Month: May 2016

Fox is a character notorious for his speed, combo and pressure game, using hit-and-run tactics to rack up as much damage as possible. His potential can be pushed even further by utilizing the unique properties of his down air to extend combos and secure kills. Notable Irish Fox main Skarfelt has been in the lab with the space animal finding the optimal percentages to extend combos using Fox’s drill.

Fox’s down air is not great in the neutral, due to his high landing lag and negative frame data on shield but optimizing this move can lead to devastating combo extensions and potential kills if used in specific locations on stage.

Hits 1-6 of Fox’s down air can even be used to lock opponents on platforms who have missed their tech, which can possibly lead into more damage. Skarfelt himself admits that this is pretty unreliable and won’t be used often in a real set, but it is a fun little tech to pull out in very specific situations.

Source: Skarfelt

When you’re first getting started in the fighting game community, the amount of jargon you’ll encounter can be overwhelming. Among such muttered terms, and perhaps the most intimidating of all, is frame data. Thankfully, commentary duo Ryan “Ketchup” Neal and Jake “Mustard” Neal recently worked with ESL to release a new video–the first in a series titled “Master of Kombat”–breaking down just what frames are, how they work, and the best ways to take advantage of them.

They use Mortal Kombat’s Scorpion as their vessel for conveying these concepts, and while the data presented is centered around Mortal Kombat X, don’t worry if that isn’t your game of choice; this is the sort of knowledge that will carry over into any game that you play, and Ketchup and Mustard do a great job of making a tough concept easy to digest.

If this first episode is anything to go by, we can expect “Master of Kombat” to be a series to keep an eye on.

Source: ESL

Despite being heavily nerfed after his Japanese arcade dominance, everyone’s favorite pesky poltergeist keeps scaring up new tech.

Most of Gengar’s high execution tactics have a consistent theme: they tend to involve multi-part moves that have the ability to be cancelled before the first attack comes out. Built into these moves is a very small input window where you get both the attack you wanted, and the recovery of the cancel. Let’s break these discoveries down in chronological order.

Zano Shiran put together a quick explanatory video on Astonish Canceling.

 

Perhaps the best documented and oldest cancel tech for the G-Man is the “Astonish Cancel.” Normally doing jump+A results in an Astonishing Gengar face being summoned from the floor, followed by a built-in divekick. You can cancel the move before the face comes out and return immediately back to the ground. With Astonish Cancels, you can recover on the ground and have the projectile come out.

This allows Gengar to extend into some of his highest damage combos, and play with his opponents expectations on block.

Note that though Astonish Canceling is technically unsafe, punishing it requires the opponent to risk getting hit by the built-in safe Divekick. The ability to cancel this attack properly is both an important combo and mixup tool for any aspiring Ghost Trainer.

Building upon the same technical idea, Johnathan Brown has found that you can shoot a charged Shadow Ball and cancel the recovery into Gengar’s Shadow Stealth stance at the same time! This effectively opens up even more pressure with Gengar, giving him the ability slip out if his Shadow Ball is out prioritized in zoning wars. There’s a chance this can also be performed to a similar extent with other moves that slip into Shadow Stealth; what can you find?

Have a nice 300+ damage combo while you’re at it.

Given the age of the game and the complexity of the character, the flexibility that this tech offers is frightening.

Sources: Zano Shiran, Johnathan Brown