[CP] Valkenhayn vs Hazama

[Kiba]

Discuss the Hazama matchup here!

[Dreize]

Rising j.C > RC > j.C OS against wake-up houtenjin is important. 

[StylisH]

This match up seems more or less the same to me.  Aside from his base damage being up, ours being down, and having to keep a closer eye on wolf meter.  Overall this and the Terumi match up seem pretty easy to me, although I'll admit my opponents aren't always the greatest.....

[Stellarcircle5]

Hey guys, I've been having a bit of an issue with this matcup recently. It doesn't feel hopeless by any means, but I'm finding it difficult to deal with chains in neutral. Not being able to block is really frustrating in these situations. Does success solely rely on punishing him for committing too hard to something? I also feel like I'm suffering the wolf meter nerf pretty hard in this matchup. Any tips?

[Magaki]

Simply vary your approach. This is the only matchup where Hazama can't afford to whiff chains even with the A followup because Valk is fast enough to punish him for it or at least, safely get in.

The best chains he got against Valk are jD and j6D. Which respectively loses against wolf run and wj66D. The ground chains make him a sitting duck and he can get punished by w5C/hjC because of that while he won't be punished that badly in the air.

Defense-wise, barrier guard is great against him so make sure to abuse it. Fuzzy jumps also beat his stance mixups quite easily so if you have troubles reacting to them, don't forget to use it. The best way for him to call it out is to add 3C in his blockstrings but even if he does, he won't get much out of it meterless. He can combo off a 3C if he's close enough and do 3C>214D~66B or 3C>Jayoku but either way, he can't hitconfirm the 3C so if he goes for that and you block it, don't hesitate and punish that with a 6B FC.

Offense-wise, IIRC, none of our OSes in blockstrings beat Jayoku. Except maybe hjC>RC>hjC as a meaty which will make his Jayoku whiff. That's why if he got 50 meter you will have to bait it rather than rely on OSes. His best bet to land it in a blockstring is right after a blocked w5C. Though, throwing out a Jayoku if you're doing w5C>3D4C isn't really something easy. You can go however for w5C>RC>w5C if you want to be certain that there won't be any gap.

You can also try out the good ol' w5A/w5B>IAD>2D>wjA/wjB midscreen which will make his Jayoku whiff. Probably the only matchup where it truly shines.

[Stellarcircle5]

Awesome, thanks man! I knew the matchup isn't actually that bad, it just feels really hectic and wonky sometimes.