Samurai Shodown/Mechanics

Cancels

• If there is a cancel period on an attack, it always works, regardless of hit, block, or whiff.
• Most normal slashes will cause your character to reel back, or recoil on block. This recoil animation is, in most cases, special cancelable -- this is often referred to as a "recoil cancel", and is very important for keeping your opponent in check.
• The cancel period on recoil is later than the cancel period on hit. This allows players to input a special move quickly after the normal so that it will occur on hit, but not on recoil. This is called recoil OS.

Jumps

• Jumps take 1 frame to be counted as airborne -- you are off the ground from frame 2 and the first frame you are still grounded but seems like you can not be meatied, while in the jump animation.
• Landing from a jump has no recovery, regardless of whether or not you performed a jumping normal (jumping specials will usually have landing recovery, though).

• There is a short landing animation, but this is cancelable by any action.
• Holding an upward direction will not cause you to immediately jump after landing. To immediately jump after landing, time another up input just as you land. This is referred to in the in-game tutorial as a Combo Jump.

• If you land a jumping normal in the 2 frames before landing or against a crouching opponent, you will 12 frames (j.K/A/B) or 19 frames (j.C) of bonus hitstun. This is usually referred to as a deep jump-in.
• This bonus is helpful for landing jump in combos as jump attacks are usually not advantageous enough on hit to combo from in this game.
• If you get hit while in the air and air reset, you will have a few frames of throw invincibility when you land.
• However, you are hit 1f before landing, you will not be air reset and instead go into hitstun as if you were grounded.

Movement

• 66 - Dash

• Dashes are your all-purpose forwards movement tool, hold 6 to dash further.
• Dashes have a 1f startup and lasts for a minimum of 11f. It can be cancelled at any point into a dash normal, throw, spot dodge, or jump.
• Letting go of forward will put you in a 4f window where you are still considered dashing, any normal inputted during this window will still be considered as dashing normals, and any special move input will retain the initial forward input (236 will be read as 6236 instead)
• Holding 1 or 4 during this window will put you in 4 frames of recovery before you come to a full stop to block.
• If you don’t input 1 or 4 during this 4f window, your character enters 6 frames of recovery where you cannot block, attack, or jump. This recovery period can be cancelled with a throw, spot dodge, deflect, or special.
• If you dash under an airborne opponent or over a forward-/back-rolling opponent and perform a dash normal or special, you will instantly change direction and attack.

• 44 - Backdash

• All backdashes set you airborne from the first frame. This is a great way to evade throw attempts and combos on landing, since you'll just get out of the way in the case of throws, or get air reset if they try to hit you, making them whiff the special moves they cancel into afterwards.
• Some characters are able to cancel the airborne portions of their backdash into aerial special moves.
• Backdashes also have brief lower body invulnerability, which can be used to avoid low attacks or fireballs that travel along the ground. Taller characters with bigger lower body hurtboxes will avoid more, as the entire box is absent during the backdash.

Spot Dodge

• Spot dodges are performed with AB.

• Spot dodges provide full body invulnerability, but have a long, uncancellable recovery period. They are invulnerable from frame 1.
• Invincible to strikes from frames 1 to 16, Invincible to throws from frames 1 to 10
• Spot dodges are primarily used to avoid throws.
• Spot dodges can be used to avoid mix-ups, but the recovery time may limit your ability to punish the mix-up.

Throws

• Throw in this game is performed with 4/6CD. This is referred to in-game as a Guard Break.

• Throws start up in about three frames (i.e. they visually connect on frame 4 after input). They have an insanely long recovery animation, leaving you wide open to punishment.
• Forward throw is 3 frame startup and is +20
• Throws deal no damage, but instead push your opponent a small distance and give you enough frame advantage to land a free attack or combo.
• Back throw, due to leaving your opponent back turned, generally allows for stronger follow-ups than forward throw.
• Back throw is 5 frame startup and is +25
• Throw is the only move in the game that applies damage scaling. Follow-up attacks from a throw will only deal 80% of their full damage, while WFT will only deal around 60% of its full damage, and Issen will only deal 50% of its full damage.
• There is about 12f of throw invul after leaving hitstun/blockstun/landing from air reset/neutral wakeup
• If both players throws on the exact same frame, the person thrown is random

Wakeup

• After a knockdown, you can either get up neutral by pressing nothing, roll forward by holding 6 or rolling backward by holding 4.
• The timing of the wakeup cannot be altered.
• Rolls are fully invincible and cannot be directly punished.

• Characters can run through rolling opponents on wakeup allowing side swap situations that be can be used for mix-ups. Neutral wakeup does not allow this.

• After neutral wakeup, you have a brief period of throw invincibility.
• Forward and backward roll have no throw invincibility after wakeup.

Rage Mechanics

Max Rage

As you take damage or successfully Just Defend, the Rage meter is filled. When full, it stays full for a character-dependent period of time, signifying that your character has entered Max Rage. The data sections on character pages list each character's rage duration.

• During Max Rage...

• All attacks (except Super Special Moves) deal 20% bonus damage.
• One or more of your special moves becomes Rage-enhanced, usually dealing more damage and/or having different properties. These are commonly referred to as EX special moves, and (with the exception of Yashamaru) replace the C version of the special move for the duration of Rage.
• You can perform a Weapon Flipping Technique (WFT) with 236B+C. WFT disarms your opponent on hit.
  • WFT will only end Rage on hit. If it whiffs or is blocked, you can attempt another WFT. If it hits, the Rage meter will be depleted on the first hit.
• When Max Rage ends, the Rage meter will be completely emptied.

Rage Explosion

For Rage Explosion duration and Lightning Blade damage values, refer to the table in the System Data page.

• By pressing ABC, you will perform a Rage Explosion (RE).

• RE is a more powerful version of Max Rage which gives up your Rage meter, meaning once RE ends, you will not be able to do anything that uses Rage for the remainder of the match.
• During RE, your attacks deal 40% bonus damage and you have access to all the benefits of Max Rage.
• You can activate RE during hitstun, but only on the ground. It will not work during "catch" moves such as Yoshitora 214S or Genjuro 421S.
• You must have your weapon to activate Rage Explosion.
• RE activation has a hitbox that pushes the opponent back on hit. It does no damage, but is completely unblockable.
• Activation takes 60f total. The initial RE activation is invincible for its full duration and you can block immediately after it ends.
• When either character is in the RE state, the match timer stops ticking down.
• RE at 1000 health lasts around 305f (5.1 sec), counted from the moment you can act again after RE activation to when the timer symbol changes colors from red to blue.
• For each 100 life you're missing, RE duration increases by ~68f and maximum possible Lightning Blade damage increases by ~30.
• The RE timer does not tick down while you're in hitstun or knocked down. It does tick down during blockstun.
• The round timer does not tick down while in RE.

Lightning Blade

• During RE, you can perform a Lightning Blade (LB) attack (commonly referred to as an Issen) by hitting A+B+C.

• LB is a fast-advancing dash attack that instantly catches the opponent on contact.
• It is fully invulnerable on startup, and projectile invulnerable for the whole animation.
• It is blockable, and very punishable.
• Its damage is based on the remaining amount of time in your RE. More time left = more damage.
• Its damage is more heavily scaled down after a throw than other attacks. Using issen after throw is generally suboptimal.

• Using Issen ends RE.
• Issen can be used as an anti-air from point blank to nearly full screen. For this reason, jumping during an opponent's rage explosion is highly risky.
  • But, beware opponents that will use air mobility options to try and bait an anti-air issen.
• Issen cannot be cancelled into from normals. However, it can be used during recoil.
• Minimum Issen damage is 300.
• Haohmaru WFT during RE does 490 damage. In general, when there are less than ~7 seconds of RE duration remaining, doing a WFT does more damage than Issen.

Just Defend and Stance Break

• Blocking an attack just before it would connect will cause you to Just Defend the attack.
  • Whenever an attack has been blocked with Just Defend, it cannot inflict chip damage or lower guard gauge.
• The Just Defend window is very generous -- pressing 1 or 4 within roughly 8 frames of an attack connecting will result in a JD.
  • Because the window to JD is somewhat generous, you can JD more than one hit in a single JD as long as the hits are very close to each other.
  • Because Samurai Shodown does not have Absolute Guard (i.e. you must continuously hold 1 or 4 to fully block multi-hit attacks), you can attempt to JD an attack after blocking normally.
  • Just Defend does not cause you to take reduced blockstun. However, a successful Just Defend will build a small amount of Rage for your character, and grant access to Stance Break.
• Stance Break is a special guard cancel available only from a Just Defend. It is performed by pressing AB after a JD.
  • Stance Break is a blockable attack that does no damage, but will knock down on hit.
  • All Stance Breaks have the same startup, but differ in their reach, both vertically and horizontally.
  • Stance break has invincible startup so it can be used against multiple hitting attacks.
  • The window to perform Stance Break is pretty generous, so you can still do it pretty late, although you always want to perform Stance Breaks as soon as possible.
  • Stance Break has a lot of recovery, so whiffing or blocking can leave you very punishable.
    • Stance Break can be used to anti air, but an air normal done shortly before landing will allow the opponent to block and punish the stance break.
  • Due to weapon attacks having no recoil against unarmed opponents, using stance break while unarmed can work on a larger array of attacks that would be usually be safe due to recoil pushback.

Counters and Weapon Catches

Counters and Weapon Catches are really important for keeping your opponent from being too predictable, but can mostly be ignored by new players. They're both considered to be specials, so you can cancel into them normally.

• 236AB - Counters

• These are often referred to as Deflects.
• This will counter most weapon slashes. Jumping slashes, low slashes, universal overheads, special moves, punches, and kicks cannot be countered.
• After being countered, the opponent will be stunned and open to attack. Rage Explosion can escape this stun.
• Deflecting any heavy slash or a running medium slash will also cause the opponent to lose their weapon.
• The duration of the stun depends on the attack deflected and what active frame of the counter caused the deflect.

• Countering a non-running light slash stuns them for 35 to 45 frames.
• Countering a non-running medium slash or running light slash stuns them for 49 to 59 frames.
• Countering a running medium slash or any heavy slash stuns them for 39 to 49 frames.
• The exact duration of the stun is usually not important. Even the shortest stun is long enough to allow for an SSM punish.

• u.236AB - Weapon Catch

• Weapon catches may only be done when unarmed.
• This will catch any deflectable normal as described above.
• All catches will disarm the opponent and knock them down.
• Catches have significantly less recovery than counters.

Super Special Move

• Super Special Move (SSM) is available at the start of every game.
• Input with 641236CD.
• SSM may be attempted only once per game. This one use is always expended on use regardless of outcome.
• SSMs deal between 620 and 700 base damage. Rage and Rage Explosion damage scaling does not apply to SSM. All other damage scaling does apply.
• SSM startup has two parts. Between these two parts is a brief freeze. The part before the freeze is invincible. The part after the freeze is not invincible.
• Using an SSM as a reversal is highly situational. SSM will only work as reversal against a small amount of attacks due to the long startup, screen freeze, and incomplete invincibility,
• No attacks can cancel into SSM. SSM can be used on recoil.
• The most common ways to get a guaranteed SSM are to block a highly unsafe move, spot dodge a throw, or deflect an opponent. Some characters have setups that allow them to hit confirm into an SSM.
• The round timer stops during SSM's animation.

Sword Clash

• A Sword Clash happens when both player's clash box on their normals overlap, causing them to run together and have a button mashing minigame to decide who gets disarmed.
• The following conditions must be met for this to occur:

• It can only happen once per round.
• The clash boxes overlap each other. These generally exist before the attack actually comes out, have greater active time, and cover a larger area than what the actual attack would hit. Not all normals have clash boxes.
• There must be at least 16 seconds remaining on the timer.
• There must be a difference of at least 160 health between the two opponents.

• If the clash boxes overlap but the full conditions are not met, there will be a distinct clash sound and nothing else will happen.
• Once activated, both players will have 95 frames(1.583 seconds) to mash, the person with the higher press count wins and the loser will be disarmed.

• If there is a tie, both players will either lose both their weapons or keep them. There is also a rare chance one player will be randomly disarmed.
• There is also a rare chance that the clash will be determined to be a draw (both players keep/lose their weapons together) regardless of who won the mash.

• Disarmed weapons will fly off in a random direction. If both players are disarmed, both weapons will go in the same direction.

Mash Buffer/Infinite Buffer

Performing a special move (or any kind of move that requires a motion) then proceed to keep tapping the same button/s used will buffer the move indefinitely until it can be performed.

• Buffering this way will make sure the move will come out on the first possible frame that you can move. This would mean that a DP on wakeup will come out on the first frame 100% of the time.
• As long as you keep tapping the button/s you can do other actions and the move will still be in buffer. This means that while you are knocked down you can buffer the move then hold a direction to roll, and you wouldn't have to worry about which side perform the special move.

Run/Backdash buffer

You can simply buffer a run/backdash by double tapping then holding that same direction.

• Same rules apply from mash buffer, so you can buffer it while knocked down or in the air.
  • Buffering a backdash when landing next to an opponent works well to avoid a throw.

Unarmed State

• Unarmed, also referred to as disarmed, describes a character being without their weapon.
• Characters can be disarmed by manual disarm (2 B+C+D), getting hit by Weapon Flip Technique, having a heavy slash or running medium slash deflected, or using a special move that results in losing a weapon.
• Characters can lose all or most specials that involve using their weapons, while some characters are affected slightly or not at all.
  • Some characters will gain completely new universal overheads, normals or specials when disarmed.
• Weapon normals do chip damage to unarmed opponents.
• Recoil does not occur on unarmed opponents that block weapon attacks.
  • This allows stance break to work in situations where recoil pushback would make opponents safe from a punish.
  • Conversely, lack of recoil can make normals with long recoil windows much safer when used against unarmed foes, such as 5Cs and 66Bs.
  • Cancellable recoiling normals become cancellable from blockstun against unarmed opponents. This allows for blockstrings specific to unarmed opponents.
• Unarmed opponents cannot be guard crushed nor do they incur any damage to guard meter.
  • Guard meter will regenerate during unarmed state.
  • Conversely, unarmed opponents can still cause guard damage against armed opponents.
• Pressing A will pick up the fallen weapon, this action will override any special move that uses light slash.
  • This does not include actions such as spot dodge or weapon catch.
• When a weapon is offscreen, it can be picked up by setting the character near the edge of the screen and pressing A on the side that it's sitting on.
• Unarmed characters gain access to weapon catch, the disarmed equivalent to deflect. This has much less recovery than the standard deflect, making it difficult to punish on reaction. Landing a weapon catch will also disarm the opponent while giving you enough knockdown time to get your weapon back, making this an excellent comeback mechanic.
• Unarmed characters lose access to Weapon Flip Technique, SSM, Rage Explosion, and Issen.
  • Gongsun Li is an exception as she is required to disarm herself with her umbrella toss to gain access to her SSM, but she cannot use it if she was disarmed by other means.
• All unarmed characters have a universal 66A that is generally similar to their usual 66A.
  • Although similar, unarmed 66As can have significant differences in hitbox size and frame advantage. The most important difference is that every unarmed 66A knocks down on hit. Counter-poking with 66A is therefore a valuable method of getting your weapon back.
• Uniquely, unarmed jump normals always cause a deep jump state on hit, even from max height. This makes landing an unarmed jump slash into 66A combo and excellent way to get your weapon back.

Guard Crush

Blocking an attack will reduce an internal guard meter. When the meter is down to 25%, players will be able to be guard crushed.

• Universal meter reduction:

• Light (5A/2A/66A/JA) 5%
• Medium (5B/2B/66B/JB) 10%
• Heavy (5C/2C) 25% (66C/JC) 20%
• Kick (5D/2D/3D/66D/JD) 5% (Darli's 66D does 10%)
• Universal Overhead (BC) 10%
• Unarmed Slashes (U.5S/U.2S/U.66S/U.JS) 5% (With exceptions of GSL and Wan-Fu)

• Stance Break, Issen, WFT and SSM deals no damage to the guard meter.
• For meter reduced by specials for each character, check each character's own page.

• Multi-hit special guard meter damage is when opponent is forced to block every hit in the corner.

• Player will glow red when they are able to be guard crushed.
• Guard meter recovers slowly over time, but you cant tell how much you have recovered other than knowing when you are out of the guard crush threshold.

• it also keeps recovering during the SSM cutscenes.

• Only a 5C (far/close) can trigger a guard crush.

• Upon triggering a guard crush, player is able to cancel the 5C into a special.
• Multi-hit 5Cs can cancel the hit that triggered the guard crush or combo from the last hit into a special, WFT, or Issen.
• Certain characters have specials that allow them to recover faster from a 5C and allow for follow up otherwise impossible. (Ex. Ukyo's 214D)
• The opponent can avoid being guard crushed by 5C by using Just Defend on the button instead of normal blocking.

• Opponents are able to rage explode after being guard crushed.
• Just defend will prevent guard crush meter from being reduced.
• The guard crush mechanic does not apply to unarmed opponents, they cannot have their guard meter reduced or be guard broken whatsoever.

• If you're disarmed while glowing red, even if you block attacks your guard meter will naturally recover instead of reduce or stay the same.

• For the specific combo for each character, check each character's own page.

Other

• If someone is hit with two heavy attacks in a row in a combo, they will be knocked down, even if the attack does not normally knock down. This can be avoided by doing something like heavy, medium, heavy, etc.
• Killing the opponent with a heavy slash cuts them in half. Using a middle slash leads to the blood spurt animation.
• Multi hit specials and weapon flips have juggle points on all hits except the last one, so if you were to force a trade before the final hit you could get a free juggle. This was patched out of Haomaru's DPs.
• When blocking a multi hitting move with no gaps inbetween, any attack buttons won't cancel your guard as long as you keep holding back.
• The round timer is not in units of seconds. Each tick of the round timer is 1.5 seconds.
• In a situation where a projectile and a strike land on the same frame on an opponent, the properties of the projectile take priority but the damage for both will register. For example if Rimururu lands a sweep (2C) on the same frame as Tondeke (236S), the opponent will not be knocked down but instead be stuck in the freeze animation as they normally would.