MK11 SHANG TSUNG Match Up Thread

[SaSSolino]

Riffle stance zones every kharacter in the game, that is why it’s only 8 shots. With Shang’s zoning options that shouldn’t be a problem for a whole match. Scud shot doesn’t work against corpses. You zone him with that, after he’s learnt that Scud shot doesn’t help, your other options open up.
Even if he amplifies scud shot before your Corpse falls it’s whatever, just 6% and he just lost a bar, you will take more damage by making him block 3 corpses.
The only time you really can’t zone is when he’s got FB ready.
I think the MU is closer to 5:5, but I need to play it more

I haven't tried zoning with Corpse too much since, as you said, I always got AMP Scud Shot on reaction. I should try it more.

I don’t think her drone is better. It is different , it has better hit advantage. And that’s it. The start up is 30 frames , while Shang’s is 26. It only does 6% damage (9% for the Corpse), and is -23 on block (-16 for the Corpse) . On top of all that it only does 1.75% chip. And every time she blocks your Corpse there is a mind game of Amplified or not. She has to either wait a bit or jump out before the amplify. Both of which give you another turn at a skull or at another corpse.

Yeah, not really. Drone drop knocks down, so even if it does less damage it gives her the turn, which is super big since her projectile is better than Shang's in every possible way.

 

[legion666]

I haven't tried zoning with Corpse too much since, as you said, I always got AMP Scud Shot on reaction. I should try it more.



Yeah, not really. Drone drop knocks down, so even if it does less damage it gives her the turn, which is super big since her projectile is better than Shang's in every possible way.

“Not really” doesn’t address any of the stuff I have just listed. I am not here to argue, I am giving an advice. Don’t really care if it is a bad MU for you. Knockdown on her drone only matters if you get hit! Block it and drop a reversal corpse - you did more chip and she needs to read the amplify or not. In a chip war ,which is what happens if both opponents are playing it properly, she looses. Shang’s projectile is good enough to hit her as well if they both shoot around the same time. Plus if your Corpse hits her raw, or if she reads the amplify wrong and gets hit you knock her down as well.

 

[kcd117]

At first, I thought this character was guaranteed top tier, now I really don't know how I feel about him.

He has some amazing and very dominant tools, I thought they would be enough to handle every character. That is not really the case tbh.

Some of his problem matchups seem to be:

Erron - Really hard for him, can't be zoned, FB limits Shang a lot, F4 really kills the neutral, stupid oki... 4-6.

Cassie - One variation outzones Shang with knee shot, the other is shoulder shoulder shoulder shoulder to punish everything you try to do at the range Shang shines. 4-6.

Scorpion - Basically you can't play neutral. 4-6.

Jacqui - Whoever sold that bill that Jacqui struggles against zoning needs to level up. The character gets in for free with dash punch and B2, staggers you to death and has the added benefit of making Shang's D3 whiff when she is doing her F3. 4.5-5.5.

Geras - This is Shang's worst matchup imo. He seems to destroy him at every range. 4-6 or worse.

Sonya - heavy lifelead based matchup, whoever gets the first hit usually wins, but Shang doesn't have 50% conversions from 50/50s to make a comeback lol. 4.5-5.5.

Cetrion - One of his worst, you can't really win at any range vs this character, she really shuts him down. 4-6 or worse.

Sub-Zero - The slide variation destroys Shang, punishes everything he does in the mid-range game, and can keep him out pretty effectively. 4-6 or worse.


The only high tier characters he seems to do really well against are Kabal and Jade.

 

[CitizenSnips]

At first, I thought this character was guaranteed top tier, now I really don't know how I feel about him.

He has some amazing and very dominant tools, I thought they would be enough to handle every character. That is not really the case tbh.

Some of his problem matchups seem to be:

Erron - Really hard for him, can't be zoned, FB limits Shang a lot, F4 really kills the neutral, stupid oki... 4-6.

Cassie - One variation outzones Shang with knee shot, the other is shoulder shoulder shoulder shoulder to punish everything you try to do at the range Shang shines. 4-6.

Scorpion - Basically you can't play neutral. 4-6.

Jacqui - Whoever sold that bill that Jacqui struggles against zoning needs to level up. The character gets in for free with dash punch and B2, staggers you to death and has the added benefit of making Shang's D3 whiff when she is doing her F3. 4.5-5.5.

Geras - This is Shang's worst matchup imo. He seems to destroy him at every range. 4-6 or worse.

Sonya - heavy lifelead based matchup, whoever gets the first hit usually wins, but Shang doesn't have 50% conversions from 50/50s to make a comeback lol. 4.5-5.5.

Cetrion - One of his worst, you can't really win at any range vs this character, she really shuts him down. 4-6 or worse.

Sub-Zero - The slide variation destroys Shang, punishes everything he does in the mid-range game, and can keep him out pretty effectively. 4-6 or worse.


The only high tier characters he seems to do really well against are Kabal and Jade.

I agree with a lot of this although I think Sonya is along with Geras his worst matchup so far. Imo Sonya has a much easier time getting the life lead and also evening it out if she is down a bit and she wins full screen and wins up close due to high damage potential. Shang has to basically contain her in groundfireball range but it seems pretty difficult to do that.

I haven't played a long set against a really great Jacqui but so far I haven't had too many issues zoning her out. I am positive once she's close it's hell for Shang but I think as long as you can read and dael with the dash punch she is one of the easier top tiers to zone out.

I think Liu Kang may be problematic too. Flying kick keeps some of his zoning in check and does good damage on enhance. Up close playing the poke game can be dangerous due to his F4. Not too sure if I would say it's in either characters favor but it's not an easy matchup.

One thing I like to do against Scorpion after doing a combo on him is corpse drop as he's getting up. A lot of times it seems like Scorpion will getup and teleport or they see the incoming corpse drop animation on their getup and think they can teleport to punish but the corpse will hit them. You have to time it a bit but it doesn't seem too hard to do.

 

[kcd117]

I agree with a lot of this although I think Sonya is along with Geras his worst matchup so far. Imo Sonya has a much easier time getting the life lead and also evening it out if she is down a bit and she wins full screen and wins up close due to high damage potential. Shang has to basically contain her in groundfireball range but it seems pretty difficult to do that.

I haven't played a long set against a really great Jacqui but so far I haven't had too many issues zoning her out. I am positive once she's close it's hell for Shang but I think as long as you can read and dael with the dash punch she is one of the easier top tiers to zone out.

I think Liu Kang may be problematic too. Flying kick keeps some of his zoning in check and does good damage on enhance. Up close playing the poke game can be dangerous due to his F4. Not too sure if I would say it's in either characters favor but it's not an easy matchup.

One thing I like to do against Scorpion after doing a combo on him is corpse drop as he's getting up. A lot of times it seems like Scorpion will getup and teleport or they see the incoming corpse drop animation on their getup and think they can teleport to punish but the corpse will hit them. You have to time it a bit but it doesn't seem too hard to do.

I forgot about Kang. He is definitely a terrible match too. Beats Shang everywhere in the screen.

 

[deathstroke187]

again noob saibot shut down your footsies and anything shang does full screen beside corpse drops shang lose 40% and his air scythe move goes through shang projectiles and full combo punish

4-6 or worst

 

[SaSSolino]

again noob saibot shut down your footsies and anything shang does full screen beside corpse drops shang lose 40% and his air scythe move goes through shang projectiles and full combo punish

4-6 or worst

Are you sure? I never felt on a disadvantage in the Noob match up.

 

[dribirut]

I really think some of you guys are really over exaggerating his losing matchups. I’ve been maining him since launch and can’t think of a single mu I can say he definitely loses. I’m not saying he doesn’t have one but he without a doubt has tools to compete in any mu imo

 

[CitizenSnips]

I really think some of you guys are really over exaggerating his losing matchups. I’ve been maining him since launch and can’t think of a single mu I can say he definitely loses. I’m not saying he doesn’t have one but he without a doubt has tools to compete in any mu imo

I think a lot of people including myself are not saying we are 100% right but most people tend to come to the same conclusion about certain matchups. Shang has all the tools to win for sure but in reality some characters are much harder to contain or dictate the match a bit better than others which are harder matchups for him. I definitely think Shang is one of the better/best characters in the game but at the same time I think he has some bad matchups. On the flipside I think he does extremely well against a good number of the cast too

 

[kcd117]

I really think some of you guys are really over exaggerating his losing matchups. I’ve been maining him since launch and can’t think of a single mu I can say he definitely loses. I’m not saying he doesn’t have one but he without a doubt has tools to compete in any mu imo

He has the dmg output to stay in the game in every matchup if people fuck up.

Competing when the oponent plays right is another story tho. I just can’t see how he would be able to compete against a decent Cetrion or Geras for example.

I do think he is a very good character, and that he beats a lot of characters, but he seems to have very polarized matchups so far. He either beats a character in a fundamental level or gets beat in a fundamental level.

I wish I was exagerating vut out of the top 10 characters in this game, he has at least 9 bad matchups.

I’d say the top 10 are:

Erron, Sonya, Scorpion, Gerras, Jacqui, Cassie, Cetrion, Kabal, Liu and Sub.

Everyone in this list gives him a lot of problems, with the exception of Kabal, a character he kinda mops.

I don’t think he is bad, but I can’t say a character that will struggle against the most used characters in tournament setting is one of the better characters.

I honestly think he is perfect the way he is, only thing I’d change about him is make his D3 -6 bc it is dumb rn. If variations are added he’ll end up with shake in one of them and that move alone would have big impact so I’m not really worried about him in the long run, he is fun to play and has some solid tools. He is just nowhere near the top tiers rn, and that is great, bc they are all broken.

 

[LawAbidingCitizen]

He has the dmg output to stay in the game in every matchup if people fuck up.

Competing when the oponent plays right is another story tho. I just can’t see how he would be able to compete against a decent Cetrion or Geras for example.

I do think he is a very good character, and that he beats a lot of characters, but he seems to have very polarized matchups so far. He either beats a character in a fundamental level or gets beat in a fundamental level.

I wish I was exagerating vut out of the top 10 characters in this game, he has at least 9 bad matchups.

I’d say the top 10 are:

Erron, Sonya, Scorpion, Gerras, Jacqui, Cassie, Cetrion, Kabal, Liu and Sub.

Everyone in this list gives him a lot of problems, with the exception of Kabal, a character he kinda mops.

I don’t think he is bad, but I can’t say a character that will struggle against the most used characters in tournament setting is one of the better characters.

I honestly think he is perfect the way he is, only thing I’d change about him is make his D3 -6 bc it is dumb rn. If variations are added he’ll end up with shake in one of them and that move alone would have big impact so I’m not really worried about him in the long run, he is fun to play and has some solid tools. He is just nowhere near the top tiers rn, and that is great, bc they are all broken.

I've been saying it forever. I feel Shang is honest. He is definitely not S Tier but he is definitely in A Tier. He has annoying stuff like Ground Skulls and Corpse but its far from broke. Considering at least 11 characters have solid teleports his zoning is countered. What I feel makes him lose Matchups isn't a lack of tools or options its characters shutting down his zoning or making it very unsafe. He us a momentum zoner that capitalizes off hit adv from his projectiles but characters like: Cetrion, Scorpion, Geras, Scarlet, Cassie, Erron, Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Raiden can shut his zoning down. Some do it with Teleports some do it on reaction with counter zoning tools but anything that stops his zoning on reaction basically shuts down his main strength. He does have good F2(ranged mid at 17f) and B3(10f low)/D3/D4 for close up but essentially he is a get off me character that excels from Mid to full screen range once that is countered its very difficult to get shit going.
B3U4/B3D4 is fuzzy blockable and full combo punishable with 15f gap..
B3xxDB1 is full combo punishable when blocked, second hit wiffs.
B1D2 is reactable but can be staggered.
F242 can be poked 6f and is FB punished and no plus frames on regular FB. Massive recovery and gap on Wiff.
Nearly every projectile us punishable near full screen vs certain matchups.
Soulsteal is punishable by a good number of Characters.
Solid character though.

I do feel Geras, Scorpion, Jacqui, Cetrion, Sub Zero are bad MU's for him but I'm nor sure about Sonya or Cassie just yet. I'm thinking Scarlet might be but unsure as well. Usually teleports counter his zoning hard.
Its the honeymoon phase and once that dies down and a few majors pass I bet he drips in tiers. Since everyone and thier dog will be using him at EVO I bet we will see him higher on Tiers until the tech to counter him becomes common knowledge.

 

[deathstroke187]

He has the dmg output to stay in the game in every matchup if people fuck up.

Competing when the oponent plays right is another story tho. I just can’t see how he would be able to compete against a decent Cetrion or Geras for example.

I do think he is a very good character, and that he beats a lot of characters, but he seems to have very polarized matchups so far. He either beats a character in a fundamental level or gets beat in a fundamental level.

I wish I was exagerating vut out of the top 10 characters in this game, he has at least 9 bad matchups.

I’d say the top 10 are:

Erron, Sonya, Scorpion, Gerras, Jacqui, Cassie, Cetrion, Kabal, Liu and Sub.

Everyone in this list gives him a lot of problems, with the exception of Kabal, a character he kinda mops.

I don’t think he is bad, but I can’t say a character that will struggle against the most used characters in tournament setting is one of the better characters.

I honestly think he is perfect the way he is, only thing I’d change about him is make his D3 -6 bc it is dumb rn. If variations are added he’ll end up with shake in one of them and that move alone would have big impact so I’m not really worried about him in the long run, he is fun to play and has some solid tools. He is just nowhere near the top tiers rn, and that is great, bc they are all broken.

jesus finally , i agree with that 100%. hes not bad but his not top 10. But its fine he doesnt need to be his very fun to play with but i dont think its a character we will see a lot at high level. I wouldnt buff him and i wouldnt nerf him i feel like his balanced.

 

[deathstroke187]

I've been saying it forever. I feel Shang is honest. He is definitely not S Tier but he is definitely in A Tier. He has annoying stuff like Ground Skulls and Corpse but its far from broke. Considering at least 11 characters have solid teleports his zoning is countered. What I feel makes him lose Matchups isn't a lack of tools or options its characters shutting down his zoning or making it very unsafe. He us a momentum zoner that capitalizes off hit adv from his projectiles but characters like: Cetrion, Scorpion, Geras, Scarlet, Cassie, Erron, Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Raiden can shut his zoning down. Some do it with Teleports some do it on reaction with counter zoning tools but anything that stops his zoning on reaction basically shuts down his main strength. He does have good F2(ranged mid at 17f) and B3(10f low)/D3/D4 for close up but essentially he is a get off me character that excels from Mid to full screen range once that is countered its very difficult to get shit going.
B3U4/B3D4 is fuzzy blockable and full combo punishable with 15f gap..
B3xxDB1 is full combo punishable when blocked, second hit wiffs.
B1D2 is reactable but can be staggered.
F242 can be poked 6f and is FB punished and no plus frames on regular FB. Massive recovery and gap on Wiff.
Nearly every projectile us punishable near full screen vs certain matchups.
Soulsteal is punishable by a good number of Characters.
Solid character though.

I do feel Geras, Scorpion, Jacqui, Cetrion, Sub Zero are bad MU's for him but I'm nor sure about Sonya or Cassie just yet. I'm thinking Scarlet might be but unsure as well. Usually teleports counter his zoning hard.
Its the honeymoon phase and once that dies down and a few majors pass I bet he drips in tiers. Since everyone and thier dog will be using him at EVO I bet we will see him higher on Tiers until the tech to counter him becomes common knowledge.

I feel like Skarlet outzone Shang maybe im just bad in this mu. but she has better footsies than him mid screen maybe shang wins close range ?

 

[LawAbidingCitizen]

Im

I feel like Skarlet outzone Shang maybe im just bad in this mu. but she has better footsies than him mid screen maybe shang wins close range ?

Thinking the same but I haven't played vs high level scarlets enough to actually know for sure.

 

[kcd117]

B3U4/B3D4 is fuzzy blockable and full combo punishable with 15f gap..
B3xxDB1 is full combo punishable when blocked, second hit wiffs.
B1D2 is reactable but can be staggered.
F242 can be poked 6f and is FB punished and no plus frames on regular FB. Massive recovery and gap on Wiff.
Nearly every projectile us punishable near full screen vs certain matchups.
Soulsteal is punishable by a good number of Characters.
Solid character though.

I do feel Geras, Scorpion, Jacqui, Cetrion, Sub Zero are bad MU's for him but I'm nor sure about Sonya or Cassie just yet. I'm thinking Scarlet might be but unsure as well. Usually teleports counter his zoning hard.
Its the honeymoon phase and once that dies down and a few majors pass I bet he drips in tiers. Since everyone and thier dog will be using him at EVO I bet we will see him higher on Tiers until the tech to counter him becomes common knowledge.

One thing that helps a lot against good players is staggering B3 and going for S3. Smart people will start punishing the B3U4 gap but using this you will punish them with max dmg combos for trying, making the guessing game heavily in your favor. I really think his staggers into backdash S3 or just raw S3 are very very underrated, I have been abusing it against good players and they keep falling for it bc this character is hella annoying lol.

I think people say that he is S tier and stuff bc of his potato tendencies in some matchups, but with time people will figure out and stop getting hit by his gimmicky and fake stuff. Even top players haven't really studied this character properly yet. For example, we can see sonic fox playing against foxy, he did not know that Cassie can reversal shoulder out of the first ground skull, or just flawless block and punish it for free. Or ninjakilla, he is still not flawless blocking reversal flying kick the ground skulls, the Sonya players are not abusing her low crushing boot against him up close, they are also not flawless blocking the second hit of ground skulls even tho they can get a dash in B1 punish unless you space it correctly.

I think the "Shang is busted" narrative will be buried as soon as people actually lab the character properly and things become common knowledge. For now, I just hope NRS doesn't kneejerk nerf him bc the only thing that is messed up about him is his dumb D3.

 

[legion666]

I think a lot of players are calling him “broke” without labbing, and that is going to do what it always does. I predict that If we see something from a Shang player at Evo Warlock will be nerfed as a knee jerk reaction. But if they give Shang a 3rd tournament variation with Shake after Evo that is where everyone going to go.

 

[AK Harold]

I still think he is really good in warlock. I just think you can't just toss shit out and hope it works. His rising skulls are a crutch an extremely well made one at that. But if you think about it and what he can do without them in the neutral he is still strong.

I think the biggest weakness he has at the moment is he is all in on strike throw scenarios or will get little payout with b34. Since b11 is not safe nor is b3u4, he has difficulty when a solid mid is required. It is the bane of many characters on the roster. But his d3 is key, much like Sonya he has to get enough small damage and setup mids in to open up other options.

I don't have enough games played yet as him but he never feels like he loses any match ups out right.

 

[t3kwytch3r]

Maybe i haven't played enough good Erron Black players, but i think the MU is actually in Shang's favour. Rifle Stance can outzone him, but if youre prepared you can just advance and crouch into ground skulls range. Once he's wasted his bullets, you're gold. Slide and Big Boot can be Ground Skulled or Soul Stealed on reaction from mid - long range. Keep him there.

Sonya is definitely a tough matchup. Scorpion is difficult but doable. Searing rage is easier than reborn ofc. Beyond that i'm not sure

 

[SaSSolino]

Slide and Big Boot can be Ground Skulled or Soul Stealed on reaction

I'll belive it when I see it.

 

[AK Harold]

It can be if it's all you are watching for, but then you should go for a bigger combo that's even easier if you got those reactions.

 

[t3kwytch3r]

If you're crouching , you essentially have Ground Skulls buffered. If you walkback, you're buffering soul steal. If it's a good Erron player, he surely wouldn't YOLO Slide from midscreen, but if he does you can quickly throw out the special closest to your thumb so to speak.

Probably would be easier to just B1 combo start, but if his feet have left the ground your second hit will whiff. Again, i haven't played a huge amount of good errons, so take it with a grain of salt. Seriously though, throw the 4 random hidden options in practice mode mid-farscreen and make 2 of them Slide and big boot, the other 2 whichever options you think he'd use most at that range, maybe 32?. It's not the hardest thing to counter and if you do it twice, he'll think twice about using the move again.

 

[SHAOLIN]

I'm not going to throw match up numbers but I do feel like a lot of people are not exploring all the options that Shang Tsung has to offer.

Most of his strings are either safe on block or plus on block. Even if you use a string that is safe and puts you in a throw/strike scenario, you can turn that into your favor, granted you understand your opponent's habit.

I do feel like people are having tunnel vision with this character because of of his zoning (in Warlock) and that's only one part of him. Mind you I play the SoulTaker variation so I have to utilize his strings/normals and understand them more than probably warlock players.

I guess what I'm saying is that we should be trying to get in the face of our opponent A.K.A Rushdown and utilize the zoning as secondary, because his zoning is great, just not the only thing he has.

Also I will like to say that since I am a SoulTaker main my perspective on all this might be a little bit of skewed, so do take what I'm saying with a grain of salt.

 

[Invincible Salads]

Shangs 2nd variation doesn’t have good damage tho does it?

 

[Marinjuana]

Shangs 2nd variation doesn’t have good damage tho does it?

No, his best punish in 3U2~DB1 Amp does around 25%, though he gets healthy damage from his universal KB's.

 

[Invincible Salads]

No, his best punish in 3U2~DB1 Amp does around 25%, though he gets healthy damage from his universal KB's.

still not worth using imo, hopefully his 3rd variation is an all ninja one, i'd prefer Shake, Lift and Roundhouse tho, don't really give a shit about slide, but knowing NRS of course they'd give em slide over roundhouse :V