this type of character being top tier would be stupid, i think they’ve succeeded in making a character that is fun but also pretty strong when you’ve mastered her. if you’re expecting to get far with her while not maximizing combo routes, oki, and keeping your AA reactions sharp then she’s not the character for you. she’s not going to make you feel like you’re good at the game when you’re not like necalli and balrog do. the people saying she sucks and isn’t worth learning reminds of all the idiots who said the same about guile and ibuki when they dropped…
I don’t care about tiers as long it isn’t trash tiers and she doesn’t seem weak to me. And definitely fun.
If talking about her tools i maybe would like a more reliable crossup. I often miss it, especially after HK.Step or double jump. I thought that i’m just spoiled by Ryu and Karing jump buttons. But am looking at Poonkgo replays now and he seems to have the same problem.
All her other tools i actually really like. ji.HK were giving me trouble but the more i use it the more i like it.
The thing i haven’t figured out yet is VanityStep. Seem kinda reactable. It seems like you can see what version were used and act accordingly. If someone has directions about it - i would appreciate it.
In theory it seem simple: Use MK.Step to get in. When they start to react to it and poke - start mixing it up with LK.Step > P (stuffs button) or LK.Step, LP.Hail (make them block) or pause, dash (get in) or HK.Step (jump over button). But in practice opponent usually guess or react right. I don’t know, maybe i’m slow with it and predictable, but haven’t had much success with it.
Also it’s interesting if Step can be used in block strings in gaps. Has anybody explore that?
i just use vanity step to mess with people’s wake up. mostly dp mashers on their wake up. works wonders. but yea, her lack of mk cross up hurts.
PROBLEM:
how to win with Kolin
SOLUTION:
get really gud at reading people’s patterns lol
I started playing Street Fighter 5 because of Kolin.
She is definitely fun and her options are fun but I just don’t see her as Top 10 material.
Too much unsafety and requires too much guesswork for countering and oki/wakeup game.
Being objective.
It is reactable.
That’s one of her struggles. Her offensive game is ass but her wakeup game is where you’ll have to focus to win.
Score a knockdown, mixup into reset. Rinse and repeat.
If you play a typical footsies game with her, you’ll lose most of the time.
Sadly yeah, that is her biggest strength and weakness at the same time.
Kolin is unique in that she can challenge during any block string and exploit patterns in a spectacular manner. However she also puts herself at a huge risk for doing so. I think it was a good idea from Capcom to maker her EX counters 240 damage and 300 stuns AND a HKD that leads to some guaranteed setups.
Yeah you have to guess but the risk / reward is still decent enough for you to take the guess IMO. Like you said however, She isn’t reliable and reliability is key for top tiers so yeah. I generally agree with your statement. I think Kolin can be really dangerous if played in a lame turtly way since her counters, V-skill and V-trigger all plays a huge part in making it risky for the opponent to approach her.
She have to irritate her opponent, i guess.
How are you guys dealing with fireball characters? I don’t have a problem with Ken, Ryu or Chun but Guile is giving me a tough time. I don’t think EX Vanity step is good enough to react with.
Guile is an asshole and people who main him are assholes too.
Dude must at least 6-4 more than half the cast. You can’t react and punish the booms, just gotta get lucky with a jumpin or something.
With Guile you either have to wait for him to make a mistake or troll him with Kolin’s backwalk and hope that he switches to offense. The Xian tactic: make them come to you and when you’re in the corner, jump out.
the footsies arent bad if you can hitconfirm stray st.hp into heavy parabellum or ex parabellum with a high success rate. i’m not saying its easy but i think a good amount of players write it off as impossible or past their skill level when it isnt. especially when you setup the counterpoke ranges with literally all of her plus normals or after light parabellums on block or hit. an 8f with decent range that won’t trade with lower priority normals and crush counters on counterhit is godlike. i dont think she HAS to be played as an unsafe character to take rounds, there are plenty of guaranteed counter situations where you don’t have to guess.
I can hit confirm the CC st.HP into hands and i have practiced a lot on Chun’s st.HP super confirm so i am sure with some practice hit confirming her st.HP would be viable. The cancel window looks big enough.
it passes the random block training mode dummy test (buffer the qcf every time but only hit hp for the confirm) but in a real match you’re also going to look closely at what the opponents doing right when you press hp. you’ll learn to spot when you’re hitting them out of the startup or recovery of something. whenever you’re not sure or the match has drained your focus in one way or another, you can switch the confirm to light parabellum to avoid a huge punish but i think drilling suboptimal stuff into muscle memory is a common mistake that hurts in the long run.
Check out this guide https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r5lsyvV35YMkkC9bOuPa1s1dmsuYaad60AycAu1RPVo/edit
I’m at work and can’t study it, but on a glance it seems informative
Mono won a 29 people tourney yesterday with Kolin.
She is definitely viable.
Mid Tier and viable.
Poongko used her in some Chinese tournament a couple of weeks ago or so. Lost to Xian if I remember correctly in finals. But i think it’s too early to place her in tiers. People need to learn the matchup, adapt, counteradapt, readapt and so on. Now there are too much uncertainty and factors, like unfamiliarity and underdevelopment. We will not know until middle of the season if not end. That is why I don’t think much about tiers - they shift and depend on the player heavily. But what she is viable I think is true.
You can link st.lk after st.hp tho, so no need to hitconfirm like that if it isnt a CC or max range st.hp
Sniping kick(b.hk) into super works wonder for me, it does have a small cancel window but has enough startup to buffer the whole super and react, even if it was a CC it still connects
A real heartbreaker strategy when they jump right before it hits and you spend CA just to be punished T_T
Yeh… When you hitconfirm feels like shit… Still, people shouldnt be jumping at you, since you can mix them up with a few air counters, then cr.hp