So remember when I said this:
I was surprised that the control scheme heavily leans towards an “arcade stick” setup, …
It turns out I was wrong. Skullgirls has two custom input buttons for players using the controller, which allows you to map up to six buttons or something to both L1 and L2. All you have to do is go into the control setup (press “Start” while on character select), move down to where L1 and L2 are listed, press that button, and then press however many buttons you want, then press L1 or L2 again depending on which one you’re editing! What a really great feature, and very quick to do! So, for example, I assigned all three punch buttons to L1, and all three kicks to L2. I could also have assigned buttons to make calling assists easier, swapping teammates, etc.
Right now the fighting game community is exploding with videos on insane combos, which certainly looks scary. Even with my limited skills and practice, I found myself doing over 10 hit combos and finding it quite satisfying. Now I feel stupid for ever doubting it!