Ken has at worse 6-4 match ups. I think he does well against the cast. In fact I think Ryu and Ken, as shotos, have to be good because everyone knows how to defend against them. If they don’t have strong tools they would be pretty ass. Ryu is probably a little more balanced than Ken, but ken probably has a few 6-4’s in his favor while Ryu is more 5-5 across the roster.
Ryu is particularly strong right now, but it’s still early.
Only if you don’t know how to use them.
I suppose I need to watch more match up footage and all.
Anyone know his run cancel frame data? Or is it all unsafe. I’ve been abusing st.HK run cancel and everyone gets hit by it.
on block it’s all unsafe yes.
Ok I think I need advice on the Karin matchup more than I’d realise before. I actually find her harder than Chun now, any tips? I think it’s partly due to my shit reactions, I take her bullshit a lot but I still find it hard either way.
Also I seem to have trouble against Guile and Alex who I think shouldn’t be that hard but I suck.
When fighting Karin, there are a few things I pay extra attention too.
In neutral, try not to challenge her poke game around mid-range. Try to play outside her normals and bait an unsafe ressenha/jump. Practice punishing ressenha and it’s follow-ups in training.
If you jump in from mid-range she can AA you with st hp. However, her AA is weak up close. Throw in some air tatsus (non-ex) to throw off her AA timing on the st hp too.
Once you get in, it can be annoying to keep pressure. She has such long pokes that can reach you after you put her in a block string. See what their tendency is after you block string her - If they like to sweep a lot, always be ready to punish it. You can always punish max range blocked Karin sweep with reversal LP srk.
Always keep an eye on her meter and her tendency to spend it instantly on wake-up ex dp. Without meter, you can pressure her harder, and it makes it easier to predict her reversal dp since it cost a bar.
what’s up guys? I need help with the Alex match up. any help would be appreciated.
I disagree, what you have to understand is which buttons of yours beat which buttons of her’s. Karin out of all the “buttony” characters in the game Ken can hit her buttons extremely well. But you have to pay attention to what she is pressing. Her s.HK requires a different response than her c.MK for instance.
found some buggy stuff vs gief. his ex spd is definitely 4 frames its listed as 5 on most guides
even though its 4 frames you can’t use cr.lp, cr. hp to set up crush counters 
also if you use cr.lk,cr.lp,cr.mp as a block string he will eat the cr. mp and spd…i have no idea why it happens…seems like a bug to me.
Another weird thing in this MU is that st hp from Gief can’t absorb Ken’s st HK despite the fact it’s supposed to have armor, it always crush counters.
If both moves go active on the same frame the grab wins.
here’s the proof. examples 1 and 2 are both 4 frame gaps.
Agree.
I also like to add it might be easier and safer to stay just outside of st.hk range so it allows u to whiff punish it, not only that but I think that is where karins like to use v skill to build gauge, so u have a factor to neutral jump and land big damage, so there is a more predictive element at that range as well as being able to stay active. But once they catch on and don’t use those much, that is ur time to get a little closer and challenge her poke game so u don’t allow yourself to back into a corner.
Again, even after u do a blockstring, u can still bully her with the right buttons despite her normals reaching far. Depending what button u use, u will most likely counter-poke her if she presses a button.
But u are right to lookout to see what their tendency will be right after a block string , it will usually determine what button u should use to counterpoke, even despite the fact that u may be at a disadvantage frame data wise, it is still possible for u to counter poke depending what button u used to end the block string to leave u at a certain distance. That is when karins might have to end up blocking for u to land a nice thunderkick to the face! A dash up Or Feint to get u right outside of throw range for them to stand and hit grab while u hit confirm cr.mk into super.
bison likes to dash or jump, always be looking for those, try feinting with fireballs more, jumpback hk in the corner when your getting bullied. when you meaty bison he has no real reversals so tick throw or shimmy or just keep up pressure since he has to block. you did respect him too much and whenever you threw out a slow move like a fireball or roundhouse he jumped and punished you. 2nd round you blocked 3 lk.scissors in a row you should have just back dash or reversal. when he started pressing buttons like crazy in the corner you should have just jump tatsu out of there or v reversal instead or hailmary ex dp. vtrigger cancel. also more anti airs my friend, thats all i got.
step kick when he does yoga fire, hit jab when he teleports, dont quick rise it will throw off his setups. dont always jump with mk, mix it up use hk, or hp more damage, and u can combo t.c.2 with them as well if your further. jump tatsu to throw off anti airs. dont be afraid to play outside his range for a bit alot of impatient sims will teleport right to you when your outside of their st.mp. range. also it seemed like he was always hitting you with slide vtrigger after your blockstrings. mostly just be more patient and be alert for teleports.
im just starting to get this matchup, first learn to punish slash elbow with st.lk.> hp. shoryu. his ex slash elbow you can use st.hp. into whatever combo. his air stampede use T.C.1 on block, and his sledgehammer use a st.hp. combo. if you start doing that then use fireballs to zone him if use his air divekick thingy, punish on block with a st.hp. combo. also v reversal his lariat move that setups a really strong guessing game for him and watch out for dash ex. grabs.
Yes punishing the elbow is vital else they spam it like no tomorrow.
Necalli. What is his weakness? Where is my point of advantage?
When I win, it always feels like it’s more b/c of his stupidity than my own play (fake double dash pressure on knockdown, overeager disc guidance, thinking I can’t SRK his divekick, way too many DPs, etc.). I always feel like all it takes is just a little less stupidity on his part and he could crush me easily.
His wakeup: what character has TWO 3f jabs that combo AND a command throw AND a DP? Chun I can meaty without a care since she has to use meter; Cammy only needs to guess wrong once to get CC-ed to heaven; but Necalli? He can eat the CC, he can spam jab, he can DP a perfect meaty, and he can COMMAND GRAB if I get too cautious trying to bait the DP. The wheel of options has made it so that I find him one of the hardest chars to play any oki on. I’ve even started hanging back and just watching him get back up, like some cuck. This is huge, as Ken inevitably wins by being able to play the wakeup game in some form.
My wakeup: the command grab messes everything up; between that and the EZ frametraps, DP starts looking inevitable… except his CC damage is pretty fucking insane. Hell, I’m more afraid of it than Mika’s as she has to reset into another round of guessing, but Necalli just pumps out all that damage so there isn’t another round. Get scared enough and he’ll just dash up command grab. Oh hey, what about a far-reaching heavy overhead that CCs? Again, it feels lopsided that he gets both superior defense and offense. Oh well, guess that means he has shitty neutral, right?
Anti-fireball: a CA that reaches fullscreen, disc guidance, AND a v-skill? V-skill > fireball: you don’t get the neutral situation where two FBs clash. No, he gets the knockdown -> oki AND build V AND it’s guaranteed for him if you ever decide to throw a FB in the midrange. Ok cool, just keep neutering my options, I didn’t want them anyway.
Neutral: the one place I can hang semi-equally (and only equally at best), which is unfair given all his other advantages. The V-skill is another confounding factor here; it’s possible to react, but it’s deceptive: he doesn’t have the tell-tale bob of a QCF (which you rely on more than you think, I lost count how many times a quick teabag has made someone jump). Twitch-jump and he gets an easy DP, so yay his zoning (recall Vskill > fireball) is better than yours too. And let’s have it build V on block and also -2 ON BLOCK so he can just chain one after another and dare you to jump.
I don’t know if you guys have been watching Momochi vs Haitani all over the many tourneys they’ve met, but THAT’S the thing I’m afraid of: a Necalli with a brain, knowing his advantages and pressing them. Momochi has been getting wrecked, and I honestly don’t know what he’s supposed to do any better.
What do you guys do that you feel favors you more percentage-wise than Necalli? It too often feels like he has way too favorably-skewed odds and options compared to me, from wakeup (on both fucking sides LOL) to neutral to zoning.
I just want ONE area (or gimmick or normal or whatever) where I have the clear advantage so I can press it.
Also, does anyone know the full list of frame changes when he’s in V? V-skill is faster, right?
*EDIT: I’m not even going to go into EZ SAFE low-hitting cr.mk stomp pressure -> CA, that’s just uber cool. I’m totally loving it. I have to manually hit-confirm cr.mk -> CA, but he gets to spam like no tomorrow.
I think Ken has at least a slight advantage 5.5-4.5 and possibly 6-4. At a certain range Necalli can’t really be pressing buttons, ken’s st.lk and b.mp are really effective to whiff punishing his normals.
Normals cancelled into stomp are untrue blockstrings, anytime you block a normal that you think he can cancel you should buffer dp and hit mp once you see a cancel. It’s not easy and I screw it up a lot myself but it’s something to aspire to
Necalli players by default like to hit a button as soon as you block a stomp, whiff punish that shiet
Pay attention to how he deals with the situation after blocking a fireball and be ready to counter it
His overhead is -4 but the blockstun and pushback are really weird, gotta get used to punishing that with st.lk into dp.
These factors will force the necalli player to fight differently in neutral. If he’s trying to fake you out with light normals then you just throw out st.hk and sneak in fireballs. If he’s not pressing anything then it’s your cue to go in with f.hk, dash up throw/shimmy/whatever, walk up button, divekick, run, anything to make him uncomfortable and commit to bad buttons again.
Replay for proof of concept
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54Gho3BzOj8
TLDR his weakness is his slow ass normals, most of them are risky
Insightful post from Mochalatte as always.
Just want to add, the ideal button to whiff punish Necalli’s stand HK is stand mk. Stand HK has a stray hurt box at his shoulder during the recovery frames, and you can confirm into TC xx HP SRK on hit.
The only problem with this is that besides whiff punishing stand hk, stand mk isn’t that good in the neutral, so even though it’s a whiff punish, it requires a read, to react fast enough.