Yang: Street Fighter 3 Third Strike Strategy Guide and Moves

Guide by RPGFighter with edits by EventHubs.com staff

Character Overview

Yang is considered in the high tier or low part of top tier. He is very good at delivering quick knockdowns and brutal amounts of offense.

He is one of those characters that is easy to learn at first — but to become dominant, he takes a lot of time and dedication.

Strengths
+ Very fast and solid offensive game.
+ He can deliver stun very quick thanks to his bread and butter combos.
+ Yang is easy to learn.
+ Good movement speed.
+ Very scary command dash.
+ Good specials.

Weaknesses:
- Fairly low health and stun.
- Like everyone, he has a tough time against top tier characters. Chun-Li is the prime example.
- Has a weak poking game, you have to always be up close and personal.
- Has a rough time against turtle/poke characters who can keep you away, like Remy, Urien, etc.

Special Moves

• Mantis Slashes (Tourou Zan) •
Similar to Fei Long's Rekka Kens from the Street Fighter games, you can throw out Mantis Slashes up to 3 times doing the inputs in quick succession.

This move is really good and should be what you look for in combos and such. Use it and learn it for it's part of his Bread and Butter combo.

• Roll Kick (Senkyuutai) •
He rolls on the ground and comes up with a kick. It's rarely useful, you're better off doing Mantis Slashes in combos as this is pretty easy to parry.

• Flip Grab (Zenpou Tenshin, Command Grab) •
Yang grabs his opponent and flips over them. Very good for mixups and you can combo after it. You should learn the timing on combos and utilize this move for a good mixup game.

or
• Palm or Fake Palm (Byakko Soushouda) •
He takes one step forward and hits you with his two palms. This does a good amount of damage but comes out very slow, though can be useful as a well timed anti air or if your mixups are good enough you can hit them with this because they are expecting a fast move.

Pressing two punches instead of one performs a Fake Palm.

• Command Dash (Kaihou) •
Makes Yang dash very quickly across the screen. Light Kick travels the shortest distance, and Hard Kick the farthest. The heavier versions have a longer start up time.

This move is good especially if you score a knock down from far away — after Mantis Slashes. You can also cross them up with your Command Dash if you get the timing and spacing down, so it can be very deadly when you learn how to use it.

(In the air)
• Dive Kick •
While jumping straight up or forward, inputting this command makes Yang sail down at an angle with his foot out.

This alters the trajectory of your jump, depending on the strength of the button used, which sets up some great mix up opportunities and mind games. Your Dive Kick is a great attack and something you need to learn to use properly.

• Personal Action (Taunt) •
Increases damage for the next hit or combo by 31.3%. Also, increases damage for the next throw by 6.3%, these effects do not stack if multiple taunts are performed.

EX Moves

• EX-Mantis Slashes (Tourou Zan) •
Same as your regular Mantis Slashes, except there are more hits and it takes off more life.

You change the timing of your EX-Mantis Slashes depending on how fast you do the inputs, most prefer just mashing them together to get one clean combo, though.

This is a pretty useful attack when you want to score extra damage in a combo.

• Roll Kick (Senkyuutai) •
Same as normal Roll Kicks except its quick start up and it tracks (goes to wherever your opponent was when you started the move).

Not terribly useful, but it can be helpful in some wake up situations.

Super Arts

• SA1: Raishin-Mahhaken •
Worst Super Art he has. It does good damage, but it does not give that much meter to work with and the combos you can use it in are just not good.

• SA2: Tenshin-Senkyutai •
This is the Super Art of choice for most Yang players. It does fairly good damage, but the big reason to choose it is that it gives you the most EX meter to play with for EX-Mantis Slashes.

You'll have a few opportunities to use the Super Art itself in some matches, but for the most part you'll want the extra meter.

• SA3: Custom Combo (Seiei-Enbu) •
Another good Super Art for Yang. This is very similar to Yun's Genei Jin, as it lets you Cancel and Chain moves you couldn't before until the timer runs out.

There are some great set ups for this, but the biggest drawback is it only gives you 1 EX move to play with at a time.

Depending on the match up or your play style, you'll probably end up using this or SA2.

Combos

• Crouching Medium Kick, Cancel into Mantis Slashes •
Your basic combo with Yang, but very important to be able to execute consistently. You can also do a Standing Medium Punch to start off this combo. If you're sure you will connect, use your EX-Mantis Slashes to score more damage.

• Crouching Light Punch 3x, Cancel into EX-Mantis Slashes •

• Standing Medium Kick, Super Jump Cancel, Jumping Hard Kick •

• Jumping Hard Kick, Standing Hard Punch, Mantis Slashes •
Jumping Hard Kick has to be deep for this combo to connect. You can also sub in EX-Mantis Slashes at the end for more damage.

Super Art Combos

• Crouching Medium Kick, Cancel into Super Art 2 •
You can sub in Standing Medium Punch at the start of this combo instead.

• Palm, Cancel into Super Art 2 •

• Standing Hard Punch, Cancel into Super Art 2 •
You must Cancel the first hit of your Standing Hard Punch for this to combo properly.

Target Combos

This is pretty nifty, as you can use it to combo into Yang's Super Art 2. Also, it scores a knock down and it's a good follow up after a Dive Kick.

Not really useful, you rarely see this anyone actually perform this string.

Important Normals

• Close Standing Medium Punch •
Good for combos and it has good priority.

• Close Standing Medium Kick •
Puts your opponent into a juggle state. You can Super Jump Cancel after wards and it's is useful to get a good setup in.

• Crouching Medium Punch •
Yang's best meter building normal. If you're far away just mash this move to build meter.

• Crouching Light Kick •
Decent poke.

• Crouching Light Punch •
Set ups a lot of combos for Yang, and can start some good setups.

• Crouching Medium Kick •
One of Yang's best moves. Good range and you can Cancel it into his Mantis Slashes.

• Crouching Hard Kick •
Bad range, but a good fast sweep and it gives you a knock down if it connects, which is always helpful with Yang.

• Overhead •
Must be blocked high, solid attack, good for mix ups.

Flip Grab Setups

Here are a few ways to set up Yang's Flip Grab command throw. Also, any of the Mantis Slashes can be the normal or EX versions.

Color guide

Colors requiring more than one button can be unlocked by beating the game with this character.