In the Street Fighter 2 series, it depends on what kind of frame advantage the move in question gives you. In the cases of Ryu, Ken, and Akuma, the only reason to start a link from a weak attack (cl. and cr.:lp: start and recover the fastest and give the most frame advantage, btw) is to link into a cl./cr.:hp:. But, after that, the best that you can (usually) do is interrupt that :hp: into a Hadouken. (With Ken, that might combo, but it’s not likely. Ryu and Akuma…that’s easy for them.) But…why do that when cr.:mp: gives even more frame advantage? It’s easily the best attack in their arsenal to link from. Cr.:lk: (x2), cr.:mk:, cr:hk: is a knockdown combo and may even dizzy from a crossup, but it won’t yield you the damage that crossup dizzy combos into special moves (especially Akuma’s juggle-starting Hurricane Kick) that have already been mentioned will. (By the way, cr.:lk:, cr.:mp:, cr.:hk: is easier.)
I did this one cross up tonight that looked like this:
j.Roundhouse / Air Fireball --> c.Forward --> s.Roundhouse --> Hurricane Kick --> Shoryuken
I only practiced this on a non-blocking CPU in Training Mode. If everything here actually lands, it’s a guaranteed dizzy by the time the Hurricane Kick connects. If the person doesn’t get dizzied by the time the Hurricane Kick ends, the DP will do the trick. If you have a Super stored, then it may as well be the finishing move.
Only problem with this one though, is that there seems to be too many variables that throws it off. Against an attacking CPU, I found it really difficult to land the s.Roundhouse part because sometimes the CPU crouch-blocks and it whiffs. I have a feeling that the s.Roundhouse may be coming out too slow and giving the opponent an opportunity to initiate a block. Need to test this out more, but I doubt this will work because it seems a little too good to be true.
Other handy ones I figured out are:
j.Roundhouse / Air Fireball --> s.Forward (Close) --> s.Strong --> Fierce Fireball (For knockdown)
j.Roundhouse / Air Fireball --> c.Strong --> c.Jab --> c.Forward --> Fireball
These one connects much more consistently and I know it works because everything comes out fast enough. Need to stop with the Forwards and start figuring stuff out with Strongs now… God, this stuff hurts my head…
You know it works because it tells you the number of hits in the combo.
Spoken like a true master. 
Yeah, Phoenix…it’s not a combo unless the combo meter says so.
Well then I’ll just have to find ones that the combo meter recognizes and try to be even faster >=D
And now for something completely different… Is there a certain timing to Akuma’s air fireball that let you cancel out the input lag that comes after it impacts? I know it’s not network lag because this happens on locals too. I’ve had instances where I will land an air fireball on someone and then immediately be able to follow up with either a “c.Forward --> fireball” or a DP. But there are also times when I’ll land the air fireball and then the game will slow to a crawl with a brief moment where no move will come out whatsoever. Even if I mash c.Roundhouse or c.Forward, it would take at least a full second before the characters actually does the move. The opponent doesn’t retaliate during this brief slow-down either so I’m assuming that it happens to both players and I know that the slow-down has been around in the SF2 games for quite awhile.
Is there a certain height or time that I’m suppose to throw the air fireball so that I can immediately follow up with an attack once it impacts, or is this input lag another one of those randomness factors in ST?
I don’t know if anyone has mentioned this peculiar thing yet: I was able to perform a jumping punch, which was canceled into an air fireball. The punch came out rather early then was canceled by the air fireball.
Has anyone done this? Do you think this is just another glitch?
I have not attempted to practice this in training mode, but I have done it (by accident) 3 or 4 times in online games.
I thought Vanilla ST Akuma could do this. I remember jumping in with fierce and then cancelling it into an air fireball. He should be able to cancel any jumping punch into it.
^^Yep. ST Akuma could do this too. For forward and backward jumps any punch will cancel into Air Hadoken. For neutral jumps, punches and kicks can be cancelled.
Any air special can be cancelled like this. Ryu, Ken, and Akuma can cancel jumping punch into hurricane kick, and THawk can cancel into hawk dive.
Just a quick follow up to my testing out the Air Fireball Tiger Knee lockdown.
It’s not hard, for sure, with the motion I posted up earlier. But it’s not really effective. There are a couple of problems with it.
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It requires you to be closer than the standard corner Air Fireball trap because he throws them out lower to the ground. So it’s easier for people to counter and gives Akuma much less time to react properly to someone getting hit by the Air Fireball.
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Taking an Air Fireball really messes up the trap because of the slow down, You really have to be going Air Fireball happy to keep the lockdown going, so if the enemy gets hit by the Air Fireball, most likely you are already trying to Jump up and throw the next one.
So the Tiger Knee Air Fireball trap doesn’t feel like anything new to add to the equation. It didn’t make him any better than some may have thought already.
- James
Forgive my naivety; I’m new to ST. That’s good to know though.
Any use for it? I never hear anyone talk about it or see anyone use it.
Probably not practical, huh?
Only for Ken.
He’s Right
You can do J. FP > Mid-Air Hurricane Kick > Land into Super and it’ll all connect
That’s pretty good, I hadn’t thought of that.
Just a random thought, can Akuma do jump fierce, hurricane kick (air), hurricane kick ground? Or are there always more powerful guarenteed combos?
ok, so i hate akuma. like, really really hate him. but, as an akuma user in 3s (or used to be, hd remix takes up most of my time) i’ve been wondering about his potential demon setups. kara demon and dash demon setups in 3s are soo satisfying… so for the sake of spreading that wonderful feeling, here is a video with a demon setup i thought might be pretty effective. love, hate, flame, whatever.
[media=youtube]4wF-vOTh6Q0[/media]
akuma can cancel a jumping fierce with hk, but it won’t connect. you’ll hear him make the noise of a hk, but he’ll land before you really even notice the animation, let alone before any hitboxes appear. maybe good for the extra meter?
EDIT: sorry if this has already been discussed, but i am not going to look through 9 pages to see if this has already been discovered (9 pages of akuma, yuck!)
You can also buffer Standing Fierce into it, which gives you a MUCH larger window for Buffering. And yes, when you Buffer Stand Fierce, the opponent still cannot jump out of it no matter what.
- James
“akuma can cancel a jumping fierce with hk, but it won’t connect. you’ll hear him make the noise of a hk, but he’ll land before you really even notice the animation, let alone before any hitboxes appear. maybe good for the extra meter?”
^ it animates… but it just doesn’t hit. I think there are hitboxes there too.
I don’t know why it doesn’t hit. 
forgot to mention that i was doing the standing fierce and low short demons point blank and found both could be jumped away from (holding up immediately after the tick), but pretty much impossible to do on reaction. unless i’m missing something?
Strange, when omni and I were testing it, we couldn’t get away at all. Maybe we were actually hitting up too late? But yeah, we did Fierce into Demon, and none of us could jump away from it in time. I dunno, maybe I’ll have to test it some more.
- James