Frame Data
I don’t think it’s critically important. You know what works just by playing the game really. Frame data won’t tell you anything mind blowing if you’ve taken the time to practice and see what moves do what and cancel into what, etc. Which will make you better much faster than looking at numbers.
like let blood run said, just play a lot and watch videos for ideas/examples of what is possible.
frame data matters a shit ton in 3s.
you think it doesn’t till that mp shoulder with yun gets your ass reversaled with chunner and ken and 6000 more examples
it’s because 3S has a much more liquid mental game than sf4. making a series of decisions in 3S has less to do with safe patterns (eg. a typical blockstring in sf4) and more to do with what your opponent would likely expect in the situation you’ve put them in. and that doesn’t depend as much on frame traps as it does on… mind traps, i guess. frame traps do exist in 3S but the two trap types coexist and it takes time before you get good at evaluating both kinds of situations at once. frame data is still needed for figuring out what’s punishable and what can combo, though.
btw i disagree with the person who said uppercuts are worse in 3S. in sf4 uppercuts trade like mad, even with jabs. uppercuts are harder to time in 3S and the other guy has more options to counter them (option select parries against single hit srks, air parry, etc) but the actual move properties are probably better in 3S imo.
Just want to reiterate because I’m not seeing a lot of this: Tier lists are pretty worthless. I would say nearly ever character in the game can compete against Top Tier. Alex isn’t a bad character at all, he just lacks a good crouching combo and a solid AA Special. But if Alex gets in on that ass he will buttfuck you. Necro is great too, a lot of great links into Super and Mind games. Only his Drill and Hooks suck when playing someone who’s awesome at parrying. Remy is kinda’ pushing it, his stamina and damage are fucking pitiful (literally two combos by someone like Dudley or Ken, and he’s dead) but he has a chance. Sean and 12 are the worst characters, but even then it’s possible to do well with them.
Someone made mention of third strike training mode? Wha??
I’m using the cps3 emu
While I don’t care much about tiers, I have to say that tiers do matter somewhat in this game… I at least believe powerhouses like Chun and Yun have a very big advantage over a lot of other characters. BUT tiers will almost never matter to a lot of us since we’ll be playing 3s at a level where tiers don’t make much of a difference. It is only at the much higher levels of play that top tier characters show just how much better they are over other characters (tournament results don’t lie, I don’t think I’ve ever seen an Alex win SBO). Then again, it is at these very high levels of play (in Japan, mostly) that we see players who’ve dedicated and spent a lot of time to exploring lower tier-characters able to beast top tier characters with those low tiers … But they’re a special exception, and a lot of us will never be able to master a character that well, not to mention the fact that most of the players who can beast with low-tier characters are just exceptional players in general (i.e. Kuroda, Hayao, YSB, etc).
It’s possible to be good with any character and beat top tier characters, but it just takes a whole lot more effort in your part.
You’ll come to fully understand the tiers as you progress in the game through learning the matchups. But for now, just focus on choosing which character you want to use and learn everything through experience. How well you do depends on how much time you want to put into it. MOV may use Chun, but he puts in a sick amount of time as if he’s learning a low-tier character.
You could say the same for all the characters. It takes a lot of work to be good with any of them… except for maybe Ken.
do you all really have to fill new people’s heads with tiers when he just started learning.
forget about tiers and understand the mechanics! and there is definite fastest way to do that.
if you learn ken you learn 3s. ken can do everything in the game that is there conceptually and will give you a strong understanding of what 3s is all about. after you have messed around with him enough to learn the mechanics and kinda see what they are about, play with everyone you find remotely interesting.
the case for learning ken first and then switching…
ken has : links to super (low strong, stand strong) , every type of 3s traditional ‘cancel’ confirm (short short, low forward, strong fierce target combo), reversal with super, strong poke game, good jumper, good crossups, good high low mixups, ability to capitalize off of pretty much any parry you get, good dash/back dash
basically learn ken hes got every trick in the 3s game book minus unblockables which you don’t need to worry about because only 3 characters have them and only one is really common.
with the skill set ken gives you, you can fairly easily transition that out to the cast member you like the most. and even if you end up playing a character who doesn’t confirm you will understand both the power and importance of it.
yeah honestly the tier discussion doesn’t do any good. its not like ssf4 players dont discuss tier lists too
Okay I know tier list discussion isn’t conducive here, but just for the sake of it:
Every character requires effort to be good with, but as the rule of tier lists go: 2 players of equal skill levels and potential put in 100 hours of practice into each of their respective characters. Player A uses Chun and Player B uses Sean. Player A would still beat Player B more often than the converse despite both of them being just as good as one another. A player using a lower tier character needs MORE effort (or more natural talent/potential) than a player using a top tier character. It’s just common sense really.
But for what it’s worth… Yeah, screw tiers. Just play the character that appeals to you the most.
Lostintheflurry definitely has a point with Ken, though. Shotos are always the easiest characters to start off with, and Ken is arguably the easiest and most effective Shoto in 3s.
Ken is easy to use at first, but pretty difficult to master.
Yeah pretty much. It’s very easy to cr.mk into super but that doesn’t mean you will ever land that on someone who knows what they’re doing. At least that’s how it always felt to me.
Personally though I would spend some time checking everyone out. You will learn a lot about the game as a whole, a lot about the characters you’ll be playing against (what they can do, how fast moves are, damage, etc) and probably find a character you have fun with. It might feel like it’s wasted time but it isn’t. Knowing your opponent is as important in 3S as in anything so knowing what every character has in their bag of tricks is necessary to knowing how to win.
Exactly, playing ken is more about knowing your opponent rather then the matchup, since everyone knows what you can do as ken already. Meaning you have to become better at reading.
Let me ask you folks…
So its no secret that 3s is sort of a niche segment in the fighting game community now. One of the reasons sf4 has ballooned exponentially (other than its lower barrier to entry) is just the access to the game. It’s everywhere and everything I need is easy to find. What do think will happen when (if) 3SO launches? There are so many people bitching in sf4 forums how horrible the game is but i wonder if the game will really see a mas exodus with a ps3/xbox playable version of 3s.
Second… how are 3s players quenching their thirst to play vs people. I’m NOT an arcade rat willing to pay 2 bucks a game just to lose and wait in line for another 30 min to play.
Yeah Ken was the character I had in mind despite the “hatred” that I’ve built up for shotos playing s/sf4. Shotos even though “high” on the tier list in 3s don’t seem as brain dead as they are to use in s/sf4.
Just the thing with other other “non-traditional” crapcom characters in 3s are just a bit of a turn off (q, necro, 12, etc)…
This is far from being even easy, unless you’re talking about punishment situations or to do it without confirming cr.mk.
Another thing that’s pretty cool about picking a supposed low-tier character, is that you can really go to town on people who don’t know that matchup. Case in point: Justin Wong vs Gamerbee.
No, that’s match ups.
…Exactly. I’m not just bullshitting randomly. He’s simply GOOD and not specifically awkward in any way. It’s not like learning Oro or Ibuki or Necro where they have relatively unique specials/command normals and other odd properties. The entry barrier is lower but that has nothing to do with using the character well. It just means less time learning the intricacies of a unique character and more time learning the properties of the game as a whole.
So no, hit confirming cr.mk to super isn’t an easy task against an opponent who understands the game but it was an example of Ken having easy to do/understand combos/confirms. We’re talking about someone who basically hasn’t touched the game. From that perspective I would say Ken and Ryu are definitely more friendly than a lot of the cast. So maybe it was a bad example if you want to be intensely picky but who cares. Start with a character that you can explore the game with and if you end up liking someone else you’ll have more generic knowledge in your pocket to begin learning someone else.