Hey all!

[CarteBlanche]

Ah, sidestepping is not really about knowing all that much.
If you're blocking a string like Cervantes' or Aeon's BBB, you can sidestep the third B and punish it, so knowledge is applicable for that sort of thing, but...
Otherwise if your attack was blocked, it's pretty much about anticipation. You take a risk and you hope for a good reward.
Of course you can put in some effort to read their typical answers after a blocked attack, but I prefer the lazy way of just hoping for the best and switching my strategy if I get caught too many times while side stepping. :P

I think there are some characters against which sidestepping in anticipation seems less effective since they use so many horizontals for their all-purpose stuff. Cervantes is the primary example in my head, so sidestepping against him in anticipation is not worth it, in my opinion.

 

[orcitect]

I've noticed a few people doing that to me with a few different strings, people sidestepping the B of Nightmare's AAB, I tend to just start using A2AA or 3AA/3A2A if they do that. I'll have to try not to play the game so linearly, throw an attack out and then sidestep and see what happens like you've suggested.

Yeah, I've found its bad to sidestep Cervantes. I think I'm gonna bounce between Nightmare and Devil Jin mostly. I'm not planning to go to any tournaments so Devil Jin seems fine to play.

 

[Mage]

Welcome to the site!

Admittedly, when I first got Soulcalibur V, I was torn between several different characters since Ivy (my main from SC2-Now) seemed pretty bad at first. Even though I learnt Calamity Symphony (her command grab) and began maining her for the fourth time, I was glad I had invested time into other characters because it greatly increased my knowledge of matchups and other little details like ducking Maxi's 66A and punishing it with FC 1B ~ G ~ 6B8 or jumping his 2A with Ivy's 9B and getting free damage out of it.

I see you have the same indecisiveness that I had when I first looked at the roster of Soulcalibur V, but evidence from your posts suggest that you prefer the powerful high tier characters like Nightmare and Mitsurugi. Even though I invested 24 hours worth of training mode to learn things about every character (I'm still not Player Level 99!!) I highly suggest a new player like you should focus on one character until you have mastered them, then you should move on to learn about the rest. Knowing about your enemy is one thing, but knowing about your own skill is another thing.

I hope I have explained what may be best for you, and below are some useful Soul Arenas and threads that might help you in due course:

Mitsurugi:

http://8wayrun.com/forums/mitsurugi.96/ - Mitsurugi's Soul Arena. Here you can discuss your ideas and opinions while also asking questions, and with Belial as the forum moderator, you're almost 100% sure to get an answer. There is also a Patch 1.04 wishlist, where you can post what you'd want to change to Mitsurugi if Namco were to ever make another patch. The threads below are what I believe are the most helpful threads within the Soul Arena of Mitsurugi:

• http://8wayrun.com/threads/feel-my-wrath-mitsurugi-matchup-thread.11033/
  - This is Mitsurugi's Matchup Thread, which is where you can discuss who Mitsurugi has an easy fight against or who he has difficulties with.​

• http://8wayrun.com/threads/a-taste-of-hell-restaurant-okizeme-tech-traps-moved-here.11281/ - This is Mitsurugi's Tech Trap Thread/Discussion. What is a tech trap? In simple terms, it is certain moves (generally knockdown moves) that allow you to hit them again without them being able to avoid it, unless they have knowledge on the only way out of it).​
• http://8wayrun.com/threads/mitsurugi-general-discussion-and-q-a.9991/ - This is your Old School General Discussion and Q&A Thread for Mitsurugi. All questions should be directed here and anything you want to discuss about Mitsurugi whether it's his costume or moves, should be directed here.

Nightmare:

http://8wayrun.com/forums/nightmare.95/ - Nightmare's Soul Arena. Exactly the same purpose as Mitsurugi's, except it's for Nightmare (lol). The Threads of most helpfulness and importance are listed below:

• http://8wayrun.com/threads/nightmare-matchup-reference-guide.10049/ - A Matchup Thread for Nightmare! This is not a discussion of Nightmare's matchups but it is a good place to find your matchups (props to Sp1d3r).
• http://8wayrun.com/threads/nightmare-guide-for-scv.11813/ - This is basically Tiamat's guide to upping your Nightmare game. When I used Nightmare, I referred to this several times so I recommend it. However, it is notation heavy, so if you don't get the notations such as 1K, 2K or 3K, etc, then there will be a video at the bottom paragraph of this post you can refer to.
• http://8wayrun.com/threads/nightmare-combos-tech-traps.9016/ - This is Nightmare's Thread for both Combos and Tech Traps. Again, this is not open to discussion, but it does contain some good combos to make you god tier ;).

I hope I haven't babbled on too long, but I have covered most helpful things in the Soul Arenas. Even though I have listed a few here, there are more! Feel free to browse the Soul Arenas at your leisure.
As for the Notations, Partisan (one of the Senior Moderators) made a tutorial for notations on Soulcalibur IV, but it still works the same. View it below and it will explain everything to you:

This is now where I conclude and allow you to go off and find out more about your favorite characters. Welcome to 8wayrun.com and I hope you have a good time here.​

 

[orcitect]

Hey Mage!

Thanks for the lengthy reply!

I'm pretty set on Nightmare at the moment, the links are very helpful! I've come from Blazblue so I know the number notation and such and I've kinda picked up the SC specific acronyms and such through osmosis from lurking on the 24/7 stream.

I appreciate the warm welcome!

 

[Frostheart]

Hi orcitect!

Welcome to 8wr! It's nice to have someone so enthusiastic to learn stuff, check streams and have your own videos for evaluation :) You're doing pretty well for someone who's new from what I see from your vids, having experience with other fighting games do help of course. At least you do stuff methodically instead of rushing and mashing like many other new players do. You probably know already that a lot of principles in BB (pretty much every FG) are present here, like mid/low attacks, okizemes, mixups, tech rolls, supers, frame traps , spacing game etc. Which region/state are you from? Feel free to ask any of these great players here questions about whichever character you decide to main at the individual character forums :)

I used to play Blazblue CT too, used to play Rachel but got a little miffed she was shit-tier in CS when she's (canonically) one of the strongest of the cast...