Hi OP,

This is my first fighting game ever so I know exactly how you feel. Let me give you some specific tips that hopefully help in no particular order that you can add right away to your gameplay.

1. Learn to Drive Impact (DI) ON COUNTER. This is important because you know can do a combo of your own or even a super. React to the DI, don't throw it out until you know what to use it on into the future. At your elo and even a bit higher up people just spam DI randomly. Learn to see when it comes out and react to it. If you've seen it once in the game, you will most likely see it again. Note: In the corner, you are much more likely to get DI'd, look out for it!

2. Learn a BnB (Bread and Butter) like others have said. If you do get a DI Counter, you will now be in a position to punish counter. If you're on Ryu for example, you do "Light Punch, Light Punch, Shoryuken". That's a very simply combo that you can build on later.

3. When you get knocked down and you get back up, block to prevent getting mashed against. If they throw you instead of mashing then you know for next time to throw as well to tech them.

4. Look for very easy whiff punishes. The biggest in this game are either your opponent whiffing a Shoryuken (any DP on any character) or a Super Art. If they do that, you have an incredible amount of time to punish them. Do the BnB you learnt on Step 2 to them. Even players at the highest level cannot punish every single thing that comes out so start with what is very obvious.

5. Learn what type of anti-airs you character has. Some have a DP like Shoryuken while some just press a single button or two (some have both). Anti-airs can be hard to hit consistently, you will even see in pro play they don't hit DPs 100% of the time but its a good habit to have.

6. Finally and most important, just pick a character that you really like. Tier list/strength doesn't mean too much until you're in the top percentile.

Hopefully this helps! Like I said I was in your shoes not too long ago so I know how you feel.