Is Drive cancel essential to climb up in ranked?

[ShinjiTao]

Hey people!

Sorry for the english if there are mistakes, I try my best.

I would like to know if you make much use of the Drive Cancel system in your gameplay? And if its absolutely essential to do so to reach high ranks.

The reason why I am thinking about this and asking you this question: I sometimes dont see the benefits of it.

To give you a specific example: I mostly play Cammy. Cancelling from Cammys HP (Hard Punch) into her Hard Quick Spin Knuckle is not possible, as the Frame advantage on hit is not high enough, so your enemy is able to block the follow up. BUT it is possible if you drive cancel her HP into a 2nd one before going into her Hard Quick Spin Knuckle, which you can then cancel into her Level 3 super.

HOWEVER; It is indeed possible to Cancel her HP into a medium Quick Spin Knuckle, which can then also be cancelled into Delta Red Assault.

What baffles me now is that this one does MORE damage than the first version where I include drive cancelling. Tested it multiple times in Practice mode. And it also doesnt matter if I add a jump attack before both combos. The one without drive cancelling still does a slight bit more damage.

Considering the high cost (3 bars), the high risk (adding drive cancel makes combos more complex/technical so you can mess it up in the heat of a battle) and the fact that it's less rewarding in my given example (does less damage) I even just question myself.
Do I misunderstand the purpose of drive cancel?
Isnt higher dmg what it is for?
And if not: Why making use of it and risking to mess up your combo if the output is almost the same or sometimes even more then without it?

I hope I get some reactions to this as I am really curious about your opinions on this.

Thanks in advance.

[ShinjiTao]

Publicado originalmente por kn1ghtsabre:

Depends on where you want to raise your rank too, I'm not really using it much and I'm hover between plat and diamond. But the matches I lose are definitely to people who are good at it.

If plat or diamond is in the reach as you say, then I'm fine with it to be honest.

[ShinjiTao]

Publicado originalmente por Agoraphobic Meep:

A lot of cammy's good hitconfirms benefit from DR (CH 5MP, 5HP xx DR~2HP, 5HP xx DR~2HP, 5HP xx 236HK for example). Off of CH 5MP, you can just link into 5HP and go into 236HK, but you're throwing away a lot of corner carry and damage. To be fair, the combo I just mentioned is mostly a meter dump for when you want to kill, but still, she has a lot of good extensions is my point.

Drive cancel specifically is rewarding when you use it correctly, but in general I don't think you need it, at least at lower levels. Just having a solid BnB combo to fall back on is more than enough to get you out of diamond IMO, as long as your fundamentals and defense are solid.

I miss the times were Street Fighter was focusing more on the fundamentals and positioning. I guess Samurai Shodown is now the only available option out there if thats what you are looking for.

[Agoraphobic Meep]

Publicado originalmente por ShinjiTao:

Publicado originalmente por Agoraphobic Meep:

A lot of cammy's good hitconfirms benefit from DR (CH 5MP, 5HP xx DR~2HP, 5HP xx DR~2HP, 5HP xx 236HK for example). Off of CH 5MP, you can just link into 5HP and go into 236HK, but you're throwing away a lot of corner carry and damage. To be fair, the combo I just mentioned is mostly a meter dump for when you want to kill, but still, she has a lot of good extensions is my point.

Drive cancel specifically is rewarding when you use it correctly, but in general I don't think you need it, at least at lower levels. Just having a solid BnB combo to fall back on is more than enough to get you out of diamond IMO, as long as your fundamentals and defense are solid.

I miss the times were Street Fighter was focusing more on the fundamentals and positioning. I guess Samurai Shodown is now the only available option out there if thats what you are looking for.

Eh, SF6 is still focused on fundamentals and spacing. Whiff punishing and neutral game is still a big part of SF6, especially since it's much easier to whiff punish in this game compared to SFV, at least IMO.

Funny green dash adds a level of volatility to the game, sure but street fighter has had whacky neutral gimmicks for years. Third strike is probably the most "honest" footsies you'll get out of a SF game. USF4 had a generally pretty focused neutral game, but tons of characters had ways to skip neutral and start their pressure, Vtrigger...existed, and now we have green dash, which is at least reactable and can get stuffed so your opponent needs to enforce a mental stack to skip neutral with it.

[my butt is erect]

I'm pretty new to street fighter. I played some casually back on snes but that's it. But this game seems like it's all about getting 9million guaranteed (?) damage off a single punish as long as you can do your combos. That's pretty annoying to me because it turns matches into a low-sample-size of win/loss interactions to decide a match.

I'm still new and bad enough to not really know how correct I am about all that. But seeing there are combos that do 50-70% (and you can't escape them after getting hit if I understand) is really disheartening. Overabundance of insane burst damage is always annoying in competitive games.

[doomleika]

DC is not needed until you reach mid Diamond. High cost from DC, 15% damage reduction after DC and stopped drive recovery after DC(unless it's SA3+) means you are at large drive disadvantage after use unless you have very good reason(you are at 5+ drive, enemy dies after this DC combo). I see so many low diamonds wasted their drive on unoptimized combo only to got burnout

[Gebba]

Publicado originalmente por Poongoolie:

I'm pretty new to street fighter. I played some casually back on snes but that's it. But this game seems like it's all about getting 9million guaranteed (?) damage off a single punish as long as you can do your combos. That's pretty annoying to me because it turns matches into a low-sample-size of win/loss interactions to decide a match.

I'm still new and bad enough to not really know how correct I am about all that. But seeing there are combos that do 50-70% (and you can't escape them after getting hit if I understand) is really disheartening. Overabundance of insane burst damage is always annoying in competitive games.

You're not wrong necessarily, sometimes that happens but other times not. Those are still really difficult to perform and if you really want the insane 70% damage blowup then you probably need an install and your super, while they are exhausted and splatted on a corner for a stun

If you look at the pro tour matches for example, a lot of the pro's there are feeling each other out, checking neutral, punishing a whiff, etc. Sometimes it's just a sweep and back to neutral, sometimes it's a shimmy and the move you hit confirmed only goes for a quick combo, and saving your gauge for other opportunities is better

Sometimes you're drive rushing and not canceling, using an OD because it's faster or has longer range, and combining these things together is draining your gauge where you don't have the opportunity anymore just unload everything in one single combo

Now i'm kinda new too so take it with a grain of salt, but that's what i've seen so far. Most of it seems to boil down that SA3 is too powerful (especially those that just carry you all the way to corner) and tuning it down would allow the other supers to be more used, while decreasing the total damage output in a single moment

Overall i'd say the damage is probably the least offensive from fighters that i have played (MK but not the new one, and GG although you can yellow roman cancel if needed), feels like the pacing is slower in general especially in low and mid-ranks where most people are

[Little White Goblino From Juno]

It's needed for High MR in Master. I can get Diamond 4 without really doing a Drive Rush Cancel. The major key of grinding ranks is counter Drive impact. If you can do that then it's so easy to rank up. Thats' why the cheats are so popular, because it does it for you. It takes half of the thinking and handles it for you.

[processor.dev1l]

I have two main combos where I use CDR, one for max damage and one for corner carry. Other than that I don't really use the cancel as it costs 3 stocks, but I do use several combos that I extend with pure DR, one stock only and it adds nice extra damage.

[doomleika]

Publicado originalmente por ShinjiTao:

Hey people!
To give you a specific example: I mostly play Cammy. Cancelling from Cammys HP (Hard Punch) into her Hard Quick Spin Knuckle is not possible, as the Frame advantage on hit is not high enough, so your enemy is able to block the follow up. BUT it is possible if you drive cancel her HP into a 2nd one before going into her Hard Quick Spin Knuckle, which you can then cancel into her Level 3 super.

HOWEVER; It is indeed possible to Cancel her HP into a medium Quick Spin Knuckle, which can then also be cancelled into Delta Red Assault.

What baffles me now is that this one does MORE damage than the first version where I include drive cancelling. Tested it multiple times in Practice mode. And it also doesnt matter if I add a jump attack before both combos. The one without drive cancelling still does a slight bit more damage.

Added note. Inaccurate but general rule of thumb, every combo reduce damage by 10% to a minimum of 8%. Longer combo don't necessary means better and meterless BnB will be suffice most of the case. For DRC combos it's either used in two scenario:

1. Weak combo like hit at tip of cr.mk and convert into ok combo
2. Long chained combo and finish with SA for SA have minimum damage redution(30%/40%/50%).

"Mid length combo" are generally ill advised for DRC combos.