Purpose Driven Play (Yun: Series 2; Entry 2)

Let's start with stating the obvious.  Super Street Fighter IV: AE is a game that is far easier to play while playing defensively as opposed to being forced into playing offensively.  Have you ever seen people play (especially on Xbox LIVE) that will be down on the life lead and suddenly start to run away and turtle?  Hopefully, you have the sense to look at the life bars and decide if you have to chase them down or will you win simply by doing nothing?  The sad part is, that many, many people will go in after these people and the person turtling is essentially racking up wins by doing nothing.  It is just too easy to get zoned out, anti-air'd, or punished for trying to move in on a defensive player.

Having said this, you can see why it is important to be in this "chasing situation" as little as possible.  The more times you have to get in on your opponent, the more the chances of you losing are.  If you plan to play as a character such as Yun, who has lower than average life, your execution needs to be on point!  Anytime, you connect an attack with your opponent you want to take that one hit and chain it into another hit for a hit confirm, link that hit confirm into a stronger move, and cancel that strong normal with a high damage output special move.  If you land a crouching jab on your opponent and simply mash jab until you push them out of range, you may get (let's just say) 3 jabs in.  That's 84 damage. If your average opponent has 1000 vitality, you will have to do that at least a dozen times.  Twelve times of  risking uppercuts, weaving through fireballs, etc. to not even take a tenth of your opponents health.  What if instead you land that crouching jab, chain to standing jab, link to crouching strong, link to standing strong, and cancel into medium Nishokyaku? 211 Damage.  With no EX meter spent, you just took more than a fifth of your opponents life with a combo starting off with a crouching jab. With one bar of EX you can instead end the combo with an EX Nishokyaku and juggle with a light Zesshou Hohou netting you 238 damage.  Now you are nearing the quarter mark of your enemy's life bar.  That's only a combo starting with a jab!

We've already had a post where I've listed some of the better combo's with Yun so I'm not going to go back into that, but you need to spend enough time in training mode such that when you are in a match and you need to make it count, you only have to get in on your opponent around 4 or 5 times.  There are a few keys to doing this successfully. One is your technical ability to pull of combos consistently. Practice this in training.  Secondly, make sure you know what are your options at any given moment and which move will give you the most damaging outcome. For example, if you land a cr.MP on your opponent it would be in your best interest not to simply follow it up with cr.HP for the cr.MP >> cr.HP target combo.  Instead, how about cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx H Nishokyaku? Also very important, be able to recognize your hit confirms as quickly as possible.  I suggest going into training mode, access the training options, and set the dummy's to block randomly.  Now, dive kick or jump in on the dummy and start with your pokes.  If the dummy is blocking, recognize this before you are out of range and go into a command grab and get a combo for free.  If the dummy is not blocking, finish out your combo maximizing your damage.

The last thing to touch on regarding this issue is meter building and meter management.  Always be cognizant of your opponents and your own health bar, super meter, and ultra meter. If your enemy is running fairly low on life and expending some EX will polish off the round or match and you are running the risk of being ko'd by another combo or two, finish them off.  Otherwise, save the meter for your Genei Jin.  It should not be a hard task to consume about half of your opponents life with one Genei Jin combo (granted you don't activate it 5 or 6 hits into a combo).  Throw out your standing MP and buffer a light Tetsuzanko behind it. If the MP hits, the L Tetsuzanko is coming out and connecting and you should be able to cancel into Genei Jin.  Yun's Ultra of choice, Ultra 1 (You Hou), will do 375 damage with no follow up juggle, 479 if you juggle with a H Zesshou Hohou, and 536 damage if you juggle with EX Zesshou Hohou->EX Tetsuzanko.

With a Super Combo netting you between 400 and 600 damage (at least) and an Ultra Combo capable of 400 to 500, there is no excuse not to get the job done in only a few combos.  Watch any high level tournament match and more than likely you will see that no one is going to be able to allow their opponent to land more than half a dozen combos on them (that many if they are lucky).

In the next entry, I will discuss using the Genei Jin combo and maximizing damage.  This will include the best ways to combo into it, the most damaging attacks to do while in the Genei Jin, damage resets and other tricky ways to end it, and even how to pick it back up again if you drop the combo.  Also, I am going to include all the Ultra set ups that I currently know with Yun, including character specific combos, and just a heads up...I believe the current count is up to 18. And thats not recycling the same move that links or juggles to Ultra 1 with a different combo in front of it, that is 18 ways you can guarantee you land the Ultra all off of different moves, situations, etc.

Back to Basics (Yun: Series 2; Entry 1)

For the first series I jumped right into Yun's Combos, be it meterless, EX, Super, or Ultra and also how is specials juggle among one another for monster damage and finally wrapped it all up in an entry regarding how to tie these aspects of Yun's offense together.  However, before I move any further into the more elaborate set ups and offensive pressure tactics I wanted to take a step back and really make sure we know when and why we are using certain normals.  This may seem like a particularly boring entry, but it will serve as the foundation for all the more complicated concepts we build on from here on out.

Jab
Yun's jab is going to be your best tool for starting combos and punishing blocks that leave themselves too wide open. Close standing LP and crouching LP both have 3 frame start ups (far standing starts up in 4 frames).  Not only do these attacks come out fast but they also chain into themselves and every other form of LP and LK.  Beware that even though you can chain into standing LK, LK will not chain into any other pokes.  Due to the speed at which they come out and the ability to chain, makes them perfect for poking and hit confirming into your basic combos (eg cr.LP-cr.LP-LP->MP xx M Nishokyaku).  Crouching LP is +2 on block and both standing versions are +3 on block, so these make ideal pokes to use for setting up tick throws.

Short
The crouching LK serves all the same purposes as the LP.  Chainable, starts up in 4 frames, good for hit confirms, and are good for setting up tick throws.  The main advantage that crouching short has over crouching jab is you will open up more opponents to combos as it will connect on standing opponents due to the fact that it is a low hitting attack.  Force opponents to stand and block with the overhead (more later) then open them up for combos with cr.LK (eg. cr.LK-LP->MP xx H Nishokyaku).

Strong
Medium Punch is really the best poke in Yun's arsenal.  Crouching MP is going to be the version you want to use to for a somewhat rangey poke and it also links into Yun's more damaging Ultras. When poking with cr.MP be prepared to link into another (and sometimes two more) cr.MP then link to a standing MP and finish with the combo ender that best suits your needs. cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx H Nishokyaku is great and also linking cr.MP to cr.MK before ending your combo with a M Zesshou Hohou or L Tetsuzanko can be a good idea.  You typically don't want to combo off of cr.MP as you can not link into L Tetsuzanko (and thus can't cancel it to Super) and trying to cancel into Nishokyaku often times leads to some unforeseen results because of the awkward angle you come flying upward at.

Standing MP is a phenomenal poke, and is great for fishing for a hit.  It has deceptive range as it moves you slightly forward as you attack.  Buffering HP behind your primary MP will allow you to start Yun's target combo (MP-HP-B+HP) and read the hit confirm to decide to stop the combo after the first HP if you are being blocked and you will remain relatively safe from punishment.  If it hits finish out the target combo with the back + HP and use this opportunity to cancel into Genei Jin Super Combo if you have it.

Forward
It is uncommon that you will land the close MK version during a match while not in Super Combo. However, if you do you can juggle into Ultra 1 for free or jump cancel which leads to a plethora of mix ups.  The standing far version works well as a selective anti-air from opponents jumping from too far away at you.  The far, standing version works well in a footsies role, to help keep the opponent out of your face but offers no further damage in the form of links or cancelling into specials.  The strength of this move lies in its crouching version.  Throw out the cr.MK just outside of its effective range and buffer a M Zesshou Hohou behind it for a quick 1,2 if it lands.

Fierce
Yun's HP is limited in its usefulness while not in Genei Jin by only serving as a very useful poke in its far, standing form.  This is a strong, rangey poke for good damage and to maintain your spacing.

Roundhouse
Standing HK is another good tool in Yun's footsies game.  It is far reaching, knocks down on hit, and gives Yun a little breathing room.  The crouching HK is a standard sweep and can set up some good safe jump scenarios (more later) but beware the opponents wake up time differs depending on if they are standing or crouching when you hit them.  Also, this version of the move has an incredibly long recovery period so if blocked, it is best to press HK again, to complete Yun's Target Combo (cr.HK>>HK) and hopefully not get punished.

Senpukyaku
Yun's overhead.  Safe on hit and block, however under normal conditions it does not offer to start nor extend any combos.  However, battering an opponent with several overheads in a row is a sure fire way to set them up to eat a combo that starts with a low poke (eg cr.LK).

Dakai
A very strong poke that covers about half the screen, this is a great move as a surprise poke to knockdown your opponent and gain some ground in the zoning game.  Use it to punish moves that otherwise would be out of reach and use it against jump ins as it will cross under your opponent and Yun's hand furthest behind him will strike the airborne opponent, given the correct spacing.

Yun Video Recap (Series 1 Videos)

Here are two videos that showcase several of the important aspects of playing with Yun mentioned over the three last blogs on the subject. I made a very obvious note as to when I do something that I specifically mentioned in the blogs. One focuses more on building Super Meter while the other focuses on mixing up your opponent when your dive kicks are blocked and juggling specials with other specials. Enjoy!

Yun's first series of strategy blogs just kind of jumped right into the meat and potato's of the character with the assumption you already were familiar with how the character played and how best to utilize his normals.  Though I won't be reverting in the second series of Yun blogs, I may just want to reinforce our understanding of his unique normals and their purpose and get into specific properties of certain moves, so that we can move on to the more advanced things like resets, baiting your opponent, spacing and zoning, and really get a leg up on the rest of the Yun players out there.  Hope you are looking forward to it!

Setting Up Yun's Offense (Yun: Series 1; Entry 3)

So far I've put up two entries for Yun.  One was some of his more commonly used combos and the other was showing how his specials could be linked together to deal some nasty damage.  Armed with that knowledge you may be wondering, "Well how do I set my opponent up for this kind of damage?".  I'm going to do my best to try to break some of this down for you.

Yun excels as a high pressure, rush down type character.   Using dive kicks against blocking opponents puts them in a situation where they have to make some tough decisions. Let's suppose your initial dive kick is blocked and you immediately throw your opponent. Next time you are in this situation they may attempt to tech or OS crouch/tech in anticipation of a throw immediately after blocking your dive kick.  In this instance following up the blocked dive kick immediately with another dive kick could land you the counter hit opening up your opponent for huge damage.  Now your opponent may be turtled up hard, only blocking.  This opens up your command grab game.  It may also be especially useful to batter your opponent with overheads forcing them to block high only so you can start a combo off with a cr.LK.

At some point your opponent will get frustrated and begin back dashing or mashing out attacks in hopes of scoring a reversal. This is an ideal time to set up some option selects and safe jumps. If your opponent is back dashing (mostly happens on wake up) to avoid having to deal with your dive kick pressure, you could set up an OS that would result in a L Zesshou Hohou coming out if your jump in whiffs, and thus knocking down the back dashing opponent (more on this later).  If you attempt to pressure via safe jumps after scoring an untechable knockdown, if your opponent were to mash out a reversal move in frustration you could either beat their attack out cleanly, or land and block before their move enters its 'active' frames, allowing a free punish (more on this later, as well).  However, a smart opponent is going to try to zone Yun out and keep their spacing to avoid this very frustrating mix up game.

Luckily for Yun players, Yun has many tools to combat being zoned effectively.  He has dive kicks that can carry him over fireballs and a good distance across the screen while your opponent is in recovery frames.  Tetsuzanko is another good tool to go under fireballs and strike an unsuspecting opponent and leads to several opportunities for follow up moves for each version (light, medium, and heavy) if it connects.  Kobokushi's have the properties of projectiles and will absorb incoming projectiles. What's more is that these Kobokushi's build a ton of Super Meter and Yun is DANGEROUS with Super.  Anytime you have the opportunity, be it from scoring a knockdown, an opponent running away, etc. you should be building Super Meter by throwing out Kobokushi's.  So, while being zoned you should be building meter and trying to close in on your opponent, preferably by landing a big damage combo off of one of his specials (see earlier Yun entries). If you have a full Super Meter once you've got back in on your opponent it should be enough to close out the round.

Other opponents will tend to keep you at a distance that is advantageous to them and attempt to out poke you.  Typically, if you are in poke range then you are in dive kick range.  It is however a good idea to engage in "footsies" to some extent as Yun has some excellent pokes that lead into combos and it will mentally commit your opponent to a ground game softening their reaction time to a well timed low dive kick.  While poking, stay just outside of cr.MK range and use your cr.MK and buffer a M Zesshou Hohou behind each cr.MK.  Since, you are out of range (just barely) your cr.MK will whiff and you will never see the Zesshou Hohou come out.... That is unless your opponent tries to poke, and now they are in range for your cr.MK to land as a counter poke and the M Zesshou Hohou will instantly follow up as the second hit knocking your opponent down and placing you right next to them and in prime position for a mix up.  Another strong poking tool is your standing MP as it carries Yun slightly forward and has deceptively long range. Use a similar style of spacing with the MP so you are always at max range for MP to connect or just outside of it and buffer behind it a HP so that if the MP connects, you will get a standing HP,  and you can read this hit confirm and finish the target combo by pressing Back + HP (this would be a great time to cancel into Genei Jin if your Super Meter is full).

Yun's Special Juggles (Yun: Series 1; Entry 2)

This is the second entry in my series sharing some basic knowledge about Yun in SSFIV:AE. The focus of this article is to point out all the special moves that will juggle off one another with Yun and by learning this, you will be sure to get the most damage out of all of your combos.

Let's start with the Tetsuzanko, or shoulder charge. Damage will be shown to the right in parentheses.

H Tetsuzanko->H Zesshou Hohou (270)
H Tetsuzanko->EX Tetsuzanko (290)
*Corner only H Tetsuzanko->Ultra 1 (440)
*Corner only H Tetsuzanko->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (489)

The Kobokushi, or Palm Strike, will primarily be limited to corner combos unless using the EX version.

*Corner only Kobokushi->L Zesshou Hohou (250)
*Corner only Kobokushi->H Nishokyaku (300)
*Corner only Kobokushi->EX Nishokyaku->EX Nishokyaku (340)
*Corner only Kobokushi->Ultra 1 (460)
*Corner only Kobokushi->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (508)
EX Kobokushi->L Tetsuzanko->H Zesshou Hohou (364)
*Near Corner EX Kobokushi->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (508)

How about Zesshou Hohou (which you can combo into the EX Version, see my previous entry)

EX Zesshou Hohou->L Zesshou Hohou (230)
EX Zesshou Hohou->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (488)
*In Corner EX Zesshou Hohou->EX Nishokyaku (240)

Finally, let's add in our Nishokyaku, Up Kicks, as its the primary combo ender.

2nd Hit of L Nishokyaku->L Zesshou Hohou (140)
2nd Hit of L Nishokyaku->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (398)
EX Nishokyaku->L Zesshou Hohou (190)
*Corner only EX Nishokyaku->EX Nishokyaku (200)
*Corner only EX Nishokyaku->Ultra 1->EX Tetsuzanko (448)

With there being so many, I surely have left some out and hope to keep everything updated.

Yun's Key Combos (Yun: Series 1; Entry 1)

I'm going to make these next few entries kind of a series of entries to relay some basic Yun info.  It is just some common knowledge that I am sharing among friends, and by putting these things here, they will already be written down.

My first entry is simply going to be some of the more common combos I use and their variations depending on if you have or choose to expend EX meter or Ultra.

Key : Meterless; Requires EX; Requires Ultra and possibly EX Meter
Chain: -
Link: ->
Cancel: xx
L: Light
M: Medium
H: Heavy
EX: what do you think EX means?
cr.: crouching
j. jumping
f.: far standing
no prefix: either close standing or you will already be at the correct distance
B: Back; F: Forward; D: Down; U: Up

Here are some of my most commonly used combos:
cr.LP-LP->MP xx H Nishokyaku  (188)
cr.LP-LP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->L Zesshou Hohou  (214)
*in corner cr.LP-LP-MP xx EX Nishokyaku->EX Nishokyaku  (220)
*in corner cr.LP-LP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->Ultra 1(->EX Tetsuzanko)  (377)


cr.MP->MP xx H Nishokyaku  (232)
cr.MP->MP xx EX Zesshou Hohou->L Zesshou Hohou  (295)
cr.MP->MP xx EX Zesshou Hohou->Ultra 1(->EX Tetsuzanko)  (460)


cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx H Nishokyaku  (258)
cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->L Zesshou Hohou  (284)
*in corner cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->EX Nishokyaku  (290)
*in corner cr.MP->cr.MP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->Ultra1(->EX Tetsuzanko)  (447)


cr.MP->cr.MP->cr.MK xx M Zesshou Hohou  (245)
cr.MP->cr.MP->cr.MK xx EX Tetsuzanko  (273)


cr.LP-cr.LP-LP->MP xx M Nishokyaku  (189)
cr.LP-cr.LP-LP->MP-HP-B+HP  (179)
cr.LP-cr.LP-LP->MP xx EX Nishokyaku->L Zesshou Hohou  (216)

Featured in SSFIV:AE OMGWTFLOLBBQ Moments Episode 4

DontTaseMeBro has been putting together some video montages of clips from Super Street Fighter IV:AE and other popular fighting games for sometime now.  He usually features outrageous, hilarious, intriguing, and often times just plain odd moments that have been recorded while playing.

His latest compilation video dropped today with your's truly being featured for the better part of a minute.  The clips of me consist of three of my signature 'Kanevo Cancels' , as they are now known as, and lastly an Ultra Combo set-up that no one would expect to be hit with.  I've embedded the video below. I make my appearance starting around 3:18. Or you can follow this link to jump right to my clip. Video quality is rather poor.