Capitalizing on Tusk's staggers (setups inside)

I am playing Tusk heavily today and I’m finding hard to consistently follow up some of the stagger buttons, specially crouching mp.

It would be cool if we knew more about the stagger mechanic. It seems the stagger is cancellable by shadow moves always, but it needs acurate timing. Sometimes it feels like the stagger is just a return to neutral because the moment I can follow up with something, the opponent is already blocking.

What are the input windows for following up a stagger? In which frame can I cancel into things? Do I get “locked out” if I press buttons early? What are the best follow up moves?

EDIT: Stagger set-ups already discovered:

@Dayv0 :

If I recall correctly:
C. MP →
1-shadow inmortal spirit
2-shadow skull splitter(doesn’t work from max range, if you are in range, one chance break combo into conqueror for more than 50% damage)
3-inmortal spirit-light follow up
4-inmortal spirit-medium follow up
5-light skull splitter (only close range, not sure of this)

If you have meter, use always option 2 if you are in range. One manual, conqueror ender, 50% health damage

more

@TrustfulWhale
Here’s some fun devastation I found with linking staggers:

Backstab (far), s.HP (far), Heavy Manual xx Light Skull Splitter/Light Shoulder/Medium Slide xx stuff
s.HP (far), Heavy Manual xx Light Skull Splitter/Shoulder/Slide xx stuff
s.MP (far), Medium or Light Manualxx Light Skull Splitter/Shoulder/Slide xx stff
cr.MP, Medium or Light Manual, etc

Landing staggers on Counter Hit allows for a stronger Skull Splitter follow-up than normal.

For fun:
Backstab (max range), s.HP (far) xx Instinct Cancel, s.HP (far) xx Shadow Skull Splitter xx Shadow Skull Splitter xx Nothing but Heavies xx Conqueror - 100% damage

more

More

Spine splitter, crouching mp xx shadow skull splitter
Spine splitter, crouching mp xx light skull splitter
Heavy skull spliiter, standing mp, light skull splitter (you have to time standing mp so you don’t trigger the autodouble)

1 Like

Remember that you have to be a certain distance to connect with a normal to confirm a stagger into a combo without using meter.

Usually s.hk is your best bet but play around with stuff and distance. Don’t expect to confirm a stagger at full range with a normal though that would be way too OP.

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Cancel: finishing one move early by performing another move, which removes the rest of the recovery on the first move.

Link (manual): letting one move end naturally and then hitting with another move before the opponent has recovered from the first move.

Outside of instinct Tusk cannot cancel many of his staggers into specials or shadows (notable exceptions being his overhead from the dash and (IIRC) his skull splitter special moves) so you have to link into the next move. I have not had much of a chance to test this but AFAIK Your main links after the shorter staggers are shadow shoulder, dash slide and maybe s.mk/s.hk if close enough.

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If I recall correctly:
C. MP ->
1-shadow inmortal spirit
2-shadow skull splitter(doesn’t work from max range, if you are in range, one chance break combo into conqueror for more than 50% damage)
3-inmortal spirit-light follow up
4-inmortal spirit-medium follow up
5-light skull splitter (only close range, not sure of this)

If you have meter, use always option 2 if you are in range. One manual, conqueror ender, 50% health damage

2 Likes

Yeah, right now my options after a crouching mp stagger depend heavily on how close I am to the opponent. The same for skull splitter and medium st mp. In rare occasions that I have not been able to reproduce, I can follow a stagger with another stagger, but I guess this is because the staggers are meaties, I’ll check in the lab and post the results here

IIRC, far standing HP can be linked into c. MP

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Indeed, I tried it right after you posted (I am posting whie playing). But it’s also heavily depending on range and timing.

What is the real frame advantage of a stagger? It seems to be less than I thought. Doesn’t frame data say it’s +22 or something? It doesn’t seem to be that much.

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It can link into another heavy, actually.

2 Likes

I don’t have the frame data at reach, I’m not at home. Maybe its only me, but some staggers “seems” different from others.

Dunno,maybe its only my impressions, but peacemaker stagger seems shorter than Shago’s overhead, for example.

Maybe it’s only an early impression

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Here’s some fun devastation I found with linking staggers:

Backstab (far), s.HP (far), Heavy Manual xx Light Skull Splitter/Light Shoulder/Medium Slide xx stuff
s.HP (far), Heavy Manual xx Light Skull Splitter/Shoulder/Slide xx stuff
s.MP (far), Medium or Light Manualxx Light Skull Splitter/Shoulder/Slide xx stff
cr.MP, Medium or Light Manual, etc

Landing staggers on Counter Hit allows for a stronger Skull Splitter follow-up than normal.

For fun:
Backstab (max range), s.HP (far) xx Instinct Cancel, s.HP (far) xx Shadow Skull Splitter xx Shadow Skull Splitter xx Nothing but Heavies xx Conqueror - 100% damage

1 Like

More

Spine splitter, crouching mp xx shadow skull splitter
Spine splitter, crouching mp xx light skull splitter
Heavy skull spliiter, standing mp, light skull splitter (you have to time standing mp so you don’t trigger the autodouble)

1 Like

Suggestion: what about editing the OP with all the possibilities? Could work like this:

Starting from:

a) c. MP->
1- shadow inmortal spirit (opener)
2- standing mk xx inmortal spirit light follow up (opener)

b) Spine splitter->
1- crouching mp xx shadow skull splitter(opener)

We can have a complete guide of all Tusk’s stagger applications

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I’ll make a diagram when I come back from work.

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3 Likes

ahahahaha, I love it. You made my day

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Ah yes the old ken flowchart… Xd

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I suppose it’s incomplete, but it’s a good start

Mmm there are some issues with this flowchart:

1-Once you land a special move (regular or shadow version) you are in the combo system, so your next move is breakabke. The flowchart should end there, because you managed the objective: confirm a stagger into a real combo
2-Chart 1: max range. From a max range c. Mp you cannot confirm into shadow skull splitter, shadow inmortal spirit is the choice here.
3- Aren’t chart 3 and 4 covering the same scenario?

well the chart shows every instance where you can chain one stagger into another stagger, hence why I call it “perma-stagger chart”. If it’s useful in combat or no, that’s another matter.

Indeed you are right. Well, in part. Let me clarify:

At 100% max range, NOTHING can confirm a c.mp. Not sh. inmortal spirit, or sh. skull splitter
At 95% range, only sh. inmortal spirit confirms
At 90%, both confirm.

So saying max range is confusing, because there’s different options at 90%-95%-100% max range.Difficult to assess since there’s pixels of difference.But I’ll modify that.

Chart 4 shows the follow ups after backstab. Since the stagger time is so massive in this move, it can easily link into the other three charts.

Something I just found: Tusk can perform a 43% damage unbreakable.

Backstab, st fierce punch, grab, skewer.

Skewer is breakable but the damage is already done