How are you inputting hands? The way I’m used to is :
LP HP MP LP HP
so the ex input is as easy as hitting MP+HP for the last input
LP HP MP LP MP+HP
Have been using hands xx RFA more and more, but I noticed something odd.
If you do fierce hands and you RFA at some specific times during the hands, the EX RFA won’t combo. Before you guys say it’s because you’re holding RFA too long, I assure you this is not the case.
I lost some crucial games because of this and I hope it gets fixed.
you have to do it like the 3rd hit of hands. if you do it at the first hit of hands, the RFA won’t hit. My guess is because of the frame advantage that hands offers depending on how much hits.
Nooo, I love his sweep, haha. Nobody is used to seeing it and nobody knows its actually substantially positive on block, so it can get lots of counterhits after using it for oki. It recovers crazy fast for a heavy move, so it’s often really useful to fake people out who are focusing on whiff-punishing you. Seeing that huge start-up just begs opponents to push a button, so a random sweep in footsies followed by headbutt or something can catch many people off guard. It also works really well as a defensive poke vs Dudley, where it beats like all of his moves, lol. I recommend you guys try it more.
I don’t think he really needs any extra buffs, just revert the stupid EX Headbutt nerf…it was just completely unnecessary. Strong defense is supposed to be Honda’s whole game, and safe EX HB was a cornerstone of that. Or at least give back the hit-invulnerable EX Oicho from the arcade Ultra version.
But it also sometimes happens on the 3rd hit of hands.
See that, both the uses you have sited weird whiff punish and not many people know the frame data on it are guess what? COMPLETE GIMMICKS.This is the problem with the move, someone at capcom had the same line of thinking and thats why the move has been unpractical gimmicky garbage for 5+years running on six. It needs an overhaul trust me as robertson said earlier I have used this move extensively in moderate to high level play and trust when I tell ya it doesn’t work against good players. Even overhead is useful vs pros but sweep is just bad. Unless you are bodying dieminion on the regular with it, please believe me as someone who uses the move way often than I should, it is bad. In a game where knockdowns are as lenient as they are now honda comboing into a sweep that is 95% purposeless even at: a still very slow 10 frames startup, being minus 2 and 80dmg, should be a given. What honda gets off sweep is pitiful, his safe jump setups are barely ambiguous and usually get blown up by 3frame dps. Now with delayed wakeup they are that much worse. So its not like him being able to do something 85 percent of the cast can do is gonna break him. I like how they said silly unintelligible choices like old ex hb or dp fadc forward are gone, but with the new more offensive game honda needs to keep up. This will help in a way he used to have as his original design. Dangerous up close, ask any st pro or cvs2(he was bad in aplha 3).
I agree that sweep is simply awful - I think Honda has the worst sweep in the entire game. The problem is, even if sweep becomes better, I don’t think it helps Sumo that much - because DWU, hard kd are not that threatening anymore.
On the other hand, Oicho not cross up on hit is something all Honda players wanted and was one of the most requested buffs. I would really like this one.
Nybb’s suggestion about reverting Ex Hb or giving back Ex Oicho strike invincibility is also something I agree with.
Oicho not cross up on hit, Ex Oicho usefull (more range, 1 hit of armor, or strike invincibility) and Lp Hb having 1 more frame of fireball invincibility is what I would like. But I guess this is over so we will have to manage with what we have…
I personally don’t think EX Oicho needs an additional major buff. Maybe give it more stun or something, but nothing big. EX Oicho is such a blowup on all catchers now, for example Hugo can’t do shit if you do it on his wake-up (besides running away by jumping or backdashing), 5fr throw invincibility is that strong.
If Honda would get buffs, I’d like to see LP or MP Hb gain 1 more frame of fireball invincibility, an oicho not cross-up on hit and last but not least, a slight increase in Ultra 1’s travel speed.
It doesn’t need to be lighting fast like EX headbutt, maybe an increase in 10%, I just want it to be a tiny bit more viable compared to all other anti-fireball ultras.
i have noticed this too, when i first tried it i was not getting it and was kind of thinking that they took it out. i seem to have found the timing now though and have not dropped it since. i believe it actually has more to do with the timing in which you hit the red focus cancel rather than which hit of hands it is. if you ever do some of the harder trials they make you do sequences with regular focus cancels, the timing is really strict on when you press the cancel. i have not had a chance to play as much as i would have liked yet and my honda time has been pretty much split into half with guile and decapre. i have yet to see if its an issue ( i am still inputting the ultra too early once crumpled lol)
Honda’s design has been inherently anti-grappler since SF2. The last thing he needed was another tool to beat them. What EX Oicho needed was strike invulnerability, not throw invulnerability.
Agreed, I never wanted throw invincibility on ex oicho anyways, what you said is the exact same argument I used 5 months ago when it was announced Honda would get throw invincibility instead of strike.
It’s not as if Honda ever needed help with ANY grappler in AE. But if you think to previous patches and saw it in action, they’re NEVER going to give Honda strike invincibility on ex oicho again. It’s a (too?) strong tool since you can never (safe)jump at Honda, **especially **with DWU.
I can only imagine the dirty gimmicks you can do if we do get it back by some miracle which is highly unlikely.
close EX Headbutt (block) -> EX Oicho
Yolo Buttslam to get in on fireball characters (blocked) -> EX Oicho
I’d rather see a complete overhaul on EX Oicho like EVERYONE in this forum, but if we assume they’re going to KEEP Ex oicho’s throw invincibility, then I do think he needs nothing major to buff it up more.
On hindsight, what if they gave EX oicho low body strike invincibility, like how Hugo’s meat squasher was in 3s?
ehm… In case you were not aware, the game is now in a final status… there will be no other changes until the next “2015 version” (version that I hope there will never be… I’m really tired of those endless SF4’s iterations!)
I have good ground to disagree. A lot of rumors are concurrent with the idea that the hard disk release may be the final release. Cf is responding to complaints the world over. Why would he if nothing was coming down the pipeline that needed more tweaks? Whos to say that when considering just the gltiches alone this game won’t get another patch?
Sotty, but now Capcom will only fix bugs, graphical glitches, etc… but NO more others re-balancing operations are planned…
So whats everyones opinion on Honda now? Lots of players seem to be dropping him but i cant bring myself to ditch the sumoman
I think that Honda is now low tier, perhaps not as bottom as seen on some tier-list, but mid-low for sure… The buffs he has received are not useful in the bad match-ups and the ex-HB nerf is simply stupid (because made the already bad machups even worse). On other side, several PGs that were low tier are significantly better in ultra and have better tools to deal with Honda (T.Hawk is not more in Honda’s favour, now, imho… even Guy is much better, in USF4)
That said, fortunately, USF4 and (and SSF4ae 2012 before) is quite overall well balanced, howewer… the difference beetwen the top and the bottom tier is not huge as you can see in other games and even the low tier PGs can do a decent work…
Honda has some severe flaws (he deserved better treatment from Capcom, but sumo-man is not loved by them at all, you know), but is not a complete garbage… I think…
ps: excuse my bad english…
Honda is kind of a character that only specialists are gonna play now, I think. So many people who invested time into the character are dropping him in favor of characters who received more options or who didn’t get their options taken away/ nerfed too hard. The nerf to EX headbutt was a big blow to a lot of people but to be honest waking up with Honda has always been a crapshoot against characters with invincible OS’s. Honda’s matchups have stayed about even imo or just got slightly worse. The matchups he struggles in are still the same matchups he’s always struggled in(Shotos, Sagat, Sim, Guile, DeeJay, Boxer, Gouken) and no amount of buffs was gonna change that imo.
Now, straying away from the Debbie Downer shit…Honda gained several buffs that are situational, but still appreciated. I loved that they made EX HHS easier to link off of, because I was going for the advanced Honda combos anyways and having that extra frame really helps ramp up what would normally be a 225 damage combo into a 300+ damage combo depending on how you want to spend your meter. Both of Honda’s Ultras were buffed as well and have use. U2 is a bit more niche and situation-based but still useable. U1 being a frame faster can help get those tight punishes on fireballs if you make a good read or help punish moves that are super negative on block with a 300-500 damage U1. Some of the buffs to Honda’s normals are kinda whatever, but it’s honestly better than nothing.
In the overall scheme of things and how the meta currently stands for SFIV I didn’t honestly see Honda being top tier in the long run. His bad matchups are fairly common tournament characters. Don’t get me wrong, I’m in it for the long haul and Honda is too much fun for me (this coming off of being a previous DeeJay, Rufus and Yun main).
I sure hope they consider doing a small balance patch, that will at the very least revert some of the unnecessary changes, when the retail version comes out. They cant possibly look at characters like Honda and Deejay and think they did a good job with balancing them.
my take
i have very little reason to use u2 now due to HHS RFC u1. its just so good, i get a lot of round enders now that i did not have the opportunity before. i was a strong advocate for u2 in AE2012 lol and to think now its buffed i am never using it.
all in all i dont find hardly any difference to matchups. i am not really sure how to use delayed standing ( ithink you have to hold 2 buttons as you hit the ground?), but i have seen there are situations it could have majorly helped me. so it will take some adjustment. also i am not punishing the DP FADC fwds. HUGE damage left on the table and huge mixup i could have avoided.
does any match actually feel harder to you? like i said they mostly seem about the same to me, but to be honest the bad matchups seem to have all gotten better and the good matchups have gotten worse (but not much they are still good). i think they have actaully done a great job balancing this character.
that being said you will still get shit on by dhalsim, seth to such a level its almost pointless to try and play against them at a high level. seth i actually feel is winnable esp. with delayed stand while dhalsim is still nearly impossible. i havent played any with the u1 and jump mp buffs yet though so ill report back when i do