Stuff that works occasionally (do not abuse!!):
against fireball+limb spam
-> last second lariat, sometimes the sim already decided on landing fireball and limb at the same, so you basically get a free full screen knock down.
Can be delayed though.
-> armor through both hits and hit his extended limbs with vskill.
preferably cancelled into trigger.
But mix it up. Neutral jump the fireball, dash forward asap when you see a fireball, just block.
Not getting predictable is key
Itās really amazing what people say when they donāt even play the character. I watch streams and you got these idiots in chat all saying the same thing. Giefās op, top tier, too cheap, jab spd unfair(sounds like SF4), st.jab op, and of course lariat too good lmao. Even today I was watching Slaynmans stream and some moron was saying that Gief was already top in season 1. Gief by far is still the hardest character in this game to win with CONSISTENTLY imo and against good players who know the mu itās even more difficult.
People watch Stupendous blow up online scrubs and they think the characters op smh. Seriously how many US Giefās place high regularly in tournies? Uh basically zero. The only real world class Gief is Itazan by a mile. I can almost feel it already- cr.jab, st.jab, and lariat getting nerfed. Combofiend and crew listening to the usual whining scrubs for their balance knowledge.
Balrog MU is no longer in Giefās favor. Feels like the only way to deal with Rog now is to stay on top of him and try to finish the game before he gets v-trigger.
Use to enjoy this MU in season 1, now not so muchā¦
I like Stu but he gets away with the flew way too much at WNF, and he would get blown up for it during tournaments for it. Now this is season 1 talk I havenāt been able to watch season 2 Stu due to work, but is he still doing it?
Also fuck Europe those guys crying for command grab nerfs, and especially fuck Phenom fucker you play Necalli who gets away with a number of bullshit.
Yeah, the only reason Itazan does so well with Gief is because heās one of the best SF players in the world. He makes Gief look top tier like Komoda made Blanka look top tier in ST and Kuroda made Q look top tier in 3S. If Gief were high or even mid-tier, weād be seeing many more players doing well with him in tournaments.
Itazan wins because of two main reasons: 1. He reads his opponents so well he must be damn near telepathic. 2. His decision making is impeccable. Heās able to circumvent most of Giefās flaws elegantly, which is why itās so disheartening to see him lose to basic 50/50 ( wake-up) situations so often. The game is so skewed towards offense that itās not unusual to see pro players tick thrown 2-3 times in a row. Many situations are crapshoots that favor the luckiest player instead of the most skilled one.
To illustrate this: I was playing footsies with a Balrog and stuck out a cr. jab 1/3 of the screen away. Next thing you know Iām CCād and lose half my health in the resulting combo. All from an innocuous cr. jab. A situation like this would never happen in earlier games. A jab would not lose out to a heavier attack, and CCs were obviously non-existent. Opportunistic button pressing is rewarded on attack, and punished on defence. Iāve said it before, but if even Dhalsim is only viable as a rushdown character, the mechanics of the game are inherently flawed.
Thatās cause crush counters are better than anything in the game, period. Think about it, not only do heavies beat lights and mediums, but with invincibility practically out of the game what on earth is there? And if thatās not good enough you get a crush counter if your opponent pushes a button? Iām sorry, but the priority system and crush counters should not exist in the same game. If lights actually interrupted heavies then maybe crush counters would be fair. Speaking of Balrog, his crush counter is +3 on block. Who balanced this shit?
The game is a disaster imo but Iāve felt that way since it came out. Lets make everything safe on block, lets get rid of footsies entirely, lets encourage pressing buttons with no way of getting punished, lets get rid of defensive play completely, and on and on and on. Itās always felt like this game was designed by people that have no clue about SF or never played SF.
Itās designed by people who only like RTSD gameplay. Which is what SFV isā¦RSTD, and fuck everything else. Problem is SFV has no defensive options to counter the RTSD gameplay.
Big post on eventhubs about Itazanās comeback today. Donāt get me wrong, Iāll always be a fan of his, but dash spd, dash spd, dash spd, vtrigger vacuum spd isnāt really that exciting, its just pure luck. Thereās nothing āsolidā in this game, at least not with this character.
I want to agree because of how matchups tend to feel with Gief, but if heās consistently doing it against the best in Japan, then there has to be something there. Wouldnāt say itās just luck.
I look at it like this the CC would have been a good idea if it wasnāt for the fact that Giefās heavyās are so slow that itās a moot point unless the opponent is at a distance.
Given how some have great mediums you are stuck guess since our mediums suck, I mean as of now Gief footsies have devolved to c.jab then s.HP hoping to catch them.
CC actually is a nice idea. Just poorly implemented. Itās focus attack bias all over again.
Example:
Uriens st.hp (CC) gives enough frame advantage to dash forward and link another heavy, cr.hp for example.
Then you got Ken st.hp run cancel.
On regular hit you get 3f advantage, on CC you get like 1f additional advantageā¦ wutā¦?
Couple that bias (/favoritsmā¦?) with the priority system and youāve got youself a messā¦
Instead of my cr.jabs trading (which is bad enough), I get crush countered now. If it werent for that horrible priority system, lights would actually be kind of safe to use against heavy buttons, because thereās only 3-4f startup involved. The priority system makes their actives frames vulnerable too, thatās too much.
Especially against akumas st.hp (TC), I risk receiving tons of damage for using cr.jab in neutral. Itās absurd.
Either everyone gets the same (relative!!) CC advantages or the priority system has to go. As it is right now, itās just super annyoing
Itās a very open ended mix-up string that he employs and he has initial mix-ups that can be recovered into secondary options or OSād if they fail, youāve got delayed L.SPD to catch backdashes, cr.lk > dash OS(forgot how this works but I saw someone do it in a tech vid), throw whiff > air SPD the jump, raw SPD, double dash SPD, dash cr.lp, step St.hp, step meaty f.mk and more to use. With so many options itās hard to say Gief canāt make a consistent gameplan around it tbh, thereās so much flexibility.
I actually really like watching Itazan and Infexious not just because of their mix-up but because both really good at using Giefās buttons properly. You see a lot of good usage of buttons aside from maybe cr.mk and sweep which are kinda ass.
I mean I prefer this Gief over SFIVās Gief now he plays a more interesting game. SFIV Gief felt really dull.
Exactly, itās just guessing and Itazan guessed right. Also look at the situation, he was a pixel from death and had nothing to lose and went balls out. Another thing is that really good players BLOCK on wakeup a lot so you can get away with dash spd where as scrubs will almost always mash something on wakeup so this would never work against them. Youād think the opposite would be true but itās not lol.
But even if they mash SPD still beats it, itās meatyā¦I was doing just fine about ultra plat/diamonds earlier. Urien players in-particular because you can work around his EX reversal very easily.
Thanks for that post Froztey; Iām learning Zangief and I was just about to ask if my understanding of M/H/EX spd after dash was off since itās +2 and SPD is only 5 frames (i.e. beats everything in the game excluding reversals).
Essentially every time you land M/H/EX SPD and dash afterwards, you put your opponent in a situation where they can only: 1) block 2) mash 3) jump or 4) use an invincible reversal right? With SPD beating 1 & 2 (and creating a loop if you land anything but the LP version) right?
Also, anyone have any tips for performing CA from a standstill and in a combo? I have no issues hitting the 720 from a dash but Iād really like to be able to use it in other scenarios (using stick).
You only get a prime set-up from H and EX SPD, but you can do some stuff from M.SPD as well
I dont think itās viable to learn standing 720 anymore. Since you can combo into grab supers this time, there is like no need to ārisk itā for all that effortā¦
do it off of st headbutt or cr mp. you have enough time to confirm if it hit or not. you can do it off of both surprisingly late.
Thanks! You have a point there gigglz. And sorry for the question overload, but I was practicing his oki last night off of M/H/EX SPD/Borsch and good Lord timing attacks to beat 3 frame wakeup mashing is brutal. Any timing tricks? The only thing I can seem to get right is meaty 5HK and 5HP. Iām not even close on the spds.