Why is Cody’s forward medium punch so good at beating grabs/crouch techs? Is the grabbable hurtbox small?
I had a question for you guys.
I have been playing SF4 since vanilla, but over the last 3 months or so I’ve been playing more regularly and trying to improve using Cody. Cody is my favorite character, and I’d like to keep playing him even if he’s a little bit lower on the teir list.
For the last couple months I’ve just been losing almost constantly to every type of player, with my PP being about 200, but in the last week I’ve started to notice I’m starting to win against players rated much higher, even like 1700 sometimes, and doing a lot better in matchups that used to give me problems.
One problem I’m still having is when people jump in at me from 2 different ranges. One is where they’re up in your face just jumping all over you, like when Ryu / Ken players keep jumping at the distance that will cross you up. If you know their going for that crossup, what would the best thing to do be? Just block? Dash forward? Crouching medium kick? Neutral jump and air attack?
The other jump in distance I’m having problems with is at the distance that is too far away to hit back medium punch, and too close to hit far heavy kick. I think that heavy ruffian kick should work, but sometimes that ends up wiffing too (they’re too close). I’m not sure if I just need to time it better or what.
Also, are there any more up to date cody guides or matchup videos, or people that are still playing cody at a high level in Sf4 ultra that you guys would recommend?
Thank you.
- this is one of cody’s major problems due to slow backwards walkspeed. Jump back jab is a solid option at the cost of losing ground, cr.mk is another option to make jump ins whiff
- far st.hp and hk.ruffians are good but vs divekick characters like seth will whiff like you said. Theres no real solid universal answer to that range, the normals you will need to use varies on the matchup
Whenever i’m under pressure i keep in the back of my mind that they might go for a crossup, especially the Adon, Juri, Ken etc players. It is definately annoying, jump back+lp is definately going to beat almost anything it just doesnt do alot of damage, jump back hp is slower and you miight get beaten out but atleast it is something. Anyway neutral jump or backjump plus an attack is the best answer when they are constantly jumping over you where the b.mp is guaranteed to whiff.
Other option is using cr.mk to go under them, unfortunately you only gain a very slight improvement in positioning, you maybe you can steal the advantage by pressing a cr.lk/lp immediately after.
There is a very small area where people jump over st.hk and the b.mp will whiff if they don’t press a button, however if they do press a button b.mp will almost beat anything.
far hp covers the area pretty well, however it might be a bit wierd to use, atleast to me. HK ruffian you have to have fast reaction or atleast anticipate a jump, do not use this when they are point blank because like you said it will whiff.
Overall you need to practice and you’ll know which moves to use for which distances, it will always go better if you keep aware of when people might jump.
A pretty ghetto way of dealing with constant crossups is by actually dashing forward, you have to dash early or it’ll auto-correct and turns into a forward dash to the wrong side, i sometimes use it when i see a late jump in on my wakeup and it’ll just do cr.lk xx criminal upper.
With any other character that you might use and has a good backdash i advise a focus backdash to get out of that silly pressure.
Also with other characters that have uppercut like moves a delayed DP will auto-correct and beat them clean.
Hey guys I just picked up cody and I have a couple of questions:
- When something like c.lpx2 into c.lk is done are the light punches chained then the light kick is linked?
- Are Cr.LP chains our only true blockstring?
- What are F.MP / F.HK applications in blockstrings? They seem slow on startup so would we use these moves when the opponent is respecting our blockstrings / frametraps?
- What are some good ways to close the distance or play footsies as Cody? I struggle to get in.
- What is done for oki off of criminal upper or his standard throw? Do I just dash in and meaty?
- You can either chain or link the light punches but the light kick must be linked if you want to cancel into a special.
- No, but the others aren’t super useful. cl.mp is +4 on block and so is level 2 focus dash forward, so you can create true strings with lights afterward. Obviously you can also create true strings off blocked jump ins, but I assume that’s not what you meant. You can also chain into c.lk from c.lp, which means if you’re testing them to see when/if they stand up you can get a tiny bit of damage out of it too.
- They are slow. A lot of Cody’s normals are. f.mp is good because it moves Cody forwards, which means you can do it at a range where short range buttons won’t hit it. For instance, do some jabs > walk back a little > f.mp will frequently catch people if they press something. f.mp is also at least +1 on block which means you have a simplistic mix-up between throwing and finishing the string with c.lk xx lCU. The safety of this varies per match-up. Likewise f.hk moves Cody forward, has some low invincibility frames and is airborne, which means you can use it to go over lows and either tag them with something or throw. Basically you space yourself out with buttons so that using f.hk will make you avoid their low or, hopefully, catch them doing something standing in which case you convert into good damage with ruffian or EX CU. If they’re respecting your pressure, i.e. down-backing like a champ, there’s not a huge amount you can do about it outside of throw and overhead. Make sure you add in kara-throw as well.
- Closing the distance easily is one of Cody’s weaknesses. You have f.mp and f.hk, dash/focus dash, jump, properly spaced lk ruffian, EX ruffian on reaction to fireball (match-up specific) and I suppose you could throw in Zonk FADC forward if you’re willing to spend some bar. Bear in mind, however, that ‘getting in’ isn’t always Cody’s objective. There are plenty of match-ups where it’s better to run with a zoning gameplan despite Cody’s reputation. As for footsies, Cody has some decent buttons - c.lk, c.mk, far mk, far mp, far hk… Buffering mk ruffian off c.lk, c.lp, c.mp or c.hp is frequently a good option (button choice is match-up dependent). f.mp is important too - you can convert into sweep or c.hp xx ender even without a counter-hit if you space it correctly. Use rock and fake rock to try and bait jump-ins.
- You can dash in for a meaty after hp CU if you want. Against some characters you have an auto safe jump off hp CU just by holding up forward, although these can be defeated by delayed quickrise. In any case you’re safe if you jump forward and press a button, even against Ryu’s DP for instance, which means it can be used for baiting. Probably not safe against invincible EX grabs, grab ultras or fast supers, but you can easily test that yourself. Whenever you have a safe jump-in like that you can mix up between doing nothing, going for throw or doing raw EX Zonk. It sounds stupid but really Cody’s mix-up game is pretty weak and ‘to EX Zonk or not to EX Zonk’ is a legitimate guess that you can force your opponent to make. EX Zonk makes a lot of reversals whiff, which gives you punish opportunities and can also help discourage them from using those options in future. It also blows up backdashes across the board, although it can be jumped out of. Be wary of characters like Dudley who can jump back and still punish fully. You have safe jumps off both throws, although forward throw is manual timing. Back throw is just hold up forward for 5 frame safe jump. Again it’s just a case of picking between your limited options and trying to detect tendencies that you can exploit.
Good luck!