Guilty Gear X2 - Baiken FAQ By: Paul Benson (pbenson@wheatonma.edu) Legal Stuff: ~~~~~ All trademarks and copyrights contained in this document are owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders. This may not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal, private use. It may not be placed on any web site or otherwise distributed publicly without advance written permission. Use of this guide on any other web site or as a part of any public display is strictly prohibited, and a violation of copyright. ~~~~~~ *Whew* Okay, welcome to my first FAQ! I swear... All this legal stuff scares the crap outta me. First time I played GGXX, I saw Baiken and immediately thought she was the coolest and hottest lookin’ piece of woman I’d seen in a long time. Obviously I chose her. She’s got AN eye! Not even A or TWO but AN eye (if you don’t get it, ask an English teacher). Anyway, Heya, and welcome to reading my very first FAQ! FAQ note1: When I make fun of the characters and stuff, please understand that I’m joking 99% of the time. FAQ note2: Please understand that FAQ note1 is a joke. ::::::::::::::::: :Baiken Overview: ::::::::::::::::: NOTE: This FAQ is written for normal Baiken. Not EX, not Gold, or Shadow (black) Baiken. I’ll give more attention to those versions later, but primarily this FAQ is for normal Baiken. Baiken is a great character. She’s brutal, she’s crafty; she’s this compact bag of tricks that is divinely devilish to use. Her strengths are that she’s fast, has a good move list, and is defensive. Her weaknesses are that she’s close range, poorly limited offensively, her damage ratio suxs, and she’s defensive. The fact that she is defensive can either be a blessing or a curse, depending on what you do with it. Baikens’s strengths are strong indeed. She may not have much, but what she DOES have is pretty good. She is one of the quickest characters in the game. Combine that with quick attack speeds and she doesn’t have to guard cancel moves if she can stop them before they happen. Her second strength is her move list. It is awesome. Baiken has enough creative potential in her move list to adapt to and do just about anything. However, she only gets this strength when on the defensive. A crazy kamikaze Baiken is one of two things: dead or lucky, and I’m betting on the first. Baiken has severe weaknesses. She is pitifully limited when going on the offensive often having to resort to tricks and short painful combos to get any noticeable damage done. Her second weakness is that her range is absolutely pathetic. Unless she is within melee range, she can’t do much, her chain grab being her only long ranged move (and even that’s kinda slow). This means that for Baiken to do any sort of damage she has to be uber close to her opponents, which is troublesome against characters like Ky who can throw projectiles all day. Baiken’s third weakness is her damage ratio. She takes damage the fourth most poorly in the game. Strategically this means that Baiken’s opponents have to hit her less then she has to hit them (with the exceptions of Millia, Chipp, and Kliff). Baiken’s last weakness is also one of her strengths, that she is defensive. She is forced to be on the defensive too much due to her loss guard cancels. Baiken could never match Sol or Venom or Johnny on open offensive ground. In conclusion to this basic strategical overview of Baiken, I conclude that Baiken has to be on the defensive, all the time. However, there are many ways to be defensive and still do damage. Being watchful, being careful, using counters, using her speed and mobility to be lithe, and using the tricks within are all good methods of turning the tides in Baiken’s favor. :::::::::::::::: :Game Mechanics: :::::::::::::::: Psych Burst: ~~~~~~~~~~~ New to Guilty Gear is the idea of a Psych Burst. When you pull these things off, you can kill a combo or possibly get a full tension bar depending on how the Psych Burst is used. As your life decreases, the rate at which you gain psych (ultimately to do another psych burst) increases. If you just use psych, while neither being hit or hitting, you expend 2/3 of the psych bar. If you use psych while being hit, being staggered, leaning backwards, being thrown, or guarding you use all your psych. BUT if you manage to smack your opponent, you regain 1/3 of the psych bar. Finally, if you manage to hit your opponent with your psych burst like an attack, you gain a full tension bar. Damage ratio: (life) ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Well, obviously Sammy is doing it right with her damage level and stuff, because as a smoker, Baiken has a decreased damage ratio. Snake (from MGS) always took smoking damage, and so does Baiken. However, like snake, Baiken has grit. As Baiken’s life bar is slowly drained and depleted through a round, she starts getting angry... This is represented in the game by her altered damage ratio. As Baiken gets closer and closer to being KO’d, she takes less and less damage. What this means to you and me is that Baiken cannot trade hits. She will almost always have to deal more damage to her opponents then they have to do to her, and your opponents can afford to trade blows with you all day long because they know they’ll win out in the end. The solution is that you have to hold to Baiken’s strategy (being defensive) to hold on to every scrap of life you have. Tension: ~~~~~~~ Tension is life for the Guilty Gear player. The more tension you have, the more you stuff you can do. Overdrives, faultless defense, dead angle attacks, roman candles, and the timer for Instant Kills... Tension allows you to do a lot of stuff. The problem is, GGXX rewards offensive actions with tension, and if you stay passive or defensive for too long, you are penalized with all your tension being taken away. This is bad for Baiken, obviously. Since she’s a defensive character, she is usually at higher risk for losing her tension. Also, since your opponent is most likely doing offensive stuff while you’re being defensive, he/she will probably get more tension faster, giving him/her more options. The good news is that there are tricks you can use to get more tension rather quickly. (See tricks) Stagger: ~~~~~~~ Also new to GGXX are staggers. In a stagger, your opponent will be unable to block, attack, or move. This allows for many interesting new tricks (chain grabbing into Baiken’s Sanzu Watashi... *grin*), but also potentially a big problem. If Baiken gets staggered, she’s a sitting duck. Take some time, go through the game and figure out who does what to get you staggered, and how long it’ll take you to get out of it. It’s a painstaking process, but better that then getting staggered in front of a good dizzy player with 50% tension... *cringe* Faultless Defense: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ That green li’l shield is going to be your best friend. Venom’s dark angel overdrive chipping you down? Faultless. Can’t get enough space between you and Chipp with basic blocking? Faultless. IS Ky hoping to kill you with guard damage at the end of a round? Faultless. Faultless defense fixes all. It backs up your opponent more then a normal block, and it stops people from cutting your health as if it were a roll of salami (salami slices... they’re REALLY thin... yea). The catch is that tension feeds faultless. While in faultless defense, your tension bar is constantly being drained. So, learn to use faultless along with dash breaks and Baiken’s Suzuran to conserve tension. Air Recovery: ~~~~~~~~~~~~ 98% percent of the time, you can air-recover strait out of the air by pushing punch and kick (P+K) simultaneously along with the directional button that you want to recover to.. Some moves, like Johnny’s second level mist finer, have secondary effects beyond pain like not allowing air recoveries. Added onto this nifty and highly useful feature is that you can redirect which direction you’re going to recover to. Also, you can double jump again after an air recover, or air dash, but not both (at least not with Baiken *sigh*) Air Dash: ~~~~~~~~ The air dash is absolutely essential. Don’t over use it, as Baiken isn’t exactly at her best in the air. Air dashes are useful for quickly closing and retreating from an enemy, but be careful as you’re defenseless when you dash. Also, start to run and then jump and push forward (6686 in numpad) you’ll automatically airdash, for only having to push it ONCE. You move quick and fast and pretty much bee-line it to your opponent. Jump Cancel: ~~~~~~~~~~~ When you look at any particular move being done, you’ll notice that it consists of a certain amount of frames of animation and time in order for the move to go from start to completion. A jump cancel is where during a move (that can be JC’d) you push up, and you interrupt the move into a jump. The cHS for example. Normally it hits three times, but if you push up after the first hit, you jump, canceling the other two. You use this to cut the lag time on moves, mostly. Roman Candles: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Roman Candles are where you push three attack buttons and hey, you just stopped whatever it was that you were doing. You can stop an overdrive (the use would be if you were about to be attacked), you can cut recovery time off moves to continue/repeat a combo... they’re pretty nifty. Not as nifty for Baiken though, because she has a lot better uses for 50% then a continued combo. There’s also FRC’s (Fake Roman Candles) that work exactly like RC’s, but the timing is horribly picky about when you can pull them in a move. It’s a trade-off though, because they only cost 25%. Jumps: ~~~~~ Baiken as well as any other character, has lots of methods of jumping. Too bad she isn’t as skilled as Dante (DMC joke), but she can hold her own. There are double jumps, and high jumps. A double jump is jumping (pushing up again) again when you’re already in the air. Chipp has a triple jump, Dizzy can double air dash, but Baiken? She just gets the shaft and the normal, double jump *sigh*. Then there’s the high jump. There’s a sorta surreal shadow following Baiken as she jumps higher then a normal jump but not as high as if she double jumped, but she can still air dash after high jumping. After a double jump, Baiken gets to fall back to the ground where your opponent is most likely already waiting for you. Being in the air is dangerous for just that reason. Baiken can only do so much in the air before she exhausts all her options, so be careful. Guilty Gear Mode: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ So, you just completed all 60 story modes and you got through Justice’s story? Awesome! You just got three new characters and Guilty Gear Mode!! GG mode is the bomb. Think about two flies stuck in a jar, and that’s regular. Now, think about two hyper flies hopped up on who knows what stuck in a jar, and that’s GG mode. It’s faster, the physics are looser, air dashes can be done so close to the ground... and just about everything can be jump canceled. It’s nifty. ::::::::::::::::::::::: :New controller set up: ::::::::::::::::::::::: Hmm, after playing Guilty Gear X for so long, I began to really want to re-customize the controller, because there were plenty of shoulder buttons doing plenty of nothing :P Now, thanks to the awesome might that is GGXX, you can! Alright, I know that sounded like a REALLY bad radio commercial... In any case I got really tired of jamming 3 buttons or all 4 for the Roman Candle or the Instant Kill. My fingers thank whoever was it that decided to revise the button editing system. I say set it to default and then change the “P K Sâ€￾ to R2, and the “P K S HSâ€￾ button to L1. Taunt goes to L2, and Dust is where it was at R1. This way you have easy access to RC’s, and an IK (if you need it) ::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :Move list & Pros and Cons: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::: In this move list I’m going to go through each move and explain it’s usefulness to Baiken. Format: ~~~~~~ P= punch K = kick S = slash HS = hard slash JC = jump cancel RC = roman candle FRC = fake roman candle D = dust attack T = Taunt button Forward = f Backward = b Jumping = j Crouching = c Quarter Circle (starting from the down position) = qc (Note: ‘qcf’ would mean quarter circle forward, just like a standard Capcom fireball) Half Circle = hc (Note: ‘hcf’ would mean you start pushing backwards, and then move counter clockwise to forward, and vice versa with ‘hcb’) Dragon Punch = dp (Note: the name comes from the standard Capcom shoto fighter dragon punch, to which the motion is a ‘z’ shape on the controller) NOTE: When/if you do research on Baiken, you’ll find some people use numpad notation. Look at your number pad (the part of the keyboard that resembles your phone), take out the 5, and consider that your d-pad on your controller. So, for example, the dragon punch would be ‘623’ in numpad notation. I don’t use it here, because this is more of a beginner/intermediate FAQ then anything. *whew* Alrighty, now that we got the format out of the way so everyone can understand what in the world I’m talking about if I say fHS (forward+HS). Onto the moves! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ BASIC ATTACKS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Standing Punch: Middle (P) -------------- Baiken pokes at the opponent with the hilt (saya(?)) of her katana. It is a pretty weak move (only 8 damage), but not without its advantages. Baiken is quite skilled at pulling off little 4-5 hit combos using this to start them off. Baiken can also use the quick speed of this move to counter a lot of standard moves out there. Main use: a combo starter or counter. RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Standing Kick: Middle (K) ------------- Baiken shows off her feminine flexibility (don’t make fun or she’ll cut you :P) by lifting her foot about stomach level and kicking her opponent in the gut. This is a move that is generally not used so often, although its off-beat timing is helpful during ‘time game’ tricks. Baiken also moves ever so slightly closer to her opponent after using this move. Main use: time games RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Standing Slash: Far – Middle / Close – High (S) -------------- First of all there are two versions of this move, one that is close, and one that is further away. For the far slash, Baiken pulls her katana out horizontally and rips it through the stomach/chest level of the opponent. In the close slash, it looks like Baiken pulls the katana out strait up, and then stabs it into the opponent. These are two VERY important moves. I swear... with the amount of times you’ll use any of her slash moves, you’d think she’d wear triangle earrings pledging her allegiance to Pythagoras (math joke). It’s got good reach and comes out at a nice speed. It’s also easily used in or to start a combo. Main use: general purpose ground attack(s) RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Standing Hard Slash: Middle (HS) ------------------- Baiken does a crazy hand movement and brings a diagonal overhead strike down on her opponent. It’s pretty fancy, and it’s a pretty good combo finisher. Good reach, but S is quicker... Main use: general purpose ground combo finisher RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Forward Punch: Middle (for both hits) (fP) ------------- Alright, in this move Baiken smashes her elbow (her only elbow I might add) into the opponent’s chest area and then swings her palm up and hits them in the face. This is generally a less used move, I think. I suppose you could use it for bragging rights: “Hah! I punched you in the face!â€￾ but that ain’t cool. The oddity of the timing makes this move not really good for combos, but semi-effective in using Time games on the opponent. Main use: Time Games (although not the BEST choice, it works) RC: Yes FRC: no JC: yes Forward Kick: Middle (fK) ------------ This move looks exactly like the standing kick, except that Baiken scooches herself forward more. However, the fK is different because fK cause opponents to STAGGER. It’s not automatic though, you have to counter-hit their moves in order to get the stagger, but if you get it, they will have hell to pay for being so close to Baiken and defenseless... I almost feel bad, almost. Main use: staggering / time games RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Forward Hard Slash: High (fHS) ------------------ This is a good one. Just watch this move a few times, ‘cuz damn it looks painful. Baiken spins and grabs her katana and swings it overhead bringing all her momentum and muscle to push the katana as deeply into her opponent as she can. It’s her strongest single move, but also one of her slowest. Not too good for combos (although a roman candle can fix that...), and much more useful for the follow up trick, I think. Main use: Follow up trick / causing pain RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Jumping Punch: High (jP) ------------- I think this is another commonly used Baiken move. In the air, Baiken kinda opens her mouth and throws and does a backhand punch in the air and conks her opponent in the head. This move is good for a lot of the same reasons that the forward punch, or the standing punch is: countering, combo starting, and combo filling. Not so good with range though, I’d still go for the jS, but this is still a useful move due to how fast it is. Main use: combo starting, combo filling, countering RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Jumping Kick: High (jK) ------------ Okay, in this move Baiken does the splits in mid-air and breaks her foot off on her opponent’s head (I wonder where Ky is lookin’ now...). This is a good move. Why, you ask? It is one of Baiken’s two moves that launch her opponent in the air! Why is launching important? Launching = air combos. Main use: Launching RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Jumping Slash: High (jS) ------------- This is Baiken’s key to air defense. Out of her sleeve of tricks and goodness, a huge black metal spiked piece of death extends to smash whatever is in its way. It’s got great reach, speed, and damage ain’t bad. A backwards jump and a jumping slash can work wonders. Usually special moves (moves that show up on the game’s move list) have priority, but Baiken’s jS beats out a lot of them. This move should be ready at all times in you’re going to be in the air. Main use: Air defense RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Jumping Hard Slash: High (jHS) ------------------ Ahh, the jHS. In this move, Baiken pulls out the Katana and stabs it strait down into an opponent. I cringed a little first time I saw it, it looked like it hurt so bad. This is another strong move, but slower then most of her moves. I think it’s really good for falling air defense. When falling (like out of an air recovery high in the air) pull it out. Sometimes your opponent won’t expect it and you’ll get a nice hit in. It’s hard to combo, but it’s possible. Usually your opponent will just block giving you the right of way all the way down. Main use: Falling air defense RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Crouching Punch: Middle (cP) --------------- For this move, Baiken in her crouch, and extends her hand apparently jabbing her hand into her opponent. Looks like something out of a Kung-Fu movie... It’s good for the high and low games, as well as being useful for combo starters and filling open spaces in combos. Main use: High and Low / Combo starting / Combo filling RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Crouching Kick: Low (cK) -------------- A more interesting attack of Baiken’s, she twists her body a bit and smacks her opponent with the butt of her sword sheath. This is an extremely important move to Baiken, because it’s one of her few moves that actually hit low. This makes it incredibly important for the high and low trick. Out of five of her crouching attacks (don’t forget the cD) this is one of two that actually hit low. Baiken’s sweep is a knockdown, so there isn’t too much combo ability there. With the crouching kick, Baiken hits low AND has a good opportunity to combo. Main use: High and Low RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Crouching Slash: Middle (cS) --------------- This is a cool lookin’ good move. Baiken shoots a crystal spike fan’ish looking thing to gouge into the opponent. The use of this move comes from its speed (although the cP is faster...), but more importantly its range. It can hit from a little under half a screen. It works to kill dashes into Baiken from a distance (chances are your opponent isn’t expecting a counter attack before he/she even gets off an attack), it works to use distance in the high & low game, and it’s pretty quick speed doesn’t hurt. Main use: Dash defense / distanced melee attack RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Crouching Hard Slash: Middle (cHS) -------------------- This is one of Baiken’s most useful ground moves. While crouching she curls up a bit and lets the katana spin in her hand slicing up your opponent up to three times. This hits people jumping into you, running at you, it juggles opponents for a hot second (only if you caught them in the air), and you can defend with it to push an opponent back (use faultless defense to create a little more distance). Main use: General Purpose defensive move RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dust Attacks ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dust attack: Middle (D) ----------- For Baiken’s Dust, she braces herself and throws out her hand as if to throw a fireball. A big yellow blob appears (energy?) and shoots Baiken’s opponent into the air. Usually, the idea is to jump up right after doing this dust attack and do a long brutal combo in the air and cut a sizable chunk of life of your opponent’s life bar. This is move is very slow for Baiken, which makes it a lower priority move because of lengthier piece of time it takes to pull it off. Could try to precondition an opponent to block low and try it though, I suppose. What this move also does is create some heavy duty distance. Main use: Launcher into a brutal combo RC: yes FRC: no JC: pretty obvious :P (yes) Sweep: Low (cD) ----- In this move Baiken looks like she’s break dancing. She crouches, kicks off the ground, and stylishly pivots off her one and only hand sweeping her opponent off his/her feet knocking them down. Very similar to a SF (Street Fighter) sweep. I’ve found most SF bred fighters don’t know about Guilty Gear sweeps, which is their loss, but it’s a must for any Baiken user. Sweeping is quick, it has some range, and allows for an easy follow up fHS trick. Also, it is Baiken’s other low hitting attack (the first one is the cK), so it is useful for High & Low games. Pulling out a sweep catches a lot more people (or computer opponents for that matter) in the heat of combat then you’d expect. Especially if done in repetition. Main use: Hitting Low / High & Low tricks RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Aerial Dust Attack: High (jD) ------------------ This is Baiken’s funkiest looking move. What seems like a couple green octopus tentacles with yellow suction cups come out of her sleeve to shoot a blast to knock the opponent back. It comes out fairly quickly, gives Baiken some breathing room (this goes back into mobility) since it backs her up a bit. The aerial dust attack also makes for a nice alternative to the Youzansen in ending air combos. The fact that this move is FRC capable is what separates it from the Youzansen as a combo ender. If you FRC, and if you’re gutsy, you can also FRC (the timing on FRC’s is hard to figure out, I know) into an air dash and try to give you opponent more hell since they have to recover out of it. It looks funky, but it’s a pretty cool move. Main use: Alternate combo ender, creating distance, mobility RC: yes FRC: yes JC: no ~~~~~~ Throws ~~~~~~ Note/Suggestion: Throws... are in some social circles considered cheap and disrespectful to your opponent. There are reasons for this. Specifically that they do a lot of damage (almost as much as Baiken’s fHS) for one move, and are extremely easy to use. Personally, I think they’re not the easiest move to pull off in GG, Baiken is a brutal character (so why not use brutal tactics?), and combos are preferred over throws because more damage can be done. As a nicety, you may want to ask about friends opinions on throws before an argument starts. Standing Throw: (you cannot block throws) (fHS CLOSE) -------------- In this move, Baiken grabs her opponent throws him/her on the ground, and stabs him/her in the back with her katana before kicking him/her to the other side of the screen. Pretty painful lookin’. Using the Suzuran is an easy way to get close and throw, although they can throw you just as easily (throws go through blocks, remember?). Also, if you throw into a corner, you can buy a little juggling time. If you’re not in the corner, you can chase after the throw and use the follow up fHS trick. Main use: lots of damage / creating space RC: no FRC: no JC: no Air Throw: (can’t block throws) (jfHS CLOSE (or jbHS)) --------- In the air, Baiken pulls two HUGE hooks, catches her opponent, and swings him/her underneath Baiken and tosses him/her to the other side of the screen. She throws her opponent to the opposite side that you push. So if you do jfHS, she throws you opponent behind you, and vice versa. Practice this move some, to find out the placement, because figuring how high or far away you can/have to be to air throw is a good thing to know. Main use: lots of damage / creating space RC: no FRC: no JC: no ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Special Moves ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Suzuran: N/A (hcb+K) ------- This is probably one of Baiken’s less popularly used moves. For this move Baiken draws her sword and quickly (faster then her standard run) dashes towards her opponent parrying anything that hits high or middle. Overdrives, instant kills, Ky’s projectiles, Suzuran blocks them all. Baiken moves somewhere between a third and a half of the screen, and keep in mind that she can NOT use faultless defense while this move is going on, so blocking via this move can be quite painful if used against you. The use of this move comes in its application. It can be used to get to a turtled opponent (be careful, as you can be still be thrown), or it can be used for an extra slice of mobility since it is quicker then her run. Main use: closing the distance between you and your opponent RC: no FRC: no JC: no Tatami Gaeshi: Middle (qcf+K) (Can be done in Mid-Air) ------------- This is the infamous Tatami. Learn to love Tatami, because the Tatami mat is as important to Baiken as air is to a human being. In this special move, Baiken raises her leg and brings it down with a thud, kicking a Tatami mat into existence. I don’t know how Arcs thought this one up, but it works. A good rule to hold by is “When in doubt, Tatami.â€￾ It’s got good range, and it *launches.* Launches = air combos. The speed on this move is adequate, but the large weakness is that there is space between Baiken and where the Tatami comes out that an opponent can stand in and not take damage. So, if your opponent is too close, you just left yourself completely open. On the other hand tho, if they’re just close, you can use Tatami to push them back a bit. Baiken loves Tatami. For breakfast, for lunch, for snacks, and for dinner. She loves looking at Tatami, she loves feeling Tatami, but most of all, Baiken loves kicking Tatami into opponents. Main use: General purpose offense/defense move RC: no FRC: yes JC: no Youzansen: High (air only) (dp+S) --------- This is Baiken’s aerial close-quarters offensive move. Also, just about every air combo you ever do should be finished with this move. For this move, Baiken draws her katana in the air and makes this 270 degree swing over her head and ends it strait down. For range I’d still go with the jS, or air Tatami, but this move works well. There is also a trick of sorts to get this move done close enough to the ground to hit standing opponents, but look for that in tricks. Main use: Air combo finishing / Close Quarter Aerial Combat RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Kabari: Middle (hcf+HS) ------ This is a fun move. Baiken sorta winds up as if to throw a baseball, and then shoots a grappling claw out of her sleeve to grab her opponent and drags him/her over to where Baiken is. This is one of her stagger moves, so chain grabbing and then launching into a combo/super is a pretty good idea. This move is super important because it’s Baiken’s ONLY range attack. The problem with it is that it’s slow from far away, and from closer range there are better moves to choose. Still, it’s a good move, one that should be studied and learned. Main use: Long ranged attack RC: yes FRC: no JC: yes Tetsuzansen: Middle (Immediately after Kabari: S) ----------- This is the follow up move to the Kabari. After Baiken chain grabs her opponent and drags their pitiful carcass over to her, she cuts them back into the air. If Baiken gets her opponent from too far away, she’s our of range for this move, so don’t bother... occasionally, you play against a stupid person who stops blocking after the Kabari, and then gets hit by this, but that seems more like a preconditioned tactic... You can also RC this into a high jump for some extended combo’s. Main use: extra follow up damage from Kabari RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Guard Cancels: ------------- Note: Youshijin and Sakura are capable of RC’s, but not Mawarikomi. None can FRC or JC. Second Note: All of these moves are done the same way, being different only in what attack button you press. They all go from guarding stance (back) rotating counter-clockwise to down, plus the attack button. Baiken, is the almighty queen and ruler of all things counter like. When on the defensive, she can do soooo much damage it makes Sol cry for his momma to make the torture stop (does he even have one?). The point is, these guard cancels are at the core of what makes up a good Baiken; being on the defensive. A Baiken player that plays without guard cancels or without being on the defensive hasn’t even tapped her/his creative potential with tactics and strategy. It’s a good thing to know that these counters can and do and will fail sometimes. However, that being said, do these counters right, and your opponent will be stuck between choosing to getting countered or getting pressured. Youshijin: Middle(?) (P) ~~~~~~~~~ For this counter, Baiken shoots an anchor (What the...) into the ground, only to have it go strait back up and slam into the opponent. I think Baiken bribed her with a cookie, knocked her out and stole her anchor... Anyway, if your opponent jumps into this counter, it hits, but they don’t go up. If you hit a standing opponent with it, they go flying. I don’t have the frame data to back this up, but I believe it’s her fastest counter as well. Definitely an improvement over the GGX version... Main use: Anti-air guard cancel / Launcher RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Mawarikomi: N/A (K) ~~~~~~~~~~ Baiken’s most difficult counter (to use effectively), this one allows Baiken to sidestep her opponent suddenly moving forward and turning around to her opponent’s back. Trying to get in close with this (example: getting around Ky’s projectiles) doesn’t work, you go a part of the way, turn around, and Ky fries you for breakfast with another one. The difficulty of this move comes from its slow timing. By the time Sol’s fHS finishes (a pretty slow move), Baiken doesn’t have much time to do anything that Sakura or Youshijin couldn’t do. Researching the timing and counter ability on this move is crucial. Get the timing right and instead you could’ve made that scrubby Sol eat a Sanzu Watashi. Main use: Laggy move guard cancel / getting out of the corner RC: no FRC: no JC: no Sakura: Middle (S) ~~~~~~ The easiest and most common of her counters, Baiken shifts to facing away from her opponent, and then shoves her katana into her opponents gut, shooting pink flame and whatnot all about. It’s pretty quick, and can end a lot of standard moves, specials, and supers dead in their tracks. Fast attacks will recover faster then you can get the counter out most of the time, which leaves you open, so be careful when you use this, and don’t use it too much. Main use: General purpose ground guard cancel RC: yes FRC: no JC: no ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tension Attacks ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (NOTE: All of these Tension Attacks cost 50% of your tension bar, so, if you don’t have 50%, you can’t perform these moves until you do get 50%) Dead-Angle attack: Middle (While guarding, push towards & 2 attack buttons) ----------------- For this move, Baiken pulls out her fP, while guarding. The speed of this counter is what makes it useful, although the extra speed may worth the 50% of your tension bar, especially when Baiken already has numerous counters already and they’re free. Main use: VERY quick countering RC: no FRC: yes JC: no Sanzu Watashi: Middle (qcf qcf+S) ------------- This is Baiken’s only offensive overdrive. She draws her katana, and spills blood three times with three cuts. She shouts out the Chinese characters “Tienâ€￾ (the same symbol that Akuma wears on his back) “Chiâ€￾ and “Ninâ€￾ for this overdrive as she executes each stroke. As Chinese characters are exceedingly complex, I won’t give out full meanings but the basic meaning should be “Heavenâ€￾ “energyâ€￾ and “people.â€￾ This move rocks. Learn it and learn it well, because you will probably end more opponents with this then any other move. This move does nice damage, and it has insane priority. Learn how to ‘time game’ with this move and your opponent will be hurting. Main use: Doing a lot of damage / Killing RC: yes FRC: no JC: no Baku: ---- (NOTE: All Baku moves are eligible for RC, but not FRC or JC. If you’re going to Roman Candle out of a Baku, you best have a GOOD reason because that’s 100% tension down the drain...) In these moves, Baiken is guarding and then rolls her arms about and smacks your opponent with a Chinese character. This set of four moves is what drives fear into the name Baiken. With these defensive overdrives you can do a myriad of things. You can make your opponent unable to jump, unable to do special moves (that includes tension moves), do less damage to you, and take more damage from you. You also get something of a small grace period with these moves as your human opponent attempts to figure out what curse you just gave him or her. The downside is these come out rather slow, so you have to have enough time to pull it off, or else your opponent will run away and that’s 50% tension down the drain. Pretty nifty though, eh? The trick about these moves, is figuring out which Baku is the right Baku for the right time. If you play someone you doesn’t jump and then put Baku Ki on them, it’s a waste of tension bar, because they don’t jump anyway! On the contrary, if you nail someone who only uses special moves with a Baku Rin, they’re paralyzed. What sucks is that the move lasts for only 14 seconds, which means that you have 14 seconds to do whatever it is you’re trying to do before your opponent is freed from the effect. That’s not a lot of time, so make it count. Baku Ki: Middle (on guard, hcb+P) ------- This move makes your opponent lose his or her ability to jump naturally. If a special move or tension move takes the character into the air, it still happens, but pushing “upâ€￾ don’t do squat for 14 seconds. Baku Rin: Middle (on guard, hcb+K) -------- This move makes your opponent lose his or her ability to use anything but the basic moves. So all those characters with exceedingly long command lists *cough Chipp cough* just lost ‘em, but only for 14 seconds. Baku Ryu: Middle (on guard, hcb+S) -------- This move makes your opponent do less damage to you. Think of all that damage potential that Potemkin has... and think of him being as scrawny looking as Bridget for 14 seconds. Make your grin fast, ‘cuz it lasts for 14 seconds. Baku Hou: Middle (on guard, hcb+HS) -------- *grin* With this move, you deal more damage. A lot more damage. Potemkin starts taking damage about as easily as Baiken does, while Chipp and Kliff start running for the hills... and well, I ain’t never seen Chipp run faster. He only runs for 14 seconds tho, so make it hurt for all you’re worth. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Instant Kill: Middle (P,K,S,HS, then qcf,qcf+HS) ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Baiken’s instant kill is where she flat out runs at her opponent and then the background changes, and you see two silhouettes of Baiken and your opponent, and then he/she just falls dead, the round is instantly over in your favor. The things to know about IK’s are that they’re not exactly the easiest moves to pull off, that if you have no tension bar it eats your life instead, and if you miss your tension bar is GONE (but only for the end of that round). If you’re playing Baiken and you miss an instant kill, your life for that round just got that much harder. Without the threat of the Baku, faultless defense, or Sanzu Watashi, your opponent should be wasting no time giving you so much punishment that Baiken just crumbles. That being said, IK’s are risky things. Great if you get it, but fatal if you don’t. ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :The Baiken Bag O’ Tricks (or sleeve...): ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Damn, this is gonna be fun to write. Okay, this is the bag. Baiken needs tricks, and brutal tricks at that. Beyond that, if you want to screw around with some friends, there are tricks for that too ^_^ The Follow up fHS: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is a crucial trick to learn. Any time that your opponent falls down or is going to fall down (being hit out of the air, being sweeped, whatever) immediately follow up with a fHS. Baiken will swing her blade into the opponent for some extra damage. It doesn’t hurt that much, but it’s noticeable. Some people will probably whine about hitting when they’re down, Baiken is quite the unforgiving character for that sort of thing. Dash Break: ~~~~~~~~~~ Basic basic trick. This is running in ready to block on a moments notice. You have to use the faultless defense though, otherwise you’ll do that skid stop of Baiken’s and pretty much run into your opponent saying “hellooooo, I’m a dumb Baiken and want to get smacked!â€￾ Time Games: ~~~~~~~~~~ Okay, the time game is where you alter the timing of the combo. Say you start attacking and the opponent is blocking, pause a split second, and continue the attack. What you’ll find is most of the time no one expects a change in your timing and rhythm, and you’ll have a whole new chance to continue combos and attacks. Working familiar combos are best (such as S-S-HS), but any move that comes out very quickly is perfectly fine. When the screen reads out “counter-hitâ€￾ just about every other second, or when you open up your opponent to do the same combo you just did again; you know you’re doing this right. Fake Cornering: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Since Baiken is a defensive character, it’s best to put her on the defensive, where she is at her most versatile. Fake cornering is where you deliberately put yourself in the corner to lure your opponent into attacking you. When this happens, and Baiken is on the defensive, it’s time to show them what a cornered and angry Baiken is all about. HOWEVER, note that being in the corner means that you better be highly prepared, because your opponent should waste no time giving you an exceptional amount of pressure. Time Traps: ~~~~~~~~~~ This is a different kind of trick and it’s completely useless if you’re playing with infinite time. The trick is that you stay on the defensive the whole round, chipping off life when it’s completely safe, and drawing the match out. As time goes on, this forces your opponent to attack and attempt to beat the Baiken defense. Otherwise, they’ll lose by time. Air Feints: ~~~~~~~~~~ As you’re probably noticing, most of these tricks and techniques revolve around the basic concept of getting your opponent to come after you, to be on the defensive, and punish them horribly the split second they’re vulnerable. The air feint is the same kind of trick. Air dash strait into them while pushing back on the controller. You’ll defend if they attack, but don’t use faultless defense, because they can see the green and may not fall for it. The goal of the trick is to get closer (like with Zato or Testament), or to lure them into attacking while your defending and leaving themselves open. High & Low: ~~~~~~~~~~ This is an interesting trick/strategy which should be familiar to most fighting gamers. The point is to get your opponent to expect you to attack either high or low, and then attack the other way. If they think you’ll go up, sweep. If they block low, give them pain with Baiken’s fHS. The key to the High & Low trick is the running crouch. From crouching, Baiken still has many crouching attacks which still hit middle, and less that hit low, but the point is that when crouching, your opponent doesn’t know whether you’re going to go high or low. Unfortunately, Baiken doesn’t have much for low hits, but see the move list (above) for more info on which moves you can use to hit low, middle and high. (NOTE: Baiken is so short that most high/middle/low attacks can be blocked simply by a low block) Defensive Tatami: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The defensive Tatami is when you jump backwards and create some Tatami. The effect of the trick is that A) you create a second or sob’s worth of air defense, and B) that Tatami will fall hurting (or at least forcing an opponent to block) your opponent. Learn to love the Tatami, and the Tatami will learn to love you. Tatami Flood: ~~~~~~~~~~~~ This trick is, to flood your opponent with Tatami. Every second you have is chipping at their life bar with Tatami guard damage. Jumping Tatami combined with standing Tatami, Tatami jumping forward... Tatami jumping back... if your opponent isn’t cursing the creators of Tatami, you ain’t making enough. In a corner, a Tatami Flood is a sight to behold. Plus, thanks to GGXX’s new addition of FRC’s to the Tatami, you can dramatically speed up some Tatami. Sometimes, at the end of a match, it’s a Tatami flood that will end the match through the excessive guard damage made by the Tatami. The Precondition: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This trick is all about setting up attacks in advance. It’s probably the hardest trick that I’m telling y’all about, because it’s high risk and the payoff is anything but guaranteed. The idea is to precondition your opponent to defend a certain way. For example: Baiken runs in and uses her fHS, then uses it again and again and again. The next time Baiken runs in, the enemy is to expect you to use Baiken’s fHS, but instead Baiken sweeps doing damage. This is preconditioning, and using that preset reaction you just spent some time working at to create an opening in your opponent. There are all sorts of ways to do it. I used to play a friend of mine who likes to play Chipp sometimes. I’d let him hit me with Chipp’s alpha blade, then let him hit me a few more times. Now, my friend thinks that he’ll keep getting me with the alpha blade, and that’s when I defend, like I could’ve done all along, and gave him a slice of hell that won the match. It’s a tough trick, because a lot of things can go wrong with it. It’s a gamble, but if you do it right, the payoff can be huge. The Baiken Legend: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is more of a social trick, but it’s fun sometimes. Here’s what to do: When playing with a group of friends, let everyone (regardless of skill) get you down to down to an itty bitty piece of life, before beating them. Also, when you beat them, it should be something stylish, like a special move, a combo, or Balkan’s triple slash, and then act like it was a tough battle. Sigh, compliment the player, and keep a poker face. If you do it right, everyone should start being like “Yo... we ALMOST got him (or her)!â€￾ and they’ll keep trying. Not too be overdone, I should add, but it’s an amusing trick. The real trick is that Baiken is at her best when the life bar is down. She starts taking less damage as her life bar goes down (only really matters with that last third though) and she gets burst more easily. Check out Gamecombo’s charts on guts and stuff for the %’s and numbers. Taunting: ~~~~~~~~~ If you can spare enough time in a match to actually pull off a complete taunt, I have to give mad props to you. Taunts take a bit of time to completely go through, but if you pull it off, my hat goes off to you. This isn’t a trick per se, but more for style points. Ground Youzansen: High ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is a tough trick to learn, it takes a while and some hard practice. Basically, you’re re-learning the dragon punch motion, backwards. You push down, then down and forward (last two-thirds of the youzansen), then up, and finally forward. Since you complete the motion for the Youzansen a split second after you jump, GGXX still recognizes the command, and you do a Youzansen so close to the ground it hits grounded opponents. It’s a nifty trick for combos and such, you should experiment. Tension Tricks: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ So, you need more tension, eh? Make Baiken run. Perform useless and meaningless Tatami. Air dash (towards the opponent). As long as you don’t stay still for too long, GGXX won’t take away your tension, and it rewards running towards opponents, air dashing, and special moves with tension. It’s not as good as actually attacking and hitting the opponent, but if you’re caught in a jam and need tension, it works. Doin’ the Kenshin thing: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For all us Kenshin lovers, y’know how Kenshin sees someone fight, or sees a technique, and after the first time it’s done it becomes useless to the opponent because Kenshin already knows how to counter it in a thousand different ways? Baiken does the same thing. When playing, you have to be very perceptive and watch what the opponent does. Offensive? Defensive? Does he/she like to jump a lot? Favorite Combo’s? Common attack patterns? Does she/he only use a few moves or all of a character’s moves? Within a relatively short space of time, Baiken needs to know her opponent better than they know themselves. Once you figure out how to read your opponents like books and adapt accordingly, your opponents don’t stand a chance. NOTE: There’s truth to that old saying “In the beginner’s mind there are many options, but in the master’s mind there are few.â€￾ Be cautious of beginning players, because there is no strategy to read. Come and Go: ~~~~~~~~~~~ A mobility trick, this is where Baiken comes very close to the opponent then backs up quickly in order to lure your opponent to coming after you. Once your opponent comes after you, it’s a matter of using Tatami or guard cancels or any number of her defensive moves. The risk of this trick is in the beginning and the follow up. You have to make sure you can get in close without getting hurt, and make sure that you can punish your opponent when they do come after you. Keepin’ a low profile: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This is a defensive trick by omission. Here’s how it works. When you play as Baiken, you’ll usually have particular combo’s or special moves that you prefer over another, just like your opponent. This trick is where you keep some of your special moves and combo’s under wraps and don’t use them. Then, when necessary or for style points, you pull out a style and trick that nobody ever thought you had. Because nobody has seen the trick before, it’s new territory and you’ll generally be able to do what you’re trying to do, assuming you pull the trick off successfully. Always try and keep a few secrets though. *grin* I think I can, I think I can: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As stupid as this sounds, if you go into a GGXX match depressed because your car died, your significant other is cheating on you, and you lost your job, you ain’t gonna do well. Instead, be thinking that that car was dying anyway, your significant other had all those annoying habits anyway, your job sucked, and you’ll probably do better in GGXX. Having the right attitude is the point here. Be firmly confident that you’re good and you’ll do fine. If you don’t think you can get to 999 in survival and kick that sorry Sol’s carcass, you never will. Try to have a good attitude! ::::::::::::::::::::::::: :Baiken against them all: ::::::::::::::::::::::::: NOTE: As an added cool thing to do, spend some time VS every character in training on the highest difficulty. It can be hard, yea, but you can also learn to adapt to the characters before you ever have to really face them. Familiarity with the enemy character will do miracles for you. 
About the CPU:  The computer’s main strength is its technical and cold
mathematical proficiency.  In training when you see the input commands, you may
notice that you pop in a few more buttons or directional buttons then
necessary.  The computer will never do that.  The computer’s thumb or wrist
will never get tired, and the computer will never get anxious, nervous, or
apprehensive.  Instead, the computer is a collection of numbers and various
complex patterns.  The problem with the computer is that it will never adapt to
particular strategy.  The CPU can never learn, because it can’t modify what
programming it was given.  So, when you find a trick and abuse the computer
with it, it will never realize that you’re doing the same thing, over, and
over, and over.

About Human Opponents:  Human opponents are much scarier then any computer. 
Think about 2000+ years of evolution sitting down to play some GGXX and you
begin to understand.  Human opponents are bundles of instincts and intuitions
that learn.  The same trick rarely works more then a few times on a human, a
human gets better over time, and what’s scarier, is that a human can learn to
pull your tricks on you, and you’ll fall for them.

Note about the “about’sâ€￾: Keep this stuff in mind when playing against
the computer or human opponents, because the strategies used against both will
vary.

 Ky Kiske:
 ~~~~~~~~

  Ky Kiske is probably the most basic and balanced fighter in GGXX, and Baiken
is probably the most defensive character in the game.  Consequently, a good Ky
can and will put Baiken on the offensive with projectiles, and then swat her
with his longer reaching sword when she gets to close (his defense ain’t
bad).  The key to beating this trap is to use Ky’s slower moves and
Baiken’s faster moves and speed against him.  Ky is generally slower then
Baiken; his moves are slower, and he’s slightly less quick on his feet. 
It’s a game of his reach and your speed here... and if you’re quicker then
his reach, it’s your win.


 Sol Badguy:
 ~~~~~~~~~~

  Ahh... Sol.  Sol is so completely offensive he doesn’t even know the word
“defense.â€￾  The 60 billion double dollar (Trigun joke ^_^) question is, is
your defense better then his offense?  Both characters are playing to their
particular strengths in this match.  Remember that his Ground Viper hits LOW,
then MIDDLE.  If you don’t change your guard to match, you’ll wind up in
the air.  Stay on the defensive and be VERY very fast.  Leave yourself open for
a second and Sol will give Baiken so much pain...  Watch, learn, and kick his
sorry carcass when you’re done.  With the amount of Sol players out there, a
little time to learn Sol is well spent for the amount of people you’ll send
home trying to figure out what went wrong.


 Potemkin:
 ~~~~~~~~

  This bub is a pain to kill.  Not that it’s overly difficult, but it takes
so damn long... *sigh* Anyway... Potemkin is SLOW.  Potemkin is STRONG. 
Potemkin is quite durable.  Use your ability to dash and his inability to keep
away and stay away.  If you get caught by that Potemkin Buster, you’re toast.
 Good Potemkin users try to cover up for his slow speed with his quicker
attacks. My advice is: BE CAREFUL.  He doesn’t have to hit you that much to
finish you... five fHS and you’re gone.  Use Baiken’s speed and mobility to
pick and choose exactly when you want to attack.


 Chipp Zanuff:
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  You those guys who get in your face about anything and don’t back up? 
Chipp’s like that.  He’s fast, yea, but he bruises in stiff wind.  Chipp is
one of the few characters that Baiken can afford to trade hits with, because at
the end of the round, Baiken will come out on top.  I’ve come to find that
there are generally two types of Chipp players.  The first kind are the ones
who simply seek to confuse you (teleports, limited invisibility) and chip off
life where they can.  The second kind is the kind that stay so close to Baiken
you can smell what Chipp had for lunch (usually using his quicker moves and
short combos).  The best Chipp I ever played gave me no more then the time it
takes me to blink before Chipp’s blade is halfway up Baiken’s rear. 
Remember that Baiken does NOT have to catch Chipp, she waits for Chipp.  Make
the Japanese wannabe come to Baiken, he will come.  Baku Rin works well,
considering how long Chipp’s move list is, and a Baku Hou is just brutal...
*grin*


 Jam Kuradoberie:


 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Jam, like Chipp, is a fast character.  She’s faster then Baiken anyway. 
The strategies used with Jam revolve around her ability to combo just about
anything.  Once you get hit, you’re taking pain.  Her charge moves leave her
open, her combo’s are usually 4-__ hits, and they just come out one after
another.  Learning Jam’s attack patterns and how and what she tends to do and
favor is paramount to your ability to block getting hit, since she’s usually
open after she fails a combo.  A Baku Ryu can help with the combo damage and
allow you to be more offensive...


 May:
 ~~~

  May is a hidden find.  Not a whole lot of people use her, but that anchor is
death.  She has moderate speed, she’s powerful, and she can take a hit.  May
has this anchor / restive rolling / dolphin strategy which is very basic and
works very well.  The trick is to keep your guard cancels ready and use lots of
tricks that leave her defense open, such as air feints, precondition, Suzuran,
etc.  Don’t be hasty, and cut her apart a piece at a time.


 Dizzy:
 ~~~~~

  Dizzy is a tough one.  Y’know, for a passive gear she sure packs a punch...
One word of advice is to be EXTREMELY careful once she gets 50% of her tension
bar and can launch into her accursed overdrives.  Lots of her moves are slower
then most in starting, but have really good recovery times.  Also, many of
Dizzy’s moves are projectiles and work with her excellent range.  The key to
beating her is to stay close, and very watchful.  Find the tiniest crack in her
defense and exploit it.  A Baku Rin can do miracles against Dizzy, killing all
of those annoying projectiles..


 Venom:
 ~~~~~

  As a friend of mine put it, Venom is the “Rushdown King.â€￾  What this
means is that Venom has a wide variety of projectiles and moves that allow him
to rush you from any number of directions stomping you to the ground.  His
“dark angelâ€￾ overdrive should never be blocked, but jumped over because it
will chip your life away like a jackhammer.  I swear... If Indiana Jones ever
saw that ball he’d piss his pants.  Making Baiken take a more offensive
strategy is the general idea.  Use Baiken’s speed and quick attacks to
counter and throw Venom off his guard.  Tatami floods can exert an amazing
amount of pressure, which is necessary to keep Venom pinned down.


 Johnny:
 ~~~~~~

 Oh man, is Johnny a tough one.  This bub is built to bear.  Alright speed,
good damage, good durability... *sigh* good Johnny’s are a paiiiiiiiin.  The
coins, the Bacchus Sigh, and the Mist finers... *oi* Johnny be good.  So what
do you do?  Be hella-careful.  Keep your distance.  Stay JUST out of range of
his fHS and mist finers.  If you see that smoke, run for your life.  A good
Johnny will smack the bejeezus out of you if you EVER get caught with that
smoke.  This match is where time games, high and low, precondition, air feints,
ANYTHING that could give Baiken an edge needs to be used.


 Bridget:
 ~~~~~~~

  I’ve heard that Bridget is the most popular character in Japan, and this...
sexually confused individual is pretty nifty.  He’s fast (it’s really a
he), and his move list has incredible variety.  That yo-yo of his can do
practically anything. His supers are quite strong.  The trick to beating
Bridget is to have prolonged exposure to him.  The more time that’s spent
around him, the less confusing his moves become and the easier it becomes to
see him for what he really is: dead.


 Millia:
 ~~~~~~

  Millia can be hard or easy.  She’s fast, has innovative moves (I ain’t
NEVER seen anybody ride their hair for a weapon), and has good combo ability. 
That Lust Shaker of hers is a huge pressure weapon.  She (unlike so many
characters) is pretty strong in the air, so staying in the air is bad and using
air feints against Millia is a good idea.  Do NOT get hit.  If you get hit on
the ground you can expect the combo to be around 9-15 hits long, and that it
will HURT.  She’s got a double air dash which allows her to move around
easier then Baiken, but her moves still don’t do so much damage.  She still
takes damage worse then Baiken, tho.  Even though her basic move list is very
capable of creativity and variation, her specials are... good the first time,
but they quickly grow old and seen, and adapted to.  She’s fairly easy
character to defend against, despite her speed.  Trade hits, pressure her,
watch her, and don’t stay on the ground or in the air long enough for her to
make use of it.


 Eddie (Zato-1):
 ~~~~~

  So I don’t confuse the lot of you, I’m referring to the character as
Zato, and the shadow as Eddie, just like GGX.  This dude rocks.  Good Zato’s
can crush Baiken like an ant if they ever get the first hit they need to start
the whole complex series of death they have plotted.  Eddie can be used to lead
and take a hit, so guard cancels are risky as Eddie could be hit and not Zato. 
And the pressure and zone strategies that Zato can pull off are just mind
boggling.  Mastering the timing of Baiken and the distance necessary to keep
safe is essential.  Offensive strategies generally fail due to Zato’s ability
to attack from afar while he is safe.  Using safe guard cancels, the Come & Go
trick (as well as plenty of others), tricky timing, and distance are all
necessary to bring Zato down.


 Faust:
 ~~~~~

  Faust is the craziest character I’ve ever seen.  Playing him is a pain
because he’s got long reach (he’s 9 feet tall!!), his moves may not combo
too easily, but he does good damage.  Also, he is so friggin’ unpredictable
that you have no idea of what this crazy bag lunatic is going to do.  The good
news is that his range costs him speed.  Most of his moves are highly laggy
(read: easy to punish).  Prolonged exposure to his moves (just like with Zappa)
is usually necessary since they’re rather unorthodox.  Another good thing to
keep in mind is that people choose Faust almost less than they choose Baiken to
master, so you probably won’t have to face master a Faust too often.


 Slayer:
 ~~~~~~

  The thing to know about Slayer is that he’s watching you as much as
you’re watching him.  He’s not so quick, but his teleport can be extremely
annoying, his dandy step can trick you (it has four things it can do (the last
is if Slayer does nothing)), and he takes damage almost as well as Potemkin. 
Also account for his one hit moves that do lots of damage.  Staying completely
on the defensive for too long is a bad idea.  The key to beating slayer is to
finding out when and where Baiken should counter, time game, or be mobile. 
Figure that out, and Baiken owns Slayer.


 Zappa:
 ~~~~~

  Zappa is great just for the shock value.  Most of his moves are so confusing
looking that the opponent isn’t really sure where the hits are coming from. 
Zappa needs orbs, and he’s gonna use all the evil spirits he can muster to
get them in order to get the big spirit.  The ghost spirits are used for ranged
attacks (don’t get hit or it’s gonna be like Testament and the bird).  The
dog is just annoying because it can just sit there like a mine and you forget
about it, and the sword is the most annoying of all, but it’s kinda slow, so
it’s easy to see coming.  Keeping a comfortable distance is a good safe way
of keeping Zappa from getting spirits, and poking works pretty nicely.


Axl Low:
~~~~~~~

  This guy has RANGE.  Most of his standard moves have immense range trapping
ability while Axl charges moves (he’s a charge character.)  He’s also quite
slow.  Beware his counters though, because good Axl’s can usually make those
count.  The Suzuran, the Kabari, and the air dash are really good moves to use
because of their ability to attack from afar or move in quickly.  Once close,
staying on guard and using counters is a good idea.

Anji:
~~~~

  Anji... What kind of crazy weirdo uses FANS for a weapon?  I mean, what’s
he gonna do, fan AIR at you?  *shrugs* I suppose it doesn’t really matter how
stupid they are when they’re beating you six feet under.  The fans allow Anji
to auto-guard (think the Suzuran) while attacking for some of his standard
moves (like the fHS, the HS, etc.)  He does supers with those fans, he creates
butterflies out of energy that attack you (and once again if you block) with
those fans, and he can snatch you out of the air and zap you with blue energy
with those fans.  Them fans are pretty beastly for fans.  Use your counters,
speed, and eye.  Having a good sense of timing (when to attack, when not to
attack) is crucial to beating Anji.


Baiken:
~~~~~~

  It really, REALLY sucks if you have to play against a Baiken player. 
Instead, it becomes more like a chess match, as who can do better when both
have the same stuff.  The advantage here is that both have the exact same
advantages and weaknesses.  How would YOU fight YOURself?


I-No:
~~~~

  Out of all the new characters, I think I-No is the most dangerous (and
promiscuous, but that’s a different story).  With I-No, you have to relearn
how to do a basic block.  Her high/low game is so varied it’s one of her big
strengths, and her move list is very quick so she can counter most of
Baiken’s slower moves.  Also, remember that just about all the moves she does
on the ground can be done in the air as well, so be CAREFUL about going into
the air, because I-No can do lots of nasty stuff once she gets airborne.  Keep
your counters ready, and keep defensive.  I-No can cancel into her air
overdrive or her ground overdrive easily, and they do a nice chunk of damage. 
Baiken will probably be turtling more with I-No then anyone else.


Testament:
~~~~~~~~~

  Testament is a trap and zone character akin to Zato.  This means that if
Baiken gives Testament a chance to start setting up traps, she’s dead.  The
advantage that Testament has is his ability to attack Baiken from all sides of
the screen.  This means that Testament can sit in one spot and trap Baiken on
the ground, in the air, it doesn’t matter... *sigh*  A good testament will
quake the ground you stand on with demons and poison the air with skulls and
not give Baiken 2 inches to call her own.  However, most of his moves are on
the laggy side, so stay close, stay defensive, and abuse his lagginess.

*Kliff, Robo-Ky, and Justice are not being covered*


:::::::::::::::
:Miscellaneous:
:::::::::::::::

Bio:
~~~
  Name: Baiken
  Height: 5’4’’
  Weight: 99 lbs. (I think she lied :P)
  Birthday: March 5th
  Blood Type: B
  Nationality: Japanese


Story:
~~~~~

  Baiken’s story (in a nutshell) is that in the war with the gears she lost
her parent’s, her right arm and her left eye.  She remembers it though.  She
remembers the guy that did it.  From that day on, she learned to use a Katana
(Japanese sword), made her missing arm into a bag of tricks and death, and is
currently hunting down “That Man,â€￾ that did this to her.  Why?  To kill
him.


Color Costumes:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Welcome to Baiken’s wardrobe!  I love changing the colors on this woman,
she looks great in so many colors...  When you choose Baiken for training,
arcade, or .vs, you can change Baiken’s color depending on what button you
push to choose her.  Her sword changes color sometimes too.  Also, there is SP
version of Baiken which gives you another 6 colors (yay!!)  Anyway, onto the
first color:

  Square:  This is the basic pink hair, white kimono with a pink moon.

  X: This is what I dub, the “Kenshinâ€￾ color, probably put in due to
popular request...  Baiken’s hair is red, with a white kimono and red moon. 
Looks a lot like Kenshin from the series.

  Triangle:  I don’t pick this color so much, but it’s an improvement over
it’s GGX’s counterpart (damn, that one looked bad).  Baiken has dark red
hair, a red kimono with a dark red moon.

  Circle:  I like it... Baiken becomes a brunette, has a green kimono with a
brown moon.

  Start:  My favorite color of all.  I like to reserve this color for big
matches or such, it just looks so good...  Baiken has brown hair, a brown obi,
this moss green kimono with a brown moon.  Very cool.

  Dust:  This color looks pretty good, but I don’t like the red blade... 
Baiken has grey/white hair, a black kimono, and the moon is white.  It’s
nifty.


  SP Square: a funky looking color, Baiken has hair the same color as a
sunflower, and her kimono is light pink.

  SP X:  Good color... Baiken has grey hair, a blue kimono, and a white/grey
moon.  She almost looks like a medieval fantasy character.

  SP Triangle:  Weird color... Baiken’s hair is winter green, the kimono is
white with a lime green, and a dark green moon.  Also known as ‘Evergreen
Baiken.’

  SP Circle:  Funky color #2.  Baiken has light brown hair, dark yellow kimono,
and a light brown moon.

  SP Start:  This is Shadow Baiken.  She’s all black (ink black) It plays the
same as normal Baiken, except that she has infinite tension.

  SP Dust:  Gold Baiken!  She’s faster, stronger, can take more hits, has
infinite tension and her tatami’s NEVER go away.


EX mode:
~~~~~~~

  The EX Baiken is a tricky thing.  All of her guard cancels just became
standard special moves.  This means that you can’t guard, then counter... you
just counter, no guarding.  However, this also means that you don’t have to
wait for the hit before you counter.  For example: Sol’s fHS just got stopped
before it happened.  If you use counters a lot, like a good Baiken should, then
this can be great.  Pulling out the counters quicker allows for more of
anticipating strategy then a guard counter strategy.  Baiken’s Mawarikomi
just become a beast because it got SO much faster since it’s a standard move
now.  She also got a new overdrive, but the Sanzu Watashi is better, in my
opinion.


Random Baiken Thoughts...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~	

  This is the only section that I get to free form blab on about Baiken, yay!

 Rant #1
  What’s up with the Tatami?!  How is Baiken going to be kicking the ground
(or the air which is even crazier, and tatami pops up?!  This is nutz, absolut
crazy Guilty Gear nutz.

 Rant #2
  Two things that I was always wondering about is what the moon (is it a moon?)
on her kimono is.  Is it a symbol?  It looks like some sort of sun, or whatnot,
but who knows...  The other thing is about the face paint.  What is that all
about?!  Maybe she ran with a different crowd in her adolescent days, and the
tattoo’s are the result?  I read in Shiva’s Baiken FAQ that Baiken did the
face paint to consider herself a warrior instead of a woman... *shrugs* no
idea.

 Rant #3
  What’s up between Baiken and Anji??  I think Anji likes Baiken (or did, or
still does, etc) and Baiken knows.  In Baiken’s third ending, Anji calls her
a goddess, a Japanese beauty, after she agrees to forgive him for ... well, you
play and find out!  In any case, is it just because they’re both Japanese? 
Pretty sketchy...  Anji’s ending (one of them, I forget which) picture also
shows him defending her, while she has the “huh?â€￾ look and rummaging her
hair like she just woke up...

 Rant #4
  So Baiken loves drinking (stated under hobbies in the GGX manual), huh?  I
wonder how good her walking is with a head full of Sake and no depth perception
(she’s got one eye remember?)... Good thing Baiken doesn’t know how to
drive :P

 Rant #5
  She’s got ONE arm.  An arm... just looking at her, you can see how beefy
her shoulder line is, packed with muscle.  Girl is one fit girl... Probably
beats lots of people at arm-wrestling :P  Still, one arm?!

 Rant #6
  What’s up with her right arm.  Y’know... the one that’s a torn empty
sleeve.  Where claws, anchors, spikes, mace-like looking things... and then
there’s the aerial dust attack with the tentacle stuff...  I’m confused. 
She’s like... go-go gadget and kenshin made female :P

 Rant #7
  Why is it that no one ever chooses Baiken?  Lots of people choose Sol, and
Chipp, Millia, Anji, Zato (eddie), but Baiken?  Nope.  *sigh*

 Rant #8
  Anyone notice how Baiken’s chest is somewhat revealing?  I swear... girl
has a rack that sends even Lara Croft home :P

 Rant #9
  When watching the extra movie, who else thought that Baiken fights A LOT like
Kenshin during the first OAV’s?  Crazy...

 Rant #10
  Think about Baiken’s story for a sec.  Think about, if as a kid, this nasty
piece of work destroyed your home, your parents, and robbed you of an eye and
arm.  How many of us would want vengeance and pursue it to the end of our
lives?

 Rant #11
  I keep repeating myself a lot when I call Baiken brutal and there’s a
reason for it, to enforce the playing style that suits her story and
personality.  For all us anime fans, you remember the Kenshin OAV’s?  The
first ones’s, where we see kenshin as the Hitokiri Battousai?  Naiken is a
lot like that.  Kenshin was as stone cold as they come.  Alert, ready, calm and
brutal is what he was.  Baiken is a lot like that.

 Rant #12
  To completely conflict with my last rant, Baiken also seems to be a forgiving
and understanding character.  She was going to kill Anji, but instead offered
him a way out.  It makes me wonder what would happen if Baiken finally was able
to beat “that man.â€￾  The quick and easy answer would be to say that she’d
kill him, but I’m not so sure...

 Rant #13
  Baiken and Kenshin.  Coincidence? I think not.  Similar temperaments, looks,
weapon (but different style), and voice (done by the same voice actress
(that’s right, kenshin was voiced by a woman, just like bart simpson)). 
Although, Baiken is this weird mix of Kenshin... It seems more that she’s a
blend of the older kenshin (like in the series and last OAV’s), and the
younger kenshin (like in the first OAV’s).  I’ve been researching the past
and I guess the creator of GG even thought Kenshin was a woman at first, always
drawing him with breasts.  Crazy, eh?


:::::::::::::::::::::
:Attack Combinations:
:::::::::::::::::::::

NOTE:  Using combos for Baiken is a must.  I mean, look at her!  She’s got
one eye?  One arm? ...If I lost an arm and an eye, I’d be hella-pissed.  The
point is, Baiken is a pissed off brutal character.  Hit them when they’re
down (I routinely follow-up just about every sweep or fall with a fHS), hit
them when they’re up, when they’re standing... Do it often and do it HARD. 
Baiken is a brutal character and she does brutal damage.  In training find out
how much damage you can do in as few hits as possible.  Keep the guard settings
to “limited,â€￾ and “NTâ€￾ to test your combo.

Standing

      P-P-P-P
      P-P-P-fP
      P-S
      S-S-HS
	P-P-S-S
	Sweep-fHS
	HS-RC-HS
	S-S-HS-tatami
	S-dS-S
	cK-S-S-S
      cP-cK-S-S
      Sweep-tatami-fHS
      Sweep-tatami (this one launches, so make sure to follow up with an air
combo)



Air Combos

(Pre-Note: Baiken is pretty weak in the air, her Youzansen, jS, and aerial dust
attack being her effective moves)

(Note: Even if you fall and can’t keep up with the character, you can also
use ground tatami to keep the opponent in the air.)

(Double Note: Remember that even though you CAN do these combos, an experienced
player should be able to air recover right out of it, psych burst to end the
combo, etc..)

(Triple note: a lot of the advanced combo’s use the jumping kick or Tatami
because they both are launchers.  I encourage experimentation rather then
following some other dude’s combo.  So, use the jK, and the Tatami, and see
what you can come up with!)

     pp-Y
     p-k-JC-pp-s-Y
     s-Y
     p-air tatami (land, jump back up) – another combo
     s-p-k-JC-s-air dust



(Ending Note: you didn’t think I was going to put down ALL my combo’s, did
ya?  EXPERIMENT.  EXPERIMENT.  EXPERIMENT.  Be the proverbial mad scientist and
come with all sorts of crazy combo’s and variations to give your opponent
pain!  Use the tatami’s FRC!  Use the air tatami’s FRC!!  Juggle!!  Pain!! 
Use the air dusts FRC and air dash back in bringing the crates of whoopass!! 
Be as sadistic and cruel with your combo’s as possible!! You’ll be a lot
better player if you can create combo’s rather then having to depend on other
sources for combo’s, so experiment! ^_^)




::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:Training strategy for Baiken:
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

       Okay, welcome to class.  You could probably use a training method like
this for any fighting game and any character, but I developed it for using
Baiken and showing other people how to use Baiken.  It starts with mobility and
defense.  Building those skills is essential (and I repeat: essential) for a
good Baiken player, and from there to learning attacks, strategies, etc...

  First things first, this training strategy isn’t designed for tournament
play.  It’s designed for people who have no idea of how to play a fighting
game to take a look, spend a few hours, and be able to have fun when the
friends decides to put GGXX in.  In other words, it’s to properly get in the
basics.

  That being said, here’s the first lesson.  Read the manual, watch the game
for a little bit, get your head ready to learn.  Learn to block and move
forward, learn to run and back-step, learn to air dash forward and backwards. 
Learn how to move your character around the screen with relative ease.  A game
I came up with is to play “tag.â€￾  1P is “itâ€￾ first, and whoever is it
at the end of the round loses, regardless of health (you tag your opponent with
a single punch.  No more, no less).  The point here is to learn mobility with
Baiken.


  Second lesson is to start learning attacks.  Read the move list I give
earlier in this FAQ, learn the basic moves, then the special moves (especially
tatami and the guard cancels).  Finally learn the overdrive’s and Instant
Kill.  Then start to experiment with the different moves and see what sort of
crazy combo’s you can come up with, or just borrow the ones listed earlier in
this FAQ ^_^

  So, Now that you know moves but haven’t played squat, go through the game
multiple times.  Lesson three is story mode, survival mode, arcade mode.  Do
‘em all and see how far you can get!  The point here is to integrate what you
just learned into actual playing, so that you don’t have to think: “Um...
how do I do ___ move again?â€￾ during the middle of a round.  Once you know all
of Baiken’s moves, and all the ways she can move around, and gain some game
experience; you’re done with the lesson ^_^

!!!Congrats!!!  At this point, you are no longer a beginner and are an
intermediate player.  At this point, you should be able to start picking up
other characters and having fun at parties and such without losing too badly or
feeling bad for doing horribly.  A thing to remember is don’t play for too
long.  Take whole day breaks to do other things, and leave the game alone.  The
reason for this is that playing too long and too hard will make you do worse. 
Take it easy, have fun with it, and you’ll do great! ^_^

  Lesson four is learning the more intermediate techniques.  Use training mode
and figure out what Roman Candles do, using faultless defense, instant block,
air recoveries, and read the tricks section earlier in this FAQ and start
integrating these tricks into play.  You’ll learn to integrate these
techniques by going the game multiple times again.

  Lesson five is learning analysis.  This one is best done if you get a friend
who knows how to play the game pretty well.  Ask him/her to pick a particular
strategy to use (being offensive, over using one move, jump attacking too much,
etc...), without him/her telling you what he/she is going to pick.  Set the
rounds to one, and the time to 30 seconds.  As Baiken you avoid for 30 seconds
as your friend does the strategy and at the end you have to know what strategy
it was.  Then do it again, this time as a duel, your friend using the EXACT
same strategy.  The point is to learn how to read your opponents, see patterns
and favorite’s moves, and to adapt.  Don’t get mad if it doesn’t work the
first time, it takes time to learn how to read opponents.  Many opponents have
favorite combo’s and moves that they like to use, but the trick is to
recognize them when they’re used, and how to adapt and defend against them.

  Lesson six is going back through all those lessons, and doing it again. 
Relearn all her moves, and all the ways she can move around.  Relearn all her
attacks, etc.  When you get back to this lesson, take a break, ‘cuz you’re
doing awesome.

  !!!! CONGRATS !!!!
  At this point, you should be pretty good at GGXX with Baiken.  Go check out
other characters... play with friends, have fun with it.  It’s a game, after
all, and games are supposed to be fun ^_^

  The last lesson that I’m putting here is to venture out.  Play with a wide
variety of opponents and spread the GG phenomenom all over ^_^


::::::::::::::::
:Special Thanks:
::::::::::::::::

  To David, for being an awesome challenge any day of the week.
  To EChang, for a well informed FAQ, I referred to it many times.
  To Mike, Steve, and Chuck, for allowing all that “research.â€￾
  To Shiva Nataraja, for a Baiken FAQ that got me on the right track.
  To Ed, for introducing me to GG so many years ago.
  To Dice, for teaching me the way of the fighting game.
  To Gamecombos, for providing such a factually well informed site.


  To Sony, for providing an awesome gaming platform.
  To Arcs Systems Development, for creating such an incredible game.
  To Sammy, for publishing such an incredible game.
  To GameFaqs for allowing this FAQ to even be in existence.

  And to you, the reader, for putting up with a thirty page FAQ.

Well done, good reader, you’ve made it to the end.  Thanks for reading ^_^

Copyright 2003 Paul Benson