KOF XII - Benimaru thread

I won MI’s last biweekly with Beni in the 2nd slot, so I hope this means I’ve got some stuff worth sharing, haha. Everyone else has covered combos but no one’s really talking about strategy, so I thought I’d try and contribute.

I feel really comfortable controlling the matches at mid range with Raijenken and TK Raijenken. They eat projectiles and serve as sort of “beat all” attacks. He’s vulnerable during start up but once the move is out only REALLY long range lows or perfect super jump cross ups can hit him. A poor jump (which will happen a lot) gets hit by the orb, then I super jump and combo with jump C+D and then I pressure on wake up. TK Raijenken is useful versus some characters that have a easier time stuffing the normal standing one because it beats lows. (Namely- Joe 2D)

If someone tries to roll past the Raijenken, you can mixup with the new Benimaru Lancer. This’ll hit them regardless of whether or not they crossup, and it recovers even faster on whiff then Raijenken.

Close up ground stuff-
2BB 236B pushes out on block and is easy to hit confirm before doing the last 28B. 2B2A6B is a great anti-mash string to mixup with 2B2A->Throw. Even though his throw is techable, I don’t really worry about it to much because if they tech, it reestablishes the mid-range that Beni dominates so well in. Outside of that, I use 6D for anti-low/sweep attacks. CH leads to combo, normal hit/block pushes out and reestablishes mid range. Standing B is super annoying, and if I have a significant life lead I’ve been known to just whore this move out relentlessly. It has tons of range, is really fast, fast recovery, anti-hop, anti-forward movement. If I’m wise to someone trying to sweep, which is pretty much the only thing that standing B loses to, I’ll do 6D. B/6D mixups in general seem to be REALLY frustrating to deal with, and one CH 6D->2BB combo is no joke. The only real overhead I use at this range is hop/hyper hop/jump B. It’s steep angle/crossup properties make it useful here, it seems active for a while too.

Another trick- Sweep->Raijenken cancel. The push out of the sweep makes the Raijenken whiff right in front of their face. They can’t do any sort of attack or forward movement without getting hit by the orb. If they just sit there, I recover safely behind the orb.

Some jump tricks->

*Benimaru Drill auto-crosses up when you jump over the enemy. It’s at disadvantage at hit or block, and it’s always safe. I mixup parry/grab/hyper hop when I use this. The angle/air stalling properties are REALLY nice. I also like doing TK Drill whiffs into grabs.

*Benimaru jump D is an amazing defensive tool. At certain ranges/heights it’s safe versus parries, it works air v. air and air v. ground, deep D hits lead to combos, etc. I use this in conjunction with…

*Benimaru C+D is my main air-to-air attack, and it’s what I use if I psychic jump over a fireball. Lots of block stun.

Oh, also, if you anticipate a poke and really want to be a dick, you can poke (gets parried)->214214C. The invincibility of the super beats the parry attack even though you should’ve been punished. If I know someone has the reactions to parry a fully charged C+D, I’ll usually do that on purpose just to get them to parry, haha. They can’t block and they can’t parry this setup. :slight_smile:

Lastly, here’s the corner CC I use-
CC, Parry, Lancerx3, (CC state ends), C+D, Lancer, C+D, Raijenken, 236B, 236B28B/236236C. With super this does more damage then the guide recommended corner CC.

come down to ohio sometime

I wanna. :,(

Are there any benimaru players online here?

Well I can tell you, at first I didn’t care much of Beni, everybody kept saying that he was mid tier. He seemed to have a lot of tools but the rest of the cast had better, and a lot of his stuff didn’t look safe.
Well I needed a 2nd slot character and after going through about half the cast I finally picked up Beni and he really kicks butt! His damage isn’t that, but his air game is sick, probably 2nd only to Athena. I gave that Iori player that was used to knocking me out of the air on reflex a very hard time. I absolutely love his air B+D, you can set up a lot of stuff with it.

I think the best part about Beni is that nobody really plays him, so his shenanigans are harder to predict then the top tier characters.