Lots of Ryu questions!

You might be able to point me toward a guide but I’m not sure which kick/punch is best for what situation. I hope to have every question answered, but if it’s too much that is fine.

  1. When jumping in for a blockstring should I initiate with j.mk, j.hp, or j.hk? I know j.mk is for cross ups but is j.hk better for jump ins? J.hp seems like it has the least advantage for a jump in but I see it often.

  2. Should there ever be a time to forward jump counter someone else’s jump in? If so which punch or kick should I use or should I strictly use my jumping hurricane kick for this? Or is SRK/cr.hp the only answer to jump ins?

  3. I’ve seen players neutral jump kick to counter a jump in, why not SRK?

  4. What is the perfect variation for this standard ryu blockstring: cr.lk, cr.lp, cr.mp, cr.mk xx hadoken? Often I see cr.lp x3, cr.mk xx hadoken or cr.hp xx hadoken, they seem inefficient, am I missing something? Cr.lk seems like the only smart way to start and cr.mk seems smarter than cr.hp because it has better range and standing opponents can’t block it.

  5. When is it appropriate to jump in? I’ve been told to not jump in but I see pros do it all the time and I suck at walking in for a blockstring and just doing cr.mk xx hadoken pokes feel week and non aggressive.

  6. I’ve seen some players attack blocking opponents continuously without pause and I have personally been overwhelmed by this. How do I do this with Ryu? I can’t seem to dash forward quick enough after a string and I don’t know if a certain blockstring/combo is necessary. I want to take complete advantage of an opening.

  7. I have drilled cr.mk xx hadoken for months in different ways (I play on stick) and never have I graduated past slipping into a shoryuken instead of hadoken. When poking I simply can’t wait .2 seconds for shoryuken to cancel out and I’m certain going half circle doesn’t cancel it when doing it as quickly as I need to to not be punished for standing in their face waiting before I can cr.mk. It’s maddening, I’ve practiced this tens of hours.

  8. As I am playing Ryu for the same reason everybody says to start with him, what all should I have down before graduating to other characters? I love playing ryu so I’m not in any hurry to drop him.

  9. Do you touch the gate when you dash? I can’t shake dashing from feeling alien and I can’t do it without stutter stepping just slightly.

  10. What information personally caused your breakthrough past the 0 - 1000pp skill range (with Ryu)? I understand footsies and zoning are the heart of skill but that mostly comes with time.

  11. Is there a flow chart for zoning with Ryu? I’d love to be able to zone like a pro and then turn the table and go ape shit aggressive half way through the match.

  12. Is there a specific blockstring I should initiate when looking to counter through an opening in an opponent’s blockstring?

  13. With the standard blockstring I gave for example in question 4, am I expected to perfect it? Because I’ve trained it for months with perfection nowhere in sight, I’m lucky to get the full combo 1 out of 10 tries. I want to know if I should feel comfortable with not having it down before experimenting with mix ups or if I just suck that bad.

  14. What essential mix ups should I know and is there a great guide for them?

  15. What question/s have I not asked but should?

I basically want to know EVERYTHING.

You aren’t watching and predicting your opponent. Most of your questions are asking what to do, but there is no general correct answer. You must know your opponents options and the opponents habits in using his/her options to make reads for hard countering those options. Play solid by forcing a game you can analyze and predict, IE: AA jump ins and keeping proper spacing versus jump in attacks or approaching specials and punishing approaches that are negative or risky and ect…

  1. J. hp hits lower than hurbox making it a little better for stopping AA normals and weaker DPs. Its a general all purpose jump in. The reach isn’t that long so… J. hk has long reach and block/hit stun so you use it to empty jump from far in order to make a dp wiff or you use the block/hit stun to hit deep at a distance and walk in for pressure or combo. J. mk if you predict they will be crossed up. Use a j. light attack to tick throw or tech trap upon landing. J. mp is a 1-2 hit mixup use in wake up scenarios where you predict your opponent will not wake up dp.

  2. You counter jump ins with everything. Ground normals force later attacks from your opponent’s jump ins allowing you to counter jump ins with jump medium punch combos. Counter jumps force early attacks from opponents leading to free ground AA normals or wiff jump attacks that get you free trip guard combos. counter jumps lead to ground pressure and sometimes cross under mixups while ground normals can lead to ground pressure or walk under mixups. I like to stand light kick AA into a jumping mixup where I can normal attack or cross up hurricane. As for your dp, you want to use it as a buffer when you wiff a poke typically. If they jump your poke and you buffered dp, you’ll be there jump in clean, no worries about trading normals or blocking.

  3. Easier. More damage and stun for less effort. Timing a dp wrong could be disastrous for the round. Only heavy dp is better, but there is a risk of trading.

  4. No perfect variation. Cater it to your opponent. Chain lights to push out dp spammers and cause there dp to wiff. Use crouch light kick to hit people who stand in your block strings (you’ll see it, then you’ll have to predict it). Use heavy punch XX fireball if opponent mashes between crouch medium kick xx fireball(because it isn’t a true blockstring). Your block strings need to be predicting your opponent, so remember to block as you space stuff out or remember to keep strings tight enough to frame trap but loose enough to let your opponent start normals.

  5. Jump ins are good. When your opponent cannot AA, just jump in on them and win. When your opponent can AA, you can jump in if you predict a laggy poke or special. People jump fireballs because its a good thing to punish with a jump. You can also punish sweeps and other long animation moves with jumps. If your opponent is using a character with a long poke, you can try to jump it for a big punish. Focus is also a good option. Its all prediction… If you think you can punish it with a jump and you know that your opponent will do that move next, punish the move with a jump.

  6. You need to predict how your opponent presses buttons. If you know your opponent will simply block until you push yourself out, stop pushing yourself out with continuous attacks. Attack and walk back in. If you know your opponent likes to push buttons in between attacks, use small gaps in your strings. When you start fighting intermediate opponents, you are going to have to mix the two options up to the point where you are pressing attacks, taking quick steps toward your opponent and attacking again to frame trap. In order to get that great pressure you see, you have to be able to convert your hits during pressure into knock downs. If you can’t reset the situation back to the beginning when you hit, your opponent will take more risks. Once you can kill an opponent simply from pressure into knockdown, you’re opponents will press less buttons allowing you to get back in as you push yourself out. Its a snow ball effect that only works in your favor as you prove you’re are capable of performing correctly.

  7. Do it a hundred times in a row in training mode. Once you have that down, do it a hundred times in a row in arcade mode while actually hitting the cpu. You’ll naturally get the timing down over time as long as you remember what you are doing. You are waiting for the program to drop your forward input after a certain amount of time. Also, even daigo does dp sometimes, so yea, it happens…

  8. When you understand why match ups are bad/good, you can move on… It involves normals, walk speed, damage, spacing, punishes, pressure and risk/reward. There’s more, but at least understand that stuff in your match ups and you should be fine to move on…

  9. Do what ever is comfortable. As you get used to it, you’ll be able to optimize your technique. Just get consistent first.

  10. Understanding that scrubs get jumped in on, doing nothing lets you AA scrubs who jump in, pressing crouch medium kick and buffing fireball gets me damage or forces bad players to jump, buffering dp after crouch medium kick buffered fireball lets me AA jump ins over my crouch medium kick. Also, you get better as you do more damage and take away damage from opponents. A back dash on wake up may get you air reset instead of ground punished, while dp fadc ultra gets me more damage vs a jump in than a regular AA. Predict your opponent and try to take away as much life as possible. Don’t give life away, like, don’t risk a jump in vs a ryu with 2 bars and full ultra.

  11. Spacing is for zoning, learn it. Know how far your opponent can punish fireballs with their tools/meter. Understand jump arcs and attack lengths. Know when a jump can be hit with a dp or if your dp will wiff. Slow fireballs force focus dashes to be negative as long as the fireball and the focus don’t meet point blank. Medium fireballs are something to play around with your opponent’s reactions and vision. Heavy fireballs can catch jumps or force blocks before your opponent can input their counter fireball. EX recovers quick and punishes most armor, focus or special. Ex is also safe on block, so you can almost pressure with it. Walk back some and always threaten with more than just a fireball, like normals or movement such as cross up hurricane or dash under a jump after a fake. Make use of your three fakes. You can pump to fake a fireball, you can fireball with a kick or you can start a pattern than stop. Pump fakes let you AA with normals, faking fireballs with light kick lets you dp jump ins and changing patterns let you predict your opponent long before the fake in order to get a max punish such as raw ultra AA.

  12. Have your blockstrings premeditated and practiced. Each time you counter your opponent’s pressure, the situation will not be the same. Have different pressure strings for: when you’re opponent is close/far, when your opponent has meter, when your opponent as a good dp, ect…

  13. Have your blockstrings practiced, than set your dummy up to random block and counter hit on then practice confirming. You can do some time practicing the string and some time confirming the string. You’ll get both down over time. There is no perfect blockstring, so I suggest writing different ones down, learning what situations they are good for and practicing all of them. When you get better, you can work on confirming non-counter hit set ups by changing the dummy’s counter hit to random.

  14. Yea, there are guides, I also did a bunch of write ups on mixing up with ryu. Mainly, just work on empty jump low, ambiguous cross ups after a throw. Sweep ambiguous cross ups are a bit more dangerous. AA with stand lights give you a chance for crossunders. Air to air attacks are much better for cross under mix ups. Frame trapping players who try to tech your throws are your bread and butter mixups as ryu. Just don’t forget to throw. Jumping in and hitting with jump medium punch so that it could hit 1 or 2 times is another mix up, don’t for get to hit low when landing or toss in a throw/tech trap on a block. Make sure you know how to properly hurricane kick cross up when doing non-ambiguous jump ins (of course your normals hits in front). Finally, don’t forget that baiting is one of the most important mix ups. If you don’t know how to bait, you’ll lose a lot of matches to mashing into pressure or death by random high damage.

  15. Idk… How about you go to the match up thread, learn some match ups and figure out some more specific questions to ask…

Hey sorry I haven’t replied yet. I posted this same thread on the StreetFighter subreddit and got 59 replies…so I have a lot to respond to and I’m probably going to be a Ryu aficionado after memorizing all this…

I plan to reply in detail soon. Thanks for your time, I appreciate it.

I’m the only Master Level Ryu who has documented nearly everything Ryu can do. I even invented a lot of tech no one in the history of SF4 ever discovered with Ryu like my GUTS Combo and my Tatsu Magic as you’ll see in the video below. I still have a lot of material to upload. You’ll find your answers at my channel.