It’s a huge problem having to db to charge. It would become so much more useful if it was a f, d, df + k. Then we’d be able to actually be mobile while having an AA thread besides 2 normals and a few air normals.
I agree with Vegaman though, it needs to have safer hit boxes on the feet and less hurt box around it. If it did, then the chances of an opponent getting into to ground meaty pressure us becomes much less hence not needing invincibility on start up. Blocking low isn’t the problem, it’s the air mix up and ambiguous cross up in the corner when you’re waking up and dealing with frame traps + block strings. If only people couldn’t jump behind us in the corner like every other fucking SF on the planet, then I’d have no problem dealing with frontal assaults on wake up.
I agree blocking is strong in this game (and pretty much any game without stupid ass guard meters, looking at you Alpha 3!!) but disagree with Vegaman that it beats many options. Block doesn’t beat chip damage and when your opponent has normals that are upwards to +6 on block like Cody then you’re stuck blocking and most likely eating chip afterwards, which slow whittles away what little vitality Vega has.
not that hitbox don’t matter on other moves! i just meant it doesn’t matter much for vega’ st! it has that frontal hitbox that can hit anyone! it’ll only whiff if the person do a dive kick right above our heads! our st right now gets stuffed because we use it early+we don’t have any invincibility at all. but if we concentrate on hitting people when they are closer to the ground, the hitbox won’t just whiff.
Not just dive kicks… anything where they are aiming at our head. And opponents aiming for the head isn’t exactly a rare occurrence.
You’re not going to have the ability to consistently anti air by waiting for the opponent to get close to the ground. just like how Guile has to use his EX FK to get decent AA properties even though regular ones have invincibility… (hint… it’s cause of hitboxes). If it were that easy I sure as hell wouldn’t be getting away with so many jump in combos on Guile just straight up tearing through FKs.
chip doesn’t even come into play until end game and only if you’re down to less than 100 health. Just because chip does damage to blocking doesn’t make it significant damage. I’ll sit there blocking fireballs all day before I voluntarily take a bad risk of losing non-chip damage life. That sure as hell ain’t going to be a factor in my gameplan until I get down to <100 health.
I play Gief as an alt. Gief doesn’t have as many tools or as good of an ability to get around fireballs as Vega. I am completely comfortable blocking every single one, instead of trying to evade and jump over, or waste meter EX GH through, or risking big damage from Lariat-ing through. For the vast majority of the match, chip is insignificant… and doesn’t beat blocking.
Gief has a ton more vitality though. Vega is a glass cannon. Still, nothing we can do about having to block, but getting stuck in those block strings that result in chip and more chip really sucks, especially against the likes of Rufus and Sakura.
At this point it’s learning to not get in that situation as much as possible.
ggs. I couldn’t tech for shit without having to delay it ridiculously late, but that actually reinforces my point. When I sat on down back you ended up falling into predictable patterns of cLP Kara throw, or sLK PoM. Under normal circumstances I would have either teched the throws or simply ST them. It really is a matter of question of how many times can you get away with something like that in a row. Yes there’s the option of changing it up to make the kara throws less predictable, but ultimately the throw or an overhead has to come if Vega doesn’t have the life lead and they aren’t hard to spot without getting right up in their face to do something extremely risky like sHK.
Your alt has the ability to open up opponents on downback because of the threat of serious damage from the actual overhead and the combo that follows. This is why I ask for PoM to be comboable on hit. It adds the threat of damage to sitting on downback and at least makes the opponent consider standing… or else.
Also, against Vega sitting on downback enabled me to see exactly what kinda offense you have. It’s a bit harder against Duds since that’s not one of my stronger matches and the fact he can combo from his overhead. You offense from Vega isn’t really different than mine for the situations I was trying to look at. Mix ups between Kara throws and overheads. But like i said. It boils down to how many consecutive kara throws can you land before the opponent adjusts, potentially erasing any gains you’ve made from landing them.
GGs last night. Funny thing about last night is that I knew a Vega mirror match would significantly lower my options to show you how I break down defense, so I asked you to play your alternate. Before we played I said to myself, “as long as his alternate is not Zangief or T-hawk things should be fine”. LOL
Zangief is probably the second worst character matchup to showcase how I break down defense. The only way to play him is to gain a life lead and keep him out. If you’re playing Zangief aggressively using Vega, then you’re playing him wrong.
I’m not sure what you mean when you say, “under normal circumstances.” I was waiting for you to ST me but you almost never did. If I recall correctly you only did it once.
I believe you’re only seeing our match from one perspective. Your own. You state that my patterns became predictable, but you did nothing to stop them.
I’m not knocking your game play just trying to give you my perspective of our matches. Hear me out. You state that my patterns were predictable but I can say that you were predictable as well. Arguably even more predictable than I was.
I say this because the way I viewed our matches, you were playing too safe. I got away with kara throws and overheads because you allowed me to. I knew you were not going to ST me. The reason why you didn’t is irrelevant. What’s important for you to know is that I KNEW you wouldn’t.
You see Vegaman, your safe play made you predictable.
Regarding my patterns, I fell into a pattern because what I did worked, so why change it? You as the opponent have to force me to change my pattern by showing me that what I’m doing no longer works on you. Until you did, I had no reason to change it up.
Keep in mind that as a Vega player myself, I was FULLY aware of your options. I was testing you to see what I could get away with. Seeing how many Kara throws I could land, how many overheads (Dudley) I could land before you wised up and forced me to change.
EDIT…
I didn’t explain my mentality when playing as Vega. Against most characters, I approach matches by first establishing my Kara throw game. I want the opponent to fear it, to always be aware of it. Once that fear is established, I’m able to control the pace of the game. I have no problem landing one frame cr. lp into cr.mp links. It’s all muscle memory for me at this point, ( I can literally do it with my eyes closed). The part of my game that you didn’t see, and one of my strongest in my opinion, is my poke game. I delay poke to bait out button presses. I never got a chance to show you this because, 1. its not effective in the mirror match. 2. its not effective vs Gief or T-Hawk.
I tried a couple times… but they never came out in time. That’s why I resorted to jumping back. It was the only thing I could see to do in time. Hell, I even tried to ultra them a couple of times. Nada.
believe me I tried. The problem is that I ended up having to do reversal STs just to make sure they were done early enough.
Did you not notice that I put myself into the corner? From the beginning? Of course my defense was predictable. I wanted to see your offense lol. I can’t do that if I’m attacking you. The point was to play safe. I wanted to see how you broke down someone sitting on down back determined not to press a button. The answer was the same answer I had. Kara throw and PoM mixups.
Yes. That’s pretty standard. You can fall into a pattern because it works. That’s fine. The point I’m making is again, how many times in a row can you get away with it? To not expect that at some point the opponent will guess right, is a bit far fetched. And against anyone, you run a real risk of eating major damage. Lag prevented me from showing you that in those matches, but I’m sure you’re aware of it.
Forget about chip, being stuck in a block string leaves you susceptible to being thrown. I don’t know why Vegaman continues to downplay how strong the throw is in this game. I’ve heard the same thing said by many pro players, such as Diago, Sako, and Infiltration just to name a few.
For example, simple examination of Infiltrations gameplay strategy will show you just how strong the throw is. His mastery of max range kara throw using Akuma is a prime example. If you analyze his strategy, you would notice that he establishes a strong throw game first, followed by frame traps and delayed dp’s. Without establishing a strong throw game, frame traps are useless. In fact, frame traps would not be useful at all without the effectiveness of throwing in SSFIV.
If you doubt this, just look at SFxT as an example. Frame traps are pretty much pointless in the game. Why? Because the fear of being thrown is gone. Blocking in SFxT is much more powerful than in SSIV as a result.
My plan is to place the opponent in a guessing situation. If you would’ve played me seriously, you would have seen that placing you in a guessing position means that you are at an disadvantage.
All this aside, you are unable to see how I play with the characters you use. I can’t stress this enough, the mirror match takes away too many of my options. It’s THE reason why I absolutely hate the mirror match. And your secondary character was of no use at all, it’s Gief after all. There is no opening Gief.
I wanted you to show me your defense when I picked Dudley. Next time, lets have a serious game. I’m not sure what your goal was, but in order to see how I break down defense, you have to play me seriously.
how does the mirror take away options though. Vega’s defense is weaker than any other character’s. The only thing you “can’t” do is wall dive mixups.
See what you’re saying doesn’t make sense. Whether I play seriously or not should be irrelevant. You wanted to make reads. I get it. The simple fact is that throws do less damage than counterhit combos. The only difference between how I played you last night and how I’d play seriously is that I’d be less inclined to give up space, not let punishes go by, and I would have used more frame traps. You imply that if I were playing seriously that I would have been more inclined to do something different on defense. That’s not necessarily the case. The only thing that would have changed would have been my offense. That would have defeated the point… just like on the matches when I did play normally, you spent more time on defense than on offense. The goal I had was to see your offense… not to see who had the better mirror. I don’t care enough about online play to worry about who has the better mirror.
Against anyone other than Vega, you have the threat DP FADC to deal with as well. How does giving the opponent the ability to safely break up frame traps help your offense? The only thing I can think of is that having an invincible reversal i guess potentially makes the opponent more likely to not block, but if they have the life lead why would an intelligent player want to take that kind of risk full well knowing that DP FADC is NOT guaranteed on Vega due to backflip?
The mirror match takes away his poke game. You can’t use cr.mk nor cr.mp because they’re both punishable during recovery frames. Two of Vegas best footsie tools are gone and you still ask how?
This discussion stemmed from my belief that throw is stronger than blocking. If my performance last night did not prove that to you then I don’t know what else would. You ate so many throws I can’t even count. The ONLY way to beat my throws would have been to press buttons, which you decided not to do (for the sake of the experiment I suppose).
The entire point of us playing was to break down your defense (in this case it was to hold dp). I accomplished this by throwing you.
I’m not sure what your definition of breaking someone’s defense is but if anyone was spectating our matches, your defense was certainly broken.
Also, another way to break defense is to change a persons defense to offense (i.e., press buttons). The only way you could’ve stopped me from throwing you was to press those buttons. I can assure you that I play far less risky when I need to. In our matches, I had no need. All you did was hold db, which was easily beaten by throwing you.
which was pretty much all you could do. You make it seem like I wasn’t even trying to break them. I tried teching, then ST, then ultra, then jumping. I’m not going to sit there relying on reversal ST JUST to make sure I can break the throws in time. Sure, you landed a lot of throws on me, most of which would have been broken up offline. That’s not the point. The point is that you had NOTHING to fall back on other than throws. What happens if I was able to tech them? You would have changed it up to bait my crouch tech attempts right? What happens if I just attempt to tech once? You’d go back to throwing after the tech traps fail. If you guess right best case scenario, you land a forward throw. You get 120 damage and maintain the corner. What happens if I guess right? You potentially eat an ST to the face doing 160-180 damage, and I get an almost free safe jump or meaty, and I escape the corner. And that’s just against Vega.
That’s the entire point I’m trying to make… Vega only has frame traps and kara throw to fall back on, on offense. Nothing else. No +3 or better frame advantage on block. No threat of serious damage from overhead. No reason to even bother worrying about getting off down back. Yeah the 60 damage from PoM eventually adds up but look at the risk you’re taking to land 60 damage. The argument isn’t about how to beat downback. We all know how to do that. The argument is that Vega only has 3 ways to beat it.
Jump in - which is reactible
Overhead- which doesn’t do much damage meaning you have to risk it a LOT for the damage to add up
Kara throw- The ONLY tool he has to open up opponents… which DOESN’T get people off downback. It just gets a button press.
I’ve said this over and over and over… that’s great if you can get a button press. My concern isn’t if they press a button. It’s if they DON’T press a button. What if the opponent simply picks instances where you are predictable to punish your throw attempts?
See here’s the thing. Vega has to take all these risks JUST to get minimal damage in this situation. If he has the life lead every attempt to throw or PoM puts Vega’s life lead in jeopardy. In addition, it helps to establish a pattern.
But what if the opponent has the life lead? Now the opponent doesn’t even have to care to take those risks like pressing a button. Why? cause they know that throws do less damage than combos. And unless the throw itself puts the defender’s life lead in jeopardy, what incentive do they have to even bother pressing a button. The entire risk is on the attacker. And unless you expect the opponent to do something about it, you run the risk of getting nailed. If you do expect the opponent to do something about it, you give up pressure. So here you are having to walk the razor thin line between giving up pressure and getting nailed. The fact you can walk this razor thin line rather well, doesn’t remove the fact it doesn’t take much to knock you off… and often with catastrophic consequences.
I’m not saying that throws are worthless in this game. They’re not. But they’re only effective tool Vega has against blocking. Remember, Vega (unlike Dudley) has no standing lows or highs and only 1 crouching high (PoM). As long as the opponent mimics Vega’s stance (crouching or standing), they really only risk 60 damage from the overhead or 120 from the throw. And if the defender doesn’t even want to deal with high/low mixups… he can just take the overhead and never risk damage from lows.
To bring this entire thing back onto topic…
This is why (IMO) PoM being +4 on hit is more important than 4 frames of invincibility on a move that requires downback charge, meter, can’t be FADC, doesn’t follow up with a combo, and has shitty hit/hurtboxes. PoM being +4 on hit (unlike throws) will get an opponent off downback. You won’t be restricted to an offense that entirely consists of throw/frame trap mix ups…
Throw/frame trap mix ups form the back bone and very essence that is SSFIV. Read my other post, as previously stated, frame traps would not exist without throws. That’s mostly what characters have to work with in order to create offense. Besides Dudley, what other character has a comboable overhead? If that option is as strong as you make it out to be then why is Dudley low tier?
I’m going to finish this discussion by saying that increasing a characters offensive abilities in a defense oriented game, yields less gain than building a characters defensive abilities.
I have a question for you. If you would have had PoM +4 last night, how would it have helped you? It’s not like you could have used it instead of ST to stop my throws.
I’m not arguing that PoM+4 wouldn’t be a valuable buff, but I argue that in his current state, the gains made from such a buff would do little to help him once an opponent gets in.
The purpose of frame traps is to land a counterhit. It’s not just to punish with tech trap attempts. That’s like saying I should never land frame traps in SFxT. I landed them all the time. Throws were significantly weaker in that game.
Yes blocking in SFxT was even stronger than it is in SSF4. Jump in combos were way better in SF2. Does that make jump in combos weak in this game? No.
I’ve never seen Duds (since SSF4) as low tier at all. Honestly, I have no idea what tier he is or why. As far as I’m concerned, the toolset he has puts him solidly in the middle… at least. But I’m not a dudley player. So I’m not qualified to judge.
Defense doesn’t take life away from the opponent. The BEST it can do is create the opportunity to take life away.
PoM being +4 on hit is an offensive tool, not a defensive one. You’re missing the whole point. It’s not about the throws you landed. It’s the fact that YOU had nothing to rely on EXCEPT throws. It’s the options YOU lacked. Did you not notice I had far more trouble dealing with your Dudley mixups than with your Vega mixups? Why? Because I then had to be concerned with standing blocks since downback risked serious damage.
Offensive tools aren’t meant to help on defense. That’s the whole point. I don’t care about more defensive tools. This is a defensive game. I lack offensive tools. I’m not sure why you have trouble understanding this concept.
As for me on defense, invincibility on ST isn’t going to do anything for me against your throws. ST is already throw invincible. If I’m not pressing buttons during your frame traps then what good would 4 frames of invincibility serve… when that’s basically the ONLY thing invincibility will help with?
Vega has a good tool for dealing with frame traps. Blocking. Costs less meter, and is a ton safer. He lacks variability on offense.
Dudley is definitely low tier. He has shit wake up options. Just like Vega. Just like Juri.
Anyway, they could give Vega a cross up so that people can’t hold down back in the corner. If they gave us SFxT’s j.MK and put a hit box on his back knee, he’d have a pretty good ambiguous cross up. If he had that and PoM +4 then he’d have some serious options to get people off down back other than simply kara throw.