SA I vs SA II

Classic Fighting Games Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike
1

I’ve seen Q users using both SA I, and SA II. I’ve been using Q for a little while, and I can’t decide which I prefer. SA I has the clear advantages of EX’s, and 2 supers. SA II clearly has the advantage of damage (by a long shot.) Only 3 EX’s, and you can’t use an EX and a super in the same combo. SA II has the advantage of combo-ability, too. Both have the same Taunt options, and can be executed of close s.mk.

Can anyone think of anything else to help me decide?
And while we’re at it: Does anyone use SA III? And if so… how so?

2

No one uses SAIII. Ever. Except as a joke, because beating someone with the worst super of the worst character in the game (and one of the worst supers of them all) is pretty awesome.

Pick between SAI and SAII based on the opponent’s character. Pick SAI when playing against most characters and SAII when playing against one that spends most of its time in the air or that dominates Q so badly that you need to get the most damage out of one opportunity you can get. Basically I pick SAII against Yun, Yang, Akuma, Ibuki, and sometimes Twelve, unless for example I’ve played against a certain Yang user before and I know he spends most of his time on the ground, in which case SAI comes out.

With the exception of generally unnecessary resets and a combo-vid-only combo or two, SAII has the same comboability as SAI does, it’s just that it deals more damage and can work as an anti-air. If you land SAI on an opponent who’s in the air, it’ll just hit a couple times, but if you land SAII you still deal full damage, and that’s great against the above characters who spend lots of time in the air or air-raiding you to death. Its higher damage output is great for playing against characters who lock Q down and barely give him a chance to breath; when that chance comes, you wanna hurt the opponent as much as possible.

There are some other notable properties of SAI as well. It can go through fireballs, for one thing, more or less negating Ryu’s denjin hadouken for example. It also has great reach. For example, you can punish even a max-range blocked shoto-sweep with it. It also does pretty good chip damage, just in case either you want to try to chip the opponent to death or something goes wrong and you miss like a standing forward to super. SAI is also better for random wake-up supers. Stupid and scrubby, for sure, but when Q is waking up he has precious few options. He can block, parry, option-select throw, or, uh… nothing good, basically. He has no good reversals that’ll stuff an impending throw or meaty. A super can do that. While both SAI and SAII have invincibility on startup, SAI can reach farther and if you miss, hey, you probably still have some meter or even a full bar left, and if the opponent blocks he gets chipped and if he jumps and you completely miss he’ll have to chase after you, and if he’s got someone without good mobility or he has no bar you’ll either be safe or just eat something simple. Again, wake up supers are a bad and way-too-risky strategy, but you’re playing Q, and you need every option you can get.

3

SAI is a lot better as a wakeup super.
I’ve seen SAII lose to command grabs so many times it’s not ven funny.

4

SAII can lose to normal throws, even. It hurts.

Both supers leave you screwed if blocked, so expect your opponent try baiting a super from you if you get knocked down and have one in stock. SAI isn’t always bad when it whiffs outright (depends who you’re against, whether/not they have meter), SAII leaves you screwed. So yeah, be careful with those wakeup supers.

Random note:
SAII can be linked after UOH on characters that AREN’T crouching (but then why would they get hit by the UOH?..), WITHOUT the UOH meaty. SAI to my knowledge cannot be linked off of a non-meaty UOH.

If you can’t consistently do reversal SAI against blocked shoto sweeps, you may want to pick SAII when fighting Ken. For whatever reason, I just feel more secure when I have SAII against Ken.

5

yea its more of what super makes u feel more secure… SA2 makes me feel more secure and from my Q playing experience I barely land supers in high level play… maybe 1 per match average so I rather have sa2 and dish out those 2 big chunks of life…

but sa1 has the low ex attack cancel to super which is a very good zoning move

6

SAII can also be done off of lk.command grab.
My strategy is to do mix up wake up game on grounded opponents. Either going in with UOH then s.mk to mp.slaps or UOH to lk. command grab into SAII. I works almost everytime.

Command Grab… abuse it… abuse it a lot.

7

If you’re gonna do a UOH on wakeup, you don’t have to bother with the c&db to land SAII. You can link it, and SAI as well, directly from the overhead. C&db, like any special move, hightens damage scaling and that sucks for Q. Also, as one of the slowest moves in the game (or is it THE slowest, I don’t remember offhand), you’re taking a gamble that needn’t be taken if you have proper UOH spacing. Unfortunately for Q, the c&db isn’t exactly abusable. Maybe he’d be not-worst-tier if it was, but oh well.

8

yea its not like capcom could have given Q a really good command throw lol. But hey, its all the poor guy has. but it definately is abusable in mix up game if you execute it right

9

Q is not even close to the worst character in the game just the hardest to play well. If you can parry well, he is a monster. Now Sean on the other hand, I can’t find any redeemable qualities. He is the worst character. I prefer the saII but cause of its similarities to ryu’s sa2 and it’s anti- air benefits.

10

C&db is useful in mixup games, but it’s not really abusable. Ken’s jumping forward crossup is abusable, genei jin is abusable, chun’s saII is abusable. Capture and deadly blow isn’t even in the same league. Personally I think his karathrow is more abusable.

Anyway, this isn’t the right place for a tier discussion, but yes, Q is the worst character in the game. Worse than Sean even. It’s true that a Q player who can parry well can kick ass, but that’s meaningless; any character used by a good parrier will kick ass. Sean has a nice set of normal attacks, his supers are decent, and most importantly he has actual options and doesn’t get locked down like Q does. When I first started really getting into the game, I was like you in that I thought Q wasn’t that bad and could be good if used right, but eventually, after trying out all sorts of things and learning to use him decently well, I came around. I love and use Q, but the guy sucks.

11

lol… stop downing Q… a good Q player is the type of player that can handle being locked down and has alot of patience… being locked down doesn’t mean promised damage to Q… I mean mad turtling blocking high, low and know how to red parry… what really helps Q is his kara throw… mad range and its done by holding back (one of the best kara throw imo)

12

Good Q player? isn’t that an Oxymoron?

13

I use SAI all the time, except for Yun. Catching Yun with a SAII in the middle of Genei-Gin pressure is just too easy.

14

I’ve seen a Q player rack up about 40 wins at an arcade… I remember him using SAIII atleast once! I agree that he’s the hardest to use in high level play, But 40 wins is proof that this guy is either MSF ranking with shotos or Q is actually good.

15

Where do you live? I had 54 wins with Q in an arcade just last week, and I used SAIII once or twice just to spice things up a bit. But I’m pretty sucky with the shotos, never really spent much time with them. Someone winning with Q does not, I repeat, does not mean that Q is a good character, it means that the opponents aren’t very good, or he knows Q really well and knows how to play his matchups really well and his opponents don’t know their character as well, or he’s getting lucky. Consistently winning with Q requires at least one of those things.

SAIII really isn’t good. Not only is it not good on its own, but by picking it you lose out on the sweet things that SAI and SAII have, like range, antiair, reversals, and comboability. I know of only one usable SAIII combo, a corner capture and deadly blow combo I’ve seen on several combo videos. It goes: roundhouse c&db, dash punch (diff strength, depending on the opponent’s character) xx activate SAIII, SAIII punch version. There’s pretty major damage reduction, and the punch version is the weaker of the two versions anyway.

Eddie, you’re right, being locked down doesn’t mean guaranteed damage to Q. I’ve recently come to believe that the most important skill when playing with Q, aside from knowing him and his matchups well, is defense. Knowing when to block a Ken crossup, whether to block after the crossup or throw, whether to block high or low, those are really important things for Q. He will be locked down, it just remains to be seen whether he’ll take big damage because of it. Of course, he can’t damage the opponent while being locked down, but you can make him live long enough to hope the other guy screw up or something hehe.

16

I’m the only nut case to actually use SAIII as my main super: jumping in fierce punch or kick and standing medium kick to qcf. medium punch. For kara’s, down weak kick to the SAIII command grab, overhead SAIII command grab, and jumping in fierce punch into SAIII command grab (for this one its better to do it when they’re blocking). Also for people who parry too much, do standing medium kick into the SAIII command grab or do fierce kick into SAIII command grab. Yeah, I’ll say it again, I’m the nut case who uses the SAIII on any character.

17

An important thing to know in 3S is that there is no guard crush.
So block. Stay cool. Have a blocking mentality.

If they can only score damage on you with throws, then don’t sweat it… note that this doesn’t hold against the likes of Makoto and Yun (and to some extent Necro), but then again, their command throw into combo craziness is something else entirely. Throws are almost assuredly less damage and stun and opponent meter than whatever decent combo they could otherwise land on you, so when you’re under the gun, it’s a worthwhile trade. Plus they may end up pitted against Q’s kara throw, which is a good thing for Q.

I thought we were talking about SAI and SAII here.

18

and the winner is SA1 why because of 2 stocks that pretty much gave that super the edge… sa2 does big damage but you only have one long bar and before you get that one bar stocked ur opponent will shit all over u till u get meter then youll finally be a threat for wakeups etc and when u finally do use it ur a living target again… sa1 has 2x the threat after u land one ur still a threat to your opponent cuz u have another one stocked :tup:

19

I just like SAIII for the shear fact its the one that does get neglected for its power. SAII is still my kill super considering doing the mid. deadly blow into weak charge punch (held) into another weak charge punch (not held) into SAII. SAIII is “Total Destruction” because I like to see shoto’s burn in hell.

20

SA1 owns… SA2 against jumpers/twins. SAIII when I want to prove something…

“Danger!!” Q dies