Advanced V.G. 2/Ayako

Introduction

Ayako has entered the tournament to test the mettle of her unkillable vibes.

Ayako, despite her party gal image, is a character who excels at space control and grounded footsies. Sporting great pokes, solid anti-airs and a reliable tool for low-profiling moves in neutral, Ayako has just about everything she needs to play the ground game, and play it well. However, despite having an air throw, her air presence is hampered by a relatively weak set of air normals, and her overall damage output leaves something to be desired, even with her solid meter efficiency.

Ayako has a unique glitch that allows her to guard cancel when blocking in the air, she can do this into any of her air normals and her air throw. This makes air-to-air encounters with Ayako a very dangerous proposition.

Ayako is a footsies-focused character who wants to use her dominant pokes to bully opponents into the corner, where she can enforce her powerful throw game.
Pros	Cons
Fantastic grounded space control tools that convert into easy damage Scary throw game thanks to a normal throw that starts combos even if the opponent softens it Very meter efficient, with plenty of ways to build and spend bar Unique glitch allows her to guard cancel aerial blockstun Greatest idle animation ever	Fairly weak aerial presence, despite having an air throw Lack of solid jump normals means you'll be relying largely on grounded approaches Somewhat low combo damage Lacks both dash brake and dash super jump

Movelist

Normals

st.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Mid		-	-	-
A standing slap, good range and nice upward angle, but is outclassed by her other buttons. It does chain into all her other standing buttons, most notably stHP for a juggle combo. Chains to: > st. > st. > st. > st. > st. > st. > cr. > st./st.

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st.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Mid		-	-5	-
One of Ayako's strongest buttons. It has phenomenal range and easily links into itself repeatedly, allowing Ayako amble time to confirm into Rave Storm. This defines her ability to control grounded space. Chains to: > st./cr.

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st.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Mid		-	-	-
Ayako's signature anti-air. Her upward fan strike will reliably knock opponents out of the air and also covers space vertical for when she has the opponent in the corner and they want to jump out. This will whiff on crouchers however.

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st. (hold)

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High		-	-	-
After her stHP, if held down Ayako will twirl her fan and do a standing overhead. Not particularly fast or anything, but it's worth having in the back pocket.

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st.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-32	Mid		-	-	-
A stiff mule kick, not a good horizontal poke but it is a little wider than the normally superior stHP. She is the only character who's dashing attack is her stHK instead of stHP.

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cr.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Mid		-	--1	-
A crouching hand strike. It can cancel, but has no chain routes, which limits its usefulness. Its only major draw is that it has a good chunk more range than cr., but even there it's outclassed by the mighty st..

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cr.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Low	4	-	-	-
A crouching kick that chains (not links!) into itself, into crLP, and into stLK. This makes it an awesome low option with amble selection of confirm routes. It's also her OTG pickup normal. Chains to: > st./cr. > cr. > cr.

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cr.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Mid	10	-	-	-
With the majority of Ayako's standing attacks being upward angled, her crHP becomes her biggest horizontal poke. It natively special cancels so you can poke into Rave Storm if your confirms are on point

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cr.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	Low		-	-	-
Ayako busts out the moves with a breakdancing spin that has 3 hits during it's long active time. Due to pushback, if this gets blocked it can wind up being very punishable. The flipside is that the 3rd hit has the most range so you might be able to tag them if they go in for an early punish but this is not a plan you want to set your clock to.

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j.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High		-	-	-
A downward chop, decent enough aerial button. Chains into jHP and jHK. Can hit a standing opponent while rising. Chains to: > j./j.

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j.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High		-	-	-
A very fanciful looking knee strike, the hitbox is at the point of her knee so it works best as an air-to-air even if it can hit a standing opponent while rising. Chains to: > j./j.

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j.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High	8	-	-	-
A downward angled fan chop, probably her best choice for a jump in. It's best strength is that if you do rising jLP or jLK you can chain into this and it will connect, but that's really all you get so don't go planning your day around it.

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j.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High	6	-	-	-
Good startup, but realistically you don't to use this due to the njHK technique. A decent enough air normal if you get it however.

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nj.

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	High		-	-	-
A split-legged kick, powerful as it is active on both sides. It is possible to get this in a angled jump by pumping additional inputs, if you do 69 jLK 8 jHK you can get njHK to come out during a diagonal jump.

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Command Moves

Any Direction (Besides Up) + In air

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
-	N/A	1	-	-	-
Ayako grabs the opponent and flips down to Earth to slam them, probably her best aerial option as other facets of her aerial game are purely fine. Because of her aerial guard cancel glitch, this throw becomes crazy powerful in air-to-air situations as you can guard cancel out of blocking an attack and straight up throw them for trying.

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Special Moves

Mach Spin

+

Version	Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
		Mid		-	-	-
Ayako Spiral Arrows her way straight up into the air. Despite appearances, it's kind of hard to use as an anti-air. She does however recover in air, allowing her to stick out an air normal and come down with an overhead.
		N/A		-	-	-
Moves Ayako forward before shooting into the air. Afterwards Ayako will come down with an equally vertical attack, but if the rising attack hit the descending attack will whiff.
+		N/A		-	-	-
The EX version is Ayako's instant super, giving it some risky offensive and defensive utility outside of also being a situational combo ender.
+		N/A		-	-	-
In a word, it's EX Mach Spin without the superflash. Not awful, but it's really just kind of there, so you don't need to worry about it.

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Rave Storm

+

Version	Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
		Mid		-	-	-
Ayako's primary combo ender, this is what you'll be defaulting to every time you hit a button in neutral. This is the only version that will hit crouchers so make sure to have it at the ready. All versions of Rave Storm are horribly unsafe on block so even if all version are able to low-profile moves and projectiles (yes, this has upper body invincibility for some reason), do not throw it out willy-nilly in neutral. The LK version does not knock down.
		N/A		-	-	-
The preferred version to end combos with, but the later half of the HP version will whiff on crouchers leaving you open for a massive punish. This version travels much further, so outside of really slow fireballs you can pretty confidently HP Rave Storm through a projectile to bop your opponent. The HK version DOES knock down, so get that OTG pickup afterwards.
+		N/A		-	-	-
The EX version is fast and great as a super cancel, but also whiffs on crouchers, so make sure to stand confirm the opponent before letting this rip.

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Tornado Attack

+

Version	Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
		N/A		-	-	-
Basically a Demon Flip. Can help with aerial approaches in neutral, but it's also surprisingly useful for mixuups.
		N/A		-	-	-
the HP version goes further.

Fan Chop

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
	High		-	-	-
If you input this move just before landing, you essentially get an empty flip without any landing recovery. Since the Fan Chop itself is an overhead, you can set up some very tricky high/low mixups if your opponent is respecting you.

Frankensteiner

above opponent

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
	N/A		-	-	-
Ayako's throw option out of Tornado Attack, getting the timing down on where exactly you need to input it to get Frankensteiner and not Fan Chop is tricky.

Slide Kick

No Input

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
	Mid		-	-	-
A slide that knocks down, but is NOT A LOW. Her mixup is actually delayed Fan Chop overhead or land and then cr.LK because this is not a mixup tool. Quite punishable if it gets blocked, but it very easily leads into a combo on hit in the corner.

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Guard Cancels

Note: Ayako's and guard cancels change which move she uses depending on whether she performs the guard cancel standing or crouching.

st. Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's st.. Not an awful option, but you have much better options for standing guard cancels.

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cr. Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's cr.. The preferred guard cancel for when you're crouch blocking, since it retains its self-chain properties as a guard cancel. If it hits, cancel into Rave Storm for a combo.

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st. Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's st.. Ayako's best guard cancel when standing, because it's her st., including all of its usual self-chain and cancel properties. Cancel into Rave Storm for a follow-up.

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cr. Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's cr.. Generally invalidated by her other guard cancel options, especially since her sweep is much riskier for much less reward.

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Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's Mach Spin. Could potentially be useful as an anti-air guard cancel, but the low reward compared to the risk of using Mach Spin makes it less worthwhile than Ayako's other options.

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Guard Cancel

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
Uses Ayako's Rave Storm. Ayako can still super cancel into EX Rave Storm, but there is literally no reason to do that when she can use her st. or cr. guard cancels to confirm into Rave Storm.

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Super Moves

Spiral Dive

cl. +

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
	N/A	1	-	-	-
A 1F command throw super. Although it costs two bars, it's an incredibly useful tool to keep in your back pocket. It also doesn't have a whiff animation, so if you're not in range for the throw, you'll just get Mach Spin, which makes it pretty strong against jump-out attempts.

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F･T･I･C

+

Damage	Guard	Startup	Active	Recovery	FrameAdv
	Mid		-	-	-
Stands for Final Tornado Illusion Crisis. Although the damage on this attack is huge, only use this when you're sure it'll get you the win. The startup is very slow, and because Ayako poses after the super finishes, the recovery means that sometimes you can be unsafe on hit.

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Strategy

Ayako thrives at the midrange. You can honestly get a lot of mileage out of basically spamming st.LK, since it's fast, has fantastic range, and links into itself, allowing you to easily confirm into a combo. If your opponent decides to jump at you, st.HP will very easily swat them out of the air, and since this normal is also a launcher, you'll often be able to convert into a combo even if it trades.
On defense, you can use EX Mach Spin as a reversal thanks to its speed, but your best bet is to try and land st.HP anti-airs, since most characters will try to start offense with jumping normal chains.
Ayako is also able to very easily punish throw techs with her st.HP, and combined with her ability to combo after her throw in the corner, this gives her an unexpectedly scary throw game. Learn the timing for st.HP after a throw tech so you don't have to react to it.

Combos

Basic Combos
st.LK x1-3 xx Rave Storm
You can cancel Rave Storm into EX Rave Storm if you want to cash out some meter. If you want even more damage, cancel EX Rave Storm into EX Mach Spin or FTIC.

cr.LK > cr.LP > cr.HP xx Rave Storm
(corner) Throw, st.LK xx HK Rave Storm
(anti-air) st.HP, sj.LK > j.HK, dash st.HK xx EX Mach Spin
You can also use this combo to punish throw techs.