Virtual-On Oratorio Tangram/Controls/Melee Attacks

See Notation / Player inputs if you're uncertain about how control inputs are written within these sections.

Melee Attacks

Melee attacks are done with the same inputs as projectile attacks. When close enough to an opponent your weapon gauges turn yellow. The yellow gauge signifies that the weapon is in melee range and will now perform a melee move.
This is with the exception of Left Turbo attacks which will always fire a projectile.

Melee attacks do not require weapon gauge. Melee ranges are character dependant and vary between weapons.

Normal melee

Input: LW/RW/CW while weapon gauge is yellow

Performs a melee attack for high damage. First moving towards the target, then swinging your weapon. Normal melee can be comboed into other attacks for increased damage.

• Normal melee can be cancelled into any movement option or guard at any point.
• Normal melee can be cancelled into crouching melee until active frames.

RW and LW melee often have a 2-3 part attack string by inputting the weapon multiple times. These strings are quite slow and don’t deal the highest combo damage, making them rarely used.

Crouching melee

Input: Crouch + LW/RW/CW while weapon gauge is yellow

• Crouching melee can be cancelled into standing melee, quickstep or dash until the move becomes active / hitbox can connect with opponent..
• Crouching melee cannot be guarded, it deals full damage to guarding opponents.
• Crouching melee is completely uncancellable as it is active and recovering. This is the risk involved with using this move.

Turbo melee

Input: RT + LW/RW/CW while weapon gauge is yellow

• Turbo melee can be cancelled into any movement options before active frames. Turbo melee can be cancelled into Guard at any point.
• Usually a more powerful melee attack that causes immediate knockdown instead of continuing into a combo. Turbo melee cannot be cancelled directly into other melee attacks.
  
• When blocked, turbo melee causes slight damage and forces knockdown.

Guard Reversal melee

Input: LW or RW during Guard - or shortly after releasing Guard

VR performs a quick melee attack without moving from current position.

• Guard Reversal melee cannot be cancelled.

A melee attack that can be manually spaced. Usually faster total startup than normal melee. These properties make Guard Reversal a strong option.
Normal melee often moves unnecessarily close to the target before actually starting the attack. With guard reversals you can space your attack to hit at maximum range. This is effective with VR that use long melee weapons such as Fei-Yen and Cypher.

Attack differs depending on weapon. Like with crouch melee, lack of cancel ability is the risk involved. Keep in mind that jump cancelling / fast falling immediately puts you into a guarding state.

Quickstep melee

Input LW,RW or CW immediately after performing a sideways (4/6) Quickstep.

Performs a melee attack while rotating around the opponent. Startup is somewhat slow and can be interrupted. You can cancel it anytime by dashing, jumping, or guarding.
Since you rotate around the opponent it can often hit from behind and go around the opponents guard. Good at catching opponents jump cancels as the attack is delayed but mobile. Sometimes comboable into as an unblockable.

Jump melee

While opponent is in range on horizontal plane (yellow gauges not required)
Jump input + LW/CW/RW

Auto targeting melee move starting from the air and falling down. Completely uncancellable, can be punished on guard or whiff. High damage but rarely used apart from hard reads or combos. Usually it hits someone perfoming a grounded attack, the jump part making them miss. Weapon type changes attack for some VR (Raiden)

Dash melee

Down / 2-2 OR Rotate + LW/RW/CW during a ground dash (forward or diagonal forward)

Perform a meleattack while continuing on your current dash direction. Can be performed anywhere during ground dash. Fully manual control of the swing, no auto targeting. You can rotate during the whole animation to control hitbox further. Like a ground dash projectile you are stuck in an animation until the recovery ends.

note: dash melee is extremely difficult to use but is efficient in some scenarios at high level. Also used as a combo tool.

On the ground (OTG) melee

Condition: Opponent is in knocked down state.
Input: RW (LW for fei-yen) when weapon gauge turns green while in melee range.

Causes high damage on grounded opponent. However this attack is not a guaranteed hit if the opponent wakes up fast enough. You can get punished heavily as the move is completely uncancellable and you are in point blank range.

There are exceptions like Fei-Yen who has exceptionally fast OTG melee startup.
Other VR have different melee moves or projectiles that do less damage but are suited better for grounded hits than OTG melee.

Melee cancel route examples

Since melee attacks can be cancelled in many ways you have the freedom of cancelling into anything you want by indirect means assuming your execution is fast enough.

• Example 1: normal melee (HIT) -> jump cancel -> any action
• Example 2: turbo melee -> guard -> jump cancel -> any action

Quick step -> guard -> guard reversal is a common defensive technique.