The Basics, Page 10
Meter-Using Abilities: Snapbacks and Hypers: What’s More Super than Super?
Snapback – :qcf: + :a1: or :a2:
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 1
•Damage: 50,000
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 2
•Active Frames: –
•Recovery Frames: N/A (Presumably same as his s. :h:)
•Frame Advantage on Hit: –
•Frame Advantage on Block: N/A (Presumably same as his s. :h:)
Discussion: Chris’s snapback replicates one of his better normals in standing heavy, so he thankfully isn’t like some characters whose snapbacks replicate some normal with crappy reach or conspicuous gaps.
Not much else to say about it at present other than that you **can **empty cancel this straight out of crouching heavy or :f: + 
now. (Despite the change to Flamethrower in UMvC3’s 1.01 patch, it can now cancel into snapbacks, but only on contact.)
I suppose, technically, I should also note the universal aspects of a snapback. Well, the most obvious thing is to say that using a snapback forcibly tags in an opponent’s character–:a1: for the second/bottom character and :a2: for the third/top character–if you somehow didn’t know that still. Similarly obvious, you can’t snapback a character out if they’re the last character on. Finally, you must clean hit your opponent’s character to snap them out–if you trade with anything they do, you’ve just wasted a meter and fall down barely scratched. This is generally why, despite their speed, snapbacks are still confined to the end of combos.
Hypers: The Really Big Guns
Note: None of Chris’s hypers can be mashed.
Grenade Launcher (OTG) – :qcf: + :atk::atk: (1 Bar)
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 4
•Damage: 343,700: 100,000 + 90,000 (third shot) + 80,000 (fourth shot) + 72,800 (second shot) (30,000 x 4 when [push] blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 15 + 4
•Active Frames: 111
•Recovery Frames: 36
•Frame Advantage on Hit: –
•Frame Advantage on Block: –
**Verbal Cues: **“Loading grenade!” (during opening cinematic); “Opening fire!” (during launch of initial shell); “Did that work?!” (during end of hyper)
Discussion: As somewhat implied above under Damage, Chris’s Grenade Launcher is a rather segmented, not-always guaranteed hyper. All of Chris’s hypers are segmented, actually, though his level 1s don’t take multiple commands like She-Hulk’s :qcf: + :atk::atk: hyper.
As for the hyper itself, I suppose I might as well describe it even if I didn’t do that for specials. Chris manifests a grenade launcher from hammerbrospace as he does all his weapons and fires the first of apparently four already loaded grenades.
The first shot is a freezing shot that freezes the opponent if they’re standing on the ground, floors them if they were hit while in the air, or slightly pop-ups them up before they fall back to the ground if it OTGs them. The first shot is the only one that OTGs (at least when it comes to characters not downed at the end of the match) and it explodes at relatively fixed distance unless it smacks into something, like the corner, so it can be difficult to OTG with mid-screen. It should be noted, however, that even OTG within without putting a grenade or an assist usually allows for that character to roll out of it and punish Chris if you didn’t K.O. them.
Regardless of the opponent’s position or health state, if Chris is not stopped, Chris proceeds to fire a grenade straight up that semi-homes onto the opponent. He then fires a third grenade at the would-be-still-frozen opponent that creates a fiery explosion that pops them up, followed quickly by the firing of the fourth and final, apparently electrified grenade. That grenade pops them up even farther, before the second fired, semi-homing concussive grenade lands on top of them, blowing them up even more. Chris can move pretty much as soon as he begins to speak at the end, meaning that he can tack on more damage either in the corner or even from the across the screen with a simple Machine Gun fire or something complicated.
First and foremost, rather needless to say, don’t do this move randomly. Even if your opponent is someone inexperienced enough to flail about after inevitably hit you after you’ve fired the second homing shot and even if they get hit, it’s still not worth it. You’ve taken damage and wasted a bar.
(It should be noted, however, that when it trades initially at the beginning of the first hit sometimes, the opponent will become massively stunned for at least 2 real-life seconds as if they were frozen. You can take advantage of that, but it’s still not something to aim for in most instances.)
Secondly, this move is kinda safe from a distance, especially if you’ve put out a grenade or two and canceled into it from those, as the third, fourth and second shells hit in rather rapid enough succession that it keeps people grounded. Considering that Chris can move and/or act as soon as he begins to say “Did”, that should tell you that real vulnerability point is between the first and second shots. Still, don’t just throw it out, especially against teleporters.
Next, it hits from almost entirely across the screen; it just **barely **misses going all the way. It also has a great amount of durablity on each shot despite its sluggishness—the first shell of it alone eats up the entirety of Dormammu’s Stalker Flare, for example. (Stalker Flare is that fiery ball of doom that you see in your nightmares now.)
Still, don’t just throw it out.
Finally, this hyper is unfortunately rather difficult to DHC into and sometimes out of. The awkwardness of the gap between first and second shots demands that you keep your opponent grounded to hit with all of it when DHC into it and this is rather uncommon, at least for other projectile hypers. DHC out of it is usually easier, though it’s easier to screw up DHCing out of an OTG attempt with it since you have to DHC basically as soon as the first shell explodes due to distance issues.
Sweep Combo (OTG) – :dp: + :atk::atk: (1 Bar)
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 22
•Damage: 290,400 (12,000 + 15,000 [12,000] + 24,000 + 3,000 x 8 + miss [30,000] + 39,000 when [push] blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 10 + 2
•Active Frames: 4 (10) 3 (27) 8 (27) 17 (20) 7 (43) 20
•Recovery Frames: 53
•Frame Advantage on Hit: –
•Frame Advantage on Block: –
Verbal Cues: “It’s all or nothing!” (during opening cinematic); “Eat it!” (during magnum shot); “Eat lead! (during rocket-propelled grenade).
Discussion: To quickly describe this hyper, it is a sweeping knife slash to stun rod to shotgun to OTG machine gun to magnum to rocket-propelled grenade. The fact that machine gun now OTGs “properly” in Ultimate even after two groundbounces is marked improvement to the point where it’s tempting to always spend meter on this to end combos now. Rather than having to do a quite a bit more work to make sure all parts of Grenade Launcher hits or having to make sure you only groundbounced once and use Flamethrower to combo into it, you can go straight from cr. :h: into this and it will generally connect if you cancel the cr. :h: as soon as possible and didn’t use too many j. s and such.
Be warned, though, that despite the Deadly Rave-esque sounding nature of the hyper, Chris will do all those actions whether he’s hitting anyone or not. As such, it’s extremely unsafe, not that you should be doing any of Chris’s supers for the hell of it. Chris doesn’t have the luxury of having a Level 1 with invincibility frames or safety, though they thankfully do a good amount of damage if you still are going to use them.
Also, it should be noted, that even with the change to Sweep Combo’s OTG, Sweep Combo still won’t hit more than one person at the machine gun sweep part that OTGs.
Satellite Laser (OTG) – :qcb: + :atk::atk: (3 Bars)
Initial Positioning of Targeting Marker:
- Hold nothing or two more buttons: Appears on Chris.
- Hold :l:: Appears about a character space in front of Chris.
- Hold : Appears “mid-screen”.
- Hold :h:: Appears pretty much full-screen.
(Note: Apparently auto-locks if the opponent is in the air.)
Fire: :atk: as or after targeting marker appears
Details
[details=Spoiler]
Attack Data:
•Hits: 27 max: 9 per shot.
•Damage: 445,500: 148,500 per shot. (4,900 x 9 when [pushed] blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 35 + 1 (Lock On: 14)
•Active Frames: 37 (Per shot, I’m guessing)
•Recovery Frames: 43
•Frame Advantage on Hit: –
•Frame Advantage on Block: –
Verbal Cues: “Link established!” (during opening cinematic); “Bring the pain!” (during the start of any of the three shots)
**Discussion: **Chris pulls out a large, deadly Super Scope™ and hijacks a satellite to blast his opponents with L.A.S.E.R.s from space.
As cool as it sounds, this is unfortunately arguably the worst level 3 super in the game or, at least, the most unreliable. Before we start getting into that bit of subjectiveness, though, let’s start with the other objective details.
This hyper lasts about 5 real-life seconds, until Chris has fired all three shots or until Chris has been hit out of it or cancels it with X-Factor. Chris himself won’t move when this is pushed blocked; it will instead just move the opponent farther back.
Chris is invincible during the start of this hyper **and **during each instant where he begins to fire a laser; he remains invincible until the laser blast ends, whether or not it was anywhere near him. He’s vulnerable during the half-a-second of cool down time between shots, though.
Beyond those more obvious points, this hyper can generally only combo out of grounded Magnum’s wallbounce or Combination Punch Heavy’s hard knockdown unassisted; even then, in Ultimate, due to the Combination Punch Heavy’s hard knockdown being nerfed, **that **often has to be assisted in longer combos.
Unfortunately, the bad news doesn’t stop there.
Due to the sluggishness of Satellite Laser, it generally can’t be used as straight punishment like most other attacking Level 3s can since I’d say that it has at least half-a-second of start-up between the beginning and the beam getting to the ground. As such, there are quite a few things that can pass through Chris while he’s invincible and recover safely to block and then hit him out of it during the first beam; unfortunately, quite a few other Level 3s, such as Weapon X Prime, fall into this category.
Additionally, due to the invulnerability of blasts coming in short busts, using it to counter projectile hypers is rather iffy if those projectiles are broken up/independent on of their owner like Taskmaster’s and Tron’s hypers. Sometimes you’ll cleanly counter them and be able to hit off the entire hyper. More often, though, you’ll at least best trade one single blast with them, doing at most a mere 148,500 in exchange for getting damage and losing 3 whole bars.
As such, it’s generally not worth trying to use it to “save” yourself with like other Level 3 hypers.
Finally, the hyper is just kinda unreliable in that you have to generally pass fire as quickly as possible to fire due to the cool down time and if you screw up even once, people will roll out and be able to hit you. However, trying to fire as quickly as possible from the get-go also often screws up the initial targeting position–I’ll admit that part of this is still due to me needing practice, but that’s it’s even a concern…
Regardless, I’d say save it for combos, especially in the corner. Otherwise, forget it exists against most characters.[/details]
Assists: You’re not Sheva!?!
Assist Alpha: Combination Punch Hard (Direct) (Front :f: )
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 2
•Damage: 131,000: 50,000 + 81,000 (15,000 + 27,000 when blocked; 15,000 + 15,000 when pushed blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 34
•Active Frames: 2 (16) 2
•Recovery Frames (Assist): 134
•Recovery Frames (Partner): 104
**Discussion: **See “The Basics, page 8”.
As an assist, it’s likely to be Chris’s least used despite the decent range and hard knockdown because of the physical danger it puts Chris in. This is especially true with the nerf it received in Ultimate that makes it more difficult for it to hit people in the air with.
Its hyper in THCs is Sweep Combo, which as a THC is 1-frame (at least in vanilla) and thus nigh instant, basically hitting anyone who wasn’t already blocking. For that alone, it might have some merit.
Assist Beta: Gun Fire Medium: Machine Gun (Shot) (Front :f: )
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 8
•Damage: 125,000 (6,600 x 8 when [pushed] blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 49
•Active Frames: –
•Recovery Frames (Assist): 114
•Recovery Frames (Partner): 84
Discussion: See “The Basics, Page 6”.
As an assist, this is likely to be Chris’s most used it as it puts Chris in the least danger, has the most range, is a projectile and is relatively fast. It’s pseudo-beam of sorts that weaker than most other beam assists (in terms of speed and power), but it has the advantage of being unable to be ducked and keeping people grounded.
Its hyper in THCs is Grenade Launcher.
Assist Gamma: Grenade Toss Light: Land Mine (Shot) (Tilt :df: )
Note: The assist version is at least slightly different.
Details
Spoiler
Attack Data:
•Hits: 1
•Damage: 117,000 (39,000 when blocked)
Frame Data:
•Startup Frames: 41
•Active Frames: –
•Recovery Frames (Assist): 116
•Recovery Frames (Partner): 86
Discussion: That difference in damage from the Land Mine section in “The Basics, Page 7” is not a typo. I only noticed it on 12/13/2011 myself, so I’m not sure if it’s new to Ultimate. I don’t think it is.
Besides that, it can somewhat OTG, at least for some characters like Jill. It also perhaps has a use for taller, zoning characters like Dormammu who can cover Chris putting down the mine and just stand on top of it while they zone.
Its hyper in THCs is Grenade Launcher.
Land Mine is otherwise the same other than having to wait for it detonate it. Still, this merits further investigation….
- Medium Attack
/:f: + :h: while close