The teir’s are not set yet, I think its still to soon.
Everyone made a Big deal about Rufus, in the beginning.
I think there still more to see later on.
Rufus is not broken nor top-tier, he was just being played
by one of the top Street Fighter players ever.
Rufus has great punishing combos, does quite a lot of damage. He has his problems though.
Shitty pokes, no real overhead game (I gotta use that more in my pressure strings), and no 100% confirmable (FA doesn’t count!) messiah kick link (combo into messiah kick).
but still, his lp snake strike having its quick ass start up and his anti projectile game is quite beastly.
not to mention he is rush down God.
AND he is the king of comebacks, you can be losing the round, but 1 combo into ultra (too many setups for that shit…) and you got chances again.
Hes like 3s makoto in that sense
haha
I’d put him down as like dudley.
He can end a match within 20 seconds just by putting on the pressure.
he doesn’t give a fuck what you do to him, he’ll just ex-messiah kick out
he’s got dangerous links to an OP ultra
yeahhh hes my dudley 
(now all he needs is dudley’s stun bar!)
Rufus Standing Mk is godlike.
apparently the EX tornado beats Bison’s ultra shrug
iono how it works but i was about a character distance away when he did it
well, during EX tornado, rufus creates some kind of “space” where the opp will be sucked in, no matter if hes blocking or not. so maybe you performed EX tornado just before he touched you and Bison got sucked in because he entered on this “space”
Is it just me, or does Rufus seem to have trouble blocking Blanka’s Ultra?
Everytime I stand up to block the overhead portion of the Ultra, when its activated at point blank range, I get hit for full damage. Don’t have that problem with any other character.
Get ready to be mindfucked. The reason you aren’t blocking Blanka’s ultra is because it’s crossing you up. Rufus is so fat that it’s easier to get crossed up and harder to see the crossups.
Yeah that’s what I thought. Anyway to tell if its going to be a cross up? (I’m guessing the answer is no).
Hmm… I really don’t know. I think it’s all about how far you are from him.
Well I was messing around and trying kara throws with Rufus, and I discovered two Kara throws… that actually push you backwards lol.
The first was standing roundhouse kara throw. Sends you back a couple milimeters.
The next was MK. Again throws you backwards.
Haven’t tested anyone else, and I was having trouble getting other normals to kara.
I agree. Great normal, quick recovery, good range. Beats low footsies.
C.HP excellent for long range. c.MP and standing HP good AA.
F.HP seems to have crazy properties and alot of uses. It’s a big wonky but I think it has alot of uses.
Fragrance Palm + LP Snake Strike in the corner for nice damage.
Fragrance Palm + MP Snake Strike in the corner does a tad more damage but the timing is a tad stricter.
Fragrance Palm + Ultra in the corner rocks.
The main problem though is getting Fragrance Palm to hit. Maybe I can find a combo into it that is decent and easy.
IIRC there is a combo in Challenge mode that may help with this.
Finally got to play for a good 7 seven hours last night!
It may just be me transitioning to the new engine, but I’m having trouble controlling rufus in general. I can’t seem to control his dive kick at all, the only time I get the sharp angle is after I’ve jumped backward (?).
and I CANNOT link cr.lk -> cr.lk -> ex tornado, I’m having the toughest time with the simplest combos in the game. Though I must say lk -> hk -> ultra is easy to do, easier than the rest of the combos.
It’s hard to tell for me whether the lk’s, either crouching or standing land, in other games there is a distinct “blocking” or “hitting” sound to queue whether the hit connected. Maybe the volume wasn’t loud enough but I could not tell for the life of me whether these connected or not.
I also don’t know the big deal with the messiah kick, I’m having trouble hitting people with it at all. Though the hk ending is good to mix up crouching characters. the snake strike just seems odd, out of control move. caught in the air hk -> ex snake strike is the only sure way to connect it I’ve found.
Anyway, sorry for the rambling, if anyone could help or comment on all this I’d appreciate it.
For the dive kicks, just go into training mode and play around with them. Make sure you learn how to do the dives as low to the ground as possible as well while you’re playing around. Also, try and learn to combo dive kick, st. lk, close st. hp xx hp tornado. This will help you in getting damage off of the dives.
For me I have found that cr. lk xx ex tornado is more of a cancel than a link to me.
Regular messiah kicks are kinda meh, but you should be saving meter for the ex version, that shit is dumb lol. And IIRC the mk follow up is + 0 on block, so it is something that can be thrown out sparingly I guess.
The Snake Strike is imo, Rufus’s most interesting move. Its got a different use depending on which strength you use.
The Normal Messiah Kick is just a pretty bad move in general since its unsafe and easily stuffable. Light Messiah kick can be used to jump over and punish crouching sweeps/forwards and Forward/Roundhouse Messiah can be used to jump over fireballs. In both uses, however, you must anticipate correctly, cause its too slow to be used on reaction. If you connect, you can do the LK follow up> FADC> Ultra, though.
What’s the best strat against Guile?
rush that fool down