Guilty Gear XrCise - Range
Difficulty Beginner
Focus Range
The intention of these exercises is to help a new player learn the various ranges of their character's buttons and punishes, as well as how their defensive choices interact with range. In Guilty Gear you have a lot more ways to affect range during defense than in other games. Therefore getting used to your defensive options is just as important as getting used to your buttons various quirks. Ranges change quickly in Guilty Gear and require a high level of awareness while under pressure. As a result, these exercises are also designed to put you in high pressure situations, where you must pay strong attention to both your defense and your opponent's offense, while trying to get in a more advantegous position and learning the different punishes you will need as a result of those positions at different ranges.
These exercises are all under the Match Up section of the Guilty Gear Xrd Rev 2 Missions. These missions can be found by going to Battle > Dojo > Missions, from the Start Menu. Be sure you have selected Match Up missions and not Universal missions, in order to get the correct exercise.
These exercises are a supplement to the Missions content and are not intended to be replacements. If you find yourself confused by some of the terminology used throughout this exercise guide, or if you are new to Guilty Gear, we strongly encourage you take a look at the Universal missions first, before using ours.
While you can attempt these exercises with any character, not all of the advice is applicable to certain characters, due to the high variability of character abilities in Guilty Gear. The most important thing to note in these exercises is just as much when an option cannot work for you, as when it can.
We highly encourage trying the End Goals of the exercise even if they may not utilize the most optimal approaches for your character, as the End Goals are meant to teach a broader concept. Just be sure to note when said approaches are less optimal.
As these exercises are intended to supplement the game's existing tutorial content, not all of them actually require completing the goal given in the Match Up mission. Mastering these exercises is less about completing the mission given by the game, and more about how you approach the situation that the mission presents.
Match Up Exercise 30
Character Requirement
No specific character is required for this exercise.
Goals
- Starting Goal - Focus on blocking Sin's attacks and learning the different patterns. You can do short practice with the missions original goal of punishing his calorie gauge refill.
- Secondary Goal - Learn what strings of Sin's are unsafe with your jab and neutral poke buttons, until you find the holes in his offense.
- End Goal - Learn what spaces your blocking causes push back wise and how it interacts with what buttons you can use to punish Sin's gaps.
Exercise Summary
The goal of this exercise is to defend against Sin's string of offense, and learn what sequences are interruptable by your close and midrange normals. This exercise should help improve a beginners defense, as well as learning how to measure space with your normals. This is an exploration type exercise and will involve a lot of failure as you test all of your different options.
When first starting out, just dot he exercise as the game asks, and block Sin's pressure until he goes to refill calorie gauge by eating. This will help you get used to the defensive requirement of the exercise and reacting to an opening after a lot of stress. The method for learning your different options in this exercise is mostly to hit all your character's possible normals after Sin does a move. Follow your instincts! You should eventually learn what sequences of Sin's are not actually safe.
Once you better understand the gaps in Sin's pressure, you can be more confident in when to test your options and what options might work out best. Depending ont he sequence Sin will push himself out more or less and therefore will vary the range. Even if a sequence would normally be unsafe, therefore, your standard option may not always work to punish or may not be as comboable as a result depending on your character.
To complete this exercise you must be able to reliably block and interrupt Sin's pressure before he goes to eat his meat, and have confidence in your knowledge of the different spacings and options you have for interrupting this type of pressure.
Additional Notes
The pressure strings involved in this exercise are less important to the actual goal of learning. This is more about learning your keep out options, and being able to see the spacings your opponent leaves themselves at while under heavy stress from an opponent's offense. Being able to remember your options under stress and being confident in them goes a long way in a game like Guilty Gear, as it allows you to be less vulnerable to being put on tilt, and being able to do complicated combos later on that would be otherwise difficult or impossible due to the stress and precision of the reaction.
Learning how far back your good poking options puts your opponent in different situations is an advanced training focus, as it becomes important to understand this in order to be good at footsies in this game, as well as makes you aware of when you are not exactly at advantage even if you succesfully interrupted an opponent.
Match Up Exercise 32
Character Requirement
No specific character is required for this exercise.
Goals
- Starting Goal - Learn to defend Elphelt's pressure strings and jab her out (hit 4/5P) to find the holes in her pressure.
- Secondary Goal - Learn your various mobility options to escape Elphelt's pressure.
- End Goal - Learn green block then Super Jump out of Elphelt's pressure.
Exercise Summary
This exercise is mainly about understanding your defensive mobility options and getting comfortable enough to use them while under pressure. This exercise should help you learn your different mobility options while under pressure as well as help cultivate your green blocking usage. Additionally it gives you a feeling for your short range normals.
When first starting out, start to learn what moves and strings of Elphelt has that are punishable. She will not always do the same one and it can take quite a few mission play throughs to see all of her options. The shorter your normals, the better as it gives Elphelt less options and opportunity to punish you. This is an important thing to learn, since characters with good pressure and offense can leave you feeling frustrated when your normal neutral pokes end up getting consistently punished with high damaging combos.
Once you have an idea of where the opportunities for action are, you can begin learning the mobility options possible in this type of corner pressure situation. It is important to note here that the Elphelt CPU is not doing optimal Elphelt pressure, but it is still good enough to get a basic feel for what to look for in corner pressure situations. Try super jumping, dashing forward, invincible back dashing, and forward jumping to try and escape her pressure. Every character will vary in what is most optimal for them to do in this type of situation. It is highly encouraged that you give them all a try and see what feels most comfortable to you.
Once you have a good idea of your options, attempt to use your green block (faultless defense) to push Elphelt out enough to have time to Super Jump and/or Instant Air Dash. This is executionally difficult to do, especially in a high pressure situation like the one simulatedin the mission. This is more important to learn for some characters than others as they gain a large amount of advantage from being able to utilize this option. However, it is universally useful at the beginner level to learn as it may make a highly pressure based opponent reconsider how to do their pressure since the punishes required against an aerial opponent are usually different than for a grounded one. This adds a mental stack to your opponent's thought processing and can possibly cause them to pressure less, or in a more escapable way.
Additional Notes
This can help you practice awareness as much as execution. The differences in stand crouch and green blocking all have a different effect on push back and how Elphelt's moves interact. You can also learn how much meter green blocking drains if you are good enough at blocking the pressure to pay attention to it. Even if you are not, the mission ending should give you enough time to look at it quickly. She does not hit low so you can mostly rely on stand blocking.
Additionally, when first starting out the mobility phase, you may notice that you can get punished when trying to jump out. Do not get discouraged, as this is part of why this mission is so helpful to the exercise since it requires you to be extra vigilant of what your opponent is doing. The exploration process should also help teach you an emotional skill essential for Guilty Gear. That skill being the ability to accept that sometimes a mix up means your correct decision won't work, but that it was still correct to try it occasionally anyway. Being able to be emotionally flexible about this situation means you can keep your confidence in how you think about your defensive and even offensive options, and is universal to most other fighting games. Learning multiple solutions to the same problem and being comfortable with them is the main way to bolster your ability to handle situations like this, which is part of what this exercise is meant to get you the foundation for.