Ronove

It's good because you can only perform it when you're under blockstun, and it's a 2D so it will make you escape from the corner. The supers are still a good reversal if you know the opponent is not baiting them (but good players WILL bait them) to punish you (or make you waste a burst as well if your reversal super whiffs or gets blocked). A lot of japanese players use her dead angle more than supers when they're being pressured/cornered. It's a her best (and only) safe way to escape, why not make use of it?

Dead angle is what you should be doing. Smart opponents will bait her super unless they're recklessly exposing themselves on your oki.

Horizontal drive loop off an air-to-air j.C is only possible against a few characters though.

Pirateyoshi, IB on air vs air or ground vs air? If it's IB on air you pretty much do anything you want, depending on how close you are. If you're on ground, 2a/5b/6a/throw. I like to use j.B a lot in this matchup, you can delay it and you can use efficiently as deep crossup after a jump-in/IAD or even after a 2D.

I rarely use the neutral grab, but generally you do a j.4D~B (~A if you're cornering him) and follow with OTG string > drive loop.

I just noticed this too, what the heck

lurch_E_bean, I haven't watched all of the vids (just the Jin ones and the mirror, I promise to watch the rest when I have some spare time today), but one thing you need to fix is to: - throw less hitconfirmed 6C, or if your 6C gets blocked follow up with a 236a or a 2D and don't go for a 236CC. It's too risky, especially against Jin since he's amazingly good at punishing whiffs and holes in your pressure. You may use it once in a while from max distance but I'd just rather avoid that unless you've already played some mind games on your opponent and you know he's going to barrier low. (or if you notice that the opponent is using barrier the whole time) - don't use 3C in blockstrings. This is a bad habit that lot of Taos have (I am trying to remove this as well from my pressure game). I know it's not easy to hitconfirm online due to the lag and the fact that Tao's normals don't have a lasting blockstun, but try to make an effort and only use 5b/2b/2a and 6b/throw/2d as part of your mixup, and occasionally use 5b/2b > 5C > 236aa as well. Don't use 3C unless you're sure to hitconfirm it for two simple reasons: it can be easily insta-blocked, and canceling it with a drive won't always save you if your opponent has a good and quick reversal tool. If you want to train your hitconfirming, besides practicing with people offline (possibly) go to training mode and set the dummy to block/barrier randomly. Start with 5b/2a and if he's blocking keep following with blockstrings, if he's not once you hitconfirm you follow with a 3c/6a/5c combo (or if you set counterhit status with a 6c so that you can improve at hitconfirming 6c's as well). It's a good method to train your reflexes to react and switch from blockstring to combos by maximizing your hitconfirm rate and decreasing the chances of you throwing some risky normal. As for the rest, I really liked those j.C > 236BB > j.2D~B > Taunt combos. I personally never follow up with a taunt after that string (5C is easier to hitconfirm) but good job for being risky and being rewarded for it.

Good stuff on round 2 by Xdest, 2b on oki was a nice move. Nice job with ~c feints as well although you really played it risky a few times, he could have punished you. Game 2, nice job with air counter-throw after his tech at the corner. I think you might need to pressure more with 66->5b though (reason is you can stay on Nu's face and also be in range for a nice kara-throw), although you can somehow get away if you "poke" with 3C from max range, it's such an easy move to IB that I think it's not worth the risk... @ArcadeFire I only gave it a quick look so forgive me if I don't list all the specific things (might do that tomorrw, it's already pretty late at night here): round 1, at the beginning, IB his 3C and punish hard. During round 2 and also round 3, you let yourself get hit by a clean 6C when you dashed back and tried to throw a sword. Don't forget Tao's 6C has a LOT of range and he can also 66 that move as (66C, just like he can 66 her 5B or her 2a by doing 63a) so keep that in mind. If you're backdashing and you fear he might poke you from the distance I think that TK crescent saber is what you're supposed to do (or atleast that's what my sparring partner does when playing midscreen). Or, dash and jump back, but then again all of this depends on what are the "habits" of the Tao player that you are facing. XDest seems to know you pretty well so I guess that's why he's throwing so many 6C without any CH hitconfirm first.

@ArcadeFire That's because Tao has a lot of tools to get around Nu's game from distance. However, if the Tao player wants to forcefully get in they have to risk sometimes even with drive cancel mixups, which is why this matchup is pretty even. It's a matter of how well the Nu is good at taking advantage of the gaps that Tao sometimes has to leave and the ability of the Tao player to capitalize on a chance given and start her pressure/mixup on oki. In this matchup Nu's swords are not supposed to be the primary source of damage dealing (well of course they're always good on oki if Tao has been knocked down), they are mostly used to force the Tao player to pick a path and possibly try to limit his options when he's closing in. But thankfully Tao has 3 jumps or 2 airdashes so it's all a matter on how wisely you use them to get in and avoid an anti-air 2C or any other thing that the Nu might be preparing.

Well, but you're not supposed to do that in first place. Atleast in CT.

Well that's why Nu vs Tao is considered 5:5 (or 4.5:5.5 in Nu's favor). Tao has a lot of tricks with her drive cancels (~c and ~b) to bait Nu's risky moves since most of the times a Nu player will opt to go straight for a 2C or 3C. What you do by looking for gaps is correct, the Nu player I train the matchup with does the same: defends the best he can and tries to sneak something between the holes in Tao's pressure game (and there will be holes, especially if you know how to IB her strings). A lot of Nus will usually 2C or use her antiair D stuff on reaction when they see Tao approaching with a drive from the air, it's all a matter of not getting baited too easily. @XDest 1 or 2 frames are still safe, no move in the game is that fast, so you can still block or tech-throw. Besides, Nu doesn't really have any amazingly fast pokes so that's why ~B on hit is still considered fine.

-1 or -2 on hit for the B cancel is safe, considering there is no move that is that fast. @Arcade Fire Normally a good Tao will never use a drive move unless they're sure to hit or after hitconfirming first. They may use it as cross-up manuver jump (j.2D~B) or use the ~C cancel as a feint to bait something from the opponent, but it's just too risky to blindly drive on a Nu and getting blocked since the recovery from a blocked drive is pretty long and you have all the time to decide what you want to do to punish Tao (2C, or just dash forward->mixup, or dash backward). At most if a drive move was blocked the Tao may attempt to drive again during her back roll animation but unless it's a j.2D~B or a j.4D~B that manage to hit it's too risky. On a semi-unrelated note, here's an other little tip for Taos that I got from personal match-up experience: it may occasionally occur that the Nu will throw her launcher as a reversal move at the end of your blockstring. That move even if blocked is a bother to deal with (you'll still get launched), so be sure to bait it out, it's not super fast so you can either CH 5B it or quick kara-throw. Just to make sure you don't get countered by the aforementioned launcher, try to avoid ending your blockstrings with a low unless you're able to quickly follow up with something else that is either a 5b or a 5c (maybe even 6a, but I never tried it on block, too risky). Of course, if you notice that the Nu player is really launcher-happy you might want to purposely leave little gaps in your blockstrings and punish that move to keep him honest.

What!? 5D~B > Taunt?! Has the ~B cancel become that fast in CS?

Once you get the timing for the 214D > j.2D~B it actually becomes fairly easy. Just like the timing for the stick motion on the j.2D~B, it's all matter of muscle memory and training. Plus, CS will hopefully make it even easier due to the better ~B cancel, so learning how to do this in CT is going to help a lot in the transition process. However I'm questioning how viable will Tao be online in CS once the console release will be out (hopefully). Taunt combos are probably the least usable ones online (I rarely do use them) due to the fact that even the slighest hint of lag will mess the timing of the jump cancel after the 6a(1), not to mention the timing of the ~b cancel...

I'd suggest everyone training taunt combos more than usual since they're basically going to become Tao's standard BnB in CS. As much as her 3C combos are good and in comparison easier to pull off, we still don't know how many of them might be efficiently working in CS.

I suppose it's due the changes to her j.2D~B? If I am not wrong they did make it faster (even on recovery). Anyway, since it's basically a repetition of the same string, if one already has the timing for the 214D > j.2D~B down then no matter how many repetitions there are the combo should be easy to perform. Could we rename it as ... taunt loop?

Tomorrow I should be updating the first post with all the vids you guys posted (sorry for the long delay!), and hopefully with all the new CS footage that has started to come in!

You should use her kara-throw as often as possible, it's a GREAT mixup tool and once you let the opponent know that you're able to pull it off you can even play mind games on him (since you'll be out of the opponent's grab range in most cases except against Tager or an other Tao) and get him to attempt counter-throws and stuff them for sweet CH combo damage. I never tried with a pad so I can't tell you if it works just as well, but on a stick it's actually pretty easy to pull of once you get the timing. You almost press them together except that C actually gets pressed a fraction earlier than B. Anyway, regarding her kara-throw, boss TaoFTW already gave a brief explanation here: http://www.dustloop.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7581 As for specific strategies and setups involving it, I guess we could have some short guide on it but it shouldn't be too hard to figure out how to make best use of it. As I said the best thing about kara-throw it's not just the range but the fact that you're going to make your opponent afraid of it and play mindgames on him by either mixing it up or not mixing it up and baiting a counter from him. However be aware that good players will know what Tao's real throw range is so they will expect it if you get too predictable with it. So while it is not abusable it can still be used as part of her mixup game and it's an other valuable option at your disposal.

@OMG It's a duck 1) If you notice that during your drive loop string your second j.c is going to whiff then alter that part like this: 2d~6 -> j.c -> 8d~6 -> 236bb -> j.c -> 8d~6 -> 236bbbb It's a general rule that works not only for that combo but for all of her combos everytime you don't get the exact timing during her OTG string which results in her whiffing the drive loop juggles. You can tell when you're going to whiff the second j.c because the first one will already hit the opponent far too low on their hitbox (unless it's Tager). 2) Kara-throw them before they get to jump away, or IAD -> airgrab. If they do it again and they're expecting you to go for that option then j.a or j.C (outside of their throw range) to punish their counter-throw. Depending on the positioning and on the character you're up against you can use them to hitconfirm her air-combos which deal some sweet damage. Thankfully the barrier back jump won't be possible in Continuum Shift.

It doesn't need to be a CH for 4D~B. I've tested it and I can definetely land the same combo regardless of whether it hits on counterhit state or not.

I agree. It gets bad for Tao if the Bang player knows how to play oki once he's scored a knockdown. Overall though, I think Tao has more options to land big damage on Bang (especially off a 2D) so it all comes down on which character is able to keep the momentum and get a decent lead.