For fun, how would you tier thus far?

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

i think on an average high level weight isn't that important...may be for beginners its more important because they need their flowcharts but as an average high level player you know other weak points that a lighter char doesn't have, you just can't rely on one way of playing and i think that's good because it makes the player develope more diffrent strategies.

TimBo

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

and i can do nearly the same with pai: p, f+p, f,f+p, d+p, fc-f+p, also combined with tg (in my opinion with quite good throws completed through her ST), a fast sweep (db+k+g /damn doesn't knock down in 4) and i also like her reverse crescent.

The thing is... moves like the sweep and f,f+P are great if they hit (well not great but OK)... but if they're blocked, Pai is in trouble. FC, f+P is great if you force them to block it, but if it whiffs pai's in trouble. Pai's good at poking, and I agree that the way to play her is to poke and look for a place to do a throw or .. tg? What's tg? A throw or combo is what I would say.

The problem is that Pai's throws and combos are kind of crappy, and being really light means she eats more damage per combo that almost anyone else in the game. It's hard for pai to get 40% damage vs. someone else, and it's pretty much impossible without a counterhit. But anyone can get 40% on no counter vs. Pai.

both have a side exchange (pai even a low one) with guaranteed damage

As far as I know, Pai STILL has no guaranteed damage after d/f+P+G or f+P+K+G.
u/f+K, K comes close, and that's not a whole lot of damage.

ps: are there any movies where i can see her 270-, her low side throw or her inashis (i think there are two inashis in one of the history vids)???

I'm pretty sure there are - I remember seeing a throw in the movie and saying "huh, that must be the 270 throw. That kind of sucks." ... In fact I'm sure of it, it was pai vs. .. Akira? On pai's stage, and the pai player kept doing it after they'd won the round and were beating up on akira's corpse. Anyway, it's in an old TBzone movie, and I'd figure out which one if I only were at my home computer. Since I'm not, the only thing I can say is look for the TBZone movies that involve pai and you'll eventually find it. Or maybe feixaq can help, he has all these movies mirrored and if he's bored enough, he can find the specific movie. Also try Cause, who runs www.rustedtech.com.

I don't recall whether or not I've seen the inashis you may be talking about.
Pai's basic inashi (f+P+K) is still there from VF3, and doesn't look like much. There are some movies I've got on vf.dyndns.org (it'll be back up sometime soon) that show pai doing some cute combos by inashi-ing Kage's dragon punch.
Other than that, did you mean no damage reversals or something? Pai does have a new reversal where she turns you around and sidekicks you in the back without knocking you down, but that isn't an inashi, it does damage.

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

Yeah I like Pai but really there's not a lot of fancy stuff you can do with her compared to other characters and not a lot of guaranteed stuff. The closest would be some kind f+P or f,f+P combo from her ST, or a PPPK or some variant off a K or b,b+P or FC,f+P. Biggest offensive weapon? PPP.

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

probably it's the fact that i never had a good challenger in any beat'em up and especially not in vf so that i may have success with strategies and moves which wouldn't work on a high level player...

f,f+p: probably only useful against my opponents who i can confuse easily.

but db+k+g and D, f+p are good attacks, sweep is fast (good against dodgers and you have to dodge against a punching pai) D, f+p is fast and recovers well, if blocked or if they whiff every character's moves are critical not only pai's.

-sorry for the tg, was my own abbreviation for throw guessing

- i thought the DSKs would be guaranteed after the exchange throws though it indeed would not be much damage

- ice-9 listed these low damage reversals as inashis. when is an inashi called inashi, when it does no damage? when it doesn't knock down?

TimBo

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

ice-9 listed these low damage reversals as inashis. when is an inashi called inashi, when it does no damage? when it doesn't knock down?

As far as I know, an inashi deflects an attack and does no damage. Aoi's Yin Yang stance and Jacky's auto-inashi(?) are examples of inashi.

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

- i thought the DSKs would be guaranteed after the exchange throws though it indeed would not be much damage

I've seen them avoided with a dodge, I dunno if it's timing or you just have to dodge in the right direction or what... but I will say that when I use them, 90% of the time I get away with it. The low kick-sweep canned combo is also one that works well but isn't guaranteed.

- ice-9 listed these low damage reversals as inashis. when is an inashi called inashi, when it does no damage? when it doesn't knock down?

Inashi's are just zero damage reversals. They set you up for a move or combo instead of doing damage. Speaking of inashi's, I saw aoi do a high kick inashi reversal into a hit throw and it looked fairly guaranteed.. anyone confirm this?

 

Re: Everybody loves pai.

i saw the hit throw also working after a high rising kick inashi (it's the same animation as a crescent inashi)

TimBo

 

I believe the fastest punches belong to Sarah, Pai, and Aoi.

Wolf and Jeffry doesn't need a fast P, LP is enough!

My point was that in minor counter situations after blocking an attack, the fast punchers usually have more options than Wolf or Jeff. Everything that is counterable is throw counterable, so Wolf and Jeff aren't totally screwed, they just do not have as many options. As a Sarah player, I know I can get a guaranteed 30 pts of damage (with PK or PPP) after blocking certain attacks. Wolf and Jeff have to mix up throws or try for MC knee combo. They don't have anything that is guaranteed.

That being said, however, the heavies have more options than the fast punchers when it comes to countering attacks that recover low. Everyone including Wolf/Jeff can low punch counter in most cases, but sometimes elbows aren't fast enough. Wolf and Jeff have a big plus with their low throws.

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

A few of you have Shun in your top tier. I'm not going to attempt to make a list myself, as I have not seen any of the characters (except maybe Akira and Aoi) played at anywhere near what could be called "above average play" however subjective that term even is... But I would not put Shun on my personal top tier simply because of his lack in variety of throws. This is similar to my arguement why I wouldn't put Wolf and Jeff as top tier. Lack in variety of throws is a BIG minus in a game where if an attack is counterable at all, then you can throw the attacker. If Shun's opponent can do triple throw escapes consistently, Shun cannot throw at all to minor counter blocked attacks that are only throw counterable. That's such a huge hole in Shun's game IMO that he cannot be top tier.

Triple throw escape -- guard will severely limit what Shun Di can do.
b+P+G, n+P+G, df+P+G(release P and keep finger on G to guard)
will stop all of Shun's throws, and if done properly will block any attempted counter attack as well.

Here's a short list of common attacks that fall under this category. See Rich's transcribed counter attack list for more details.

Akira: shoulder ram; knee
Aoi: double stop; FC elbow
Jacky: FC uppercut; punt kick; knee
Sarah: lunging knee; punt kick
Kage: helix-kick; heel kick
Lau: heel kick
Pai: double high kick; heel kick; LBF-kick; LBF-punch-uppercut
Lion: FC uppercut; uppercut-swipe
Shun: mule kick
Jeff: dashing elbow-uppercut; side kick
Wolf: PPP; body blow
Lei: FC single palm; double leg hop kick
Vanessa: dashing body blow


Re: Pai's downward spiral since VF2

I agree that she's at the bottom of the list for all the reasons given above. She just has too many strikes against her and does not have that big (stumble) throw or float combo starter to get her 40% chunks of damage like all the other characters seem to have. Like Creed said, Pai has to guess right 4 to 5 times, while other characters only need 3 chances to finish an opponent off.

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

I am under SEVERE VF4 burn-out right now, and hadn't planned on posting/reading anything for at LEAST a week, but I was reading about how Duke lost to FSU and thought, ahh, what the hell, I'll just skim through the forum and maybe a post one or two.

To quickly respond...

Timbo: Thanks for the advice, as I'm sure it was well intentioned...but, I am quite happy with my Pai knowledge. Anyway, on my first day at Kanispo there were tons of people playing Pai...generally, she is played quite conservatively and there wasn't anything that made me go "Ah ha! So that's how she's powerful!" Just very basic P, f+P, sidekick, d/b+K+G, DSKs, D,f+P, heelkick, and strong okizeme. LBFs were actually quite rare. This is going to sound ironic, considering my post, but, one big advantage Pai has over other oppponents is her quick mobility. I can't back this up with stats or anything, but Pai does seem to dash back and forth faster, and a good Pai seems to be one that's fluid, moving back and forth constantly. One very nice Pai combo, I think works up to MWs: D,f+P -> P -> D,f+P -> DSKs. Takes about 40% and requires MC of course.

Inashis: Yeah, they're probably technically reversals. The base damage is 5, but it seems like they take more damage depending on the move (a la reversals). I called them inashis because her whiff animation was the same as her VF3 inashi...but, whatever. I thought the differentiation might make it easier to label in conversation, but as long as people know what they are...I don't really sweat over semantics much.

Aoi: Yeah, I think the b,f+P hit throw and f,f+K,K are guaranteed after high kick reversal. Could be stance dependent though.

Shun: God he's powerful! His options aren't as bad in VF4 now that he's been given a true alternative to inflicting mucho damage in his mule kick. Moreover, his Sleeping Buddha moves take of a ton of damage and they are a realistic third option. In any case, Shun cannot have the same amount of options as other characters have, or he would just be too damn strong.

Tiering in general: Well, Tokyo definitely confirmed that there really does not seem as if a tier exists. Every character was well represented and I saw/played against at least one or two really good players for each character...

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

Is it possible to do a triple escape guard?

anyway, I think p as a minor counter is not worth it unless you retain initiative. I think only Kage's pphelix have initiaitive on normal hit. For Vanessa (MT) ppp, Vanessa loses initaitve after a ppp minor counter which is pretty bad. You should go for big throws or mid damage moves.

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

hey

so hows Japan??? you got the blue book? any good new Vanessa ideas?? my Vanessa is stuck...

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

damn...i've tried to do triple throw escape---->guard, but can't seem to get it. Its so frustrating, has anybody had any luk performing this with any consistency? DTE-guard is definitely possible in quick situations, but i don't know about TTE-guard...

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

Is it possible to do a triple escape guard?

I would say theoretically, yes, but as Adam pointed out later in the thread, double throw escape --> guard is a more attainable goal. Unless you're expecting your throw counterable attack to be blocked (then why did you attack with a throw counterable attack in the first place /versus/images/icons/tongue.gif) you have to react to your attack being blocked (takes some time) and then enter the throw escapes. For (triple/double) throw escape --> guard to work, you need to finish and be holding guard before the attack that started this mess recovers. If you took too long, then your character ends up doing a whiff throw animation instead of guarding. Oops.

anyway, I think p as a minor counter is not worth it unless you retain initiative. I think only Kage's pphelix have initiaitive on normal hit. For Vanessa (MT) ppp, Vanessa loses initaitve after a ppp minor counter which is pretty bad. You should go for big throws or mid damage moves.

Alan, I agree with you. My point was that the characters with fast punches have the option to go for the guaranteed 30 pts of damage in certain minor counter situations. The characters with slower punches don't have that option. Everyone has the option to throw or mid-attack float combo, it's just that the throws are escapable and in most minor counter situations the float combo starter attack is slow enough to be blocked. If your opponent's yomi is good enough, he can get away with no damage at all.

Knowing that you have a guaranteed punch counter with a fast character is very comforting to me when I get my opponent down to his last bit of life bar. PPP with Sarah/Pai/Aoi will end the round and also if your opponent is backed up to the ring edge, it can push them out of the ring. (Add in the knee combo for Sarah if your certain it will push enough for the ring out.)

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

Hey Alan, I think you have to start playing Defensive style...most of the Japanese Vanessas play maybe 70% DS and 30% MT. I didn't play a single Vanessa that was MT dedicated. At high levels, I think it's tougher to win with MT than DS.

As for MT PPP...who cares! Her MT P recovers sooo fast already.

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

err... at least tell me a LITTLE bit what they use in DS???

Is it like the movie I watched?? crouch dash forward, FC,P? then look for the 3/4 circle throw? What is there bread and butter moves? sidekick? f,f+k? Is her dodge attack used often?

BTW, what is the highest dan Vanessa you saw?

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

Hmmm, you didn't see my Vanessa before I left did you?! Somewhat similar. The movie that you saw is actually a little more WS, P hardcore than usual. Actually, the funny thing about Vanessa is that I thought by far she was played the most differently, player to player. Some people played her very poking style, lots of attacks, some played very finesse style, few moves, big guesses. Anyway, the staple moves were her punching strings, sidekick, that WS, P, her elbow kick variations, and of course her throws are quite good. Don't forget her DA either, it's strong and EVERYONE double low throw escapes in Tokyo (so her dodging punches aren't quite as effective).

As for dans...I don't think I saw an emperor, but Segirl plays Vanessa and I think her...whoops, his Vanessa is 10th dan. I saw at least several 7/8 dans though, but the Vanessa that I liked most actually didn't have a ranking (or the player never used his card).

 

i saw one interesting move of Akira. that person did a CR,f+P+K which floats his opponent and did a LP and followup with CR,f+P+K and ended his strings of combo with CR,b,f+P (dbl palm)... I tried but was not able to pull off the dbl palm. This move took approximately 1/2 of his opponent's life. Thank you for any one that can solve my problem. And oso i would love to see other of Akira's combo using a floater to start with.

 

Re: OK, here are my thoughts and tier

You can DOUBLE-LOW-THROW-ESCAPE in VF4?! Hmm, despite my consistency at escaping low throws these days (in Portland anyways).... I'll have to experiment with that, though I do think being able to plug in more than one low throw escape in an instance sucks.

-Chanchai

 

shoulder ram, p, shoulder ram, doublepalm is doable only against lightweights on regular hits, and midweights on major counter hits.