Silver Samurai Guide Ver. 1.0 By Carlton Kong Alias Cybermitsu in most Tekken forums * Notice: This being my own personal work, it is my obligation to protect what I believe are threats to my work. Silver Samurai Guide is property of Carlton Kong, copyright 2000. If you wish to put this FAQ into some part of a vast anthology for MvC2 or simply wish to use a tidbit of it on your website, contact me at my email address above. If I hear news that my FAQ has been used in any other manner without my consent, written or otherwise, I will have no choice but to take legal action against those who have used this FAQ without my consent. *FAQ History* Ver. 1.0 - First publication of this FAQ. *Table of Contents* 1) Reasons and Uses of This FAQ 2) Advantages and Disadvantages 3) Movelist and Conventions 4) Movelist Analysis 5) Fighting Strategies 6) Special Thanks *Reasons and Uses of This FAQ* Why would someone put all their time and effort on a character that is as unpopular as Silver Samurai? Simple. To disprove the myth that he sucks. I've asked about a dozen or so people to help me out with improving my Silver Samurai and all I've come across are just a lot of confused people that tell me to go to another character. So what did I do? I shelled out some hard earned cash and played. Slowly, I learned the little nuances of his game through practice that often left my hands numb. Now, I'm going to share my knowledge with you. I designed this guide for the intermediate to expert player. It is not intended for the use of a person that is just starting to play MvC2. In other words, newbies need not look here. *Advantages and Disadvantages* Adavantages- Silver Samurai is extremely strong for his size. His combos and aerial raves can cause excessive damage. His special moves cause great block damage and his hyper combos cause even greater block damage. He also can take more damage than most normal charcters. I believe that his damage setting is at 90%, which is pretty good. Due to his ability to gain elemental enhancements, he has a wider range of hyper combos than most characters. Disadvantages- Due to his great physical strength, he has a real big problem with being excessively slow. Another problem that he has is a lack of special moves. Most characters have about 3 or 4 special moves, but Silver Samurai only has 2. He also cannot deal with people that jump in the air during a fight since he does not have a proper anti-air move. Although this can be remedied by using an anti-air assist, it doesn't really cut it. Quite possibly the biggest disadvantage is the fact that his launcher sends opponents up at a weird trajectory. Rather than sending them straight up, he sends him flying at about a 45 degree angle. This makes initating aerial raves very difficult. *Movelist and Conventions* Conventions will show the abbreviations that I use for indicating the notation of a move or during an explanation of a strategy. I assume that the reader knows general directionals, ie. u is up and d is down. Therefore, general directionals have been ommited from the conventions. Movelist is listed from special moves to command attacks to hyper combos. After the hyper combos, there is a subsection that will list the hyper combos during the elemental enhancements. Afterwards, a list of assists appears showing what moves occur during a partner assist, a variable counter, and a variable combination. --Conventions-- QCF- quarter circle forward (d,df,f) QCB- quarter circle back (d,db,b) DP- dragon punch motion (f,d,df) P- any punch K- any kick PP- both punches KK- both kicks LP- light punch LK- light kick HP- heavy punch HK- heavy kick = - next in sequence / - or i.e. either command may be input (air)- can be done in the air (PL)- power up lightning (PF)- power up fire (PI)- power up ice a- alpha assist B- beta assist y- gamma assist --Movelist-- Shuriken: QCF + P, direct with u / d (air) Repeating Slash: DP + P / tap P rapidly =Dashing Slash: tap f,f Double Slash: Tap LP,LP / HP,HP Downward Strike: in air, tap D + HK Triple Shuriken: QCF + PP Lightning Strike: QCF + KK Sword Power-up (Lightning): QCB + P Sword Power-up (Ice): QCB + LK Sword Power-up (Flame): QCB + HK Lightning Triple Shuriken: (PI) QCF + PP Lightning Strike: (PI) QCF + KK Flame Spiral: (PF) QCF + KK Ice Stab: (PI) QCF + KK partner assist variable counter variable combination ------------------------------------------------------------------- a: HP Repeating Slash HP Repeating Slash Hyper Repeating Slash B: HP Shuriken HP Shuriken Triple Shuriken y: Crouching HP Crouching HP L.Strike/F.Spiral/I.Stab *Movelist Analysis* Note: I will call Silver Samurai "Sam" throughout this section. Just want to clear that up. Shuriken - QCF + P One of the best moves in Sam's arsenal. When it hits, it can cause six hits BY ITSELF! The direction of the shuriken can be controlled by pressing up or down. By using the "up" shuriken on the ground, it is possible to keep a person from jumping around too much. Using the "down" shuriken in the air is good if your afraid someone might try to dash under you while your trying to get into the air. Great to use at the end of an aerial rave to cause more damage. More importantly, this move causes good guard damage, even on that "invincible" Iceman. Good to use for keep away. Repeating Slash - DP + P / tap P rapidly Not much to say about this move. It's particularly useful to make someone think twice about just tryiing to run up to you for a d+WK to popup. Also does good guard damage. But there's a bit of lagtime when they block it. =Dashing Slash - tap f,f DO NOT USE THIS!! What it does is cause Sam to run forward while doing the reapeating slash. Sounds good, right? Wrong!! After the dashing slash, Sam sorta stands there with his sword in the air. He stands so long that a person can use their popup and launch you for an aerial rave. Even worse is that they can get off their hyper combo. Double Slash - tap LP,LP / HP,HP I'm not particularly sure how to describe this. All Sam does is two consecutive sword slashes. That's it. Does good damage, but not particularly useful. Downward Strike - in air, d + FK Unlike the double slash, this move is excessively useful. Sam points his sword downward and stabs them before he hits the ground. This is a great option to the usual jumping HP / HK and is easily comboed into his popup. Since he goes straight down, he can tag in another hit after he is finsihed with his aerial rave. Triple Shuriken - QCF + PP This is the hyper combo of choice! Don't bother with anything else. It dishes out plenty of damage and causes opponents to fly across the screen. I've even got only about 2 hits off it since my opponent interrupted the move and it still causes them to fly. But the most important aspect of the Triple Shuriken is the fact that it causes about the SAME amount of damage if blocked. When I did this on a friend of mine, he says that it was worse than the block damage caused by the Mega Optic Blast. As a bonus, this also damages Iceman while he's blocking. And for some insult to injury, it can also be directed with up or down like his normal shuriken. Use the up and down tactics that are used with the normal shuriken with it. Lightning Strike - QCF + KK I really have not used this move. I actually think its pathetic. It doesn't give you the damage like the Triple Shuriken. It also does puny guard damage. It can be chained together after his popup, which is a bit of a plus. Sword Power Up's - QCB + P(PL) / LK(PF) / HK(PI) Each of the Sword Power Up's gives Sam an elemental associated with his sword. Basically, his sword will cause elemental damage. The Sword Power Up's also cause changes to Sam's strength, defense, and his special moves. -Lightning- While in PL, he gains an increase in defense but also decreases his attack power. He will be able to perform the Triple Shuriken in midair. His Lightning Strike seems to change with this power up, making it more difficult to connect off the popup. A normal shuriken only hits once rather than the usual six. Both his normal and Triple Shuriken go out at much greater speed. -Fire- While in PF, he gains an increase in strength and in defense. The Lightning Strike is replaced with the Flame Spiral, which is a vertical column of fire. It isn't really useful since he cannot popup opponents straight up. Oddly, his Repeating Slash gets altered so that his LP version does only two hits while his HP does NONE! However, during the HP version, you can tack in hits by pressing P as late as possible. His shuriken gets a bit of a speed increase, although it may be a bit intangible. -Ice- While in PI, he gains an increase in defense and a decrease in attack power. He also gains the power of super armor while he's on the ground. The Lightning Strike is replaced with his Ice Stab. When performed, Sam jumps into the air and sticks his sword into the ground. Then a sudden rush of ice comes from his sword and freezes his opponent in place. Sam then can use his Triple Shuriken or just popup and start and aerial rave. Although the damage from the stab is puny, it must be blocked LOW. His shuriken in this form only causes 3 hits compared to the regular 6. His Repeating Slash only deals 4 hits with LP and 6 hits with HP initially compared to 6 hits for both. Assists: a - Ground Type: Rpeating Slash / Hyper Repeating Slash This was the first assist that I began to tinker with. It is good for a little while. What Sam does is jump in a perform his Repeating Slash close to the opponent. Problem is that he strikes a bit of a pose right next to the opponent, providing the perfect opportunity to juggle him or a hyper combo. What I like to do with this assist is use that to chip while I jump away and cover him with a projectile or long range hyper combo. Thus if they try to hit Sam, you can hit them and allow Sam to jump away off screen. I don't really like to use his Hyper Repeating Slash. Heck, I think I've ever used the Hyper Repeating Slash. I believe that it's just like the normal one, just with a lot more hits. I just wish that you could do it just by yourself and not part of a variable combination... B - Projectile Type: Shuriken / Triple Shuriken This is the assist to use. This one causes Sam to throw out his shuriken from quite a lond distance. The shuriken dissipates over time though. It's strength is the fact that it takes quite some time for all the hits to hit so you can use it as a stun. Then you can do a popup to an aerial rave with ease. Ex. Team - Strider, Sam. Strider is on screen. Calls Sam to throw the shuriken. While Sam's throwing it, Strider is double jumping over the oppoennt. Causes the opponent to get confused on where to block. Shuriken connects and Strider is free to popup and aerial rave for a 12 hit air combo. The Triple Shuriken is really good for the variable combination. Improves the guard damage of most hyper combos. y - Launcher Type: Crouching HP / L.Strike/F.Spiral/I.Stab This is the most horrible assist that I have seen. All Sam does is a dman crouching HP that pops 'em up. THAT'S IT!! I only use that if a person has medium launcher and that's not even that reliable. I'm not sure which of the moves occurs during the variable combination. I've been able to get both the L.Strike and the F.Spiral to work during a variable combination in one match. I don't really understand how it is chosen. *Fighting Strategies* Coming Soon... *Special Thanks* Capcom - without them, most of us would be playing something else. Dan - one of the best at MvC2 or almost any other game. Adrian - a tough SOB in any fighting game. Chris MacDonald - his general FAQ is amazing. I learned a lot from it.