"Ain't my style!" Paul General Discussion Thread

Classic Fighting Games Street Fighter x Tekken
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Lol. I am pretty sure I asked you that question a few months ago and forgot about it. I probably also said “all my Smasher has is a really nice cross roll setup with a Raze followup,” so I think I should start using your idea myself. How does it fare against rolls? Do you think it will be removed once Raze’s trajectory changes post-patch? If Paul has a safe jump from there, does that mean he has one off of a post-launch launcher (harder to do I suppose since it is techable).

This reminded me of a question I had: when are the best times to jump with Paul? For ages I just used jumps on oki/jump in attempts when my footsies were not working, but now I realize the obvious that you should use them after certain blockstrings where you have frame advantage. What are some of Paul’s good strings to do these on, particularly ones that put him in cross up range?

Of course I noticed the gem, I dig my gems (and have been using the same one on Paul since its release). I’ll update the gem topic soon once I play with the new ones, but there are so many solid choices now I think a lot of it changes depending on Paul’s partner.

Oh, played my first Online matches in months last night and I actually won (admittedly to a “new to sfxt” d rank who used selected random)! A bit depressing though, since it made me realize that try as I may to avoid, Nina will always carry me and be my best character, and her synergy with Paul is very poor. And if I had to decide between the two, Nina does have that new alt…

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First of all, in order for the safe jump to work the opponent has to quick stand, and mountain raze will always give a soft knockdown.

[media=youtube]g9fs8N4gLE0[/media]

As you can see the safe jump won’t work against 3frame reversals. But it’s not so bad since only Ken, Ryu and akuma have a 3frame reversals.

Getting a soft knockdown is IMO more important than a hard knockdown, cause hard knockdowns always give the opponent the ability to roll forward so you always have to gamble whether he’s gonna stand still or roll forward.
So in that regard I’ll always try to avoid hard knockdowns and hope for my opponent to quick stand. Most people tend to quick stand, whenever they are able to, and press buttons (invincible reversals) cause they don’t like to defend and get pressured all the time.

It depends how much they changed it, I could safe jump some reversals with MK mountain raze but definitely not all. But it’s not THAT big of a problem if it wouldn’t work anymore, it’s the soft knockdown that matters. You can still bait reversals with an empty jump afterwards.

It really depends on the matchup and on the options of your opponent.
Paul cannot footsie properly because of his slow walkspeed and normals. So the only way for you to get your game going is by jumping on your opponent, problem is that some characters are just impossible to jump on, like Ryu, Cody, Marduk, Juri etc.
Their AA’s are way too good so all the jumps that you’ll be doing against them are going to be based on reads.
So when you’re fighting against these people just change to your secondary character, your secondary is gonna do all the footsie work, and tag Paul in whenever you have a hit.

The best way to jump with Paul is, just like u said after blockstrings, when you have a lot of frame advantage. Paul his jump arc is a bit lower than most characters and his jump MK is a great cross up, so by ‘spamming’ jab and crossing them up all the time you’re putting your opponent in an awkward position, the only way for them to get rid of your pressure is by jumping back and attacking you in the air.
A lot of people like to do reversals after you crossed them up so do be aware of that and try to bait it.

@hellnova
About Paul his cl.MP, make sure that your jump is deep enough, because it has the tendency to get stuffed by jabs.

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It depends with who you’re strongest with.

  • Rog is really strong up close, he suffers full/midscreen because his dash punches are ass now. He’s still a better footsie character than Paul and he also has better AA’s but he can’t really fill all the weaknesses Paul has.
  • Sakura, I have no information about her, but if she’s like SF4 then it is pretty much the same scenario as Rog, same game plan as Paul but simply better.
  • Poison is imo the best choice. She’s an all around character, she can handle pressure pretty easily, she can zone pretty good, has far reaching normals, great AA’s. She’s the perfect fit and she doesn’t really has to rely on Paul if she doesn’t want to cause you can play her defensively AND offensively.
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Thanks much for all the info Ralenzo! I find it interesting that, in spite of Paul’s “braindeadness” when you get down to specifics we actually play him rather differently. I much prefer hard knockdowns to soft ones, because in the latter they have 3 methods of getting up and in the former only 2. I’ve also learned a lot of strong setups against rollers so I am actually at an advantage when enemies do it. Of course ideally one should mix up both: as the more hard knockdowns you follow up with good oki, the more they are willing to tech when they get the chance.
If you have not seen Vulcan_Hades’ oki guide I highly recommend it, and although it is not a Paul guide specifically it has about a dozen setups for him in it.

Additionally, besides hard knockdowns my game with Paul revolves around entirely around getting the enemy to the corner with Smasher combos and roll resets (Nina has amazing carry too so that’s one point of synergy), where Paul benefits from increased combo damage, gives more ground for a zoning partner to walk back, stronger option selects, and an opponent even more likely to roll. Maybe if we make our Pauls do a fusion dance we can come up with something special…

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I like that fusion idea :smiley:
My way of getting my opponent to the corner is probably a lot slower than you, but I am succesful tho :stuck_out_tongue:
Still I’m gonna watch that oki video of vulcanhades, I know the guy because my brother is a hardcore yoshimitsu fan (and pretty strong too, even if I do say so myself :P), but I don’t recall watching an oki video of vulcan, so that’s the first thing I’m gonna do now.

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Well yes, you are certainly the more successful player, for now anyway…mwahahaa. just thought I’d share some of my own things and see if you’d like to incorporate them. For instance, after a smasher doing mk Raze puts you in optimal df.HK/f.mp/st.mk range and on roll you are in their face on the same side, but if you hk raze on their roll you end up behind them as a kind of KoF crossup. Similar raze things can be done on his throws, and on Sweep followups the move corpse hops, so they either hold the same direction and do not roll or are forced to roll backwards ie to the corner.
Also if you time df.HK properly on a roll, Paul will instead do afusion meaty sweep in the opposite direction (and once rolls are punishable I think this might always work! Thanks to zukuu for that one).

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I know most of the setups, I’ve been using Mountain Raze after phoenix smasher myself, I think everyone does to tell the truth. But I stopped doing it after I found myself having more success rate with just using mountain raze into safe jump etc.
I just watched vulcan his video but didn’t learn a lot, most of the things he explained sounded like basic knowledge. I’ve been playing fighting games for quite some time now so I’m not that surprised. But still, it can never hurt to revision everything once in a while, u might catch something that u may have forgotten :smiley:

Yes I may look like the more successful player but that’s just because I am experienced, been playing fighting games since I was a little kid and started playing it seriously when SSF4 came out. I also have a really strong sparring partner (my brother) who always finishes top 8 in tournaments, so that’s probably why I’m having an easier time than others.
And Paul is not an easy character to be effective with, he’s pretty weak so in order to be good with him you kinda have to be a great player yourself. He has no reliable AA or reversals so your defense has to be on point, you also have to make good reads and bait properly, you kinda always have to outplay your opponent, cause when you’re picking Paul you’re basically giving yourself an handicap. And that’s partly the reason why I never dropped him, even though I’m a character loyalist, I also like giving myself challenges.

Still the most successful player imo is the one who has level upped the most, and I’m pretty sure that you Samuel are much stronger than you were at the beginning, so in that way my friend, it is you who are far more successful :wink:

And btw don’t think that I’m not listening to your advice or anything, I’m pretty sure that in the future, everytime I’m gonna play SFxTK, I’m gonna start hearing your words in back of my mind. “push him to the corner!!” “now, go for a meaty demolition man !” “no what did u do, mountain raze after phoenix smasher, not scissor kick!!” :smiley:

ps: what’s your psn ? I think we should spar sometime :slight_smile:

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I’d love to if my internet allows it. I super upgraded it last month (I think I only had good connections with those on my block before), but it might not stretch the Atlantic. PSN:QuackendriverV.

Must be nice having such a close sparring partner. One of my issues with fighters is that none of my friends play them because it is a time sink, and having cruddy online for years meant I was never really able to play them like I wanted to.

Don’t worry I know you aren’t ignoring it, I just like sharing tactics and having other players go “yeah those don’t suck,” and they can always help others looking at the forum.

Paul is a bit of a handicap. There’s a small counterbalance in that you don’t need to learn crazy combos or links to play him effectively, but even so I am wondering if I should level up with others first then come back to Paul post-patch.

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Why don’t we make a chatroom on psn called Team OSU!! or something and invite all psn Paul players to it for sparring and Paul talk lol.

I was involved in something similar with psn Team Akuma for SSF4 and it was pretty successful. I guess it depends how many active Paul Players there are.

I tend to be on XBL more often but I do play on psn.

I’ve been messing around in training with the Raze setup after Smasher. After a hk Raze an instant cr mk is a meaty even if they roll. Annoyingly if you try to chain hp after this it goes into a cs hp and tends to whiff I was hoping to be able to do cr mk ~ st hp > ex mortar and similar shenanigans.

You can do a mk Raze and walk foward a tiny bit cr mk and chain into fs heavy punch but it’s not a perfect meaty and they can jump out. Same story if you hk Raze and walk back a tiny bit. Pretty annoying.

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@samuelvines
I also upgraded my connection some time ago, because it was impossible to play KOF online, still, chances are that the connection will be bad, but we can at least try ^^'
Yeah it’s nice to have a close sparring partner but most of my experience comes from online play, that’s where I learned everything. If it wasn’t for online play me and my brother would still suck.

@Helnova
I wouldn’t mind that, I think it’s kinda neat :smiley:
Eventho I don’t play SFxTK that much, I’m always down to spar.

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Oh KoF. I got it free on PSN about a month ago and fell in love with it. Even though I only played it for 2 weeks before I heard about sfxt changelog I plan to go back soon, and I feel even that little experience made me an all-around better fighting player.

I’d love a room like that. I’m in NYC for people predicting their routers, and I know zukuu is all the way in Germany.

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I could make it tonight i’ll need psn id’s to invite people.

I was playing around with cr mk post Smasher - hk Raze. Cr mk ~ cs hk seems like a faily solid follow up. If it’s blocked ex cadc seems safe to most things except some super arts. It’s a bar just to make a move safe but there is high reward potential from a meaty low you can go cr mk ~ cs hk into launcher or ex phoenix smasher if you have the meter.

It’s pretty solid play average Smasher combo damage is probably in the 200 - 250 range. If you hit them with the meaty low into ex Smasher combo ending with another smasher its 375 so thats 500 - 600 damage for that sequence, 1 bar and you are in the same mixup state can go for a overhead or bait a reversal etc.

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Don’t be sissy, instead of EXCADCing backwards do it forwards into either Hammer of the Gods or Bone Breaker!

Course, I don’t see that being much use until patch, hellooo -6 forward dash frames.

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using Tapatalk 2

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Hehe :wink: that is an option too lol.

Yeah will be good in the patch when you can change the distance of ex Mortar and have a better cadc :slight_smile:

Will be pretty sick actually with anything after ex cadc being a counter hit lol.

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Well I am dropping Paul at the moment in favor of Ken so that I can actually learn how to play fighting games (even though I feel like a dirty dirty girl for it…). See y’all in about a month, though if these Paul chat/lobbies ever get going I’d still like to be a part of them.

Man, for all my theory when I was playing Ralenzo I forgot that Morta Punch was +3 on block. I was all “Aww yeah blocked morta time to pun-WHY ARE YOU HITTING ME OH GOD PLEASE STOP!”

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just do any attack to stuff the mortar, so you don’t have to deal with that. ^.^

also, god you’re dirty.

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Mortar punch can become a lot more useful if u can condition your opponent to stop pressing buttons :stuck_out_tongue:

@helnova, pass me your psn so we can spar.

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My psn is Helnova lol.

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it’s not like you can’t simply react to mortar. I can get a coffe and watch a movie and when I come back, paul is still in the start up - it’s THAT slow xD

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I know that mortar punch is not the fastest move there is, and I know that you are kidding, but I still feel that you are underrating it too much…
Ex mortar punch is as fast as Chunli her light overhead flip kick (hazanzu) -> 24 frames and the regular mortar punch is only 3 frames slower -> 27 frames

I wanted to know how effective my mortar punches were so I watched all 10 youtube videos of mine and I can tell you that out of the 15 times that I used it, I ONLY got stuffed twice. The two reasons why I got stuffed are;

  1. I mistimed it and flew against a fireball.
  2. My opponent did a shoryuken after my blockstring (reversal).
    So I never got stuffed because they ‘reacted’ to it but just because I misused it. I’m not saying that it’s not react-able, but that it’s not as bad as you may think, especially when it gives you an advantage of +3 on block.

Oh and all the players I fought were at least B rank, so it was not like I was playing against noobs are anything.