Notation & Glossary

Glossary

For a more indepth cross game glossary check out the comprehensive infil glossary here
Cancel verb

involves a second action that overrides an existing action usually for the purpose of comboing. I.e in Fantasy Strike you can cancel the recovery portion of some normal moves with a special move.

Parry/Counter/Catch noun

a special move type that involves being hit by the other players attack during your moves active frames. I.e in fantasy strike graves air super will negate any strike type attack that hits during its active frames and counter attack with a 2 damage cinematic.

Command Throw noun

a special type of throw that cannot be escaped by normal means. In Fantasy Strike you can avoid command throws by being airborne or in prejump frames. I.e rook ground C special.

Chip Damage noun

a special type of damage inflicted when blocking an attack. In Fantasy Strike most special moves do one portion of chip damage and your health remains flashing for 4 seconds, if you receive another chip damage the duration extends by another 4 seconds and on a third chip damage you take 1 hp damage.

Combo noun

any sequence of attacks where after the first hit the follow up hits cannot be avoided, I.e a jump in A with + frames into a ground A the opponent is stuck in hit stun from the jumping attack so that the follow up A cannot be blocked/avoided.

Crossup noun

a type of move that takes advantage of fighting game system mechanics in which your time your jumping moves active hit box to hit at the moment the game flips sides for the characters thus forcing you to block in the opposite direction. A pseudo mix up if you will as you can force a player to guess whether you will crossup or not.

Counter Hit noun

a special type of hit, that usually provides bonus frame advantage and ocasionally aditional effects when you hit an opponent during the startup frames of a move. I.e On counter hit Degreys back A causes a

Frame Trap noun

Frame traps are an offensive technique that uses move frame data to create a 'false' opening in an offensive sequence, with the intention of baiting the opponent into using a move usually at a negative frame advantage, and thus allowing the player utilizing the frame trap to follow up with another attack/action. I.e Degrey does B>B daggerfall, it is +9 frames on block, degrey then performs back A, if the opponent tries to attack from block his move will be interrupted before it becomes active and degreys Back A will land a counter hit and cause a ground bounce for a free combo.

Hard Knockdown noun

a state that some moves can inflict that causes your character to be knocked off their feet and requires time to get back up, in Fantasy Strike wake up animations are consistant at 38 frames across the entire roster.

Soft knockdown/Flip out noun

a move that does not cause a hard knockdown but still imposes a penalty for a small duration in which victim needs to recover from I.e Midori normal throw does not knockdown and instead ends with the opponent standing, or landing air hit onto an airbourne opponent will cause them to flipout and recover standing up.

Link noun

when a second action requires the first action to be completely finished(active and recovery frames) to combo. I.e Grave neutral A counter hit into neutral A.

Armor, Super Armor,Hyper Armor adj.

Usually being hit by a move will transition you into hitstun animation, when hit with a move whilst armored you will ignore the hitstun and instead finish the move you are currently performing usually involving landing your move on the opponent while they are stuck recovering, some armor types can absorb only one hit whilst some can absorb more. I.e Rook ground C has 1 hit of super armor whilst Rook ground Super has infinite hits of armor.

Low Profile noun, verb

a move that can in certain circumstances avoid other moves/projecties. I.e Lum can time his ground B panda ball special to roll under projectiles and thus avoid being hit.

Meaty Attack noun

an attack performed during okizeme designed to hit late in its active frames just as the opponent wakes up and thus provide a larger frame advantage.

Meter noun

a generic term that describes the various meter mechanics found in fighting games, in Fantasy Strike each character has a super meter and some characters have additional character specific meters I.e Geigers gear meter.

Mixup noun,verb

a action or sequence of actions that requires the opponent to guess which one to defend against. I.e after scoring a knockdown, Rook can choose to use a strike attack(requires blocking or a command throw(requires jumping), when waking up the opponent can only defend against one, and if they choose wrong then they will usually be hit by the attack.

Neutral noun

when both players are not in any advantaged or disadvantaged state, also the term for when no direction is pressed on a joystick/pad.

Normal, Command Normal noun

denotes a type of attack usually performed with a single button press, a command normal has an additional directional input in addition to the face button.

Negative Edge noun

this is a system mechanic that exists in most fighting games that causes the release of a button to count as an additional input for that button, this mostly decreases the difficulty when timing attacks as ;ess precision is needed, no attacks require specific button release currently in Fantasy Strike.

Okizeme noun

used to describe what the offensive player is doing during an opponents wakup/recovery, usually via meaty attacks, mixups or other strategies.

Pressure noun

defines one player attacking another relentlessly with moves that leave them very advantaged or that do not leave much space for a counter attack.

Proximity Block noun

blocking is triggered by several factors during an attack and when holding back can ocasionally enter the blocking animation when an attack would in fact not actually hit you(usually due to fuzzy game logic that accounts for player movement/latency/rollbacks e.t.c)

Rekkas noun

shortened from Rekkaken a move from Street Fighter 2, involves a series of attack that are only able to be performed after a specific first move is performed. I.e Valerie ground B special cyan can lead into two additional attacks, magenta & yellow upon additional B inputs.

Reset noun

a strategy that involves deliberately dropping or ending a combo early in order to change into a different type of offense/mixup to potentially do more damage, in Fantasy Strike, hitting an airbourne opponent with a jumping move will cause a air flipout reset which can allow you to go into more offense or even bait your opponents counter attack.

Reversal noun,adj.

Is a move that usually has invincibility and moderate to long recovery used to interrupt during gaps in an opponents offense or to stuff certain okizeme options when waking up or leaving hitstun/blockstun.

Rushdown noun

this denotes a certain style of play that involves constant attacking in close proximity that gives your opponent very little time for offense as they spend most of their time defending against you.

Shoryken, DP, SRK noun

denotes a specific type of move that has invincible startup, long recovery, and a jumping/rising motion. I.e Jaina's ground C dragon heart is invincible and travels up and forward along with having a very long recovery animation

Special noun

denotes a type of attack that usually requires a special command involving directional inputs followed by face button inputs like down, down forward, forward, A(A). In Fantasy Strike all special moves are one button without directional inputs, whilst some special moves can be modified with directional inputs.

Super noun, adj.

This is a type of attack that consumes meter and is typically followed by a superfreeze. In Fantasy Strike you can buffer inputs during your opponents superfreeze and the will be carried out at the first available opportunity assuming your not stuck unable to react (in hitstun/blockstun for example).

Vortex noun

a specific type of mixup that leads into another knockdown which then creates another opportunity to end with another knockdown, thus trapping them in a vortex until they guess correctly. I.e Rook can Choose between a normal throw that knocks down, a command throw that knocks down or neutral A that knocks down vs a downed opponent waking up.

Wake Up noun

describes the characters state after they have been knocked down as they go through a getting up animation and regain the ability to perform actions again.

Whiff noun

describes a move that has completely missed the opponent, some moves can have additional penalties on whiff I.e Lum ground C throw item will whiff if a melon is still active on the screen and have its recovery frame duration increased.

Zoning/ Keep Away noun

denotes a playstyle that involves trying to stay far away from an opponent while barraging them with ranged attacks to gain advantage. I.e Argagarg filling the screen with various fish and stretchy limbs to prevent the opponent from getting in.

Yomi noun

is a Japanese term meaning "Knowing the mind of the opponent", it is the ability to 'know' your opponent and thus act accordingly to what you expect them to do. I.e Argagarg wants to keep people away, if he 'knows' they are about to attempt to jump from mid screen he can start his upward stretchy punch to slap them out of the air, and when he catches them he can then follow up with a forward stretch punch that will combo.

Yomi Counter noun

A Fantasy Strike specific term, when you have no button inputs or directional inputs buffered you will always counter normal throws. These counters also grant you 100% of your super meter.

50/50 noun

a mixup that involves two options with the same statistical probability of options that forces the player to guess to defend against only one without the ability to react and thus require them to guess first. I.e Throw vs strike, strike vs command throw e.t.c

Frame Data Related Terms

Active noun

the period of frames in which an attack is 'active' and can hit the opponent

Blockstun noun

a specific animation that the defending player is forced into when successfully blocking an attack that usually prevents the player from acting other than additional blocking, duration is based upon the specific attack that lands, you cannot be thrown (normal or command) while in blockstun.

Frame noun

denotes the smallest unit of time in a fighting game, Fantasy Strike like most modern fighting games runs at 60 frames per second.

Frame Advantage/Disadvantage noun

the time difference in frames between the players that defines who can act first. I.e if Rook uses neutral A and it is blocked rook can act 3 frames earlier than the opponent.

Hitbox noun

a generic term that denotes the area of an attack that can hit the opponent, and that can be hit by the opponent.

Hitstop noun

when a character is successfully hit by an attack both characters are frozen in place at the time of impact(usually to infer a stronger feeling of impact). This can also increase the window in which moves can be buffered and thus makes combos easier. Most projectiles only cause hitstop on the victim of the hit

hitstun noun

a specific animation that the defending player is forced into when failing to block an attack and making the victim vulnerable to followup attacks, duration is based upon the specific attack that lands, you cannot be thrown (normal or command) while in hitstun.

hurtbox noun

denotes the area of a character can be hit by an opponents attacks.

Recovery noun

the number of animation frames that the player must wait for until they can perform another action, certain scenarios allow you to 'skip' recovery frames. I.e on hit or blow you can cancel most normals in Fantasy Strike into a special move

Startup noun

the time in frames an attack takes to startup, the move usually does nothing during startup but occasionally can have iframes or some kind of momentum. I.e Grave neutral A has 8 frames of startup, it does nothing until frame 9 when it becomes active and can hit the opponent.

Damage noun

Damage defines how hard a move hits, usually as a portion of maximum healh/hp. In fantasy strike most moves do 1 damage with some multi hitting and special moves inflicting more. I.e Rooks ground super does 3 damage, whilst valerie's back A has two active sections and can do 1 or 1 plus and additional 1 damage

iFrames noun

denotes frames in which the character either has no hurtbox, is immune to being hit/damaged or has a modified hitbox that can avoid being hit in certain circumstances, common on reversals/dps.

Fighting Game Culture Related Terms

BnB, B&b, Bread and Butter noun

a standard combo, that is relatively simple yet effective, usually a core part of using a character.

Shoto noun

a type of character similar to Street Fighters Ryu, involves having a ranged projectile, a dp style reversal, whilst being balanced for both defensive and offensive play.

Grappler noun

a character arhetype whose primary gameplan is to get close and throw the opponent for high damage, grapplers usually have higher health pools and suffer with poor mobility options.

Main noun & verb

denotes the character that you either use exclusivesly or one of the characters you use/preffer the most.

Sub noun

your non main characters.

Mash noun, verb

to press buttons quite rapidly, often used to denote a lack of rational planning.

“what are you doing?”

“just trying to mash out a reversal?”

Runback noun, verb

synonym for a rematch.

'Tech', Technology noun

loosely defines tactics, strategy, combos, e.t.c utilised and worked on by players throughout the lifespan(and even after!) of a game. not to be confused with teching that involves recovering from knockdown(game specific)

“developed offensive tech when using X char in Y scenario”

Hard Read verb

when you correctly predict what the opponents next action will be. Loosely related to yomi layers.

Zoner noun

denotes a character with a playstyle that involves lots of keepaway and long range projectiles, they usually suffer in close quarters combat with less up close defensive options.

Unga noun

valerie