TD

The answer to keepaway is patience

I watched the whole thing including the other games (that mu play was pretty decent). Let me just start off by saying, very nice improvement from last time. It seems you have been practicing, or you're just more familiar with Valkenhayn. Whatever the case, good job. Now, there were a few mistakes that you were making in neutral that, if corrected, would make you more formidable vs valk. Instead of the critique-as-I-go method I employed last time, I'm going to give you a summary of what I saw that could have simply been a better decision. Firstly, understanding how the neutral works in this matchup. Valk has the insane speed and movement to do a run-up on rachel and do her in from many a range, but he must sacrifice his defensive capabilities to do so. Rachel, on the other hand, has an excellent defensive zoning game and Able to capitalize on valk's weaknesses, but she also lacks a dp of any sort and cannot afford a screw up in the neutral, lest valk get in. With that said, after seeing these matches, I would say you weren't punishing him enough. In the neutral, your best friends are 6a, jc, pumpkin/frog, 236a, j.236a, and 236c. All of these moves stop one or several important movement options for wolf valk. They also shut down one avenue of movement; valk usually either approaches in a straight line or at an angle with wolf, so a lot of these moves are easier to connect on him. Use accordingly. The point I'm trying to make is, find out how the valk will approach, be it horizontally or at an angle, and show him you are willing to stop him. Next, find out if he will attempt to use another movement to bait your counter, or a beast cannon (which loses to lobelias). Frog is very good defensively if he tries to approach, stay near him. There are more points to this matchup, like how each summon interacts with him, but ill leave that out for now. Basically, zone him with your specials and particular focus on 6a, jc and 6b(vs human form)/236a. *deep breath* ANYWAYS, on to the matches. Don't back dash on wakeup. Valk completely shuts it down with several of his attacks. The closer you are to a corner, the more of these options lead to a combo. If he gets you, you have to take it, or risk a roll or something else. Slightly disagree with your use of td in this matchup. It is a lot better to get a hit with it by waiting on an approach via wolf, and you buy some time by waiting on his approach (because he needs to eventually). Also great if you have a frog out, because it means you have a higher chance of approaching him with all your wind. if you're going to super jump with wind, throw out a lobelia or two and summon a pumpkin. Mostly though spend time on the ground, you were out of wind often, but super jump wind is situationally ok. Highly advise you do the j2c lv2 j.214a 1d combos, doing 2d 5cc is losing out on damage, heat, wind, and stronger corner carry. Pressure was good. Sometimes though (as shown in the vid), variety isn't too effective. Don't be afraid to instant overhead twice, and include 5b (delay) 2b as one of your primary block strings in conjunction with j.a. Also, because of the respect you were getting, 4b, pumpkin summon, stagger pressure, and other tricks (refer to the mixup guide if you need help with that) would have worked well. Lastly. Save. Your. Bursts. It is absolutely important that you be able to gold burst at crucial points, like in the corner on wakeup, or to beat a 6c or 6b reset. Valk doesn't have much in the way of primer breaking so green bursts are ok too. You pretty much should only burst on wakeip or on a good combo starter. Do NOT burst during 5b, 5c, 6c starters, or you're asking to get baited. DO burst during any specials, against wolf, 6b, and 3c. He's your bitch, not the other way around. So deny him pressure whenever you can.

oh right, b lotus also makes most of her combos into auto corner-carry with a potentially significant wind cost reduction. since the corner and corner-carry combos are the cornerstone of rachel's offense (yes... lots of corners), it's really, really good and could be the reason she's enjoying top/high tierdom edit: l figured lotus had more time. how much exactly? off the top of my head i'll give it 12-13 secs (she has a recurring "13" theme lol)

increase wind strength. a lotus (blue bat) increases it vertically and b lotus (pink bat) increases it horizontally. a lotus right now is the midscreen ground combo extender and makes j2c lv3 combos possible/easier (with corner carry combos and heat/j2c lv3 nerfs a lotus is pretty useless atm). b lotus dramatically increases zoning potential. rachel becomes lambda/nu for like 10 seconds, shes much harder to touch with b lotus and it has situational synergy with OD as well

with the story supposedly being as long as it is, let's hope kagura and/or terumi are unlocked somewhere in the middle.

"you shouldn't"? that's just crazy speak. of course you can, pretty sure it's encouraged actually [Generally] if you know what you're doing

tried to join but psn is being booty next time

l play lots, read lots, watch lots. the information is bound to stick. that's why the game is fun, you never stop learning and doing.

That was just...tragic. Poor tager.

6a, jc, careful summoning, and your own mobility. Remember that you can also move just as quickly as those characters with your wind, so long as you move with a purpose because of how wind works. If you get a setup going you can keep these characters out decently, but they also have ways of dealing with Rachel's zoning, so you'll need to be even more careful if haz has 50 heat (jump/block portal super) Tao with heat (duck pounce super), and bangs d teleports.

There's ...6a 236b (frog hits) dash 5b jc j236a for a two pole setup. Not much to do with 3c being used up early. speaking of, I've seen 5b 5cdc bbl work in the corner which may open up some damaging combo routes.

They can all join the army of subs

*cough* she's always been a zoner/pressure character In ct her zoning was just as broken as her rushdown. Once she got a pumpkin out the round was almost won, it was so good. So were lobelias/frog/damage/ oki, pretty much everything In cs2/cse she's a watered down reincarnation of her old self, same in cp Only CS was she pretty much strictly zoner And really her offense just includes high low because its so good, there's no reason you can't play aggro with rachel. Don't you understand (not trying to be condescending here), the point of her zoning is to gain wind and advantage so that she can[\ii] rushdown, along with being a godsend in certain matchups (tsubaki, makoto, ragna). So if that's the reason you dropped the game... Well you should pick in back up again! :3

You could make a tower out of random things in your room or house, put the camera on it for balance, then you can trim the vid to your liking. I used to do that when I had to use my vita as a makeshift cam.

so, l must ask this. why does izayoi look so one-dimensional on offense? meaning it looks very simple to figure out what she'll do next. like, after sonic saber if shes close, the only real option is to do that fubuki sword swipe attack, or if she does [GA]236d the only real option is to dash it which seems too limited to overheads (because having to land and then a low). and then crossups look really slow too. l mean, l thought she was good, but after taking another look... please someone help me figure out what this character's pressure/mixup game is (before and/or after she has enough of those star things)

oh... yeah what else could they give her. like unlimited item and instant miracle jeanne on the first combo. oh well, sucks for plat what makes you say that? is it because makoto is higher? (for the record, l thought she should have been moved up) EDIT: ok, minus the translation by him, this list looks very legit. his other list were blatantly wrong for comedic effect.

new (though unofficial) tier lists rachel at a+ in the first position. may mean shes the closet to top tier or may not have a particular order. either way, this is the highest hime has been since old ct

seems legit (why is platinum so low though?) some changes from last time, notably makoto, bullet and rachel moving up azrael looks like he went down. very surprised izayoi is -still- so low, she looks pretty good! amane, not as much surprised

youre fine nemesis. and tbolt im really not trying to put you on blast or anything, youve just been doing that as long as i've known you and l thought you'd grow out of it. not sure if we spoke of this before(?). l would honestly rather you try to mash that just block like that, at least you'd be adding some depth and mixup to your strategy meh. l wasn't here

minus the fraudulence mu has an extensive guide on the wiki iirc, why not start there? mu has the tools to press a button anywhere on screen. if youre not as confident defending l dont see why you cant be more aggressive. at least move around a little more in the neutral. what youre currently doing isnt really working, and the philosophy behing things that don't work: try anything else.

? why im just surprised. like the very least yet effective strategy you could do is do a david sirlin and use 5c only. every mu player knows that when you should be blocking, you could always just 5c instead (hey, fraudulence wins games) l just... want you to press something... other than 4

ggs to thunderbolts room thunderbolt it always baffles me why you hold 4 for half the match at a time. l don't know what strategy youre trying to employ, but too much of a good thing isn't good. on top of that youre playing mu, queen of press-whatever-the-fuck-I-want. l mean.. seriously. why

she can keep him away decently, it's just once he catches her he can pressure her just as 'decently'

thanks rolling against rachel in the corner is pretty much impossible now... there is no escape rofl

the concern here is the max damage, which is a little over 7k. needing 50 heat for mj, needing 50 heat for super ender, needing the correct item, needing (near) the corner. the combo damage drops significantly or doesn't work at all with one or several of these requirements missing. yes, you can get decent oki and damage in most cases if you want/have to, but that wasn't exactly the case l was trying to refute. if you say that this combo is practical l'd definitely like to see it done a few times in real matches.