Fyga 101 Lesson 2, ikimaaasu~!! It’s been a while since I’ve had a fighting game lecture so why not get started now! Lesson 2 will be less about actual fighting game tactics but instead on how to learn a new character in a fighting game. It sounds silly to have to “learn how to learn a character” but the truth of the matter is, in fighting games many players too often limit themselves to one or two characters because they think they’re unable to learn or adapt to other characters. While certain characters are of course better fit for each individual, I’m here to prove it wrong that anyone cannot use any character.

So! To begin, with, the Fyga 101 series will from now on be based around the Blazblue series because that and Super Street Fighter IV are easily the two most played fighting games at the moment and the latter of the two needs not any more guides written for it.

To start us off let’s ask, why you should use a different character? Why bother learning a new character when you are perfectly comfortable with your main?

There is no real “right” answer to this question but there are good answers to it. As far as strategy goes, learning a character who has a favorable match up against a character who has the lead against your main is theoretically a smart thing to do in tournaments that allow counter picking. However while this is one of the most common reasons why people learn other characters, it is arguably the least important.

Learning a new character is important because it helps you master three things: the new character you’re learning, the other characters you’ve learned, and the game you’re playing as a whole. By learning more characters you refine your overall ability at playing that fighting game by further understanding system and character specific mechanics. At greater lengths, you can begin to understand your opponent’s mentality before you even play him or her and apply the appropriate counter measures required to win against them. Furthermore learning additional characters adopts new fighting game abilities and ideologies onto your boundless skill slate, contributing to a more flavorful style of play for all of your characters in each fighting game you play.

I could go on endlessly about the benefits from learning new characters, because if you know me in the fighting game realm then you’d know I often learn the entire cast of the many fighting games I play and it’s in my nature to embellish something I like as much as possible, but let’s get to the actual meat of the process now shall we?

Where to start? First pick a character of course. This is simply up to your tastes, pick a character you deem interesting or worthy of use. To use an example for this guide I’ll pick BBCS Jin as he is an easy to learn, “jack of all trades” type of character and works well with many examples. For this guide I will make it as I have no prior experience using Jin and am learning him from the ground up. Practice mode and internet forums will be your friend in executing the following steps. (=ﾟωﾟ)

Step 1) Movement and Normals

The first step is the foundation of your character. Familiarize yourself with ALL of your character’s movement options and normals. Movement options contribute to the properties of your walks, runs, jumps, back steps, air dashes, etc. Note when you can do these options, what they can cancel into, if they’re safe, how many times you can do them, etc. Make particular note of your character’s stronger movement options and their weaker options.

Next familiarize yourself with all of your normals. Seriously. Your character has MANY different moves and many of them go unused when they often should be. Recognize your stronger pokes, your anti-airs, your overheads, etc. In Jin’s case, I’ll break down each one of his normals and I recommend you do the same when you start learning your character. I will not cover frame data in this lesson, but it is important to understand and have as a resource in this step. For BBCS you can find most of the character’s frame data here.

5A – A typical standing jab with all of its usual traits. An average 6 frame start up, a decent anti-air to catch out jumps, but whiffs on most crouchers. You may purposely whiff on a crouching opponent to quickly follow up with a throw if your opponent is not expecting it.
2A – A typical crouch jab that does not actually hit low. However, Jin’s hittable hitbox during this move is very low and hard to hit making this a surprisingly good and quick anti-air.
6A – Jin’s only and rather bad ground overhead. It can only gatling from 5A or 2A so you will not be able to sneak it in often. Still you can get decent damage on it and it works well as an ender with a Distortion follow up.
5B – A 2 hit normal in which the second hit draws your opponent in with a vacuum effect. The move is 0 frames on block meaning you and your opponent are at a neutral state at the very same time after your opponent blocks it. This makes it an effective pressure reset tool but should not be used in this way too often. The vacuum effect of the second hit is important to understand to correctly time combos, pressure, and mix up options. ie: if you allow the second hit to vacuum your opponent in on block, it will be impossible to later hit your opponent with Jin’s 2D as they will be too close to you.
2B – One of Jin’s only 2 lows and also his main low. Like most lows in this game, it prorates your combo pretty badly ending up in weak combos, but a low is a low and required to use often to prevent your opponent from over predicting overheads and jumping out of blockstrings.
6B – A jump kick that jumps over low profile moves but can still be beat by them with proper timing therefore it should not be thrown out to often. Still, on hit you have massive +frames and can link to many different moves and combos.
5C – Best horizontal ranged poke and makes a decent anti-air given correct spacing. On counter hit or crouching hit it can link to 6C which is a very important part of Jin’s combos.
2C – Jin’s “anti-air” but its slow start up makes it rather poor. It has great vertical range and is air unblockable and is further more a fatal counter so it does have its uses.
6C – A slow launcher with a huge hitbox that can be easily instant blocked and punished unless you cancel into a dp which of course has its drawbacks. Great damage potential however.
3C – Jin’s sweep and his only other low. Use this to punish jump happy opponents during blockstrings. Otherwise isn’t useful in many places and is incredibly punishable if left empty on block.
5D – A decent projectile poke that’s relatively safe to use but shouldn’t be spammed especially because it’s hard to follow up without meter. Not very useful.
2D – This move is great because of the +frames you get on block and can catch people jumping if timed right. Its start up looks faster than it really is however and will lose to many things and the recovery is very long allowing people who dodge the ice sword to get a free crouch combo on Jin.
6D – Very long start up but this move has a ton of +frames on block and can continue into very strong combos if it hits. High risk, high reward.
j.A – Standard j.AAAAAA, should beat out other aerials.
j.B – This move has two parts, the first half has a smaller hitbox while the second half extends to retardedly large lengths. Not as good as it was in CT but the second half’s hitbox covers all around Jin except above him.
j.C – Very fast and strong air-air poke that can link to 2D on counter hit. However it likes to whiff crouchers so be wary of this.
j.2C – Decent air-ground but a bit slow. Not much use of this outside of combos when j.B and j.C already do their job.
j.D – Only useful for combos and an okay cross up option.

You don’t have to go through such specific lengths in understanding your character’s normals but getting to know them will definitely help you understand how your character plays in the long run.

Lastly, combining your character’s movement options with your character’s normals will begin to concrete your familiarity with your character in a neutral situation aka tachimawari. This is the first area of play you want to be able to control and understand your character in. This situation refers to how your character should be played when not directly confronted with your opponent. The factors that apply to neutral game are: footsies, approach (dash in, jump in), zoning, etc. Some characters are better suited for staying further away and allowing their opponent to recklessly approach them while others require getting into close range to stay at an advantage.

In Jin’s case he has a variety of quick normals that allow him to play effectively in nearly all situations of the stage. From far range he has his projectile series to throw out but perhaps at mid range he is most effective with his several great ranged pokes like j.C and 623A for air coverage, and 5C, 6C, and 2D for grounded. All of these moves can lead to great damage on counter hit. Therefore Jin does not necessarily have to rush in and pressure unless your opponent’s character is susceptible to that style of play. In that case, Jin has every option to succeed in rushing in as well with good normals like 2A, j.B, 6B, and 5C.

Step 2) Positioning

Positioning is similar to zoning but I don’t quite wish to use that word for this topic. Zoning has become a rather broad term in fighting games but kind of fits this idea too. Zoning traditionally refers to positioning your opponent in a way that is beneficial to your own character, be it through the use of good pokes or projectiles. Positioning is roughly just what I finished talking about in the last two paragraphs however those only referred to Jin who makes a poor example of positioning as he can do well in all positions.

Take Carl for example, generally a bad to okay character even with Nirvana backing him up. However should you ever be sandwiched between the two then you’ll be stuck in a near inescapable trap and up against arguably the now strongest character in the game provided the Carl player doesn’t slip up. Each character in every fighting game has a situation like this in which they notably excel at more than other situations. They may not be as hectic at Carl’s but they do indeed exist. As another example, Litchi excels at corner game and has all the tools to push her opponent there and furthermore keep them there while Bang is a monster at wake up game and of course has all the tools he needs to put his opponent in that position (thus, we had top tier). Tager had no good way to “position” his opponent in Calamity Trigger, and thus Gadget Finger was created, and since that wasn’t good enough, CSII Tager has charged super armor 6[A].

In short what I call positioning is really just the “game” your character plays best at. There are more specific instances in which a character may be superior in but these character specifics are what you have to learn when learning your character.

3) Combos

This is an obvious step in learning your character. The very first combo you should learn and engrave into your fingers is your character’s BnB or Bread and Butter combo. This is usually the character’s best combo that can be applied to a regular situation and requires no specific set up. You really don’t need to get fancy with your BnB, just stick to the recommended one or ones.

After this, your situation specific combos should come next. Blazblue is quite unique in that certain characters benefit from the addition frames of hitstun on crouching characters greatly. On a crouching opponent, Jin can link 5C to 6C which opts for stronger air combos and is the main source of his damage. Similarly on a crouching opponent Noel can link 5C or 2C into 3C, Hazama can link 2B into 3C, and Tager can even link together the 5B 5C 6A chain. Additionally some moves may whiff on a crouching opponent, like Bang’s 6C and Litchi’s staffless 6C, so different combos have to be used for these situations as well. Being able to hit confirm into the appropriate combo depending on your opponent’s hit state is very important. It may be hard to learn at first, but to help you there are certain cues to look out for. If you’re already hitting your opponent out of a move that requires a low (1, 2, or 3) input (like Jin’s 2D), they’ll automatically be in a crouching state when hit. Additionally if you can’t quite hit confirm say Jin’s 5C into 6C on reaction, opt for a dash in 2A and during the combo up to 5C, determine if your opponent was crouching or not and hit confirm if appropriate.

A few more situation specific combos will apply to certain things like positions in relation to the corner/wall, counter hits, and airborne opponents. Learning your character’s best combos for each situation will give you that last bit of upper edge that can decide the whole match. To elaborate on what I mean on airborne opponents though, in Guilty Gear styled fighting games air combos are an important part of the combo formula and are often good ways to end combos. However building this muscle memory of your air combo BnB can often screw up air combos for you outside of your BnB.

Say Jin lands a plain 5A anti-air. In most of Jin’s air combos, the first air normal to use is j.B after usually a 5C. However if you use a j.B in this situation, it would come out too slow and miss and you’d lose a free combo. This returns to understanding your characters normals, when I said that, I really meant it. I see Japanese players dropping these combos often when they switch to a new character because they’re high tier. They haven’t taken the time to understand their character’s normals and don’t know which ones to use in which order to correctly complete the combo. In this case, Jin’s regular combo would look like (can be different due to spacing however) 5A (air hit) j.A j.B dj j.2C j.D 214C. (Read more about this in Lesson 1)

4) Character Specifics

There isn’t much left required to learn a character. The final step is to simply play that character often. But one final step is to figure out your character’s specific “things”. This can refer to specific abilities, set ups, mind games, traps, etc. etc. Blazblue has a lot of weird properties especially with the Drive system so be sure to study and really know your character’s full potential. For Jin, he has many options that many Jin players don’t make use of like j.236D anti-cross up, j.236D ender to 6C anti-air reset, and even a true unblockable set up.

Putting a spin on it, learning your character’s specific strategies and combos against specific characters would be the second half of this step. After you’ve practiced your character to a point of comfort, it’s time to start learning the match ups for the character. Each character has his or her worse and better match ups and depending on which character you’re playing against you could be using an entirely different character yourself.

Practice character specific combos, read about the match up, watch the pros play the match up, and most importantly–

5) Lose

Yep. Unless you’re making money at all of the free American tournaments, then this step is not not for you. Play your character. Lose. That is the only way to get better. Learn from your mistakes and ask why you are losing and apply appropriate measures to remedy this. If you’re losing to an annoying tactic or top tier BS, don’t think of it as “this game sucks” or “that character is cheap” but instead as “I did something wrong and it is my fault, I should change or stop doing this or that”. This sort of composed mindset respects your character, your opponent, and the game in a collective manner and is required to honestly hone your ability at the game.

6) Win

Once you’ve become skilled with your character, win for me. :3

And that about wraps up this lesson. This sort of procedure is what I myself go through when learning a new game and its characters. Don’t leave that character that’s really hard to use become wasted memory, take up a chance and do something different! A loss with a character you have not mastered is more educational than victory with a character you have already mastered!

pixiv artist: ミラノ＠3日目ケ-14a