I need some help with Liu Kang, I get that some in here think it's in our favor - I just fail to see why. Either I suck against this guy specifically despite labbing his pressure string, or I just meet the God Kangs consistently. He punishes us HARD, he doesn't HAVE to play footises since his fullscreen game is good (ours is too, it's about getting lifelead). His throw game is crazy good because his pressure string demands so much respect and we have to be very considerate in terms of poking. Are we even able to punish the flying kick with our average speed mids? It seems to be a really tight window if possible. Can we punish low fireball (and the enhanced version)? Every time I try he blocks in time. Can I interrupt with d4 when he goes for the + on block ender? I can only do it somewhat consistently with d1
I do find success with baiting his string after f344 and back dash, but his f12 string catches that - and sometimes his main string catches my attempt at whiff punishing lol but that's just my dumbass not letting him flush the 4 in the string before punishing. And online is a big factor too, I can't count how many timers I've been KB'ed by the ender even though I read he wanted to go for it and tried to hit him out of it
I know where you're coming from, but let's take a step back from the losses and break some of this down.
First point- he does have to play footsies, and he loses them. Johnny's fireball is faster than Liu Kang's. If you're referring to LK's teleport variation, I'd like to point out that his teleport options are all unsafe, it's a mixup. As for fireballs, his are slower to come out and slightly slower to travel the screen.
Continuing with the footsies thing, check out his best normals. F4, f3... Uh... B1? Even b2. The range on all of them is pathetic compared to Johnny's. This is the biggest thing keeping it in our favor. He's one of the easiest matchups imo just because of how hard our normals raw outspace his.
Fly kick is high and -20, nearly identical to Shadow Kick. It's punishable by f344, but if that gives you trouble then f21 nutpunch should work. If you're feeling ballsy, it's possible to duck and uppercut as it passes over.
His throw game is kinda eh, since you only need to tech backthrow. His fwd throw puts you back at fullscreen where you're free to outprojectile and outspace him. Both low fireball and amp are full combo punishable. These are things you just have to lab. It's an easier punish than cassies amped low guns. Pretty sure the gap is big enough for d4 on his f43u3, but you have to get the timing down. D1 should work everytime. This is another issue that boils down to practice. You can only backdash f43u3 after the last hit as a reversal if he started the string from further away. If he starts this string close to you and you try the backdash reversal, his next f43 will catch you if his inputs are tight.
Sounds like a lot of what you've said boils down to simple lab work, and a lot of fundamental improvements. Once you've fixed those, don't forget all his options from f43 are unsafe. As anyone vs LK, it's very important to stay vigilant for stagger points since they're all -7. You have to be patient, hold block, and look for when to let it go. D4 is definitely your best bet to interupt the u3, since it stops both the finisher and the parry, and the only thing he's left with is blocking which creates a gap you can use to get out, or lowfireball which only rewards him a negligible amount of damage, and you can blow him up on a read.
Lol how can Cage be in favor of a matchup with someone that has a 9 frame mid?
If parry was like kang's then probably yes but in this case: No.
Who cares how fast it is when you should never be in range to worry about blocking it? If you give him a jump in, that's on you. In equal level of play he doesn't get many of these to connect in this MU without that. And further, the risk/reward ratio is skewed in the opponent's favor. Low fireball amp is like 150dmg, and his hit confirm from f43 bike kick is only 220 amped. If you just block and he fireballs, we get our full 300+ dmg combo. Same if you hold block and react to his parry.
People are overrating LK imo, he's MKX SD Johnny is all. F43 is 11. Holding block and reacting is the new armor reversal that tears the whole mixup apart. He's not chipping you out with this shit. If they want to complete it, I just give them the + frames and stay patient, and nuke em on anything else. D4 beats throw stagger too, so there's not much he can do.
