mixedmethods

Confirmed: Ken's health is 9,500. Source: my own calculations during the round Ken lost to Junpei. AoA is indeed the Fatal Recovery (probably to compensate for the range), but, as we saw, Koromaru can cover during recovery. Not at all surprised that Ho-chan went with Rise, as if anyone is going to figure out how to create corner lockdowns and juggles using her projectiles, it's going to be him. I still think Shadow Aigis is the worst character in the game. Terrible auto-combo (at least compared to the new one), reduced damage, supers that don't lend themselves into Shadow Berserk chains, and, y'know, Orgia is still limited. One DLC character announced and "more to come," Yu says. This ... is news, and not necessarily the good kind. Either the character assumed to be unlocked via story mode is going to be playable only as DLC or there's yet another newcomer. (Fuuka? Uh. Who else is left?) The former will enrage the fan base; the latter is confusing. Or Yu misspoke. Kinda hoping it's that third option.

I was wrong: Ken can burst even if Koromaru is KO'd. Seems like his two Fatal Recovery moves are Thunder Reign and the pole vault.

Thanks for the correction. I'd heard otherwise. Due to Atlus's stream quality reverting to dial-up days, I couldn't catch everything in the Yukari-Shadow Ken match, but I'm pegging his HP at 9,500. 9000 does seem to be the minimum, though, as in Awakening, I saw Ken take 3046 damage and survive; if 9,000 is correct, his Awakened HP would be (at max) 3150... but the complication is that Ken wasn't at magic pixel status when I caught that number (my notes read "3046 = still alive in Awk"), hence my thinking his HP is actually 9,500. Or the simple solution: despite breaking out the calculator, my notes are useless. He's definitely not in the 8,500 group, so there's that, in case anyone else is as interested in Ken as I am. ETA: Were people picking Shadow Aigis because they don't know the new tech? Because Shadow Aigis looks like a strong candidate for Worst Character. God, that old autocombo ... I will not miss you. Lots of Orion whiffs too.

Lots of Ken earlier. Rise... I saw once or twice today, lots of her yesterday. I'm trying to calculate Ken's health, actually. Unless someone has confirmation on the number, which would be awesome.

It's like Lambda's "use every sword move" trophy all over again.... Which makes me wonder if we'll get trophies like that in P4AU (Mitsuru gets Jin's freeze requirements, Naoto has to use every type of gunshot, etc.).

I think it whiffed. Or at least I saw a lot of whiffs, as that thing does great damage but is relatively slow. Can you do that super without Koromaru? Confirmed that Fire Breath can be superjumped if you're at distance or already in the air.

5, plus one persona shot (as long as not persona-broken), same as regular Naoto. Or did you mean the Shadow Berserk combo with the looped supers? Some notes from watching (if it's allowed, I can start and run Ken's sub-forum....), starting with Ken: - DP > Thunder Reign is a good left-right cross-up but because of the timing on Ken's DP, watch it or you'll eat a Fatal Recovery starter from Thunder Reign. - DP damage: 1050; Pierce super: 3650 (non-awakened opponents, just throwing out the numbers for confirmation). - 236A/B -- Fatal Recovery? - Cannot burst when Koromaru is KO'd, making smart Mediarama usage a key part of his gameplan -Maragidyne/Fire Breath -- easy whiff, does control space well (it's probably possible to superjump it but start-up is so fast you may only have time to block). Rise: - I heard people figured out her tech later last night and one guy was running 5k combos. Alas, I missed it. - Shields seem to be pretty useless; better Rises aren't using them. - DP is Fatal Recovery and a guaranteed Fatal starter for anyone who doesn't walk into it (... which should be just about everybody). Very long active frames (possibly longer than Yosuke's?), so don't mash it unless you know you're going to get the lightening follow-up and avoid the fatal. - Satellite super: seemed to do 500-800 damage for each bomb. Bomb hit boxes can be destroyed before activating (? pretty sure I saw an opponent take them out). As with Yukari, careful positioning and technical skill is going to be key. - Great pressure tools, not so great defence. Get those scans and make them count. Obviously, we need confirms from actual players, but I think we've started getting a good idea of what the non-arcade characters are capable of, their strengths and weaknesses, etc. Also, Stunedge was going as Ho-chan last year, I think. I always knew of him as Stunedge but he registered for Evo 2013 as Ho-chan ... I think that's been his name of choice for a good while but maybe something got lost in translation.

Can we please do some solo fights someday? Your Yosuke is a beast and I need the experience. (I just feel bad stealing it when there are others in the room who haven't fought you....)

Forgot to note: one of Koromaru's commands (ground attack) causes knockdown, unless I really missed something. So for zoners, the dog either eats your projectile or he knocks you down and Ken gets in... damn.

I'll add that there's a cooldown gauge (looks like the grey bar for overheated Orgia, same as with Rise's shield) and that I think the bombs can be blocked crouching or standing. Seems like they're most useful if Rise follows them in and goes for mixup, detonating after the opponent's opened up. Can't remember the damage, though, but it didn't seem excessive.

Sure! Naoto and Yosuke are both MUs several of us need more experience with, and definitely Kanji as well. Expect a PSN friend request. I'm planning to host a room tonight, assuming enough people aren't tuned into Evo streams and are down to play. (P4A side tournament will be starting at 7PM EST, while I plan to have the room up no later than 9PM EST, so... can't have both, unless you want to watch on a tablet or laptop in between playing rounds.) Random select was a disaster but I liked winner out, three match limit. Any objections? Passing is fine and generally encouraged if someone new shows up or if people are getting the same MUs, someone needs more practise with a specific MU, etc.

Ken spear super: 2156 damage on Awakened opponent. Very nice. Mediarama: disables burst; normal counter (not fatal). DP doesn't seem to be Fatal Recovery either. May not be the worst DP in the game.

Remember when you'd fight a netplay Narukami and he'd spam DP all day? It looks like Rise is copying her beloved senpai. Ho, boy. Hitting her when she's behind the non-DP shield should be stupidly easy for any characters with cross-up jumps and nets you a free counter hit starter. Ken looks like a bad MU for her. (Then again, he looks like a bad MU for a lot of people.) Not sure what to think of Rise. It'd be interesting to see how she fares against someone like Yosuke or Aigis. She looks pretty weak to me, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time until someone figures out a solid gameplan for her. (Though, man, that rhythm game super is unexpectedly easy to dodge. I wonder what the start-up is... looks like you're going to have to combo into it but even then it's not airtight. Also interesting: either Koromaru's standing hitbox ducks that super entirely or it has to actually touch Ken, as I saw it whiffing when Koromaru did his spinning shoulder-height move to land on the ground at Rise's feet during the start-up while Ken himself was out of range. I'm guessing it's "must hit Ken," which would give him all the time he wants to position Koromaru for the whiffed super punish.)

Yeah, I'm not dogging the Mitsuru player -- he's very good, and that's awesome, but I think we all get the point already. It was kind of frustrating to watch Shadow Rise get Perfected before we even had a chance to see what she could do differently than her normal version. It would be nice to see how Ken's reach fares against Mitsuru's, but that would require the Mitsuru player to take it down a notch. Which, to his credit, he did a bit during the first Kanji set so the opponent could learn the controls, but... this is really getting dull. We've seen Aigis twice, Yosuke once, the Elizabeth mirror match (that was when I started watching), two Minazukis, normal Rise and Shadow Rise, and now Kanji. And Mitsuru crushing everybody.

So it's been about an hour of Mitsuru wrecking people. That's ... fun. No, seriously, someone pick Ken already.

Yeah, I was unclear -- I meant that that MU was especially unfavourable because of Kirisame, not that Chie is a particularly bad MU for Junpei. As for batting Teddie's items, I think it was UltraChen that demonstrated that it was indeed possible to do so.

Maragidyne is awesome. Unblockable Maragidyne is evil... but still awesome.

It is Kirisame and two rounds to win... and Chie doesn't have projectiles for Junpei to bat back. That's going to be tough for Junpei, I would assume, since he either needs to be able to swat projectiles or get in for bat attacks, but Kirisame's Shadow Chie is just too dominant. Don't lose all hope -- that was definitely a match where the odds were against Junpei, and having to defensively burst removed the option of OMB combos. And with Shadow Rampage + SB Power Charge, any character would be having a tough time, because Chie is ... still Chie, unfortunately, and 20% damage reduction for Shadow version doesn't hurt Chie as much as some others. It looks like Junpei is going to be in uphill battles against most of the cast, but there's still plenty of potential, so ... think positive!

So avoiding her 5A range is integral, but what do you do about Mitsurus that get a life lead and then park themselves in the corner to get the win through time out? It's happened a lot in ranked. They won't come out due to 2B and the fact that I've taken a few persona cards AAing them, but attempting to go in just gets me blown up. Vulcan's slight push backwards is helpful for pressuring them into touching a button, but doing it close enough to hit a crouching Mitsuru means eating Droit on landing; Cannon isn't a crouch, so that puts Aigis back in range of eating a 5A; going in from the air is all kinds of bad... when they won't even play footsies, what do you do? They know they're safe from Gatling, they're holding charge for the moment you come in range (and they know they can bypass 5D to tap Aigis), and they'll AA if you attempt to tri-jump in for a boost j.B overhead (or just get anywhere near them). At 100 meter, Goddess Shield + OMC gets me in, but that's all meter (pre-Awakening) and I've only made it work when at full Orgia and able to do an immediate overhead to start mixup. It's a huge gamble but it's all I've found once Mitsuru gets distance and just parks herself to Bufudyne or SB Droit on reaction to... everything. I haven't had problems pressuring her, even without Orgia, if I'm the one to put her in the corner, as our jump combos can easily lock her down long enough for Orgia recharge.

I just added sent PSN friend requests to everyone who expressed interest. Again, room by 9PM EST, look for the DL in the name, come to play, stay for the inane commentary and navigator trolling.

The change to Radical Cannon is that we have to manually detonate the explosion by releasing the button. I would assume players with decent execution can still do the loop, since the timing in the corner doesn't look too strict (out of the corner... well, playing Aigis means we do a lot of spacing checks), but I have no proof and don't know what (if any) change this will have on timing or match-practicality... j.214A > j.C (or any ground-to-air conversion > j.214A/j.C pick-up) looks like an easy way to get blown up by a burst if you don't bait it. Looking at the video, the air mortar loops pre-Megido are burstable and a burst would blow Aigis full screen. Megido is still going to eat bursts alive, but it seems like the longer the air cannon loop, the better the odds of getting blown up. At least that's my impression. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. Those loops often used a OMB, so, again, not sure how match-practical it is. With the Shos, possibly Ken and Koromaru, Yukari, and the buffs to Yosuke (Yosuke: more damage, more options, new Awakening super that tracks for 25SP + Sukukaja install, can land knockdowns now; Mitsuru: less damage, better options, can't crouch under 5A but can beat her 5A with a sweep) in play, high-level Aigis is still crazy strong but I wouldn't be OMBing unless it was the last round and I had a huge life lead. Well, you aren't going to be spending the whole match in Orgia. So I'd work on non-Orgia options as well, because you're not going to do much in Orgia unless you know how to use Aigis's tools to get in and out of Orgia safely, apply pressure, open up opponents, etc. Her buttons are very different from the rest of the casts', so you'll be messing around to feel out her range quite a bit. In Orgia, don't ever get in the habit of just holding 6 to dash in; you will be punished by any low-profile move and be put in the corner. Also, figure out how you want to use the Orgia game. You will inevitably be put in a situation where Orgia is low and you have to choose between deactivating off 5C (which will halt your offence and give an opponent a win if you're low on health) or taking the overheat and stalling with mixup. You're going to want to get into Orgia, do your thing, deactivate, and repeat, but if you spend your gauge chasing after an opponent with boosts or doing boost jumps to try to open them up, you have to choose between converting the confirm into Megido and overheat (use your meter to super after the Megido) or do the 5C deactivate ... at which point you will probably try to get back to avoid retaliation, which doesn't always work. If you're low on Orgia, in Awakening, and have more than 100 meter, then I always opt to take the overheat with SB Megido > Spear so that I can at least contest the round. You can do solid pressure even in overheat -- I've done it and I'm a complete novice. You won't get much damage but I've locked opponents down long enough to get Orgia back. Out of Orgia, ground throw > OMC is a friend of yours. In Orgia, you can confirm off air throws by chasing in with boost. Be careful with 5D/j.D; always tap C as soon as the blue counter animation has worn off or you're going to lose a card. Don't just throw out the D series, as you can get hit on start up if you try one too close. j.C is a great way to lose a card if you just throw it out -- persona break is very bad for Aigis, so you'll be learning spacing on j.C via MU experience. Her DP is pretty bad (though I've killed with it), particularly if it's your attempt at deactivating, as your opponent is watching for it. You can super cancel into Goddess Shield on hit or block, and with 100 meter you can DP > Goddess Shield > OMC to restart offence. It's an option if you're under pressure, near or at Awakening, and have at least 50 meter (if near, you should get to Awakening from either the DP alone or DP + super cancel, which gives you the extra 50 meter for the OMC). Sweep > OMC > 6 > 2/5 A is another good way to make use of extra meter in order to open up opponents. OMC + forward is basically a microdash, so after the sweep you can go for another low, a high, or anything else to vary your mix-up. (See Omex's match analysis vids -- the Yosuke vs. Aigis one is where I learned that trick.)

Awesome! I'm new to FGs and the sole Aigis. Teddie is one of her worst MUs, so I'm looking forward to actually fighting one!

You want Mitsuru. In fact, you just described her. There are several strong Mitsuru players who've come to the DL Casuals, so perhaps they can give you some tips. Mitsuru is one of my worst MUs, so I can't help you, other than by suggesting you go to Omex's YouTube (OmexK) and check out his match analysis vids, as I know he has at least one featuring DIE-Chan (former Mitsuru God, top 8 at Evo, now plays Minazuki). LordKnight is the best US Mitsuru and an amazing player all around, so look for him as well. He was second at Evo, so if you watch the top 8, you'll see plenty of good Mitsuru play.

There's a session tomorrow night, 9PM EST, if you can make it. Frankly, I'd be over the moon if we had a Teddie. I'll add you on PSN tomorrow. Come if you'd like, feel free to play miced, stay as long or short as you please.

Well, I think anyone here who's played me could tell you I'm still pretty awful, but I'm glad I could help. When it comes to FGs, you're going to honing your skills for the duration of your time in the community. Which means you're going to lose a lot, but the trick is not looking at win/loss as the sole indicator of improvement. I went 0-15 against my friend yesterday afternoon (did steal a few rounds, though) -- and after most fights, I found myself saying "That wasn't too bad for me." He laughed and pointed out that I have been saying that after almost every match, which is a huge change from a week ago. Last week, I would contemplate not teching and just letting him kill me off sooner because I could not figure out what to do in the match up; this week, I've actually put him on defence and blocked some of his mix-ups, gotten my own pressure going, etc. I'm not winning but I'm definitely improving. Take joy and achievement where you can find it, not in wins. You're also more likely to do something that'll get you blown up if you get desperate and try to chase a win. One reason I like watching LordKnight's P4A performances so much is because he does not hit buttons when on defence, which helped curb some of my initial mashing tendencies. Match footage is invaluable -- I'd internalised some terrible habits from playing the CPU ("mash like crazy, don't block, spam the attack the AI doesn't know how to deal with") but knowing that it's better to block for what feels like forever than try an unsafe reversal is completely different from seeing top players actually block and deliberately choose when to get out of the corner. It can feel disorienting to play in very different (i.e., better) ways, but sometimes seeing the "right" way is more helpful than just screaming "BLOCK DAMNIT" to yourself. I'll rewatch matches dozens of times, which seems to help with driving the info into my brain for immediate recall during play.