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I can haz critique on this guide I'm currently writing?

Resident Fascist

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Resident Fascist Newbie

Resident Fascist

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Posted

Ok, like I'm skipping all the Intro about the game and so on. fyi, It's for BlazBlue - Continuum Shift EXTEND or CS2 at time of writing.

Large credit to those at dustloop.com for some information. I really appreciate it.

1: Fundemental Basics.
The game runs at 60FPS(? I'd like a confirmation on this.) so 1 Frame is 1/60th of a second. What is a frame? Think of a flipbook, where you have a stickman jump up in the air. Then each page is 1 Frame. We use frames as a length of time rather than seconds, as many things in game don't last for anymore than 3 seconds. Every character has a Super Meter which goes up to 100% with the exception of Haku-Men who has a Magatama guage instead. This meter can be spent on Supers(Distortion Drives), Rapid Cancels, Counter-Assaults and Astral Heats. Every character also has a Health bar, Taokaka and Carl have the lowest health respectively, with only 9,500 Health Points. Tager has the highest Health with 13,000 Health Points. Underneath a Character's health guage, you will find the Burst Icon. Each Player starts a Match with 1 Burst, and they will gain an additional burst if they lose a round(Up to a Max of 2.) By pressing all 4 Attack Buttons at once, you will use up a Burst, and use an Aura Like attack that does no damage but blows your Opponent back. There are two types of Bursts, which I shall cover later.

Next to the Burst Icon, you will find the Barrier Guard Meter. This is used to Block Attacks using the Barrier Guard, which again will be covered in the blocking section of this tutorial. A little right from the Barrier Meter, you will find the Guard Primers. Each character has a Number of Guard Primers(Or as I call them, Guard Blocks) that represent your character's Guard Strength. Most characters have 5, where as some characters like Hazama have 4. Tager has 10 Guard Primers. Reducing your Opponent's Guard Primers to 0 will trigger a Guard Crush. After a Guard Crush, a player is slightly vunerable. After which, they will gain all their Guard Primers back. More information can be found in the Blocking section.

Above both Players Guard Primers, you shall find the timer: which tells you how many Seconds remain in the round. In a normal tournement match, there are a Maximum of 3 Rounds, with 99 Seconds. 2 Wins to take a set and 2 Sets to take the match. If both players draw while at match-point, a Tie-Breaker Game will occur(REBEL FINAL, ACTION!)

Finally, the game version is displayed at the top.

Ver 1.00/TYPE-A = BLAZBLUE: CONTINUUM SHIFT(1st Release)
Ver.1.1/TYPE-B = BLAZBLUE: CONTINUUM SHIFT(Makoto=Nanaya Released as DLC)
Ver.1.2/TYPE-C = BLAZBLUE: CONTINUUM SHIFT(Valkenhyn=R.=Hellsing Released as DLC)
Ver.1.3/TYPE-D = BLAZBLUE: CONTINUUM SHIFT II(Platinum=The=Trinity and CS2 Character Balances released)

Note, you will need internet access to recieve these updates.

2: Attacking your Opponent

As you might have figured, Attacking your opponent is a very key thing in BlazBlue. It is also extremely complex and difficult to master using the right attack in the exact right situation.There are 4 Attack buttons to use in BlazBlue. A,B,C and D. A executes weak attacks, B does Medium attacks and C does Strong attacks. D is a unique attack for each character, which can be found under the command list. In addition to these moves, there are directional input+Button attacks, which perform unique attacks. Each character also has special attacks which are done by performing a motion like Quarter-Cricle Backward(214) and pressing an attack button.

To save you time and save me a lot of typing, I'm going to introduce you to your new best friend:

789
456
123

this is the numbers system. Each number corresponds to a directional button/position. 4 is back, 6 is forward, 8 is up, 2 is down. and so on. 214 is down, then down-back, then back. You getting it? It's not a hard subject to grasp, but if you want to read high level combos, you'll need this vital information. 214A is 214 and then A, and so on.

Now back to the good stuff. How to attack your Opponent. The safest way to approach your Opponent varies from character to character. There are 3 Vital things to look for against a Character when approaching:

Anti-Air
Anti-Ground
Their general options in close-range.

Let's take the example of Ragna's 6A. It is a good anti-air. If my opponent where to approach me by air, I would easily be able to hit them with the attack and follow up with an Aerial Combo. In addition, if I catch them mashing buttons to find a safe in, I'll get a counter hit and be able to capitalise on the situation further. Knowing these situations and how to capitalise on them is key to approaching safely. If I know my opponent has a really safe anti-air, I shouldn't try and just dive in blindly by air dashing. This is where Anti-Ground attacks come into play. Anti-Ground attacks do what they say. A great example of a Great anti-Ground is Ragna's Aerial 5C. It has a long range, and decent priority, and can combo into his B&Bs when used close to the ground. Knowing my Attack's hitbox is bigger than my Opponent's Anti-Air hitbox, I can use the attack, and almost guarentee a safe in.

"Knowing your enemy is half the battle" Has never been more true. If you are trying to stop your Opponent's jump in and or attempts to get in, think for a little: What anti-ground do they have? Is my Anti-Air Safe?

Once you have finally managed to get into close range, It's time to consider once again. What options does my opponent have here? What measures can I take to avoid them? Am I safe if I do this...? Don't just rush blindly into attacks, and certianly don't try to button mash. If you are on the other side of someone rushing into attacks, while it sounds difficult, it makes your life a lot easier. Simply wait for a applicable time to use a Safe Attack and then well, you're probably winning. When I first started playing, I thought rushing into your B&Bs was the best thing. No. It's much, much less risky to make sure you're safe before attempting anything. While this [b]sounds easy [/b]it's not in [b]real gameplay. [/b]One of the key things to becoming a good player is to [b]stay calm. [/b]Next we come to my favorite part: Mix-ups. What [b]is [/b]a Mix-up, in the simplest sense? A mix-up forces your Opponent to guess, and not be certian if they are making the right descision. Let's take a look at Ragna's most basic B&B combo.

5B>5C>214A>214D

Now, let's say 3 out of 10 times, you do this instead.

5B>5C>3C>214A>214D

While the entire combo can be blocked in crouching guard, your opponent has to think "What if this is one of those 3/10 times? How should I block?" and If you see them crouching block, change the 5B into a 6B overhead to start the combo. This will force them to think. If they start guarding before the combo, 6B will hit them. If they guard standing, they'll get hit by 3C unless they switch guards. You can combine these to make a suitable mix-up and confuse your Opponent. If your Opponent doesn't know what you are going to do, chances are they'll be less prepared for it. This is why I am going to say learn atleast[b] variations of most of your combos. Even if you don't plan on using them. [/b]

Now, mix-ups are one of the most complicated things to do as they involve your Opponent's Mind. Now for something that involves your Own Brain: Hit confirms. What are hit confirms? Hit confirming is a complex mechanic that allows you to use a safe move to chain into something less safe. Overall, it allows you to make safe approaches to big, game changing combos. To test your hit confirming, set the cpu to random block and use ragna. Press 5A>5B. Everytime the CPU blocks 5A, don't do 5B. It's hard, right? Your muscle memory has memorised the pattern, so you do it without thinking. Hit confirming is one of the few things that automaticially makes you a much better player. It allows ambigious pokes to become combos. If the opening attack is blocked, no worries: you are still safe. As per usual, Hit confirms vary from character to character.

One thing that can severely confuse a new player is what we mean by "More Damage" In general, making a combo safe is worth losing 300 to 2000 Damage off the combo in varying cases. Raw Power is not what makes a combo good, it is how safe the combo is to start, and how much meter and total damage it does all together. The point is, a Unsafe combo that does 7K damage is not superior to a safe combo that does 3.5k.

And to round off the final part of the offence section, we come to Rapid Cancels(RC, Sometimes called Romantic Cancel as that's it's GG name.) Rapid Cancelling is done by pressing A+B+C at the same time while you have 50 or more heat, you should hear the word "Rapid" and see it on the side of the screen to alert you that you Rapid Cancelled successfully. Nearly all attacks can be rapid cancelled. You cannot rapid cancel a move that did not hit the other player. You can rapid cancel blocked attacks, however. My favorite personal use of rapid cancels is to make unsafe attacks safe and also to extend combos if I have 50 Heat to use. If you've got 50 Heat, Rapid Cancel is the best option. Followed by a Super, and then a Counter-Assault. In general, most supers are decent, while some are plain bad. and some are outclassed by other supers in most situations. Rapid Cancels add a lot to BlazBlue's Gameplay, and are a vital tool to make use of when you can.

3: Defence

oh god. If you thought offence was complex.... well... Hey, there's only 4 types of guards! It can't be that hard!

Now going into each type of Guard.

The regular guard is performed by simply holding 4 or 2 when an opponent attacks you. You will take chip damage from certian attacks, and this is generally considered the worst type of Guard.

Instant Blocking is performed by pressing 4 or 2 5 or 7~ frames before an attack hits you. Your character will flash white and say something different. You will gain 3% Heat Meter and also recover quicker, which allows you to Punish empty blockstrings a lot easier.

Barrier Guard is performed by Pressing 4/2+A+B at the same time, and your character will summon a green barrier to protect them. Continually using the Barrier consumes barrier guage, and when you have none you will enter the "DANGER!" state where you will take more damage until your Barrier meter refills to half.

Instant Barrier is done by performing a Instant Block, except with barrier commands, It is: by far the best block in the game, as it not only pushed your opponent back, but you recover quicker, gain heat and take no chip damage. As it's use is limited, it's best to resort to both it and the Regular Instant Block in a lot of situations.

Ahh, apart from the blocks, Defence is given a huge stance with Bursts. Bursts allow you an easy "GET ME OUT OF THIS MESS!" Every match. If you lose a round, you get an additional burst for that match. If you perform a Burst whilst not being hit, your burst will be gold and this is considered a regular burst. If your opponent touches the burst they will be thrown back.

If you activate a burst whilst blocking or being hit, your Burst will come out green("Defensive Burst") and you will lose 1/2 of your maximum guard primers for the remainder of the round. When you block certian attacks, a Guard Primer(s) will be broken. Though, regular attacks will not reduce your Guard Primers. Over time, Guard Primers will regenerate: However, if you lose another guard primer whilst one is recovering, you will lose any progress you had made to recovering that Guard Primer.

And now we come to Punishing. What is a Punish? A punish is well... a Punishment for when your Opponent does certian things. Let's say my Opponent uses this really obvious blockst-[color=#ff0000][b]INFERNO DIVIDER![/b][/color] To the face. Let's say if they try and Make a Unsafe Move, Punish once again. This is how you can exploit your Opponent's Mistakes and slowly start to take the match even in a less superior position. Instant Blocking makes Punishing Obvious Blockstrings very easy as you recover quicker.

Now, I'd like to discuss Counter-Assualts. When you guard an attack, you can press 6+A+B to counter-assault at the cost of 50 Heat. It is effectively another way out of a combo, while not the best option in a lot of cases, it's still a valid tool and one that should be used every now and then. Because of their nature, they usually score counter hits. Some character's counter assualts can be combo'd from and some are just dodges.
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sorry if this looks rushed, this is the first draft and I shall be tweaking it as I go. Please I can haz valid critique? Stuff on Jump cancels and stuff will be added at a later date.

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