I’ve been playin against a really “GAY” Geif lately using Balrog, but it’s been mostly a losing battle. Geif’s Fierce Body splash and jumping fierces have mad priorty in the air and on the ground. Both of Balrogs dashing punches(low one too) and both supers are snuffed by Gief’s lariot. Gief can 360 after blocking a dashing punch or after getting hit by one, I lose both ways. Gief’s standing fierce has more range and priority than 'Rogs and if we trade hits in the air or ground, Gief does more damage. Alomst any attack I do puts me in Pile Driver range; WTF am I supposed to do!? Does playing him in V-ism help? Oh, and how the hell are you supposed to do his shoulder butt?
hi buffalo headbutt is only in the game in the form of his AC in A mode. and its hella good. i personally think rog beats gief. if you can keep gief at rogs maximum range to where your s.fierce and jab rush punch(dont bother with low rushpunch against gief). his fierces and rush punches are much faster than gief’s s.fierce so you can easily get em in between attacks. and you are definitely out of range even from a kara spd. the only real problem rog should really have is stopping the splash or j.fierce. an early weak rush uppercut should do it. but thats not always gonna be the case. so i would save some meter to ac it to get him back out…
i dunno, apoc may help on this a little more
and playing him in V is completely worthless. he has no vc’s at all except for air to air counter in to a vc cc. which isnt the greatest to rely on by itself.
I’ve actually done his headbutt w/o it being an AC, I think it has to be done while you’re standing up.
Gief’s fierce body splash is dealt with easily. Cr.fierce as early as you can. You’ll either trade or hit clean depending on how fast you are. But let’s say you trade every time? Now you’ve both lost 50% of vitality. At this point though, Gief would have a slight edge. But he feels safe doing this so after enough trades, bust an ac. Now what? Both of you are low but he’s behind. What’s he gonna do? Rush you down? lol. Gief can’t get ahead that way, really. But this is a simple tactic to keep the math clean until Gief realizes it’s a stalemate or he’s losing.
Add that to his other anti-airs. Airthrow, st. jab(2in1 for nice damage), jumping jab(in all directions depending, crouch cancel walk-fierce) dash short upper(only use this once you’ve locked down Gief’s close jump in game) and don’t forget supers that juggle and set up juggles.
Jumping Fierce should just be blocked or countered. Gief has to guess on this one, Rog will nail him for free if he doesn’t hit it on the way up, but if he does that then Rog can counter since he can’t block after whiffing. And of course, you can always AC it.
The lariet doesn’t hit all rushes. It’s a matter of range. At the appropriate range, he can’t counter a jab low rush. Also, short low upper is a major counter. It usually trades at worst since you duck the attack(and don’t rush into it’s range either) and the only hittable part is the part that Rog will be hitting with which leads, again to clean hits and trades. Gief can’t hit that clean unless you don’t have time to extend the move. That means Gief is on your ass and you already f*cked up. Also, you can bait lariets and hit their recovery. He can’t randomly bust that without getting a fierce in the mouth. But keep in mind the low short rush in this match. It covers a lot of defense in it’s offense. It moves you forward, will counter clotheslines and hit early or late jump fierces etc. This moves is great as long as you’re not too predicatable and keep the proper distance. Also, early jumpins can nail Gief once he starts a lariet. Or he blocks it. Either way, momentum changed and he’s backing up.
Don’t feel discouraged though. Gief has always been a counter match for Rog(cept in ST maybe). In Vism, he is also. I mean, how simple is it to see a rush and just vc? It’s clearly Gief’s fight but I win it more often that not which shows that playing to your gameplan will balance out the match more.
The Buffalo Headbutt is a reversal only move. You can do it anytime you can make the reversal message appear. It’s charge down, up+punch and can be activated upon waking up, recovering from being hit, recovering from blocking an attack etc. What sucks about this move is that even though it takes nice timing to make useful, it’s priority is average at best. Pathetic.
Anyway, if you have the evo2k2 dvd there’s a Rog vs Gief with me vs Ino(keep in mind that I didn’t bother learning to crouch cancel with him or learn the recovery of the lariet which I learned in a minute(lol, lazy) so there are obvious times when I should be doing what I say here and don’t. But you can catch those and overall it shows how to move in the fight. The first round I was ACing like mad on purpose. Not game strategic, just a mental game. Just to say, “I will be rushing you down, I don’t need guard meter.” So the first round is a lil hard to explain. Just sending a msg(cuz I’m cocky like that, shrug) and I start playing smart. Hey, it was my first round in the tourney, I’ll do what I waunt!!!
The match is 65-35 in Gief’s favor, imo. But that’s on paper. Not so bad. If you’re the better player, you could win more often.
Apoc.
I know I’m kinda late, but my friend made me watch the Alpha 3 5vs5 from evo 2k2 when I went home, and let me tell you… Apoc, your Barlog had me rooting for you in two year old matches 
I think I remember people ragging on you for ACing so many times, but watching, I only saw one instance when ACing resulting in you being guard broken. And that’s out of the 642316324874216879846524 you used. My question is, where you just playing like a monster, or is Barlog really not that bad of a char?
I like Karin. Random knowledge for you. 
-R
lol, that is f*ckin’ cool to hear man! I think Balrog is pretty well rounded in the game. I think any character that can hang with top tiers has to be pretty good even if it’s not obvious. Most every top player aside from Cole and Nelson always said he sucked. Mainly, because st.jab with the majority of characters can counter most of his moves. However, that doesn’t work out too well with the risk/reward ratio and major counter system, heheh. I think if you look below the surface or gain a deeper understanding of his playstyle he is a beast. Much higher than anyone’s ever ranked him. How could he be weak if he can hang or beat top tier characters? I think Geif and Chun cause some major problems for him but otherwise, he’s incredibly solid and he can win in those matches too(ok, played properly, Chun li should beat him everytime but I don’t see a million Chuns in tourneys so, not much of a problem there:) ).
I’d rank Rog in the top 10, easily, in Aism.
Apoc.
apoc, fyi ur box is full… 2nd half of letter pending
and so as to make this topic-relevant, I’m too new to Balrog to really know what im talking about, but my 'rog has faced some problems vs Vega and Rolento. Man, it’s those hit n run characters