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to be honest, nobody techs fast anymore. that was back in 2009-2010. everybody late techs now.
if you are ever going to punish their techs then just make sure to delay your attack later than they tech. its that simple but takes quite awhile to figure out. if youre new to the game then it will take awhile before you figure out frame traps.
doing shoryu after jump-in on cammy usually isnt a good idea because her “dragon punch” will beat Kens. -
yes its good to use slower normals such as cr.hp or st.hk to punish their techs.
i found a safejump, but i’m not sure if it works on cammy.
f-thow, fake thunder kick, nj mk.
[media=youtube]VSsAHLdgdqc[/media]
here ya go 
[media=youtube]I3OIwjEd-aE[/media]
Good stuff ImagineVC. I found hard to get the right timing doing safe jumps like this, just using a step back and little pauses. I have a safe jump setup similar to yours for Cammy. But I do a jab instead of a little pause, and jump with roundhouse. I always miss the timing on real fights, thats why I was hoping to see another option here, maybe wiffing a normal to get the right time. I think I need to practice more against cammy’s wake up. ^^
there are a few other safejump timings but this is the most ambiguous and versatile one as you can either safejump, cross up tatsu or empty jump low short.
other setups make it too obvious that its a safejump so they can easily just block.
you cant use a jab instead of a slight pause as the jab takes too long and it will no longer be a safejump.
can anyone tell me what the use of jumping light kick is for jump ins on someones wakeup or in the corner? is it to trick your opponent? and I was thinking since it puts your opponent in short block stun can’t they just do a shoryu?
It’s supposed to trick the opponent into thinking they’re being crossed up only to have Ken start his chain in the front upon landing.
But yeah, if you connect with the j. lk too high you’re open to a reversal DP. As with anything else in life, enjoy in moderation unless you know your opponent doesn’t have or doesn’t use a decent anti-air to stuff it.
It’s not something I use too much anymore, most of the matchups I come across nowadays have an answer for it…
guys i need advice on how to beat Guile. imo he is easily Ken’s worst matchup. i lose like 7-3 to Guile. just lost to one last night at the CanadaCup Qualifiers.
Guile is the only reason i’m using Akuma as a secondary but i dont want to resort to counter-picking as its not a good mindset. i’d rather strengthen my mind and figure out how to beat Guile with Ken.
any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Against a great Guile, I usually have to resort to playing the clock and alternating between matching/focusing/neutral jumping booms to build meter. If he does something silly like throw out a sweep or a backhand and you focus it, you can go for the hard knockdown and get in that ass. His flashkicks are 4 frames across the board and typically get snuffed by safejumps and crossups. I beat a Guile player in my tournament this past weekend, but only because his anti-air and throw tech game was lacking.
Personally, Blanka, Seth and the other shotos are more stressful. Y u no let me ambigous crossup all over your face?
Thoughts about Guile:
Guile is really hard to win. You have to play very patient and clean. I think the most important thing to do is get a knockdown. Try to take him to the corner as fast as you can, cause if he is not dieminion he will have trouble to get out of there. Dont put yourself on the corner, Guile is one of that chars that is a beast controlling the corner. Once your close to Guile its like Dhalsin, dont let him get away.
I usually play against Guile similar the way a play against Sagat and Rose. I slowly try to get close to him, blocking his sonic booms, being very patient, always on the ground, and little by little pushing him to the corner. Dont rush him without thinking, after get impatient. Thats what he wants.
Dont get frustrated when ex boom hit you. It doenst do that damage and if Guile does it, thats a good thing, he is throwing away one bar which is very hard to get back. Dont always do focus on his booms too. Watch if Guile is moving, If the Guile player is good he willl punish it with his good pokes. Avoid jump ins, guile has an excellent air throw and good AA.
When you are close always finish your combos with fierce DP. Do a lot throws too, if he techs it doesnt matter, you still on his face. But Guile players expects throws, so change to frame traps if he is teching. Use focus is good too, Guile has no multi-hit normals that breaks focus.
I would use ultra 1 on this match. Its more useful. If you get a counter hit, it will do a lot of damage, and every little damage against Guile is important.
Dont play footsies with him. He has better normals then Ken. Use well c.MK, far s.MP and step kick to cover distance. But dont abuse it. Practice a lot the way you punish blocked flash kicks. If Guile has no meter, attack him before the second hit of blocked c.HK. You have time to do a lot of things there if you have practice.
Guile has a weak wake up, and cant deal with cross ups. On his wake up if his not crazy, he only have 4 options: flash kick (fadc), c. tech, back dash, or focus back dash. His BD is very short, you can do OS. His c.tech and flash kick loose to late fierce shoryuken(fadc) if you want to play aggressive, and you get a counter. And its very rare a guile waking up doing focus BD which looses to throw. I think the best option is to set a cross up and continue the pressure.
If Guile is far his on advantage, but when Ken is close the match turns to Ken’s favor drastically, keep that in mind.
Peace
Dhalsim
For this match up you definitely want to use Ultra 2 as it will go through Yoga Catastrophe and can be used to option select punish teleports.
Your goal in this match up to knock Dhalsim down and stay on him
Full Screen and getting in
Most Dhalsims will throw Yoga fire at full screen. What you want to do is anticipate when a Yoga fire is going to come out and get in using an EX Tatsu, his only option at the end of the EX tatsu is to teleport away or throw you. Meaning you’re at an advantage since you are +1, if he tries to use Yoga Catastrophe at the end of the EX Tatsu you will end up throwing him.
Empty jumps are your friend in this match and most will try to punish with st.HK what you do here is empty jump and use LP.SRK to punish the recovery on his st.HK for a soft knockdown. Once knocked down you can go for a FTK to Kara throw/cr.LK to combo or if he tries to teleport you can option select EX Tatsu/U2 depending on what you have.
Your biggest goal here is to built at least one bar of meter and get in. His st.HP can be focus parried and punished on reaction. At max distance you want to try and get st.HK to trade with him st.HP as you will take 75 damage and he will take 130 damage forcing him to become more aggressive and perhaps even careless.
Your methods for getting in on Dhalsim are Towards + Medium Kick, EX Tatsu, and Kara Ait Tatsu. Empty jumps are extremely effective as Ken has a higher jump arc with less horizontal distance than Ryu,
This match requires you to be extremely aggressive.
I tried what you wrote about the Sim Match up and it worked. I also found that you can counter his j.hp with cr. hp xx Tatsu so you can close distances and do some damage. It’s not difficult to react to it unless that j.hp is an instant overhead after some close range poke
funny thing happened during one endless match. I was fighting an adon and buffered an U2, and I accidentally reacted to a short off the wall jag kick. U2 connected and he died. So I went to the lab and tested it,** you can react to almost full screen (90%) short off the wall jag kicks with U2 and adon cannot block this**. I haven’t tested EX version yet.
Talking about Guile, I’ve recently been training a lot, and facing a very solid Guile player, and maybe this is the worst match up for Ken indeed. It’s so damn hard to fight a solid Guile using Ken. I’ve noticed a lot of things about this match that Ken just cant do anything about it. I will try to point to you guys some of the things that happen a lot in this match and makes it so hard for Ken to deal with:
-Air Control
Everybody knows that Guile has a lot of AA normals and the best of them is his c.HP. He has a 4 frames flash kick too, that reaches very far, have good invincibility, can be FADCed but Guile needs to be close to you in order to do that. But his flash kick is not hard to be safe jumped. After a throw you can cross up him easily making the flash kick wiff or get stuffed. This is the greater advantage for Ken is this match up. Cause Ken is a cross up master, and Guile has problems with that. So you really have to rely on throws and cross ups, its almost your unique way to get Guile in trouble.
People say that you should empty jump him a lot because of his c.HP hitbox. But theses days, at 2012 AE, this rarely is a good thing. In my opinion, you really should’t jump at all at Guile. Good Guiles know that people will empty jump a lot, and they are expecting it, and thats exactly why the game gave Guile too many AA normals. No matter what distance was your empty jump he basically can control how to AA you. He can literally choose which normal is best to AA. And that is huge for his defensive game. Think about that. You just cant jump at a charge defensive character. If you do, there’s a minimal chance for that jump in actually hit Guile. At the most part you will be AA and get a meaty sonic boom after that, and after the sonic boom probably a poke while you blocking it pushing you further. This is real, and happen a lot. And dont think about air tatsu or kara air tatsu. Good Guiles react to that with no big deal. Cross up tatsu always get hit by c.HP, if you dont get hit by that facing a good Guile, you’re very lucky. Finally, Guile has a very good air throw, with good hitbox and damage, that’s one more reason for Ken not jump.
-Ground Game
So, you should’t jump at all, what you can do to get close to him? Play very solid on the ground. But thats really hard too. As we all know Ken doesn’t have very good normals, you can poke with c.MK, far s.HK, far s.MP and sometimes step kick to get close, but this normals dont match Guile’s. His LP sonic boom and his normals make this footsie game very difficult for Ken. Guile has 3 normal moves that reach far. His far s.HK, his back fist and c.HK. So if Guile does a sonic boom, we all know that he recovers very fast, hard to punish and he can walk with it shutting down a lot of Ken’s options. First, you cant focus sonic booms. Maybe you can, if you’re far, just to get some meter, kepping the neutral game, because if you are in Guile’s normals range, he will poke you and get free damage, that includes Ken doing neutral jump. Second, Guile can throw a lot of c.MP and jabs to stuff Ken’s step kick while his charging. That happens a lot. So you will have few step kicks hitting Guile, which is the best “get close” option for Ken on the ground. Third, you cant use hadouken very often. If you have the habit of doing c.MK -> hadouken like me, you should leave this habit in this match, or do this very close to Guile, otherwise he can punish you with flash kick, super or even ultra on reaction. If you like to do raw hadoukens, you cant do it close to him, he can do a sonic boom, and after that a back fist getting Ken’s recovering from the move. He can do Ex sonic boom, which doesnt do that damage, but has good momentum effect. And if he has ultra 2, he can easily react to you hadouken getting free damage and all his momentum back. So lets put this all together: Ken’s pokes are not effective and loose to Guile’s, you can use raw hadouken or c.MK-> hadouken as spacing control tools that often, cant focus his booms close to him, and your best approach tool (step kick) get stuffed easily while he’s charging. I dont need to say anything about his corner control right? He’s a beast doing that like Juri, and this is one more thing that Ken cant do, get corned. So what Ken can do? Basically, be neutral all the time looking for mistakes.
-Punishments
Let’s pretend that besides all the things that I said before you were able to get close to Guile. After all, he can do some mistakes. Guile is crouching and you wanna go for a BNB, like c.LK, c.LP, c.LP->fierce SRK, ok? But you cant, cause Guile crouching has a very tiny size, combos that work against other characters dont work with him. The second c.LP doesn’t hit Guile, gets wiffed, and that sucks, cause finally you get an opening, but when you go for the things that you usually do, now its different. I think that this BNB only works on Guile after a LK jump in or FADC SRK, Im not sure. Theres a lot of other combos that dont work against Guile too making this match even harder for Ken. You have to adapt a lot of your combos and punishments. There are other characters that dont take the second c.LP too, but you can go for c.MK instead for example, and the combo works just fine. With Guile if you do c.LK, c.LP, c.MK->fierce SRK the SRK doesn’t hit while he’s crouching. So if you want to finish this BNB you have to stop on the second input, just do c.LK, c.LP->fierce SRK, or maybe c.LK, c.LP, c.LK->fierce SRK which is easier to confirm but does less damage, but you get the SRK knockdown anyway. Another example about his annoying small size, its so damn hard to hit far s.MP on Guile crouching. You really have to be on the correct spacing otherwise it will wiff or you will get a close s.MP. And if he is standing, sometime you’re forced to finish your combos with EX tatsu. Cause HK tatsu can wiff according to the spacing. So put the difficult that is for Ken to get close, and finally get a combo opportunity, if you forget somehow about Guile’s weird size or calculate the wrong spacing, you can easily drop your chance of winning the round just like that.
I not playing real good Dhalsims these days, so I cant say much about this match up, but I really think Guile’s match up is the worst match for Ken now. There are so many things that Ken just can deal with, excepts respect Guile’s spacing and being in a neutral game just looking for some mistake that really makes me change my mind. I dont know if this match is 7-3 in Guile’s favor, but definitely is a bad match up for Ken. I’m really studying this match, spending some time in the training room, seeing a lot of videos, and I cant find how Ken would win this match in a convincing way. Obviously you can win Guile playing Ken, but you have to play out of your mind and get some luck for that. On youtube I think the best representative matches with Ken and Guile are with ACE E I RIN against Ichi. Those are old matches but since that time I dont see this match changing that much. I would like to see Dieminion, best Guile in my opinion, playing against good Ken players, I really dont see him loosing a set.
Do you guys have any kind of tech, unblockable, ambigous jump in, or anything hidden that help this match up in Ken’s favor?
Peace.
I also play Ken and I do find this matchup is the worst for Ken… basically none of the top Japanese Ken player can beat a solid Guile.
He just wins in the air and in the ground, and it is so hard to do mix up on his wake up now that he can focus dash, plainly dash…etc to mess up your timing. You need to option select or even double option select in order to make the most out of a knock. Even so it only take one right guess for him to reset the whole situation.
You can’t even jump the sonic boom from full screen because he has the time to charge a flash kick and hit you with the heavy version.
You WILL be frustrated at some point then all hell break loose.
In AE he had the sweep to play footsies but now with it gone, it seems nothing works.
I would also like to hear some tips from you top Kens!!
yup, most Kens including myself agree that Guile is by far Ken’s worst matchup.
i have a lot of trouble against Guile.
within a week, i’ll have a tutorial vid against Guile with various tips and tricks. bad matchup is no excuse for losing. that’s a loser’s mentality!
Xian’s Gen beat Fuudo and Mago’s Fei Long at CanadaCup 2012 and thats one of Gen’s worst matchups.
Daigo demolished Dieminions Guile at the 25th Anniversary and thats a bad matchup for Ryu.
no excuses!!
I would also like to hear you guys’ thought on the Gouken match-up.
On the ground, his normals beat Ken’s badly, fastest sweep that is safe on block - ridiculous, fast overheads, and his saving is also a good tool against us.
Fireball game - he dominates it, he recover way too quickly for Ken to jump, not to mention the risk of eating a anti-air fireball then the follow-ups… matching his fireball puts you in a very passive situation, remember he can use his flip moves far away or go through your fireballs with the palm move to beat you
His parrying moves render Ken’s wake up game pretty useless. His dive kicks, air parry make you afraid to dp him.
Then the mixups…
A Gouken can play keep away all day and Ken will have a really hard time getting in…
It’s not as bad as Guile but still it needs good reads to beat him
First U2 can be very annoying for Gouken… he needs to be very careful when you have it charged… You can FADC fireballs and charge U2 and make some shy fireball game against him.
Remember that you can cancel tatsu into a combo that breaks parrying and you can still mixup him normally making him guess if parry or not (empty jumps -> big punish if he do parry).
I think Gouken is not a hard matchup for ken, but you should avoid corners or you are almost die… this is very important against Gouken (600+ dmg on corner easily)
Also use ex.srk a couple of flips (beats absorb)
Against Guile, I find that U2 helps me focus and even gives me some peace of mind. If you’re fishing for U2, Guile has to play much more honestly, and you’ll also be keeping yourself focused on the ground game instead of jumping. It’s possible to whiff punish a number of Guile’s normals if you can react fast enough–I caught a dude’s whiffed backfist (I was crouching) with U2 at a tourney recently. To a certain extent, you can control the flow of the match-up with the threat of a U2 punish/read…obviously, actually landing one really helps, although if you go for it and screw up, Guile might feel more comfortable and you get him next time.
In general, you just have to play at a glacial pace. You can really kinda mindfuck Guile players who are used to seeing opponents crack and lose patience. Remember that a sonic boom does around 10 damage on chip, so you can make up for blocking six or seven of them with a single poke. Trading sweep with boom is great if you’re in range. Once he’s finally floored you can take out all the tension on him and exploit his shitty wake up and low stun.