Parrying and GI's are the lifeblood of Soul Calibur. If someone knows and can identify their opponent's moves they can exploit this knowledge by reacting to attacks that would necessitate a block with a GI. Instead of taking soul gauge damage, a repel reverses the tables and allows the player to both deal soul gauge damage to their opponent (JI) and gain a significant frame advantage without exposing themselves to any risk. To me, this has always been the most beautiful part of Soul Calibur and it is the aspect of the game that my friends and I try to perfect. Unfortunately, the knowledge doesn't seem to have disseminated into the Soul Calibur community. In fact, there is a lot of bias against parries on this forum and given that my playgroup finds them quite easy I feel it is appropriate to start a thread about appropriate use of GI's and also the changes in Soul Calibur 4 that weakened the GI but did not remove it from our games altogether.
First, let's start with a couple of moves you should realistically counter-hit or JI if you prefer (I prefer to JI but that's my preference)
Astaroth's 1[a], 1a
Siegfried's 1[a]
Taki unblockable bomb
Cervantes flying hits
Because these moves are easily punishable unless one will consistently hit the JI it's advantageous to punish immediately. Because a JI will give one a window for punishment AND do soul gauge damage I personally prefer to punish both the life bar and the soul gauge but unless someone hits +50% of their JI's they need to go for immediate punishment.
The second category of moves are those that one should only counter-hit. I'm just mentioning a few moves that I encounter in my matchups to give a feel for when a GI is not appropriate.
Nightmare's 1[a] (changeable so counter-hit is preferrable)
Siegfried's 44b, WS a, a (both cancellable so counter-hit is preferrable)
Mitsurugi's 1[a] (should block/counterhit the low as it is punishable, if modified into b it should be GI'd)
Because the move can be cancelled or changed a parry will expose you to a huge risk so only a counter-hit is acceptable. For Mitsurugi's 1[a] one actually get the best of punishment and a great GI opportunity which is why trained Mitsurugi's will never throw the move in offline battles.
Finally, what type of move can someone ONLY GI? There is only one move that should only be GI'd that I know of and that is Mitsurugi's 1[a]b if you miss punishing 1[a] or decide to block it. There is a very easy situation where one can identify when to GI, however, and that is when an opponent is predictably using their best ground-pound move during a knockdown. The situation will occur numerous times throughout the match and each character has an extremely limited set of moves that they can use during this period of time. In fact, any time one "just knows" what their opponent will do they have an opportunity to punish them for this by either counter-hitting, evading and punishing, blocking and punishing or GI and then punishing. The problem is the advantage from a GI in SC4 is too small to justify the move choice over other guaranteed punishment options for opponents who throw unsafe moves.
In high level competition, however, the number of unsafe moves one has a punishment option against is severely limited. In fact, part of getting to a higher level in Soul Calibur is eliminating punishment options for one's opponent and "playing it safe." Defense is far more important than offense but the two meet at a high level in the form of safe pokes and an extremely defensive offense. Thus, if someone wants to counter safe pokes with GI's it is not only appropriate, but vital to gaining significant advantage in an even matchup. The issue is that this requires almost immediate identification of the opponent's move based on seeing just a couple of frames of the move prior to your reaction. While this is trainable, one can also make an educated guess based on the matchup and the situation.
For example, if one's opponent does not have a good low combo available because of the matchup and is playing a pressure punishment game the likely scenario is that they will pressure with high/mid moves because they are extremely fast and try to keep their opponent honest with low pokes. If the low pokes are known to not stun on counter-hit, it is easily acceptable to go for a JI on the high/mid especially if one has good identification of their low pokes.
Another aspect that can help is training identification of the best low counter-hit stuns and pokes for each character. In this fashion one can react to a low with a reactive low block while using a GI for each high/mid thrown because of your good training on the lows. Each character has a variety of moves available, but the number of fast, effective, safe lows is extremely limited. One may only have to train their reaction to two or three low hits per character to be able to safely GI the character's pressure game. When it comes to a longer distance game, because moves are slower or more easily evaded the parry becomes less of a necessity and more of a risk with little to no reward. In fact, using a GI on a move that can be easily avoided is more like "spitting in someone's face" because the statement that's made is that punishment wasn't even necessary, their defense is so weak they will lose regardless.
Finally, when do you really, really not want to try to GI. The most important time to not GI is when the matchup is bad and the game has holes in its hitboxes that will make the characters miss each other. Take the voldo siegfried matchup as an example of when siegfried should simply stick to punishment and counter-hits. For some reason the tracking on voldo's moves cause them to randomly miss siegfried a high percentage of the time. It's a terrible situation for voldo to be stuck in and thus siegfried should simply exploit voldo's inability to hit with more than a handful of moves and pound voldo down without giving any respect to the pressure game voldo can typically play. The predictable moves can be GI'd but the large assortment of other moves that a voldo inexperienced with the matchup will try to utilize should be exploited to the largest extent that they can be, which is a counter-hit combo and NOT a GI. Another time you don't want to GI is when an opponent throws an extremely unsafe move that you can punish effectively because a GI will actually give THEM some advantage by allowing them to recover and doing minimal soul gauge damage (unless you can JI effectively, again this is always a caveat) The less experienced the opponent, the less likely a GI is appropriate because punishment opportunities may be so commonplace in the matchup that a GI would be an unnecessary and inappropriate risk. Soul Calibur 4 weakened the normal GI frame advantage but the JI frame advantage can easily justify utilizing the repel as an initiation tactic as well, baiting the opponent into one of their select few initiation moves and then using this knowledge and experience in the matchup against them to gain an immediate advantage for those moves that cannot be counter-hit and punished.
I appreciate your feedback about when to GI and when not to, and felt that I should full explain my personal philosophy on GI's so hopefully I can share a little of what I have learned about GI's and perhaps some other experienced groups can share their own insight into the GI.
Edit: Oops, mods please move this thread to strategy and tactics.
First, let's start with a couple of moves you should realistically counter-hit or JI if you prefer (I prefer to JI but that's my preference)
Astaroth's 1[a], 1a
Siegfried's 1[a]
Taki unblockable bomb
Cervantes flying hits
Because these moves are easily punishable unless one will consistently hit the JI it's advantageous to punish immediately. Because a JI will give one a window for punishment AND do soul gauge damage I personally prefer to punish both the life bar and the soul gauge but unless someone hits +50% of their JI's they need to go for immediate punishment.
The second category of moves are those that one should only counter-hit. I'm just mentioning a few moves that I encounter in my matchups to give a feel for when a GI is not appropriate.
Nightmare's 1[a] (changeable so counter-hit is preferrable)
Siegfried's 44b, WS a, a (both cancellable so counter-hit is preferrable)
Mitsurugi's 1[a] (should block/counterhit the low as it is punishable, if modified into b it should be GI'd)
Because the move can be cancelled or changed a parry will expose you to a huge risk so only a counter-hit is acceptable. For Mitsurugi's 1[a] one actually get the best of punishment and a great GI opportunity which is why trained Mitsurugi's will never throw the move in offline battles.
Finally, what type of move can someone ONLY GI? There is only one move that should only be GI'd that I know of and that is Mitsurugi's 1[a]b if you miss punishing 1[a] or decide to block it. There is a very easy situation where one can identify when to GI, however, and that is when an opponent is predictably using their best ground-pound move during a knockdown. The situation will occur numerous times throughout the match and each character has an extremely limited set of moves that they can use during this period of time. In fact, any time one "just knows" what their opponent will do they have an opportunity to punish them for this by either counter-hitting, evading and punishing, blocking and punishing or GI and then punishing. The problem is the advantage from a GI in SC4 is too small to justify the move choice over other guaranteed punishment options for opponents who throw unsafe moves.
In high level competition, however, the number of unsafe moves one has a punishment option against is severely limited. In fact, part of getting to a higher level in Soul Calibur is eliminating punishment options for one's opponent and "playing it safe." Defense is far more important than offense but the two meet at a high level in the form of safe pokes and an extremely defensive offense. Thus, if someone wants to counter safe pokes with GI's it is not only appropriate, but vital to gaining significant advantage in an even matchup. The issue is that this requires almost immediate identification of the opponent's move based on seeing just a couple of frames of the move prior to your reaction. While this is trainable, one can also make an educated guess based on the matchup and the situation.
For example, if one's opponent does not have a good low combo available because of the matchup and is playing a pressure punishment game the likely scenario is that they will pressure with high/mid moves because they are extremely fast and try to keep their opponent honest with low pokes. If the low pokes are known to not stun on counter-hit, it is easily acceptable to go for a JI on the high/mid especially if one has good identification of their low pokes.
Another aspect that can help is training identification of the best low counter-hit stuns and pokes for each character. In this fashion one can react to a low with a reactive low block while using a GI for each high/mid thrown because of your good training on the lows. Each character has a variety of moves available, but the number of fast, effective, safe lows is extremely limited. One may only have to train their reaction to two or three low hits per character to be able to safely GI the character's pressure game. When it comes to a longer distance game, because moves are slower or more easily evaded the parry becomes less of a necessity and more of a risk with little to no reward. In fact, using a GI on a move that can be easily avoided is more like "spitting in someone's face" because the statement that's made is that punishment wasn't even necessary, their defense is so weak they will lose regardless.
Finally, when do you really, really not want to try to GI. The most important time to not GI is when the matchup is bad and the game has holes in its hitboxes that will make the characters miss each other. Take the voldo siegfried matchup as an example of when siegfried should simply stick to punishment and counter-hits. For some reason the tracking on voldo's moves cause them to randomly miss siegfried a high percentage of the time. It's a terrible situation for voldo to be stuck in and thus siegfried should simply exploit voldo's inability to hit with more than a handful of moves and pound voldo down without giving any respect to the pressure game voldo can typically play. The predictable moves can be GI'd but the large assortment of other moves that a voldo inexperienced with the matchup will try to utilize should be exploited to the largest extent that they can be, which is a counter-hit combo and NOT a GI. Another time you don't want to GI is when an opponent throws an extremely unsafe move that you can punish effectively because a GI will actually give THEM some advantage by allowing them to recover and doing minimal soul gauge damage (unless you can JI effectively, again this is always a caveat) The less experienced the opponent, the less likely a GI is appropriate because punishment opportunities may be so commonplace in the matchup that a GI would be an unnecessary and inappropriate risk. Soul Calibur 4 weakened the normal GI frame advantage but the JI frame advantage can easily justify utilizing the repel as an initiation tactic as well, baiting the opponent into one of their select few initiation moves and then using this knowledge and experience in the matchup against them to gain an immediate advantage for those moves that cannot be counter-hit and punished.
I appreciate your feedback about when to GI and when not to, and felt that I should full explain my personal philosophy on GI's so hopefully I can share a little of what I have learned about GI's and perhaps some other experienced groups can share their own insight into the GI.
Edit: Oops, mods please move this thread to strategy and tactics.
