Another thing with Gief is that you have to be careful when you throw out your pokes. If he knows you’re going to throw out a (for example) st. strong, he could beat it out with a SPD.
When ever I play against a Gief, it’s always becomes a game of cat and mouse. Throw out pokes when he doesn’t expect it, and keep him out with kikokens. Gief’s can stuff them with a green hand, so be mindful of where you’re throwing them out.
Oh, and the st. Roundhouse is great too.
I just noticed, but haven’t we left out Rufus in Az’s threads so far? If not, wouldn’t he belong in the Brickhouses/Tanks category?
The Rufus matchup is just plain difficult with low Dive Kick rape. I haven’t found a real solution other than jump back roundhouse and pray. Or the occasional lucky s.jab for high Dive Kicks.
What reminded me about this match-up was a video of Chun-Li at EVO pool play who had amazing success zoning, but then when Rufus went into full rush down mode, he had simply no answer.
What the HELL do you do against Rufus other than zone and pray he never gets in?
Ughhh I reformatted and lost all my gained strategies since the game came out. FORTUNATELY, I have a lot of them down to muscle memory. I had something called “Chun-Li SFIV Master Notebook” that had every note I took down. I’m trying to rebuild it and release it to you guys. So far, I’ll just post what I have re-written.
vs Honda
Reversal ultra all headbutts
st.forward and cr.strong anti airs. Sweep if they try to neutral jump kikokens.
Reversal ultra far st.roundhouse
Switch up to focus anti air to gain momentum unexpectedly
Jump in short to counter his jump fierce and gain momentum
st.roudnhouse his walks
hasan-shu his walk and blocks
st.strong poke at his walks
throw, cross up j.short to avoid his wake up EX sumo slam
meaty lows to avoid wake up EX headbutts, not jab.
vs M. Bison (Dictator)
Low jabs to beat scissors and some pokes.
st or cr.strong to beat scissors from a distance, must be anticipated. Sweep works as well
and also covers some pokes.
Jump roundhouse at the head and he can’t anti air it.
Safe meaty low jabs and react to what he does.
Walk back, bait EX psycho crushers, and sweep the recovery on his wake up/reversal.
Hit his EX psycho crusher with a late neutral jump roundhouse if he goes under.
Low forward or low strong under devil reverses. Focus absorb mix ups are powerful as well.
Air throw if he is doing devil’s reverse or stomping too close to you.
Use cr.short cr.jab cr.short EX legs to avoid whiffing cr.short on Bison’s odd hitbox.
Use short hasan-shu to go over EX psycho crusher, his low shorts, and avoid other
reversals while still applying pressure. Remember to combo after the hit.
If he is jumping close, jump away with roundhouse to anti air.
EX SBK is the main anti air in this match up, his jump fierce has high priority.
Anti air with neutral jump roundhouse, j.forward, and j.short
vs Blanka
After blocked ball, walk up st.strong.
EX SBK is the main anti air in this match-up, his jump roundhouse has high priority.
Switch up the focus anti air mix ups. Back dash to start to fish for empty throws and
such. Then switch it up to level 1 mix ups, etc.
Go under his cross ups with low forward, or just hit it with EX SBK.
Main B&B combo in this match is cr.short, cr.jab, cr.forward into EX legs to hit a
crouching Blanka with EX legs and not whiff. cr.short x 2 into EX legs does NOT work here.
On anticipation, anti air with j.fierces, neutral jump roundhouse, and j.short. Not much
you can do if he jumps a poke and you don’t have time for these, though…
To punish his blocked ultra, walk back 1 step and activate your ultra for a full hit.
Abuse throw into cross up j.short. His EX vertical ball goes right under and you can dash
up, walk into sweep punish all day.
Fierce kikoken hit box can be tricky for him to slide against. You can use it to get him
to come to you.
When he comes to you, poke at him or jump at him when he has no charge. Chun has a huge
advantage when Blanka has to get close.
To seal a victory, sit on your lead with EX SBK’s and low jabs. Blanka can’t really do
anything to those, and if he tries to…you still have your pokes.
Punish Blanka balls with dash ultra. It is autopiloted to land fully. There is no
timing required as long as you did a dash. If you try and time it without a dash, you will
need to be able to time it right.
If you focus anti air and back dash, wait for another jump. Some Blanka players think
they can abuse it, but jumping a poke is only good for once. Next time, wait for it and air
throw or j.fierces.
In addition to sitting on your lead, reversal ultra sweeps, cr.fierces, slides, and of
course Blanka balls to lame him out harder.
Coincidentally, they happen to be Brickhouse characters :bgrin:.
I’ve been experimenting with cr. strong against Blanka in training mode. He wants to jump right around st. strong range. It seems like the trick is to walk right under him. It has roughly the same timing as st. forward anti-air. It’ll beat his roundhouse and cross-up because your head will end up on his other side while he whiffs above your leg. It should also be possible to link a cr. jab after it.
vs Balrog (Boxer)
Close or far standing fierce are the staple anti airs in this match-up
EX SBK, or low strong can be used as a substitute if they are trying j.short (the elbow)
Kikoken into lightning legs is a good and pretty safe way to build meter.
Back dash lightning legs builds meter and is good against rush punches.
Staple footsie game is with st.strong. It is safe from headbutts and focus, very good to
use to halt his approaches.
If he doesn’t have EX rush upper or meter in general and is walking up to you…you can
st.roundhouse his walks just like any other character.
Having smart use of focus is key is this match-up. It beats his jab straights and sweeps.
If they do armor-breaking moves, it’s time to start switching it up from focus into grabs.
You can grab all his EX rushes and TAPs. Neutral jumping is optional, but if they have down
charge…it isn’t wise because of headbutt into ultra.
When zoning with kikokens, st.fierce beats jumps, TAPs, and is a great poke as well as
hitting armor for a 2nd time.
Like all tanks, you can hasan-shu his walks if he is walking and blocking.
When zoning, you can use your kikoken as a place holder for mix ups. They include waiting
for the EX rushes/headbutt (baiting moves), annoying them with st.strong and pokes, walk up
or dash throws depending on the distance, st.roundhouse, and finally hasan-shu’s.
cr.fierce is a decent meaty. You can option select hasan-shu from the first hit, or if
they back dash…the 2nd hit clips them. It also goes under EX rushes and hits twice to
break armor.
d/f+roundhouse shines in this match up, like against other charge characters. It stops him
from back dashes, as well as puts you in a good 50/50 situation. However, if you don’t time
it deep enough…you could eat jabs into headbutt ultra. You cannot cr.jab into close
roundhouse after this, but you can do a properly timed counter hit close roundhouse right
away with no jabs for the frame trap counter.
Beware of his wake up hit box, you need to jump in to set up the frame trap close
roundhouse. If not, you will get a far roundhouse and then jabbed into headbutt ultra.
Level 1 focus attacks on Balrog really hurt his game. He cannot jab or EX rush punch out
of them, and jabs are safe from headbutts. Abuse these if they are scared to jump over.
Remember to condition them not to jump before using this technique.
Very nice Mag, this info just reading through it quickly gave me some good insight to those specific matches I have trouble with. Specifically Dictator and Boxer man, they give me TROUBLE. I hope Az puts these into the saved spaces because everyone NEEDS to know these important tips to deal with those match-ups.
Most of these guys give me trouble. I need to read this thread. Out of all of them, I’d say I hate Blanka the most.
Blanka always gives me trouble. I think my biggest issue, which should be an easy solve but i manage to always screw up is… Electricity right next to you. Chuns sweep is a no no. For me its about %60 chance of getting hit by electricity. Sometimes c.jab or c.short gets hit too.
My first instinct is to sweep (bad habit). Does kikoken or l.hasan-shu should work but i haven’t tested this out yet.
Blankas LOVE to abuse the roll, because it’s hard to dash and ultra. However, a perfectly timed no-dash Ultra will punish a Blocked Roll at full power.
Thanks for the strategies, these guys are really problem opponents for me as Chun-li, especially E. Honda and Blanka, they’re pains in the butt to fight against for me.
Couple more things to use against Honda to compliment what Magman already posted:
-After a blocked Fierce Headbutt, you can punish it by taking a step forward and pressing st. strong (for when you don’t have meter). This counter is too slow to actually hit the other headbutts on block but it still helps you gain some ground and avoid being pushed toward the corner. It also stuffs the startup of any additional headbutt attempt besides the EX version so keep that in mind.
-Headbutt/EX Headbutt is a surprisingly good antiair for him if timed right but not a lot of Honda players seem to utilize it yet. It can be stuffed with a crossup j. lk, however it’s kind of hard to always be in the right range to attempt this so j. lp and j. hk give you a pretty decent chance of stuffing it as well to hopefully burn his meter (be wary that his EX headbutt has 8 frames of invincibility on startup so you can only get him when he becomes active). Also empty jump (charging back), block is okay bait for reversal ultra as long as you didn’t jump in too deep and can land to block in time.
-Buttsplash: Heavy version can be punished with a jab/short combo on block, every other version can be reversal super punished on block. Whiffed splash can be Ultra punished. Can be focused on the way down but watch out for reversal slpashes 'cause they break armor.
-(From the Chun vs Honda in the video thread). Dunno why I haven’t thought to do this before but you can straight up punish a whiffed ochio on reaction with Ultra (Hondas tend whiff ochio quite a bit in order to build meter). This even works full screen so that’s another move sealed by Ultra threat.
I played a Blanka today, and got beat hard. Annoyingly, I think its because I’m out of practise against the guy, nobody seems to use him anymore!
The worst thing was, I think I was the better player, I just for some reason coulnd’t deal with constant cross ups. He’s jump over me, do that double knee type stike, and then he’d be jumping over me again. I had no meter for EX, and the short range of his jump made it really tricky for me.
Whats the solution? Jump back LK was mentioned, is that good enough?
Thanks.
I’ve beaten 2 Blankas in the last matches I had against one. The first one was with Chun-li and the 2nd time using Ryu (my 2nd main after Chun).
Focus dash away works pretty well against this.
Real Helpful :rolleyes:
Blanka can give you a lot of headaches if you go into the matchup unprepared.
Personally I do not specialize in aggressive until I’ve determined how effective they’re able to poke and utilize Blanka Ball. Jumping in on most players is very risky since it doesn’t take much effort for them to initiate electricity, which you all know nullifies Chun’s DF+RH attack.
Good luck.
Thanks for the tips. Yeah, as I was playing I realised that I was really underprepared in comparison say to Sagat or Ryu (I wonder why!).
If I ever come across this again, I’ll try the FA. But importantly, as bahn mentioned, I perhaps won’t go so trigger happy on my offense either. I think you actually have to be really careful in this match about not doing stupid stuff, and perhaps I didn’t realise this fully at the time!
I was fighting against Zangief using Chun-Li.
He was at point blank range and pulled out his Ultra. As soon as the animation started I was like "OMGWTFBBQ I’m so dead!"
But somehow, I managed to throw him out of his Ultra. I don’t know how the hell it happened, but it sure as hell left me confused and most probably left the other guy broken hearted.
Anyone here had a similar experience or can do this consistently? If so, what’s the timing (I can’t remember if I input the LP+LK before or after Gief’s Ultra animation)
I’ve only thrown Blanka out of his Ultra once. You’d have to do it within the very first few frames; not something I’d take a gamble doing.
Vs Rog. Fish for counter-hits and counter-pokes. Your jab, both standing and crouching have excellent frame advantage (+3) on block. Quick follow-ups are very difficult to punish if used quickly and smartly.
After a dash punch, Balrog is -3 which gives you time to jab > fierce/1 cr. short xx ex legs him if you’re in range.
Check if he mashes jab.
St. fierce at worse will trade with a jab if you make him block your jab.
Cr. fierce is more risky as he has 1 frame where he might counter-hit you. However, counter-hit cr. fierce combos into lk hsu. On trade, you can combo into sweep.
St. mp is the same as cr. fierce, but is safer on block. Combos into sweep on counter-hit. Cancel into kikoken to add pressure, but watch for headbutts at this point.
Cr. mp goes under many of Rogs’ pokes/dash punches and avoids headbutt if you smell one.
Jab starts the mix-up.
You’ll know he’s blocking too much if you don’t get counter-hits. Tic throw him then.
Walk up cl. rh is great for crouch techers.
Walk up low shorts for safe standing techs.
Break him down as safely as you can if you manage to get close range enough or if he’s throwing lots of dash punches your way, which are all negative on block and allow you to counter him with mix-ups.
In general, I think ex kikoken is a good tool if you want to zone him with fireballs enough to make the tactic effective. It’ll make him think twice about psychic ex dash punches.
Couple of notes.
Keep-away is the main goal, but you don’t want to turtle up. Sometimes the Gief player might feel he can comfortably stay 3/4th-full screen and build meter with KKK lariat. Use Chun’s fast walking speed to punish or force a block if he starts doing this. EX Hand is the best weapon the Gief player has for breaking through Chun’s wall of pokes. You need to stay off your back as much as possible and EX hand is going to put you there in a hurry.
Mixing up pokes is important, it prevents them from properly timing st. MK or cr. RH from stuffing you. Throwing in fireballs is fine, but be careful at what ranges you use them. Out of position fireball and sweeps are probably the top 2 ways Chun gives up all the advantages she has over Gief in a poke battle.
If they just decide to tank it through, and a lot of Gief players will do this, using normal green hands and RH then you can take advantage of this behavior without too many issues. Properly timed sweeps are hard to punish and throws are great on blocked green hands. You can also sometimes do a walk-up throw without repercussion, due to the speed which you can get point blank and Gief’s are unlikely to standing SPD on reaction due to the possibility of a whiff.
Neutral jump RH is also a big deal, because it provides a safe-zone. Gief only has 3 real options that work against it. They can try a max range St. RH which will usually get stuffed. They can walk right next to Chun’s foot and cr. mk and that will usually beat it, but doesn’t do a lot of damage and doesn’t get them point blank without a green hand follow-up, which is unsafe. Finally if they time EX hand right, they can either beat it or space it in such a way that the RH whiffs and they can SPD when you land. Naturally the latter is the scary part, since it basically mocks you for trying the jumping RH. However Gief can only try it once or twice and if they get the timing wrong they eat a full jump-in combo and have to try and get in from max range again. Since it requires meter for them to try this approach, you can sometimes spam neutral RH without a ton of ramifications. Add in an empty jump or two and on occasion you can even catch Gief open if they try a late poke and whiff.
EX SBK is obviously your best move if you get knocked down, but you can’t afford to abuse it. At some point Gief is going to get smart and jump-in with a back-MK and stuff EX SBK clean, leaving you out a bar, a little lower in life and Gief point blank in your face. Sometimes the best move is just to block the cross-up and go for a jump back RH, sometimes it’ll get stuffed and sometimes you escape. One move which I’m unsure is an option is I accidentally threw out normal SBK and obviously got hit by body splash. However since I got air recovery the typical follow-up from gief was mistimed and allowed me to punish him severely. If normally SBK consistently gets you an air recovery that might be good enough as it provides a slight space buffer and forces the gief to be on his toes.
I don’t see many Chun save up for super in this match and although I can sort of understand why (ex SBK) it really is one of the best punishes she has. It’s not very hard to hit, punishes like 2/3’rds of Gief’s moves if they whiff and basically shuts down the tank approach, forcing him to be patient and poke back until he can get very close.
tl;dr version.
Tank Gief is a lot easier to beat because he runs into pokes all day. Mix them up so the green hand timing is off and don’t let him build free meter so he only has like 3 chances to EX GH. Neutral Jumping RH can be a huge annoyance, especially if you’ve forced Gief near a corner. because he takes a lot of free damage, a knockdown into a jump-in combo can basically KO him since he then has to chase you all across the screen again to do anything.
Pokey Gief is harder to stop, but again is relying on timing his attacks better than you or making a correct guess. This approach is also more likely to eat silly things like walk-up throws, EX Ball or back jump RH. Key is to keep working with it and changing it up. The worst thing you can do is whiff a bunch of short quick recovery moves because you aren’t going to bait an EX Hand, instead he’ll walk up slightly and most likely max range SPD you. Even if he screws up, you aren’t at a great punish range so what does he care?
EX SBK is the nuts on wake-up, but be wary of a late jump-in. If you can see the MK coming, you can take advantage of it and get away clean.
Super is v.v. good.
Sweep is probably the most overrated poke in the match, same with cr. mp which some people use for w/e reason.
quick edit; Chun’s FA is pretty good against Gief. It can force players not to spam quick standing pokes and even a lvl1 FA on block is completely safe for Chun. Just be very ready to backdash if he just keeps walking forward or he gets a free throw or SPD.