Fighting Game Guide

Assists

Assist attacks happen independently from the active character but they still follow the same rules of all attacks as they have startup, active, and recovery frames.

It can be difficult to punish an assist because your opponent's active character will hit you to save their teammate. If you do manage to get a good punish on one there are some limitations. You usually can't throw assists and attacks that transition into cinematics don't work on assists.

There are also less restrictions when it comes to comboing assists which means that when assists get comboed they almost always get killed if the active character doesn't save them. Typically damage is unscaled, hitstun deterioration does not apply, all knockdowns are hard knockdowns, and combo rules do not have to be followed. For example, in Marvel vs. Capcom it's not possible to have more than one wall bounce in a single combo but when comboing an assist that rule does not apply.

If you hit an assist but you can't kill it don't spend any meter. There's a chance that their recoverable health can heal completely while they are in reserve. If you ever catch both the active character and an assist in the same combo try to kill one of the characters even if it costs a lot of meter. You have the rare opportunity to kill one of their characters and heavily damage the other one, if not kill them both. Killing two characters on a team in one combo is called a Happy Birthday, and killing three characters in one combo is called a Merry Christmas.

Different types of assists

Reversal assist: A defensive assist that can be invincible and is often a good anti-air. It's essentially a DP in assist form. In most team games it's not possible to call assists during blockstun or hitstun which means you have to call the assist preemptively.

Zoning assist: An assist that occupies a certain part of the screen. The most common assists are projectiles like fireballs, laser beams, and missiles.

Spacing assist: An assist that is used for creating distance or closing distance. The assist helps you position yourself where you want to be. Players can call an assist then hide behind it like a shield to protect their approach.

Mix-up assist: An assist that is a high attack, low attack, or throw. It helps create deadly mixups.

Multi-hitting assist: This assist can be used for extending block pressure or combos. They are called lockdown assists when used to keep your opponent in blockstun longer. To combo off of multi-hitting assists you might have to call the assist before the combo begins.

Pushblock

Pushblock is a defensive mechanic performed during blockstun that increases pushback on blocked attacks but locks your character in blockstun for a predetermined amount of time. There's a high pushblock for high attacks and mid attacks and a low pushblock for mid attacks and low attacks.

The character continues to automatically block at the level they pushblocked until they leave blockstun. That means after a high pushblock, I continue blocking high and mid attacks even if I let go of the blocking input. I can high pushblock and then crouch block to block high, mid, and low attacks all at once.

Pushblock typically has you locked in blockstun longer than if you had blocked normally unless you're pushblocking an attack with an absurdly large amount of blockstun. That means that you can't punish unsafe on block attacks and don't “get your turn” back after pushblocking. Still, pushblocking will help you more than it will hurt you.

If pushblock has no startup or recovery how can it be punished? Blockstun is short in most games so pushblock is used predicatively and not reactively. Most players input the pushblock command before they begin blocking an attack. Beat pushblock by never putting your opponent in blockstun and what they inputted will come out instead. Have a punish for that. Let's take Marvel vs. Capcom for example. Pushblocking is done by pressing any two attack buttons in blockstun. If I don't put my opponent in blockstun and they press those two buttons, they perform a dash instead. I want the dash to come out instead of pushblock because I can punish it.

You also can cancel a blocked attack into a forward moving attack to stay close.

Unblockable attacks are an unavoidable part of tag fighters. If the point character attacks high and the assist attacks low, there isn't much the player can do to defend against this because they will get hit either way. The best thing to do is to avoid putting yourself in this situation in the first place. Don't give your opponent the opportunity to setup an unblockable.

In the first example, she tries to stand block to avoid the unblockable but she gets hit by the low attack then the high attack. In the second example, she successfully blocks the low attack but gets hit by the high attack while she's still in blockstun. She gets hit either way.

Getting sandwiched in team games is the worse kind of unblockable because there is minimal pushback and can result in very long and damaging combos. Actually perhaps it's more accurate to say that there's negative pushback because the sandwiched character is not going anywhere. Make sure to pushblock to prevent yourself from getting hit by sandwich unblockables.