Sure Skrull is unsafe when he uses his special moves…but with X-Factor he gets keep himself safe, and can do another mixups on you. For example.
Blocking Meteror Smash from Anchor SKRULL will lead into…
XFC Skrull goes low, keep you chicken blocking.
XFC Skrull going for a command grab.
XFC Skrull going for anti-air grab
Skrull does inferno, and than XFC out of inferno to keep himself safe for another type of
If he guess right, you die. If He guess wrong, you can kill him. If you guess wrong, you must guess again with Skrull’s 50/50 until he OCVs you team. The only weakness to this is that if Skrull guesses wrong, he can easily die.
I still feel Dark Phoenix is one of the best anchors in the game even with her nerfs in Ultimate. Now you kind of have to learn a few basic combos to win with her.
Or Strider. He’s a beastly anchor, orbs with level 3 xf is one of the scariest things in the game.
How effective is Akuma as an anchor in Ultimate? Right now I’m playing Wolveine/Akuma/Wesker but I’ve been considering switching the order around a bit because Wesker is just that much better when covered by tatsu and his assist isn’t doing much for my Akuma right now outside of one specific combo.
Wesker without assist is overrated even in XF3. Switch Akuma to anchor so you don’t have to always be tagging/DHCing into Akuma. IMO Akuma anchor is better now because he can actually stay in the air for longer than a second now which improves his overall mobility. Akuma might as well provide the best assist in the game for 2 of the best characters in the game and then run by himself at the end with an extra speed boost.
Even though Wesker has his LV4 XF bs playing him last creates a few problems with the overall team. Number 1, If your first character dies your second character is left with only Wesker’s gunshot assist backing them up. Gun shot is great for combo extensions, but thats about it. Number 2, Wesker is only a good anchor when he has X Factor, so if you blow your X Factor early to kill the “problem” but then things go bad for you Weskers comeback potential goes way down.
Long story short, XF2 (or 3 with shades off) Wesker backed up by a good assist > Dark Wesker.
I’m a culprit. I have the most fraudulent Strange in the world, I just sit on 5 bars of Vashanti and burn them the hell away with Xfactor. I dunno why, but I feel like apologizing for doing it and now I feel bad about myself =(
But what happens when you have neither x-factor nor meter? Im actually curious, strider doesn’t seem to be able to handle those kinda situations but I might be wrong. Personally I think in the long run akuma will end up being the best anchor in the game:
Sick assist
High damage with or without x-factor and meter
Sick cross over counter
Amazing hypers
Good mix-up, plus with his airborne fireballs he has the ability to cover his own mix-ups
Decent incoming character mix-up
A very damaging-if not too practical-level 3
Plus I feel at the end of a match when you both have x-factor, his lack of health becomes less of an issue.
But some other sick anchors imo are doom and vergil, doom because he is doom. High damage, good mix-up, good incoming character mix-ups and good useage of bars with both characters. I think dante can be played in anchor, but his combos are too long(waste x-factor time). With that said he has the tools to control a match no matter who he is playing against. I was a big fan of anchor dormammu in vanilla, but the nerf to flame carpet might hurt him(not too sure, but it definitely hurt my anchor dorm). Im 100 percent sure by in a few months no one will run anchor wesker anymore, its just not optimal imo and is a waste of a very good point character.
With Xfactor, no meter necessary Jam Session loops and Incoming Character mix-ups gives him good comeback potential. I use him as anchor and he’s saved me many times.
It depends on the situation. If you need to chew through 3 full characters, he really needs both meter and X-Factor to get it done easily.
If he only has 2 characters to beat, it helps to have either meter stocked OR X-Factor, but he doesn’t necessarily need both.
If it’s just Strider against 1 character, I don’t feel he needs to have either to come out on top. His tools are that good that he can play with his food (aka resets) and come out on top.
If you’re expecting to kill 3 characters without giving Strider any resources, I don’t see it happening. Then again, I don’t see any other character regularly making that climb, either. That situation only happens when you totally waste your X-Factor and all your meter without making any sort of dent in the opponent at all. How does that happen?
Akuma is a fantastic anchor, but in the same way that Akuma’s damage simply outclasses Striders, Striders mix-up, pokes and movement are in a whole other league, and I feel those tools are more important than raw damage.
And to clarify, I’m not saying Akuma’s bad - I feel he’s the #2 anchor in the game. He’s the next best combination of universal assist, comeback factor and awesome DHC synergy.
Yea, striders mix-ups and pokes are much better than akumas, but with akuma, your just never out of it. If you’ve learnt your optimal akuma combos you can do like a million with every hit while building 2 bars. Plus akumas assist is easier to use than striders since anyone can take advantage of tatsu while only certain characters can abuse strider.
But yea, strider anchor is a sight to behold, plus if your running him in the back, you just gotta make a conscious effort to either only use x-factor on a guaranteed kill or always save it for him. So I think you could make an argument for either character.
Top 5 anchors imo(in no particular order):
Akuma
Strider
Doom
Ammy(one of the most underrated anchors in the game)
Maybe Phoenix, not too sure bout her longevity yet.
With all due respect, I think some of the characters listed here (such as Strider) don’t belong on the “best anchor” list if you factor in top level play.
Don’t get me wrong - for most players of a typical skill level (or online) they work fine as anchors. But there’s a reason that you don’t see many pro players going with Strider anchor, hell you rarely see him at all outside of Clockwork (who has not been around lately anyway - btw anyone know what happened to him? Last I heard he was saying he was making some changes to help in 2012 but havent seen em since?).
Just seems kind of strange that people put down Dorm’s ability as anchor, when in top level tournament play he has achieved far more than Strider has as an anchor. Factoring tournament play, in all honesty I would say Strider is in a position of “ghetto Dark Phoenix” as an anchor atm, since even in Ultimate she has had a better tournament showing than Strider, and runs a somewhat similar gimmick. Hell, even Arthur may have achieved more in tournaments than Strider has lately…
Well that’s one of the things I was trying to speak to - after playing him for a while, you realize it’s not as much of a dilemma.
You can still pop X-Factor to kill a character early, because then they only have 2 left and you’re probably building meter in the process rather than spending it (with good combos, anyway). Since Strider really only needs meter OR X-Factor to kill 2 characters, you’re still in a good position if things get turned around.
Phoenix is far more restrictive by comparison. You can’t touch your meter at all with her. With Strider, it’s still fair game if you’re holding your x-factor, or your x-factor’s fair game if your holding your meter. And if you’re killing characters, blow it all.
IMO
Strider is more an assist character to me, he needs at least 3 openings to kill a character while akuma and wesker do it in one and it’s not too difficult to open a character with them and ouroboros is more gimmicky than Arthur anchor
Doom is a good anchor because he have foodie his lvl3 and good assists
Felicia is better than strider,need the same amount of openings/reset as he do , because she has various infinites and kitty helper is gdlk to open incoming opponents
spencer and nova are better on point or second but still can destroy teams if left for last
morrigan is better with assists and relying on xfactor to chip and then the opponent uses xfactor to negate chip she’s screwed
dark phoenix still good she can chip and mix up pretty well
Yea no doubt phoenix is a different kind of anchor, but she is still possibly a good anchor. I mean we’ve all seen the carnage dark phoenix(and just phoenixin genral) is capable of. Killing 3 characters with her really isn’t a difficult task which at the end of the day is what you want from your anchor. Plus she is like a built in combo breaker since your opponent is likely gonna let characters live that they would otherwise have killed off. Shes a diva no doubt, and your end up playing your second character without an assist, but unlike dark wesker, dark pheonix is actually designed to kill off 3 characters without an assist since she can create her own 50/50’s.
Of course Dormammu anchor has done more, for one hes been around longer, two hes a much easier character to play, three hes more popular, and lastly hes has much more abusable tools.
Few people play strider, a fraction of those play him well. I’m much more afraid of a strider anchor than a Dorm anchor.
But anyway my top anchors are:
Vergil
Viper
Felicia
Strider
Skrull
Akuma
Thats just for the x-factor derp reliable reverse OCV anchors. Theres a couple more anchors that deserve mention like Dante/Magneto/Ammy but they are top anchors for a different reason
The thing is with Strider, there’s a method behind his usage of XF3. Even though he has kill combos, they take long to finish becasue he has shit damage and Orobos is only really going to kill one chracter. All of this eats up XF time and this is why you will usually see Striders try to take out one character before they pop XF. With Wesker and friends, you just bust out XF because Wesker kills quickly and easily deads whole teams. Even when XF runs out, he does enough damage off stray hit combos that he doesn’t have to take as many risks to clean up the rest of the match. Solo Strider resets are nothing special and when you’re up against characters who can mash on stupid moves and kill you with half a combo, your resets become even riskier.
How about Rocket Racoon? (No troll)
He’s already fast, and with XF3 he is like Amateratsu, except with a nearly invisible teleport, Magneto’s Level 3, and a tri-dash.
Haven’t tested, but seems plausible on paper.
(No troll)