The fact that he is 2 different characters.
“Good tick throw” - young zeku only. Old zeku has more push back on his normals and slower walk speed.
“Gap closing specials” both the flip for old Z, and run for young Z, are too slow and easily reactable to be used in neutral.
“Longest range fast poke in the game” I assume you mean koku hk. It starts in 26f (projectile) and has 30f of recovery. If that is fast…
“AA does great damage”- old zeku - you mean off of a CC cr.hp, because back gram is too slow to be used as an AA (15f). - young zeku - lp hozanto ? In both stances, it’s range specific and doesn’t work from mid-close range, and both are slow (10f and 12f)
“Frame trap galore” old zeku’s frame traps sucks, really. Young zeku’s has very strong frame traps BUT stubby normals and too much push back which means you only have one chance to frame trap the opponent.
“Ridiculous damage in both stance from medium confirms” - it’s true he can deal 240 from a medium IF he is close enough (point blank) or it WILL whiff (a lot) due to the lack of range of his normals.
“Has a reversal in his ranged stance” yes, old zeku has a reversal with his ex dp and it does 0 stun (odd), and if it’s blocked, he is dead.
“Has a command grab from his gap closer” - you play Laura and you call that a command grab ? Just aa the flip (super easy) or duck. None of his following moves hit overhead.
My main problem with zeku is his stubby normals. He really lacks range. It damages his frame trap game, his shimmy game, his footsie game and his pressure.
I also feel like his AA are not that great especially against cross-ups. Old zeku has his dp but it is 7f and is range dependant. If you whiff or it’s blocked, you are dead. His cr.hp is 10f and is good, but won’t work for close jumps. He also has his st.mp but it trades a lot and loses to jumps that are over his head. Young zeku’s AA is st.mk. It’s quite good but loses to strong jump-in attacks.
And finally, and I really don’t get this, how come his jumping normals are so bad ?? I mean, first of all, the angles are weird (hitting upward most of the time). Secondly, his only real jumping attacks in both stances are j.mk and j.hk, which only have 4 freackin active frames ! Not mentioning the small hit box his cross-ups have. Is this also some tests for AE ? Like the +5f recovery young zeku has on his powerful buttons (st.hp, cr.hp, st.hk) and lp hozanto ?
It really feels like Zeku is a test character for the season to come.
But yeah, suuure, “on paper, zeku appears to be one of the best characters in the game”.
PS : I REAAALLY do believe that Laura IS one of the best characters in the game and I’m ready to discuss that with any of you.
Ok first of all, thank you for conversing with me I really wanted to see what others were seeing about him to know how they felt, and now that you post this, I know. So on to your points, because you seem to be kinda misinformed for the most part (nothing against you at all it happens to the best of us)
As a former gen main, his 2 stances are a boon for me personally because I like having lots of moves and tools at my disposal, I can however see it being a disadvantage for some people. That really sucks for them.
Old zeku has a tick throw that is just as good as young. Cr.lp>throw doesn’t require him to walk forward in old stance and it frame traps against 3 frame jabs.
His flip special in neutral is a great way to get in overfireballs and moves of that nature. And personally I don’t think it’s that easy to react to if the opponent is also looking for Koku and dashins and stance changes threatening yolo slides overheads and run stops… all of which get you in. (Though admittedly I don’t use the flip to get in randomly… don’t need to, koku is that good)
I also think his moveset is great upclose, you can’t just use his moves on autopilot but he has lots of ways to make his opponent second guess any defense they want to use.
26 frame startup for a move with that kind of range is pretty damn fast. It’s an excellent wiff punisher as well in the mk version and it makes people not want to press buttons and makes them like to jump towards him into his excellent AA, because it’s such a great wiff punisher it makes people not want to press pre emptive buttons as much and allows him easier dash in offense both during blockstrings and in neutral. I get more dash up throws and dash up st.mk CH with him than I have with any other character.
His AA is amongst the best in the game:
Chun AA = st.lk and it does 40 damage, her BHK does like 80-90
Most characters have normal AA’s and those do 80-100 damage and startup slow.
Old zeku has HK dp and that does 120 damage… but it doesn’t stop there. Combo it into super for crazy damage that not a whole lot of characters can do as AA.
Young has LP hozanto and L air grab and ex air grab, ex air grab starts up in 4 frames, does 160 damage and gives oki afterwards if you have v trigger.
Old zekus frame traps are bonkers good:
Cr.lp>throw, hits 3 frame button mashers.
St.mk>st.lp and st.mp>st.lp hits 3 framers and confirms into qcf lp… but no conversion from the CH st.lp unless you want to guess the conversion, still though, st.mk is most used in other places that I will point out in a sec.
St.mp>st.mp good CH conversion. St.mp into st.lp or st.lk is good for confirms into dp or fireball respectively.
Cr.lp>cr.hp is a GREAT CH fish against players that like to delay tech because it’s 10 frames of startup will hit the last frames of delay tech and give the opponent plenty of time to hit a button.
Why would the opponent do a delay tech there? Because your cr.lp>throw beats their jab and cr.lp,st.mp beats moves timed a bit slower. You as old zeku have a ton of confirm options.
What about his shimmy game? Ridiculous man:
Cr.hp or st.hp xx ex Teki xx koku does 292 damage for a shimmy and only goes up from there. If you don’t want to be -2 on block just don’t cancel or cancel into ex koku for +1 or -1 but either way he’s safe and at distance.
Also, cr.lp, CH cr.lp,st.mp xx ex teki xx hk koku does 277
Cr.lp>microwalk CH cr.lp,st.mp,st.lk xx DP works and your microwalk doesn’t have to be much at all… this is REALLY good.
His reversal… same as any other reversal…you get blocked you get owned. This isnt something bad about zeku, at all.
If all you do is duck against his flip, then all you are doing is giving him more chances at offense. Ducking is NOT a solution.
AAing is the solution, but with everything I’ve said here… if you are AAing the flip any kind of well it means I’m being to predictable or you’re concentrating on shutting it down and allowing me to do all my other gross shit (which is a win for me) Yeah, it’s not something you just whore out willy nilly like a 10 inch dong… but I digress.
Anywho, like I said, thanks for giving me your reasons for why people think he’s not great. Allows me to move forward with him now. I was wondering if they were seeing something I wasn’t. Turns out that doesn’t seem to be the case.
The air grab after the EX Palm grab is crazy, very good job @Slaynman
I need to study more pros playing Zeku, especially to learn the perfect rhythm and build my own gameplan with him. After 4 hours offline matches with some friends I’ve learned I don’t need to play too defensively in Old form, isn’t easy to contain rushdown characters like Cammy and Necalli, at least for me. With the latter we need to have our frame traps ready to kill his 3f buttons, in Young form the Palm is tremendously effective. I’m gonna labbing more today, Zeku seems a character who need a continuous work to unleash all his potential.
I was reading FAT and it says that young form’s cr hp has a hitbox to hurtbox ratio similar to bison’s cr lp. That could be good for anti airing, even though it starts in 10 frames
Didn’t test it, but LP Hozanto seems to cover that spot, so I’m good with it. Question, what’s your favorite combo starter with Yung Z? I’m trying to use st.lk more because that +3 on block is too sweet to be left behind, but st.mp feels more consistent.
Less pushback than st.mp
Can be canceled from
Links into st.mp target combo
Links into st.lp target combo
Can frame trap against 3 framers with cr.mp,CH cr.lp,cr.mp xx slide
So basically if they start trying to call out your 4 frame gap between cr.mp and st.mp then you can just start to call them out with a cr.lp CH combo.
But tbh with zeku it’s all about mixing up your blockstrings and confirms. He’s got so many that you probably shouldn’t be spamming any one string to much, just keep making them guess your strings and staggers and confirms…easier said than done, but it’s probably how the game is meant to be played or at the very least zeku.
He’s got lots of stuff to keep the opponent guessing about when to press buttons against him since he has so many moves that are plus and confirms, in both stances.
Imho YZ is all about ex run mixups and frame traps.
Old Zeku is all about koku neutral, bushin flip pressure and frame traps.
Both stances are about mixing it up.
Old has easy on block ways to get to young up close, young doesn’t need any easy way to get to old since all he has to do is jump backwards.
Old is a mix between doing his own thing upclose and transitioning into young with St.HP xx transform which is plus one on block.
Using cr.mp as a combo/blockstring starter feels natural and I do already, what isn’t still is using cr.lp right after it to beat 3f spam. I’ve noticed I can do cr.mp again after cr.lp CH,but there’s nothing more outside EX Hozanto. Maybe I need to lab more around that.
I was in training testing these yesterday and his Palm is amazing, better than I thought. Even midscreen we could create very ambiguous traps depending on the normal cancelled into Palm. The backward movement of it catches a lot of people right during their whiffed buttons, it’s very interesting. Max range st.HPxx EX Sho could beat 3f buttons and give us room for comboing after. Maybe even MP Sho could iirc.
Me personally, I’ve never found 2 and 3 frame gaps very worthwhile from lights to mediums. It’s rare to have someone mashing that hard to where they get CH consistently in those kinds of small gaps.
I was actually thinking of writing a theory primer/tutorial on frame traps and stagger pressure. My last post in the chun forum was basically a treatise in that subject… and got no likes at all so, yeah, probably won’t be doing that, especially when my stagger pressure isn’t the best (or the worst)
For me, the gaps that I try to use are varied and usually aren’t frame specific because I’m always trying to turn nothing into something… but as an example:
Cr.lp,st.mp is my most used frame trap. Good all around frame trap with regards to safety and confirming if the cr.lp was a CH… plus the cr.lp sets up for tick throws and microwalk (stagger pressure)
My next frame trap is cr.lp,st.mk… bigger gap and more risky, but bigger rewards on hit… but it doesn’t usually hit, but the gap is big and if it gets blocked it tells me a lot about my opponents current habits… means I can probably get a tick throw in or a microwalk something in.
My frame trap after that, that I don’t use that much because it’s pretty risky to abuse, is cr.lp,cr.hp which is the biggest gap I use outside of microwalks.
These are all great frame traps that I use to keep my opponent on their toes about what kind of gap I’m using.
My microwalk pressure usually consists of cr.lp, microwalk cr.lp,st.mp
Or cr.lp, microwalk st.mp
Or st.mp microwalk st.mp.
My frame traps after mediums are
St.mp,st.lp
And st.mk, st.lp
I tend to confirm the st.mk into st.lp on block or st.mp on hit, or at least I try.
Once players get really conditioned to just block is when I start to tick throw them.
If they start to get conditioned to jab at weird timings I do like a push out via a jab and a medium then I microwalk back or stay in place and do st.hk looking for the CC.
My pressure leaves a lot to be desired but my epiphany if there was one to be had was to use stagger pressure normals at ranges where my normals can’t confirm, but can just do damage… you get predictable with pressure if you are always trying to stagger into confirm range, and hitting with a naked cr.mk or cr.mp might not do much, but it adds up and sets up for your bigger more risky microwalks. If the opponent is content with getting hit by the small damage is when I start to bring out the CC normals because even on block a knowledgeable opponent identifies the risk of pressing buttons there in the future and that sets up for better pressure via bigger microwalks, plus zekus st.hk is a premier CC normal at only -2 on block.
I also don’t go in for using slide into v trigger. My v trigger activations are all Old Zeku cr.mk and cr.mp xx activate. These normals are good for hitting low and wiff punishing respectively.
All the above is for Old Zeku. I’m not really using the young man just yet. Want to get my Old Zeku nice for a month or so before I start to really get into YZ.
-edit
A pushout blockstring I’m working on is cr.lp,st.mp,st.lk,st.hk. Done from point blank the st.hk will make contact with the opponent. I say I’m working on it because I’m working on the different parts of CH optimisation the string gives, as well as finding places in the string to get in microwalks and figure out what has the highest potential for pressure and CH confirmation… like after the st.lk I can walk forward a tad and st.hk. The reason for this is because the opponent is more likely to try to reactively press a button from that range seeing a forward walk… bla bla bla.
All depends. I’ve noticed how some characters like Necalli loves to mash 3f lp’s after Yung Zeku cr.mp. So now doing cr.lp after our medium it’s a good option. I prefer to focus on punish mashers with fierce buttons or palm atm, but winning with cr.mp,CH.cr.lp xx lp Hozanto,lp Sho xx CA is so sweet.
As luck and egg on my face would have it, once my stagger pressure got really good with zeku, people started to mash the 3 frame normals so I’ve had to incorporate small gaps in my gameplay.
My confirmation sucks though so I’m not able to convert consistently and zekus amount of bnbs you need to know makes confirmation that much harder.
Yeah,learning practically 2 characters at once has even disadvantages, hitconfirms is one of them. Go for 3f kill traps vs every character with 3f buttons, there’s no doubt they will use it.
Not necessarily. No one actually used them against me previously. People that played against me pretty much only did delayed tech and walk backwards and no tech.
I have to teach people to press buttons against me by doing staggers and sometimes shimmies otherwise there’s no reason for a good opponent to ever do anything but delayed tech.
The thing about delayed tech is that microwalk pressure “beats” it by allowing you more pressure in the huge gap they are delay teching in. So I usually start out with tick throws against my opponents till they start to delay tech then I start to use microwalks to pressure their delay tech, then after that they usually either start to walk backwards or start mashing jab so that’s when I usually start with the cr.lp,cr.mk string just to hit them low, and the cr.lp,st.lp string to hit their jab. Problem is the CH tends to push me to far out for confirmation… which fucking sucks.
I’ve also started to incorporate st.hk as a CC fish after like 3 blocked pokes in a pokestring or so.
LOL… don’t know why I never noticed this but zeku has one of the easiest bnbs in the game as far as confirmation:
Cr.lp x2, st.lp xx lk koku… works against standing and crouching ken… don’t know if it works against the entire cast but this gives zeku some really good confirmation just do cr.lpx2 and if it hits do st.lp xx lk koku. If it’s blocked you have more than enough time to see it and go into stagger or pushout blockstrings.
Best thing ever about this string is that it sets up perfect spacing for zeku to do “safe” on block koku as it will be spaced very far out. And zeku has a very nice “mixup” after 2 blocked cr.lp:
Microwalk st.mp (confirm it) st.lk xx dp
Or walk forward a tad to show the throw and shimmy the opponent (works pretty well because of the pronounced walk before the throw)
Delay st.lp xx koku… this will catch people mashing buttons and knock them down making them respect your gaps.
Walk backwards a tad and st.lk xx koku gives a bigger yet safer gap and combos on CH.
This can literally be your entire gameplan while throwing in small things here and there. This knockdown also puts zeku outside of throw range on wakeup so just dashing up and blocking against 3 frame characters is much safer than normal, allowing zeku to keep close to the opponent if he wants and putting way out of jab range if the opponent backroll which means zeku is safe to the opponents mashed moves.
This is the shit, for real.
Just tested against karins and cammys small hurt box and it works against them as well, so it probably works against most characters. This is the first light x 3 jab confirm in the game that works even on block (most characters that can do this, and they are few, have their last light wiff on standing or crouching opponents, or simply dong have good specials to confirm into. Zekus special has the range, it has the autopilot, and it knocks down. This is perfect and shades of sf4.
I really wanted to see what others were seeing about him to know how they felt, and now that you post this, I know. So on to your points, because you seem to be kinda misinformed for the most part (nothing against you at all it happens to the best of us)