Here we are again to discuss Seth, probably the most misunderstood character on the Super Street Fighter 4 roster. In out last two articles we covered an introduction to Seth, his basic moves, and some of the things I learned my first night playing as Seth online with an Ibuki player. To recap shortly, basically the impact of Seth’s low stamina and damage output are factors that need to be heavily looked at and regarded when you first consider using Seth. Also, the need to be almost pin point precise with your combos is pivotal to succeeding with Seth.
Let’s get onto some new stuff.
I’ve had a little time to experiment a little more with Seth online and I figured I’d share my results with the readers of GuysNation, since it looks like these articles have been getting a fair amount of readers.
First, I want to address a move of Seth’s that I had previously forgotten. It’s his “Super” move, which is a move that can only be performed when your Super meter at the bottom of the screen is full. This is the same bar that allows you to perform EX moves.
If you aren’t familiar with what EX moves are then allow me to explain. EX moves are stronger versions of a special move and your character will flash yellow when you use them. To perform an EX move you perform the move normally, however, instead of hitting just one of the punch or kick buttons you hit two of them. For example, Seth’s Sonic Boom attack. To do it normal it’s a quarter circle forward and one punch button; light, medium, or fierce. However, if you perform the quarter circle forward and then press light and medium at the same time, as long as you have at least a fourth of your Super Meter full, Seth will glow yellow and rapidly fire off two Sonic Booms instead of one.
Back to Seth’s Super move. The move is called Tanden Storm and basically what Seth does is forms a ball of energy between his hands, the opponent, if close enough, is sucked in and heavily damaged. Here is a video of Tanden Storm in action, again I’d embed it but WordPress is stupid about embedding.
Now, you might be asking yourself, “Well? What’s so special about that?”. For one, it does almost as much damage as his Ultras at the cost of his Super Meter. One of the things about this move that will end up saving you is the insane amount of chip damage it does. Chip damage is basically the damage done while blocking, for the most part only projectiles and non-fist/kick attacks do chip damage. Plus, the fact that it draws the opponent in means you can use this Super from almost anywhere and your opponent will be drawn in. But what if he blocks? Well, if you play your cards right it won’t matter. If you use it when your opponent is low on life you can guarantee that at least the chip damage will kill them if they block. It it hits, unblocked, your opponent can kiss about a bit less than half of their life goodbye.
Okay, so remember earlier when we were talking about the Sonic Boom? I want to get into that move at this junction because it’s a pretty important tool for Seth.
The Sonic Boom is what we call a zoning or spacing tool. Basically, it’s a way of keeping your opponent from advancing on you by giving him something else to worry about, like a projectile. This can also help you figure out your opponent’s strategy because you can see how they’ll react to a projectile and find ways to punish them. With Seth, depending on which button you press will determine the speed of the Sonic Boom. If you press fierce punch a fast Sonic Boom will come out, medium punch and you get a Sonic Boom that is a little slower, and using light punch sends out a rather slow Sonic Boom. Now, you might be thinking, “What’s the point of a slow Sonic Boom? That’s dumb, just toss the fast one.” Well, that’s what the other guy is thinking too. Here’s what I do and you’d be surprised how often this works.
Throw a fast fierce punch Sonic Boom. Then a medium Sonic Boom. Then another fast Sonic Boom. By this point most people with resort to jumping over them thinking they have the timing down and not wanting to take anymore chip damage than they have to. So, what now? Throw a slow Sonic Boom and they jump right into it. Why? Because they’re anticipating a fast Sonic Boom and don’t expect one moving so slow. I suppose it’s kind of a mindgame, but like I said, you’d be surprised how often it works. Especially on Ibuki who is jumping all over the place. The same goes for the EX version, since there are two Sonic Booms instead of one it will be much harder to jump over and obviously does more chip damage.
We’re not done with the Sonic Boom yet. There is one more thing about the Sonic Boom I’d like to bring up and that is the combination of a slow Sonic Boom and a teleport. Basically, what you do is throw a slow Sonic Boom and then when the Sonic Boom is about mid screen teleport using the kick buttons and you’ll end up behind your opponent. Why? Because your opponent will have to decide one of two things. Block the oncoming Sonic Boom but be forced to take whatever damage you dish out when you exit the teleport or take the Sonic Boom and pray they can block the other way fast enough to not get hit by both the Sonic Boom and your fist. Now, this HAS to be done with the slow Sonic Boom because the other Sonic Boom variations are too fast and won’t give you enough time after the recovery frames, basically the time it takes the animation to finish so you can do another move, of the Sonic Boom to teleport.
While on the topic of teleporting, I’d like to make reference to a point I made in the previous article. I said that teleporting in close to your opponent was a tricky business. But I found something that, well, I guess it kinda falls under mindgames again. So, we said that teleporting in on your opponent more than twice is probably a bad idea because they’ll start getting the idea and attacking as soon as they see you teleport. If this happens and you have a full Ultra Meter? Get ready for some fun.
So, your opponent thinks they have your number. They’ve been burned by your teleport shenanigans for the last time. They attack into a combo on reaction and refuse to let you burn them again. So what do you do? You teleport. But, when you teleport. Hit your Ultra. That’s right, Seth’s Ultra can be done out of a teleport. I’ve also discovered that there is almost no move, Super or Ultra even, that will out-prioritize Seth’s second Ultra. So, even if they react to your Ultra with their own Ultra? You’ll still win out if you used Seth’s Tanden Typhoon.
However, this is a serious risk as well and you’ve GOT to make sure that you’re certain your opponent will try to attack you right out of your teleport. Because if they block it and you throw that Ultra? You’re a sitting duck because Seth takes FOREVER to recover from that Ultra.
We’ll stop there for now. I know this article was dominated a little by the Sonic Boom but it is a very important tool for Seth and can be used to set up a lot of damage giving opportunities if properly utilized.
Just like last time, be sure to keep an eye out for my next article where I continue to talk about Seth, what I’ve learned playing Seth, and just whatever comes to mind as a beginner Seth player. Also, if you are a more proficient Seth player or just a better Super Street Fighter 4 player in general then feel free to tell me if I’ve said something inaccurate, leave tips, or even just something I didn’t know.
Until next time…
The Stage of Battle is SETH – Are You?
All images and characters represented are not my own. All images and characters are the copyright and property of Capcom Entertainment, Inc.
Also, if you all want my opinion on a character from the Super Street Fighter 4 roster, or just the Street Fighter universe in general, feel free to leave a comment here and ask.
Who is the best character to play with?
That’s a little subjective, I mean with enough skill any character can be pretty much the best character. I’d probably have to give the nod to Rufus just because of the relative ease in comboing into his Ultra. Plus, his normal moves do quite a bit of damage, his combos aren’t all that difficult to learn and he has a lot of life. One if his drawbacks is he has a low stun, but that’s kinda meh to me. But, a lot of the high tier players use him. Like if you’ve ever seen a player named Justin Wong use Rufus? You don’t beat him unless your name is Daigo Umehara.
Why is M. Bison shown as being “Vega”?
A good question to those not familiar with the history of Street Fighter. Basically, when Street Fighter created in Japan the Shadowloo’s names had to change. Mostly because Capcom America thought that M.Bison, being the original name for Boxer (Balrog), was far too close to Mike Tyson, M.Tyson. So, they decided to swap the names of Bison, Vega, and Balrog. But, those changes were only made for the American game. The screenshot above is a Japanese screen.
The original Japanese names are as follow:
Vega = M.Bison (Dictator)
Balrog = Vega (Claw)
M.Bison = Balrog (Boxer)
Most in the Street Fighter community just refer to them now as Dictator, Claw, and Boxer to avoid confusion when talking about them.
Claw > Dictator > Boxer
I used to main Vega (Claw), in Street Fighter 4 before Super. He was given some serious upgrades in Super and went from being a low tier character to a mid-high tier character with the improvements he was given.
Gotta love the Spanish Ninja.