Street Fighter 3: 2nd Impact/Urien

Introduction

Urien is not the monster he is in 3rd Strike, but he's a character with seemingly a lot of potential in this game. His pokes are respectable and his damage/stun is nothing to scoff at. His aegis setups might even be deadly too.

A mid tier character, he requires a lot of work in this game due to lacking in defensive options (No Red Parry) and certain things being weaker, changed or downright gone in this game compared to 3rd Strike. If you're willing to put in that work however, he can be a bit more devastating than one might think.

Moves List

Normal Moves

Standing Normals

stLP - Fast jab, has a target combo into stMP, cancellable

stLK - Fast but doesn't reach very far, cancellable.

stMP - Godlike poke, whiffs on crouchers however, cancellable

stMK - LONG normal, fair enough poke to use in neutral.

stHP - Fast chop, knocks down airborne opponents

stHK - Somewhat long startup but respectable overhead, pushes you back very far on block.

Crouching Normals

crLP - Another fast jab, cancellable

crLK - Fast Low, cancellable

crMK - Good far reaching low poke.

crMP - lol, lmao

crHP - Very essential launcher in this game, unlike 3rd strike the second hit will whiff on launchers however, but this move is super duper important for starting anything as Urien

crHK - Awesome sweep, hits you from a backdash away.

Command Normals

f+MK - Moves you forward by a lot, not a bad meaty.

f+MP - Don't use this.

Throws

f/b+MP/HP - Spartan Bomb: One of Urien's really good throws, no difference between the strength used, puts you very close to the opponent after a throw, gives you oki and pressure opportunities

f/b+MK/HK - Destroy Claw: Urien's Hold, racks up a shitton of stun and like Spartan Bomb, puts you very close to the opponent.

Special Moves

Metallic Sphere (Fireball): QCB + Punch

Always Use light if you have to, the anti-air versions that medium and heavy present aren't very useful and the reward you get off it is really bad. There's a lot of recovery as far as the move is concerned too so whiffing this is a death sentence as well.

Tackle: Charge Back, Forward + Kick

Tackling in neutral is probably something you wanna do cautiously, the move has a lot of recovery in this game so you'll get punished harder, try to combo into this instead, the reward you get is amazing. EX Tackle leads into a loop so I wouldn't fault you for fishing for it. Backbone of your corner combos as well.

Knee Drop: Charge Down, Up + Kick

If you wanna punish a fireball sure, but this move is garbage otherwise, you can even be punished on hit sometimes so I really don't recommend it. People in 2022 shouldn't be letting you get away with this move either, especially not EX.

Headbutt: Charge Down, Up + Punch

Godlike special as far as urien's toolkit is concerned. EX Headbutt is an amazing special that mines the fuck out of the opponent's stun bar and leads into hilariously high stun combos that are as easy as just repeatedly doing EX headbutt. It's otherwise a gimmicky throw setup and ghetto pressure tool. Solid combo ender however.

Super Moves

All Of His Supers Are Done with QCFx2 + Punch

SA1 (Tyrant Slaughter): You can, in fact, use this super in this game. SA1 is a more immediately useful super as far as Urien's supers go. It is his only reversal and combo routes you can go for into SA1 and even out of SA1 aren't limited. The longer bar + two stocks allows for more EX Tackle Loops/EX Headbutts. This is probably more versatile due to launching the opponent being harder in this game.

SA2 (Temporal Thunder): This Super Sucks Don't Use It.

SA3 (Aegis Reflector): Aegis Reflector is worse in this game than in 3S, but it doesn't mean it's a bad super per se. The distance aegis travels depends on the strength you use, with light being the nearest and heavy being the farthest. EX aegis will place the mirror above you.

You can set things up with aegis and the reward you get off it is extremely high. There are a lot of resets into aegis as well as a fairly universal hard knockdown setup and the reward you can get off those are typically combos that lead into stun/another reset or death. I wouldn't underestimate this super just because it no longer leads to unblockables, there's still a guess to be made. I can recommend this one as well but only if you're willing to gamble and put in the work to use it, otherwise, go SA1

USE: SA1, SA3

DON'T USE: SA2

The Basics

Urien's a very basic character in this game, the main gist of it is that you wanna be poking around with stMP and crMK and try not to get yourself cornered. Sometimes you'll land a combo here and there and do some damage. He's ultimately a zoner for a good part of the match. You have solid anti-airs with crHP, stMP as previously mentioned, stHP is great too. (it's also a combo ender)

His throws are amazing and gives you oki, as well as having a hold that gives you a lot of stun as well as oki, you're going to love his throws in this game, especially since this is a game with extremely good throws (and a stupidly plus UoH to tick from)

Once you get your meter, however, is when you wanna ramp up the aggression and try to win the corner or at least be somewhere near the corner, it's very important you don't get cornered yourself because unless you're running SA1, you don't have a reversal and you're just gonna have to hold so much shit in this game because of the lack of red parrying. Make sure your defense is good and that you're not trying to guess parry too much, there's only enough crack for 2i players to do and you can't be wasting it on Urien of all characters.

If you're running SA3, you wanna try to get your setups and/or corner resets on deck and try to win the game off a really good opening, you can do that with aegis in this game even if you don't have unblockables like you do in 3rd Strike.

If you're running SA2, don't.

Advanced Strategy

Charge Partitioning:

Much like in 3rd Strike, Charge Partitioning does exist in this game. Charge partitioning is the ability to break up your change into multiple parts/sections by performing a different action before going back to charge. For example, you can't do empty jump headbutt by simply charge buffering during your jump. But if you can charge in the middle of a whiffed stMP, then jump and as soon as you jump continue charging, because of the charge meter adding up to one full charge, you'll be able to get headbutt out. the same idea can be applied to dash up headbutt, making certain combos easier etc.

As long as your first charge isn't a full charge, you can partition it and break it up as many times as you like.

Tackle Tackle Headbutt:

You can do Tackle Tackle Headbutt in 2i as well! This is typically off of crHP. Here's a handy guide to what tackles to use when doing TTH. I always recommend ending with light headbutt here.

Medium Tackle Twice: Shotos, Urien, Hugo, Necro

Medium Tackle, Light Tackle: Alex

If a character isn't mentioned, it doesn't work on them off of crHP launcher, feel free to do ex headbutt before your TTH.

EX Tackle Loops:

In this game, if you land EX Tackle, you are able to link stMP afterwards, this allows you to repeatedly loop that. It's not an infinite as you will eventually run out of bar. I recommend ending your loop with stMP EX headbutt into TTH or whatever corner ender you feel like would work afterwards once you reach the corner....or SA1 if you're running SA1

Combo: (Whatever) xx EX Tackle, [stMP xx EX Tackle]xN

USING AEGIS:

Aegis Midscreen Hard Knockdown Setup:

So unfortunately your hard knockdown setups midscreen are very limited, however there is one that's universal and works across the cast with very little deviation outside of Elena and Hugo.

The setup is as follows:

crHP, EX Headbutt, Jab Fireball xx Jab Aegis, Medium Tackle to switch sides

On Elena: crHP, EX Headbutt, Jab Aegis, Medium Tackle to switch sides

On Hugo: crHP, EX Headbutt, Jab Aegis, Dash under Hugo to switch sides

The idea is you want to get to the other side for positioning reasons, after that you can implement a mix-up of your choice. UOH, crMK, jHK. All you need to do have them get hit by a high/low and get your reward once their dumbasses get opened up. The reward varies per character but try to find a way to relaunch them.

You can't loop this setup but if you want to put them in another aegis setup your only option is a soft knockdown setup they might be able to quick rise.

Corner Shit:

There's not much you can do with corner aegis in this game outside of resetting into it or hoping they get opened up on knockdown. I'd always go for the reset here, the reward is insane and they're forced to just hold it. The reset is that of your choice, but I'd recommend doing:

Launcher, Tackle, Tackle (or maybe just one tackle sometimes), stMP xx Strong Aegis.

After that you can try to open them up with UOH, crMK and at that point just go for a corner combo, you can even try resetting them and putting them in the same guessing situations. Go fuck people up.