What does Capcom have against Vega having an anti-air?

Classic Fighting Games Street Fighter x Tekken
1

Seriously. This incarnation of Vega has been in 6 games now, starting with Vanilla Arcade. And in every single one he lacks one of the most fundamental parts of Street Fighter, anti-airing. Every single character has at least one tool for AAing decently from the ground. He hasn’t had a viable reversal either, something every other character has. Scarlet Terror was always invincible before the summer of 2008… Why are they designing him around his LACK of basic shit? Essential tools needed to succeed.

Vega in SFxT got some buffs and nerfs but overall he was extremely buffed. Vega is now GREAT at everything he was good/decent at in SF4. (Except very nerfed throw game and somewhat nerfed forward walkspeed. IDK what was the problem with him having the 3rd fastest walk speed in SFIV.) But he’s still bad for the same reasons as before and the only reason it might sting less… is because your other character might have an AA.

You might argue that the problem has been lessened can now counter-hit air to air people and then juggle for decent damage, nice damage if he has super stocked. And that’s awesome, air-to-air MP now actually does some damage. That gives them SOME incentive not to jump. But it’s also pretty evident that in SFxT, anti-airing in general isn’t as good and jumps-in fucking rock with some characters. The problem is made worse than ever.

And, like it’s always been with the newer Capcom games, scrubs jumping around like idiots is actually a huge problem for him. Your entire gameplan works only because Street Fighter players are conditioned to jump carefully. When you fight someone who figures out that Vega can’t stop you from jumping on him, or you just fight some idiot who likes to jump all the time, it’s done. Vega’s one strength is his excellent footsies and that does not matter at all when you fight someone who jumps a lot. This is only compounded by the fact that Vega doesn’t have a reversal; when someone is on you (probably because they jumped on you for free), they have no reason to stop going in on you because you have no invincible move to threaten them with. You getting out pretty depends on dumb luck/very lucky guess that creates goofy enough trade for you to get out. So, if they can keep putting you are frame disadvantage, you’re practically locked down and all you can do is keep blocking and teching while you watch your mask and claw fall off…

This entire time for the last 4 years of Street Fighter games developed by DIMPS, Vega has had two moves created especially for anti-airing since SF2: c.HP and Scarlet Terror. And they both have thoroughly terrible hitboxes that, at the absolute best if you’re lucky, will trade with a jump in normal. I have never actually seen c.HP hit someone who was airborne, the hitbox is THAT bad. How has he gone through 5 revisions and Capcom never touched on the fact that he loses to jumping? c.HP is a normal especially for anti-airing, and it can’t do it at all, not even an empty jump. Seriously, if they just fixed the hit/hurtboxes on that, I would have no reason to play any other character in SF4 or SFxT. I wouldn’t mind the lack of an invincible reversal, as long as I could anti-air to prevent the situation where I would need to fucking use it.

For reals, why can’t Vega have an anti-air? What’s so good about him that he warrants having a giant hole in his game that’s extremely easy to exploit? Isn’t AAing Street Fighter 101? Vega always been really good but having footsies + an AA or two never made him broke. c.HP alright from decent distances. Why can’t he have that basic tool that he always had? Scarlet Terror has always been a decent AA/reversal move that gets boned by crossups. What the hell is the problem with him having an AA that he needs to sit and charge for?

Glad I finally dropped him. Fuck Vega.

2

nj. rh
st. hk

His antiair isn’t free - but his punish game is.

3

s.HK has never been a good anti air in SFIV-onwards. Yet another nice AA he had, before they screwed the hitbox up so that you have another normal that doesn’t do its fucking job. Now it only AAs from far angles if you’re very lucky. Doesn’t help that it did no damage as an AA. In SFIV, I’ve actually AA’d a Ryu who had only sliver of health left… and he went down to fighting with no health left. The fight went on for another 20 seconds even tho, against any other character, it would be over the moment he made a stupid jump. The only reason that it’s marginally better now is that the first hit might CH and now you can finally get both hits during AA… sometimes.

nj.HK is a big, risky commitment to countering a jump. And it requires a risky prediction; it will almost never work if done on reaction. What’s much more likely to work and less risky is jump back Strong. And even when it works, in SFIV all you got was an air reset and a tiny amount of damage, not much to deter them from just jumping again.

It’s less that “Vega’s AA game isn’t free” and more “Vega is absolutely free to jumping.”

I agree that his punish game is awesome, but it doesn’t matter after they start jumping.

4

OP:

Vega is god like in this game. How are you complaining? Everytime I play him in SfxT I just start smiling, he is so good and so fun. My advice would be to stick it out some more. Focus on footsies. People shouldn’t be getting in on you easily at all, Vega has some of the fastest and longest normals in the game… and there is no focus attack in this game! Makes me so happy.

edit:
on his hk, it’s spacing dependent. go to training mode and find the spacing. Some characters, like Gief, are 100% free to it once you get the spacing down. They simply won’t be able to jump at you. at all.

5

Because he’s too busy being in the air…

6

Stop crying, it could be worse, vega could of ended up like his Boss, you lot got it great compared to that.

7

I would agree. Everything he was good at in SFIV, he’s GREAT at now. Vega is a god as long as they stay on the ground. It’s a shame that none of his advantages matter after they jump.

Do you mean nj or stand HK? Either way, it’s not always up to you if you can get that spacing, and it’s Gief. Still isn’t shit he can do about, say, Juri and Rufus. He’s absolutely free in those matchups.

8

st. hk

once again, it’s not as godlike as it was in sf4 but it’s still really good. Dive kicks are a problem, they always have been for characters w/o good reversals. I agree w/ you on that point. Rufus can be tough. Best advice is to try and keep him out, if he gets in you have to rely on solid defense. Don’t try to throw pokes out between his moves, you’ll probably end up getting frame trapped. Play defense and wait for an actual opening, then make it count.

Also, since this is a tag game, picking a partner that covers your weaknesses is HUGE imo. All the teams I play are one rush characters and one zoning character. Zone w/ great normals like Bison and Vega or Projectile charcters. I don’t think, as some do, that it is over for them, characters may have ways around projectiles but they are still good and force the opponent to act so don’t underestimate them.

9

What? Stand HK was the opposite of godlike in SFIV. (For AAing anyways, it was a pretty cool ground poke. As fast as a jab.) I feel like the Rufus matchup is not quite as bad as before; s.HK actually matters now that both hits can connect, and can strike him when he’s pretty low to the ground. Still only covers the space directly in front of him, Vega is still totally vulnerable to approaches toward his head/chest, and using s.HK and not hitting with it means that Rufus can set himself up to get in for free while you’re sitting there whiffing s.HK. Rufus and almost everyone else in the cast can jump for free on Vega 90% of the time.

10

ST N.Vega.

/thread

11

Vega has super and tag super as Anti-airs. If you think Vega deserves a beats-everything anti-air it’s probably because your ground game is off.

Seriously, Vega has a sub-par air game because he has THE BEST ground game. Deal with it, it’s always going to be that way.

just be fortunate you have a QCF invincible anti-air for 3 bars and a down charge super for 2 bars where you can CHOOSE WHICH WAY TO GO AFTER YOU DO IT, REGARDLESS OF YOUR INITIAL INPUT.

Complaining about Vega in this game, really? He’s easily top 10, probably top 5.

Not to mention you can always just create space, charge an SHC to EX, dash out, buy a counter hit, air to air and do over 9000 damage. Stop complaining bro, this is old hat by now.

And Graphf makes a good point. Vega has shitty anti-airs… my partner is King, who has incredible ones.

Bah why do i even bother, lol

12

You all make me sad. I did post a long post about all of his AA options and no NJ HK is not one of the main ones that you want to use. Additionally every single AA should be leading to 400+ damage for CH air to airs and for CH/non counter hit LK STs. Its annoying that people are still complaining about the same thing without even trying these out.

  1. NJ HP- When they are slightly below you or same level. Land with st mk xx st HK x tag. Only use NJ HK if you are landing on them from a good distance above.

  2. NJ MP- when they are above you and diagonally. Land with cr mp x HK ST x tag

  3. JF mp or JF lp or JF HP- Easiest air to airs to use. Learn the distances to use them. JF lp may be more reliable but does less damage so I usually use JF mp. You can use JF HP if you are confident that you will beat out their air attack. Land with cr mp x HK ST x tag. If you want to take less risk or if you need to try and counter a crossup, then jump back and use lp/mp.

  4. Air throw in place of JF MP if you don’t want to take the risk of getting a counter hit. It sets up FBA vortex as well.

  5. LK ST- If you happen to be holding downback after a poke like cr mp and they jump, then you will have enough charge for lk ST, or if you were blocking or just holding downback. LK ST x CH x HK ST x Tag OR replace the CH for cr mp if they are too low.

I currently have not tested st HK or cr HP enough and id rather not use them anyways since the damage potential for them probably suck and are not worth the risk. My partner also has godlike AA (The input is B+ MP. It has 1-11 frames of invincibility. It puts you on a juggle state on CH or non CH lol) so yea having a partner cover your weaknesses are good.

Please everyone start AA with Vega properly and stop complaining. You even have those AA with I frames as Jozhear has mentioned for those difficult jump ins. He is not easy to AA with, but his AA are definitely worth it.

13

I can attest to nj.HP, it’s very good, nearly always hits clean. I was having problems against Kazuya air to air until I started using this. I almost never jump forward now in this game, nearly all forward progress I make is on the ground – walking forward, using pokes and chaining them into launcher or cancel into exFBA. Jumps are reserved for nj and back jumps.

Also the fact that we can now combo off of his overhead is huge. Take the time to learn this link. Seriously. So nice to be pressuring someone and land that overhead and convert into 300+ damage.

14

I am 90% sure that you can only combo off of his overhead when they were hit by it standing. I can plink into low strong off of it just fine, but have never hit with anything when Piece of Mercury hits a crouching person. Only working on standing opponents, which kind of takes the point out of it being an overhead. I’m pretty sure it has airborn frames tho so it works as a situational throw-counter, that will hit them standing.

alexlkd your information is very appreciated and I’ll see if that makes me change my mind. Tho I never thought that any version of ST has been a good AA. At best, you can hope ST will hit a empty jumps, before they they hit a button or during the startup of a normal. Because it lose/trade with virtually any jump in come at you, perhaps give them a free CH. But I’ll test it, maybe they secretly gave it an awesome hitbox but I kind of doubt it.

15

play cvs2 and ST

16

Yea I miss Vega being a brainless top tier character too. He was so fucking sweet back then.

17

Yes NJ HP is very good. Make sure you use st mk xx st hk x tag to do huge damage on counter hit. Or if you have found another combo off of NJ HP thats even better, then please let us know.

POM is +2 on crouching hit. On standing hit it is +4. You can combo on counter hit though or on the last frame of POM on a crouching opponent.

Also Vega’s jf attacks are very powerful. Finding situations to use them in increase Vega’s strength significantly. It may not be the best thing against Ryu or Ibuki but other characters may find it difficult to deal with and the damage potential on hit is very high.

Only use lk ST so that it hits opponents near their peak of their jump or before if you want to take a risk. Damage and combo potential from lk ST is very high. I usually get 500+ from hitting with this non counter hit.

18

Jump back normal and airthrow

19

Lili has an anti air normal that CRUSHES all air-attacks…and she can easily juggle from it. Mi Jelly.

20

No it is not true