My Tips To Reach Golden League

[Xx-KingOFDark-xX]

In 2020, I opened a topic asking how difficult it is to reach gold rank in Street Fighter V for someone new here and I want to thank everyone for their kinds remarks at the time.

 

Well, I am here to inform you that I have reached gold rank with Chun-Li on the PS4 in 2021 (sorry for being late) and last week on PC with Alex ( February 2024, reached 5200 LP. Took me around 4 days playing 3 hrs each day).

 

Here are my tips as someone who started completely new to the genre that hopefully will be useful. I'll start with the basics and follow up with more detailed stuff.

Keep in mind, all these tips also apply to Street Fighter VI.

 

1. I will start by saying that people in bronze even up to gold and super gold do a lot of shenanigans. Jumping, unsafe punishable moves, DP on wake up a lot of times ( wake up is when you throw them at the ground putting them at a disadvantage) leaving them open for a big combo. So be calm and block. I know this may sound simple but do not get agitated while playing. Use the time you're blocking to study your opponent. Do they jump a lot ? Do they use moves you can punish like heavy kick ? Do they try to throw you when you wake up or hit you with a move ?

A lot of gold players rely on you not knowing how to punish them (especially Kens) and once you counter their few tricks, their entire playstyle crumbles. 

 

2. Learn your character basics:

 

A. That's your anti-air. What moves do you use to punish their jumps. Moreover, how can you get the most from you anti-air ( AA ). For example: With Chun-Li, when I AA, I dash under them and do my BnB ( explained in C) combo into whatever I want. Super, special, V-trigger. With Alex, I'd use EX knee for more damage from the AA.

 

B. Learn your character's pokes and unsafe moves.

Each character has a move or two that are safe on block. Meaning if your opponent block them, they can't punish you. Like MP, LP and LK with Chun-Li or LP, MP, and HP with Alex.

If these moves connect, you can turn them to combos, if blocked you're safe. In contrast, learn you character's unsafe moves. Moves that when blocked, can give your opponent the chance to punish you. Like Ken's Heavy Tastu, or low heavy kick. Learn also your long pokes, that you can annoy your opponents with from afar. Like Chun-Li's HP.

 

To know what is safe and what is not. Go to training, set Attack data and colour on. Set the dummy to block. If the move is red when blocked, it's punishable, if it blue, you're safe.

 

Note: Some unsafe red moves can be made safe with spacing or V-trigger. As in, if you use it in your opponent's face, it's punishable. If you use it from a distance where the move connects on the margin, they can't do anything ( granted you start blocking after ). Additionally, if you use an unsafe move and it's blocked then you activate V-trigger, that will make it safe.

Also, move that are -2 frames are safe if you block immediately after it since the fastest move in the game is +3 frames.

 

C. Learn your character's BnB combos.

As in bread and butter. As in your basic reliable combos. That you can start through your safe pokes then turned into CA, EX, V-trigger.. etc. It doesn't have to be a big one. It can be as simple as Chun-Li MP to MK to Special move or Alex's HP, MP to special. That you will use to punish any unsafe move you block.

 

D. Learn some set-ups on people you throw to the ground. Like I said above, when someone is waking up from the ground, they are at a disadvantage ( red ). Meaning if you press a well-timed poke as they're waking up and they press a button, you'll get a counter or a crush counter. From which, you launch a combo. Once you condition them and they start blocking, you begin throwing them or command grabbing them. And people up to gold LOVE pressing buttons on wake-up. The amount of crushing counter I got, just from learning Chun's and Alex's wake up set-ups was astonishing.

 

Note: they are three types of wake up. Lay flat on the ground. Waking up on their exact spot ( by pressing L1) or waking up with a flip ( with L2). A lot of people even in daimond, do not know this, and have their waking up habits cemented. As in they'll always use one of the three and not vary between them.

 

With Chun, if it's the exact spot wake up after I put them on the ground, I dash once, press LP then Back HP. Flip wake up, dash twice, Back HP. If my opponents pressed a button, I would get a crush-counter followed by a big combo.

With Alex I just dash once, HP. Dash twice, HP. Same results.

 

E. Learn to cross-up. As in jump over your enemy, hit them from the other side and start a combo.

 

F. Learn some tricks and mind games. Some weird moves only to your character a few would know that you can exploit. With Chun, it was using V-skill to get a cross-up after my super that no ever suspects, or using my sliding poke into V-trigger. With Alex, it was if someone blocks my HP, I have time to go for a command grab.

Another thing with Alex, I would start the 1st round with the flying command grab, in the second round my opponents would think they're smart and jump to avoid it and I just do the flying knee.

 

G. Learn one combo that starts with a light attack into super to use on guaranteed punishable moves. Example: I block a heavy low kick that is -7, I use Light punch, to Chun's lighting Light kicks to super. Saved me a lot.

 

3. Learn your opponent's character. If you fight someone that's beating you with things you don't know. Go to training, set the character to repeat what they defeated you with and learn how to punish it. That helped me destroy a lot of characters strategies.

 

4. Bait DPs. A LOT and I mean A LOT of people in bronze to gold just love DP. So bait it, which will give a crush counter giving you a big combo.

 

5. Use your entire kit of offensive and defensive options. Like your V-reversals and V-shifts. Someone is pressuring you too much or you're about to get stunned, V-reversal to kick them away or escape the corner. Or V-shift to escape a move. My favourite thing to do is V-shifting a heavy punch or a heavy kick followed by the Critical Art for a full unscaled super damage.

 

6. Resist the urge to jump. If you're in a pinch, jumping should not be your first option. Space yourself, wait for your opponent to make a motion to jump from the corner or v-reversal out of danger. Jumping is effective when used selectively, or timing it on fireball start-ups to guarantee you don't get anti-aired.

 

This is a list of me reaching gold with Chun-Li in 2020-2021. You can see the improvements with each rank.

 

 

To prove my previous points, last week I started again on PC with Alex. I just learned my AA, one or two combos, one trick and one mind game. The rest was just blocking and punishing my opponents jumps, unsafe moves and their wake up. I upload a video of it here:

 

 

I hope all this will be of use to anyone still playing SF5 or just want to 100% the game and be done with it. Feel free to ask me anything.

Edited February 29 by Xx-KingOFDark-xX

[Beyondthegrave07]

This doesn't just work for SFV, but a lot of these tips work across ALL fighting games. Great guide in general @Xx-KingOFDark-xX!

 

The hardest part of any fighting game is not learning your character, it's learning the match ups of all the other characters. It's why personally, I think it's good to at least try every character and have a general understanding of how they work. For example, knowing Zangeif has troubles navigating through fireballs and zoners is helpful or knowing that Ken playstyle pushes the offense and plays more aggressive than someone like Dhalsim.

 

A lot of this is learned through playing, but it's important to not get frustrated at the beginning. If you find yourself struggling with a particular match up, lab it.

 

Unfortunately, the netcode and my dogwater internet can't handle me going for this trophy. Otherwise, I would go for it.

Edited February 28 by Beyondthegrave07

[x49ersblitzkreig]

Holy hell that's a lot to read but amazing guide mate.

[Xx-KingOFDark-xX]

15 hours ago, Beyondthegrave07 said:

This doesn't just work for SFV, but a lot of these tips work across ALL fighting games. Great guide in general @Xx-KingOFDark-xX!

 

The hardest part of any fighting game is not learning your character, it's learning the match ups of all the other characters. It's why personally, I think it's good to at least try every character and have a general understanding of how they work. For example, knowing Zangeif has troubles navigating through fireballs and zoners is helpful or knowing that Ken playstyle pushes the offense and plays more aggressive than someone like Dhalsim.

 

A lot of this is learned through playing, but it's important to not get frustrated at the beginning. If you find yourself struggling with a particular match up, lab it.

 

Unfortunately, the netcode and my dogwater internet can't handle me going for this trophy. Otherwise, I would go for it.

 

That's true about the learning the other characters. 

 

However, I did not touch on it too much because in the case of SFV, many players up to super gold just throw obvious unsafe  moves (your heavy kicks, tatsus....etc), jump a lot and have just the one fightingplan (flowchart). Which why I put a lot of emphasis on learning your character. For just learning the basics and having a 55% - 65% winrate will be enough to get you to gold. With AA, punishes and figuring out the flowcharts. Especially considering, you only fight gold players when you reach ultra silver. And all the bronze and silver players do all the shenanigans and nonsense I mentioned. 

15 hours ago, x49ersblitzkreig said:

Holy hell that's a lot to read but amazing guide mate.

Thank you very much. That really means a lot. 

[Xx-KingOFDark-xX]

A bit of an update.

I have managed to reach platinum using the same tips above.

 

When you reach Ultra Silver, you begin to fight people in gold. With gold players, there are two types of players.

 

25% of the time you will fight actual good players who make the occasional mistakes. You just have you outsmart and outplay them, and they will be more of a challenge you have to overcome.

 

The other 75% are just players who reached to gold and even platinum depending on BS most people don't know. Either they have perfected a string of attacks and combos and you just have to break their "flowchart" and they will be helpless. Bringing us back to point 3 above. Or just using random attacks that are rare to see and hence not able to counter.

 

Like this Vega player below. He beat me once using Vega's flying moves. I watched a quick video on what to do and faced him again. I haven't perfected the timing on punishing his moves since I never went into training for it but it got the job done. Once I broke his "flowchart", he basically turned into a bronze player who doesn't know what to do. Even ragequit when I bested him a 3rd time.  My V-trigger parry also helped, so if you character has a parry skill that will do a lot of work.

 

One thing I learned is some players are just reacting to your character moving to do their moves. Like when I baited the Vega player below at 1:33. When they just reacted to my V-skill and I dashed back to punish them. So a good trick is bait and punish. 

 

 

 

Same thing applies all the way to platinum. One important thing I need to emphases is KEEP CALM AND OBSERVE. I'm not using many combo with Alex and 75% of what carried me to platinum is blocking and figuring out people's habits. Do they jump after I block their moves, do they always dash and throw, they always press low HK after their combo. Stuff like that and then it's just catching them from their habits.

 

Another helpful tip is keep an eye on what V-skill and V-trigger a player uses before the match. So you would not be caught off guard. I knew this Vega player's flower v-trigger so whenever it was full. I kept jumping to avoid it or blocking when I'm afar as I knew he liked to throw it randomly or on wake-up.

 

This is a video of me reaching Platinum.

 

One thing to note where which relates to point 1.D above:

Quote

D. Learn some set-ups on people you throw to the ground. Like I said above, when someone is waking up from the ground, they are at a disadvantage ( red ). Meaning if you press a well-timed poke as they're waking up and they press a button, you'll get a counter or a crush counter. From which, you launch a combo. Once you condition them and they start blocking, you begin throwing them or command grabbing them. And people up to gold LOVE pressing buttons on wake-up. The amount of crushing counter I got, just from learning Chun's and Alex's wake up set-ups was astonishing.

I had already faced this Rose player before, and hit them with multiple HP crush-counters until they learned to block. Once they were conditioned to block on wake-up, I just started command grabbing them.

Also, I already got hit with Rose's V-trigger and learned she's always plus (blue) when active. So this time I just blocked and waited for an anti-air until the V-trigger ran out.
 

 

 

Edited March 13 by Xx-KingOFDark-xX

[Xx-KingOFDark-xX]

I realized I never explained what a flowchart is. It's basically a string of moves and actions that a player will only do and nothing else. You figured it out and they're done.

As you go higher in the ranks the flowchart will become more difficult to counter but it will always have a weakness you can use to break it. Even if it is a single -3 move on block that you can punish with a 3 frame light attack.

 

Here's the usual flowchart of a Ken player that I hope will do a better job explaining it.

 

Edited March 13 by Xx-KingOFDark-xX