I don’t think many people thought Honda ever had advantage over Sim. You’re right, Sim technically has an answer for everything in the right hands, but keeping that concentration for the entire match is incredibly hard.
Not to mention knowing what is the correct counter for whatever distance in the first place. Sim is not for children, indeed.
Pssht… The Honda player has to be concentrated for all his matches! EVEN his GOOD match ups. Seeing that the match ups are somewhat based on perfect play. We have to turtle and react to EVERYTHING! Also all our bad matches seem nearly impossible if we slack off at all. Got to love people that “hate” Honda because we work for our wins just as much as anyone else. Maybe even more. =D
On another note…
Does anyone else realize how good Cr. Lp is vs DeeJay? He up kicks over it, and up kicks over the stored ochio.
Sim is geriatric zone.
LOL.
Ya, spaced correctly Upkicks will wiff against cr.jab, and if you negative Ochio they can’t reversal Upkick it either. The whole problem is getting in that position in the first place against DJ, LOL.
Mad possum and SweetJV have good wisdom w.r.t. Honda vs Dhalsim.
One thing I’d add to the toolset, that I haven’t seen other Hondas really use (maybe because it didn’t really work in old ST), is the power of your super. If your opponent is the type to throw fullscreen jab yoga fires all day and kick your jump-in / buttslam, you can easily use jab HHS to build meter for free between each fire (either block the fire or n-jump over it). Then, once you have super, you can punish any fire on reaction from fullscreen and basically kill him right there. If he then stops throwing fires because he’s afraid of super, well, you know what to do: fierce headbutt his limbs or rush him down with MP / HP HHS.
I like to open vs Dhalsim with either MP HHS (only loses to slide or back low jab, I believe) or MP headbutt (only loses to backjump reaction drill, but then you gained position anyway). It’s pretty crucial to gain meter fast in this matchup imo, and these openings guarantee you some meter right at the start. It’s also why I like constantly using HHS / buttslam / headbutt early on, even if it’s not the “optimal” move - getting full meter early and threatening reaction supers is just so good that I’m willing to take the risk of getting back-low-jabbed or whatever.
From full screen I’m pretty sure Sim can cr.jab the Super on reaction after a fireball, unless you did it early in anticipation. But then it’s worth burning meter and taking one jab worth of damage to go from across the screen to being right on top of them in the corner. Actually the Super works a little better in ST against Sim because you can walk forward and hold the charge and use the super to hit anything he throws out or go through fireballs. And Sim doesn’t have any big damage way to punish the Super, so it’s not that big a deal that it doesn’t get full hits in ST.
But your right, it works a lot better against Sim than against most fireballers.
Even if you mistime the Super, usually the most damage you’ll take is a cr.jab (to counter Super) or st.MK (after blocked Super), which still puts you right on them, usually with them in the corner and no good way for them to get out (teleport=free damage for Honda). A lot of Sims seem to fall for doing MP HHS to move forward with charge when you have Super. They like to fireball or stick something out when they see that, which you can then Super.
I like to open against Sim with either cr.jab or just hold down+back and react to what Sim does. Most good Sims open the round one of three ways:
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Slide: They do this to counter HHS or Sumo Smash (make SS wiff). If I cr.jab, it hits slide clean. If I hold down+back I block and there right next to me.
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down+back jab: They do this counter opening HHS and Headbutts. Most of the time it won’t hit my cr.jab (both usually wiff). If I’m opening charging and see this I immediatly do HK SS to land right on top of him, he blocks but then has to deal with mix-ups. If you get a HP or HK grab off of it you can end the round right there (HK grab=throw loop, HP grab=cross-up throw/HHS combo).
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Jump backwards: This is what they do most often because it moves them away and gives them options to stop most of what you can do (can HP your SS, drill your HB, etc). cr.jab will wiff but they can’t punish and still gives you plenty of time (you should be charging while cr.jabbing). If I see them jump back I wait and hold charge, then do a fierce headbutt to hit them as soon as they land. If you time it right they can’t drill and will be hit for the knockdown (big damage time!). If you do it too late you’ll eat a cr.jab, but that still leaves you close them with them backed into the corner, perfect spacing for you. If you do it too early you’ll eat a drill, but you’ll still be on top of them and they usually won’t be able to follow up after the drill. Obviously you want to time it as late as possible while not let them jump again before you get there (or you’ll get drill, cr.MK, cr.MK).
I feel like I can pretty much react to whatever Sim does to open the round and put myself in pretty good position. One thing to look out for, if your late in SS’ing in reaction to Sim opening w/ cr.jab, they can sometimes get out UpFlame to counter if they anticipate it, but that’s pretty risky for them (if they’re late they eat SS for knockdown, if you don’t SS they leave themselves wide open for HB, sweep, etc).
Slow work day today, I had some free time, LOL.
I am by no means a Dhalsim expert. I’m average trying to get better but here are some matches of me playing against Mad Possum and a few other Honda players. I am not as optimistic as Possum or Sweet JV because when I play a good Honda I know it is a battle. As Possum has stated though, the trades work in your favor and couple that with all of your attacks hit hard, along with a sumo splash that Sim doesnt have the best answer for means it is not as bad as it may seem. I agree Sim has to stay focus the whole match and one mistake can mean instant doom. Also Sim doesnt have any powerful attacks that really can cause fear so even if he is advancing towards you, again as Possum said just watch those string of attacks and punish accordingly.
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I know people dont care for norkeh on psn because he has a reputation for quitting but I found playing him interesting because of the things he was doing. I knew Honda was a tic machine but wow I didnt realize how much. Hope this helps man. Also my main beef against this matchup is Honda’s sumo splash. Sim doesnt have a really good way to stop that move. The good Honda players know how to use this to gain ground, quickly, on Sim and then just overwhelm him.
I think once you see the light you will see it is not as bad as you are thinking it is. Trust me, I’ve played Possum, Thelo, MrEgoTrip, SuperNYC01,MrX64 to name a few and it is not fun. I’ve gotten better and Im hoping if I ever go offline that I can tell SweetJV he is right because on-line fighting Honda sucks.
Good Luck bro.
It is that bad. Only Honda that (frequently) makes it look like Honda is good in the match is Babynine(off the top of my head), yet he still gets beat up. Sims are just scared of him I guess lol.
Good post, but I have to deny this one - it’s very possible to reaction super fast enough that Dhalsim can’t block it (though most of the time, I personally need to prediction-buffer the motion to do it fast enough). Along with Ken, he’s probably the easiest char on which that works. Then you have a KD on Dhalsim which you can ride into an easy win, so the payoff is pretty huge if you can react fast enough.
It’s a bit off-topic, but the old ST stored super is a trap vs Dhalsim and really doesn’t work as well as you’d think. Only the first hit of that super will actually hit Dhalsim in the mouth, for puny damage, then Dhalsim can block the second hit every time and kick you in the face to punish (it’s about even damage), then push you out back to fullscreen with limbs for free. I recently played that matchup in old ST vs Sabin, and this scenario basically happened to every anti-fireball super I used, unless the first hit actually killed. You might have rose-tinted memories of Old ST Honda’s super, because it really was pretty garbage.
Yeah, the stored super “trick” works best vs non-fireball characters. Perfect example would be the mirror. Do the super motion, sit on down forward, and react with only a button! For extra trickery if you think your opponent knows about this. Quickly go from down forward to down, hit cr.Lp, and right after you hit the button go back to down forward. You should still have stored super. :looney:
Thelo - well, your reactions are a lot faster than mine, I’m just getting slow in my old age, LOL. I seem to get hit by cr.jab half the time unless I’m 3/4 of a screen or closer.
Sim get’s guarenteed follow up poke after the standing MK after blocked Super? I know the second hit of the Super will never hit in ST (it never hits any character) but I always take the st.MK damage for being in. I thought you could at least stick a SS or HB in after Sim’s MK. I may be wrong, though. I mainly used it against Sim because I got in from across the screen and Sim didn’t have a move to hit you in between hits of the Super (like Ryu can SRK you after the first hit, Guile can Flashkick after 1st hit, etc).
But ya, the Super in ST was really only good for AA, otherwise almost every character could punish you after the 1st hit. It was cool though when it would randomly hit for all hits but the last one, and you could follow it up with an Ochio. That did massive damage, but again it was random, you usually just got killed for landing your Super (how dumb is that?). Overall I’ll take HDR Super evertime, having your Super actually hit is better than a useless storable one, LOL.
How did the matches against Sabin go? I still think Honda v. Sim is close to 5-5 in ST. Ochio loop in the corner in ST is pretty hard for Sim to get out of without a reversal (other than reversal throw).
Sim can reversal theleport to get out of that situation. I gonna focus on Honda for a while, my secondary needs some attention again 
Yes, but because of the reversal teleport glitch he will reappear right back in the same place, ready to be thrown all over again.
It went to Sabin’s advantage, fairly comfortably. To be fair, I struggled way more than I should have to just pull off handslaps consistently, but even if I did, his zoning was completely on point that day and I was mostly locked at fullscreen.
Incidentally, I also faced Sabin about a year ago in HDR in some east coast tourney, and I performed way better back then, though I suspect he was mostly caught off-guard by the jab headbutt (iirc I didn’t lose a single round in that match).
I find the hardest thing in going from HDR to ST and back is the HHS. Playing a lot of HDR trains your fingers to do just the required number of button presses, and I find it really hard to do the extra button presses on reaction in ST now. I played a bunch of classic mode the other day and struggled the whole time with my HHS (which I never did before HDR came out, LOL).
What was Sabin doing that was so effective? Kacom seems to think the match-up is impossible, I find it to be one of my favorite match-ups. I’ve played SJV and AfroCole a lot on GGPO before HDR came out, play Cvital, NLP OU, etc. on HDR now, it’s always a really tough fight with players that good but I’ve never felt like the match-up was way against me. Nowhere near like playing a good shoto, or Guile, or DeeJay. The aggregate results always seemed to come close to 50-50. I’m sure it’s harder for Sim online against Honda (unfortunetly I haven’t gotten to play any of those players offline, I haven’t run into any top level Sim players here in the midwest, only player I’ve played offline that actually has an upper level Sim is Damdai and he, of course, used Ken against me, LOL).
I do think the match-up is better for Honda in HDR than ST. Jab headbutt isn’t much use, but full hit Super, jumping short to counter long ground pokes, and easier HHS is. Plus Sim’s MP throw range being shortened makes it harder for him to reversal throw well placed tick-throws (can’t double tap MP,HP). You do have to be more carefull when he has Super, though, since he can use it has a reversal now.
If sim blocks the first hit can he super you in between?
Or is the motion too prohibitive for that
I’m pretty sure all of 'sim’s super can be input during a single normal hit freeze. I’d expect that to be the case with Honda’s super as well.
HHS is too punishable in HDR though.
Also are you guys really having a hard time doing hands in VST? I enjoy the hands in VST. Not just because they are better but because when I do cross-up 2 Cr.Lk into hands I feel so legit. Guess it’s my age allowing me to mash faster. =P The switch from HDR and VST isn’t really troublesome for me.
Arthritis makes mashing HHS harder.
LOL.
Edit: In all seriousness, in the winter when my hands are cold I have a heck of a time with HHS, I have to play a few rounds and warm my hands up, LOL.
At completely full screen away, it’s just on the edge of being able to do on reaction it when you see the fireball. You can do it, but you must do it immediately. In practice, what this means is that good players can try to bait you into wasting your meter by throwing a fireball right near the end of you whiffing some random poke/movement from full screen to make it look like it’s punishable. It’s a dangerous dance though, it’s really easy for either character to judge things a frame or two off and have it not pan out for them.
As far as being OK with spending the meter just to get in, I’d be cautious about that. There are times when the flow of the match, the timer, or your life gauge may make the gamble worth it, but most of the time I wouldn’t blow it if you think it’ll get blocked. If you play a good Sim who respects the upgraded HDR super then just having that meter changes the entire tone of the match. It should cause him to throw almost no fireballs. Sim can still zone you with far MP/HP and his normal AA, but everything becomes much riskier. If you try to inch in slowly it will be tougher for him to punish that or push you back out. And if you keep a charge whenever you’re not walking, then you can punish any mistake big time. If you have the life lead, then you can treat Sim like a slow version of Cammy and just chill at db. LOL! But, unless you’re having a hell of a time in the round I think either sitting there and waiting to land it or keeping it in your back pocket to scare him is often the better play.
Possum: It’s probably because you mostly play Sim online that it feels like you can’t super him on reaction. Like I say, it’s right on the edge of being possible to do. It’s probably the one thing that works to Sims advantage in lag. On the flip side, it also makes random supers seem like a much better idea because it’s much harder for Sim to punish that properly in lag.