3s New Player FAQ // Directions -- START HERE

Super through it with Q. <3

It’s fun to use Yang’s command dash while the user is charging it and mind fuck the person.

Allright, so I think this game seems like alot of fun, but I fucking SUCK. I really want to make myself not suck, but I don’t really know how to. I mean, I practice combos in training mode on my Xbox, but I can’t seem to hit them at all when actually in a game.
When I’ve been practicing an easy combo in training mode for like 40-50 minutes I can do it pretty consistently, but it all disapears once in a real game. Do you guys have any tips to practice this or is it just for me to try to hit those combos until I do? When practicing combos ingame I just tend to lose and get frustrated, and while I do realize that losing is a part of the game and a part och improvement, it just doesn’t seem to get me anywhere in this case since I still never get a hang of those damn combos.
When playing games I usually develop a strong game sense pretty quickly, so I’m not as worried about that. What I’m struggeling with is mostly the technical part of the game.

Also I’m having a hard time settling for a main. Basically I want a pretty all-round character with good footsies. Would that make the shotos my main choices?
(I know you guys hate these kind of questions, but I don’t want to put a bunch of effort into a character just to discover that I don’t like playing it)

Thank you in advande, and happy fighting!

unfortunately, there’s no shortcut around the first problem. when you’re new to a fighting game, learning combos is hard, making decisions and defending in versus play is hard, and doing both at the same time (ie. real matches) is a nightmare because when it’s finally time to do a combo, you’re burned out on the other stuff that just happened so you botch it. continue practicing combos and playing in matches and you’ll eventually develop the ability to comfortably do both. the good news is, the combos in 3S are a lot shorter than what you might find in kof, arcsys games, and marvel. you just need a small set of combos to cover major situations and you’re good.

chun isn’t necessarily a well-rounded character, but she has the best footsies and has some of the smallest combos possible. you can kill two birds with one stone if you go that route. shotos are good too. yang, elena, and alex have alright footsies as well and are fairly easy to learn.

Alex has good footsies? What?

far mk is useful against some of the most commonly used pokes a new person will encounter (shoto c.mk, for one). c.mp is a decent poke. i did say “alright,” not good. it’s not that his footsies are great or that he has a wide variety of options therein, it’s that he provides some of the most understandable ways to see why pokes with decent priority are useful in common scenarios.

I’d suggest Elena, but every person I’ve seen who plays her tends to go into derp mode and completely forget about how good her pokes are.

Just go ryu/ken/yang tbh.

Elena’s cr mk is good, standing and back roundhouse are good, forward mk is good, she’s a fun character with good buttons. she also can usually hold her own with other good characters with good pokes which isn’t always the case for some characters.

she can also cr mp xx sa2 off a lot of situations where she just parried, so that’s cool too.

Thanks for the help guys. I think I’m gonna try Chun out to see if I like her. Otherwise I think I’ll go with Ken or possibly Yang.

What… How can anyone reccomend Alex to someone that has just started out …

Despite the fact that he isn’t a particularly good character. He is however, fairly simple to learn when compared to the rest of the cast.

  • Easy combos that do some pretty heavy damage
  • Offense-oriented
  • Big stun potential off of just a few mixups
  • Despite what many people may think, does have tools to get around basic BS
  • Decent big bursts of damage as opposed to bits and bits of small damage

Obviously the Alex player’s going to go through growing pains as he faces better opponents, but on a scrub-to-scrub level he’s an easy character to pick up and see visual results off the bat. The latter part of my last sentence is the reason KSK picked Alex in the first place.

well here is a simple ass question that has never occured to me till now.

you take more damage crouching, does this also count with chip damage?

KEN KEN KEN, the most well rounded character in the game.

and as a 3S player, its only inevitable that you will play him at some point so might as well start with him.

Everyone should play Ken IMO. If he’s not your main he should be one of your main side characters.

As much as people will hate me for saying so, I agree.

Why would they hate you for agreeing? He is what he is, and everybody will be able to benefit from playing him. There is seriously no reason why anyone should NOT try him out in 3S, and that whole “everyone plays Ken/Shotos” argument is BS.

That’s what I was refering to. Personally, I find shoto mirrors (especially ken ones) to be the most interesting in the game.

I usually go through periods were I mostly play the shotos for my alts for a couple of months. Then I stop playing them for awhile because I get bored with them. Ken has been my goto 2nd char for a long time, but I think Makoto is going to eventually usurp him lol.
Yeah, shoto mirrors are the shit tho.

3rd Strike is probably the only game where I actually love watching Ken mirrors, simply because there’s so little BS that can happen in it* compared to any other matchup. When you have two solid players using the most well-rounded character in the game, fun times will be had by all.

  • The exception is Deshiken vs K.O, and even then that match is so stupid that it’s entertaining.