yeah you can fuck blanka up on wakeup, but if you lose that momentum it’s a bitch to get it back. if you corner him though it’s really shitty for him. he can’t use any reversals and if he does and hits you, it’s a free punish or a free ultra. he can only rainbow roll escape and that’s a free ultra as well. the only time i get fucked over is when they use rainbow roll to actually hit me. i can’t block it worth shit if they make it ambiguous enough.
I lost my first tournament to a fuerte and heres what i learned:
- do not give him space to mixup. splash beats or trades with all your crap
- a real good fuerte will use his target combo to deter random scissors. watch for it.
- use your fantastic air normals in this matchup. you shoudl be in the air more often than other matchups. even if he hits you with guac once or twice, it gives him one more thing to think about instead of planning his oki, which is where you are really in trouble.
- use teleport liberally in this matchup. that’s not to say spam it cuz he can chase with a slide or a run stop U2, but more often than in other matches. Just resetting the space can frustrated the hell out of fuerte because all his plans of knocking you down in that instance go to hell.
That’s my best fuerte advice.
Focus owns rainbow roll (unless it’s reversal or the Blanka is good and they land in front of you -> throw instead of hitting you). I’ve been stuffed when I Ex rainbow rolled quite a bit. It has weird properties.
If you’re going to teleport, mix it up (between all the different versions). A fuerte I play with here in Japan says he has option selects against the back TP that will catch it a LOT. Like every time I tried to TP he’d catch me.
Against fuerte you want to mix up our escape options as best as possible, as he has ways to punish all of them and put you right back in the mixup. A couple of tips:
-EX devils reverse is a decent escape tool against splash, slide, and the tortilla throw. However, if he can predict it he can jump and airthrow you, or run slide/ultra you if you try to do the follow up.
-Backdash can get you out of the splashes and the tortilla, but use it too much and they’ll start sliding, delaying the splash or ultra-ing it.
-Focus on wakeup can be an effective tool. If the crossup splash, you can dash to safety. Splashing in front or sliding gives you a free crumple. Can be punished with the tortilla (if you don’t backdash), run stop throw, or ultra 2.
-EX psycho isn’t that useful honestly, since good fuertes will cross you up after an untechable and take away your charge. It can be punished hard if they bait it too.
-EX headstomp on wakeup is pretty much never a good idea.
-If you have no meter and extra a little life to burn, jumping can be a good option if used sparingly. It gets you out of the tortilla throw, and if you get splashed, you can tech the recovery, effectively taking you out of the mixup. Get too silly with it and you’ll get guacamole leg thrown back to the ground.
-BLOCK. You can block all of fuerte’s wakeup options except one. Standing your ground can often be the best option, since it sets you up to counter his moves (you can tag a splash with st mk or scissors, throw the run slide, rh the shit out of him if he goes airborn, etc). Not throwing anything also allows you to avoid and punish his ultras. Worst case scenario, you get tortilla thrown. But that’s better than having your teleport ultra’d for half life.
EDIT: A really good exercise in learning to deal with Fuerte wakeup pressure is to practice against a Fuerte using a character other than Bison. I alt Chun, and playing the matchup with her limited wakeup options has made me more conscious of avoiding knockdowns, and more disciplined about trying to always escape pressure on wakeup. It’s totally possible to deal with Fuerte’s okizeme using nothing but blocking, backdashing and focusing. You just have to play it smart.
Very good tips on Fuerte. I will put up some of these after I finish the last batch of match ups and then run through everything again from A to Z.
What are the worst match ups for Bison?
Guile, Gief, and Chun pretty much. Honda can be a royal pain as well.
I don’t think any of Bison’s match ups can get WORSE than the way they were in regular SF4.
But for my personal picks…
6-4’s over Bison
Abel
Guile
Chun
Zangief
Granted I feel match ups are a lot tighter and more balanced, even if these are 6-4’s, you can still out muscle them anywhere until the rounds expire. Bison is a great escape artist.
I think everybody else is 5-5 with Bison or Bison 6-4’s over them.
I’d say Honda is a tough one. That match is all about getting a lead and keeping it. However, if Honda is down he only has to guess right once to take it, where as Bison needs to do so several times in the same situation.
Abel is an interesting choice for a tough match. Any reasons why? Abel and Bison both have weak defense, so it always feels to me like whoever takes the intiative on offense is the one who wins that matchup.
I think he’s a little more threatening with EX meter. Hyper armor with EX-Change of Direction to get in and mix up, EX-Tornado with invincibility, and his Ultras are both pretty good against Bison while either of Bison’s Ultra’s don’t really matter in the long run.
I don’t have any Abel players in my scene (or ones that give me trouble at least), if you know of one that I could play online, or something, or meet at Evo this year, please give me a name via PM or something.
I’ll agree that Guile and Gief are hard matchups. I still have yet to run into a Chun that makes me really fear her though.
I still think that Bison has the advantage over Abel. Roundhouse is pretty godly, and j.fierce works really well too. It’s just a matter of not being hit by his tick throws or falling for his EX Change of Direction.
I still find Chun to be a little tricky, as she can jump really high and has better air normals (for air-to-air attacks) than Bison. But all you have to do in that match is rush her down.
And I think Bison’s U2 has actually helped him in the Gief match-up, as it’s a good way to get out of the corner. Even though Gief can still punish you to some extent for doing it, it’s better than being in the corner against him.
bison owns abel
^IMO Bison doesn’t know abel.
Ne whoo M.Bisons Ex Pc can tail whip Chun li’s cross up kick thing Its not a fluke Ive done it consistently in battle against good chuners.
Sadly the opposite happens for me, her foot hits the tail and beats me clean…I seriously don’t get it lol.
Yeah the timing on it is a bit strict but once you get it down you have crushed a good part of chuns mix up gameplay, heck and sometimes Ive gotten auto correct Ex Pc instead of the tail whip. Oh and jump back hell attack > beats out chuns air attacks or trades with em, and I don’t have to mention you can land ultra 2 off a jump back hell attack.
Just teleport her flipkick. She can’t punish it off a crossup reversal
Abel IMO is a very easy matchup for Bison if you are patient. All you have to do is stay on the ground (keep your charge) and counter everything he does with s.hk or scissor kicks. HK can punish the roll and qcb kkk when spaced correctly. I have easily beaten high BP Abel’s using the strategy (14K is the highest i’ve seen). The same strategy completely destroys Zangief and Dudley as well. Those three matchups are easily 6-4+ for Bison. Zangief is probably 7-3.
Chun and Guile are definitely harder matches. You need to play much more aggressively and rush them down. Once you get Guie in the corner, he’s dead. If you get a life lead on chun, it’s pretty easy to play lame with devils reverse if you want…
sHK can catch that flip kick too
and ^^^^ that abel info was pretty good. You seriously have to kinda play a bit more defensive than usual vs abel.
^^ The above strategy also makes Rufus pretty easy and is pretty effective against Blanka. I always laugh when a Rufus try’s to catch me with j.hk… S.HK kills Rufus. “I’m not jumping my friend”
Try staying on the ground against Rufus, Abel, Zangief and Dudley and watch how easy the match becomes.