someone wanted a general discussion thread: here it is. (i might add some FAQ or facts if they seem to reoccur)
another topic: j.lk as AA. has the most active frames and a weired hit box, it stuffs quite alot due to the jump arc.
I’ve been trying to use U2 as much as possible, but it’s so unreliable. I usually just go U1, even against fireball characters. My footsies can use the practice anyway.
Teiga almost always trades in the air for me, so I decided it’s just way to gimmicky, and Shitenkestu has a habit of avoiding a full connection for me.
I haven’t really tried KKK c.lk purposely as an anti-air. It sometimes comes out when I slide my thumb over the button by accident and stuffs my opponent’s jump in. I get lucky I guess.
On a related note: Gen v Guile. This was a dreaded match in vanilla and it is now my most dreaded match in super. It just seems if it were two top players facing each other, Guile would dominate with 8-2 or 9-1. So how do you deal with the experienced guile players? The ones who know their normals and abuse them along with air throw.
sry, j.lk^^
here is the hitbox:
it has 4 startup and 9(!) active frames. sadly, only 40 dmg.
I’m seriously thinking about dropping Gen. He’s the most unrewarding uphill battle character there is. I’ve had better luck with Rose and I suck with her. All I do is fight freaking Ryus and Kens and both are amazing at zoning and Kens stupid Air Tatsu is god like. His footsies are amazing too. I’m tired of having to do nothing but f’ing bait. I’m getting tired of having to do two or three times as much than the other player just to get some decent damage in, without super or ultra. Hell vs good Ryus sometimes it takes as long as 30 seconds just for me to get in on them so I can jump safely over their fireball, usually they don’t throw anything, so I can’t jump. And all they do is back off or crouch block forward, crouch block forward. I wish some of the higher ranked gens posted more videos. Half of Oni Fuz’s are Abels and low BP abels at that. He had a few high BP kens that didn’t even play that great.
i can feel your pain i face a really good ken last night who had his links down and it was almost imposable to do damage. he was a really good player tho had ken links down and yes i did lost.
Yeah, Gen’s frustrating. When you look at the tools some (ok, most) other characters have you just start to think why you’re even wasting your time with Gen’s hard combos that don’t do any damage. One of my primary practice partners offline plays a very lame (and I mean this as a compliment) Ryu with really good footsies and zoning. Pain in the ass to deal with for just about any character but with Gen you just want to throw your stick at the TV sometimes. At least with Blanka I’ve got enough tools to deal with the zoning while still getting the pianoing fix.
But, I’ve been thinking (bad habit, I know)… we need to work more untechable knockdowns into Gen’s BnB combos, at least to help keep up some sort of offensive momentum.
How viable is it to try and combo more into crane c.lk --> mantis c.hk from the ground? It seems like the range on crane c.lk is so limited that if you try to hitconfirm into it you just end up pushing people out of range. Still I’ve been working on stuff like mp mk hands fadc mp crane c.lk mantis c.hk. Doesn’t seem to be too reliable though, but maybe it’s just my bad execution, so I’ll keep working on it.
EX hands into sweep seems to have the same problem - if you try to hitconfirm into EX hands from any kind of lengthy string you just push people out of range and the sweep whiffs, and if you don’t hitconfirm, then you’re just blowing meter on blocked EX hands. Mp mk EX hands sweep seems to work pretty well though, but is also somewhat unrealiable for me with my sloppy execution, at least on smaller characters.
If mantis sweep had a 6 frame startup, that would solve a lot of problems. Being able to do c.lk c.lp s.mp c.hk would open up a ton of new pressure opportunities.
my random ken matchup thoughts.
1.pick ultra 2.
2.absorb as many fireballs as you can.
3.crane cr.mk under ex fireballs
4.if they sit back and wait on you, take the opporutunity to build some meter with giekros or whatever.
5.most players stop throwing fireballss when they realize you would rather utilize their zoning/turtling for building your own super meter and stocking an anti fireball ultra
6.use focus attacks a lot if he starts step kicking all the time
7.shotos are easilly anti aired in either stance
also thanks zuuku for starting the thread
I would go U2 against every single character for a while, just because landing crane U2 on a baited opponent feels damn good. I just forget them along with Oga when the opponent’s playstyle is block.
In vanilla, I used to use crane j.LK and j.LP quite a lot as an air-2-air against floaty jumps like Chun. But now, I usually use mantis j.LP or j.MP on air fight.
As for crane c.LK hit confirm , mantis c.LP -> crane s.LP xx c.LK or something similar would be better. mantis s.MP pushes a bit too much for it to work reliably on non-blank range IMO, and I don’t like 1-frame links.
Btw, what do you guys use the most as a jump-in or a follow-up of a neutral jump? It is usually unsafe to do this, but doing it rarely can catch people by surprise. I usually use crane j.MP as a jump-in due to its high damage, hitbox and comboability into c.MP -> Roll (but you need to combo roll late), and crane nj.MP or nj.HK depending on whether the opponents is standing or crouching.
Usually I would go for crane j.hk >c.mp> HP roll simply because it’s his strongest combo. Unless I play a grappler such as T’hawk and Gief due to their ability to 360 the roll (well, if not all hits connect) on block, too risky. I also use crane j.hk >mantis s.mp> mk hands alot.
Crane j.mp has a great active hitbox indeed.
Anytime I use Crane U2 and crouch fierce AA players stop once I have it. I’ve had one player not.
For Gief and Thawk I like to use the j.HK, c.mp, roll vs them vary rarely do I mess that up.
I think Crane j.MK, Mantis, s.MP is the way to go for now depending on if it’s a character that should be knocking down all the time, like guile.
as a matter of fact, i tried to use crane j.hp much more. and here is the news: it’s awzum. if used early enough it will beat most air attacks or at least trade (which is most likely in gen’s favor unless the opponent’s was also a hard attack). even as jump in it’s quite good (tho, follow up is limited) c.lp, throw or dash on block, c.lk or s.hk on hit. i can’t accustom myself to change stance after landing. happend alot that it fails (due to known reasons…). but if i go for it, it does more damage over all than 2x. j.hk (since j.hk counts as 2 attack, next attack is reduced to 80% and followup even further). j.hk is good vs a late jump in (when u jump into their jump arc) or vs focus attacks.
for neutral jump i use j.mk the most, it has the biggest hitbox and can catch some dashes aswell.
if both neutral jump, j.lk kicks balls ^^
here a good question to ask everyone, i was thinking of this while i was in training mode. if capcom ever fix the landing glitch would that open more options for the old man or most at least more mix up potential.
like say you got a opponent who likes to turtle, you get him in the air with a reset switch with a mantis normal then switch to crane in the air and do his overhead for a mixup.
i dont know just a random thought that i had.
another awzum little thing would be if u can change stance while crane roll and then cancel one hit into mantis super. atm u can only super cancel with crane ultra, since u are considered crane stance for the duration of the move.
in general i think stance swtich alone is enough “challenge”, why it has to be unsafe?
If you watch my videos you will see I use Crane j.HP all the time. It’s awesome to jump over guiles Booms because if you use HK your butt with hit the boom. Also I find it stuffs more than the HK for air to ground
I love the Crane U2, but yes it does get beat out alot. For example, Vegas Ex backflip kick straight up beats it, no trade, just beats it. But I love it cause the other player doesn’t expect it and its great when you catch them with it when they are on the way down in the air or when you can get it to crossup. The Mantis U2, i dunno, its great, but I find its hard to connect it. The input sucks for it and I hate how it trades with other ultras, it seems like it should beat other ultras since its a “special” ultra.
I do love crane j.mp too.
I also wish that you could combo out of Crane j.HK x 2 instead of just hitting em twice and then waiting for them to get back up. Seems stupid you can’t combo after that since other characters i.e. Akuma, can dp you when you are about to hit the ground on that tatsu combo after taking about 5 hits.
Also, why the fuck is it so hard to Crane U1 out of a gekiro. Its easy to get the crane super, but its like impossible to do the Ultra. It would be such a good link to have available, sure it will scale some, but it would be a nice tool.
I have stopped using the U2 set completely, even in matchups against FBers. His old ultras just have way too many setups for me to ignore, and better guaranteed damage as well.
How do you guys successfully combo in Mantis after landing a Crane j.mk? What attacks do you use after the Crane j.mk hits? The best I can do is combo into his jab/short in Mantis. I can never land mantis st.mp because of the stance change glitch (I presume). Is there a trick to it?
Has anyone else developed a really bad habit of backdashing all the time? I really need to chill out with that shit. Luckily the average online player doesn’t know about options selects, but against good comp I get punished hard via OS or something else. The sad thing is that SRK mash-happy SF4 pretty much conditioned me to backdash so much, because I got really fucking tired eating mashed SRKs if my jump in was timed a little too early or my timing was off on a block string. I also hate blocking the SRK–>FADC which gives them frame advantage. 
So I developed a habit of backdashing after blocked jumpins and some block strings. Thankfully Gen has a fucking great backdash though, and if I backdash after the opponent blocks my jumpin that often makes them jump after me in return–that’s where I take a few steps forward and tag them with crane cr.hk.
Crane cr.hk is the shit. I said it in other topics, but it’s my #1 anti air by far. It’s really fucking good when you’ve dominated someone enough in footsies because alot of players get frustrated and jump towards you. Also it’s really good for surrendering space and giving your opponent a false sense that you are backing off. Since crane has such a fast walk speed you can back up a few steps (where you would be outside of their jump in range), see them jump, and then walk forward a few steps to AA them. It works really well when you get the opponent cornered. Crane cr.mp is great in footsies now. Is is relatively fast (5 frames), has good range and stuff alot of crap on the ground. Plus is much more safe than in vanilla. Definitely use it more if you havent.
Finally, WHAT’S YOU FAVORITE COLOR FOR GEN? Yea I said it. Mine is #7 (the dark green). Shit is too stylin.
Fucking pink Gen all the way, PEOPLE GET MAD CUZ IM STYLIN ON THEM
Seriously though, I backdash way too much aswell. I got punished for it badly today against a Ryu that spotted that habit and did his ultra as I backdashed 
yeah i usually be alot more time in crane than in mantis during footsie / zoning. despite hands, crane suffer nothing. c.hk is really good anti air if u get the timing down. tho, it requires alot of experience. this move needs more active frames! 
crane c.mp as poke is really good. and in combination with hp roll a good punisher.
c.lp is also usefull. it’s imo by far his best frame trap.
and crabe s.mp + s.hp is really good as mixup.
i usually go for black as color. if i play mirror and he uses black (as player 1) than i go for white. need to check his 3rd costum while playing, dont have the package yet.
Totally! Pink all the way. I use that color with all my character, no homo.
For crane j.MK combo, I’m into a habit of doing s.LP xx c.LK -> Sweep if hit, and s.LP xx c.LP if blocked. But I’m doing more MP MK hands than before.
I found out that I’m backdashing almost every time I get knocked down. One of a hundred bad habits that reside within my gameplay.
I’m always colour #4 or #12, with taunt #6 or #7.