Despite a general speed boost and a larger array of rushdown/semi-rushdown characters (Guy, Juri, Dee Jay, presumably the 3S cast), SSF4 will not be significantly different from vanilla 4 in terms of required fundamentals. Offense will be a bit faster-paced with the new speed tweaks, but the same defensive skills will apply. That means blocking crossups, teching throws, learning the spacing on dash-unders and Focus -> backdash anti-air (especially if he’s going to play Chun), and of course reading your opponent’s patterns – what do they do in a blockstring, and how do they try to get in on you? (You can learn many of the answers to these questions in the matchup forums. Even if you only play one character, you’ll have to gain at least a small understanding of the characters you expect to fight, particularly the common selections like Ryu, Balrog, Sagat, Zangief…)
If he needs to work on basic crossup/throw defense as described above, it’s probably more helpful to play against one skilled guy on your friends list for a marathon session rather than just gloryholing in Championship mode. Do a first-to-10 set or however long you want, just make sure the guy’s actually pretty good. Doing this against one guy with minimal character switching is better because that way your friend doesn’t have to stress remembering information for more than 1-2 matchups, and since he’s only playing against 1-2 characters by way of the same guy, he gets more slack to be experimental; to sit back and watch what the other guy does on offense/defense (especially good for learning throw teching/anti-air even if you’re getting stomped, because EVENTUALLY (although maybe not in that set) you’ll learn to predict what he’ll do in a given situation and how you can retake the initiative). Having learned the way out of this player’s blockstrings (and hopefully he did enough of his homework to punish at least stuff that’s super unsafe like blocked non-FADC’ed DPs and Ultras), he also gets a regular opponent against whom he can test his offense and footsies, learning about how to confuse his opponent’s reactions and impulses and use those to get free hits of his own. And even if he gets swept in the first of these sets (he probably will, that happens to everybody in his position), he will probably get some valuable (and hopefully polite!) info from his opponent about his major weaknesses and the things he was doing right. (Most players who will consent to play such “learning” sets with new players will extend this courtesy.)
Just make sure your friend is supplementing any sweepings he’s enduring with at least combo/blockstring practice in Training Mode and reading up on matchups in the Ryu/Chun-Li forums. He doesn’t need to be able to do anything really curly-mustache, but he definitely needs to learn the most damaging options he can consistently do against super-unsafe stuff like the aforementioned blocked DPs and Ultras.
If he’s going to stick with Ryu, he ought to learn Ryu’s jump fierce/roundhouse, low strong, low strong, low forward xx fireball or sweep links, as well as seeing what links he can do off of crouching LK. He should practice level 2/level 3 Focus combos without Ultra for dizzy combos/following up on a successful bait into Focus, and if there’s one Ultra juggle he NEEDS to learn to start, I’d say it should be trade anti-air DP -> Ultra, because even if he’s getting swarmed on he’ll at least have some chance to turn it around with a random SRK hit. (Right after that, he should probably learn the corner EX Hadoken -> Ultra juggle, because that’s fairly easy and that lets him get some good damage off an easy low forward xx EX Hadoken combo. He should also be practicing blocked DP -> FADC for pressure and tick throws out of his blockstrings. Take all this with a grain of salt because most of my Ryu experience comes from the other side of the matchup (namely, him ripping my Vega to shreds).
For Chun, he should learn c. LK x3 xx EX Lightning Legs first, because it’s one of the easiest BnBs in the game off one of the easiest links in the entire game. From there he should practice the Ultra juggle in the corner (and also to learn who drops out of it!), as well as making sure he can do her EX Legs BnB off jump fierce x2. He should learn how to move with an LP Kikoken out, how to roll the motion for a Hazan Shu while waiting for a fireball bait (you can wait a surprisingly long time after the motion to hit the button and the move will still come out, this is true of most half-circle specials in SF4), and where he can tick throw out of his blockstrings. Other than that, his focus in learning Chun will be on basic defense (since Chun’s EX SBK isn’t nearly as strong a reversal as moves like MP/HP SRK) and poking/footsie, which he’ll have to learn more or less in action (although he can test basic ranges by setting the dummy to do one normal over and over again to learn what he can counter-sweep/stand fierce and what have you).
It would probably be helpful here to know which of his two characters he’s most confident with (doesn’t matter how powerful he thinks they are, which one does he feel he could play the best at with practice?) and focus on only one of them to start. With Ryu vs. Chun, I’d say it’s more a question of mobility vs. firepower – is he more confident with being able to walk around really fast and manage his range easily with a fireball by way of Chun-Li, or prefer Ryu’s slightly tougher hide, stronger reversals (and the options they set up), and higher damage at the cost of some mobility? (I don’t think the answer’s very slanted towards Ryu at all; having a character who walks hella fast can really help people learn how to establish their ranges for footsies and quickly transition from poking to offense if they get a good look.)
Also, what part of Florida are you in? You mentioned the big summer Orlando tournament, but are you guys closer to Orlando than anywhere else? As long as you’re near one of the major Florida hubs (Orlando, Miami, Tampa, Jax, Tallahassee, Daytona), there’s got to be people in your area you can meet up with in person to learn the game. This is something you really ought to consider for the reasons I mentioned in my first post. Learning the game face-to-face with people who share your interest in the game can be a lot less frustrating than trying to learn the game online.
