Kage Maru

Recently I have been trying to seriously learn Kage as a secondary character and I have to say I am having a whole lot of fun. I have dabbled with Kage before in the past, but I have never ever really tried to become really strong with him. He is a very interesting character where you constantly have to change the tempo of a fight depending on your opponents fighting style. Currently for me though I find myself more on the turtling end than on the offensive end where I would like to be. I guess it's mainly because I do not know to many tricks with him to feel comfortable fighting up close the whole match yet. There are many other reasons for this, but the most annoying one is that most online players are just fucking spammers. You can put them in a HIGH disadvantage position while you are trying to setup for a trick or strategy and they will still continue to attack no matter what the situation. I really don't get it! I beat so many players yesterday with what I am calling KSP which is known as KONJOU SUPER PUNCH! This elite VF tactic is guaranteed to own all high level noob online players. Have you ever lost to a Sarah player who has a rank of 8th Dan or better that you are better than and you just don't know why you lost? Have you lost to Brad players around the board with ranks ranging from Kyu's to Master and you just can't seem to seal the win? Why is it that Lei Fei players always seem to be beating you to the punch all the time? Well my friends I can assure you that with KONJOU SUPER PUNCH you will not have to worry anymore. It's guaranteed to help you get the win and pwn that fucking noob. More on KSP later.

The hardest problem I am having with Kage is getting sufficient damage. I think it's total bullshit that when I block a move that leaves someone at -17 I can only get PK damage where as someone like Akira can do 46P plus a follow up combo. This is another reason that prevents me from staying close. Keeping a small distance can be vital to Kage getting damage if something whiffs. But, what if the person is equally as skilled as I am or has superb defense better than my own? Now the difficulty of getting damage from that type of player has doubled if not tripled. Another area I am having trouble with is I do not know all of Kage's options for getting out of situations. For example I was playing ranking battle yesterday with VF395 who is a regular VFDC user and a really good Lei Fei player. There were many times during our matches where he would just constantly turn his back to me with Lei Fei and just use those strong back turned skills that sabaki and leave him totally safe. Even if something missed or whiffed he would just switch to another stance and then switch back to normal backed turned stance and just rinse repeat until something hit or he caused a stagger. For many matches I felt help less against this and always found myself at the wrong end of the guessing game simply because I could not figure out what move Kage has that can turn the tide or help me escape this trap. Although I was winning most of the matches, it was highly annoying to deal with this situation and I desperately wanted a way out of it. If I had Akira then it would be no problem as I understand all of his options and what move is best for most situations. It took me about 10 matches while brain storming in between rounds before it hit me. I remembered a conversation I had with Denkai(GT: BlackBauerCTU) about Lei's back turn situations and how good they were. Denkai's response was basically "pppffft I love when he turns his back and I am using Jacky. I just 46K+G and he is done!" This is not his exact words, but it's close enough. Unfortunately Kage does not have such a move, but remembering this conversation helped me figure out the answer. DOH Konjou use a fucking move that he can't sabaki to force him to hesitate next time or use the switch stance command to avoid your incoming attack. The answer??? *in my best Guile impersonation voice* SOMERSAULT! After about 3-4 flip kicks immediately upon turning his back it helped change the overall flow of the match and made the situation much more easier to deal with. Who says VF isn't about character knowledge? Especially when that knowledge is for your own character! Of coarse I know from back turned it's easy for Lei Fei to avoid incoming attacks, but now instead of me having to guess HE has to guess. This tide turning move now puts me on the offense although I am on the defense. It's 50/50 guess now. If I think he will attack immediately upon back turned just *Guile voice again* SOMERSAULT, if I think he will switch stance to avoid then just dash and throw. PWNED!

Alright that's enough ramble for now. I can't wait to get home and work on my Kage some more. There is so many things I have to practice and perfect especially that damn 4 hit uppercut combo from hell. It looks like I might have to practice that on a daily basis to be able to hit it on a constant basis. It's by far the hardest move or series of moves in the game. Christ I would kill for the Dural version of it! After I dabble with Kage for a few more weeks I think I will move on to Eileen next.