Really solid Kuma. I noticed that some opponents were holding back while you were doing g-clef pressure. I go straight into Headbutt(after one or two blocked f.Lp). It’ll either condition them to crouch and take the pressure(while still having the option to use his rolling bear command grab). If they are trying to predict the headbutt and jump, you can go for Megaton claw to catch them and put them back into a hard knockdown or sending them into the corner.
Lots of good reads and keeping them honest with the guesses. Good stuff mayne.
Also just to add, from mid range st.mp is really good, this move stuffs so many attacks, it’s priority is crazy good!
Plus you can cancel it into megaton punch
How are you guys following up with Kumas alpha counter/ HBS move that launches em?
I ususally use alph acounters to tag in my opponent. Gonna test now and see if I can spend meter and bring in partner for dmg, i doubt it
Its possible, but hard. AFter kuma alpha counter, I brought in vega, best I could get was a sweep, and it didnt always hit either. 
Is it just me or does Kuma’s cr.mp move him MILES forward?
At first like everyone else I tried to use it as an anti-air but I’ve seen it just completely move me under and behind an opponent when they try to cross me up. I need to test this more, but this might be a better option than straight up trying to anti-air someone if they jump at close range. Just duck under them and then go for whatever, I think it’s going to be too far away to land a command grab though, boo.
One other option I’m yet to try (curse you work always getting in the way of everything!) is using Kumas coward crouch to just avoid a jump in and then go for any of your HBS options. My Hakan sense is tingling.
Re gems, I’m rolling with 2 power boost and one meter building. One of the power boost gems is the one that activates when your tag partner lands a launcher, so I get a nice little damage boost to the combo ender when Kuma comes in, and if your wake up plan goes accordingly then youre going to see extra damage on that as well. meter build gem is purely to help increase the chance of having meter stocked for an EX frolicking bear in tight anti-air situations.
if you have time to HBS and coward crouch, just big tree (f+mp) its much better and beats all jump ins.
Have a question for you guys - how often do you find yourselves landing HBS~f.mp as an anti-air? What situations arise when you can feasibly use this in match? If I’m in HBS and they’re close enough where I could f.mp them if they try to jump in… they’re also close enough to combo me out of HBS - and that’s what usually happens - HBS in that range = ground combo or at least a c.rh. How are you baiting them to jump at you instead of attemping a ground combo or simply running away while you’re in HBS?
I’ve been finding frolicking bear or plain old blocking to be the only reliable option against jump-in :\
Julia on point with Kuma on backup. Dirty.
I have found that when julia does a boost into tag combo, her tag attack does not lift the opponent very high, making it very difficult for kuma to follow up with his more damaging combos. Most reliable combo I can get with kuma after a julia tag is low short into megaton…kinda sad. Standing fierce is practically impossible, I think sometimes I can get a standing mk, but that too is difficult.
Best julia tag combos with kuma seem to start after a tag cancelled mk uppercut…gives kuma lots of time to do what he wants, ie., standing fierce/rh, etc.
I can do it on reaction if Im just standing at midrange playing the footsie game. You can really do it from closer but you have to just train yourself to do it. If they are too close going into b+hp is better since they will usually whiff their jump alot of the time since Kuma makes himself so much shorter, then they will land and go for block string but b+hp will absorb.
I think really the important thing with Big tree is to know when you should be looking for it and when you should be just trying to close space. There are certain characters such as hugo where you should just be standing around at max range poking with st.lp and trying to force them to jump so you can big tree and just keep them out. As long as you have the life lead that is.
A good Hugo will not jump on Kuma though. I’m fairly sure Kuma has nothing in his arsenal that would bother Hugo on the ground.
Hugo is like Kuma, but with better range, damage and easier access to a move with armour. I play with a Hugo Kuma team and if I had to play someone with Kuma when I had Hugo out, I would just be looking to outpoke the bear with cr.mp into slap frame traps, punish HBS with cr.lk, cr.mk sweep of awesomeness. If Kuma comes in on the offensive I’ll be looking to punish with the clotheline because I don’t feel like Kuma has the speed in most of his strings to hit Hugo twice before the clothesline connects. Also that massive bear hitbox makes it super easy for Hugo to land those combos of slappy death.
Of all the times I’ve fought against Hugo, I’ve usually stayed grounded and punished him when a opportunity shows up, particularly using the G-Clef Cannon starter. Hugo’s poke range is pretty good and I think the only real thing I’ve done outside of inclose is using the double wild slap attack to get some damage from afar.
Actually, Double Slap with the extra HP added at the end is sick damage and has decent range, it catches folks off-guard when they get into thinking that Kuma only has short hitting attacks. You can also Ex-Megaton Claw off of it into s.hk xx megaton claw (HP) for the standard combo, it does 436 damage and has surprisingly good range. You’ll whiff if you can’t nab the second s.hp but it’ll keep them out. The double slap does 232 damage by itself and is safe aside from I think supers so it’s pretty nice if you want to smack folks from afar.
Have we all come to the conclusion that kuma at this point is pretty solid?
Kuma has pretty large weaknesses unfortunately.
except for his boost combos, i have sadly found that his most common strings are not block strings, and can in fact be dash out of or interrupted by invincible moves.
jp~b+mp, yea, that can be interrupted.
g-clef cannon, yup, interruptable (but im sure most people knew about that)
Thats rough…in addition, characters like ibuki and rolento, well, i havent figured out a way to deal with these charactrers with kuma…there may be a solution, but i dont see it yet.
I’m a little bit disappointed too. I really want Kuma to be good and I want to play him because I think his moves look awesome and powerful, especially his fierces and megaton claw.
But, I really hate his bad, slow normals. My inability to anti-air with him. His few options and combos… Maybe he’s not a bad character, but I don’t think he fits my playstyle. I really don’t have enough time to learn this game right now in depth, so I guess I’m stuck with the characters I already know enough not to get beaten by total scrubs, which I hate.
Hey guys, what do you use as an air to air ? J.FP? J.MP? J.HK? …I use HP for neutrals and MP for backwards, and if you hit,can you combo something?
I think the best way to avoid pressure is to make pressure… “the best defense is an offense” 
Huh? I didn’t think G-Clef Cannon could be interrupted by itself. I know that random EXs will beat a blocked or slow megaton claw but the cannon itself?
I was just thinking about that charge cancel, haven’t quite implemented it into my game yet!
I’ve been punishing blocked patriot circle with LP Circus pretty consistently. Also EX Megaton Claw and EX Frolick have been effective at interrupting block strings. Never seen G-clef interrupted thats news to me!
yea, g-clef is totally interuptable, especially between the first two hits. Not sure about between the second and third, but between first two without a doubt. If its interruptable between the second and third hits (which im pretty sure is highly highly likely), g-clef cannon’s usefulness as a block string is dramatically reduced, because while most people wont reversal between hits 1 and 2, they can deffinately have enough reaction time to interrupt between 2 and 3. And the real problem with g-clef cannon is you cant cancel the first move (his godly f+lp), so kuma always has to go at least to the second hit to cancel to megaton, which again leaves him open to mash reverrsals, which will become more common against kuma as people recognize this major flaw.
So basically, You start g-clef cannon, and between first two hits they can mash out an ex reversal, or even an ultra, if they are prepared and ready for it.
My jaw kinda dropped when my opponent reversalled between the jab~b+mp string. I figured since it was basically jab to mp, that it has to be like the boost combo and just a simple block string. nnnnooooopppe, opponent was backdashing out of it like I was just standing still, so then he got more bold and started testing rolento ex-patriot circle to interrupt, which also was successful. The window for him to interrupt was small, and he messed up once or twice, but when he had ex and wanted to interrupt, it was easy.
The good news (sorta), is that many of the tekken string attacks are actually interruptable, and are not block strings (a block string would be something where the opponent is forced to block all the way through, they cant even reversal, because + frames are high enough that the opponent is kept in block stun throughout. sfxt teken and sf4, unlike many previous SF games, do not have a lot of true block strings). The bad news is that unlike other tekken strings, I feel kuma’s are really easy to identify, and as a result really easy to punish.
The bad news basically is that as opponents recognize these flaws, kuma is going to be forced, against top tier opponents, to not use ANY of his safer strings, because sadly they are not safe at all. and unlike most of the cast, kuma has a really really hard time linking jab to jab before going into a string, so he’ll just get jabs in here and there, and he wont be able to push the opponent back and get breathing space. On one hand this is understandable, because it means that rock and roll circus and headbutt become more important as you want the oppponent close to use those moves, but yet more practically, fast poking characters will be able to get in and stay in, and not be pushed away, and that makes the future look like crap.
Circus to punish patriot circle may work on a scrub, but it should only work once and never again. PAtriot circle is -1 on block, and circus is 6 frame startup, so in this situation circus is effectively a 5 frame startup move. Guess what, unless u do ex circus, all the opponent has to do is mash on jab (4 frame startup), and they will beat out your circus. Lets also not forget that if they just jump straight up, kuma will take massive damage. It could work once, just due to sheer unfamiliarity with kuma, but its not a reliable strategy at all.
My longer term bright news is that frankly, sfxt feels extremely unfinished and really unbalanced…there’s a lot of really stupid moves that capcom did not test for (im sure capcom’s QA team is a dead nerd in a broken closet somewhere, either that, or the QA is this pay to play beta everyone is currently involved in). This game will deffinately be patched, but knowing capcom not until 6 months later and the new characters say hello.