In the beginning days of me owning the game, I played strictly in mission mode. Contrary to what it sounds like, Mission Mode is more like a combo tutorial. Each character has 10 missions which are comprised of completing a combo listed by the developers, and the "difficulty" scales upwards until the last one. For me, this is a good way to figure out what kind of playstyles each character has. The first character I wanted to learn was Phoenix(before ever hearing how terrible/spectacular she is), so I went to Mission mode and did all of her missions.
Phoenix is fun and all, but she has the lowest HP of all the characters in the game. To compensate for that, when you have 5 hyper bars she will go into "Dark Phoenix" mode when she dies. That gives her full health, a huge damage buff, and a huge improvement to her abilities. Her fireballs are doubled, single hits fire off little embers, and lots of other zany stuff. Unfortunately since I wanted her to be my "point-gal"(lead character), I often don't get the chance to farm hyber bars. The pros play Phoenix by having her in reserves and building your meter with your other lead character. Since I didn't want to do that, I decided to drop Phoenix from my roster. My main team from MvC1 had Morrigan in it, so I decided to try her in Mission Mode.
Morrigan is(as of right now) my best character. Her standing combo string is fairly long and her projectile isn't completely useless. Playing online(against other noobs), I have been able to wipe teams with her alone. Morrigan is also fairly speedy in her normal attacks, which lets you get in a frame faster than some of the slow guys. Her dash is pretty unique as she can fly across the entire level if you want, and when you drop out of dash with aerial attacks! The QCF Hyper combo she has is pretty sucky in my opinion, but her QCB in the air makes up for it. Another gripe I have with Morrigan is that her assist isn't very useful. You have the choice of either Soul Spark or Shadow Servant(one of the games many shoryukens). Life Harmonizer is the other option, and gives you 30% of your hyper bar. I'm sure that is nice for some characters, but I have yet to try it. I have Morrigan on each of my 3 teams, so that goes to show how important she is to me. I don't use her as my point-gal though, but rather as my anchor(your backup character that you try to hold off on using until the end). In the #2 slot lies Chun-li:
I am definitely no pro with Chun-li, but I like her movelist in this game, so that is why I use her. She has a nice, stunning assist with Hyakuretsu Kyaku(lightning kicks!). This lets me get in with my Point-guy or gal to start up a combo I may have not been able to do. Using her in battle is a teeny bit difficult for me with her lack of range. She has an extended crouching M attack that I should use more often. Since I'm so used to dashing in and going for the L attack, I can never reach the enemy. Probably too used to the way how Crimson Viper plays.
Like I said, I'm no pro at the game, but I do want to become good at it. Aside from learning combos, a big part of the game is coming up with Teams that work well. So far, my only good characters are C.Viper and Morrigan. On the rise from those 2 are Jill, Chun-li and Captain America(one of my favorites from MvC1). Tossing Hun and America into a team is great, but my other 3 characters are all point characters(except Morrigan I guess?). Something like Jill-America-Morrigan seems like a nice team, but Jill-Viper-Morrigan wouldn't be, as all of those characters are good point/solo characters. What I think I need is another Assist character like America. That could be Hulk(which I want to learn) or Iron Man(who I used to play a lot too.) I like America in this spot, but I would love to have another choice as my assist to Jill and Viper. Once you get a team built, the next important step is to learn how to Punish your opponent. All charcters have attacks that will leave them vulnerable. If they aren't backed by an assist, the pro players "get in there" and punish the opponent for being open. A good example is Captain America. Captain's Hyper Charging Star can breakthrough tons of different projectile attacks and lay down some nice damage. With Viper, you can charge her focus attack to stun enemies that rush in. Jill can jump over enemy attacks with her QCF special, or if you don't have that but are in the air, you can slam down on enemies with knee drop.
Poor Chun. I chickened out and didn't even try to rescue her.
As with a lot of games like this, before I get especially good at it, I chicken out a lot. It's 10x worse with Jill because she can't break through attacks very well without using her QCF Hyper. Admittedly, I lose most of my matches online. Especially against turtles, I just can't break through. For those that don't know, turtles on mvc3 will stay in the crouching stance for the entirety of the match. When you get close, they'll launch you to start the only combo they know for that character. When you try to combo through they're block(stupid to try) they will block until you're done, then launch you into the same combo. Other turtles spam projectile attacks to kill you. If you jump in, they will use a launcher to start a combo on you, punishing you for jumping over their projectiles. There are ways to counter these tactics, but I always choke up before I get it off. Turtle Blockers? Use High attacks or jump cancels to break through their low block(Such as Jill's Forward H. It attacks High without having to jump). Turtle Spammers? Haven't figured out a true answer to this. Only thing I have so far is breaking through with Charging Star or hopping over and using an air special.
People say that the only way you can get good is by playing other people. In Soul Calibur, I spent all of my time in training mode on extreme difficulty. Unfortunately the computer(usually) doesn't play like a human, especially noobs. I honestly don't care if I ever get as good as people who play competitively. I just don't want to lose to jerks online anymore!
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