Pen_Ninja

Care to share this IOH combo? I've been using this one from BananaKen

Best combos I could get off a forward throw in the corner (meterless of course). Haven't tested this off back throw. The first combo drops on Tager because 5B hits too late so the 2nd combo is for him. Both versions need a delay before the 5C after throw for some characters or they'll be too high for 2C (Noel and Mu are issues so far) 5BC > 9D , 5C > 2C > 6C > jc , j.C > j.2C > 236D |> 22B , 5B > 6A > 236B > 5C > oki (4453 damage) 5BC > 9D , 5C > 2C > 6C > jc , j.C > j.2C (whiff) , 236D |> 22B , 5C > 6A > 236B > 5C > oki (4343 damage) the difference between hitting and whiffing j.2C is pretty much just a timing thing. Delaying the jump cancel on 6C usually helps with the first combo.

A couple of videos of my Kokonoe. I'm still pretty new with her in real games so my neutral is pretty average for the moment. I also start experimenting as to where I can and can't teleport out of strings which doesn't work for the most part... but now I know. There's also a lot of failed astral inputs so probably ignore any 2A>2A>7D or 2A>black hole against Azrael... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjYF9mh2bMs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcQjaK28xPw Posted here instead of videos thread because general advice is always good. Chances are I already know where I'm going wrong (IAD lol) but I may have missed something.

Does anybody have any further explanation on top of what's in those notes? I've heard people mentioning something about Kokonoe's changes being counter hit related. Is it possible that they now counter carry where they don't seem to have done so before?

I recommend Carl. I started with him and I turned out just fine.

You can try some Azrael I suppose. He plays pretty well if you've got solid fundamentals and seems to do a fair amount of damage just with the most basic of combos. Has a decent variety of moves but the main thing i that you need to be somewhat smart with your pressure because of how his dash works. To get anywhere with anyone you're going to need decent combos though or else you're not going to get anything optimal off your hits and you'll end up hitting someone 7 times and losing because they hit you twice but confirmed better.

On how to actually set up a 22B setup? 236B > 5C > 22B > black hole. To be honest, I'm not even sure she has an escape for the 236B > 5C > black hole setup though. Both corner only, obviously.

I hope you're asking for some sort of match analysis... otherwise I just look terrible saying stuff when you didn't want it. Here we go. You need to work on your corner carry. There were a number of confirms that could have brought your opponent to the corner and essentially ended the game. The ones that come to mind at 0:35 where you could have done this which would have left you at maybe 1/4 away from the corner, at which point a Nu can only really go backwards or attempt to go over you. The other the throw at 0:41 where you could have done 6D or 9D to keep them closer to the corner. The j.As before the purple throw would have scaled the combo so you couldn't do a full throw combo but the corner would have been nice. Along with the above, just working on combos in general will always help. There were a lot of 2Cs and 6Cs done when they weren't going to combo. Most of these could have been replaced with 236A and in some cases, the combo could have been extended and pushed to the corner thanks to existing gravitons on screen. Other than this, just general neutral game is important. -I like the graviton > fireball and sometimes the teleport but there were a few cases where you teleported too early or at not so ideal times where it wouldn't cross him up and just set you up to be counter hit. Sometimes a 6D > 236D can be just as effective because it puts people in blockstun and moves them towards you at the same time. -There were a bunch of whiffed 3Cs mid-blockstring because of the graviton influencing your opponent so they were within 3C's minimum range. This is something you'll get over in time as long as you're aware that it's happening. I used to whiff 3Cs often too . -I'm really against using 1D, 2D or 3D in most cases as it leaves the graviton in the ground which AFAIK is pretty much always bad for combos because it makes people land even faster and it also covers less space. The only time I really use these directions is when myself or my opponent are high enough in the air that the camera has moved to follow them and the edge of the screen has changed position. 6D, 4D and 5D should be your go-to gravitons.

I tried BananaKen's black hole setup against Valkenhayn to see if he had an answer to it. Immediate emergency tech into super is actually too slow to catch the recovery of 214A and you can either block the super or teleport behind him. Teleporting means you don't block it and the 22B hitbox doesn't disappear I guess which means a not-so-great combo but blocking the super gives you better punish options. Video Bionic Wolf (Sturm Wolf) appears to have 10 frames of startup so this should technically work on anything with 10 or more frames of startup, possibly less... correct? I haven't tested anything else yet. It does have some trouble against delayed emergency techs but you can adjust the string to account for this on reaction.

Kurushii layin' down the law! While it's a decent video and a lot of information... the information is just kind of move properties followed by combos. On the subject of combos FC 2C>6[A]>6[A]>6[A]>6A>22A>6[A]>6[A]>6[A]>22A>6[A]>6A The combo is pretty much finished there, you won't get much off it. If you really want to do this in match (don't do it) then you should be able to do 6B instead of the last 6A into oki.

I find that CON Volante works well in this MU. Mainly because there's usually some short, unjabbable breaks in block strings that you can volante during but as soon as he enters stances, he's fairly committed. I played against Kagura a bit recently but the player wasn't so great...

Just as general advice against Azrael, his pressure really falls to correct blocking. Not just in the fact that you're blocking mixups but doing things like instant barrier blocking (or just barrier blocking) his normals to push him away helps because his normals are fairly stubby in general. Then if he tries to get in with 236A you can instant block it to make it -2 on block and he'll be forced to either block, back off, or get CH with 2A/5A. If he tries to use 6C to get back in then you can do the same to make it -1 but that means you'll need to use 5A because 2A will trade with his 5A if both done on frame 1. Your better option to beat 6C is to beat it out with 6A as it has head attribute. 2C (the stone wall) into either 6D or 3D is a fairly common mixup as 6D and 3D look pretty similar up until the later frames, much like Noel's d.6B and d.6D but these are much easier to deal with. You can always jab him out of either 6D or 3D, regardless of which option he went for. His other option after 2C is to do another 2C but there's a 16 or so frame gap here so you should be safe to whiff a jab in there pretty easily. If he keeps doing 2C over and over, which I've seen some Azraels do to try and bait something out at the right range, you should be able to hit him with 3C but it'll be tight. In any case, if he does any of this after 2C (3D, 6D or another 2C) you should be able to SUPER jump (normal jump tends to get caught by 6D) 6D, land, then 22C. I recommend super jumping and barrier blocking until you're above his 6D height before using your own 6D. On the subject of growler, it has a normal hit where he's invincible to everything except throws which works as his DP followed by a period where he'll absorb projectiles which he can extend for a certain length of time by holding the button. If you block the first hit or it whiffs you get a free physical hit punish because the invincibility wear of quite quickly. If he absorbs a projectile though, he's invincible until growler ends. Further projectiles absorbed will increase the length of growler and keep him invincible through it. Long story short: if he growlers and gets to absorb a projectile, you can't punish him for the growler. He will however, lose his invincibility as soon as he recovers meaning he won't get pressure on you at least. I recommend not letting him Growler things but if it can't be helped and somehow he gets a growler in, let him growler, set a graviton on him and give him the old 50/50 high/low mixup meaty when he comes out of growler. I believe he can just growler again though so just be careful of that.

Not sure whether this belongs here or general gameplay. In the end, it's a video and this is the video thread sooo... Further mixups after IOH I've had people block the IOH a few times. These setups work best on Hakumen or Tager, the first hit of air dash j.B whiffs on the rest of the cast crouching but this still gives you an idea of what you can do. Anti-forward tech/roll mixups Cam up with some ways to mix up those people who like to forward tech out of the corner. Pretty much just using 236D to push them back into the corner.

I'm confused about this as well. If you emergency tech then you can't IB the follow-up explosion of the Bunker because the black hole is meat and hits you first. If you roll, then the follow-up is already gone and the only other thing active is the black hole which I don't recommend trying to IB. Edit: I just remembered that my usual setup is bunker > 5C > black hole, not just bunker > black hole. I still don't think you have time to roll in time to still have to block the followup explosion but you can definitely just roll out normally in many situations anyway.

Bananaken's example uses 22B > 3C. In the comments he mentions that he thinks you need to do both moves ASAP or 3C will be too late. This means that the 3 frame buffer should help out just fine. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlgFRomUHks 5A > OD > 5B sounds like a terrible idea though... Why would you not just black hole > overdrive > 3C? That way you don't have some crappy 5A messing with your proration and you also get double the OD time than if you OD cancelled.

The best I could find was probably j.B+3D > 5AB > 46D > 6C(L2) > 5C > j.B > j.C > 623D > 5C > j.B > j.B > j.C > 412D > 6A > j.B > j.2C > j.B > j.B > j.C > 8D > optional 3C > Super. Not sure how much damage it does or whether it's really optimal but it was the best I could find. Let me know if this doesn't work too. I'm not in a position where I can double check whether this was actually the right combo or not at the moment.

Well I came 3rd at this major. Not overly happy tbh. I ate far too many Jin DPs for my liking. It's always Jin T_____T

Raw Ada hits are generally pretty good starters with the exception of maybe con fuoco. Once you get into the character fully you just realise that you have certain combo paths and they're all pretty interchangeable. Combos into volante, combos into 6D, combos into 8D, etc. The problem with raw Ada hits is that Carl could be doing literally anything he wants at the time. Confiing off a volante that hits just after you 236A has recovered is differen go combining off one that hits mid-236A because you'll need to account for hot long it takes for Carl to do stuff and how long that allows you to move Ada. Volante you can usually get 5C j.b j.2c j.c 2D 5c j.b j.b j.c 46D 6a j.b j.2c j.b j.c 8D at least in CON CNO gives you something completely different. Combos off 41236 are a bit shorter. I recommend trying to combo into something that leaves both of you standing. This is untested but maybe L1 6c 2a 2b 5b 5c 46d air dash j.5b etc into mixup. Again, unconfirmed and untested Done on my phone so I expect a mistake or 2

Your main concern when Ada is down is to stall for time, not so much to do damage. Mid screen I don't see to much option past the standard 623C > RC > 5C > j.B > j.2C > j.B > dj.B > j.C or j.214C. In the corner you obviously have more options.

I still use j.B > j.2C > j.B string in my air combos when appropriate. It can be a bit annoying when my combo drops between the j.B and j.C due to the timer though... At least I'm fairly sure it's due to the timer. I can hit the exact same combo if I just speed everything up a little bit so I figure it's not some normal proration issues

The funny thing is that none of these characters play the same at all. The most similar ones are probably Carl and S.Lab but there's still a completely different feeling. Eddie seems to play a whole lot more like Relius to me.

In terms of just shitty matchups: We have a really derp Tager that's pretty hard to read and I just hate the matchup anyway, it's so easy just to die in a few seconds if nothing goes right. Other than that, we've got a Mu that plays the matchup well. I'm trying my best. Go to work, get home, training mode, go to bed, repeat. Casuals on every Tuesday and Sunday. Working hard. More important than the main tournament though are the team battles on the Friday for both BB and GG. It seems like I'm on anchor for at least BB so hopefully I won't need to do anything. The trouble with these is that we fly in on Friday morning >_> Even more important than both of these things is that I establish myself as the "Australian Puppet Character Guy" with my Carl, Eddie and S.Lab.

I won another local tournament today. Managed to hit an Astral on the last round of the tourney... Good times were had. There was also a GG tourney which I also won but a tad less convincingly until my 6-0 grand finals coming out of loser's bracket. I still need to work on a bunch of odd hit confirms (eg. random CON brio) and work out unblockable setups off some of my less common starters. Other than that, just hard-core combo practice to make sure I don't drop anything ever. Next week is a big deal because we're all heading interstate for a "major" (about as big of an anime tourney we'll ever get in Australia) and we're feeling fairly confident for BB and possibly GG. Hopefully we'll find some videos of the event and I'll share them around here. Wish me luck ;D

I've been trying to avoid crossing up every time now that people in my area are starting to block it. There's plenty more you can do other than 5B 6B 236A 4D. I find that you can, in some cases 236A from CON to OCN to cross up 4D, then 236A again to cross up for the 2nd hit. 4D doesn't true blockstring into the 2nd hit so you can double cross up. The only problem is that you need to adjust your combo if the first hit wasnt blocked.

I once met an Azrael that backdashed on wake-up every time. You can either just time your meaties a bit better to come out before the backdash or you can bait it out and hit them out of it. Backdashes have invincibility but not enough to be safe at all.