Clark Still (Arcade Version)

[LouisCipher]

Okay, I put Clark on 1st to get better with him. And I still can't find much use for D SAB. It seems like it's mostly used to punish or to combo into if you don't have two bars and DC meter. Because every other time I tried to land it I would just eat an attack. If I knocked them down and did it as they got up, I'd get it by standing C or crouching D, not even an SRK. This could be online fucking up the D SAB but I don't know.

[desmond_kof]

Empty jump (or super jump j.D whiff) into D SAB isn't good?

[Raynex]

Empty jump (or super jump j.D whiff) into D SAB isn't good?

I was about to recommend doing that also. Empty hops into D SAB is great because it beats pretty much everything due to its sheer speed. What can the opponent do aside from their own 1f move (or invincible move/jumping obviously) to beat your SAB attempt?

Regarding you getting tagged by st.Cs and Ds: There is a period of time after an opponent wakes up where they are immune to throws. If I remember correctly it's something like 8 frames of throw invulnerability. You could be whiffing your throw during this time and getting hit because of it. Another possibility is that it's the connection...or that you're not timing it correctly. More importantly though, it also means you haven't conditioned them to block yet. Hitting meaties and hit-confirming back into a knockdown+recycle the mix-up should be your main objective at this point. Generally speaking, grabbing is an exploitation of predictable blocking. It's hard to go for them when your opponent isn't afraid to press shit on wake-up.

[LouisCipher]

If I empty jump or hop in, 9 times out of 10 I'm going to get AA'd. I don't know why, I guess almost everyone online is in that SF4 mentality. I find using jumping CD is overall better, it will beat and/or trade with their AA's and condition them to stop doing it... most of them anyway.

Knowing that their immune to being thrown for 8 frames on wakeup helps, thanks.

[Raynex]

No problem. When I was talking about empty jumping, just to clarify, I was mainly referring to doing it when your opponent is on their back. As in, knockdown -> empty jump (optional whiff late j.CD to fake) -> D SAB or DM. Empty hopping as an approach is leagues different. Is this what you meant by getting "AA"ed? Or were you talking about wake-up DPs?

Anywho, on the topic of empty hopping in neutral spacing:

You can only do that once you've trained them to respect your jump-in via

-late j.CDs (blocked), which provide enough frame advantage to freely hop into an uninterrupted j.whatever (which you can then mix-up)

-you have them scared/trapped in the corner. Even the best players let a few hops slip by unnoticed and focus on blocking.

etc

[BioBooster]

You'll probably find running D SAB (after a c.B as well) and D SAB right after the fwd+BD step useful?

[LouisCipher]

Thanks guys. Two quick questions:

What does Clark's air grab beat?

And if I do A Gatling attack and end it with his air grab does that result in a hard knock down?

[Raynex]

I'm not familiar with how air grabs function in KOF (yet). But to answer your second question, yes, comboing into the air grab does provide you with an untechable knockdown.