The hit stun timer starts further along when the first hit of a combo is done on an airborn opponent if that’s what you mean. Semantics I guess, but I think the way you’re putting it is not a 100% accurate way of describing it.
For example, you can start a combo the same way with a jump in on both a grounded or airborn opponent, then go into your typical ground string into launcher and you will be able to do far more in the first case regardless of the starters being completely identical.
Once you get that first hit, it doesn’t really matter if every single subsequent hit of the combo is a jumping attack. The initial state of the defender is what matters (at least in my experience).
As a seasoned lab technician that’s played this game too much, the general consensus in this thread matches what I’ve known/believed to be true for some time. That being that,
Hitstun Decay is a timer
A timer that moves much faster when the opponent is off their feet. Characters like Hawkeye/Frank(net/zombiegrab) can do huge strings against grounded opponents that have a small affect on hitstun decay.
Hitstun on SJ normals is innately higher
Cinematics pause the timer. Frank can Kneedrop -> Tools Cinematic -> Hyper Sentinel Force -> Relaunch into combo, for instance.
TACs temporarily reset HSD to 0, but reenact it in full after the TAC pause is over.
Everything pauses during hitstop, hitstun included. This is important so people understand that a one second bounce off of a wall/groundbounce is much “longer” than one second doing jMMHS.
I believe the issues I quoted here have simple answers, though
The hitstun problems with throws can be explained by throws starting the hitstun timer when they grab you. These are long airborne/off-their-feet animations, and would cause a large amount of hitstun decay. Same with Ammy’s Counters.
Wesker’s counter is a cinematic, and leaves them in a grounded state. Likewise, by the above rules, it would cause almost no hitstun decay. Same with UWT, it should be almost identical to a normal Vs Air confirm.
Oh, and flight has SJ properties even if you cancel the startup frames of a SJ into it and get it from the ground, such as jump cancelling into it after a launch with a superjump. I really need to train my Sent to start making TK SJ Flight the default, when he’s alone.
I think not all throws are the same. Take Magneto’s for example.
He can essentially do any of his regular combos off a throw and I think it’s because there is no hard knockdown.
As a rule of thumb, if you can keep the opponent from the initial hard knockdown, you’ll get more damage (Thor, Iron Man, Doom’s back throw, etc)
You might chalk it up to the hit stun timer, but I believe it’s putting them in a non-standard state on the first hit that does it.
But then you look at Doom’s f throw, which allows much longer followups than it used to in Vanilla and you might think it breaks the rules, but I think it works the way it does because it’s now considered a cinematic until the opponent hits the ground (Doom can’t be hit).
I don’t think the state in which the opponent is when starting a combo affects hit stun, but rather the state in which they are during the combo itself.
A perfect example of this would be Dante.
For example, In a normal confirm, opponents are still grounded up until Volcano, but in a Hammer confirm, they are being Juggled from the Second hit on.
By all intents and purposes, you should be able to do a normal Volcano series into Prop’n Shredder after a Hammer or Air S confirm.
A Hammer confirm cuts up the initial 4 or 5 hits of the normal combo (St.L, St.M. St.H, Stinger), so the Hammer confirms are faster, yet you cannot go into Prop’n Shredder if Volcano is used from a Hammer confirm, meaning that maybe certain moves also advance the timer?
Because the damage from a Hammer confirm could be ridiculous, yet for some strange reason Dante’s move became an Oddball when he got nerfed from Vanilla.
It’s mostly timer based, but is also affected if the initial hit is on an airborne opponent.
Certain types of attacks (hard knockdown, wall bounce, ground bounce) when used as the first hit of a combo also seem to start the timer a little further along.
Number of hits has absolutely nothing to do with it and neither do L attacks despite the common misconception.
The minimum hit stun is 4 frames, which explains why certain attacks such as dp’s, armor piercer, Doom’s time or snapbacks can always be canceled into even off of L’s no matter how late in a combo you are.