Strategy
Despite being the strongest character in the game, Sagat in practice is not that complicated of a character. When boiling it down, he has two real main playstyles: a neutral heavy Sagat that focuses on using his pokes to confirm into damage, and a pressure heavy Sagat that uses his run pressure and short hops to kill the opponent slowly. As you would expect, the Capcom grooves are where you'd play the neutral Sagat, and the SNK grooves are the ones where you'd play pressure Sagat.
Neutral
Sagat's neutral game is the best the game has to offer. He sports a cavalcade of powerful, damaging pokes. If used right, Sagat becomes a giant, imposing wall that's hard to break down. He's got it all, from fast annoying pokes to strong, punishing ones. There are many bits and pieces to Sagat's neutral, and they will be detailed here.
Pokes
5LK: Good for space control. Mainly used at max range to badger the opponent and stuff out their longer range pokes which most likely have slower startup. 5LK has the range to outrange jabs and has the speed to beat pokes that can reach 5LK. You can use it up close for frame traps, as it is -1, but at max range is where this button is most effective.
5MK: Sagat's longest ranged poke, but is really unsafe to compensate. Because of that, spacing is necessary to avoid getting punished. When spaced, it can be a nice way of checking opponents from even longer distances and keeping them honest, as it can halt bad approaches pretty well. Although, 900 damage is pretty low for Sagat's standards, but it's still useful.
5HP: Really powerful counterpoke. Because of it's crazy priority, it can check a lot of standing pokes easily. As a standard poke, it can easily be crouched under (with some exceptions, those are the matchups Sagat tends to dominate), so it's not nearly as threatening as 2HP. If landed in neutral, it does a crazy 1600 damage, tied for the highest single button damage with other big body guys like Zangief and Raiden. In neutral, if you anticipate a standing poke or approach, use this button to counter.
2LK: A good up close poke, hits low and can lead into more pokes. Generally it's good for combos and pressure, but if you can use it's quick speed, it can be a pretty nice poke in Sagat's arsenal.
2MK: One of Sagat's best pokes. At a very fast 4 frames, it also sports great range. It has both a special and super cancel to guarantee chip, and also hits low. It can stop a lot of pokes by itself, and it is only -2, so basically unpunishable without parry or JD. In which case it's very hard to get either of those due to it's speed, especially when used unpredictably. Overall a very nice tool in Sagat's kit.
2HP: The button you were probably thinking of. Every Sagat loves this button, but there's a catch. If you overuse this button, which is a very tempting thing to do, a good player can take advantage of this. The main weakness of 2HP is its speed. Plus frames don't matter if the move whiffs, and if it whiffs or gets i-framed on, Sagat is left open.
Some ways opponent's counter 2HP include:
- Activating Custom Combo: because of its long hurtbox, activations can punish this move from long distances.
- Low Jumps: Any low hop can take this button out. Some jump-ins can't really counter this move, fair enough, but every character has some answer for low jumping a vulnerable Sagat in the 2HP state.
- Roll Cancels: An opponent anticipating a 2HP can simply roll cancel past it. It may not lead to huge damage in some instances but if it happens multiple times the damage can rack up.
- Parries/JDs: Both of these mechanics can turn the +2 that 2HP has into something much worse and punishable. Predictably using 2HP is just asking for these defensive mechanics to shut it down.
- Lvl.2s / Lvl.3s: Due to their high i-frames, an opponent anticipating this poke can i-frame through it. It has high active frames, so level 1 supers will most likely trade or straight up lose, but level 2s and 3s can beat it out.
Now that I've downplayed this poke, reminder that these weaknesses apply if you overuse this button. Situational or not, using this button predictably can result in these events happening, but if you have a healthy variety of all the pokes mentioned, you will most likely not face these difficulties. It has great range, very powerful damage, and even better reward when cancelled into super (Mainly Low Tiger Cannon). It's definitely his best poke, but has to be used wisely. Despite how powerful Sagat's button is he cannot cheat neutral against a good player.
Low Hop j.HK: Only available in grooves that allow short hops (P, S, N, K). Sagat's normal jump is too slow for low jump HK to work as something he can use in neutral. Due to the opponent expecting Sagat's potent low pokes, they aren't expecting a quick and damaging overhead like j.HK. Due to it hitting fairly low, it can make contact with standing and crouching characters, but there are some exceptions where hitting low jump HK is really difficult (i.e. Athena and Yuri).
Pressure
Sagat can pressure in both dash and run grooves, it's just that he has more freeform rushdown in the run/short hop grooves. Here are some of his pressure options, ranging from blockstrings, to tick throw setups.
Defense
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Okizeme
Sagat's Okizeme game is rather average. He doesn't possess crazy mixups all the time (discounting the Tiger Raid mixup), his dash doesn't corpse hop and his overhead/low presence isn't super threatening on wake-up. The best thing Sagat can do is simply maintain offensive presence after a knockdown.
Here are some okizeme options Sagat can do, just note that they aren't that great.
- Low Jump ("Fake" Corpse Hop): Sagat's dash doesnt corpse hop, but his low jump can. It's not going to make the opponent anymore confused on where to block, but it's something to get them scared on what Sagat is preparing.
Groove Strategy
C-Groove Sagat is scary. He almost always has at least half a bar of meter that confirms into fat damage, and the system mechanics in place really compliment the type of character he is, like air blocking, rolling, and the unique level 2 super cancel that gives him access to one of the most damaging optimal combos in the whole game.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Level 2 Super Cancel deals insane damage | - No short hop |
| + Air Blocking makes being in the air safer | - Somewhat difficult since you can't pressure |
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You might come to believe this variation of Sagat would be very strong. CCs in general do get big damage, however this version of Sagat is just redundant. In practice, he's merely a worse version of C Sagat. His CC also has little practicality, only working as either an anti air or up-close punish, however the CC itself is quite difficult to perform. Overall, there's way better A-groove characters out there and C Sagat is far stronger than this version.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Air blocking makes jumping safer | - No level 2 or 3 supers |
| + Fairly simple and linear meter to work with | - No short hop to make his pressure scary |
| + Has both a roll and alpha counter to get out of pressure | - CC is situational |
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P-Groove sucks. Common knowledge, but even with P-Groove you can make Sagat work. This groove turns Sagat from a fairly simple character to learn to a hard challenge. He's still strong, but it's really hard to deal with good grooves as P Sagat. You need to make good use of parries and the rare times you can use a level 3 super.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Parrying gives free openings and approaches | - At most you'll get to use one super per round |
| + Short hop makes pressure scary | - Weak defensive options: No roll, alpha counter or air block |
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S Sagat is the best character you can possibly use in S-Groove. That's not saying much, since S-Groove in general sucks, but Sagat has some niche tools in S-Groove like using his dodge attack in neutral, or replacing his tigershot for his tiger cannon once he reaches low health. His damage output only really gets high when he gets those infinite level 1 supers, but again he can only get them if he's about to die, making it a very risky situation to be in.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Infinite supers make his damage good at low health | - Supers are scarce until you reach low health |
| + Short hop makes pressure scary | - No reliable source of meter outside power charge |
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N-Groove Sagat may be far less threatening compared to his optimal grooves but don't get it twisted. He's still very strong. He still has access supers frequently, and can "pop" to bag in some really big damage. Not to mention he still has a short hop. He's like a fusion of C and K but with the core parts of each groove taken out, you still end up with a very strong character.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Easy control of supers with traditional meter | - Needs to spend extra and "pop" for level 3 supers |
| + Short hop makes pressure scary | - No air blocking makes jumps less safe |
| + Retains a roll and a counter roll to escape pressure | - Fairly slow building meter, supers are not as frequent |
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The strongest CvS2 character. K-Sagat is the scariest man in the whole game. He has access to a short hop, already making his pressure insanely good, and benefits the most from K-Groove's Rage and Just Defense. Once Sagat is raged, once good super turns the round in his favor, and thanks to the extremely convenient Just Defense (JD) it makes getting rage far easier that you think.
| Pros | Cons |
| + Rage Mode can easily deny the opponent the win | - No Alpha Counter, hard to escape good pressure |
| + Just Defense gives you a good amount of meter | - No control over your supers due to the nature of K-Groove's meterbuild |
| + Short hop makes your pressure very scary | - No air block forces you to make smart jumps |
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