TIFunkalicious

Learn how to combo off of it and they may be a little bit scared to iad against you, which is his strongest movement option, a big plus for rachel Im starting to see more and more that this is in her favor, I just need to work on my fundies and timing to take advantage of what she has over him.

It also has almost half the startup frames as the other 2 versions, in fact, it's practically her fastest move excluding standing/low A and standing/low B and jumping attacks

I've met and might start playing with a ggac sbo qual and likely the best player in my state who I believe mains arakune. I'll def update this thread with any useful information I am able to come up with. For now though, I've noticed when ara starts his corner trap nonsense 236A will often counterhit if he is in range. Can anyone comfirm that this is useful or am I just playing against dudes who screw up the pattern?

Thank you much for the comments. I haven't incorporated instant blocks or counter assaults into this matchup yet, and I think we're at a point that we could both start learning where to use them because both of us are very effective at locking the other down in a corner. 214B is his 2hit magic feet that hit low then mid and cancels into itself up to 4 times, which often ends in a guard break. 2C falls short of punishing even the first one.

I started Rachel at the beginning of this week and have been playing nightly with a very good Hakumen player, here are some notes/observations and few questions. In summary, this is a brutal match, either you keep him at bay or in block/hit stun all day or he gets in with his monstrous melee game. You can comment and criticize, I did not research outside of BnB combos, so this is all self taught, and there are bound to be oversights that could have worked in my favor. - You have to be ace at zoning. Simple mistakes that go unnoticed in matches against other characters can end up with a sword in your face. Try to summon george without a pumpkin on screen? IAD j.C into massive damage. Misjudge your sword iris without a pumpkin? IAD j.C into massive damage. Try to summon a pumpkin at less than 1/2 screen outside of a combo? You get the point... there isn't much to learn outside of her standard stuff. Learn the arcs of cannonballs. Be a sniper with the pumpkin. And know when to put down george so you can increase pressure or punish his attempts at killing the frog. etc. You just have to take those fundamentals to a higher level. Successful rachels in this matchups are able to create something akin to blockstrings at half screen. One positive thing is that he's either moving in the air or not much at all, this makes lightning rods an essential tool. - Getting locked down in the corner is VERY VERY BAD. Worse yet, Hakumen's moves are designed to bully you into it. I've gotten guard broken less in all my other matchups combined, a jumpin with a couple moves leading a full meter of moves will likely leave you vulnerable, especially if the libra wasn't in your favor beforehand, and oh yes, he can still screw you sideways without meter after that little stunt. Dash, iad, or wind yourself out of this pickle whenever possible. I did not try to counter assault and I'm curious as to how often it can save you in this hellhole. Though likely it will fall short, much like the... - ...Cat chair! It's very good against IAD j.C's or anticipated command dashes and...not much else. You may get a couple off of ground strings, but alot of his moves will clash against the super armor but still leave his hitbox a mile away. Note that normal j.C's will usually end up with Hakumen safe as ever, and there's little reason he'd go deep on that jump in, so reserve it for when you can see the dash. EVEN AGAINST Iad attacks, you have to watch setups that don't allow cat chair to start up before being counterhit, throws seem to be only one I've seen. -6A works in some places that cat chair will fail and it's too late to cannonball, most notably in anticipation of his normal j.C. While the chair would fall short, the uppercat passes through. - Get on his ass! If you're not a wizard with Rachel's 3 projectiles, you are honestly safer keeping him in block. Learn her ground strings, especially ones involving wind that can be reset. There isn't much he can do against a j.2C (or the followup with a dj) or 5B on wakeup that doesn't involve alot of risk. Dude would sometimes barrier burst during the first combo I landed because many rounds would go to me simply because i was able to keep on him in this advantageous momentum. Although often times he would win after this, it shows you how good she can be at making Hakumen sit down for awhile. - On that note, yeah, you might want to consider a BB when he gets you in the corner for awhile with some meter . That position is simply so much in his favor it could be GGPO unless you pull something real clever. - Hakumen's drives are annoying, but once you start leaving space in strings and counterhiting with 3DC or rod into air combo it'll rarely pop up because it's very risky for him to go from blocking into one of rachel's vicious combos. 4-5 moves pause punish works wonders for making the player afraid of that button. You'll just have to research frames and whatnot you see what strings leave you safe, and find moves that combo but have space, stop on the first move and he may think you screwed up and are going to try to complete the string. In my friends case, he ended up with more failures than successes with the D counter, it just gave me something more to work with to make him go from blocking to getting hit. That's it for my knowledge. I'm new to the character obviously, and wasn't too good at keeping him out, so matches either ended heavily in either favor, basically whoever got the first knockdown and who dealt with the other's burst. Here are my questions: - I'll bring up the game's counter system again, can it get you out of the corner? - Hakumen jumps and blocks your 236B, he's now slightly closer on the ground and can jump again right away. What do you do in this situation - Oh my god does anything stop his 213B except for a psychic cat chair? - When is it safe to summon a pumpkin? Unless we both dash away at the beginning I have quite a time getting it out, only to block a halfscreen sword. I hope you noticed I called the 6A the uppercat, I feel very clever

How does the bang community punish a noel during the drive recovery? I'm usually at a distance where the only thing that won't be blocked is slide, and that often isn't worth either wasting barrier or risking the high/low mixup. same with Jin's surfboard into strong or the mashy sword, the window is there, but I'm just not sure what to do.

My kink with the BnB is that I often go from 2A to 2B by accident, I press B before the stick moves to the natural position. But I was working with it in training and found: 5A 2A 5B 2B 2C 6D = 1883 5A 5B 2B 2C 6D = 2004 I can nail the second combo almost 95%, and the first less than half the time, is there any reason to continue practicing with the low A?