K’ (Console)

[Killey]

What are the uses for K's sweep?

I'm tryng to be a little bit more unpredictable with K' because I'm finding that I'm being too easy to read. I'm not sure if it's just my general gameplay or K' oriented. So to try and remedy this situation, I'm trying to figure out the multiple uses for K's normals.

Also, what are good pressure strings for K' when on the offensive? I'm doing a few simple frame traps, but I'm finding that I'm leaving too many holes in the pressure, allowing them to escape. It could be due to my judgement or that I'm limiting my options too much when applying pressure.

I definitely would like to know more about K's:

-Hop Pressure Strings (Super needed!)
-Corner Pressure Strings
-Ground Pressure Strings

I don't want to Trigger a lot as I used to. Reasoning is because I'm noticing that for some matchups, doing a Trigger after a string effectively ends the pressure, or allows a hole for them to exit out of. Some Trigger Strings would also help as well!

K' sweep is pretty standard for any sweep. It's got a nice range to it and is special cancelable so you can cancel the recovery with Ein's Trigger to keep yourself mostly safe.

The thing with K' is he's trying to get the opponent in the corner so he can bully with Ein's Trigger traps. Midscreen you kind of have to rely on j.CD and anti-air reactions. Also, at high level play being able to capitalize off of stray j.CD's, CH j.CD's, or anti-air/air-to-air situations with TK Crow Bite is really important. It's what allows you to maximize damage from stray hits and get people into the corner faster. EX Crow Bites lets you get follow ups in the corner and you can score 450+ damage with You only want to cancel Ein's Trigger->Second Shoot in a block string when they don't have meter cause they can guard cancel roll in between and punish you. So you're ground pressure strings is pretty much standard alterations of c.B, c.A, s.B, s.A mixed in with delays, hops, and jumps.

In close range you don't want to use j.D because the hit box is weird and will often whiff or get you anti-aired with a crouching normal. I really like j.A, j.B, j.C and j.CD for his jumping normals at close ranges but primarily his j.A because it has fast start up and long active frames while j.CD has a good hit box on it.

There's nothing special in hop pressure strings, it's pretty much standard between all of the characters. You have to read your opponent and see if they are going to check a hop with a normal in between your strings. If they are throwing out anti-air normals in between gaps of your strings then you can do something like c.B, c.B, dash c.B and catch their normal. If they are mashing on c.A/B to stuff those type of strings you start hopping/jumping instead. Depending on the match up you can use normal jumps to throw the anti-air timing for normals that would stop hops.

In the corner, you're bullying with the threat of Ein's trigger. You don't really want to use it in a block string in the corner but stagger your normals to entice them to try and escape. When you leave those gaps you can try using Ein's Trigger->Second Shell to catch a button or a jump. There's no way to react to their jump so you'll have to throw in Ein's Trigger->Second Shell when you feel the opponent might jump. Otherwise, you can just do standard normal pressure with c.B, hops, etc... EX Ein's Trigger is really good in the corner for guard bar damage, frame advantage, and further bullying.

[Reiki.Kito]

Just going to throw my hat in there to answer some of your questions from my perspective. It might just be supplemental to Killey, but I play K' a bit more defensive so I make a lot of use out of his normals.

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Question 1 (Sweep): Killey already mentioned the main portions, but you can use his sweep as a hit confirm into a combo. You can cancel the sweep into EX Chain Drive which is an anywhere juggle. If you condition people to stand block, either through tick throwing or mixing up your ground pressure with hops, it will net you a decent 40% at max for two bars alone.

Since K' isn't a combo heavy character or mix-up heavy character, you have to make use of his normals to trick or pressure people.

Question 2 (Hop Pressure Strings): Again, Killey covered a lot of this, but I have something to say. j.D is a very good normal when used  properly. The arc and range of j.D is one of the most horizontal reaching normal K' has. He can hop at someone and tag them a full character length with his hop D. It's also a decent air-to-air which you can buffer qcb+K in the air to net extra damage in exchanges.

Part of hop pressure strings is also poking. You're not always going to move forward. By timing hop D, you can hit people from farther away and poke them with cr.B once at max range. This keeps you relatively safe because you don't have to commit to getting in someone's space. You can use this to hop forward from a distance and keep applying pressure from a safe position. You can use this by jumping straight up after jumping on someone with another normal or j.CD. You can step away from them a little out of their throw range and tag them with a j.D from really far away. This works wonders in the corner where jumping straight up presents a wall they can't cross. j.CD, j.B, and j.D can pressure people heavily even when you're just hopping straight up as it keeps them from advancing forward.

Some pieces of hop pressure is trying to condition people into a cross up situation. For K', his usual cross up options are j.A and j.C, but now with our discovery above, you can setup to even have j.D cross up. Cross ups are mostly ground based so we'll ignore that for now.

Question 3 (Corner Pressure Strings): Again, gonna just add on to Killey's comments. K' does not have particularly safe specials. Ein trigger follow-ups are unsafe and even Ein Trigger is fairly slow with considerable recovery. That being said, you don't always want to rely on this. Corner pressure is also about keeping people in the corner in a state of panic. K' has a fairly long reaching cr.B and st.A. Without pushback, you can mix in gaps for people to react to or not react to. For example, you can tick away with cr.B once and do st.A to check a hop. If they duck, it whiffs, but the recovery is very fast on whiff. If they tried to jump, you put them in an air reset. Reacting to these situations where there's a fork is also important. Using this example, if they ducked, they're not in a position to tech a throw. Also because you whiffed a normal, they're not in block stun. You can proceed to attempt a tick throw.  If they air reset, you can throw out a meaty (+6) regular ein trigger which will put them in a frame trap. You could throw out another normal to poke them.

You can also give them space after knock downs. Get just outside of their jump range and poke them with d.B into Ein Trigger. Even if it whiffs, if they make a motion to move forward, they'll get tagged by the Ein Trigger. Using A Ein Trigger knocks them down while C keeps them standing. I alternate, but using A in the corner gives you more air reset options so liberally use A Ein Trigger.

Poking people from a safe distance also encourages them to jump. Using vertical jumps to present a wall is also a form of pressure and attrition in the corner. K' can make use of this with early j.CDs, j.Bs, and j.Ds. They're very good, you can confirm off of them into HD, and two of them are air cancel-able so you can do qcb+K for extra damage.

In the corner, you can use strings like cr.B x3 and cr.B, cr.A, cr.B because they're pinned up against the corner. Delay them as any hit can turn into a hit confirm. You can also tag people a lot with st.B from afar because it's a mid-body normal that hits crouching and standing opponents. Use it to poke after strings to check people who might be jumping or pressing buttons. Also, part of strings is taking your foot of the gas. You can back dash or roll backwards to bait out reversals or throw off a counter-poke so you can open them up when they whiff.

Frame traps like cr.A (delay) cr.B or cr.B, st.C are great in the corner because they continue your ability to leave small gaps people react to. Use this more so when people are trying to press buttons to poke you rather than when they roll.

If they're in the corner and they roll, use your frame traps and walk back and forth a little. Don't feel like you have to commit. You can catch roll outs a lot easier if you give them some space or are not committing to a block string.

Question 4 (Ground Pressure Strings): So now we're in mid-screen, this gets a bit more difficult. K' can't get very good damage off of poking because after one or two normals, he can't get no-meter carry combos. You should stick to confusing people with frame traps I mentioned earlier, cross ups I mentioned earlier, and light block strings into running.

You can do a lot to confuse people without jumping. However, in mid-screen that's really going to use a lot of meter. His EX Black out, after 2 cr.Bs will cross people up on the other side. You can use that (sparingly) to get around people and throw off their thoughts. You can confirm with EX Ein Trigger into a combo. If you connect with two cr.Bs only, f+B follow up is better. If you got a confirm off your hop pressure, be safe and just do f+D. Either one is fairly safe.

Other than that, if you want to stick in on people, mixing in running in to low normals or running in for a tick throw is a 50-50 mix up from one or two cr.Bs. You could also delay a C Ein Trigger and use the f+B follow up to tag people pressing buttons. Using C Ein Trigger in midscreen is better because on hit, you can connect f+B for extra damage. Although they're standing, soft knockdowns are not as useful all the time because people can tech. C Ein Trigger on hit is, in my opinion, 0 frames  of advantage. It also puts you in a position to react to what they do in response on block or hit.

A risky mid-screen tactic is to pressure people and hit them with Minute Spike as a whiff punisher. You're not using it to continue pressure, but you can use it to encourage people not to whiff normals after your blockstrings which will allow you to bring in elements like running forward for tick throws (or walk, it's safer).

This same tactic can be used if you learn how to bypass Minute spike to Narrow spike for a low. At max range, B narrow spike is -5 and hard to punish because of the distance. The EX version is -3 point blank and relatively safe at a max range so you can use this to continue pressure or get in. Just be wary of grapplers like Daimon and Raiden as they have far reaching grabs.
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Well, those are my tactics. They're pretty basic. Just wanted to add a few elements to Killey's advice.

[Reiki.Kito]

Just a little addition to j.D I'd like to make.

So depending on when you press D, the active frames may fall on weird angles. It's important to understand when you do because it opens up some option selects I'd not previously considered.

For example: You knockdown Ryo with your BnB, cr.B X2, qcf+A and he doesn't tech. Doesn't matter either way considering Ryo has a great anti-air cr.C and his 3F DP, makes it difficult to capitalize. From where you're standing, you can hit Ryo in any of those circumstances or bait with just one hyper hop.

If you hyper hop and do nothing, Ryo's too far away to hit you with d.C or his dp+A. Anything slower than that will be blocked on landing or get stuffed by a normal. If you hyper hop and press j.D, that's different. The hitbox for j.D is really long horizontally on a particular active frame. If you wait till he does the DP or cr.C, it'll whiff and you can press j.D on reaction. You can tag on an extra qcb+K in the air for an easy 100 damage.

You can make good use of this in a lot of situations and make your K' more oppressive on knockdown as you can attack from a relatively safe distance.

[The K1 Effect]

what is the general consensus of K' as a point / battery chracter? How are his matchups with zoning characters like Kensou / Saiki? Opinions in general?

[Reiki.Kito]

K' needs meter to do corner carry or just confirm more than one hit or a jump-in into a combo. If you don't have meter, he plays a lot like Ash (Poking and fundamental zoning/footsies). After he gets meter, he's good to go. I'd put him as a 2nd or anchor.

Also, against zoners, his double fireball and EX fireball wreck most people. His EX teleport lets him get away from dumb setups like Saiki's fireball super and Kensou's frame traps. All and all, he's a very good zoner, one of the best in my opinion.

[The K1 Effect]

Hmmm....I was hoping to be able to use him as a battery / point character since I want to build meter for Leona.....any other opinions / suggestions?

[Reiki.Kito]

You can do a lot of short combos and fireballs if he's point. There's not a lot people can do to you unless they spend the bar to get around K' Ein trigger up close. He's a very flexible character though. You can try it and see, but again, he's not like a traditional battery that can do a lot of damage or build a lot of bar without any investment.

[The K1 Effect]

okay so this combo is really annoying the shit out of me and idk what im doing wrong. His 1 bar HD combo.....this:

cl.st.C > f+A xx qcb+D~qcb+D > [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

okay....I can do all of the parts of this combo 100% of the time....I can do the 4 reps into the ender.....I can do the confirm into HD....my issue is when I put the whole thing together, the combo drops at the end (DP+A > hdc qcf+C~f+D > etc)

It ALWAYS drops at the ein trigger when I put the " hit confirm > qcb+D > stuff " in there. The ein triegger / second shell NEVER juggle.....it seems to happen anytime I start with a qcb+D xx qcb+D before the DPs start. For example. If I do this:

activate HD >  [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

It works 100%


but if I do this:

activate HD > qcb+D(whiff)~qcb+D >  [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

it drops at the ein trigger > second shell.

Ive got no idea why, but this is driving me crazy. I can record it for yall if that might.

does anyone know whats going on?

[Reiki.Kito]

When you do crow bites into minute spike, you're gradually lifting the opponent higher into the air. So if you do it 2-3 times from some initial height, you have to wait a split second for them to fall to the right height.

[Dark Chaotix]

okay so this combo is really annoying the shit out of me and idk what im doing wrong. His 1 bar HD combo.....this:

cl.st.C > f+A xx qcb+D~qcb+D > [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

okay....I can do all of the parts of this combo 100% of the time....I can do the 4 reps into the ender.....I can do the confirm into HD....my issue is when I put the whole thing together, the combo drops at the end (DP+A > hdc qcf+C~f+D > etc)

It ALWAYS drops at the ein trigger when I put the " hit confirm > qcb+D > stuff " in there. The ein triegger / second shell NEVER juggle.....it seems to happen anytime I start with a qcb+D xx qcb+D before the DPs start. For example. If I do this:

activate HD >  [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

It works 100%


but if I do this:

activate HD > qcb+D(whiff)~qcb+D >  [ DP+A > hdc qcb+D~qcb+D(whiff)] x4 > DP+A hdc qcf+C~f+D > f+A > super

it drops at the ein trigger > second shell.

Ive got no idea why, but this is driving me crazy. I can record it for yall if that might.

does anyone know whats going on?

Doing your combo suggestion lifts the opponent higher off the ground before you start the loops, which means for the ender you have to wait till the are closer to the ground. Player might find this hard because it breaks out of their rhythm for the combo. I assume thats what happening and why you are dropping it.

I made a quick vid, showing your combo and maybe an alternate. Sacrifice damage for less execution can help and also keep the opponent alittle lower to the ground. Either way, you do have to wait a bit before you do the last rep or you will always whiff the followup.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKEXg6-HIl4

[mechanica]

I think point K' is best because he can be more risky. He has to spend too much meter to get damage, but he's great with momentum. Play point K', fuck what ya hearrrd

[FM Sway]

My thought process when it comes to K' is that he's the setup man. The man who starts things off to get a feel for general habits such as wanting to hop, mashing pokes, and their spacing. My opinion is that K' is great at understanding a player's tendencies and seeing if he adapts or not. He's not the ultra rushdown character we knew and loved back in Arcade Mode, and now he's all about spacing, gaining meter, and picking the right moments to tell your opponent that s/he generally screwed up.

That's why I choose to put K' on point. My other 2 are King and Mature, and the reality is that K' can't go wild like the other two, nor go wild like the rest of the higher tiers. But what he can do is build a solid pressure game. If they can't get past my pressure, sucks to be them, eat Trigger Flames.

If they can get past my pressure, sucks to be them, I have King next, and I have a much better understanding of your general tendencies, which I can apply with King who has the much better array of ground normals and an aerial fireball. If you get past her, you're going through my even nuttier Mature.

But in reality, all of this is set up by the point man, K'. He either beats the crap out of you, or makes sure his other teammates who have better strengths will finish what he started.

[FM Sway]

Someone, for the love of god, tell me how to face Kula. I have no clue how to approach her and her Lay Spins. The K' vs Kula matchup, even after about 50 matches, is unknown to me!

[Reiki.Kito]

So, Lay Spin isn't safe. You can d.B her if she does it in your face and does a follow up. You can throw her out of it if she does a follow up. You can also dp her if she does Lay Spin and does any follow up afterwards. It's not a true blockstring so you can get out of it. She'll opt out of doing that if you legitimately punish her every time. I would do the DP as it's invincible on start up long enough to hit her. If you're not confident in A DP, use C or EX DP for more invulnerability.

If this is too hard, you can always guard cancel roll after she does her fireball and run at her to punish her.

She'll stop doing Layspin on block and opt to do her Ice Breath on block. Still not a real block string. The timing is a bit tight, but with meter you can punish her for doing that to you with EX Black out or EX Chain Drive. Albeit, you need meter to do it and need to know she's going to do it, but Kula (after st.C or st.D) doesn't gain much from poking aside from st.B.

[FM Sway]

So, Lay Spin isn't safe. You can d.B her if she does it in your face and does a follow up. You can throw her out of it if she does a follow up. You can also dp her if she does Lay Spin and does any follow up afterwards. It's not a true blockstring so you can get out of it. She'll opt out of doing that if you legitimately punish her every time. I would do the DP as it's invincible on start up long enough to hit her. If you're not confident in A DP, use C or EX DP for more invulnerability.

If this is too hard, you can always guard cancel roll after she does her fireball and run at her to punish her.

She'll stop doing Layspin on block and opt to do her Ice Breath on block. Still not a real block string. The timing is a bit tight, but with meter you can punish her for doing that to you with EX Black out or EX Chain Drive. Albeit, you need meter to do it and need to know she's going to do it, but Kula (after st.C or st.D) doesn't gain much from poking aside from st.B.

Would it be too tight to do a Minute Spike, or at least an EX Version on her Ice Breath strings?

I'm pretty sure I tried to DP on reaction and ate the Lay Spin, but it was on awkward ranges. Most Kulas I face don't do the Lay Spin point blank, but it's usually at a range where the tip of her spin kick hits so I'm out of grab range. I'll try DPing at that point too. Once I get out of work, I'll check to see if she's still unsafe if she does no followup on a spaced-out Lay Spin.

I'm noticing that Trigger doesn't work so well in this matchup, but that may be just my poor choices. I originally stuck a mid-range/long-range game to try and bait out the lay spin with Trigger > Second Shell but it definitely doesn't feel like a viable option.