[CSE] Rachel vs. Carl

[gli]

Summary:

Fullscreen:

Midscreen:

Pressure:

[gli]

As always, avoid getting sandwiched. Resist the temptation to burst predictably in pressure.

[[SpA]Relentless]

Some tips from the top of my head:

When playing against Carl, you should mainly concentrate on not getting hit instead of thinking about how you're going to hit Carl.

Always be aware where Nirvana is. Is he near Carl on wakeup? Forget about Oki. Carl can do Con Brio (Nirvana's DP) during his neutral tech, and it will come out before the invincibility of the tech wears off. If you try to do meaty 236A as a roll tech punish + rod setup, it will bounce off Nirvana as Carl techs and you can be punished or pressured. Just two examples of why Carl is a complete retard

If she's behind you during neutral game, attempt to get past Carl as soon as possible. You don't want Nirvana behind you, especially because you can't do anything against her fireball there. When she's in front of you and does a fireball, 236A9D is a nice way to get rid of it, and you get a rod.

Run away and play as lame as possible. Carl has trouble catching Rachel. Frog and Rods are really important in this matchup. Even more than Pumpkin.

Carl can Con Fuoco (the drill) your summons on reaction, but if he just uses it on prediction, you can superjump over Nirvana, summon pumpkin, then wind in.

You can also poke Con Fuoco with 6B, then cancel 6B into a frog.

Frogs can be winded past Nirvana so they're a staple pressure starter. j.236A with wind is a great way to force him to block the frog, but always be aware of Nirvana.

Rods are great for punishing dashes/airdashes and to damage Nirvana.

If Nirvana whiffs something, don't blindly rush in because of that. Carl has some very annoyingly good normals (6A, j.A). Always wait until you get him to block either frog or pumpkin.

What's very annoying in this MU is that Carl can now cancel his forward dash into air specials. Allegretto moves him forward when he does this and it's great way to mess up your spacing/punish summons, and it starts a good combo for him. Be aware.

If you get cornered with only Nirvana in your face, wait until she whiffs something (like Brio or the clap), then winded sj out. Always save some wind for movement, and don't be greedy with it for that purpose. It's a lot more important than using wind for mixups.

If you pressure him when he's got 50 meter and Nirvana is behind you, he'll most likely try to dead angle you into the puppet for a combo. It doesn't do a lot of damage, but it shifts momentum in his favor, and that sucks hard. Another reason why it's important to always have Nirvana in front of you.

Gear super is extremely dangerous, it comes out guaranteed, grants a free combo on hit or trade and free pressure on block, and has a huge hitbox. Respect it.

If you block a random Rhapsody of Memories (Nirvana's multiple punch super), IB one of the strikes, then jump out WITHOUT blocking. You'll get hit a few times for minor damage, but you can airtech afterwards. A lot better than eating a dozen of mixups and resets.

Carl and Rachel both suck at forcing damage onto the other player if the game is in a neutral state. This is a match of life lead, if you have it, it becomes fairly easy to sit on it, and vice versa.

I find that most of my damage comes from random sword iris, random frogs or 6A antiair. I don't get a lot from oki because it's fairly dangerous to attempt oki on him, as written above.

[Herbal Grey]

If you have Carl cornered with nirvana, there's still really not a lot you can do, however, if you have combo'd him into the corner, and nirvana is far away, he will try to vivace out (the dash) every time, and if he doesn't he will try to counter assault like spa said. You can just spam 2a to make him sorry he vivace'd and hit confirm for 2.5k+. Or bait counter assault with stagger 2a or jump cancel 5b

[TD]

spa your writeup is very legit. l applied it when l fought isuyaru yesterday and it worked well (in his defense, he was rust so... ) now if only you had some insight on the bang matchup (or rather the 5a matchup... :vbang: )

[kotokot]

Carl in csex can cancel dash into everything. Now he even have some sort of wave dash 66~5D~4A+B, it is very fast, his 66~5C have very much range, 669 gives him pretty far jump and over like buggy 6696(or just 669) Rhapsody with ambiguous crossup.

Try to learn Carls oki and ways to ruin it with winded neutral roll or later waking.

Remember about hitstop when you strike Nirvana and that Carl can do everything during this, if you try to beat Nirvana with 6B Carl can do 6696 to punish you or go into offense. Sometimes Carl can eat hit because during hitstop your attack have active frames.

His combos gives him alot of heat, he can RC his CA more often than other chars.

[Rele]

Apparently there is actually a way to force oki onto Carl even if his sister is near him on wakeup. You need to do frog oki.

When he techs, do meaty 3C (and hold and wind closer if necessary). 3C will low-profile Brio so it can't hit you. And once it touches Carl, any move Nirvana did will be interrupted. Then the frog activates, and you can proceed from there. 3C also beats Vivace and mashing and is one of our best starters. No real reason to not use it in this situation.

[Alex073088]

To add, its hard to pressure carl when nirvanna is behind you due to the fact he can burst/dead angle you right in front of her and force you to tech then he can freely pressure you. Blockstrings that lead into cog super then rapid gives him a free unblockable. Crossup j.2c is one of most scrubbiest things in regards to this match-up because even if you block it your still in pressure. Carl way out damages rachel midscreen easily. Midscreen combos damage carl can dish can be anywhere from 4.k to 5.2k easily off j.2c starter or 5a.