Melty Blood/MBAACC/Arcueid Brunestud/Half Moon

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Additional Resources

Match Video Database
H-arc combos
Kfl's H-arc combos

Players to watch/ask

JP:

Okuu

NA:

Shinobi!#2954 (can be found on Discord)

Overview

Strengths Weaknesses
Strengths	High damage Good ground mobility Corner carries off of any ground starter Above average pressure 5A6AA being a versatile tool Good jump in button: j.2C Above average meter gain Good normals in the air and ground
Weaknesses	Defense wise, is not as robust as C-arc due to no invuln on 22B her air confirms don't net the same reward as her ground confirms Has a harder time opening people up that are patient due to no 5[B] overhead, relies on strike/throw game Combos can be wonky depending on hurtboxes and needs some adjusting per character. Rebeats a lot and induces the Rebeat penalty a lot and results in less damage when she finally lands a ground starter

General Gameplan

H-Arcueid is very well known for her high octane rushdown prowess. Her overall gameplan is fairly simple, its running over to the opponent and smashing them in with relentless pressure and she's quite good at it. She has quite an array of tools to choose from. Whether its 5A6A, sliding 2B(this will be covered in the neutral section below) and those are just her ground normals; you also have j.2C and j.C for her air normals that are used frequently. When she lands the hit on someone grounded expect to be corner carried where H-arc truly shines. With having a lot of normal cancel windows on her staggers it can be very frustrating to deal against and fulfilling to do them on someone. She's a typical melty blood character that adheres to the foundation of strike/throw game, but happens to be one of the best at it. A really strong, stable character that might just be for you if you happen to want a simple gameplan while also having a good set of tools to accomplish the job.

Neutral

H-Arc has the ability to function just about anywhere if you place yourself right. You'll want to note that you have a pretty fast run that can cover the screen in around 1-2 seconds. This lets you take advantage of being able to move into spaces at any point. While you're on the ground you're going to want to find spots to do dash 5A6AA, since its 0 on block its a safe 123 to throw out and see if anything sticks if it does you can then go do your combo and corner carry. There is also sliding 2B at your disposal; Sliding 2B is done by doing 66/6A+B, 3B. When you do this you retain momentum from your dash as you do 2B so you get more range out of 2B. What's more is that it can low profile a lot of things while also being a low and still confirms into 5A6AA. Each tool while they do similar goals have different applications, 5A6AA will catch backdashes and you can even slightly stagger to confirm if someone was jumping out by the time you hit 5A6A to go into an air combo or do the last 6A to confirm your ground starter while 2B is a low that low profiles that may catch people off guard while they are standing. Make good use of these while you're on the ground in tandem with your excellent ground mobility and you'll quickly see how effective harc can be on the ground.

With all this in mind its not like she's terrible in the air either! You have j.C which is a normal that is active for 10F. Very strong for air to air and is hard to contest once its out. Its fast as well since the normal is active on the 7th frame. Now, j.C is a bit different from C-arc's j.C by a small margin and it has a chance of being low profiled, however unlike C-arc you now have j.2C which is a strong jump in button as well as j.B. A lot of the time you can use these normals for just about anything a situation would call for. since j.C is very active you could do neutral jump rising j.C to stuff anyone's air approach. You can also do jump forward j.C, airdash j.C and the list goes on. Make good use of dash jump since it carries momentum and in some cases you may need to use that to augment your airdash to cover more distance for j.C or j.2C depending on what's happening on the screen. On an air counter hit you get a ground starter that will corner carry with the damage that comes along with it.

Overall as long as you understand melty movement and basics this character has all the tools needed to play neutral with the entire cast and make people hurt once they get hit.

Pressure

H-arcueid has quite a few ways to apply pressure. As she is a typical melty blood character she does rely on a lot of staggers from her normals and her normals boast a long normal and special cancel window. A lot of her pressure may seem endless and with the help of 5A6AA that is 0 on block and 214A having small recovery and being +1 on block, there's honestly so much you can do here are some examples to try out for pressure

2A delay 2A 5B 2B w5A
2A 2A 5B 5A6A delay 6A
2A 5B(let it fully recover) 2A 5B 5A6A delay 6A
2A 5B delay 2B
2A 2A 5B delay 2B 214A(blocked) 5A/2A
2A 2A delay 2B 2C 214A(whiff) 2B
2A 2A run up grab
2A 5B, Grab
2A 5B delay 2B delay 2C 5A6A Delay 6A, delay 214B

These are just small things to show how long the normal/special cancel windows are. Go into training mode and you will quickly find that staggering 5A6AA, letting your 5B and 2B recover vs staggering them will quickly make your pressure much better, when they get scared enough that's when you can throw. When you throw you can choose to either hold down or not. Holding down sends them to the ground and does more damage, while not holding down throws them to the wall which you can do either 22A without meter or 22A 623C to get a little bit more damage

Okizeme

H-arc's Oki comes from either doing a 2C 4C j.2[C] ender or from doing a rekka ender. there are reasons to do one over the other. the j.2[C] ender is more damage and allows for more set up time. what you do from there is the following:

j.2[C], (w)2A sj j.2C
j.2[C], (w)2A sj air dash j.2C
j.2[C], (w)2A sj (empty jump) 2A/2B
j.2[C], (w)2A sj (empty jump) throw
j.2[C], (w)2A sj j.B airdash j.2C
j.2[C], (w)2A sj (late to show charge animation but make it whiff)j.2[C], throw

For rekka ender you can do the same thing listed above and also you get a safe jump which to set it up is 2C delay 236A 236A 214B. these are the specific notes for the safe jump:

Note: if you delay Rekka after 2C it pops them up a bit higher and gives you better frame adv

Post rekka ender safe jump:

Jump forward, j.C: Ryougi, Miyako, Sion, Vsion, Roa, Mech, Koha, Neco, Hisui, Vakiha, Seifuku, Arc, Ciel, Akiha, Hime
Delayed Rekka, 9, j.C: Nanaya, Tohno, Wara, Satsuki, Wlen
sjf j.C: Warc, PCL
Delayed Rekka, sjf, j.C: Aoko, Nero, Len
Delayed Rekka, slightly walk forward, 9, j.C: Kouma, Ries

Defense

Other than the basic defensive options you have Bunker, 22C and 421C

22C is her actual DP but is metered and since you are h moon you only really have one chance to do this until you can land a hit again so make good use of it. Bunker also uses 100% and while 421C isn't invuln on start up it can be used to call out some pressure resets from some chars like F-Akiha's 214C pressure reset and such.