Tari

A lot of people have dropped Rachel. Not everyone. I mean, it's not like everyone goes to arcades with the purpose of recording their matches, right?

Update to the original move list, for those who haven't seen it yet: These values definitely look more realistic. That said, the 3k+ combo actually says it drops to ~2.1k with 2b added. Not sure why. The only time I ever CH a 4b was when I accidentally dropped a blockstring or did it against someone's jump-in (usually Tager) as a misinput. Not really sure there's any viability to that. It sounds sort of like Rachel's blockstrings/mixups are similar to Arakune's, now (going based on what I've heard about him in CT, mind you, as I don't use him). They don't seem to be real blockstrings, but rather a series of somewhat unsafe moves used in succession to pressure the opponent and keep him guessing on when to block and punish. Oh, I was wondering about the speed on the 4b (still don't have confirmation on if you can jab out of it or not, but I'm assuming yes) for things like j.3db j.c 5a 4b 2b 5bd 4b 5b j.3db j.c 4b... and whatnot. 4b is obviously never safe, but I was wondering if silly mixups like that were even viable at all.

She can summon lightning while the pole is forming, not before it's landed. You're forgetting that you can jab or dp out of a 4b on reaction in CT, and it doesn't looks greatly changed in CS. If you can land the blocked 4b, then you have a chance for pressure, but it appears difficult at best.

I always dash forward off my 6a in CT, so I guess I just didn't notice the difference in execution between the two games. Gah. Go figure.

Oh boy... I can see myself making all the same mistakes as that Rachel when I try playing the game. 3c9d did blackbeat. It was really tight timing in the loketests, so I'm hoping it's still in, but we'll see. Interestingly, the Rachel player actually blackbeat the 3c (3 hits) 5a 5b air combo setup the first time and instead landed a valid 3c (6 hits) 5a 5b air combo. I didn't know you could do that. 6a CH combos into 5b, it looks like. Doesn't seem to be a huge issue. Haven't seen anyone miss the 5b followup into air combo yet, so I think we'll be okay there. Won't be able to do 6a CH -> 6a32146c combos anymore, though.

Eyeballing it. Accuracy is debatable. Bad formatting abounds~! Most of this is just a string a different combos linked together through various oki setups, hence the huge amount of [combo drops] in here. 'Move forward' = walk forward'Dash' = dash 1) 0:00 - 0:15 3c 9d 6a 5b SJ j.b j.a j.b j.c JC j.2c j.214b [combo drops] j.b 5b 214a 2d 5b 236a 2) 0:16 - 0:21 5cdc 214a 236a dash 3c (1 hit) 214b [combo drops] 6dc RC block 6a 22a 3) 0:22 - 1:10 5cdc 214a dash 3c (3 hits) 214b SJ j.2c [combo drops] JC j.2c a) 3c9d 6c j.c land 632146c b) b is just a backwards c) (if blocked) 5b 236a j.3da j.b 5a 2b 5b 5cdc d) (if blocked) 3c 236b 6d SJ j.b j.a j.b j.c JC j.2c j.214b e) (if whiffed) 3d 5b 5c 236a 4) 1:11 - 1:31 4b 5b j.2dc 5b j.2c 5b 5cdc 214a dash 3c (3 hits) 214b j.2c [combo drops] JC j.2c 3c9d 6c j.c land 632146c 236a 214a dash 3c (3 hits) 236a (frog hits) 3c (2 hits) 22a AirThrow 3d land 3c (3 hits) 236a 5) 1:32 - 1:55 (2 hits prior) j.2c 5b 5cdc 214a dash 2b 5b 214b 3c (1 hit) 214a [combo drops] a) (if blocked) 3c (3 hits) 214a1d 5b 236a b) (if hit) 3c (3 hits) (move back) 3c (1 hit) 214a [combo drops] 3c (3 hits) dash 6c j.c land 632146c 6) 1:56 - 2:21 2b 5b 6b 5cdc 214a dash 3c (3 hits) 214b (move forward) 3c (3 hits) [combo drops] 214a 5b 236a (move forward) 214a2d 5b 236a (move forward) 214a1d 5b 236a dash 632146c 214a 6a 5b SJC 8d j.2dc land 214a 3c (3 hits) 236a4d 3c (3 hits) 22a AirThrow (3d) 7) 2:22 - 2:42 j.3dc 5b j.2c 5b 5cdc 214a [combo drops] 236a a) (if not teched) dash 3c (1 hit) 214b 3c (1 hit) 214a 3c (3 hits/whiffs) 6c j.c land 632146c b) (if teched and hit) dash 3c (3 whiffs) 6c j.c land 632146c 8) 2:43 - 2:54 2b 5b j.3db j.2c 5b j.2b j.2c j.c dash 5b 5cdc 214a [combo drops] 236a dash 3c (1 hit) 214b 6c j.c land 632146c 9) 2:55 - 3:17 j.2c 5b j.3dc 5b j.2c 5b 5cdc 214a [combo drops] 236a dash 3c (1 hit) 214b 5b 214a2d 5b 236a dash 214a1d 5b 236a dash 632146a 214a 6a 5b SJC 8d j.2dc land 214a 3c (3 hits) 236a4d 22a 6a 10) 3:18 - 4:05 3c9d 6c j.c land 632146c j.214a 3dc (hold c) [combo drops] 2c a) (on hit) 3c (3 hits) 214a b) (on whiff) 3c (3 hits) 214a c) same as a d) (on block) (wait for frog to finish) crossup j.2c j.c 5b j.3db j.2c 5b j.b j.2c j.c dash 5b 5cdc 236b 22a 11) 4:06 - 4:17 Throw 9d IAD j.b j.c land dash (cross up) 6a 412364c SJ 8d j.2dc (cross up) 214a 3c (2 hits) 236a (frog hits) 22a AirThrow

As far as I know it still combos. There wasn't anything about that not comboing, after all. There was some confusion in one of the other threads as to whether you could still combo from 6b, but that was because of a misunderstanding about the changes to the 6b CH. edit: I take that back. It seems you might be right about 5b not comboing directly into 6c. Need more confirmation on how that works, though.

Bit curious as to whether our 4b is still beaten by 5a spam. Was playing around with it in CT earlier in an attempt to see if anything vaguely useful can be done with it and realized that the other player can actually just hold block and mash 5a. The amount of time it takes for 4b to come out is basically a guaranteed 5a counterhit (or if they're actually watching for it, they can just dp or do anything they want that's fast enough). You have a point. In a lot matches, other players are being careful around Rachel because they aren't sure what she can and can't do in the new game, while Rachel players are trying to figure out new combos. Lots of time outs.

It's nice to know I was wrong about the CH thing for 5cc reps. Hadn't noticed it repeated (3 times!? wow) in that combo earlier. Ah, well, thanks for trying.

Taken from the changes thread: 2a is... better than 2b now. I thought it used to be the other way around? Not that it matters, since 2a isn't a low, but, yeah. The Tager dart thrower spiked the Rachel thrower's drink before they began.

Bang's combos have always been on the lower end of the damage spectrum. He just throws them at you nonstop, so it's less of an issue for him. If his combos did the same 4-5k damage that other characters' combos did, he'd probably be one of the best characters in the game (and Dora would win every tournament). The problem I have with Rachel right now, aside from her oddly changed moveset (whee, time to relearn stuff), is how much every move prorates. Tacking a 2b onto the start of her >3k combo knocks it down to 2.1k. I mean, seriously? It never felt that bad before. Also, the cat chair having a wider hitbox is pretty awesome sounding, but I need to actually know how much wider we're talking about before I can say it's worth anything. If it's significantly larger, punishing Jin/Litchi/etc. will become a lot easier with it. Of course, comboing from a 2c hit that's outside of the range of 5b may be awkward, but we'll see.

Quite honestly, I was somewhat surprised by how much they'd nerfed her damage. It's not actually so much of a huge damage nerf, though, as it is a balance to overall character damage potentials (and a lowering of the average damage dealt in the game). Rachel just happened to be able to do too much damage in the first game, so it feels like a huge drop.

@ryoko: Not sure if you can clarify or not, but was wondering about these (bit of a repost from the Rachel forums): 5B→5CC→frog→3C→A lobelia→6C→JC→air iris→land→JC→JC→A lobelia for 3k+, 2B for 2.1k It looks like this one involves an OTG frog combo? Seen a lot of whiffed attempts at frog combos (enemies floating too high after 3c236a to get frogged, mostly), so I'm a bit surprised to see a combo involving one. 2B→5B→5CC→frog→5B→JA→C lobelia→6A→baden lily→6C→JC→3C→frog→super jump (direction8)D→J2CD ...how does this one work? The first bit makes some amount of sense (weird way to knock them into the frog, but if it works, it works~), but the second part is confusing. I see no way for '6C→JC→3C→frog' to all fit within a single BBL. I'm assuming it means that there's a frog out before the 6c or something, and that you 3c the opponent back into him for the level 3 j.2c? Just confusing because I'm assuming the first 'frog' is for pulling him out and the second one is for George actually hitting the opponent. If the first 'frog' and second 'frog' are the same summon of George, then that's a really interesting combo.

From the changes thread: In particular, these have caught my attention: 5B→5CC→frog→3C→A lobelia→6C→JC→air iris→land→JC→JC→A lobelia for 3k+, 2B for 2.1k It looks like this one involves an OTG frog combo? Also nice to see some damage above 3k (though I honestly don't tend to land 5b as a first hit, so I'd get far lower damage from prorating). 2B→5B→5CC→frog→5B→JA→C lobelia→6A→baden lily→6C→JC→3C→frog→super jump (direction8)D→J2CD ...how does this one work? The first bit makes some amount of sense (weird way to knock them into the frog, but if it works, it works~), but the second part is confusing. I see no way for '6C→JC→3C→frog' to all fit within a single BBL. I'm assuming it means that there's a frog out before the 6c or something, and that you 3c the opponent back into him for the level 3 j.2c. If the first 'frog' (214a) is the summon for the second 'frog' (frog hits), then that's a really interesting combo.

It's worth pointing out that the 5cc -> 5cc repetition may be limited to 5cc CH -> 5cc (as seen in the video). If the whole 'fatal counter' positive proration thing is true, 5cc CH is a good chance to do some more damage than normal, since it's a guardbreaking move.

Yeah, I didn't know if the 214c was actually worth cancelling j.2c with, but I suppose it's faster than just bouncing off the floor. Thanks for clarifying, though. Edit: Ah, 236a makes it make much more sense.

Ah. I thought at some point level 2 and 3 were less nerfed than level 1 j.2c, but I suppose they've all been made equal. No more level 2 j.2c into air combos, then.

Do you know if the 214c is for cancelling the j.2c? Bit confused as to its purpose there, and that's the only thing that comes to mind.

Pretty neat combos and blockstrings introduced, there. Sort of interesting to note that a lot of her actual damage came from punishing blocked attacks, or the Litchi not blocking 236a/b and sword/air iris.

As far as I know, j.2c cancels into specials and 2c on landing. Not sure about in the air. I'm a bit curious if BBL sj 8d dj j.2dc (land) 214a is still combo-able or worth trying to do in CS. I've yet to see a successful execution of BBL 214a 3c, but it's apparently possible, so I'm assuming that a level 3 j.2c will be able to combo into a frog as well? Also, level 2 and 3 j.2c are cancellable into both normals and specials (same as they are in CT), correct? Or was the difference between those and the level 1 j.2c something else?

@Polka: She could actually air-throw people into George in CT, too, pending that he didn't hop out of the way. Pulling him out directly under your opponent, then jumping up and airgrabbing will combo a lot of the time (not sure what the exact timing is for George hopping back under you after you toss him, but it's pretty close to that). Also, really random, but does anyone know if Jin's D Ice Car still combos on Rachel?

Well, to be fair, 3c goes under a lot of Rachel's stuff right now, too. We just happen to have j.2c to squish Noel out of it. Also, there really doesn't seem to be much in the way of mixup for either Noel or Rachel. Best option is probably to do some sort of aerial approach (j.b j.c?) then either 4b on landing or 5a into 2b/4b. It feels like there's virtually no way to successfully break through someone's defense if you stay on the ground (not including RC strings), unless they're really slow on reacting to 4b or decide to block high for some reason. That would fit with what Lastblade mentioned when we bothered him about it. Hitting airborne opponents with 5cc knocks them to the wall. I think it was listed in one of ryoko's change lists. Not sure I've seen any really good combos with it, though. I think one player did manage to do it then wind a jump after it into a j.b j.c combo. Still only does 2.5k or so damage, though. Better than nothing, but it looks like our best bet for damage is to get a 4b CH into super or something for the (potential) positive proration on a guard-breaking CH. I wonder if anyone will find some way to get a 3-pole setup. Edit: Checked the video again and realized the 2.5k was without Rachel being under Tsubaki for the BBL. Considering that the one pole gave around 600 damage and is marked here as 1830 dmg, we can probably assume Rachel's lightning (marked at 1539 dmg) would tack on ~500 dmg, making the total 3k. ...still not very impressive. 5cdc -> frog -> 3c (1 hit) 236a causes George to whiff in the corner in one of the other videos. I'd guess that'd apply to 2b 5b frog combos, too? Unless you've seen it work somewhere. That'd be nice. Edit: Have I mentioned that I haven't slept yet? If not, then let me mention that now. Anyway, now that I actually understand what you wrote (as opposed to thinking 'sj 8d dj j.2c'), I'm going to defer to what Soniti wrote below. Yay, 236a~. A number of videos show Rachel players comboing 5b off of 6a CH. 6a CH -> 6a is apparently nigh impossible now, though. I'd totally forgotten she didn't regen wind while OTG. :8/: But at least we get to slide George along the ground while we do our combos and blockstrings, I guess, and crossup air iris seems like silly fun.