Was less of them yesterday. Today there’s so many Kens I’m honestly surprised when my opponent isn’t Ken.
I just played against a Vega which was the first non Ken I’ve fought in at least a few hours.
Looking forward to the mirrors tomorrow then, I suppose. Sadly that maintenance is supposed to start right when I leave work.
I can’t dish out stuff like some people can, my Ken is very very basic at best and always has been.
But here are some go to combos I have:
(I try to save for CA since it is so easy to confirm into unless I’m in VT)
1 Bar:
J. MK cross up or J. HK jump-in, St. Mk>Hk into EX DP or EX Tatsu
Cr. Mp, B+Mp>Hp xx EX Tatsu
1 Bar with VT:
Same basic combos above only into Lp Srk, EX Srk
Best CA I have and really easy to do:
J. Hp, Mk>Hk xx CA really good damage!
Best way into VT I have: (I use this on easy punishes or stunned opponents
St. Hp xVTx B+Mp>Hp, Lp Srk, EX SRK
Saw where this has already been mentioned. I’ve actually started using mp.srk into ex.srk for v-trigger combos more often. It’s just as easy as lp srk into ex srk. Just more damaging.
Little Gootecks Action.
Just started watching but I’m sure it has note worthy stuff!
I kind of came over here just to see if anyone was checking that stuff out.
I’m getting the same results and at first I thought this was a very apparent problem for Ken… but then I realized I was doing punishes WITH Ken as well.
In a Ken vs Ken Mirror here are some punishes listed below. Which might just mean Ken has really good normals to punish people… when i attempted with other characters like Vega and R.Mika they could punish but for minimal damage unless it was Ken’s overheads… will get to that in a moment. Basically in Ken’s neutral game it seems like just fishing for small damage with anything but st.LK, jabs and cr.MP could lead to him getting chipped away.
Cr.MK is about -5, you can get st.Lk off into Tatsu as a punish if they don’t cancel into hadoken. If they cancel into Hadoken it depends on what strength but you can still get this punish off pretty cleanly, otherwise you will trade Hadoken for st.LK and the opponent has the advantage.
If they cancel cr.MK into any fireball except EX you can stand jab for counter hit with pretty much any character even on a well placed cr.MK into hadoken.
Both overheads are punishable at about maybe -7?. I believe I got cr.MK punish off on both of Ken’s overheads. If you block the overhead a lot closer you can get the back mp > st.hp target combo for big damage. Testing this with other characters gave big damage options.
All tatsu’s on block lead to a high damage punish for all characters available at the moment.
His step kick v-skill is pretty punishable too.
His kicking target combo like you stated can just use an uppercut to punish but since the second kick is a high and whiffs like Akuma’s double kick in SFIV you can just go for a jab cancel into tatsu for punish.
It seems like his safest normals are his jabs, shorts, back strong, crouching strong and I think his stand Fierce.
If Ken has a full stock his CA comes out really really fast it seems. I was able to punish pretty decent amount of options that Ken had at that point.
At first I was thinking Ken was going to have a lot of troubles because of this, but after I tested punishing with other characters it didn’t seem that bad. It is apparent that he isn’t as safe as he was in SFIV, but we’ll just have to see how the match-ups play out for him. Right now Vega and R.Mika and with what I tested with Necalli shows he isn’t as affected by these problems as he is in a Ken vs Ken mirror. He will still get nickled and dimed with a far jab from this batch of new characters in this version but big damage into knockdowns wont be had unless you pull the abovel listed normals out up-close.
Shoto’s are currently on the lower end of neutral game currently imo which is pretty odd. Their normals are severely lacking. They have decent anti-airs but that is about it.
Hm, seems really the only thing wrong with Ken is some frame data which is pretty easy to fix.
Not really feeling any of the current characters so I decided to go with Ken till Karin is out (bring back chun!). Spacing wise, is crL, stLP the same as crLPx2? I only ask bc I’ve always found it hard to do crouching normals into DP (that is, into a regular DP motion and not just 33) but crLP, stLP xx Fierce DP was doing the same damage. Also didnt know crMP linked into bMP nor that VT Strong DP linked into EX DP. Gonna have to use that against the CPU tmw.
If you’re gonna VT cancel, you might as well add a Hado after the stHP. Can’t remember if bMP links after regular Hado VTC but it worked after EX Hado so try it.
For god’s sake ken players, and I know this might not apply to people on this board, but his mp dp has the upper body invincibility. Stop with the wake up fp dps. I’ve been just sweeping ken players out of some wake up dps and it’s getting kinda silly. In fact that works against everything except his wake up EX dp.
lp dp = no invincibility, mp dp = upper body invincibility, fp dp = no invincibility. ex dp = full invincibility
(You guys probably know this)
b-but the song
The song will always live in our hearts.
I wasnt able to get a match in the beta last night but against the CPU, I never even did a wake-up DP. But that begs the question, does Ken have any known safe-jumps so far?
Combo video from pepopulo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChBtpkqcqjs
Haven’t tested it personally, but this was up the other day.
https://vine.co/v/eVm3gpPOgBB
it seems a back recovery (i’m not sure) but if it’s back recovery, the DP with normal recovery would hit him
Kinda weird that Ken can cancel his EX DP during the second rep into VT. It doesn’t combo into anything on standing or juggle and I’m pretty sure it’s unsafe. Makes me wonder why it even has that property.
Also need to test/know how safe Hado VTC is. I’ve been using jump-in, normal xx Hado VTC for end match pressure while also getting Ken into his VT safely. Of course, if it hits, you get MK>HK xx MP DP, EX DP.
Been playing for a few hours and here’s what I learned, also have some questions
St.mk has been my go-to for whiff punishment, can confirm on hit for the follow up st.hk into hp srk. The confirm is medium difficulty, I like how the first hit will nab people crouching and has a force stand. The first hit doesn’t seem punishable on block, was able to recover on time to block each punish attempt unless they were just mis-timed.
The B.mp st.hp tc is hard to hit confirm, def punishable on block but i’ve been able to confirm on hit before following up with st.hp. Wouldn’t recommend going for the hit confirm if the connection is bad. Anyone know if the first hit is positive or minus on block?
I feel like his v-skill is kinda ass and I only use it for punishment. His v-trigger is gdlk though, it’s like having another critical art stocked up for the whiff punish into v-trigger cancel xxx combo.
Anyone know if st.hp v-skill cancel is punishable on block?
i think all of his v-skill stuff is punishable.
i really want to figure out how to make run work. i know its useful for something.
Only practical things I got from his v-skill were punish combos and using it to fake people out in the mid-range when they’re willfully backing themselves into the corner. I don’t mind having a sub-par v-skill since he makes up for it by having arguable the best v-trigger in the game imo
St.mk is such a ridiculous whiff punish in this game, hope they don’t nerf it
His V-skill is pretty much a combo extender at this point. Everyone on block is unsafe, I would only use it to close distance and some wake-up gimmicks, and max. range step kick.
C.MP C.MK St.MP B.MP and lights are his main tools. his kick target combo is a nice whiff punisher and another way to get into super.
I’m having fun revolving my entire game around the V-skill:
- Zone with fireballs to put yourself at the range where the step kick hits at max range.
- Go for step kick to build V-meter. Mix it up with run> throw and run>c.short
- Profit.
The way I see it, the V-skill is basically a KOF run with a minimum and maximum range (anywhere between those two ranges, Ken can cancel the run). To make the most of it, you need to keep the opponent in the zone between the minimum and maximum range of the run. That’s the distance where Ken can control spacing the best.