Tough Love Arena/Onion/Strategy
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Disclaimer: This is a community written page and may contain opinions that not all players may agree with. Use at your own discretion.
Goals
Onion wants to get in and stay in their opponent's face. They struggle to approach in neutral due to their stubby moves, but are a force to be reckoned with once they are able to start their strike-throw pressure.
Neutral
Onion generally struggles to approach against most of the cast, so counterpoking, inching forward, and making hard callouts will generally be their game plan in neutral. Reading the habits of your opponents' will be key to playing Onion well in neutral.
Sweep
- Sweep is very useful for whiff punishing a poke from the opponent due to its fast startup and to its ability to hit confirm off of when cancelled into Hopkick.
- With the right read on when the opponent will throw out a poke and with good spacing, Sweep can be a powerful tool in Onion's footsies game.
Roundhouse
- Roundhouse is mainly a callout tool in neutral due to it's sluggish startup and endlag and the extended hurtbox Onion gets from sliding forward.
Hopkick
- Hopkick is somewhat of a counterpoke tool that Onion can use preemptively to beat out pokes from the opponent.
- Empty Hop is useful to fakeout a Hopkick, which can lead to the opponent flinching and getting punished for it.
Shimmy/Walk and Block
- Onion does rely on meter to get damage off of long range hits and to get extend their combos, so shimmying should be a consideration for neutral sometimes.
- Walk and blocking is useful for getting Onion close enough to be able to threaten the opponent with their pokes and for walking the opponent to the corner. Be sure to mix up when to walk and block and to throw out a preemtive move to keep the opponent on their toes.
Anti Airs/Jump Punishes
Feint
- Feint is one of Onion's most rewarding and reliable anti airs to use due to its fast startup, high damage (for a meterless anti air), and meter gain.
Flick
- Flick is Onion's other solid anti air. Flick can catch Jumps earlier than Feint as well. Note that spaced Jumps can beat out Flick.
Roundhouse
- Roundhouse is Onion's most rewarding anti air but is also their least consistent anti air due to the amount of startup it has. Roundhouse can be used as a read on a jump in or as an "accidental" anti air.
Sweep
- Sweep can be useful as a whiff punish versus Jump and only requires good spacing to pull off.
Pressure
Onion's pressure is mainly strike-throw but they have plenty of useful frame traps and fakeouts to catch their opponents off guard.
Blockstrings
5L Starter:
- 5L > 5L is a basic frametrap that can loop into itself as long as Onion is close enough to the opponent.
- 5L > 4L leaves a big gap in between Flick and Trip but can punish fuzzy mashing and Parries and leaves Onion plus at the end.
- 5L > 5H keeps the opponent under pressure when they try to walk outside of Flick range.
4L Starter:
- 4L > 5L is a tight blockstring that keeps Onion close and can act as a hit confirm if Trip hits.
- 4L > 4L trades with every 5L and leaves Onion plus afterwards.
- 4L > 5H can punish mashing hard, especially if you microwalk back before using Sweep.
5H Starter:
- 5HH when delayed acts like a frametrap that can lead to solid damage meterless if the opponent is mashing. Note that the closer you are to the opponent, the less safe you will be.
- 5H > 5H can reset the scenario if the opponent is afraid of challenging Onion after Sweep.
- 5HS: Functions similar to 5HH as a frame trap tool but trades off meterless damage for safety and the ability to fake out with Empty Hop to reset Onion's pressure.
Okizeme
Onion typically gets two types of knockdowns: a throw knockdown and a juggle knockdown. Usually every type of juggle knockdown Onion gets from a full combo will allow them to safejump or walk up to the opponent to do a meaty. If Onion gets a throw knockdown, they are +27 but are also too far away to get any guaranteed pressure and leads to a rps scenario.
Meaties
- 6S is by far Onion's safest meaty option if they are able to make it a safejump. Sometimes Onion's knockdown gives them enough time to buffer and whiff a Jump to throw off the opponent.
- 5L is Onion's weakest but most consistent meaty due to it's fast speed, raw frame advantage, large active frames, and scaling.
- 4L gives Onion the most amount of frame advantage. Onion can meaty Trip > Trip for a true block string if the first Trip is meaty enough.
- 5H Gives Onion the most amount of reward on hit at the cost of strict timing and frame advantage.
Sample Meaty Setups
- 5HH > Walk > 5HS > 5HH > 6S (on block): A midscreen safejump setup that requires microwalking in between the juggle or right after the combo is required.
- 5HH > 6S > 5S > 5HS > 6S (on block): A corner setup that gives Onion an autotimed safejump.
- 5HH > 6S > 5S > 5HL > 4L (Whiff): A corner setup that lets Onion framekill into a very meaty Flick, Trip or Sweep.
Defense
Feint
- Feint is a powerful reversal that nets Onion a ton of meter and a solid chunk of damage. Feint is useful for calling out frame traps (i.e. 5L > 5L) and as a wakeup option. Use with caution however since stagger pressure can blow out Feint entirely. Fuzzying Feint is a useful way of extending the window in which frame traps can be called out.
Flick
Sweep
- Flick is useful for stuffing out an opponent’s overextensions during their block pressure, if you suspect the opponent will try to grab, or if you want to steal your turn back. Be sure to condition the opponent to not expect mashing first.
- Sweep can function very similarly to Flick due to its fast speed and has the added bonus of giving Onion more damage if they hit the opponent opposed to Flick and Sweep is less likely to get shimmied out compared to Flick. Keep in mind that its slightly slower speed will make it less useful than Flick in tighter scenarios.
Reject
- Reject lets Onion stop the opponent’s block pressure at the cost of one bar of meter. Vary Reject timings to make sure the opponent is not ready for the neutral reset and can't bait out your Reject.
- Onion likely won't get very much out of Reject due to how their are better the closer they are to the opponent.
Burst
- Use Burst when you expect the opponent’s combo will kill or if you have a big enough life lead to gain back that meter in no time if you get hit again, otherwise save your meter for Rapid and Reject. Vary your Burst timings to make sure you don’t get hard punished for getting Burst baited.
- Blocking will cause your opponent to eventually push themselves too far away to continue their block pressure. Blocking is useful to bait out overextensions versus opponents who want to keep up the pressure, and with enough conditioning, you can start to mash at certain points during their block pressure.
Counter Strategy
- Try to stay in neutral for as long as you can. Onion is at their weakest when they have to play neutral, especially when they have less range than their opponent.
- Be fine with taking a couple of throws as Onion doesn't have a reliable way to create follow up pressure and they do much more damage from their strikes.
Resources
