Frame this...frame that

ok, I understand frames are basically a timing mechanism for moves (ie how many frames does it take to do X move while the game is moving at 60 fps). BUT what I don’t get is should I really be able to tell, mentally exactly how long 3/60 second really is or is the frame data just reference data (ie I know my X move is a 4 frame move and his Y move has a 5 frame start up so I know I can hit him first)?

are top players (clearly not me as I play a pretty bad USF4 Adon, at the time) able to know the exact time that 8/60 or 2/15 second is or do they just basically know what beats what?

I hope I’m making sense with my question because as I’m writing, I’m not sure if I am, but I know what I mean in my mind. #noobLife smh

No, you shouldn’t know exactly how long 3 frames, 10 frames, 20 frames is. You are going about it in the wrong way. Frame data is used in such away where you can quickly look at it and know what should work and why it should work. You can find out punishes, combos, blockstrings even entire scenarios by just looking at the framedata. Ofcourse once you have a few ideas you will go into training and test it out. During playing you will not constantly think about framedata, you’ll have practiced certain things in training and know what works and what doesn’t work.

But in short again, no they do not know how long 10 frames are or how long 20 frames are, nor should they, they just look at the move in the game and respond to that, nothing more.

Yeah, basically by knowing that the opponent’s move takes half a second to recover, and that they have a move that takes a quarter of a second to startup, they know they can punish the unsafe move using that. And that’s just an example, the same principle is applied at several moments during the match.

awesome… this helps alot. thank you. so, basically, the frame data is useless without knowledge of matchup’s frame data, as well

If your bad at the game to begin with

Not always. There are also universal/general game mechanics to consider. Like the start up of throws/command throws, fastest light attacks, start up on “good” reversals, and that sort of thing.

wow… you really took that out of context on purpose huh?

but yes Trouble Brewing… that’s the type of things I want to focus on right now at the level I am… the general rules of frame data… is there a resource to find that type of data or is it just so varied from player to player that it doesn’t even make sense to have?

What do you mean varied? Framedata are objective facts about the game, there are no rules to them.
Simply google framedata USFIV and you got it.

I mean varied on normals (ie lp mp hp throw… etc pokes) is there like a standard of lp is 1 frame, mp is 3 frames, HK is usually 5 frames, etc?

Not really, you have to look it up if you want to know exactly how fast moves are. You have crouching, standing and close normals, and you can also divide them up in punches and kicks, so there is a huge variety and where a cr.mp might be 4 frames for a character, for another it could be 7. There are no normal attacks that are faster than 3 frames. Knowing framedata isn’t going to help you if you don’t know why you wanted to know that specific piece of frame data in the first place. For example I would like to know how fast a cr.lk of someone is so i can adjust my frametraps or blockstrings, otherwise i wouldnt even bother looking that up.

Anyway as a beginner you don’t need to bother too much with frame data, just play, gain experience and test things out. Want to know if you cna punish something, look at your frame data, want to counterhit people that are mashing certain buttons, look up frame data and thest it out in training. Look up frame data when the need for it arises, otherwise don’t bother with it.

gotcha! thank you!