Blanka counter?

[Serpentine]

How would one go about fighting Blanka as Ken (or possibly any other Anatsuken user)? I try dashing in or jumping in and he simply rolls at me. A hadouken is no use as EX Ball goes through it and he can do that weird crouch walk thing (how do you do that btw?). If I somehow manage to get close he'll just electricute me. Does anyone have any strategies for him?

PS: Can you button mash Shinryuken for the extra hits or does it not work in SFIV?

[JoeMasters]

How would one go about fighting Blanka as Ken (or possibly any other Anatsuken user)? I try dashing in or jumping in and he simply rolls at me. A hadouken is no use as EX Ball goes through it and he can do that weird crouch walk thing (how do you do that btw?). If I somehow manage to get close he'll just electricute me. Does anyone have any strategies for him?

PS: Can you button mash Shinryuken for the extra hits or does it not work in SFIV?


No button mash n shinryuken.

I played a few Blankas at the SFC last night. I have to say he really is a pain in the ass. His cross-ups are very good, so try not to put yourself in that position.
Make him be afraid of your kara throws. And remember, your jab still stuffs any type of Blanka Ball. So if your going for a kara set up, and you think hes going to throw one out, just throw out a jab. You'll hit his ass out of it and keep poking his ass. f.mk is good to throw out, but dont be perdictable. You'll get balled outa that shit quick. Watch for his cross up throw set ups. Because if he cant get you in a cross up combo, hes gonna try to throw quick.. because he doesnt have many other options. If you feel froggy, then you can throw out some dps I guess.

I am in no way shape or form a pro against Blanka. But this is the shit I picked up after playing my first Blankas in IV last night.

P.S. Blanka Crawl is down 3 punches.

[Edma]

- Learn his get up timing. He gets up slower and you tend to whiff a lot at first.
- Low forward seems good. Blanka isn't going to be throwing out c. fierce as much in this game.
- Don't be afraid of the slides. Walk back and forth and bait it out and punish.
- Watch for him losing his charge by not being in down back. Then you really only have to watch out for slide and his jump.
- Get him the corner and he's in big trouble. He has no wakeup outside of EX upball and supers. EX upball doesn't knock you down from the ground and you can punish even if you get hit. (Maybe his EX backwards roll might get him out, not sure)
- Uppercut him out of his ultra if you need to avoid the chip damage.
- Get c. fierce ready for his crossup
- And step kick is always good :wgrin:
- Super secret tactic! If you know he's waiting to ex ball through a fireball, do far away fireball and fadc backward and uppercut his ball. Whee! Don't know if that works though, but it should.

I don't know about normal usage really yet. Like, maybe c. strong is a good counter poke at Blanka's c. fierce range.

[MAGUS1234]

If blanka does not have charge you can bait slides and jump ins with Save strike charging. FP SRK can punish blocked slides at most lengths.

[Serpentine]

Thanks guys. The Blankas Im always fighting always have their charge. I think they charge it while using the ball. Kinda neat but still annoying. I'll try out those tactics next time Im at the arcades.

[Dr.Chaos]

Was playing a pretty good blanka player last night and heres what I learned.
-After b.ball follow up with f.mk, it doesn't hit but it closes the distance.
-If you jump over the ultra it can still hit you from behind so don't get to close, on block I believe you can ultra or srk when hes in the air. I know you can full ultra after its finished and hes coming down.
-I would say stay on the ground for most part of the fight, since if he doesnt have his anti air ball charged he'll just jump back with hk or hp. So if you do jump go with hk it should trade or beat his stuff cleany. If he doesnt do anything when you land either throw or fierce srk if it lands good, if not fadc into focus attack to try to hit him then land ultra or just dash and throw.
-But if you get him knocked down you should go for cross up c.lk c.lp c.mk srk or c.lk c.lp srk. Target combo cant really be trusted. Especially in this fight where every hit counts. And don't really use ex moves besides ex srk when finishing off combos.
-When spamming hadokens watch his gauge once he gets a ex stop immediately. Watch out for his overhead ball cross ups and the regular ball cross ups when you wake up you have to block the other way on that one. Watch out for short balls into electricity and the hops on wake up to throw.
- If he has a super dont jump at all.
Overall I'd say this is a real uphill battle but not impossible to win. Just have to capitalize every time you land a hit. From the start of the match you should try to take the lead by getting blanka into the corner, I had more success with offense then defense in this match. Hope this helps. :karate:

P.S. :dp: :2p: for every finisher

[gunslinger]

His jumping animation is so damn quick. His jump back hk beats my jump in most of the time. Guess that means I should jump hurricane kick?

His Electricity move is weird. The beginning of it will counter close punches/kicks. But towards its end... you can f.mk or j.k ... and combo. I'll try and test it out more. If we can work out its mechanics properly... and we can f.mk into it - MUHUHAHAHA!
---------------

Fighting Blanka is a BIG UPHILL battle... and I tire. The only thing I can smile about is to ultra his ultra!

I've twice baited a ball and ultra'd it.
All the other times... copped it in the face! Hard to do the move quick enough before he connects with you. These are all gambles... fighting Blanka is always a gamble

[Dr.Chaos]

-You can ultra after his ultra is finished, just walk forward a bit then Ultra. You might be able to Tatsu over it, if you need to avoid chip damage.
-Meaty jab and short might beat wake up electricity, overhead kick does. If they are right next to you and all ready doing it, just shoryu.
-You can also focus his rainbow ball, so you can avoid the cross up guess and get a free punish.
-Strong shoryu all his jump ins.

[ramza]

-You can ultra after his ultra is finished, just walk forward a bit then Ultra. You might be able to Tatsu over it, if you need to avoid chip damage.
-Meaty jab and short might beat wake up electricity, overhead kick does. If they are right next to you and all ready doing it, just shoryu.
-You can also focus his rainbow ball, so you can avoid the cross up guess and get a free punish.
-Strong shoryu all his jump ins.

can you focus ex rainbow? i can't remember if it was his super or his ultra, but one of those will flip around with you if you manage to jump to the other side of him(if he holds it). just a random note I remember from getting hit by that bullshit:annoy:

[Dr.Chaos]

-It might be the super, ultra just goes the one direction. I see his super like once in a blue moon though, Im not sure. Also his ultra can hit you from behind so dont walk into it if you jump over it, I died that way once :rofl:
-And im not sure about focus ex rainbow. But meaty low short and jab do beat electricity, found out today(well for Ryu, should be the same for Ken though).
- This match isn't nearly as tough as it was when I first started, but its still pretty serious. Just dont cross up with mk to much, only hadoken if they are a full screen away, and have no ex meter and strong shoryu his ass from the sky. If you see him walking forward just watch for a slide or jump. And dont chase him in the air. Just stay on your toes(literally), and you'll be fine.

[ramza]

if its really full screen(maybe even a little closer in) you can recover from your fb to dp ex balls. if you can tell they are really focusing on balling through your fbs, throw an obvious midscreen and fadc back, dp or ultra punish. i've gotten some people to flinch at midscreen fbs and not ball after they get hit by this the first few times.

blankas still a boring bitch to fight though

did up get sanwa parts in the sf4 cabs yet?:nunchuck:

[Dr.Chaos]

-Yeah this guy that also plays ken likes to do that whole full screen shoryu set up. Thats not really my style though hehe. Works pretty good though, except if you try to ultra Blanka usually ends up on the other side of you and hits you out of it. Only saw it work twice. Depends on his speed or some stupid factor. But if you ex srk him out of his ball will certainly make the other guy thing twice.
-Yeah hes boring but just set him on fire! And yes we did get sanwas on sf4, so you can choose 360 or Jap. :wgrin:

[BlackShinobi]

-Yeah this guy that also plays ken likes to do that whole full screen shoryu set up. Thats not really my style though hehe. Works pretty good though, except if you try to ultra Blanka usually ends up on the other side of you and hits you out of it. Only saw it work twice. Depends on his speed or some stupid factor. But if you ex srk him out of his ball will certainly make the other guy thing twice.
-Yeah hes boring but just set him on fire! And yes we did get sanwas on sf4, so you can choose 360 or Jap. :wgrin:

Are you talking me? :rofl:
I'll Shoryuken anything if you give me an opening.

"If you have time to block you have time to shoryuken" thats my motto

Also on the subject of blanka and shoryukens.

Blanka's ultra has more invincibility than an EX shoryuken. if the ground stun part of his ultra misses and you try to EX SRK him right after you'll just slide up against each other until you run out of invincibilty and get hit. It complete bullshit but it happens.

[CCiNO]

I find this is Ken's hardest matchup, especially if it's a turtle Blanka player.

Anybody got any new suggestions on handling more advance Blanka players?

The main things I look for is if he has his EX or Ultra meters up, when they are, it limit's your abilty to force Blanka to come to you by baiting him with a few FB. With his ultra up, it also limits your ability to try to cross him up and go on the offensive as Blanka has one of the illest and damaging wake-up Ultras.

But anyways, anyone have any suggestions?

[Bengoshi-San]

Had a hard time with a really good Blanka player yesterday (5 matches won, 10 matches lost), but all of them were close.

My problem is I always jump in on him when he has a super/ultra and he always lands it on me.

My ground game is good, but I'm not using my hadokens well.

[Dr.Chaos]

- You shouldnt really use Hadokens in this match anyway, besides sliding or ex ball he can just move where he lays on the ground.
- This match is really dictated by who has the life lead imo.(if its a turtle blanka) Jumping fierce with usually beat or trade with up ball and ground ball. Just try and lay the hurt on him earlier. Turtle blankas will usually try and chip you with the ultra if it will kill you so stay out the corner.
- Just try and get him in the corner by either a back throw or Tatsu combo and KEEP him there.

[JoeMasters]

Also anticipate slides. Blanka has a pretty decent cross-up game, and good players WILL use it.

[dragonz20]

is there any way to punish that rolling ball attack? i can't for the life of me counterattack after blanka attacks with it. i am the training mode and i can't find anything that will allow me to hit blanka back.

[Dr.Chaos]

is there any way to punish that rolling ball attack? i can't for the life of me counterattack after blanka attacks with it. i am the training mode and i can't find anything that will allow me to hit blanka back.

If they are near the corner you can f.mk it. Anywhere else on the screen hes safe.

[dragonz20]

If they are near the corner you can f.mk it. Anywhere else on the screen hes safe.

well that effin' sucks. so he can just spam his fierce rolling ball all day as long as he's not in the corner? :mad:

[Dr.Chaos]

well that effin' sucks. so he can just spam his fierce rolling ball all day as long as he's not in the corner? :mad:

Yup. :sad:

[xCPx]

yea his damn fierce roll is so safe probably just another aspect to why he's A tier, its pretty cheap though that Honda's head butt puts him in f-mk range while blanka is always safe D:

[Bengoshi-San]

I'm still trying to work out my game against Blanka/Cammy users, but I was able to figure out one solid strategy:

When you see Blanka roll towards you, throw a fierce shoryuken at them, it will always land and have priority over his roll. Of course, this is easier said than done, because you only have about 1 second to pull it out, so keep your eyes open for that roll.

The good thing about that strategy is that if you get them 2-3 times, they'll stop rolling at you (if they have an ounce of self respect) and try other things, electricity, jumping attacks, or the long range slide, at which point you just play defense, do karathrows and psych them out.

[CCiNO]

Blanka's EX Ball roll is insane..I timed Ken's Ultra perfectly when a Blanka came at me with his EX Roll, and his Roll won out. lol

[Bengoshi-San]

Blanka's EX Ball roll is insane..I timed Ken's Ultra perfectly when a Blanka came at me with his EX Roll, and his Roll won out. lol

I don't know what the exact science to it is, but I've been able to do an ultra on a rolling Blanka before. It might have something to with how Ken's punch touches Blanka. If he hits Blanka with the punch, then it'll connect, but if the punch comes out a half second after or before Blanka is gonna hit with the roll, then it wont work.

The Shoryuken strategy does work though, it was able to let me win against a few Blankas so far.

You want to try and avoid his EX rolls though, I don't try and go head to head with those. But a regular roll will be beaten down by a correctly timed Shoryuken all day long.

[BlitzMan_G]

just get high and play him
wait a minute thats my solution to everything lol
to be honest when i play blanka i play rufus cause the uphill battle isnt as bad but
i try to develope a strat for all my mains and this is the one i got for blanka

well not a lot but 2 things

If you block a blanka ball throw out a f + mk and if you think its not gonna throw another ball on landing then kara throw him i believe the distance is right

second no fireballs hold on if you thinking of throwing a fireball think this NONONONONONONONONONONONONO (ken has the slowest fireball recovery of all the shotos i think well thats before gouken and dan so im not sure but it sucks)

3rd anytime he fucks up and you have a opportunity to hit him
PUNISH HIM HARD MAKE EVERY HIT COUNT

4th dont use target combo.. because this game is rigged to the point that blanka wiffs through everything use the combos dr chaos mentioned above (cant really say much else he covered a lot with edma)

5th adapt what type of blanka player Tehyeh on psn is up there in ranking for blanka and you cant rush this guy which is hard if your a rushdown player i suggest developing some turtle knowledge

6th watch out for ultra thats all i can say his ultra hurts (everytime it hits me on some noob wakeup ultra i die a little inside Tear*)

BTW im very dissapointed Joe, Dr.C, and Max all on 360 im sure edma is too

i bet you 0 players in top 100 on psn are ken players other then myself
its really sad no kara mix ups or rushdown battles