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Nostalgia wrote:omni: alright majestros
omni: top 3 favorite combos of all time
omni: go

!!!

Hmm, so what's this thread for?

Are we to post our favorite combos?

I'm sure waiting to see yours!

Yeah, more or less. I've already decided on my top 3, in no particular order:

- zerokoubou Z2A E.Ryu combo: CC fireball x4 xx whiff jab, run up, MK Hurricane Kick (each knockdown nullifed by FB), c.MK, blah blah (0:51)
- kysg CFJ Guile combo: s.MP (parried) xx Sonic Boom, s.LP, s.HP xx FK super (8:59)
- Sai-Rec CvS2 C-Rolento combo: lvl1 knives, lvl2 grenade xx B+KKK j.LP xx B+KKK j.D+MK (0:52)

Honorable mention: TZW Maxion rev.A, the entire thing

Woo that's a tough one.

- Ode to the 2 Hit, The whole thing. But in particular, each of the combos that involved a multi-hit special or super and required some elaborate setup to nullify or whiff the hits in order to make it only a 2hit were incredibly awesome. I seriously couldn't possibly pick just one since they are all too great.

- Sai-Rec CvS2 Exhibition. Again, there was a lot of things in here that made my jaw drop. In particular I would have to say the Maki combo that begins with j.HP crossup on crouching Gief, then continues with c.MP, MP, super, lv.2 cancel into wallbounce, j.HP, LP-MP chain, link LP-MP-HP-whiff grab, link HK, super, lv.2 cancel into grab. And also the Kyo combo that required opponent Rolento Knives, then Kyo rekka into knockdown, OTG Super, lv.2 cancel the first hit into whiffed flop kick, c.MP link MP, upkicks, shoulder check, OTG last hit of rekka. Also, the S-groove Dhalsim combo was awesome, and the A-Vice combo.

Ok so there's those, now for my personal favorite and a very long winded explanation as to why it's my favorite. I feel the explanation is required to really understand/appreciate the combo because what the audience sees is basically Karin kicking you in the face repeatedly, but what I see is insanity.

- SFA3, V-Karin crossup j.MK activate unblockable command throw into tech trap CC loop with airthrow into reactivate OTG, etc.

And here's why (warning, great wall of text written in xenospeak alert).

First, Karin's Rekka series is confirmable from her c.LK chains and can end in a slide knockdown, which spaces her ideally for a crossup j.MK. Now, in SFA3 what happens when you perform a properly spaced and timed crossup is that if the opponent performs a reversal they will be facing the "wrong way". EG; a shoryuken will point toward the direction they were facing when they got up, which is not the current position of the player doing the crossup.

Next, SFA3 has the special property of V-ism custom combo giving characters move special abnormal abilities. In this case, a command throw can grab an opponent out of hitstun, blockstun, or even pre-jump animation. Anything that's not technically invulnerable can be grabbed.

Then, Karin is one of the characters that can cancel her command throw during a VC. The funny little thing about canceling it is that you switch the direction you are facing during the animation of the throw, so to cancel it into a specific move you have to do an input trick, as in doing a half circle motion will result in a DP motion, etc.

What comes next is the tech trap. After carrying your opponent to the corner using a juggle, while avoiding the last recovery frames of any move by canceling each move into another move, you set up am air recovery trap. What this entails is ending a move and thus entering the last frames of recovery and on into neutral (standing) position, and at this point the opponent can air recover. However, even though there is invulnerability frames during an air recovery, there is a window of time where the invulnerability ends but you are unable to act, and this is what Karin will capitalize on. With the correct juggle setup, the opponent will be at a specific height regardless of what tech direction they choose, and when the invulnerability wares off they are unable to block for a few frames, thus allowing Karin to hit them with a jump attack and then perform the crouch cancel series. The opponent could choose not to tech and avoid the damage scaling being reset, or could attempt a tech and risk the combo being legitimately(unavoidably) reset.

The crouch cancel is sort of like a series of well timed super jumps, in order to bypass landing recovery you much crouch as you land to activate trip guard, then cancel the crouch animation with a jump. This prevents you from entering neutral and prevents the opponent's ability to air recover each time you land. Karin's CC series is j.HK.

The icing on the cake is that both of Karin's airthrows are "slam" throws, meaning they bypass any damage scaling that is caused from hitcount or even teching the throw, because Karin slams them into the ground. Thus, even when the CC series has incremented the counter enough that each hit is only doing one pixel of damage, an airthrow "ender" will bypass the damage scaling anyway and cause a large chunk of damage.

But wait, there's more. Having built enough meter to reactivate, Karin can immediately perform a VC activation upon recovering from the airthrow and then perform a command throw immediately while coming out of the activation, grabbing the opponent up off the ground via OTG glitch, and continuing from there.

Now, the really crazy thing about all this is that it was almost unavoidable, and technically confirmable, and it all happens off a c.LK. Basically, Karin is able to chain c.LK into itself and also into standing LK, then cancel into the rekka series for a BNB. This sets up the crossup, and then from there she can land and activate. The reason this is kinda beefy is that if the opponent reversals with basically anything, the j.MK crossup will whiff and you can confirm the whiff so you don't end up wasting any meter on a failed attempt. That includes a counter-activation from the opponent. Additionally, even if the opponent attempts an Alpha Counter, you can still activate and blow through it, or even activate and grab them out of an AC attempt post-flash. But whether the opponent is hit or blocks the crossup, they will get grabbed.

So, while there are ways to force damage, such as using the shadow to hit high while you physically hit low, or using the ability to cancel to drain your opponents guard bar and force a guard break, or force a tech and then tech trap, etc. This is definitely my favorite of the bunch due to all the little details and such that I feel that not many people are aware of. And also because the execution required to land it is pretty ridiculous, but not inhuman.

Alas, there are a couple legit ways to escape it. Akuma teleportation and Juni or V-Dan pushblock, etc. But the real beauty, IMO, is the fact that it's confirmable and not escapable if the j.MK is blocked.

So in a nutshell, if she hits you with c.LK she can kill you in a very fancy and difficult way, leaving only limited means of escape at only one point, and is confirmable to where if you do manage to escape she wastes nothing.

And the reason it's my favorite is that it's just got a lot of technical things about it. While one of my favorites could be a Guy combo or another character of the SFA3 cast, this one in particular is just something I've in in awe of for a long time and it's how I basically gauge the crazy-factor of everything else.

Man... This will take hella thought. And combo video rewatching. yay.


Edit: also in that sairec video... why didn't they use dan taunt super to do lvl2 knives into lvl2 grenades? much cooler.........(infact unless Im forgetting something and this doesn't really work, this combo is now mine I call it for use in some to be made later video.

Xenozip. wrote:Ode to the 2 Hit, The whole thing. But in particular, each of the combos that involved a multi-hit special or super and required some elaborate setup to nullify or whiff the hits in order to make it only a 2hit were incredibly awesome.

Really? Half of those almost seemed like cheating. Looking back, we probably got away with it cuz we varied the methods between scenarios. Dunno about jchensor but for me, the ones which felt like the biggest successes were the KoF2k2 Billy combo at 12:22, the MvC2 pushblock combo at 12:30, and the CvS1 Akuma combo at 15:15. My favorite combo overall is the 3S Sean double reflected super FB combo at 17:18. Though the SFA3 Guile airthrow combo at 12:47 and the Kyosuke Counter Attack combo at 17:03 are close runners up.

Sai-Rec CvS2 Exhibition. Again, there was a lot of things in here that made my jaw drop. In particular I would have to say the Maki combo that begins with j.HP crossup on crouching Gief, then continues with c.MP, MP, super, lv.2 cancel into wallbounce, j.HP, LP-MP chain, link LP-MP-HP-whiff grab, link HK, super, lv.2 cancel into grab.

Haha that combo was definitely the talk of the town when it showed up on their website. In fact, a lot of their most memorable combos showed up on their website as individual clips before they made it into feature videos. I remember a bunch of us being all excited talking about that Maki combo during one of those 2am SHGL dinners.

fullmetalross wrote:in that sairec video... why didn't they use dan taunt super to do lvl2 knives into lvl2 grenades?

Cuz i left out the setup, which is a little more complicated. Zangief jabs Rolento out of lvl1 knives recovery then cancels into whiff air grab super. There's actually lots of one-frame stuff going on in that combo. I like it because it brings together a lot of advanced lvl2 cancel glitch concepts. Gief probably isn't the only viable dummy for this combo but it's definitely not gonna work with Dan's taunt super.

Either way, i don't think it's a good idea to use Dan's taunt super to turn a lvl1 into a lvl2 for no particular reason. If there's no technical breakthrough involved, it comes off as gratuitous. Incidentally, the only thing i never liked about Sai-Rec was all the forced/boring dizzy combos using Rolento's lvl1 knives. Both Harvest vids hella overplayed that setup, but thankfully they toned it way down for their last video.

Maj wrote:Really?

I'm a big fan of shenanigans and wackiness.

Anything like, "I want to use this move, but I only want to let it hit once, let's see how we can make that happen". Or even better, just for the sake of "Oh look, this would probably never happen by accident in a billion years, nor would you ever want to even try to do it due to sub-par damage/meter/execution/oki, but it's possible and it looks cool". Big thumbs up.

Since I asked Maj for his I figured I would post mine as well (in no particular order caveat):

Short Jab Short Super. God damn I love this combo and never get tired of seeing it I also remember the first time seeing broken ass john choi doing short, jab, short, stand short into dragon punch with sakura and thinking, 'Damn...'

C Akuma in CvS2: Jump in fierce, standing fierce xx fierce red fireball then link level 2 super cancel out with teleport, standing fierce xx fierce dragon punch. Something about that combo just feels right to me when doing it.

Kara Palm with Yun in 3s. Seriously...kara cancelling 2 different normals? Who thinks of that shit? And that damn combo has been around since like day 3 of 3rd strike also.

I guess I like small concepts more then drawn out long combos. shrug.

Xeno: When me and Maj were discussing this over aim originally I brought up that Karin vcombo also. It is indeed pretty.

Combo ideas that I really like no matter what the game: Gief combos where a lot of normals are involved. Cross up, standing strong, standing short, low roundhouse makes me smile every time I see it. Anything involving SPD being combo'ed. Anything involving whiff teleports / special moves (like honda's whiff spd in his cvs1/2 combos). Oh and anything involving Sentinel smacking fools with his frying pan.

Derek

That's cool, omni.

I like concepts that change the shape of the game too, but I guess due to the nature of the games I play they end up being rather extravagant as well. The very first day I picked up the new version of MeltyBlood I was running and developing advanced okizeme rushdown setups and strats for V.Sion that would later become standard/commonplace among all V.Sion players. It wasn't until much later that I really developed any combos for that game. And it's because when I look at a game I first think about tech and potential before I think about combos, which is how I learn games too -- I learn to move around first before I bother learning any combos. A lot of what we work with gets brushed off as theory fighting, which is really hurtful and painful for me to hear, but as times goes by people start to realize that these little steps turn into huge leaps when utilized the right way. 'Course sometimes it takes a Japanese player to take what you said and put it into action before people start going "oh".

It's really so depressing and aggravating to be called a theory fighter to the point where I just don't care anymore. These days I just put my thoughts out there in demonstration videos and people can do what they want with it.

When Middlekick filled me in on how Chun-Li's stomp cancel worked I was pretty hype for it, since it falls along the same lines as Karin's combo. But in a game like that, a little concept like a stomp cancel goes a long way. Same with little concepts we find and develop in MeltyBlood, which turn little concepts into large exhibitions.

'Course I can see why the Karin combo would be more esteemed due to it starting with that lovely c.LK c.LK LK Rekka confirm. I now picture your CvS2 team consisting only of characters that can do exactly that.

But this falls along the lines of why I started that "Ideal Combo System" thread. The concept of Kamone, or while-rising attacks(overheads), and the concept of Suki, caused from delay chains or staggers or whiff cancels, etc. Interested me a lot. I started to realize that they applied to other games and I wondered if they were really utilized to the extent that I had come to know them personally.

So lately I've been questioning every major breakthrough that I'm aware of and asking myself "Can you apply [x] to this game too?".

What I really wanted to do one day was to "view the big picture" so to speak. Which is another reason I love the Ode to the 2Hit so much, because it uses to very many games all in one video and opens a small window in which you can see concepts being applied universally in a playful and entertaining fashion. A true work of art!

Xenozip. wrote:What I really wanted to do one day was to "view the big picture" so to speak. Which is another reason I love the Ode to the 2Hit so much, because it uses so very many games all in one video and opens a small window in which you can see concepts being applied universally in a playful and entertaining fashion.

Funny you should mention that cuz i have the polar opposite viewpoint. What blows me away is seeing something truly unique to one game.

No doubt it's revolutionary to invent a fundamental technique which applies to multiple games. For example, the classic TZW Dhalsim setup where he jumps over a projectile thrower and reaches into it with stretchy limbs. Or more recently, the T-7 gimmick of jumping against Vega's claw dive takeoff.

However, my favorite combos all have to do with blending together multiple advanced trademark features of one single game. I'm talking about iconic combos that sincerely represent the individuality of the game they're built on.

When i look at that C-Rolento combo, i'm astonished by how thoroughly Sai-Rec grasped CvS2. What's even more impressive is that no other character can duplicate that scenario. It's not a variant of some other existing archetype. You don't arrive at a combo like that by asking a simple question like "What's the most number of hits we can get out of a CC with this character?" No, that combo exists at the end of an extreme tangent, all by itself.

If you want another example, here's what i consider to be the best combo i've ever made:

CvS2 Reversal Combo Exhibition (first seven hits of the A-Rolento CC at 1:41)

As it turns out, Sai-Rec/T-7 had already put together an improved "program pad" version of this CC, but i didn't get to see it until like a year afterwards. It's the same core concept except they applied some kara slides which had occurred to me too, but it was way beyond my execution ability.

If you asked me which combos embody the character of the CvS2 engine, that Sai-Rec C-Rolento combo and this T-7 A-Rolento combo are the absolute best candidates in my mind.

I'm actually indescribably happy from reading what you said about the 2HitCombo video. Thinking of it in those terms, it feels like a huge accomplishment. But it's different when you're looking for the best individual combo. Cuz i'm sitting here asking myself how deeply i understand the Jojo's games and i honestly can't think of a single Jojo's 2-hit combo which deviates from fundamental CvS2 engine rules. There must be Jojo's combos which exist outside the CvS2 mindset, but i didn't look closely enough to find them. Bottom line is, my expertise lies in CvS series and SF2 series but it gets rather thin outside of those boundaries. Between jchensor and myself, a lot of that landscape is legit, but some of those games aren't examined objectively at all.

Seeing Mariah use her Stand to create a juggle situation where her boob-super would only hit exactly once after the Stand, despite firing multiple shots, was awesome. That may be reproducible in other games, but for me it was gold.

As far as the core system goes, yeah I think there might be some particular niche hidden around there. I've only spent a very brief time with the game myself since I have zero comp in it, so I've only scraped with surface as well.

No doubt there is definitely cause to honor obscure exclusiveness in games when the game is thoroughly broken down and examined. I enjoy them myself from time to time. In particular, I've been constantly surprised at just how much absolutely unique scenarios have been created for MeltyBlood by our little community alone, and then we get into what those crazy Japanese players have developed as well and it's rather mind blowing just how many of those types of specific situational unique instances there are in that game.

But for me, there may be some non-combo related reasons/motives why I have this mindset. Course that would require another very long winded bloated xenospeak post so, I'll stop here before derailing the thread.

not really sure why, but i'm a huge fan of combos with multiple uppercuts (cc's don't count).

- cvs2 c-joe level 2 cancel into meaty lk dp (has falling into a meaty move been explored much?), mk dp, hk dp is one of freshest combos ever. not only does the combo have lots of dps and looks tight, i like how it perfectly abuses the juggle potential system in cvs2. i keep forgetting to check if level 2 hurricane super will connect against fat chars off of the "baku-cancelled" hands

- cvs2 akuma triple lp dp juggles against fat characters is also tight, but a lot less likely to happen in a game. not that i don't appreciate impractical combos, of course. some video showed you can do 3 more dps after a level 2 cancel but i've never been able to do it. it's pretty hilarious when you get the triple dps in a match, because you basically just have to throw out a dp from out of range and hope they stick a limb into it. this combo is basically the same idea as the joe combo, but it relies on horizontal spacing rather than vertical

- 3s ken's kara dp combos are simple, and you see them all them all the time, but are still awesome for some reason

non-dp combos that i find fun to watch:

- sairec's c-yun vs chunli "whiff a ballion dive kicks" combo
- kysg's alex combos that juggle a ton of das boots
- c-rolento combos that involve level 2 cancels

for some reason, i didn't enjoy the kysg elena combo with like 50 kara dps against q as much as i thought i would. sure it was awesome, but for some reason the joe and akuma combos strike a bigger chord with me. maybe female characters shouldnt have dps or something

Heh. Or maybe because the CvS2 stuff is humanly possible, even though in those videos it was done with a ppad. Where as half the Elena stuff is not humanly possible and/or very character/situation specific.

KYSG's Elena video is one of my favorite videos, but mostly because it's artistic and creative.

Though, since I also play Elena I know most of that stuff can only be done with a ppad/setup/etc, such as the right amount of dizzy bar and the right character and the right starting hit and doing impossible kara-cancels, which personally makes me appreciate it less from a technical standpoint.

People here will disagree strongly, but I look at it just like invalid combos. Sure it looks cool, but it's not humanly possible so in my eyes there's no difference between juggling a person that could have tech recovered (invalid) and doing a humanly impossible button input.