I was wondering how you guys get familiar with other characters (not your main) so that you know how to approach your matchups. I wanted to do this but I don’t really know how to go about it. Did you guys learn combos and played with others online or just go into training mode and record actions and learn to counter? I just fear that using other characters with my LP (1700, not a lot) would pair me against people who would just body me because I’m unfamiliar with my character at the time.
Casuals
Casuals or better yet, battle lounge against players around your level or even slightly better. Just make sure the skill gap isn’t too big, because you will just get discouraged from getting repeatedly raped.
Pick the character you wanna practice with and go into training mode. You want to focus on learning the ranges of their normals and which of them are negative on block. To see what’s negative/positive, pick a character like Chun or Necalli as your opponent (because they have 3F jabs) and use the reversal recording in training and record them doing crouch jab as the reversal. Now, anytime the dummy blocks a move it will try to counter with a jab. If it can get the jab out faster and his you before you can block, you know your move is punishable; if it blocks your move and it isn’t punishable, next you want to try to immediately hit a jab of your own after you make them block the move your testing. If you get counterhit you are negative, if you trade you are neutral, if you counterhit the dummy then you are plus.
Other than that, just try to learn your best anti airs at every range (SUPER IMPORTANT) and optimal combos for every situation. The rest you just learn from experience in matches.