Vega is a great punisher, S.HK is god-like.
Spam it.
cr.mk - cr.lp - cr.mp xx EX FBA
cr.mk - cr.mp xx EX FBA
st.lk - cr.lp - cr.mp xx EX FBA
st.hp - cr.mp xx EX FBA
cr.lp - cr.lp - cr.mp xx EX FBA
CH - ST/EX FBA
you want that damage you have to work for it because it sets up a untechable knock down, with decent options.
they all do about 300 damage. what is weak about that. Sagat cant do that damage any more with out being spaced propely or having to use meter. And he isnt a bait and punish character. your doing it wrong.
I have an 87% win rate 4.5k PP and 15.7K BP, highest win streak is 60
my lowest win rate is 51% against Seth, but it’s only because of one really good seth player
Same with the Rufus, Honda, Balrog, Cammy, and Dhalsim that are down there. Only Fei Long, at this point, seems to really give me trouble. Just don’t know the matchup well enough, NOBODY played that guy in vanilla.
I could have a lot more points. I noticed a better strategy to get points is simply to play the people who suck and chip away at your point totals. I basically never lose doing that, and eventually I haul in some good points. You can gamble and play against players who have equal or slightly less points than you, but the trade off is you’re simply more likely to lose. I tried going that way, and basically had like, FT10’s with guys who I kept joining thier lobby, but eventually I’d lose points cause I always have more than most people and we go 50/50, causing the points to even out.
I’m happy though. No 1 over Makoto and have usually been consistently no 1 in Canada for PP but now there’s some cheating pick-and-choose Sagat player who is boosting his PP.
Yeah, a LOT of people also rage quit / rage kick me. I could have farmed those guys a long time ago. I also have lots of double perfects, running on 11 right now.
wish i could get enough games here to farm 
You guys all realize that you had “EX FBA” in all of your punishes.
A supposed bait and punish chracter shouldn’t need meter just to punish. “Weak” not meaning weak damage wise, but weak on the punishing end of things.
You can either do combos which are classified as “hard” rather than normal with no ability to finish strong without EX, or you can throw or trip or something weak (punishing wise) like that.
Every other character in the game seems to have a set go to move, and most “bread and butter combos” don’t need EX meter. Which means Vega has “weak” or low tier punishing options. He’s still a good chracter though, btw, I think Makoto may be a 7/3 matchup in Vegas favor lol It feels that way to me.
I’m over 90% in ranked. Haven’t played in a while, but I haave over 100 wins in ranked.
Vega is not a bait and punish character. charge characater dont work like that. why would capcom give amazing normals to a bait and punish character? a bait and punish character has amazing specials that control space. Vega has none of those. Sagat does tho. He is the ultimate bait, and punish character.
as for makoto wait till you play a good one that knows how to use normals, that match isnt 7-3. its more or less even. Izuna loop doesnt work, CH doesnt body most of her normals. This match feels like it boils down to fundementals.
That’s exactly my point.
The guy above said he’s bait and punish, becuase thats how people play him, but he isn’t because he has poor punishes.
Against Makoto, even a good one, you can just stay in the air and use scrub tactics and there is nothing she can do. It goes to the fundamentals if you play her head up, but you don’t need to. If it’s just about winning, she has no chance.
as in jump up and down, or constant wall dive?
Of course Vega is a bait and punish character. His pokes cover huge distance, and considering how stupidly long range they are, they always do good damage. Why does Vega needing meter to do amazing damage punishes make him NOT a punishing character? He’s still a top tier punisher, what are you going to be using your meter for anyway? EX RCF? EX SHC? No, EX FBA and EX ST for every combo you do, and personally I use RCF FADC to pressure people but I know most Vega’s dont (and I probably shouldn’t.)
Vega is the only character that can punish Ryu’s sweep and others for ~270 damage. That’s a lot of fucking damage, and leads to izuna loop, for only one meter, and a move that normally, is not punished at all. Vega’s c. mp is the difference maker here. Anything that is -4 or greater is a 270 damage punish. If you know how to play Vega, you know how to hold on to your meter for these situations. These are the game changers. You can combo confirm into EX FBA from the ground but there’s a reason it’s so hard: it yields incredible benefits.
You can punish Balrog’s blocked headbutt for 315 damage for only one meter, or 200 without. I’m almost positive most characters can’t get that sort of mileage, and also: for every time Vega punishes someone, his pressure game is put into 100% effectiveness. safe jumps out the ass, which most people can’t do since alot of their combo moves have such big recovery, not allowing them to press the advantage if people tech recover. (like SRK’s).
Vega is totally a punisher character, and I don’t get why people think his punishes are weak. Seriously, people CAN’T punish most sweeps, period, but Vega can do so for great damage and only one meter, leading into izuna loops on some characters. Obviously a character with 4 frame moves across the board has to use them for something. If you don’t have meter, it’s a st. RH, which is 100 damage, 200 stun, and basically a 4 frame heavy move that most characters don’t have: with huge range on top of it. If you do have meter? c. mp EX FBA, 270 damage, izuna loop, safe jumps everywhere.
There’s a reason why Vega’s hardest matchups are against the characters who are the safest. Rufus, Bison, Honda, Chun, etc… Not much of what they do puts them at a huge disadvantage so you never have the opportunity to resort to your classic punishes. You have to rely on pressure games, which suck against characters like Honda who are incredibly strong defensively, and are easily interuppted by one reversal that leaves you screwed on your ass. Vega relies on punishing characters.
And as for stuff that whiffs in front of you, without the complications of blockstun and hit stun? Cosmic heel, all day. Nobody has a move that reaches that far, and can still combo into huge damage like ST can. Once you hit with an ST, you can basically mix up in whatever way you want, too. Vega punishes, and THEN he can start mixing people up. He’s not like others who can just jump in and go to town, no, Vega needs to stay on his feet, get the first big punish, then the game begins. I don’t know about you guys but I always fish for a punish. I’m always punishing mistakes, that’s the point with Vega. you may not be able to punish with huge damage, but you cna ALWAYS punish everything. The only stuff Vega can’t punish is any move that is -2 or -1. Granted, that’s the same for most, but consider also that EX FBA punishes literally every move in the game. It covers an incredible distance, no one else has a move that covers those bases. Between Zangief and Vega, then, they can punish every unsafe move in the game. Vega covers distance based ones like Blanka balls and Honda headbutt, and Zangief punishes close ones like a -1 cosmic heel.
If you don’t think Vega’s a punishing character then you just don’t understand how to play him. He IS a punishing character, he’s designed to be so. The combination of range and how quick those moves are with the constant advent of EX FBA for only one meter means you can punish absolutely everything with big damage, every time. If you don’t think EX FBA is big damage, then consider the fact that other big damage EX moves like a EX Tatsu from Ken whiff on people a lot, and are unsafe, unlike Vega. So… yeah, Vega is a punisher character. don’t know how you can think otherwise.
I never agreed on the fact that he is a bait and punish archetype of character. However, punishing is not something Vega has much trouble with, especially for a charge character. Since his EX Walldive doesn’t need that much charge it’s way easier to react because you don’t even have to precharge before you start the combo. And you don’t have to use focus either.
Plus, with his df.hk -> ST he has an over 200 DMG combo without meter that can even punish OS tech without needing to be too close (Boxer cl.rh, Dictator st.hp) or jumping in.
If he has charge, he can punish sweeps with cr.mp -> EX FBA every time. That’s also pretty good.
EDIT: Up there’s the long version, haha. Character archetypes are pretty difficult to nail properly though. One could even say that “bait & punish” is not even an archetype per se. Nevertheless, Vega is a good punisher. Whether he’s designed to be a “bait&punish” character is a whole different question though, especially because everything in this game somehow revolves around punishing.
I’ve always thought that Vega was not necessarily either a pressure / rushdown type character or turtle type, but smack dab in the middle: counter attack. Vega’s pressure game is decent and forces characters to make mistakes, which Vega can punish with ease. Fast walk speed and great reach on everything make this an easy task. Yet, Vega can also play a pretty decent keepaway game as we all know, and that’s what I used to think Vega was all about, but that leaves you in the corner more oft than you would hope. The idea is to always stay out of other character’s optimal ranges. You should always be at counter-poke range. Yet, unlike most characters, Vega can usually pressure people from a distance much further than most with moves like st. lk, and c. and st. mk. If they jump you always have the option of air grab and ST, so for these reasons I don’t think he’s in the same line as Bison who relies on pressure or Balrog who relies (moreso) on defense, I think he’s right in the middle. Just have to learn how to force people to make mistakes. Once you can do that, your Vega is pretty much right where you want it to be. AT higher levels it’s harder to make that shit happen which is where st. LK, the godlike move, and kara throw come in.
he is good at punishing small mistakes, and big ones alike, but he is ok at baiting things. I agree with the punishment part, but the bait, naw. he doesnt have a vortex or many option selects, which allow for baiting things, cant force reaction out of characters, etc. the whole bait and punish character thing is the wrong way to put it i guess.
Of course Vega can bait things. Walk speed. That’s what you need to bait things. There is ALWAYS a way you can coax a reversal out of someone, always. Vega has frame traps out the ass, that are always safe. The idea behind Vega is that, unlike other characters, who can’t realistically bait things because they are on top of someone (and need to be to start offense), and hence usually have reversals thrown their way get FADC’d or blocked off them and be safe, Vega’s st. LK is always outside the range of most reversals. Thus, you either meaty them with a st. LK and go to town, or you whiff it, and, unlike other characters, Vega can pressure them from far enough away to stay out of reach of SRK’s and etc. Plus, I’m always baiting with FBA. I pretty much go 50/50: either i go for the vortex / throw whatever, or I bait the reversal I expect and punish again. The better you are at moving around, the better you are at baiting things. IT’s just a matter of being creative. Plus, jump out fierce OWNS at baiting things. If you jump in fierce over someones head( like you’re standing on top of them, and you jump fierce overhead towards them so as to land behind), 90% of reversals whiff, seriously. It’s unsafe, of course, but all you have to predict is whether or not they’ll block high. That’s the only thing against every character that they can do to get out of it, for the most part. Deejay, Rufus, and some others have moves that bring them in the air fast enough to punish you in the air, but most characters don’t. (remember that jump out fierce overhead works on everyone, but only on their wakeup as they don’t have time to crouch). Free punishes everywhere. Moves like that, and always being able to move in and out of range like Vega can are what make you a good baiting character.
Ok, I believe you. I still think it’s “weak” that his punishes require EX. If you completely whiff a Fierc SRK in front of most characters faces, the match would basically be over in high level play. They have normal combos or special moves that do guarenteed damage at any situation.
But you’re saying he would be way overpowered if his punishes were more relaiable, because of how damaging they are. Especial when combining everything else thats great with his game.
About Makoto, basically do whatever you want, as long as you stay out of range of her throw. If your Kara throw game is on point, then she can’t do anything at all against Vega.
Jozhear, you seem to know your stuff, I’d be honored if I could play you/practice with you a few times. Mind if I add you? OnionMan X - XBL
Keep in mind that sometimes when Vega hits with the big damage punish, it IS over. Izuna loops can end a match. T. Hawk seems to be THE most susceptible character in the game now, even worse than Sagat and Viper used to have it. When he gets punished, there’s a good chance he’s dead. He’s too clunky to get out of the way reliably.
ANd I think his punishes are reliable. I consider Vega to be one of the best characters at punishing. If Vega had a better pressure game and a great wakeup move, he’d be close to being overpowered. but he’s a long way from that now. And I’d certainly play you, go ahead, I think I have to clear up some space on my friends list first.
I see. I think I’m still stuck on the meter thing…
cr.Mp into EX Izuna is prett reliable… Or just instant EX Izuna…
And if you think about it, Bloody High Claw may be one of the best punishes in the game, 1 frame ot hit a character for 400+ across the screen. You can catch a fireball player without them realizing what happened.
I’m one of those guys who’s still stuck in the mindset that you need to run away while using Vega… His normals and pokes are so good, that I need to start moving forward more. I still get corner trapped, I think that’s just my overall fighting game inexperience.
Edit: BTW, I dare someone to try this and post a video lol @ 1:45
[media=youtube]J3xKtVb48Is[/media]
It’s true that Vega’s punish options in a lot of cases are cut back when you don’t have meter. However, even if you don’t you can still punish -4 / -5 moves from a distance unlike others with c. mp, like Cody’s criminal upper. Vega could possibly be the only character in the game who can punish that, it’s a matchup changer. IF you’re on point any time Cody misses a hit confirm you can punish with at least 70 damage, which in the long run is a good amount. When you have meter, you simply increase any punish by ~200 damage. And lets face it: EX SHC And EX RCF are incredibly limited. Yeah, they are really useful I’ve noticed, but they are totally unreliable. I mean, if people don’t throw fireballs when you do those two EX moves, you’re pretty much screwed, and EX SHC isn’t something that is reliably against every fighter, only certain ones who suck at blocking it. It’s horribly unsafe.
EX ST is a good punisher and it’s good to punish fireball strings with it. But of course it’s best when used with Cosmic Heel, as when you do hit with it, you get the same benefits as a normal ST but with 50 more stun and some more damage. Generally, in most cases, you should always have the EX meter for FBA. You just have to hold on to it and refrain from doing the full screen shenanigans with EX barcelonas, cause those are really unsafe. Meter management is crucial, but the idea is that when Vega has meter peopel are prevented from doing LOTS of stuff. Anyone that doesn’t understand that trade off is going to do poorly against Vega.
BHC is an amazing punisher but it too is limited. You have to train your opponent in most cases, and the good thing about it is 480 damage is actually one of the strongest ultras in the game now. It’s kind of fast, like an EX FBA speed to hit on the way up, but the dash off the wall is slower than it looks. It’s REALLY good at punishing in the corner if you have good reactions as it becomes incredibly fast, but if it’s blocked, or even whiffed now ( i think the whiff animation was made slower in super) you’re screwed. Splendid Claw is also a really good punisher because of how far it goes.
Moves that prove that Vega is a punishing type are moves like his sweep. It’s incredible at punishing. I more or less use it as my “footsies punishing move”. If you space your sweeps correctly, basically every button they press is a free sweep for you. The sweep doesn’t really lose in most cases. And every time you hit, knockdown, safe jump, etc. Part of being a good Vega is not letting anything go unpunished. That’s the difference between him and other characters. Being aware of your surroundings and the situation you’re in, and having the reactions to capitalize on whiffed moves like a full screen Lariat for meter gain. Part of being an even BETTER vega is not letting anything go unpunished weakly. Optimal punishes are so important to Vega’s game. Once you’re getting used to optimal punishing and doing damage when you’re supposed to, you can stop mashing c. mp like so many of the Vega’s I see online and learn how to kara throw and start his pressure game. Vega’s pressure game is really good but takes a mastery of moving around, charging on the fly, hit confirming and kara throws. It largely revolves around st. LK because that move is godlike, and is amazing at forcing your opponents to make mistakes. You get tons of counter hits with it too, and one st. LK c. MP works from everywhere pretty much and is 110 damage !!!
I hope you understand what I’m talking about. I think my understanding of Vega is pretty accurate to what they designed him to be like. Most of the stuff I’m working on is so niche, the kind of stuff that even if I practice hours for I’ll probably only use once a match. Once I get my recording stuff working again I think I’ll post some videos of practicing pressure tactics with Vega. I like to dish on Vega when I can because I think it helps other Vega players. I still wish I saw more Vegas kara throw though. =( IMO that should be the number one thing people practice.
Too much text.
The biggest factor to the increased win rates (online) is that Sagat/Shoto Armies no longer get free wins on trade, general nerfs to make characters require a higher skill level and in general Capcom sort of told them to l2play. That said, online scrubs don’t matter. I can get an indefinite win streak by Izuna spamming all day because people either can’t react to it as easily in an online state, or because they are simply dumb.
Vega got fixes and one buff. Vega is still garbage. Online scrubs are still garbage. Instead of being smelly garbage (SF4), he’s well scented garbage (SSF4), but garbage non-the-less.
Low C tier or D tier.
^ The difference is Vega’s buffs and new ultra make Vega a viable competitor whereas before you often would not go far in tournaments. I’m positive now that I can win the same tournaments I lost in playing Vanilla. Being able to combo confirm on every character means Vega’s ground game is godlike, his air game was always good, and now he has one more solid invincible anti-air that is relatively safe if whiffed or wins outright against nearly all jump ins. He is still somewhat free on wakeup but again, new invincible ultra. By comparison he got buffed better than probably every character, even Guile. Now he has one of the highest damage outputs and is an excellent punisher, forcing people to play your way once you have meter instead of before where they’d only take minimal abuse.
I mean, if you don’t understand Vega, which you’ve always made apparent in your posts as you’ve always considered him garbage as opposed to the rational idea of him not being that bad, which is obvious now, then why even bother posting? If you want to think Vega is garbage, that’s fine. I’m pretty sure you’re the only one left, even deadfroggy knows Vega is better. It’s like you’re blatantly displaying a lack of knowledge of the game, and flaunting it, which straight up makes you look like a dumbass.