[P4A] Akihiko Video, Critique & Discussion Thread

[Codename Exia]

What I got from watching the footage -- I think i was watching KoB be hype in Divekick during your match haha.

- Liz can DP through your Maziodyne and grab you within range (scary)

- Once you're in on her use 5AA and 5B first hit duck/weave pressure fishing for confirms, she has no good answers.

- Roll those 5B's Skye!

- SB Cork trades well with random Maragi -- just do it!

Bace was a scary mother fucker though.

Feel free to correct my notes as they may not all be accurate advice -- just things that seem to work for me.

[ShelledMenace]

You can actually weave through her 5B too, though it's kind of dangerous if you press a button before the move finishes while you're sitting in it lol.

[Skye]

You can actually weave through her 5B too, though it's kind of dangerous if you press a button before the move finishes while you're sitting in it lol.

That's why I decided not to do it.

[Alpha152]

- Liz can DP through your Maziodyne and grab you within range (scary)

Using Maziodyne as a reversal in this MU is fairly bad because just like against Teddie and Yosuke they can DP on reaction to the super-flash. However, one place where you can punish her blockstrings is during the startup of 2C.

- Once you're in on her use 5AA and 5B first hit duck/weave pressure fishing for confirms, she has no good answers.

I think it's a common misconception that if a character doesn't have a 5F normal, their defensive options during pressure are bad/the other person gets in for free. Liz has a 5F throw which will beat out pressure resets such as 5B > C Duck/Weave, A KR etc. The only character that has mostly poor defensive options is Yukiko, as her fastest normal and throw are both 7F and even then she can still low profile some of Aki's pressure.

- Roll those 5B's Skye!

I think Weaving is always the best choice against 5B, aside from blocking of course. The recovery for 5B is also pretty long so you can wait for a second after she completely retracts the book and still punish. Rolling is also much more punishable compared to Weave because if they don't 5B they can punish your roll recovery. You can also get caught by the retracting part of 5B if you mistime the roll.

- SB Cork trades well with random Maragi -- just do it!

...assuming you're withing range I guess it isn't a bad option. But if its C/D Maragi and you're within SB Cork distance, there's plenty of better options you can do. A/SB KR can stuff the startup of both C/D Maragi if you're within distance and it's even possible to 5B FC if she randomly does it at neutral or after a combo that ends with you close to her. I think this move is pretty free against Aki. Aside from his options against C/D Maragi, SB Maragi can simply be jumped over or parried. At full screen you can even parry both fire pillars of the SB Maragi for free meter.

And Skye! Do you plan to be at EVO?

[Skye]

Not unless I'm getting sponsored lol.

[Alpha152]

Ah I'd say hit up FAKKU! for some sponsors but I haven't got there yet either :P

[Skye]

Wait fakku actually sponsored people beyond stickers?

[Alpha152]

I haven't approached them about it yet so I'm not sure but it'd be awesome if they did...lol

[Codename Exia]

Ah thanks for the tips Alpha, I'm still figuring out the MU myself so a different perspective is nice. I'll try just weaving 5B to see if I prefer it. I'm usually okay with the timing though.

[Skye]

One thing I caught on that would have made the difference in those matches I played was what I'm calling, "The Thanatos Effect", which is keeping your eyes on Liz's persona and not her.

Real talk, when she's pressuring you keep your eyes on liz, it will help better in setting how she's trying to pressure you.

If she's crouching, she's doing 2c, block and punish. If she's looking like she's presenting the card (it levitates from her palm) then she's using 5d, jump and poke, or jump and EX kill rush, or whatever.

I'm sure I'd have won those sets if I did this, because the mind game that captivated me was the (now false) ambiguity of Thanatos strings. I made bad reads on them and allowed myself to get pushed in the corner, which by then I was fucked.

[Mo the Hawk]

One thing I caught on that would have made the difference in those matches I played was what I'm calling, "The Thanatos Effect", which is keeping your eyes on Liz's persona and not her.

Real talk, when she's pressuring you keep your eyes on liz, it will help better in setting how she's trying to pressure you.

If she's crouching, she's doing 2c, block and punish. If she's looking like she's presenting the card (it levitates from her palm) then she's using 5d, jump and poke, or jump and EX kill rush, or whatever.

I'm sure I'd have won those sets if I did this, because the mind game that captivated me was the (now false) ambiguity of Thanatos strings. I made bad reads on them and allowed myself to get pushed in the corner, which by then I was fucked.

This is EXACTLY what blew me up in pools and what I've been practicing reacting to lately. I originally tried to pay attention to Thanatos' hands to determine whether to block or jump, but Liz has some color palettes that make Thanatos' hands blend in with the rest of his body, so it's much more reliable to focus on Liz herself.

Although Liz can OMC after 5C to obscure herself if she catches onto you doing this. In which case, I'm not sure what to do other than guess.

[ShelledMenace]

Yeah, not knowing the matchup in this particular one can be kind of disgusting. Usually you can manage to poke out thanatos with an IB 2A after the second hit of 5C (I believe it'll beat a 2C startup as long as you IB), or like you said and wait for a 2C to block and punish. Man, getting pushed into the corner against Liz though. I get depressed. It's only worse when you have like 3 status problems on lol. I really hate gimmicky stuff though, like 5C 1st hit (blocked) canceled into 5D before the 2nd hit. Mixing in chicken blocking can help in this MU though, to bait slow AA, or air grabs in the corner that let you run straight out for free. Liz's 2B is really scary though so that's always something to be on the lookout for. All the time. Liz corner pressure feels like forever though lol

[MotokoChill]

Any suggestions on what I should have done better? I know I was trying to hit way too many startup frames and throwing way too many empty hits.

[Effenhoog]

Just what I noticed

1. finish your combos. Even if you just did basic combos you would have killed him several times over, and taking the risk on an all out attack is wasted if you can't convert the big damage off it

2. doing simple blockstrings into a DP is a bad habit. There may be a time where blockstring > DP or dash up DP can work or win a match, but it's pretty rare and the risk vs reward is terrible unless you KNOW it will work. I recommend trying to DP as little as possible as it's a good habit to have, and will help you improve your defense/blocking

3. Learn the range on your normals. Going for a lot of 5Bs is tempting because it can be so rewarding on counterhit but in a lot of cases 5A is the smarter move

4. When Narukami DPs, you can dash or A duck under him to get behind him and he cannot super punish and you will be in perfect position to 5B fatal counter him to death

I don't know if it will help but here is a recent match I had against a Narukami player. I'm not that amazing and I don't really recommend trying to copy me too much but sometimes it can be helpful while learning a game to see what other average players are doing, it can give you a short term goal to work toward before you try to dive into the higher level stuff

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HrpcdwbMdE

vs Narukami starts around 29:45

[Codename Exia]

- Save your burst, no need to panic. Don't burst in the air either. You became the sun.

- 5C isn't really a good spacing tool against Narukami. You won't be able to keep him out with it -- its power comes from randomly stuffing it in there as a reset once or twice a set.

- Space the 5C so Narukami can't DP or mash A out of it if you're going to use it for oki.

- Don't end in SB cork -- you get nothing from it. Specifically you can confirm CH A Kill Rush into 6C > B+D > Autocombo for meter and in some cases B+D after the hook for super.

- DP less, that's a lot of blue health, and you're going to get punished hard on block unless you got 50 meter for thundah fists.

- Work on those confirms! Grind out some combos in the lab.

Less DP and more blocking like a man. Get those fundamentals down and finish those combos, then pay attention to the more imediate stuff I was saying.

Here's some obligatory Moke footage. Pay attention to the movement and the spacing. Also take special note of the ranges and situations in which he chooses to use certain moves. There's a reason behind everything. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAk330-a6kg

[Effenhoog]

That video reminds me, why does the jump > low airdash j.B "mixup" seem to work so often in Japanese matches. It's not like Akihiko can empty jump 2A for a low

[Codename Exia]

Not entirely sure. Safe-jumps are just scary I guess. That and raw sweep is pretty slow, but is probably hard to react to off an IAD j.B.

[Skye]

The air dash is low and people auto-pilot low blocking for ground strings. It's that simple and why shouldn't they, his sweep may be on the slow side, but it is too fast to block low on reaction either way.

[MotokoChill]

I've learned from the advice you guys gave me, and I'm working on becoming better.
Sometimes I pull Dodge Strikes out of nowhere. Calming down and focusing on what moves I want to go for has been working out better for me.

[Codename Exia]

- Assault dive isn't good outside of combos; don't use it to approach from the air -- j.B is your best friend. Any other Akihiko would fatal you for those.

- Don't end blockstrings in cork unless you're going for the OMC frame trap.

- You can confirm off CH j.C with SB Kill Rush for ez damages.

- Don't super off of a 2A.

- j.B is better to throw out air-to-ground than j.A in most scenarios and if you IAD it you can make a safe-jump.

- Wake-up super sucks, use it sparingly or not at all -- pretty yolo.

- Kill Rush into super isn't really the greatest.

Learn how to use your cyclones thoroughly and start thinking about when to use certain tools. A definite improvement though.

[MotokoChill]

Yo it's been awhile.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-CSap-nfX0

 

I realize my gold burst at 0:41 was shit, but how could I have made a further combo at 2:06 with that FC?

I still need to get down some good combos before Ultimax too.

[Strife]

Yo it's been awhile.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-CSap-nfX0

 

I realize my gold burst at 0:41 was shit, but how could I have made a further combo at 2:06 with that FC?

I still need to get down some good combos before Ultimax too.

 

00:18 - Why did you Sweep there? Was it a mistake?

Anyway, you can get away with jumpback in this part against most Akis unless they, y'know, adapt. Jumpback will get you out of basically every meterless option he has except for Sweep.

 

00:20 - You lost a bit of damage here. Should've used Hook A into Corkscrew B.

 

00:33 - Lost damage and knockdown here. Normally, when I confirm Kill Rush B or SB, I go for Duck > B+D > 5B > 2B > j.A > j.B > Assault Dive A.

You can go for 5AA > Sweep > 236A > 6B if you want more damage after B+D. You don't get knockdown though.

 

00:51 - Should've went with 5B to punish that Cyclone Upper. For some reason you were pressing 2A like crazy there and even missed Kill Rush SB. Calm down.

 

01:17 - Second time you tried to 2B after a B+D CH. That doesn't work. If they tech, they'll punish your 2B since you'll be recovering from it. In general, you can't combo from a B+D even when it's a Counter if they're on the ground. If you get them in the air though, you have time to combo with either 5A or 5B.

 

01:26 - Don't ever use Kill Rush SB after Sweep. You'll lose the opportunity to go for B+D even if you hit them since they'll be airborne already. Don't waste your meter with that.

 

01:37 - Pay attention to your meter. If you don't have 100 SP to Maziodyne > OmC then it's better to just Guard Cancel if you want to get out of pressure.

 

02:06 - That was Hook A Fatal? Midscreen, I usually go for: Duck > B+D > 5B > 2B > j.B (1) > j.214B > Duck D > 6B (Meterless) or Duck D > Hook A > Duck C > B+D > Cyclone Upper (50 SP).

In the corner, you can go for Duck C > Weave C > B+D > Sweep > 236A > 6B (Meterless) or Duck C > Corkscrew A > Cyclone Upper (50 SP).

 

02:09 - Corkscrew fatal midscreen: 2B > j.B > 2B > j.B > 5AA > Sweep > 236A > 6B.

 

 

tl;dr

- Use more 2B and learn combos from it, it's good.

- Confirm your combos, practice them.

- Calm down.

- I made a video long ago with really basic combos you can start with.

[Barzorx]

Moved to archive section since this is from Persona 4 Arena... all Persona 4 Arena Ultimax discussion should be higher up. However you are still free to discuss P4A topics here so... yeah.