Best beginner team theory?

Classic Fighting Games King of Fighters XIII
1

Hello. I’m looking for a great starting team in KoF games. While serfing gaming forums I’ve found three “best character for beginners” theories:

  1. It’s best to pick the “cheap guys”. I don’t mean it in a bad way. Many new players need to gain confidence in a game, so their best choice = easy execution + high damage.

  2. You need a “learning char” for starters. Best example I can think of is Ryu in many Street Fighter games. He usually has all the tools for winning (high or mid tier), but you NEED to learn the fundamentals to win with him (footsies, spacing, matchups, etc.) or you’ll get punished badly for every special move he has. Plus Ryu is a char you won’t have to leave later on, he’s completely viable… Something like that.

  3. Hard way is the only way. A less popular theory that states you need to start from the bottom and pick some low tier, so that when you move on to better chars later it’ll be like easy mode.

I don’t have much time to practice and my local community consists mostly of higher level player, so I like to be confident in my beginner choices. What theory in your opinion is best for KoF 13 and what character fit beginner level best and why?

PS: I haven’t found any active old KoF forums, so I have the same question for original KoF 2002 and 98.

2

At least one really button-based character.

3

Kyo is basically the series Ryu, Iroi being more Akuma than Ken but with good health. I like both a lot.

I play KOF 98 more than others, theres so many great characters in it. Chizuru is op goodness, Iori is the best character, but after a point a ton of the cast is evenly matched. Dont bother playing low tier characters unless youre a masochist or want to have a somewhat legit excuse for why you lost to someone. Theres so many awesome characters in the series and playing 98 and 13 will give you a great overall feel of the series. In 98 i feel most comfortable playing iori kyo mai or benimaru. but i love playing with mature, athena, leona a bit, rugal, chizuru, king a bit, and chin. A lot of those characters are in 13 too of course, so you can more or less use them in both games but they have different nerfs and buffs. Like, I really cant stop with just one team, I like too many characters so I mix them up regularly.