How to Approach with Ogre?

Could anyone explain to me how they get-in against people with Ogre? And how they approach a match? I’m using Hwoarang / Ogre.

I know all of his combos, all of his anti-airs, what chains/links into what. But I just have a hard time figuring out how to fight people with him.

EDIT: Meaning like, how do you guys go about a match-up with him. What’s your game plan? The only thing I see myself doing is cross-over MK and then LP,LP into whatever. Or Trying to zone with cr.M, cr.H or st.H. But that’s about all I do and it doesn’t really work. I’d really appreciate any help

I pair him with Vega. Usually I have Vega on point and go into a launcher combo to tag Ogre in, putting me in on my opponent. Once I’m in with Ogre, I attempt to stay in as long as possible. I think by himself, Ogre has difficulty getting in on his opponent but once he is, it’s scary.

Dunno man, I tend to use Hunting hawk a lot to approach. I can’t remember how unsafe it is but it’s generally safe if they’re standing and you only do the first two hits.

  • Other than that move close enough to do his cr.mk > cr.FP. Once they block the overhead change it to end with wanning moon.
  • Don’t forget you can cr.mk xx indigo punch to make it safe. You can even do things like cancel into the indigo punch and charge it and dash cancel up and throw. I tihnk you’re pretty negative maybe -5 or something I forget… I read it somewhere… so be careful with that one, but it can catch a lot of ppl by surprise.
  • st.LP x 2 is something like +7 on block so you can walk in all day with that.
  • You can also approach to a range you know they’ll jump in on you and just wait for that jump in and AA with AP. Most ppl are pretty impatient and will jump or do the usual walk up jab nonsense and then try to crossup, but AP smokes crossups with ease. Then you can pressure the wakeup however you see fit. I like use neutral empty jump so they block high on their wakeup. When you come down do a cr.lk into light owl hunt.
  • Another AA one, just walk up into that jump in range and do an ex burn kick on their jump in if you have the meter. You can go into a free combo off that.
  • Snake blade is pretty safe I think -3 on block if you do all 3 hits, so just make sure you know the matchup and if they have a 3 framer to respond with
  • Since everyone loves to jump in this game. Walk up near jump range and walk back. A lot of ppl will try to jump at you. Scrubs will jump again a 2nd time, so be ready for the 2nd jump and do a j.lk counter hit > cr.mk > cr.fp (prob better options but that one is easy enough)

I think a lot of ogres gimmicks are good for baiting your opponent into doing things and knowing how to counter it.

Anyhow, I think really what you’re asking can’t be explained so much as you just have to be intuitive (footsies). It’s all knowing what options you have at what range and knowing what their character can do at what range. Then you just try to dance in and out of those ranges to try to bait whiff attacks. For example walk into there sweep range and bait a whiff sweep, maybe you can then punish with st.FP for a crumple, or go for a counterhit crumple off another standing move they always throw out at a certain range. Things like that… I dunno the startup on st.FP so take that with a grain of salt if you do actually try to punish with it. Just gotta learn the ranges of your pokes man and play against your opponent not against their character so much. Pay attention to their tendencies and don’t auto pilot your shit. Test them out round 1… see what oyu can get away with. Can they not block jump ins? Well walk up jab pressure > jump all day. Do they suck blocking overheads? Spam that cr.mk > cr.FP. Figure out where they’re weak and abuse the shit out of it until they show you they can stop it.

Thanks for the response man. When people cross you over and you do ancient power FP, you have to reverse the motion right? And then they fall back on the other side and you can do hunting hawk BnB?

Ancient Power done early enough to actually hit, doesn’t require reverse motion. Hunting Hawk BnBs work post anti cross-up Ancient Power.

Yeah you can just do it with the normal motion and it will cover behind you. The high counter actually does the same as well (covering crossups). Another thing to remember for footsies is dashing. Ogre has a good forward dash so abuse the shit out of that. Play the footsies game faking back and forth walking then do a dash up cr.mk or snake blade or jump in or something (keep it random), hell even a dash up counter if your brave enough though that’s pretty risky. Keep resetting your spacing so they can’t say to themselves ok this guy’s just going to walk forward, stop, crouch block, walk forward some more… etc… being predictable. The key is too keep them guessing on what range you’ll be at so they can’t time a poke like cr.mk or a juicy jump in.

Jump ins have so much reward in this game and are so much quicker than SF4 that’s it harder to AA them for most of the cast. Plus, 99% of ppl can’t block a j.HK/J.HP > st.HK xx owl hunt. Even if they block the 2 normals the OH usually tags them as its pretty quick, but you gotta mix it up. Maybe one time do that string, the next jump in do cl.LP > infinite kicks xx indigo punch (if they block it all somehow) or throw out some regular normals. His st.MP and far HK are really good.

A big thing that irks me is what to do when they’re getting up off the floor. Rolling backwards or coming straight up.

A lot of times when I try to cross over and they’re coming straight up, they crouch and then my j.MK whiffs horribly =/

Yeah his crossup is kinda iffy sometimes. Some other wakeup stuff I go for:

  • meaty burn kicks it has active frames for days if they press a button (generally safe)
  • cr.FP overhead (pretty unsafe)
  • empty neutral jump shenanigans I mentioned before
  • a charged up indigo punch dash cancel back to try and bait a reversal (generally safe), 2nd knockdown dash forward and go for a throw if you think they’ll just wakeup into nothing that time
  • you could try a quick hunting hawk to change sides and try to mess up their roll if you expect that

Some stuff I haven’t tested:

I’m thinking there’s probably something we can do with superjumps to mixup whether it crosses up or doesn’t as well. In case it’s not known there are superjumps in the game. They aren’t drastically higher but they’re there…

I was watching some video over in the abel forum showing his neutral jump med or light kick which crosses up due to auto correct if they roll. It also hit weird if you dashed up and then jumped back and did it. Ogres j.mk is similar so some of those tricks might work as well.

By the way I just wanted to add to this thread. I’m having a super easy time getting in by just walking forward and baiting a jump in and doing a st.mk AA into a counterhit combo. People think they can abuse the living shit out of jump in this game. st.MK blows up jumps. Once they get hit by the counterhit combo once or twice they decide jumping in isn’t such a great idea and stick to the ground where you can play cr.mk footsies all day. So @papa give that a try. Hit up training mode learn the timing of st.MK AA (generally throw it out at their arc max in the air).

You can also AA with cr.HK but I find st.mk works better for me and even helps somewhat on jumpins which may crossup.

Dash Cancel his low forward, that has some insane range and his dash is pretty good IMO. You can catch a lot of people with dash cancel into throw.

Thanks for the responses guys!

When I’m at mid-screen range what do you guys do? My cr.MP or cr.HP gets stuffed alot hahah.

This more for a distance further than half, but Power up indigo punch for two reasons:

1 - You can keep charging + cancel for free meter building.
2 - I can’t recall how much you have to do it… whether it’s the 1 fireball hand or 2 for ogre, but I believe after doing a character’s charge move it allows you to store up a counterhit for your next hit. Now you’ve got a free crumple with st.fp on any hit from non-close range. The only problem is st.fp is kinda risky, but a good tool to have nonetheless.

For half screen:

Throwing out a random cr.HP is pretty much a prayer. You should at least try to hit confirm off a cr.MK first which also makes it a low/high mixup. Anytime that overhead is blocked its pretty unsafe and you’re going to eat a combo.

cr.MP you have to condition them not to jump first or just use it sparingly. It goes pretty far so again you may feel like you’re playing footsies and throw it out but meanwhile your opponent is thinking hey this is a great range to jump from, so just be smart about it. I mean it doesn’t lead to any damage so I don’t think it should be a main tool. You should moreso be using cr.MK as you can cancel that into specials, CADC, cr.HP

Use his st.MP that thing is great to apply pressure and counterhits like everything, even st.HK is pretty quick.

it’s whenever you cancel an ex charge you get a free counterhit. this applies if you charge up a regular move to EX level and then cancel.

it’s also really good for cl.HP as an antiair since it puts them in juggle state even if they don’t throw out a move.

Still getting the hang of this game, but in my experience far s.roundhouse is also a pretty good poke. If you’re a bit farther away, I’ve had some luck with c.strong->far.s.roundhouse, though that can be dangerous if they jump the strong or if you mess up the spacing and end up chaining to cl.roundhouse.

Honestly, though, rather than going in, I often just dance around at jump range and wait for them to do something dumb that I can hit with Ancient Power, Hunting Hawk or Owl’s Hunt.

Thanks again for the responses.

Can somebody tell me the frames on Cl.Hp? Or how you guys use it?

5 frame startup active for 4 frames 22 recovery frames (dash cancellable for 19 frames of recovery instead) -6 on block (-5 when dash cancelled backwards)

It’s a decent ant iair against jump ins if you walk back while doing it. when it’s EX charge cancelled the counter hit from it as an anti-air let’s you get 400 damage combos off of it, which is better than ancient power. Though you need to have prepped for it through charge cancelling. but that IS something ogre can do considering he can easily put a ton of pressure on an opponent in block, and then EX dash cancel an indigo punch backwards at the end of a blockstring and go into a defensive game. spending 1 meter to push an opponent into the corner and then set up to beat his jump in with a nice damage combo can definitely be worth it in certain match-ups.