Ken Far Standing Fierce

Ken’s far standing fierce is actually more useful than it seems. It’s great as anti-air, and good at poking at the taller characters like Dudley and Alex, but other than that, it doesn’t intuitively seem useful as a poke against the majority of the cast because almost everyone can duck under it. However, it works great as a poke against a waking opponent. It will hit every character on the standing frame of wake ups, even if they crouch. The great thing about this is that far fierce has great range, can’t be parried low, and it links into Jinrai.

This is a great new way to put pressure on an opponent and really adds to Ken’s mix-up options from mid range. From mid-range, where Ken can hit with low forward but low shorts shiff, there is not much Ken can do high that can’t be parried on reaction. Low forward super is the biggest threat from that range, so an opponent is likely to parry down rather than forward if Ken has meter. But now if Ken does far stand fierce as the opponent gets up, he hits a down parrier and links Jinrai. Far stand fierce is a much better move to do in place of stand roundhouse because if it hits you can link super, and if it is blocked, there is no risk of retaliation like with stand roundhouse. The move has really deceptive range, most people are shocked when they get hit by it.

Far stand fierce is really useful against Yun and Yang. When Ken forward throws Yun and he quick recovers, he gets up faster than most characters. If Ken dashes forward immediately after throwing him, Yun can throw Ken before he can do anything. So do neutral throw with Ken instead. After the throw Yun may wake up parry or try to jump. But instead he will get hit by far stand fierce linked into Jinrai. It used to be so annoying to throw Yun and be put at a disadvantage for knocking him down. Now Ken can have a real high/low mix up after the throw without putting him self at much risk.

Chun Li is the one exception to all of this. She for some reason doesn’t have a wake-up standing frame like everyone else for some reason. Really sucks because Chun Li quick recovers really quickly as well, and this would be useful against her if it worked.