From messing around in training mode I learned that when an opponent is cornered, very often the opponent cannot advance guard L Talon dive. Set the dummy to all guard and advance guard on, push them to the corner and do a d, df, f, uf + L and you’ll see the advance guard go off but X-23 is still in the opponent’s face. o_o I can’t really understand why except that when the advance guard goes off, she’s still airborne and diving forward to the point the push can’t really move her.
I also just realized this also applies to crouching opponents in the corner when they block her D+H.
I don’t agree that Magneto is her worst matchup. I do agree that Zero would be her worst matchup. I don’t feel like I can touch Zero without an assist.
Her worst matchups come from characters with normals that completely outclass hers, like Zero and Wesker, in my opinion. Magneto is fine.
You can’t just limit your offence to Talon attack. I’ve thrown plenty of M Talons myself, before the other X-23 could do something like her down H in the air. There’s always the wall jump or just plain chicken guarding. In my opinion, approaches with X-23 must be varied, otherwise they’ll get either countered or run away from easily.
But I don’t know, chances are I’m talking with a guy with an X-23 much better than mine.
Faith the reason for that is that when you advance guard a move, it pushes the opponent away from you but also pushes YOU away from the opponent. L talon attack has a property when used low enough to the ground where the advance guard push back is minimalized. When the opponent is in the corner and tries to use advance guard the corner keeps them from being pushed back also so they’re basically stuck in the corner since neither push back from the advance guard is applied in that situation. It’s a completely anti advance guard technique in the corner.
Being a Dr.Doom player the same strategy is equally important for him because he’s the only character that can dash through advance gaurds at will. Since his combos towards the corner build much more meter and do way more damage I’ll purposely give up hit confirms just to push the opponent towards the corner on an advance guard. Then if I land something I get to build 2 meters. It also makes it easier to land his mix up into combos when the person isn’t advance guarding your moves for fear of being pushed into the corner.
Yeah, I can’t stand characters like Zero and Wesker, but DevilJin01 had a very good write-up on that match-up, plus he detailed the normals that beat out his in his tutorial. I’ll try and link those once I find them. Zero, it’s less an issue of dealing with his offence and more to do with getting in and hitting him. His normals+buster just makes it awkward to get at him. Just find myself blocking against him in general until I can find an opening. Either that or get my other characters to deal with him.
Magneto, I don’t use Talon Dives in general for some reason, I concentrate on edging in wavedashes against Disruptor and use st.H combined with Mirage Feint cancelling as pokes and to keep him at bay midrange. Other than that, once he gets his offence going, I just have to try really hard not to get hit lol. I’m not sure if cancelling his strings into flight>jumping attack is tight without an assist, you might be able to jab him out for a combo if you see it, but not sure.
Yeah I’m not really afraid of Magneto outside of the OS dash air throws. His ground pokes aren’t that great compared to yours once you get inside and you can keep wave dashing up occasionally after disruptahs to help close the gap. Since he’s in the air a lot I usually try to catch him going for an air dash and air throw him out of it into mix up on wake up to start a combo. Disruptah is annoying but with a solid projectile assist you can use your M talon dive to help you get in on it. I also found out that her ankle slice allows her to go under beam based projectiles like Disruptah and Doom beam because they dont fully touch the ground.
So a tactic you can use to get in on an obvious disruptah spam Mag is wave dash up and then just do regular neck slice just when you know they will shoot the beam. It’s worth the risk because you wont die if you get hit and you need to get in to win any way. If successful you’ll slide under the start up of the beam and can whiff punish Magneto out of the beam. The best way to set it up is to range yourself just outside of where the ankle slice can hit Magneto. If you’re too close you’ll hit Magneto for one hit and then just be in his face…which isn’t bad cuz that’s what you want any way.
If they’re really getting predictable you can used charged ankle slice for the same thing. Charge up an ankle slice adn if they throw disruptah you’ll go completely under disruptah and get a full combo off the stagger.
My friend uses Magneto, Zero and Akuma/Tron/Task anchor so I get a lot of practice against both characters. Against Zero…he has even less health than Magneto so I try not to worry too much. You just kinda play the match and whoever gets hit first wins. I have Doom as anchor on my team so I try to call Doom beam regularly to keep X23 able to attack from anywhere on the screen and break her out of combos. Overall I just play the match spamming whatever is my highest priority moves around while call beam assist and hope something catches. Mainly her moves that have difficult to hit boxes like L talon attack or charged neck slice with the doom beam. Both of those moves have very difficult hit boxes to hit once active (neck slice is basically a projectile around X23’s body). You can’t really poke him so you’re best off just covering yourself with high priority hit boxes until something happens.
In general using talon attacks or talon dives pre emptively to stop air throws is good. They take about 10 to 15 frames to start up but once they are in active frames they can no longer be thrown.
Definitely talking about when the opponent is crouching. You can already do plenty of stuff to a person knocked down but this is definitely going through small characters that are in an active crouch position.
It is not safe, the transition to flight takes about 20 or 25 frames, so as long as you don’t pushblock it and Magneto doesn’t call an assist, you can poke him out of it with a st.M. Hard to do on reaction though, should definitely anticipate it if possible.
Oh no, I severely limit Talon dives vs Magneto due to Magnetic shockwave, but you should see how crazy it is when I do one and get caught. There’s a lot of superjumping required in this matchup, only because you can be locked down on the ground and the air easily. Putting yourself in a “non-blockable” state is crazy against Erik.
I agree with what MoFro said… oh and it’s good advice too.
i cant believe people are arguing how good Magneto is against Laura, shed some light on that please. My friend uses Magneto/Sentinel/Phoenix and this team DESTROYS my x-23 team all day so i always switch to my Dorm team (Dorm/Task/Dante) when i fight him.
I’d appreciate some input on how to deal with magnus+drones pressure or how to safely get in with Akuma assist. coz usually he shockwaves the second he sees akuma on the screen =/
Yeah part of the reason I went back to Doom was to get in a bit easier vs. mags + drones. Akuma assist I figured with the projectile durability would help me get through beams but unfortunately the hit box on Akuma’s tatsu that is projectile invincible is rather small. If the projectile is big enough to hit above or below Akuma’s legs he wont go through the projectile at all. Which ended up having me trade a lot instead of getting rid of Sent drones and possibly also passing through the disruptah like with Doom beam.
If you’re using Akuma assist you basically can’t really use it till you actually get relatively close. Once you get close the Akuma assist comes out very quickly and acts as a block string that they must sit and block out or get hit into a combo. If you can rush and get in and land a s.H+tatsu assist that’s pretty much all you need to lock down and start a H mirage feint overhead game or M mirage feint cross and keep up the pressure after. If you have another character with a strong projectile style assist that definitely helps but otherwise you’ll just have to make use of your wave dash and tiger knee M talon to get you in. Dont do the talon dive after the TK M talon. Just TK M Talon and then let yourself drop so you can still block or attack with a normal and land quicker to keep the gap closed. You basically wanna use wave dashes with occasional blocking to bait for disruptahs and drones to help you get in and hopefully you have a projectile assist to help take out sent drones. If not then you’ll just have to try to get in with well placed air L talolns and hit Sent and or Mag before the drones release. Which even that’s kind of risky because if you whiff an air L talon the recovery period is kinda lengthy.
Wave dashing forward when you’re about half way to Magneto and then calling Akuma assist before doing TK M talon is a nice way to get in. Long as you can get it all in before Magneto decides to mash on super. Which once you work on your wave dash blocking game wont be such a good strategy. Akuma comes out so fast once you get close that he most likely wont be able to super on reaction. He’ll have to just randomly do it as you get close and hope you called Akuma or he just wasted a bar.
In general you have to just not be afraid to get in. If the Magneto player senses that you are afraid they’re just going to sit on drones and disruptah and lame you out. Once you get in on Magneto you have the better poking game and he can’t call drones without getting both Magneto and Sent in a combo. Generally when fighting anyone with Sent drones you wanna look at their assist icon. Whenever they use an assist there’s a waiting period where they can’t call it again. Once Sentinel’s health bar says “assist ok” that means you have to be ready for Sent drones to come out again at any point. If you’re on the defensive you’ll know this is your cue that a cross up or some other gimmicky mix up is potentially coming because Sent will come out off screen with drones very soon usually. If you’re on the offensive then just keep pressing buttons and call Akuma assist because you’ll most likely stop the drones from coming out if they pull them out and possibly get 2 characters in a combo.
An obvious but possibly interesting level 3 combo lol?
L, M(must be 1 hit), H>qcb+H, J.M, J.H, air D.H>qcf+L(land), M(1 hit), H>qcb+H, J.M, J.M, J.H(land), J.M, J.M, J.H, J.S>qcf+L(land), H,S(super jump), J.M, J.M, J.H, air D.H>qcf+L(call Dante’s Jam Session), Ankle Slice, Silent Kill, jump+S, land, call Trish’s Low Voltage, H Crescent Scythe. Damage is 1,005,300. Since the beginning part builds a lot of meter, you can start with 2 bars to reach level 3, complete the combo and have a 1 bar left over so you can tag on a hyper. This was modified to fit in a hitconfirm string, you can make this combo stronger by using jump-ins or L Talon Attack, but you’d have to remove the L from the combo.
The DHC glitch kinda makes this obsolete though…plus you need two assists for it but at least X-23 is capable of dishing out the damage without DHCs.
Here’s a little gimmick that I’ve found works well against people anti-airing your dive-ins:
Do a super jump or wall jump over your opponent, and do :d:+:h: in an obvious manner. Before you get into range of their AA normal, cancel into L talon dive in the opposite direction. The startup of talon dive will make the AA whiff, and hopefully you’ll get a hit into a full combo. Against small or crouching characters, this can also cross up.
^
I’ve been trying to incorporate cross-up dives in general into my game, Deviljin’s got a tutorial about that, but I always forget about using it…
Was messing around with more combos in training mode, and X-23 can build 2 meters with one combo. Simple business really, just add an extra L to the loop I posted above. So it’d be something like this(yet another variation of 10star’s loop lol): L(cr)LM(can be 2 hits), H>qcb+H, J.M, J.H, air D.H>qcf+L(land), M(1 hit), H>qcb+H, J.M, J.M, J.H(land), J.M, J.M, J.H, J.S>qcf+L(land), H,S(super jump), J.M, J.M, J.H, air D.H>qcf+L(call Dante’s Jam Session) then Ankle Slice, H>Hard Crescent Scythe.
At the beginning of the round, you can have access to your level 3 straight off the bat, which is interesting…
Apologies if this has been mentioned. I spent a little time in the lab working out the kinks of starting combos from hits in the air with X-23. Should be fairly obvious, but I didn’t see these in the OP.
All off of normal (not super) jump height:
j.H, L-Talon Dive, (land) st.M -> whatever
The st.M after the Talon dive is a link… I find that I need to wait longer than I think before hitting it, or it doesn’t come out. The first part is an airthrow option select kinda.
M-Talon Dive, j.H (land), S -> neutral super jump, j.H, L-Talon dive -> (OTG whatever)
The first part is an airthrow tech option select, kinda. If M-Talon dive doesn’t hit at all, you might snag an airthrow, or tech an airthrow. Something I haven’t really experimented with is double-tapping the H to tech+attack?
j.H after the M-Talon dive doesn’t cause enough hitstun for anything but launcher afterwards. Also, since the launch starts higher, only NEUTRAL super jump, j.H, L-talon dive will connect in the air, (which is fine if you have an assist to OTG and keep the combo going).
M-Talon Dive, j.S (land), st.M -> whatever
Can get a full loop combo off of this, but more vulnerable to airthrow if not spaced correctly. Slightly more spacing dependent than the above combo.
Don’t waste your opportunities off of air hits, guys =P.
It’s definitely important to learn to play X23 from the air. Some characters like Storm and Trish are going to be in the air way more than on the ground and if you dont have anything but ground based techniques you’ll just be eating whatever shit they can rain down on you all day.
@Ryuga: I’ll have to try to see how much meter I can build with my team using that. The problem I have is I’m not sure what’s the best way to set up those long meter build combos with X23 using the MFC stuff. I always hit confirm with MFC but I guess if I get close enough I can try doing typical hit confirms off c.L and see what I get. I may have to mess around with c.L more in general because it seems like it’s the only safe thing that you can throw around against Wesker. If you whiff s.M against Wesker you’re as good as dead and c.L seems to do a decent job out poking out his c.M once he gets in range.
Generally it seems anti Wesker footsies is to use c.L to beat his c.M (his c.M is 8 frame frame start up) since your c.L will beat it in frames pretty convincing. Then if he’s switching up to c.L use s.M to beat that since it beats the hit box from a range and activates at the same speed (5 frame). c.M isn’t bad either since the hit box is a bit longer but s.M seems to have the best hit box for stuffing it. Overall the best strategy against Wesker seems to be to just close the gap on him and run c.L’s down his face to stop the start up of his normals and then pressure with MFC and throws after that.
@deviljin: From ‘c.l, s.m, s.h xx MFC’, you can do another 2 s.h xx MFCs into s.h xx 214 h, j.m, j.m, j.h land j.m, j.m, j.h, j.s xx j236 l land s.h, s.s launch etc. Builds around 1.75 meters before the hyper. Hope that helps bro. I’ve found c.l to be pretty reliable vs Wesker c.m too. That and instant talon l or jd.h do wonders.
^
Yeah, that and other combo variations are the best way to build meter with MFC combos.
@Deviljin01: Unfortunately, I couldn’t figure out a way to reach 2 bars using MFC combos. I find it difficult to combine long combos with MFC strings haha, so I usually use longer combos for punishment, or if I somehow know I’ll land a hit, otherwise, it’s usually MFC strings and hitconfirming off them like everyone else.
BTW, that new MFC string you posted is so sick, thanks man! Dunno if this’ll help but inspired by that string, I was looking into more cancelling junk, and you can cancel st.H before it hits an opponent. So in a string, it’d be something like st.M>H cancel before it hits. You need two hits of st.M though, couldn’t do it off one.
Messed around with this more, you can sort of bait advancing guard with this. So, you cancel before the H hits the opponent and you’ve got options like d+H or Talon Attack to try and create a failed advancing guard, which would turn into cr.H and use those two attacks to blow it up. But they can mash cr.L inbetween, well, at least characters with fast jabs can.
Seems gimmicky though. I’d prefer just constantly doing your MFC string and delay the timing since it’s pretty much airtight.
EDIT: Oh no wait, my bad LOL, you can cancel H before it hits on one hit of M. This is actually pretty screwed up, you can blow up advancing guard pretty badly but it’s not tight.
@ Burn: With that combo are you doing 2 hits for the s.M after the c.L in the beginning or just one? I tried doing a variation of that combo but I can only get like 1.40 meter and it drops on characters that fall low to the ground like Iron Man. Like s.H will whiff and s.M doesn’t cancel on first hit into launcher and the launcher will just whiff after the 2 hit s.M.
@ Ryuga: I was trying in training mode to reproduce the effect of the H whiffing but I can’t quite get it to work. Like even when I try to make naked H’s whiff i always have to make physical contact with the H first before I can cancel it. Is there a certain timing or something I’m not doing? Could definitely add a considerable amount to the mix up factor if they have to advance guard the s.M or risk wave dashing into more shit.
Oh wait now I get it. You just have to cancel EXTREMELY fast. Like you gotta do qcb+L hold as soon as the s.M is out. Yeah…this shit is pretty fucking nasty. It’s like being able to feint your normals. Some serious mix up can come from this. Good find. The fact that it’s not tight is basically what you want any way. You want them to feel like they have to advance guard to get out an infinite block string and then just when they try to advance guard a s.H they dont actually block anything because the s.H whiffed and then you can s.M them immediately into another combo. Just delaying the one hit s.M, s.H is safer but the mind fucks you could create with the H whiff are pretty nasty. Against a scrub that’s just mashing buttons it would be better to just stick to the one hit s.M, s.H but against a smart player who actually blocks and doesn’t mash on stuff you could create a lot of tricks.
The best part is that there’s different timings for like say when a one hit s.M, H MFC slight delay s.M hits the opponent as to when a one hit s.M, H whiff MFC, s.M hits. Using the difference in timing to confuse their advance guard will get them hit all over the place and would be a great way to set up ground throws or even command grab with an assist. That Doom beam to throw setup inescapable set up that Alioune found would also make it so X23’s command grab is basically inescapable if she meaties the opponent with it right before the first hit of the beam catches them. You can do the same thing with a faster timing with Akuma’s tatsu.
Literally with how good this could all become you’re probably better off just doing a one string and then just siting there in their face after the plus 12 block stun. The risk of them pressing a button again would be very considerable and allow you to start up again and go for a different string or throw or whatever. This type of stuff is what’s going to make X23 scary as long as she gets in even without an assist. Just forcing counter hits out of people all day. It would take a good bit more play on my part to get this down to a point where I can just regularly throw this around once I get in but I definitely see the potential.
Feel like we’re making X23 evolve literally by the day.
NINJA EDIT: More stuffz. Just figured out that doing the one hit s.M, s.H MFC creates on OS on whiff. Normally the one big issue with X23’s s.M is that on whiff it has some pretty noticieable recovery that’s easily punished by c.L’s or fast c.M’s. If you do the s.M, s.H MFC and the s.M doesn’t hit anything it OS’s the s.M into a whiff so you recover faster and get a chance to block or throw out another s.M quicker. Basically on hit you’ll get a plus 12 tight block string but on whiff you’ll get a s.M that recovers after the whiff considerably quicker.
Ah, sorry, I was away, I wanted to tell you how to feint the H quickly enough, but you got it anyway. And I wouldn’t have figured out it if it wasn’t for your vid haha, so credit’s all you!
And ugh, that OS is too dirty LOL. I remember on another board where I tried to tell people that there was more to X-23’s offence than meets the eye, but nobody was really listening. I have to get this trick down too. I’m really hoping when I finally get some more live play, I can incorporate all this craziness in my matches. Or at least, if I don’t get it down, you guys can and show people what’s up. And I also hope that stuff like this helps X-23 develop.
