Wakeup Pressure (Okizeme)

Thanks Hazzerone, that was very useful info. I'm going to try using some of these options more often and see if I can't use them to apply more pressure.

I already knew about moves like k+g but its so slow and easy to crouch under that I'm usually hesitant to use it. The faster moves should help though.

What is some of the wake up pressure you use? That is actually an area I know I am weak on. I usually have to back off because I get hit more often than not while trying to punish the opponent. Is it even possible to attack in such a manner that their stand up attacks won't hit you before you attack?

 

Sarah has which is imo a very under-gratified move: .

is a very useful move for a couple of reasons...let's see:
1. It is classed as being airborne on the first frame. The reason why this is useful is that it means that whenever you're in a situation where you strongly anticipate a throw you can just use and if they did indeed attempt a throw then you get a float combo doing 60ish(?) points of damage. (Of course this only works when a throw is not guaranteed - but it means you can use in anticipation of a throw all the way up to a -11 disadvantage. I must point out however that the risk you take on this move is huge... it's a 21f move and pretty much any move will counter hit you and that is why you must be very confident that they will try a throw.

2. It's also useful because it has 9 active frames. This means that there are 9 frames in which the "hitting" part of the move takes place. This is useful because it means that you can use it to beat wakeup kicks (mid, low, delayed mid, delayed low - as long as you time it right it's guaranteed to beat them) and because it has 9 active frames it means that you do not need absolute precision in your timing. Again this will give you a float if you beat out a wakeup kick.

Another way to pressure wakeup kicks is to OM in the direction of Sarah's back. I've found that if you OM towards Sarah's back it is some kind of odd hitbox issue - most characters need to carefully choose and pay attention to which side they OM around wakeup kicks but I've found that aslong as you go towards Sarah's back with the correct timing you'll avoid the wakeup kicks.

After you OM around a wakeup kick you can perform OM which *should* give a side crumple (sometimes it simply doesn't and I put this down to VF5 hitbox oddities) and from side crumple you should bounce combo which depending on the weight class I believe can get you roughly 80pts of damage.

There's also a way to get around wakeup kicks in FL stance too.

To do this you use Sarah's FL or followed by which should cancel out the or move from the stance and leave Sarah taking a big step in either direction and still in FL stance. To get around a wakeup kick you would want to perform this twice in the same direction so, for example: -> Knockdown. FL , , , and you should now be behind the opponent who performed the wakeup kick. From this situation I can't recall what I would attack with - I'm going to assume it's something like FL , (hit throw) or for a crumple (if that's possible).

There's also simply dashing up to them on wakeup to try and encourage them to wakeup kick then performing 2 backdashes for their wakeup kick to whiff to punish with a flop combo.

There's more to oki pressure than just punishing wakeup kicks though...there's also the matter of pressing the advantage whether they techroll exact, techroll, sideroll, delayed sideroll, backroll, quick stand or delayed stand.

This may all sound very confusing but really all you're doing is dashing up to them on wakeup then when they stand up go for some basic mixup such as sweep (beats evades) elbow (beats "abare" - attacking from a disadvantage), (will beat some abare, an evade towards Sarah's front and if counter hits gives a launch for a roughly 50pt damage combo) throw (beats stand block and evades).

Some opponents may feel quite hot under the collar after you nail them on wakeup time and time again and may go for a move such as an immediate when they get up and to this you can respond by dashing up to their face as usual, then backdashing when getup to bait the then punishing the whiff with for a roughly 50pt damage flop combo.

I find a way to further increase oki pressure is to act as if you're a wall in their face. By this I mean OMing in the direction which they roll to not only get good positioning but I think there's also a psychological point to it aswell - people are intimidated if you're right infront of their face on wakeup as they're at quite a bit of frame disadvantage when getting up and there's always a threat of you reading their actions accordingly leading to a knockdown which would then reset this situation of being at disadvantage.

I think oki is very important in VF and I'd say that Sarah has a decent oki game. Just remember to not be scared when you knock someone down as it is you who has the advantage! If they somehow beat you out of a situation it's also important to realise that there was also a way to beat their choice.

There's been no frame data posted for the disadvantage when getting up as the disadvantage is relative to the knockdown before it. For example some throws will give the attacker more time to move around before the character who is thrown can get up.

On numerous occasions however I've been getting up off the floor and then holding to duck or "fuzzy" under a throw just to realise that I couldn't duck in time. This suggests that the disadvantage the defender is in once the attacker is on top of them is atleast -6 and more than likely -7 and above.

To me oki is a mysterious part of the game because frame data does not exist for it. When attacks are being thrown out when both players are standing it's quite easy to gauge what the relative advantage/disadvantage is after quite a bit of experience or after checking frame data but such exact insight does not exist for oki.

 

Lots of good advice from Hazzerone. Another thing you might wanna try to beat wake up kicks in some situations is +. Specificially if your opponent lies face up, head towards you (after a sweep for instance). With the right timing it can beat both low and mid rising kicks in this situation, but it's easier to beat the mid kick. Try it in the dojo against both rising kicks and you'll see what the timing is like. If you only go for beating a mid kick it's easy to do on reaction, but you'll have to do it earlier for the low kick.

It's harder to time it right compared to , but on the other hand it's +2 on block rather than -12. For more info on this and read the okizeme section of the Sarah wiki. The Sarah wiki is great overall.

 

This is true. Actually I'd argue the point that in a face up, head towards situation the sabaki is even better than the move. In this knockdown situation the mid kicks become linear attacks and the will sabaki a mid rising kick and will hop over a low rising and cause a stagger. This stagger is what makes the so good in this situation because although a FL followup is not actually guaranteed it is very difficult to shake out of in time to prevent a FL which will stomach crumple and I don't believe anyone has actually shaken out of it in time in a match against me.

The is safer if no wakeup kick comes out (although you should actually be able to on reaction to seeing the opponent start a rising kick in this sort of situation) as the has a pretty hefty cooldown to it if it whiffs.

 

If you have all the time in the world, then theoretically one of your best bets in okizeme with Sarah would be +, since it gives the most advantage; +4 on block, +8 normal hit, +10 on CH and enters flamingo. The bad part is that its extremely slow, but in an okizeme situation you might get it to connect with opponent still, especially if they dont tech but rise on the spot.

I regards of disadvantage when rising up normally (no tech), I believe that you are invulnerable until the frame that you have fully recovered. However, you recover standing if you recover on spot, crouching if you roll. This means that opponent can at least in theory time his attack/throw to the same frame where you are recovered. At least in general sense, not going into the oki situations after specific attacks.

You cannot fuzzy/crouch under throws in this kind of oki situation, since it takes 6 frames minimum with CD and opponent can theoretically time his throws active frame to the moment you are fully recovered. So at worst its like being in -11 advantage in regards to throws. Its not practically that big since you recover standing and can block attacks from the first frame forwards; so theres no guaranteed attacks as such. But you have to guess. You are in a situation where fuzzy doesnt help, but opponent doesnt have anything guaranteed.

You can avoid throws when rising up by doing a rising attack, buffering normal attack (preferably non-clash - extremely risky), throw escape or ETEG.

Its very difficult position to be in for the one rising up. Im not sure if we should even call it "disadvantage", since theoretically its so big. However, the okizeme depends on the opponent, opponents character, what kind of move he used for knockdown and player skill how well he can apply okizeme pressure.

If you have some situation where down attack is guaranteed for example, you can forgo the down attack and instead concentrate on the okizeme since without down attack you have lots of time on your hands to time the okizeme attack. I do this with Akiras + throw sometimes for example.

I wrote this while drinking my morning coffee, so if Im rambling, excuse me.

 

What about being in Flamingo stance while the opponent is rising? Are there any good options or is it better to just cancel to default position and use the moves available there?

 

I'm sure she has some good moves for oki pressure when she's in flamingo stance, my Sarah knowledge is limited though so i'd like to know more about this too.

 

I think that Sarah's FL options are fairly weak as they are usually purpose specific. By this I mean Sarah doesn't have anything really strong like a safe full circular mid (Vanessa) which beats out both a crouch block and an evade. As you will see in the examples below most of what I list is to beat out stand block which doesn't really account for much if the opponent doesn't stand. Sarah doesn't have any decent damage off of normal hit mids except for the ultra slow and moves which really shouldn't land too often unless your opponent is a nervous wreck.

Oki is definitely about yomi but I think Sarah has to pinpoint the opponents decision to be able to land damage as opposed to some characters who can throw out moves which can cover a variety of possibilities.

Anyway a few moves to consider:

Throw (to beat evade or standing guard)
(to beat immediate counter attacks)
(with enough advantage, to beat immediate counter attacks which would lead to a stomach crumple combo if it lands as a CH)
(staggers on standing guard - leads to nothing guaranteed on fastest stagger recovery but decent pressure, also beats evades and will turn the opponent on hit)
- (beats standing block, may beat some instant counter attacks with the right amount of advantage)
(her only 14f mid in stance. use sparingly - if at all as it's real purpose is just to hit someone who you know will crouch. it's -31 on block so it could be argued that it's an awful risk-reward. as i said it's only useful if you know the opponent will crouch block
- (this move is very slow and beats stand block. on hit or block it is a hit throw and is useful after you condition the opponent to not attack)
(this is a very slow mid axe kick type move which causes flop on normal hit. This move beats crouch block and is best used when opponent is conditioned to not attack. It's the only way for Sarah to get a combo off of a normal hit mid in stance; unless you count the previous move listed)

I'd say that most of the times it's better to -cancel out of FL stance on oki to have access to better movement, the ability to block and (in my opinion atleast) a movelist better suited for oki.

 

Sabaki not crouch. There's absolutely no reward in hitting crouched opponents with this move. The CH is the real reward with a move like that.

 

The reward is 30 damage

 

Manji why do you always fucking do this?

30 pts isn't good enough if you're going to be put at -31 if they happen to stand up guarding after crouching down.

Somersaults have a good blend of reading and reaction in their easy command and start up speed. Based on how the game works with the CH reward, you want to break moves that do high damage to get the most of the CH, which just so happens to be plenty of moves that are easier to react to and see, which happens to be many sabaki and slippery moves, too.

Depending on the move, the CH with it is like 48pts+

If you want to sit here and play with semantics like you always do, and seem to imply that 30pts is more than "no reward"(by way of just mentioning it and ) then... an extra 50%+ of that is still better. And exactly what I was pointing out, at the cost of the player using it on moves they're capable of spotting instead of gambling on a crouch(that could be turned into a standing guard).