If you don’t care about her background story then good for you, I do and so does Capcom.
Her pokes are fine, her fireball is not, given she is around 20 by now. I understand your point but Bison is supposed to be better. A better fireball would make it a hella lot more competitive though. I’m praying to Capcom for that one.
I guess I am a combo centered Sakura, wanting more damage during Ultra combos. I don’t know of any other effective way than being a combo centered Sak. How do you play her?
Capcom cares about her storyline so much that they didn’t bother making her older or even adding to the one she has.
Her pokes are fine in most matchups, in others they are far from fine.
Yes, her fireball sucks, but making it faster wouldn’t improve her neutral game.
It would force people to jump, but seeing how she doesn’t have a shoryuken, she’d be much more susceptible to jumps at midrange than ryu/sagat/ken etc.
However if she got a slower moving and faster recovering fireball she’d make much more use of it.
I don’t know about everyone else but the only fireball of hers I use atm is lv2 charge because it allows me to do something with it.
Giving her a fast fireball wouldn’t benefit her at all, there’s no fear in jumping in on Sakura if she can’t recover fast enough to space her cr.hp, unless she’s got ultra.
I don’t really get what you mean by saying, “I’m a combo centered Sakura”, isn’t landing the combos something that’s to be expected?
Landing combos is only possible assuming you’re landing hits that lead into them, if she has big trouble landing those hits, she has big problems.
There are several ways for her to do it:
Jumpin
Focus
Cl.hp
Cr.hp
Cr.mk x hp sho x fadc, cl.hp
Crossover j.lk, cr.lp, cl.hp (or skipping cr.lp making it unconfirmable afaik)
I think these are the most common ways to do it.
Seeing how jumping in this game is something you want to stay away from as much as possible unless it’s concidered safe to do so i.e. safejump, jumping a fireball, jumping a poke/special with long recovery.
It’s is entirely possible to play in a way that jumpins become close to useless in the neutral game.
So this is only something she’d go for when she’s already got a knockdown for a safejump or a crossover situation.
Two of the options are only available when you’re close to the opponent, if you can’t get close you can’t use these options at all.
So basically the remaining two options are meant for Sakura to be able to get close cr.mk x hp sho and focus.
Dictator for example can shut her off with far mk/hk completley, which only leaves landing a focus attack in that matchup or whiffpunishing.
From my point of view, Sakura is a strong character in this game when she gets in your face, the problem is that she has too much trouble getting there in certain matchups.
Giving her more damage on her ultra wouldn’t change that, because that is only assuming you get enough chances to land that ultra that it’s going to count.
Adding more options to getting in is the only solution I can see for Sakura to keep her playstyle while still becoming stronger.
I read your whole post and agree with most of it. I can’t argue that more options won’t make Sakura better… lol. Thats not my point. My point is to keep her options to a minimum, given that she isn’t a master at her craft anyway (Storyline wise). I’m not alone in that opinion given many others have expressed that. But I respect yours. You don’t want GDLK changes. Just enough to give her more freedom. I agree.
One good way to hit confirm into combos is spamming S.Lp at the approiate times. This works wonders… S.Lp > S.Lp > Most Things > Ex Tatsu… (Response to your “options” section)
lol, Sakura is good in every other game she’s in but this one because of a couple easy factors they took away from her. Give those back and she’s perfect.
Old j. MK crossups needs to come back.
Her backthrow needs to be her old strangle throw.
st. HK needs a MAJOR speed increase. It used to be such an amazing zoning normal.
Fireball needs slightly less recovery or when charged needs a higher/larger hitbox so you could hit out jumpers who ran into you charging it like back in alpha. Her fireballs aren’t meant to be strong zoning tools but they are “asswank” how they are now.
Make her close fierce a b+FP commmand like Alpha
this
Yeah her offence is fine as it is, but she just dosen’t have much to defend herself with to balance it out. One example, you gotta burn 3 bars to have a safe/decent option on wakeup. That can be easily fixed by making ex tatsu airborne on the first frames, similar to Viper’s ex bk. That, a better fireball (not sure what CVS versions like, since I dunno much bout that) and faster st.rh is what she needs more than anything else imo.
Some other stuff like cl.rh which is a completely useless move atm, would be an amazing anti air if they made it a command normal. Air ex tatsu could be given a cross up hitbox at least if they aren’t doing anything with j.mk. RH tatsu knocking down would be nice too.
Sakura/Bison isn’t so bad, I use crouch mk to play poking games with bison’s stand mk and stand hk. Granted I take alot more hits, but with the fadc on the srk, it really evens out pretty well between the two. That match feels like 5/5. I could see it being tough without the SRK fadc combo though.
Weak neutral game? +3 on tastu solves this, hahaha.
I like how you get a reset after her rh tatsu, it puts pressure on you opponent and lets you push them towards the corner.
Last time I fought your Sakura, I didn’t really want to press my advantage whenever you had meter or even on knockdown. I think that match comes down to whoever flinches on the neutral game, so it’s pretty hard fought on both sides. Sakura’s fireball can be a good tool of annoyance when used properly, but I’m not sure how you feel about it now in the match up since you said Jeremy was just learning to spot your hands move and then jump RH.
Ha, ok, who’s gonna find the official capcom email and sent that video to em?
lol I wish it was that easy 
That would be a sick ultra tho.
I just don’t like the EX Shunpu to Ultra. What they can do about it I don’t know, I just don’t like doing it. If everyone’s getting two Ultras then I’ll probably use that. I just hate landing the EX Shunpu, more or less timing the Haru Ranman.
So many changes?
i think sakura is fine just give her an ultra that does a little bit more damage, and thats all i really want (i do not need it just think it would be dope)
If they give a her a shinkuu hadouken no one will use it her ex moves are too good 
Just to be a little bit faster. It’d be nice if it was faster in everything obviously, but I think the biggest thing is her recovery from some moves like c.hp and her fireball. It’s kinda annoying when you have a c.hp connect as a counter, only to have someone srk or tu you before the animation even finishes.
A bit more priority in certain situations would be nice, and while I do enjoy the j.lk crossup, a more meaty one would be nice.
Ummm, a huge damage buff, I’m talking like, her standing low punch does the same amount as Sagat’s Ultra does right now! :3
Oh yeah, and the EX otoshi at least, should be an overhead. A longer dash would be okay I guess, but I wouldn’t be too fussed about that.
Yeah, I’ve been wanting her Otoshi to be an overhead for awhile. Last night I was playing and I accidentally did j.HK > c.LK > c.LP block string into Otoshi…and it would’ve connected if it was an overhead. Sure, I could’ve done j.LK cross-up/throw…but this gives her more variety (b/c seriously, you don’t see much Otoshis), sets up for the j.LK cross-up (after you knock them down) and it looks cool. =D The only thing bad about it is that it requires good spacing.
And that it’s really obvious, might as well go for f+mk at that distance.
They should just make the otoshi P recover as you would from a regular jump.
Think Akuma’s demonflip P when whiffed.
It’s already possible to whiff it just before you land, but the recovery is pretty big.
That would make it work as a short-jump type of move, which would be cool.
For the love of god, fix her EX DP.
CvS2 fireball did good chip, 3 hits, knocked down, and was +3 on block, it had decent range and was a good poke. It didn’t travel though, it was more a big energy spark from her hand.
they r making a 2nd ultra not super. and i want her to have her triangle kick from cvs2 that would be fantastic
**Make her top tier again.
That is all…**