How do you get good with akira?

I'm sure a lot of you have seen my salty cries on the shout box complaining about all these noobs killing me

I mean I really want to get better with akira. I moved on to shun and I win much more with him but akira just has that awesomeness that I can't get away from

Currently I just have trouble with people evading too much and just (smart) mashing people. I'll go try and grab the guys evading and i get mashed up. And when I use my circular moves like 46P+K or 46P+K+G, they evade the other way magically and miss.

I like to play with an aggressive momentum and with akira, I feel like my flow gets cut off way too easily even with a simple blocked DE. What I'm basically asking is, how can I keep my momentum up? It's like the flow resets when my move is blocked and my advantage gets reset

I still have yet to go past defender as akira and it's frustrating as hell

A lot of my attacks gets blocked, leading me to think that I'm playing just linearly in both literal and figurative ways. Plus I do a lot of dumb stuff like trying to evade too hard and get owned by natural circular moves. God damn these people and their circular moves. Hitting me without even trying... haha

 

You do lose your advantage when a DE gets blocked. Defend when it's your turn to defend you can't go every round just flowcharting attacks even the best players don't.

Work on your defence so that when you do lose your advantage you can take care of yourself. I'm willing to bet you win more with Shun due to the "random" nature of his attacks and his basic evasiveness.

If you can get a video of you playing online I can give you more specific advice.

 

Yeah exactly. I feel like such a fraud. I mean I know it's -5 after DE gets blocked so I guard and all but somehow I just feel like I get hit much more with akira for some reason.

It just feels like all my shit just gets blocked. Since I don't have low sweeps, people just guard standing up and it'll guard everything. I have to work extra and do guardbreak, risking getting mashed.

 

"They evade when I attack, and they attack when I throw"

This happens a lot.

And this happens because you're not paying attention to the way they abare.

If they use too much 2P, then 4P will be useless to beat the evades. But so will throws (be useless).

So the best thing you can do if they 2P a lot, is to backdash right after you get a blocked standing punch, let them whiff something, and go for SDE or Yoho.

For the most part you can beat scrubs with pure elbow/throw/2P game. You won't need anything else, that much I can guarantee you. Use those three things, and measure their patterns. If you always 2P or P before a throw, they tend to attack right after blocking a P. It's a reflex many players have.

In those situations, do a 2P after they block your P. If you get a CH on the 2P, sometimes it's worth to do another, just so they get the hint: "Stop attacking mothafucka". As soon as they stop, throw them.

2P will lose against those who love to use low crushing moves (moves that ignore lows). In that case, learn to evade yourself. It's all about guesses, nothing else. Scrubs always have patterns. If they're completely random, just be patient and find an opening. Keep your defense tight. Interrupt when you think you should, and do it often if they don't stop attacking. When it's cool, go on the offensive.

Don't get impatient and start doing DE or throws just because they beat you. Don't go impatient just because you finally interrupted them with a counterhit 2P or P. They can still beat the throw with pure abare. And most will.

So interrupt them once or twice.
The reason why you do 2P twice, for example, is because the 2nd 2P is safer than a DE in case they evade.


Oh, and against those who like to block standing all the time, use 2K+GP!P until they stop. Specially on their wakeup if you predict they won't do a rising attack.

 

And how do you deal with Jackys Pak Sao?

 

You do something else other than high punches if they're standing neutral doing nothing.

How is that giving you any trouble? Specially when playing akira.

 

I feel the same way Washow. It's like i spend most of my time trying to get up off the ground and avoiding down attacks. Or I go for a combo only to see half of my life disappear. we've fought a few times in ranked, you're definitely good. if you stay at it, your gonna be an awesome akira.

for me, part of the problem is move execution (stupid d pad) and and not being familiar with the cast. but mostly, its just me not attacking when i should and also my predictable patterns. But i enjoy the challenge of using akira, and in those rare matches that I can shut down my opponent's offense and then punish them for blocking.... so rewarding.

 

it's been a while since i posted the op and i think my akira leveled up quite a bit
all it took was a deeper understanding of frames.

webdude i played you a bunch of times using different characters and i gotta say, you gotta work on your block some more. it felt like i could just mash shit up and you'll still get hit. i had a huge trouble with this shit and i'm getting slightly better and it just improved my games so much

 

Not sure if it will help but, P is good to. If they step without 33G, you keep adventage, a 66P will counter your open often. If he guard, you keep the priority. So, he have to mash and at that moment you can try a SDE or a SPOD etc ... I had same troubles and now it's easier.