much pick characters because their style of play suits you (the "right" way), or because you like their design/personality (the "wrong" way). I picked up Deejay for the latter reason.

You should try and work out what exactly you liked about all the different characters you played. Strong offense, rushdown, keep away, mix-ups, high health, command grabs etc
Different chars are better or worse at different things, and if you knew more concretely what you liked, you'ld find it easier to pick a main.

What characters people play within the community is also a consideration:

If you pick a character nobody plays, you might get some wins based on novelty, but you won't have anyone you can learn character specific things from. If you become good with that char, it can help the Irish scene overall by giving people experience against a rare character.

If you pick a fairly common character, you might improve faster at casuals, but get frustrated by losing all the time. For example we have 3 good Akuma players, so if you picked up Akuma, you have excellent knowledge resources to draw on; but you can expect to lose a lot of matches as everyone else is used to playing better Akumas than you.

FutureGuy

FutureGuy wrote: »

I played Ryu for ages but switched to DeeJay about 18 months ago. I have more fun with DeeJay and do better online with him than Ryu but I don't do as well in tounaments......

I'd be happy to have some games with you.

Yeah, deejay is loads of fun to use, but seems to get walked on by a lot of the cast. I used to main him in older versions, so he was a natural choice for me in 4. I thought his wakeup game sucked in this though, which was a big change, but he's tricky up close which i love. It's a lot of fun forcing mistakes out of people with fakeouts, high lows, crossups, etc, and he has some lovely combos. I found myself cheesing a lot of wins online with him (especially with that lovely EX sobat kick), but i couldn't help thinking he was missing something in terms of big bread and butter punishes like a lot of the shotos have with their FADC stuff...

Oni is definitely on my list to check out too.

I'd be happy to play some games with you on XBL, but i really couldn't promise when i'd be online. Probably for an hour or two an occasional weekend or once in a blue moon during the week. I'm getting very little gaming time lately because of work and family commitments, and arranging set times to play online is nigh on impossible. Thats kinda part of the reason i'm planning to go to to a couple of casuals more regularly, so that i can block off a few hours just to play without interruptions.

Nevertheless, PM me your XBL gamertag and i'll add you. Hope to play against you soon.

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

@Mackdaddi:

Juicebox Abel actually did a really great series of podcasts, one of them was specifically about picking your character. I tried to find you the link, but it looks like he either left BLG, or they're not hosting his old content anymore. Anyone have a working link to his stuff?

That would be excellent, if anyone has a link it'd be much appreciated.

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

You can pretty much pick characters because their style of play suits you (the "right" way), or because you like their design/personality (the "wrong" way). I picked up Deejay for the latter reason.

You should try and work out what exactly you liked about all the different characters you played.

Yeah, i have always tried to approach picking characters with the "right way" mentality, and i usually try to make sure they are somewhere in the upper tiers too. I know what i like in a character (good mixups and tricky stuff, good fireball games, good offence & rushdown and especially mobility to get around zoning, but preferably not too much of this that it's at the expence of defence) but having said that, i don't enjoy going for characters with all that, but with such poor life and vitality that they can't afford to go behind at all or they'll never catch up, especially in SFIV.

I love playing with akuma, but i just found his general lack of damage output and vitality meant that in order to keep up with him i needed to take a lot of execution risks and go for big damage every time. Every opening had to be a big damage combo or punish, or you just ended up not keeping up in the health department, and the execution demands of that were quite tough, even frustrating at times for me. I think i settled on Ryu because he has a bit of everything, and it's easy to play a bit safe with him but still get decent damage by using solid zoning and good bread and butter combos.

I am the kinda guy that will retain position and advantage and take a decent low risk 3 or 4 hit combo, over taking a risk on a bigger damage one, but possibly fluffing it and putting myself in a much worse position tactically. Spacing and position is key for me. I suppose if i had a wishlist for what makes up a charactwer, it would be ryu, and his good fireball and anti air game, maybe with a little more mobility and mixup trickiness at the expense of some of the power or the really massive high execution combos.

Would be very interested to hear if there's a character that anyone feels would fit that bill, as I'll definitely check them out.

Doctor DooM

A lot of Sf4 characters have sucky wake up.

You're not going to find a perfect character, if there was one you'd have the situation you're complaining about in the other thread for 3S

Deejay is the best he's been since SSF4 in 2012, he's been buffed and buffed but he's pants on wake up on purpose. You just have to learn to deal with it: He has a psuedo vortex, an awesome AA slide, some good normals (his 2 hit st mk which destroys focus, knee shot, nj hp, all gdlk) a good projectile and an AA special which annihilates the cross up game. The price for all that is that he's got no safe reversal on wake up. If upkicks hit low and could be FADCed, he'd be an unstoppable beast.

I still think he's worse than Guile as a character, but the gap is way, way closer than in Super.

That all being said... Ryu IMO is the closest you'll get to a perfect character. 3 frame FADCable reversal, easy ultra set ups, mix up potential, good damage, option selects, safe jumps on a load of the cast, a decent ranged defensive game and one of the best pokes in the game (cr mk). Yet he has average stun and health unlike other characters which the same good be said of (Akuma et al). I personally have more fun playing Ryu than I do virtually any other char in the game, I'm just not particularly good with him

UberPrinny_Baal

I'd avoid Deejay Mackdaddi, I like the char, but I don't think he's very good.

Do a google search for the Juicebox Abel podcasts, and let me know how you get on. I dunno was anyone else as big a fan of them as me; but if you can't find them pm me, I can sort you out with the .mp3 files at some point

Doctor DooM wrote: »

Deejay is the best he's been since SSF4 in 2012, he's been buffed and buffed

Not actually true. This is discussed fairly heavily on SRK, and although the Deejay buffs are nice, he's lost some things along the way as well.

A lot of very high level Deejays swear they would happily swap AE2012 Deejay for Super Deejay, so they can get back the unthrowable state on LK sobat.

It weakened his already bad wakeup even more, and made matches versus command grab chars even worse.

Doctor DooM

Doctor DooM wrote: »

A lot of Sf4 characters have sucky wake up...You're not going to find a perfect character, if there was one you'd have the situation you're complaining about in the other thread for 3S

All very solid points. I can't really argue. There's no point in overpowering one character, as you say, we've been there before, and from what i've read, concensus is that 2012 is quite well balanced. Just by looking at the most recent couple of tier lists, the bulk of the cast seems to be bunched in tightly around the second and third tiers. That itself is a very solid achievement for such a large cast.

Doctor DooM wrote: »

Deejay is the best he's been since SSF4 in 2012, he's been buffed and buffed but he's pants on wake up on purpose. You just have to learn to deal with it:

Yeah, again, i can't argue, especially if he was buffed since i played him, an easy/safe wakeup reversal would make him deadly, and probably too good overall. I'm really looking forward to trying him out again now. He was loads of fun as it was, even before his buffs.

Is there anywhere in the game itself that takes the new changes into account? have any of the trials or anything like that been patched to take account of the new move properties or is it just a case of googling for them?

Doctor DooM wrote: »

That all being said... Ryu IMO is the closest you'll get to a perfect character....I personally have more fun playing Ryu than I do virtually any other char in the game, I'm just not particularly good with him

Me too, i think. It's unfortunate as everybody sees so much of him and knows well how to play against him, but i have noticed that he suits my play style very well and i have a lot of fun with him, more than most of the cast. I'll probably check out Oni and E.Ryu too, but i can see myself drifting back towards Ryu and Deejay unless someone else has a lot to offer.

Has Ryu become the new ken in 2012? Seems like there's a lot of Ryu scrub hate going on on the forums. Are there Ryu scrub flowcharts now??

EDIT:

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

I'd avoid Deejay Mackdaddi, I like the char, but I don't think he's very good.....A lot of very high level Deejays swear they would happily swap AE2012 Deejay for Super Deejay, so they can get back the unthrowable state on LK sobat.

Ah nuts, that means that command grab characters will own him in close and on wakeup now, moreso. That will change the go-to tactics for him a lot, it's quite a nerf. I'll muck around and see how i do.

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

Do a google search for the Juicebox Abel podcasts, and let me know how you get on. I dunno was anyone else as big a fan of them as me; but if you can't find them pm me, I can sort you out with the .mp3 files at some point

I googled and came up with this

The podcasts seem to have missing files. Boo

UberPrinny_Baal

Deleted User wrote: »

Is there anywhere in the game itself that takes the new changes into account? have any of the trials or anything like that been patched to take account of the new move properties or is it just a case of googling for them?

No, you're going to have to do your own homework. The SRK wiki is probably your best bet. This is a personal beef I have with the SF4 series. As much as I like it, the tutorials are shockingly poor, especially compared to way less popular titles like Blazblue.

As it currently stands if you go into AE2012 trials, your game will regress back two version the Super SF4. So you have no way of knowing if anything there works anymore for the existing cast, and there's nothing for Yun/Yang/Oni/E.Ryu at all.

Deleted User wrote: »

Has Ryu become the new ken in 2012? Seems like there's a lot of Ryu scrub hate going on on the forums. Are there Ryu scrub flowcharts now??

This shouldn't matter. Whether it is true or not today, it might not be that way tomorrow. The fighting game community is prone to random flights of character hate.

Only two chars I hear a lot of hate for consistently are Seth and Viper, who seem to be generally agreed as the two best in the game.

UberPrinny_Baal

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

No, you're going to have to do your own homework. The SRK wiki is probably your best bet

Ah nuts. So, SRK...we meet again.

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

Only two chars I hear a lot of hate for consistently are Seth and Viper, who seem to be generally agreed as the two best in the game.

Yeah, but Seth really is a dick

Ramza

Seth is so cheap

Hence why I now play him

UberPrinny_Baal

Ramza wrote: »

Seth is so cheap

Hence why I now play him

Makes sense, AND he looks and moves like a robot version of Urien.

Was poor Yang not doing it for you?

Doctor DooM

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

Not actually true. This is discussed fairly heavily on SRK, and although the Deejay buffs are nice, he's lost some things along the way as well.

A lot of very high level Deejays swear they would happily swap AE2012 Deejay for Super Deejay, so they can get back the unthrowable state on LK sobat.

It weakened his already bad wakeup even more, and made matches versus command grab chars even worse.

I guess I'd not noticed, as he's effectively the same as Guile in that situation now. You HAVE to guess when a grappler knocks you down. That's the cost of strong zoning. The task is not letting him get near you!

Deleted User wrote: »

Only two chars I hear a lot of hate for consistently are Seth and Viper, who seem to be generally agreed as the two best in the game.

A lot of people hate Viper because there's a serious amount of brain off stuff going on there. I played her for a while against some friends and my burn kicks were 50/50 because I was so bad at timing, not because I was placing them.

As a matter of interest, Deejay relatively owns Viper. No burn kick dicheadry for her.

But by and large, who you hear people complaining about is character dependant. In the Guile forum you will enounter complaints about Blanka, Chun, Akuma, Sim, Fuerte, Viper, Seth and Ibuki.

You will notice most of these characters have strong games after a knock down... (with the exception of Sim, he's there for another reason).

Whereas in the Honda forum it's all Guile, Deejay and Chun... who all zone well.

Ramza wrote: »

Seth is so cheap

Hence why I now play him

Must get some practice, I have zero against a decent Seth.

Ramza

Ramza wrote: »

Seth is so cheap

Hence why I now play him

Nothing wrong with that. I get told i'm cheap because i heart throws. As far as I'm concerned, whatever wins is fair game, and people who complain just need to suck it up and train harder.

Besides, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em...

blag

Deleted User wrote: »

Nothing wrong with that. I get told i'm cheap because i heart throws. As far as I'm concerned, whatever wins is fair game, and people who complain just need to suck it up and train harder.

Besides, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em...

At least people don't get as whiney over throws in SF4 compared to ST/HDR :pac: , I miss Bison's st lk tick throws

blag

blag wrote: »

At least people don't get as whiney over throws in SF4 compared to ST/HDR :pac: , I miss Bison's st lk tick throws

Absolutely. I LOVE R.Bison's.throw game. St. Lk into throw, fake slide into throw, Fake Headstomp into throw, so many great sneaky shenanigans. Loads of fun.

I wish he was more like his old ST/HDR counterpart in IV, I love the high risk, high reward mind games stuff.

animaX

Deleted User wrote: »

Absolutely. I LOVE R.Bison's.throw game. St. Lk into throw, fake slide into throw, Fake Headstomp into throw, so many great sneaky shenanigans. Loads of fun.

I wish he was more like his old ST/HDR counterpart in IV, I love the high risk, high reward mind games stuff.

If you like shenanigans, rufus is a good choice!

Fergus_

If you like cheapness,

Cammy is a good choice!

Ramza

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

Makes sense, AND he looks and moves like a robot version of Urien.

Was poor Yang not doing it for you?

Hahah yeah

Nope Yang still my main for now, just trying this dickhead of a character out for a while

Holycrap. I just checked out some of deejay's new buffs for ver 2012. Some of the new cancels and hit confirms he got look excellent. Is his super turbo bread and butter combo (Crossup J.Mk, cr.lp, cr.lp, St.Mp xx HK sobat) now do-able in 2012?

Also his standing heavy kick cancelling looks seriously handy. J.Hk, St.Hk xx Super xx Ultra 1 looks insane. Something like 690 damage or 200 chip.

200 chip? :eek:

A blocked hk sobat xx super xx ultra from well outside sweep range would be enough to close out a tight round for deejay. That's mad, considering how hard it would be to react to.

The buffs and the big nerf (lk sobat) he's had since super would seem to have turned him into a very keepaway, zoning based character with a few good surprise attack options, but absolute muck up close and on knockdown. It seems to me that he can keep you out all day, with slides and fireballs and random pokes, and surprise you with sobats and EX sobats (love them!), but if you get in and score a knockdown on him or corner him he's in a lot of trouble, and basically needs a lucky guess to escape.

Am i right?

chopperbyrne

Ramza wrote: »

Hahah yeah

Nope Yang still my main for now, just trying this dickhead of a character out for a while

Drop Yang, play Seth, win money.

Doctor DooM

Deleted User wrote: »

The buffs and the big nerf (lk sobat) he's had since super would seem to have turned him into a very keepaway, zoning based character with a few good surprise attack options, but absolute muck up close and on knockdown. It seems to me that he can keep you out all day, with slides and fireballs and random pokes, and surprise you with sobats and EX sobats (love them!), but if you get in and score a knockdown on him or corner him he's in a lot of trouble, and basically needs a lucky guess to escape.

Am i right?

I wouldn't say he's muck after scoring a knockdown (psuedo vortex is an option) but yeah I play him very defensively.

chopperbyrne wrote: »

Drop Yang, play Seth, win money.

With all due respect to Ramza, I have waaay more fear of his Yang than his seth!

UberPrinny_Baal

Deleted User wrote: »

200 chip? :eek:

A blocked hk sobat xx super xx ultra from well outside sweep range would be enough to close out a tight round for deejay. That's mad, considering how hard it would be to react to.

The buffs and the big nerf (lk sobat) he's had since super would seem to have turned him into a very keepaway, zoning based character with a few good surprise attack options, but absolute muck up close and on knockdown. It seems to me that he can keep you out all day, with slides and fireballs and random pokes, and surprise you with sobats and EX sobats (love them!), but if you get in and score a knockdown on him or corner him he's in a lot of trouble, and basically needs a lucky guess to escape.

Am i right?

Yeah you're fairly correct.

As far as I'm aware you only get the 200 chip of an LK sobat -> Super -> Ultra. I'm not sure if this is just because (1) MK/HK sobat do less chip (2) are not a true blockstring (3) Aren't easily cancelable at safe ranges (4) Other reasons

I did have a case in casuals yesterday where Doyler got out of the 200 chip blockstring between LK Sobat and Super because the sobat was done from too far away (we think), so I imagine it's range dependent. Therefore you're not gonna be 200 damage chipping anyone from outside of sweep range, you need to be right in their faces (I think).

Keep in mind as well that Deejay gets great milage out of his meter, but if you think you're going to want to end out the round with Super->Ultra, you need to consciously NOT spend it. From what I've seen on other forums, U2 is the "Spend meter" Ultra, and U1 is the "Save meter" ultra. The playstyles that go with them are more drastic than just the ultra choice itself. EX-MGU into dash U2 is incredible damage, but the execution barrier is high enough that even really good Deejays aren't willing to attempt it in tournament settings.

Everything I say is with the caveat that I haven't spent much time practicing with 2012 DJ as AE was a fairly disheartening time.

Deejay SRK forums are a better place for questions this specific.

UberPrinny_Baal

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

Keep in mind as well that Deejay gets great milage out of his meter, but if you think you're going to want to end out the round with Super->Ultra, you need to consciously NOT spend it.

Yeah, that's the first thing I thought of when I read the change list. It's cool and all, but I'll probably never get to do it, I burn meter like a madman with deejay, his ex moves are all way more valuable and do far more for his overall game than EITHER of his ultras. I generally pick his ultra 1 and it rarely gets used.

Doctor DooM wrote: »

I wouldn't say he's muck after scoring a knockdown (psuedo vortex is an option) but yeah I play him very defensively

Sorry, what's a pseudo vortex? Is that a fancy name for something I already know how to do, or is there a wake up option for him I don't know about?

chopperbyrne

Doctor DooM wrote: »

With all due respect to Ramza, I have waaay more fear of his Yang than his seth!

For now, he's a good enough player to win tournaments if he properly learns Seth.

UberPrinny_Baal

UberPrinny_Baal wrote: »

I did have a case in casuals yesterday where Doyler got out of the 200 chip blockstring between LK Sobat and Super because the sobat was done from too far away (we think), so I imagine it's range dependent. Therefore you're not gonna be 200 damage chipping anyone from outside of sweep range, you need to be right in their faces (I think)

I just got some time in training mode (woohoo, finally) and I was pulling this off from well outside sweep range with a HK sobat. I'm not sure about it on block yet, but the HK sobat was cancelling to super from nearly half a screen away, and it was a fairly easy/fast cancel. As long as I had the right spacing for the first knee to contact I could cancel no probs, and quickly too. I think I was getting about 5 hits on the super before I couldn't cancel to the ultra anymore.

Must check it out on block. It's a nifty little combo, but probably not likely I'll ever have enough meter saved up to do it.

Sairus

Random fact of the day: Super Street Fighter 4 has a cash trade in value of €2.50 in HMV. Vanilla Street Fighter 4 has a cash value of €7.00 :pac:

UberPrinny_Baal

Deleted User wrote: »

I just got some time in training mode (woohoo, finally) and I was pulling this off from well outside sweep range with a HK sobat. I'm not sure about it on block yet, but the HK sobat was cancelling to super from nearly half a screen away, and it was a fairly easy/fast cancel. As long as I had the right spacing for the first knee to contact I could cancel no probs, and quickly too. I think I was getting about 5 hits on the super before I couldn't cancel to the ultra anymore.

That's good to know, I should play around with it more.

FYI you can do the Ultra pretty much immediately once the super comes out, and it will auto-cancel into the Ultra at the appropriate time. It looks quite bizarre, as you can have your hands off your controller for a good 2 seconds and the Ultra will still come out.

Important point is that unless you cancel it in this way, it isn't a true blockstring and can be mashed out of.

EDIT

Deleted User wrote: »

Sorry, what's a pseudo vortex? Is that a fancy name for something I already know how to do, or is there a wake up option for him I don't know about?

A vortex is where a character knocks you down, then on your wake-up forces you to make a guess from a wide range of options, and if you guess wrong they reset the situation and do it again.

Akuma, Seth, Ibuki and a lot more characters have proper vortexs where they make you guess against air attacks, cross-ups, command grabs etc etc

Deejay doesn't have a "vortex", he really just has his cross-up shenanigans, but it seems like people really liked the word and started using it for all characters. To be honest I think some people started using it sarcastically for Deejay, and other people didn't realise the intent and that's how it caught on.

Doom is only saying "pseudo vortex" to echo the opinion that's it not a proper vortex, which it isn't.