[SpA]Relentless

But it's really bad for your wind regeneration because you use wind at the end of the combo, when it might not be fully recovered yet. I rather just do pumpkin oki, have full wind when they tech, then set a frog and keep them in blockstun with the pumpkin. 3 winds + frog oki instead of less winds + frog oki.

Very nice Jason D., appreciate it a lot. Optimizing damage is one of the main things I need to improve. I always build unnecessary proration into my combos

I feel you man. I'm trying various other fighting games, but what the fuck do you do without a pumpkin and frog?

Played a few sets against emjay's Lambda the last 2 days and let me tell you: Winded techs are so godlike in this matchup, I honestly believe they make it a 5-5 (or at least close to it). It destroys all oki Lambda has and that's the only thing that got better for her in CS2. Some common ways to apply a winded tech: *) After you got hit by an aircombo ending with j214D (crescent saber): Airtech after you bounce from the ground with 3D. This will let you apply pressure if she tried doing 236D Oki or punish a 214D. Lambda can catch you with 2D if she predicts it, but you can delay your airtech3D and make the 2D whiff and apply pressure again. *) After you got hit by 236B (Low Act Parser), emergency tech or neutral tech with 5D will get you rid of 236D Oki. Pretty sure you're forced to block or dodge 214D, but 214D~C can definitely be punished. *) After you got knocked away by a defensive burst, airtech before you hit the ground, then immediately airdash with 6D. Punishes 214D and again gets rid of 236D. I wasn't able to use it yet (cause my reactions suck :S) but I saw it in videos and it's definitely legit. You can't really abuse this all the time because eventually Lambda will wise up and try to catch your winded approaches, but then again you can just not do a winded tech and you won't be forced to block mixups if she's scared enough to not do oki anymore.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-eGr3sbKXU&t=2m48s Sick way to utilize the rod you get from the lobelia fatal trick for a post-BBL combo. Looks like it hard to time/space though (you have to throw the lobelia at the right time so that the opponent crosses over you before you hit them with j2C(Lv3))

I mixed things up. You can't Emergency Tech a 5CC knockdown. The untechable time after the 3rd 5CC is a lot shorter than after only one or two 5CCs, but still more than 3c. I think we sorted that out now :X (God I can't believe all the BS I'm posting at times...)

:X Don't turn my words around like that. I didn't say 3 5cc's don't give hard knockdown, I said the knockdown isn't AS hard (as in, they can almost immediately emergency neutral tech so it's almost the same as but it's still harder than a 3c knockdown at that point, if I'm not mistaken I have to admit). And (good) people don't forward roll against either knockdown with frog anyway, because the frog would at least force them to block if he doesn't hit. Perhaps disadvantageous was still a bad choice of word from me. I thought about it again and what you say about it being reversal safe is true and can obviously be a good thing. 3c knockdown is still not bad either, because it leaves you close enough to get two mixup chances (one during the frog being blocked, and one afterwards). With 5cc oki you'll most of the time throw a 236a (to catch rolls), then summon pumpkin and mixup after the frog finished so that only gives you one mixup, although with a better setup. So in conclusion, 3c knockdown is good for when you want more (somewhat risky) mixup chances, 5cc knockdown for when you want the better, safer one. Huh.... looks like 5cc indeed has more advantages to it D: I HAVE YOMI'D MYSELF!!! (But doesn't the second hit of 5cc drop sometimes if you started the combo with really bad proration like multiple j.as/5b 2b loop or if the combo has been very long? I think I'm always scared of that and go with the easy, guaranteed 3c way).

I think people already figured out in CT that it's not a good idea to forward roll against frog oki :X

You linked the wrong video :S http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx5PrCmCDR8 Maybe we should ask jourdal to put the translation into the video description, or into the video itself as annotations.

By the way: I just noticed something while watching a Rachel combo video, take a look: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxuZ68bwgHA&t=1m29s Some alterations are made (2d while falling, different ender obviously lol), but the basic concept is the same. It does indeed work. Don't know if it's still relevant, but I wanted to clear this up :S

I suppose by windless you mean, no 4d during the BBL motion. If so, then:

LOL wing, it's hilarious how the point just flew right over your head :D

lol I'm busy with RL myself ;( Rachel (Matsu) v. Makoto (Suka) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TT6AAM8kqM Say what you want, but in my opinion Matsu is still the most complete and best overall Rachel player.

You thought you saw the most random shit in fighting games already? Sorry, look again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ltx6B_axp_w&t=4m55s @Rachel Youtube Channel We could create one and give the password to (trustworthy) Rachel players, so they can add their own setup/combo clips, add Rachel matches they see to the favorites etc. So you get a Rachel video compendium that isn't feeded by only one person. I think that would be awesome. Some problems might occur though (eg what happens if someone logs into the account while another person uploads something, and what if someone sabotages it etc.) so you'd have to organise it well. Alternatively one person could manage the account alone and accept videos from others but then he'd be responsible for uploading, actuality etc., which can be pretty tough.

Since I had the chance to play P-Mode a bit longer yesterday, I tried a few combos and came up with 2 questions: 1) I'm not too sure about 5cc's properties when it hits an airborne opponent. When doing lvl2 j.2c into 5cc in the corner, the untechable time seems to vary. What does it depend on? I have the impression that if i hit 5cc (both hits), the untechable time is always the same, but if i hit 5c(w)c (2nd hit only), the untechable time is sometimes shorter. 2) I'm somewhat getting the hang of comboing frog after a low to the ground lvl2 j.2c but I still can't nail it very consistently. Is that a combo you actually bother doing? The damage difference to the usual ender is quite significant (+ - 1000 depending on starter & ender) but there's always the risk that you drop it, and the opponent punishes the recovery of your 5b. Are there any "foolproof" setups or timing-tips I could use? Or are you actually able to differ between a j.2c that is comboable into frog and a j.2c that is not (so you go for 236b instead)? What should I look out for in that regard? To me it looks like a j.2c that is comboable into frog hits "harder" (ie the screen shakes more... lol does that make sense? Watch the tutorial video that explains it to see what I mean) but I could be wrong.

Rachel's Astral sucks, seriously. It does have a few hard to escape setups(if you don't know how to escape them)but I wouldn't bother with them really. Comboing into it is also possible (using a combination of frog and pumpkin), but very very impractical. In any situation you could combo into Astral, you can combo into BBL as well, but it's easier, safer and will also get you the kill. The only way of comboing into it midscreen I heard of (never tried, never will) is doing this: Pumpkin out and floating over opponent (takes 3 winds): (opponent blocks)6c(1) > j.214a > 3d (pumpkin is blocked) > (land) > 3c(3) (opponent gets hit) > 222b 8d (pumpkin hits) 3d (pumpkin hits) (frog hits) (astral hits) In the corner you can probably skip the whole setup if you get pumpkin + frog oki and just do the latter part of the combo. (To be honest, you shouldn't even get Astral at all because Rachel likes to use heat for combos and defense.)

You missed a few. Noel (chiwawawawa) v. Rachel (kyuuchou) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qlo-83bqOhI Rachel (kyuuchou) v. Noel (mirori) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSv4Ss7LIs4&t=22s Rachel (kyuuchou) v. Ragna (reivun) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrIXb94SJn4&t=5m54s Rachel (kyuuchou) v. Platinum (aruru) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLoHcZ-IxXo&t=4m51s Taokaka (hige) v. Rachel (kyuuchou) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLoHcZ-IxXo&t=10m20s

Rachel might be at an advantage no matter what Hakumen does, but by simply blocking it he just makes it bigger since he offers her a free mixup attempt. I don't know how a Hakumen player feels about it, but that's a valuable reward in my opinion (not giving her the free mixup). Maybe I should re-word my advice to "Don't do high level TD unless you know it's going to hit or be blocked". In most cases it will be a waste of meter. I agree with the rest you said.

Don't forget the 3rd strike throws.

Because 2d j.b whiffs on most crouching characters if you do it instantly. You'd have to delay it to a point where it would become reactable. 2d j.a done instantly hits most crouching characters.

It doesn't matter if it's hard or not. It's there and therefore something to be considered when playing against Hakumen. You can do it once to see if the opponent knows about it. If he does, stop doing it. It was performed on me before (both cutting TD and 6ding TD, all of it not just the last hit).

I'm not saying the damage is always lower (especially when using lvl3 j.2c) and of course there are situations where you have to use j.2c to continue the combo. I'm just saying that there's a possibility you won't get higher damage or not a lot more if you do it (eg if you do a combo starting from a bad proration starter going into lvl2 j2c, bbl then doing lvl3 j2c, frog etc you won't get a lot more damage than if you just did frog into bbl ender afterwards, maybe even less). Also, if you do 5cc three times with 5cc being the ender, the knockdown isn't even as hard anymore but you will end up farther away from the opponent. I'd say that's a disadvantage for most matchups.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk_AeTuyHeo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoTh_71SQDs Watching yourself play is embarrassing. So many online tactics, bad decisions and dropped combos :S I'd especially need help with the Lambda matchup. Even though I won some of the matches after this one, I feel really uncomfortable. I have to rely a lot on my enemy to make big mistakes instead of me punishing smaller ones. The Ragna match could've been better as well...

The problem with j.2c is that it has same move proration, so if you do it twice in a combo and want to continue the combo afterwards, you will most likely end up with less damage than if you only did 1 j.2c.

Might be obvious advice, but I'll write it anyway: Don't do random fullscreen TD at neutral against Hakumen. He will either cut it (thus preventing any chance at dash in & mixup) or 6d all the projectiles. In which case you shouldn't dash in and try to go for mixups either, becauses chances are he will hit you with the 6d that was activated by TD and you will look pretty dumb