skd

i'd suggest more specific questions, laow ping. I can't tell what kind of issues you're having, and specific advice would be pretty centric to the level of play, if it were to be effective at all. I could definitely give you tips, but I have no clue what he is applying and what he isn't. Generally though, I can tell you about how she wants to play, and in turn how to work with that. 1) She's going to start the match and fight for stocks. Essentially, she's going to float between both modes to find an opening or move more effectively. In normal mode she wants to play around shooting A saber, and deal with you moving around grounded A saber. Air A saber is used to cover spaces where you think someone might be. Generally, low commitment neutral from her is ideal, but she needs to get close to make you guess/move badly and end up blocking sabers. Jin and terumi can't really disrespect this in any particular way, aside from normal neutral things (jump over A saber done too close, for example. but ideally, she wont want to do this). Focus on approaching her safely, but be mindful of her remaining air actions after shooting an air saber. She can't cover approach perfectly while taking an active role, which is why she wants to generally play it very passive. In GA, with no stars, she can get in and create a tech/oki situation to exploit in normal mode, but at the end of the day the deterrent for her air game (A saber teleport) is not really there so any failed hard calls at anti airing her don't really pack a punch if you get tagged. If she does have 1 star though, she can turn this into normal mode pressure, so stay on your toes. Ultimately, the goal here is to score hits in normal mode through either neutral in normal mode, or converting a low star cost hit in gain art to get more stocks. You usually won't see people going back and forth often because you lose out on too much momentum/setup from gain art that makes her truly scary, so the flow of: Get 3 stocks > Mode change, blow stocks > Get 3 Stocks > Mode change, blow stocks is not as effective as getting 6 at once and going in with them, but the options exist depending on the demand of the situation, so she's a bit flexible. 2) If she gets in for normal mode pressure, its relatively hard to disrespect. All she really wants is for you to block so she can get stars, but there are times where she may overcommit if she gets too greedy. Focus on low commitment options (good jumping, instant blocks). Staple options are 6C stance cancel (it's +1, but her 2A is 8f), 236A (Neutral on block point blank), 236C~B/C. Attempting to punish the 236 series is a bit...risky, as she can delay her teleport to make you whiff a move. She's usually going to resort to creating space, (or letting it recover on it's own) but its a guess on your behalf. Pretty straightforward, the spacing that 6C can leave her at depending on the gatlings you run may make a disrespect 2A after 6C stance cancel whiff, so you need to be careful there too, since 1 hit at that range will turn into 6 stocks. 3) Assuming she got her stocks without dying in the process, she's in GA, she outmaneuvers you, she can bully you as far as air approach goes. Jin 2C is good, terumi 6A is also good, but theyre not definite answers as they carry a lot of risk if she were to do A saber > teleport (especially 2C) . She just straight up has great air movement, so it's very hard to catch her or keep her cornered, but focus on playing well around her approach. Stay at a good range for A saber teleport where you can jump it, hopefully she will teleport behind you and into your attacking range. This goes best with backwards jumps, jin j2C is great for this. Aside from this, there really are no concrete answers. Her approach can be countered if you guess correctly, but you need to just figure out where she is interested in attacking you from. She wants to attack at angles where your anti airs will either whiff or you need to guess so that you let her walk all over you, so in a sense she forces you to take action otherwise you are probably going to die. It's a bit hard to wait out her stocks in neutral, since she doesn't really need to use them for them to be threatening. Jumping badly or moving into bad positions really lets her exploit thanks to teleport, so you need to know these ranges beforehand. Ideally, you want to be kind of midrange, but outside of her anticipated horizontal range air to air. Jin jC does this, Terumi jD does this. Again, by no means free. She can move a little farther/faster/higher to deal with it, but you need to take advantage of that too and pressure her when possible. Essentially, force her to overextend herself in neutral to deal with safe options. 4) Her pressure game...if you were playing against me, i'd definitely say focus on low commitment escapes (again, jumping and IB forces her to commit to something that will let you escape, but it's much less free against GA). She hits super hard in GA, but if you just sit tight and block you are going to get opened up, so you gotta do something. She's never really at loss for frame traps or advantage, so mashing to disrespect CAN work, but its not really in your interest because if you are wrong you just took a lot of damage, god forbid you are in the corner it's almost 5k meterless. as far as defense goes, i don't really have a lot to say. I don't think terumi is good enough to actually open up a competent player consistently, jin is much more fortunate. she has a great backdash that is very hard to hard call, so at max range it's super hard to keep her blocking. D saber > teleport is very difficult to disrespect, if you block it in the air and she is underneath you, you are open to left right mixup during blockstun (you need to barrier in the correct direction). If you are on the ground, yeah, you need to hold the mixup unless you have meter to dead angle or burst during blockstun. ok, i hope that answered a few of your questions at least.

i am free wednesday, yeah!

mmm, i can if you'd like. But if youre in NY then wtf, come to tsb! its this saturday lol. though, ever since running the events i can't say i've had the most time to play orz

gg's! i had fun. i feel really stupid trying to play izayoi though, lol.

i can play for about an hour, hopefully its ~not laggy~ my psn is cismalescum

i replied to mashthat5a on twitter, but IMO jD covers space that, if you can use jD safely, ends up covering angles of approach that the valkenhayn player shouldnt want to pursue at that time. Yes, it can hit certain movements but in situations where you can best guess with it, usually does not do anything unless the valk commits to a pretty bad guess, which...can get utility vs someone doing something bad, but thats the kind of thing you just have to improv and punish, not quite great for matchup theory. There are lots of alternatives, including more traditional means of anti air that can seemingly cover the same situations, maybe even more practically (5A, superjump jA, 6A). Just make sure you don't superjump jA and use your second air action relatively high (he will probably just destroy you for this), going backwards causes you to lose a lot of space but its safer and thats kind of what you have to settle for.

its solid, but make sure when you finish the input you keep holding back. you can also input something similar by holding B, and then tapping A whole holding back or downback so you get 3A or 6A on crossup, if desired. Other inputs you can OS very easily are 236236 (214214), 632146 inputs (do it as 412364) with the same idea behind button inputs (holding A if you want to use the B button, holding B if you want to use the A button, holding both if you want to use C or D). Obviously, if they can bait you out it isnt surefire, and definitely definitely you do not want to mash this, this is similar in concept to fuzzy guarding. Pick a specific time to input, and input cleanly and quickly so that you don't get tagged low. If you really want to defend vs some left right, you can almost combine this with a fuzzy jump too.

it has nothing to do with the SMP property, sekkajin wallbounce is forced untechable for a set amount of frames i think? not 100% on that, but low hitting sekkajin does give you a very advantageous knockdown which is why it is preferable. another example of a good combo that incidentally has SMP (which is often disregarded)

logically speaking its design does not inherently suggest that you arent supposed to use it for offense, imo. as the name suggests, it is simply a penalty for using the same move. it ends there. SMPing at the literal last hit of a combo that would otherwise expire combo time yields no difference. SMPing during a combo where you cant do anything else while retaining a knockdown situation isnt exactly a limiter, especially considering there are hard knockdown moves with smp that have static values for untechable time (not affected by decay) on landing. As far as using SMP for okizeme and stuff, it really does nothing but hinder you as a property, but that is more of an affect of combo structure rather than the intention of SMP. edit:lmfao, i like how we all posted this in a line.

really its fine lol. like, im not trying to say dont talk about this thing, i dont really want to limit discussion or anything. But i DO want to make it very explicit that SMP resets are not really a good idea, purely by design. And especially differentiate between offensive ideas/resets with smp and optimized combos that happen to have it.

it can be optimal as part of a combo (izayoi in every match), but in every situation the property of SMP is only acting as a limiter, which is what i am saying because we are discussing the idea of "SMP on offense"(?) as to which, i say really has no purpose because anything it does (especially on hard knockdown) can be achieved without it (imagine if the property was gone), so we can't really say that it's the SMP's doing. I am trying to exclusively talk about SMP as a concept, not combos that incidentally include SMP. SMP combos exist for whatever reason, be it damage or resource gain. Essentially, youve kind of strayed from the main point of discussion, which is OK. But, i feel the need to make this clear for whoever else happens to stumble upon this.

swd, looking at the untech/proration timeline, you can just figure out why the 2C does not blue beat on that knockdown. But, let's face it: you can create a more advantageous situation without using SMP, maybe even get a bit more damage out of the combo timer, maybe even better spacing before pre-expiring it for no real reason. Hard knockdown is hard knockdown, the tech options remain the same. Maybe, it might be easy to time it with SMP, but that isnt really optimal, so it ends up being useless when there are better plausible options. SMP in this situation and the nu situation really just forcing a tech in a situation where...you could...force a tech. Maybe its a bit "sneaky" or something, but are you trying to random someone out with gimmicks or create the strongest possible oki situation? by this line of thought, smp kind of ends up being simply a limiter, despite having potential for cute unexpected tricks. at the end of the day, things like the threat of ragna 22c pickup recombo because of heavy untech decay is also possible without SMP, but SMP may make it easier to time or set up, or make it "unexpected" (which i dont have a lot of faith in).

ah yes, my subjects, you have waited long enough. im just kidding, but that probably has worsened someone's opinion of me. okay, this thread pretty much set itself on fire for the past few pages so i might not catch everything. i'll speak generally. crossing fingers, dont infract me mac i'm at 2 warning points already. It's pretty fair to say I don't think i have much to talk about without trudging into the opinions discussion, so here i go. Firstly, i'd like to talk about the validity of counterpoints, such as SWD saying I dont know about a bumper setup, and someone chiming in that me not addressing this directly is an issue. Let me repost my words from the preamble i wrote. The reason why i say this is because, if you do not follow the right train of thought when it comes to offense, you may come to off base conclusions like those on the strength of bang "mixup" (let me use "mixup" encompassing many things). Whatever arbitrary ideas you have concerning what is "mixup", what counts as pressure, and what does not, i do not care for. I am trying to talk about practical application. I dont care, because ultimately it has no bearing on what i'm trying to talk about. And by bringing up these counterpoints, you only demonstrate to me that you totally missed the point. I am trying to impart the proper approach to analysis (which apparently, people say they understand and agree with, but if you did you would not be saying what you do, and i knew this was going to happen which is why i mentioned it in that preamble, not like it did anything). If you really did understand, or had that approach, you would not be coming to those conclusions. Hell, we'd even agree on things. How valid is someone's setup who doesn't even understand offensive meta? How valid is someone's opinion on the strength of mixup who cant integrate practical application of mixup? That, is, in a nutshell, why I don't feel the need to respond to things like that. Saying something like that was totally missing the point, and i hope you revisit my post with that in mind. I hoped that much would be obvious but nobody really spelled it out. I am not really talking to anyone specifically with this, but a ton of discussion has appeared to take place despite this. If you don't have the right basis for coming to your conclusions, you are NOT going to come to the right conclusions for the right reasons. This is important, because the way I attempted to break things down, it is more so building blocks than it is the right answers. To be honest, what i wrote was VERY basic, and the actual explanation of situations can go on and on and on. But, people didn't have quite the right idea on how mixup was structured, people didnt have the right idea on reactive ability, people didnt have the right idea, so i attempted to lay it out by showing an example analysis on specific tools and gave an example of how reactable offense is implemented. I could go on for days about actual analysis for situations. I am not trying to make claims on what tools are strong or what is not. I am trying to show you the right ideas to approach those tools with, so you can come to correct conclusions on your own. You can come from any line, any scene, and have a different outlook on what is what at low/intermediate level. Someone else may come in and assume that Jin pressure is totally the most broken thing in the game. Who's to say their opinion is more valid than yours? The game. The game tells you. You can literally end up with ANY skewed opinion while developing, but ultimately as far as optimized play goes there is much shared consensus. While, there might be small discrepancies (like the thing mentioned about carl being higher tier than kokonoe, its a reasonable claim) ultimately ideas on how to play most effectively, what is strong, what isnt, general human ability...these things are shared. They are not shared because "we need consensus", it is because the most effective ideas are not exclusive to anyone. And yes, while knowledge shapes your conclusions, just because we don't come to the same ones it doesn't mean that i am lacking in knowledge. Maybe it can go vice versa, maybe someone might have an overly optimistic opinion because they don't understand the game as well. If we can't see eye to eye here, you might as well just block me. Also,ill make this very brief, but dreiko, you are definitely not getting the right idea from the "don't pedestal players" thing jiyuna said. I definitely would like to be able to use my perception as a reputable thing. After all, isn't my perception a successful one? There is that angle, that isnt debatable. Nobody is sucking me off on some skill hierarchy anything or whatever. There isnt anything wrong about saying my ideas are more accurate or considerate. Of course, you can question them, but when you directly disagree with something that we both claim to have put consideration into, isnt the onus of question on you? I've proven my understanding already. There may be people who have put in a lot of effort and a lot of time, but that does not really mean anything. Time spent coming to poor conclusions ends up as nothing but a poor conclusion. I'm not saying everyone's efforts are useless, but as people have said many times (including you), the facts speak for themselves. As i said earlier, the game tells you whether you are making the right calls or not. There are easy ways to verify these things, no, wins are not nearly so vague that you need to consider multiple causes for a win or something. Overall, i could go on for days about this kind of thing, it isnt really so on topic for me to bring this up either, i suppose. and laow ping, yes, anyone can say anything about something in a specific scope and be right, but that is not what i am concerning myself about at all. Anyone replying to me should keep that in mind, because i'm only really here to talk about optimizing ideas. However, talking about things like what is best...this is inarguable, to a point. These are not really subjective. No, it isnt as varied as "we can say this is good because i prioritize this!". That isn't how developed play works. Developed play has priorities. You have to adhere to those things. It's usually called risk/reward. Within that, perhaps you have a bit of wiggle room. I think izayoi's overall GA offense is fantastic, comparable to valk even? Yeah, i'd go that far. That might be a little hard for some people to swallow, but whats the issue? Is it unreasonable? If it is, that is one thing. If it's a lack of knowledge, that's another. Strong can be arguable. Best can be arguable, but no, you cannot dictate best like that. That isnt how fighting games work. Not sure if there was much else i wanted to say? ill go by user~ @SWD: I don't think you read my posts very clearly. If you still want to say i'm lacking in knowledge or wrong, i'd be glad to explain things for you more in depth, but i'd just be repeating myself. That would honestly be best off in a PM. @Sey: Sorry, i'm going to keep it really concise, but...Hazama options, I dont think hes really similar to jin, but his pressure is still good. His pressure is a lot looser. A lot of frame advantage, but not the same kind of threats. Can't really force you to hold very much mixup if you roll good defensive options / have good reactions, at least not as much as jin. As you mentioned with Mitsurugi, his style kind of ends up being quick pressure/threats. Not the hardest to disrespect because he can't really weigh his options the same way jin can, but still has generally threatening tools, so it ends up looking like that. @hollysmoke: Sorry! I also wrote that at 3 in the morning with my head spinning, lol. I intended to have it checked over and re-written before turning it into an article for sure, by no means do i think that is even close to publishable. Being able to dialogue about it and figure out what needs clarification gives me ideas on where to expand and better ways to organize, so testing the waters here first wasn't without purpose. Im very glad to get questions from people! I definitely do want to keep talking about things. and as for my opinion on SMP, it is literally there to limit combos. 100%. Can be used for cute resets, but those are ultimately pretty weak, especially because vs good opponents you want to assume that they know just as much as you, have a good idea about your characters options and the threat of an "SMP" making them tech earlier than expected.

this is not a good idea because you might hang yourself trying to tech a throw that never comes, or comes later. The game is designed with a system for punishing throw tech inputs, even if you barrier OS. The best ways to attempt to tech a throw if you can't react fall into a number of outcomes depending on the character you are fighting and the situation (wakeup, blockstun). You don't want to over commit to something that you can get punished for if you don't have to, a good player really will kill you for making a bad defensive choice like this. Bad throw tech decisions are probably one of the biggest pitfalls i see in a lot of midlevel players.

im kind of offended you think i'd just say something with as little weight behind it as "i played him, so i know!" from a defensive standpoint, and as a competitive player myself, what do you THINK i care about? what do you think i'd try to consider? do you think i wouldnt be interested in figuring out what bang's offensive tools best structure his offense towards? I need to understand these things to deal with them best. Just because you play the character, it doesn't mean you understand his offense :\ Other people have been playing for much longer, have put in more hours, and may end up even farther from where they should be. Time doesnt mean anything. Regardless of that, I dont necessarily agree on your perception of Jin pressure and feel like your idea of bang pressure is unrealistically strong. I don't think you have a good idea of proper defense against your character, and definitely do not have a good idea of Jin's offensive goals. Talking about mixup post hit, bang probably has better ways of opening up an opponent who chooses to respect, but he has a much harder time actually demanding that respect. Pressure and mixup are both directly related, why would I give you the light of day for this mixup situation that i might have to block 16 ways if all i have to do is move out of the way to avoid. Avoiding situations, disrespecting situations that best demand in terms of risk/reward, are all parts of good defense. If i have to mash 2A to get out of this situation, how effectively you can stop me from 2Aing is also part of the mixup. i will say explicitly, Jin offense without setup is definitely stronger than bangs. Jin's offense with ice setup does lead into tricky situations, and it is much harder to disrespect. Bang may have an easier time with raw mixup after setup, but a good opponent will make you need to weigh "pressure" effectively as well. If you aren't considering pressure as a part of the "threat", then we've kind of strayed from the point of "high level" (read: optimizing) discussion. At this point to really get to the root of the problem it would be me trying to understand why you have whatever perception of jin and bang, how their pressure works, etc.

i agree about not being able to see the animation for most throws, but i don't think 22 frames is unreactable if you aren't looking for it. I'd probably draw that line a bit lower. Regardless, if you were playing Mac online i can't really say that helps at all. The important thing about playing offline is being able to manage how much time you'll need to deal with specific options, its crucial to give yourself as much room as possible to commit to things that you'd want to. However, me saying i agree with not being able to see the animation for most throws also may imply that you can react to much less. And, yeah. You can. And Dreiko, the thing is, bang isnt as scary to block often period. You really dont want to let him get set up if possible, and there are ways to disrespect his mixup in a way that his pressure game can't contest as well as Jin's does. So, as far as not only mixup tools, but other pressure tools go, Jin's are much more cohesive and offer much more consistently scary situations. To a degree, if you can't guard against that situation you will want to avoid it. Jin generally has a much easier time making you eat that scary mixup situation, and the various ways to deal with throws definitely make Bang's command grab veryyyy risky, especially considering the strength of his basic pressure. Overall, Jin's normals and pressure compliments a throw game much better than bang's does, and the effect compounds itself when he has meter. I've played a decent amount with Dora, and i've played a decent amount of with good Jin players who are not nearly as renowned, and that call is very cut and dry to me tbh, saying Jin isnt as threatening as BANG isnt something that really clicks.

yeah, ill make a more structured article on this but its probably good to talk about stuff somewhere. whoah there, bang high low is not nearly as threatening as jin high low. Both 5C and 6B are super easy to block IMO, the presence of two mixup options are not nearly enough to make it scary, especially two options with such deliberate animations as his. Bang can do some stuff, especially between command throw and bumpers, but his basic high low mixup tools are pretty weak.

No, i literally mean that by considering all of my opponents options given a situation (is 6a a reasonable threat at this point?). Using, or not using it, the threat does not disappear if my opponent can hit me with 6A in a given time frame. There is no better indicator of what i should be ready for than the risk reward. And of course, this reasons into dividing my focus in a certain way. The urgency of me looking for 6A in a meterless pressure situation is low, so my priorities are going to be on looking for other, more urgent options. Throw, pressure resets, places where I can perhaps establish an advantage of my own? Similarly, 6A is low priority to the jin player, on the chance that he does 6A and I do end up guarding, he loses pressure, even gets punished. This risk/reward shapes this because, while he can "one up" me and maybe smack me with a 6a that does almost nothing off of a risky situation, there are other things i can do. I can backdash, fuzzy jump, mash him out, etc. At the end of the day, it really is not in his interest to 6a me unless he gets a sizeable reward, considering the investment he places in it to actually hit me if i have good defense. It isnt in his interest, and as such, it isnt in my interest. This is important, as right mindset on defense can really help shape your opponent's pressure in making it more manageable. If you defense is good, you /will/ force your opponent to make better choices on offense. At high level play, just ONE hit is so much, it takes a lot to get, you have to make the most of every opportunity because your opponent is doing the exact same. Alternatively, we can think about a metered situation, or where hitting me with 6A will give him enough meter to RC. The threat is suddenly much higher! So, you could take this as "oh, if you look for the overhead, its much easier to throw you!" but that isnt the only factor in considering what is most urgent to focus on. At this point, throw may still yield similar reward to a 6A combo, but if he hits you with 6A /he has to blow 50 meter to convert it/. The throw would end up leaving him with more meter and similar damage. As such, in this situation i'm still going to prioritize throw, but yeah, i'll try my best to guard against everything. Its difficult, but some gut feelings and reads can come into play here, as well as thinking about specific frames when you can get thrown, or when you can get hit by overhead and playing around that. Blockstun does not allow you to get green thrown for a number of frames after you leave it, so thinking about that you should prioritize looking for 6A then, etc etc. I hope this is fairly straightforward, i definitely will go into it more if necessary. Making these good defensive choices on what to react to will make you last a lot longer whether you successfully guard or not. I'd also like to take this opportunity to explicitly state that everything i wrote considers, and ignores "predictive committed reactions". Using the throw example from earlier, where you may press throw in anticipation of a throw...that is not what i mean about /reactions/. I am making this distinction now, please do not misconstrue anything i write about reactions as anything but reactions. I am well past misinterpreting what is a reaction and what is anticipated timing. as far as "how do i build good defensive reactions?" that isnt something i can so easily answer. If you are having trouble switching guard/teching for something despite waiting for it, you might be looking for it a bit too hard and getting thrown off as far as timing or something. I say this because...this definitely happens to a lot of really good players. But in terms of raw reaction speeds it's just something you have to train. Keep playing, keep playing. It's a mix of familiarity and second nature acknowledgement. If you think too hard about it, you'll just slow yourself down. Reiterating that this kind of discussion is around top level play mentality, so while certain things may apply in some scopes i am talking about dealing with optimized decisions and reactions. Ultimately meaning it invalidates other modes of approach to the game competitively, because better regard to risk/reward WILL cause you to win against someone who is not thinking about things nearly as efficiently.

When i said "in a void" referring to gauntlet hades, just looking at gh and comparing it in properties (unsafe on block, 24f, deliberate animation) to another overhead doesnt sum up it's overall worth, because of how it works in tandem with other aspects of the game. When i mentioned it earlier relating to jin and relius 6a, i meant to say that estimating it's value and overall coming to a conclusion on why jin 6A is strong comes from its application into a number of situations. to be fair, at higher levels of play it shouldnt be about conditioning. If a player is just as good as you, and doesnt have a knowledge disadvantage it wont really about rotating, you need a strong foundation. The threat alone of something being POSSIBLE is what should allow your opponent to defend against it, regardless of whether it is being used often or not. Of course, getting familiar with it is one thing, but high level of play has more than enough of that. I want to really talk about this, because thats a kind of dangerous idea about how to implement offense. i am talking about fighting against optimized defensive reactions disregarding any committed reaction. When i say committed reaction, i mean something like, someone inputting a throw tech because they thought a throw was coming. That was not a predictive reaction, that was a committed input. When i say react to a throw, i literally mean reaction. Like, raw, i would not have pressed this otherwise reaction.

as a GOOD DUSTLOOP MEMBER, ill try to push a discussion here while we wait for 2.0, maybe educate some people, since apparently not many people have very accurate ideas on how offensive, high/low/throw mixup is implemented PRACTICALLY and end up with unrealistic expectations of their own reactions or something terrible because they only play bad players (practical application is important, because while people find the ideas easily agreeable, their application of those ideas onto BB's tools is very off). I don't care about netplay personal exp, low level "opinions" that dont have much reasonable basis or whatever, this is about efficient implementation in BLAZBLUE not the 2 delay game that resembles it. The fact that i have to spell this out makes me feel some type of way but you know, i am a largely optimistic person (and an elitist asshole, as you can sum up from this preamble). i want to talk about the kind of "mixup philosophy" that goes into characters at very high level. What is good mixup? What is consistent mixup, different styles of mixup and things like that. Obviously we have good ideas of the extremes. characters like rachel and valkenhayn, with unreactable instant overheads, and we have slow standing overheads at the other end of the spectrum. But, there are a lot of speeds in between. So...how do you hit a competent opponent with a reactable mixup? What kind of reactable mixups can we consider consistent? Normally, these reactable mixups are comboable, or don't leave you in a terrible position on block (reasonable, considering the fact that they are a lot harder to land), where a lot of other extremely fast overheads are unsafe without meter, or lack cancel options. You cannot speed up a move with an RC, but you can make one safe, even give you a better combo. So realistically, these pan out as more useful. While you might be able to do a slow overhead and retain pressure (this implies less investment in actually going for it, where other overheads could leave you punishable or ) couldnt you pick a better option to use in your pressure? This kind of limits the usage of things like ragna 6b and gauntlet hades. While ragna 6B DOES let you keep something resembling pressure, why would i go for that when i could opt for better usage of my advantage situation? This contrast is seen in two normals that were recently mentioned, jin 6a and relius 6a. obviously, jin 6a is much, much better. You can't quite take these in a void. There are distinctions between the two, as well as the presence of strong mixup with meter (you CAN get a fuzzy off relius 6A with meter provided they don't instant block it, then...) but comparing all sorts of situations that come from usage of the overhead (how fast is it? reversal on reaction? cancel options into it? what kind of resources can i use to supplement the utility of this overhead? do i have a way to obscure it? how easy is it to get my opponent to respect in a situation where they'll have to eat this? how beneficial is meter for this overhead?) we can come to the conclusion that jin 6A is ultimately much more useful. Ill take a consistent, low damage/hard to convert mixup over a high damage mixup that is only going to hit once in a blue moon. Of course, it isnt so black and white and reward IS generally mediated around how hard it is to hit someone with something like this (theres a reason why jin overhead is only comboable on RC) but consistent mixups are much more effective.It is much more difficult to hit with jin 6A than it is with wolf brake jA. People will sometimes react to 6A! What makes this distinction different than people reacting to relius 6A more often than Jin 6A? what makes some mixup consistent, but others not? what is worth going for? Well, as far as the current top level of play has demonstrated, we can definitely call some forms of mixup relatively consistent. Jin 6A falls into this category. This is the kind of mixup where I feel it is difficult to guard unless you are aware of it. If you expect something else, or dont see it coming you are going to get hit. This isn't a property of its 19 frames, but rather that in conjunction with it's animation. WHATEVER it is, it has proven itself. The number of frames doesnt necessarily matter. Another good example is hakumen 6B, even then that is really pushing it as far as reaction. I think it's possible, but super, super difficult. Again, this isnt because of the speed but because of the animation. Where else do we see things that are...difficult to actually defend against successfully on reaction? Oh, throws. Yes, throws, no, i dont give a shit what you heard from dacidbro, you can react to a throw. Yes, there is more to a throw than the exclamation mark. Yes, throws have subtle animations which could make reacting to them difficult. However, it is NOT that simple. You are not going to tech a throw unless you are ready for it, and applying focus properly is a huge skill as well. It is well within human ability to consistently react, given the right frame of mind, but getting thrown off (pun not intended) by an unpredictable opponent makes throws extremely strong offensively. Same goes for other forms of mixup. Within high level play though, people will get thrown. It is a very worthwhile form of mixup to pursue, especially because the reward for throws are VERY HIGH. However, there are a few ways to defend against throw properly which shape your pressure structure, which i will cover in a later post if people would like. There comes a point where looking for one thing will impede you when looking for another. However, some things are just so damn slow that you don't even have to be looking, or it does not detract from your defense enough to cause any verifiable harm. This is why relius 6a is straight booty (highlighting this for you, myoron). Its too slow, too obvious to make someone really that scared IMO. It might hit occasionally, but vs an opponent with good defense it will not pan out so successfully, you are much better off just taking normal pressure. So, when i talk about "harder to hit with" this is harder to hit with to a point where it is kind of a waste of opportunity. But, if youre playing vs bad players go for it i guess? Not to say it is useless, as sometimes going for the safe mixup is the right choice. but, i am only talking about raw offense. How to open people up MOST effectively. remember that whole "decent at best" quip? Well, okay. Relius mixup is...reactable (fuzzy is dead next version okay), but what makes it strong is that it is hard to react to and also very safe. It is this safety that allows him room to work. That safety in itself is good, so safer mixups (that are not necessarily the most difficult to block) are still very useful. Relius offense is great precisely because he can maintain difficult to guard mixup while being very safe and having a TON of options, the overall value on his pressure is definitely not "decent at best", lol. Safe mixups that are low commitment aren't necessarily bad to go for. If you lose nothing for it, why not? But yeah, at this point i'm going a bit off topic. I want to focus on how to open people up. So, a rough example of what is good in that "looking for one thing" line of thought? While looking for jin 6A, instead of 6A he whiffs 5A and he throws you. Or, instead he takes a step back, and you realize this. And then he throws you. Or, he just throws you. This isn't necessarily a 50/50 mixup or anything of the sort. You could mash, fuzzy jump, backdash. There are a ton of ways to response, even just blocking well. you could respond to this situation VERY well and very consistently, but he also has the option to pressure you normally, maybe even moving you into a more disadvantaged position. However, this is good mixup. This is consistent mixup. Strong players will get hit by this if implemented properly, unpredictably, and with good regard to risk/reward. The best players will straight up block or tech vs these tools reasonably well, but even then it is STILL "good". Anything we can do to improve our offensive reasoning. Maybe, one day people will all get so fucking good that we will guard against throw/18f overhead like gods. I dont think so, but this is one step closer, so bear with me for the sake of example. So, simply put it isn't only about the overhead, implementation of the overhead is also very important. How demanding it is to successfully guard (or tech) is instrumental in pressure structure. In a heavy blockstun situation, where I KNOW i don't have to worry about the threat of a throw for x number of frames, it is easier to guard against jin 6A during that time. Normally, this means jin placing himself into a bigger risk for opening me up, as blockstun literally limits your opponent. Why does he need to extend himself that much to hit me? Vs some players you might be able to run this kind of mixup. It definitely would be more effective, as it is in your interest to minimize risk, right? But that priority is precisely why a good player who adheres to risk/reward well will be expecting, and ready to guard against something like that. It makes it "obvious", in a sense. Eventually, we have to draw lines at where things become superfluous as situations and responses start to cross over into eachother, and these lines generally dictate optimized responses. Talking from my corner of expertise, Izayoi is a great example of having reactable, consistent, strong mixup with very unique properties that should help flesh out some ideas. Let's talk about her meterless Gain Art mixup, because her metered mixup is actually just unreactable, flat out. Fuzzies, noir edge is 10f, i dont know what else to say lol. she has a good medium between reward and consistency of mixup that overall ends up in her standard offense being very strong. Her damage is really high, her mixups are really fast (For the sake of numbers off dash, jA is 16f, jB is 18f, jC is 21f, and her 2A is an 8 frame low), and are all generally advantageous on block. She has a ton of cancel options, being able to go for IAD's off certain things, whiffing into lows, throws, occasionally left right. Shes a fiend. If you block, you are going to get opened up. She does come with her own meter though, but that also means she has the option to burn resources for strong, hard to disrespect mixups. But these dashes are also only really possible in neutral, because you cant cancel into them. Or, in IAD's cases they are much slower, which means you do have to commit heavily for those really fast mixups, as the safer ones are a bit slower. She can do all of these things to kill you but, only given the right implementation of respect, or resources. Right off the bat, there is a limitation to how safe she can be while performing these mixups. This is intentional, and is part of the design of mixup for her, and in this game. As a result of her offense being so reliant on that, she is also given ways to dissuade attempts to disrespect her pressure. Certain reversal safe strings, low profiles, high damage, strong conversions, good frame traps, and heavy frame advantage. But, this means you have to really work your magic, and get your opponent to "let you" so to speak, unless you have the resources to back it up. When i say that, i mean that i believe dash jB is reactable. It is her go-to overhead for a number of character specific hoo-ha reasons that i won't go into, but it is 18f. I personally think this is reactable, but it is "one of those". Particularly demanding to block. On defense, coupled with other forms of mixup, it becomes nigh unreactable (which is where the focus on implementation comes in), given the respect. The necessity for respect that the tools design somewhat constrict you to ultimately allows her higher reward than other characters with safer mixups of the same speed, because it is "harder" to land, so to speak. Though, not all mixups are balanced equally in a void (gauntlet hades cry your heart out, you negative, reactable piece of trash), you cannot really look at WHY these things are the way they are in that scope. In part of her larger character design, she needs resources. She is a mode change character. Normal mode is centric around neutral play and staggered pressure, her only standing overhead in normal mode is negative on block, uncomboable, and has a literally useless feint (not really related, but i wanted to vent). While GA more than makes up for this on Izayoi's behalf, not everyone gets the nice life. Some characters are outright better than others, unfortunately, especially when it comes to certain properties. Not everyone can mix up, not everyone can play neutral, and not every cloud has a silver lining. Sometimes design just does not pan out well. But when it comes to Izayoi opening people up in GA, she is proficient, and when it comes to keep respect, she is proficient, ultimately meaning her GA offense as a whole is hella good. Those are the kinds of things to look at when analyzing a character's offensive tools, and this isnt even all of her shit, just a very general look at a specific area. I hope this gets people to look at things in a more accurate light :> this is actually the longest and least sarcastic "i am fed up with seeing dumb things" post i have ever made.

N E T P L A Y B O Y S jin 6A is a very potent form of mixup because you have to be very ready for it to block it, in situations where there is much else to be looking at for a number of (good) reasons. It is not "free" to block, and if you are blocking vs predictable players and misconstruing that as you having godlike defense then that is unfortunate. Hell, i think izayoi jB for high low is reactable and it is faster than jin 6A. However, it is one of those things where she has so many options at any given time it is extremely difficult to block, forget it if you end up in throw range or you get thrown off by something unexpected. It's extremely good for mixup. Even at extreme familiarity, it's hard to maintain that kind of reactive speed between multiple options. Jin 6A is a smidge slower, usually, blocking it in a linear or predictable situation means you are playing bad players. It is really good, if used properly. Simply reacting to a character crouching for a fast low is not possible. If you don't agree with me, i'd really love to play offline and test your reactions, but realistically im saying this to be intimidating. I think i have a pretty damn good idea on reactions. Hopefully you can take my word! edit: myoro, relius 6a is not a good overhead imo lol. even if it is comboable, it is far from strong. the animation is too blatant, it is too slow. It really...shouldnt hit often, even when they arent looking for it. Just knowing it CAN come is good enough. when it comes to an overhead like that...i think that makes it /really/ weak. There are a few tricks you can do to disguise the animation (unsummon dash 6a is a good one) but i think thats just a gimmick, you can get used to that. If we want to talk about standing overheads, it is definitely one of the weaker ones :>

Results: I'd like to point you all to my challonge account! ( http://challonge.com...superkawaiidesu ). If you'd like to reach individual results, or check the progression of the tournament as it goes along, you can access things through the template of "challonge.com/<first 3 letters of month><year>TSB<initials of game>". I ran some tournaments through tio, but...i blew up the results (im sorry). I'm going to run the subsequent tournaments on challonge, as per usual. starting things a bit early this time FIRST GAMES START AT 1:30 (BB/PERSONA 4). not gonna stress on stream time, it should be pretty short. probably small tournament. Location: Next Level 4013 8th Ave Brooklyn, NY 11232 Equipment needed: PS3's! Next Level has a good amount of Benq and Asus monitors, but without the actual games we can't do much. *Time, Elimination Rules, and Entry fee may change from month to month, so make sure you know whats up! Please call me or send a text message if you are running late, please be sure to include your tag! If you'd like my number, just PM me through here, or you can get in contact with me through Facebook group at the bottom of the page. Persona 4 1:30 PM 2/3 Rounds. 2/3 Matches. 2/3 matches for finals. $5 Double Elim BLAZBLUE 1.1 1:30 PM 2/3 Rounds. 2/3 Matches. 2/3 matches for finals. $5 Double Elim Guilty Gear XRD 3 PM 2/3 Rounds. 2/3 Matches. 2/3 matches for finals. $5 Double Elim ROTATING GAME: VAMPIRE SAVIOR?! 4 PM 2/3 Matches. 2/3 matches for finals. $1 Single Elim I'm going to be really strict with the stream schedule this time, as much as i say this every time. I'm giving BB a bit of shine this time since this is our last 1.1 tournament. Persona finals will be offstream unless we have a good amount of time (i doubt it), but i will record them separately with an LGP, okay?! I'll give art the archives, get the commentary setup going. Likely schedule: P4: 1:30~2:15 BB: 2:15 to 3 (Hopefully i FINISH BB here, before 3. If it's close to finishing, i'll let it run into GG time a bit. GG: 3:00 to ~4:00 (End time depends on vsav entrants) Vsav: ~4:00 to whenever it is done (expecting like 8~10 entrants @ single elim), then finish up GG Top 4 on stream. Streaming/Recording: Arturo himself will be handling our event! Catch it at http://www.twitch.tv/nycfurby and at his youtube channel on https://www.youtube.com/user/FGCSabin There is also a TSB Facebook Page, If that is more convenient for you (It is also a very good way of getting in touch with me): https://www.facebook...2?ref=bookmarks If you'd like to get event invites / calendar notifications through facebook for these events, please join this group! https://www.facebook...18216978271919/

im assuming the real question in this thread is just "but what if wolf is not kill" 5b is ass in this matchup without knowing what to rps to gain respect, especially if you want to footsie vs wolf. Wolf walk speed is too fast, and 5c can easily hit the extended hitbox underneath his leg. obviously the valk doesnt want to play at a closer range, and if you whiff a grounded normal like that he'll just walk in and whiff punish. 5b isn't really a point of contention against wolf except for it's speed, but thats at closer ranges. More like, don't let the valk kind of...forget it exists, he shouldnt really be walking in your face but it's in his interest to play a more spaced neutral game, it's simply in his interest for risk/reward. If theyre not really playing smart, take the damage ofc but in the scope of more developed neutral play, it shouldnt see a ton of use. jA is...ok. vs human form mainly, but i'll talk about wolf. Hell's fang is good, a bit hard to deal with, esp in the corner. At least make him scared of it, it can save you a lot of headache vs wolf in neutral. I think its pretty good, honestly lol. A bit difficult for him to jump out of to boot. obviously berial edge exists, its solid but he can still react to it as a jump in, or just walk underneath you and 5b you in either case, if you do it or not. jC kind of dies to wolf 5B, no real way to challenge it up close, compliments berial edge enough to make it tricky for him to AA you if you space yourself in regard to him not being able to wolf-walk underneath your berial edge (he might have to walk back) which is good because it means you can instantly control the space in front of you with falling jC and whatever else when you land, if he tries to walk back in and tag you right as you land from an anticipated jC (technically, he can reasonably demand advantage in a situation where you land playing around with linearity of air options) berial edge will tag him (super high reward on CH, but unfortunately for you, whiffing this will destroy you). jC is a hella safe guess off a neutral jump or upback jump, just dont get too far away haha. This is probably one of the only respect games you can really play vs wolf in this matchup. Risk/reward on almost everything else is just too bad, lol. a lot of single jump CCCCCC. He has other shit he can do like rising jA or whatever to challenge, just deal with it accordingly. dont be afraid to use 5A/6A midpressure, its super legit/safe if you know where a gap will be, and where you can guess safely with like dash 5a to control certain space (esp after forced wolf dash off special moves > transform like 236b~d or something). /keep him midrange/. 5b is almost useless, 5c is alright (good end hitbox) but a lot of recovery :< hells fang is cool, 5A, jC and berial are are your best friends imo. well, unfortunately we dont have the tools to effectively do this kind of thing (Ragna's "game" isn't really the strongest anyways, haha). What it boils down to is that you HAVE to play his game, you just have to be good at challenging it. TL;DR Wolf puts the burden of approach on him, and thats kind of what you have to play around with. ***You*** can't really approach so effectively vs wolf (especially if you jump too close, he will kill you), but you may be able to take advantage of certain situations given the respect, which leads to Midrange play. A lot of neutral jump/upback. Fake him out. Single jumps primarily, jC forever, backwards airdash jC to control space, berial is a good hard-call for over-extensions in forward movement. First, focus on stopping his approach as safely as possible rather than trying to hit him. Block well (you should be able to see jC, practice!) and disrespect his pressure where you can (IB's, 5A's, 6A's, ofc DP) You do have to be patient, wolf meter does drain relatively fast, so playing centric around "safe" guesses will go farthest. Obviously he can do stuff about it and you cant always keep him out with perfect play (at the end of the day, you're guessing in neutral), but plan around what you have and can enforce best. Just work with the situations that this kind of play creates. Overall you have to not let him walk all over you and ragna can do this relatively well.

yo! im editing the OP with this information http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sl9dde the schedule has changed, so yeah!

??? phorizer has the same untechable time (maybe even less), as it was, double phorizer worked at the end of every combo no matter what in 1.1 (supers are always unscaled as far as untechable time goes, and it was like a 5 frame window for the second phorizer). Phorizer likely has no change from 1.1 to 2.0 except wallsplat removal in OD, and the difference between the two is purely on hitstop, i think? They actually have the same amount of untechable time, the only thing that changes is where you end up after you teleport. if youre talking about the combo choice with people doing midcombo phorizer, it's generally a corner carry thing. It does decent damage. Aside from this, the only other factor here is D teleport, which apparently has been changed, and could make double phorizer easier, though it was still like a 5f window to ~[214]D 236236C, it wasn't restricted or anything before. Actually, you couldn't do double phorizer at the end of every combo in OD hilariously enough. The wallsplat would usually body you, you'd have to end the combo with your opponent midscreen, or hit them with phorizer really high so that you could either dash phorizer (godawful hard), or just phorizer with or without a teleport depending on wallsplat height. In general, her midcombo OD usage was restricted to almost exclusively midscreen (most conversions with OD were only useful/possible if she had 50 meter, but this was impossible near the corner because the forced wallsplat would result in less untechable time, or be useless b/c damage scaling when you set up the correct height) so the removal of the wallsplat is a huge buff, along with her new OD moves. Unfortunately, there is still her combo rate nerf and a lot of her combo tools getting changed around, so you wont be seeing 8k out of her ass anymore but she should hit reasonably hard (7k!) much more consistently, so im glad for that. @StylisH the thing about 1.1 is that you could put in a lot of work with height manipulation thanks to late active frame hits with noir. Pretty much gave you more time to actually land the super instead of the minimum 7f height, so a lot of air combos usually meant you would have extra time (realistically, this panned out to literally 1 extra frame lol). New strike fall looks like the heights have changed, it looks much tighter to actually get the super height. New strike fall also means that she lost strike fall > dash 5c combos, but those always required a minimum of two stars (teleport, height adjustment, strike fall) and would give you a 3c ender. Not really missing too much, tbh. Strike fall into astraea might be more expensive (no way to convert into knockdown for 2 stars without corner, or character specific routes. Maybe. Ill see.) so as things are right now, it looks like you'll have to blow 3 stars, but the corner carry is much more substantial, and the actual conversions are much, much more stable. Besides, the oki after new strike fall is a lot better, so i'd take it over the old one any day. if i had to condense my thoughts, it points to more restricted combo selection, but it actually does not matter because it's still very reasonable and pans out just as if not more effectively.