I've been comparing some matchups against Brad because I got a full-time really good Brad player,
@Tulkas , living at my place and he tries to get maximum out of his setups, frametraps and combos. He's also really sharp and is always punishing anything slightly unsafe and fishes for holds and good at fundementals, so this guy is for real.
I'll start with characters I'm familiar with, before going for characters I'm starting to get into or going back to and I'm not too good at.
vs
This is a matchup I rate actually high for Bass, like a 6-4 for him. Reasons are that he can punish moves non-grapplers can't, namely things like
,
and bunch of other stuff at -5. He can also punish him if he smalls his OHs coming and Brad very much relies on setups when it comes to the OHs and once you see it coming, you takes damage. Brad also relies on his crushes a lot and things like WR kicks and most transitions into , but once those are blocked, he's in big trouble because he's really unsafe in general.
Bass is as slow as Brad (with the exception of his 12/13 frame moves from stances or BT), though he benefits from two big things, tracking with moves like
(15i) and
and frame advantage and tools to catch Brad crouching like
that help a lot in this matchup. And the most important tool in this matchup in the low OH. You have this move and you can turn the tide of the entire matchup because you can interrupt Brad even between his strings sometimes if he does commit to something where he ends up in crouching state (Full crouching K series, I'm looking at you).
Bass still has to be very patient in this matchup and at times play keep out and get in and stay in. He's usually okay outside of Brad's
and
range and he has to usually play the spacing game and constantly come in and out and play the Tom and Jerry game. Rounds in this MU can either go from the whole 99 seconds till timeout to under 10 seconds because if you play your cards right, you can do very well.
However, Brad does have ways of getting out Bass 50/50 pressure situations like when having to deal with his BT OHs after frame advantage like Ayane, because Bass'
and WR
are really good at doing that putting the opponent in that situations. Brad has really good jumping attacks and low crushes like
and
, which can almost completely eliminate the OH pressure, unless the Bass player has to resort to outer tools like using
and
which can leave him open to possibly being crushed and punished by other moves, which plays into the whole conditioning game. This goes well with those Brad gameplan I guess. Majority of it revolves around playing risky and using a lot of mixups.
vs
I put this at 5-5, but still a possible 6-5 in Leon's favor, but let me explain why I feel that way.
Leon's a special case here because he doesn't have a good fast tracking move unless you're gonna use his strings, which transition into mids quite fast like the
starter into the mid/low mixup. Leon's can actually play rushdown in this mathcup because of his superior speed in most situations as he has 11/13/16. He also has the essential low OH and he does above-average damage with that. His GBs work well in this matchup, because even the -1 is still advantageous for Leon in this matchup due to the speed difference.
Leon's throw speed can be a problem punishing lows however, as he's isn't a throw based character and he fits more into the bruiser/power-house type of character like Rachel. This ends up being kind of a disadvantage if he isn't taking advantage of his 2P, so that's when Leon can potentially fall short, but he's is still pretty fast for Brad.
vs
I can't explain why, but I just feel this MU is 6-4 for Rachel. Like Leon she's solid, but she benefits from a fast low tracking move and a mid tracking string (
(16i)) and the low OH that in this case is +10 and allows for Rachel to pressure and keep in the range where she's best at, close to mid-range because outside of that, she's going to struggle getting in especially against characters who are good at keeping her out like Ayane.
With this character, sometimes the simplicity can actually be her downfall, because she ends up not having some tools she may need in other MUs, but strangely, she just does well against Brad. Now, obviously, you have to mix-up well enough for your pressure not to be mid-punch centric and again, like Leon, even her -1 GBs can be advantageous.
So, yeah, I had to keep this short, but I still ended up touching up on the character.
vs
I put this at 5-5, but 6-4, if the Lisa knows how to use her tools well, because she can punish his unsafe moves as a throw based grappler, but she also has moves Brad has to respect like
, which can stop some of his setups really well. She also has low-crushes like
, which can turn the tide. Her safety with her BT mixups also help a lot. Oh and she also has a very good low OH, which can give above average damage. Her throw punish is also very good with some high damage potential.
She's also good at playing the range game, though she requires a certain mindset to maximize her potential.
Now, I put this at 5-5 because despite her having a very good MU here in terms of tools and capabilities, it depends on the type of player playing this game because unlike Rachel or Leon, you can play in some many different ways, but your play style may end up biting you in the ass if you don't know how to play against this character especially because Brad requires a different way of thinking, because no matter what character you play, you can still be caught by him just laying down there and ends up parrying your 2P or catching you with his OH, or just straight up evade your high tracking moves and even some mids with
/
, because unlike Leon, Rachel or Bass, Lisa doesn't have a quick high-mid tracking string like those characters, unless you're committing to moves like
or
or
(still not ideal tbh).
So yeah, with the exception of the Brad-Lisa MU, I'm 100% sure about the other three. I'll go through other MUs later once I get more matches in.
