This is the thread for Kyo quick notes, so I’ll make a note of something I just played around with.
Punch throws and the Seven Chance Wakeup
So let’s say you’re in the heat of the battle, and in your desperate attempt to capitalize on a mistake by your opponent, you quickly mash on throw, and a punch throw comes out. All that hard work you put in trying to get in close and score a useful knockdown has gone to waste, because by the time you run back over to the body a full screen away, a lot of your mixups are useless, especially if they safe fall and you’re still running right at them.
So, your opponent is all the way on the other side of the screen. What’s a Kyo to do to stay in control?
Well, if you were Terry, you could do a jab/strong Burn Knuckle, or a jab Blanka Ball, or maybe Joe’s short/forward Smash Kick. These and similar moves have an advantage in that you can quickly and safely close the gap on your opponent, at the same time preventing them from moving backwards without risking a backdash or jump that could cause a knockdown on their part. There’s nothing they can really do except block an attack that might not even connect, as they could stop just short of you.
The thing is, Kyo has a move similar to this in his arsenal. The kick hit in his Wicked Bite chains is a rather far-reaching one that is a forward-moving attack most similar to Joe’s Smash Kick. You can use the kick-ending chains to add a new wakeup senario to Kyo’s inferior punch throw, even when you’re a full screen away.
Go into training mode and punch throw someone so that they’ll be max distance away from you. As soon as you recover, do an LP qcf->hcb->K chain as quickly as possible. If you do this correctly, you’ll be standing right in front of them, in a perfect position to kick throw or otherwise pressure someone on wakeup. The kick will just miss as the opponent is finishing his wakeup animation, leaving you in their face as they’re worrying about an attack that is somehow going to hit them from full-screen away. Since they’re going to think they’re going to have to block, you have them right where you want them.
If you’re going up against someone who uses a safe fall, taking a really quick half step backwards before starting the rekkas is what to do. Be aware that they will be fully recovered while you’re still in the middle of the punches, but the beauty of that is that you can stop the kick from coming out if you sense danger (or want to mix things up). Otherwise, the kick will stop just short of them.
There might be times where you actually hit someone with the kick, either intentionally or accidently. If you do it on purpose, it’s because you’re banking on the fact that they won’t be blocking from a half-screen away while you are doing the punch portion of the chains. This means you’ll have to set it up by starting random Wicked Bite starters from a distance, and working it in with the overhead rekka wakeup mixup. (You should do this to make the whiffed kick easier to get away with as well.) If you do it accidentally and/or they block it, the recovery time on it isn’t too bad (I don’t have the frame data around, but it looks like it’s somewhere in the neighboorhood of -5 to -8 by my eyeball), mostly because you’re hitting them at the extreme end of the hitting frames, and that most of the time it’s a big surprise to the person that blocked it.
Obviously, you’re not going to be relying on this tactic for all your distance-closing needs. However, if you really need to get in close in a hurry, consider also doing this from full screen away without a throw. Also try doing the double LP qcf chain to vary the distance that you close in on your opponent, or the MP chains if you want it to be slightly slower coming out and/or longer.
This is just another option Kyo has for mixups, but the difference here is that he has at least something that can close distance relatively safely, albeit off of either a punch throw or from the equivilant distance (full screen) away.
