Advice for expanding my tactics?

[thomahawk]

Across all fighting games I've played, I've always been magnetized (teehee) by grapplers. I've grown very accustomed to playing them at the most basic level, which is basically to just answer everything with command grab. After I picked up Tager, I went mad with the power of science and the amazing power of pulling people into my command grabs with magnetism. Whenever I play Tager myself, I find myself actually just sitting back, waiting for my opponents to come at me, and just get command grabs during unsafe or poor blockstrings. As effective as this is for me, I'm sort of becoming disillusioned with playing Tager this way. All of the Tagers I've seen online use combos and footsies to get hits or combos started into the oki mixup game. I don't want to just be a command-grab reliant Tager anymore. I want to be more diverse in how I play him.

 

My problem is I have a terrible time getting combos started. Tager's awkwardly short and clunky normals throw me off on which ones to start with, what to throw out to start a combo with, when to throw moves out my normals to punish things and get a combo going.

 

Right now at best, I catch a luck hit into Spark Bolt into the 5B>5C>j.ABC>Grand Punish but other than that, not really much. 

 

Any suggestions on what to do?

[crimsonstardust]

Well you kinda answered your question, your probably gonna have to learn the general range of his normals and learn some combos from different starters and figure out how to abuse this Magnetism cause he has combos with and without it so its good to know both. At least the way I play Tager is I try to scare my opponents from hitting buttons cause this is where you can start mixing in command throws and play a mix up game with Gadget finger and stuff. Though I feel like for Tager, your making guesses on how your opponent wants to escape pressure cause none of his mix ups or set ups are 100% fool proof (I might be wrong about this so a Tager expert correct me on this).  

 

With his poor mobility your gonna have to learn to block and walk a lot and sneak in super jump C when the opportunity comes. I feel like 5C and 5D are his main footsie tools cause most of this other normals have shorter range, 6A is good to pull in people when you have them magnetized and has armor so it makes a pretty decent combo starter. 

 

Aside from that learn some set ups, combos and know your normals is all I can really suggest. 

[Yohosie]

Only real answer is to play footsies. Honestly, without poking, you're not going to win against any experienced player. You need to learn when to poke, and when to grab, and that's really it. I recommend going into training mode and try whiff punishing and using pokes at different ranges and see what works. You've never really had to hit confirm, and it's one of the most essential skills in fighting games. Get into online matches and just throw buttons out until you learn when to poke and with what. Sounds like you don't pressure with normals much either. Learn tick throw setups, blockstrings, high/low mixups, etc.

 

It's worth mentioning that Tager's normals are not that slow or clunky like you claim (except his anti-airs, which are clunky. Especially 2C). 6B and 6C are, because they're not meant to be used in neutral, but 5A, 2A, 5B, 2B and 5C are relatively fast pokes. Not lightning fast, but fast enough, and hardly clunky. Chances are you are just not familiar enough with their properties, which is cool, because you haven't really used them much.

 

Know your ranges, know some situations, and use the right poke at the right time. Don't know what that is? Experiment. You don't play online to win, you play online to learn. A Tager without normals isn't a Tager worth playing, our tools are lacking, use them all!

[Ctrlaltwtf]

Tager really isn't a complicated character. There's no major secret to being good with him. If you really want to become competent you just need to study other character's pressure/neutral tactics and learn how to overcome them.

 

Throwing people all the time is exactly what you're supposed to be doing though. Your opponent has no excuse for losing to that. Throwing someone when you're able to is almost never a bad idea.

[thomahawk]

So in short, learn my normal ranges and pokes and how to punish with them? That sounds good.

Thanks for the friendly advice, eveeyone! I really appreciate it.