I mean when you have an overshield, so smash a grenade on yourself and then do a link as they stagger. It’s a good way to bait lockouts, but is lower damage compared to standard damage loop. Pretty sure I saw it more than once during a lockout, but just so long as you know to maximize it’s fine. I feel like a lot of games (for everyone) often hinge on those little optimizations. A lot of times the gap isn’t some big decision or knowledge hole - it’s just in the small ways in which one player doesn’t fully take advantage of some of the simpler opportunities in the match.
And here’s another set with @LetalisVenator. Happier with my defense in this one (which is ironic because I probably got hit more), but some iffy decision-making here and there for whatever reason. Either way pretty happy with how I handled the fight, but still a lot of opportunity for improvement in picking moments to approach and adapting my offensive routes to the defensive tendencies that have been displayed.
So yeah, feel free to critique 
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“I’ve come back to complete the training”
I largely stopped playing Hisako for a while, to flush out some of my “flowcharty” muscle memory, get out of my passive strategy of “wait for something -7 or worse”, and learn some other aspects of the game (what it’s like to have a DP or a backdash that’s actually worth using).
I’ve gained a fresh perspective by playing another grappler with different ways of punishing different fear responses (Triplax instead of cr.MP, Sammamish instead of TK ORZ, etc) and other chars. When I’m feeling comfy with my Sako inputs again, I’ll be back with a set to analyze.
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@STORM179 I watched your set.
I found it funny that you didn’t do much cmd grab resets at the beginning of the set.
You have not represented shadow counter at all, sat on 2 bars for some time. Maybe you wanted that.
I can’t say much apart from maybe focus on spending your meter.
Are you talking about the Letalis set? I tend not to reset in general so long as I think I can come by my damage “honestly”, and resets against Aganos in particular are pretty dangerous if you’re wrong. Letalis did a good job avoiding them in our previous suite of matches, so I wasn’t eager to give him free punish opportunities when I thought I could just outplay him within the combo game. Getting returned to neutral if the opponent breaks isn’t the worst thing in the world.
Sako’s shadow counter is full-stop worthless against Aganos unless he’s chunkless or you shadow counter something very specific. Normally he’ll just soak the hit and be able to block and/or punish you for having the temerity to try. Shadow influence is similarly difficult to use, simply because Aganos should be spending nearly all his time in neutral putting out hitboxes that will tag any grounded approach. This isn’t a fight where Hisako gets to use her meter freely - most non-combo uses for it are very situational, and require that the Aganos player make a mistake.
The issue here is that you are one of the best players, and there are no basics I can point out. Shadow countering either Hisako or Aganos is a really hard thing to do, but it isn’t impossible, there are rare occasions to do that.
I just want to tell, there is this small one thing you can consider.
Please don’t misunderstand - I’m happy to get feedback on my play! Just wanted to answer the questions (I think) you were asking in terms of why I did or didn’t do certain things.
And I’m good, but that most assuredly doesn’t mean my play is perfect or unimpeachable, even on some of the basics. To whit, most of the damage I took was from taking silly and unnecessary risks with jumps and wall-jumps. Even good players get flustered, and even good players get impatient in deleterious ways. Please continue to point out any flaws you may find in my play! Sometimes I’ll have reasons for why I’m doing what I’m doing, but sometimes maybe those reasons aren’t compelling, and sometimes maybe I don’t even have a reason. Only way to get better is to be critical of your play.
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Played a bunch of matches with a good Kan-Ra player as a bit of training in the Hisako MU for him. Will lump the two videos here, and then post my feedback below.
FT10:
FT25:
Generally speaking, this fight is all about momentum. Kan beats Hisako pretty cleanly in neutral, and once he knocks her down has lots of setups that Hisako just flat out can’t do anything about and has to hold. On the other hand, if Kan ever gets caught without sand there’s a decent chance he just straight up dies. Your job in the fight is to make sure she never gets close to you and that you’re never without sand. Because she’s generally more damaging than you are, you have to make sure you capitalize on all the mistakes the Sako player makes - she needs to be right a lot less than Kan-Ra does to win the fight.
My feedback is below, just written down as I rewatched the matches. Some of this we covered in messages, but I tried to expound more here.
- B/c sand is so important, your first priority in the fight should be to get space and get sand out.
- Importantly though, your method of getting that space can’t just be to jump back round start all the time. Mix up your round start options - across a longer set you can (and did) get punished really hard for being predictable.
- As discussed, place more scarabs in neutral. Hisako is one of the absolute worst characters in the game at clearing them, as most of her naginata normals (even air ones) will trade unfavorably with them. Scarabs will also prevent her from using counter; there are lots of situations where counter will suck her into an extant scarab and give Kan a full combo.
- Also, use Sako trying to clear the scarabs as an opportunity to punish. Me swinging at a scarab means I’m probably not swinging at you, and since Kan has normals that cover 3/4 screen that means you can usually get a full combo for me making the attempt.
- You kept waking up with shadow clutch. I tend to think that’s a bad option almost all the time. If you’re going to wake up with a shadow, use shadow whirl. Whirl will also beat command grabs, but has the added benefit of (usually) stopping TK-ORZ’s.
- Don’t guess against Hisako - if you’re unsure of the strength just leave it alone. Because Sako hits so hard, you only need to ■■■■■ up twice or so to lose a lifebar, and if you mismanage your instinct she can basically guarantee that you’ll only get one.
- Don’t mismanage your instinct. It’s better to pop and get nothing offensively out of it than to sit there and just take Sako’s mix. The screen freezes are valuable - make sure you get two of them per fight!
- If you block all three rekkas, just do shadow whirl. ORZ->shadow influence isn’t real if Kan has meter. Even if he doesn’t just jump forward and do your dive stomp thing.
- Don’t counterbreak into reset - it’s usually a gross mismanagement of free damage. Kan hits very hard when the opponent is already locked out, so just take your damage and save the swaggy resets for when your combo won’t already be doing 60%. Bonus to this is it means the opponent doesn’t get to see your resets for free. Even if I can’t block or evade the reset in the moment, rest assured that information is being filed away for later. No reason to give away your secrets when the damage is already assured.
- Your reset sense is really good though, so that’s nice!
- Opener->ultra saves lives. Kan has some really strong recap kill unbreakables - try to incorporate them into your game.
- Slow curse really messes Hisako up. If at all possible, try to end every round with post-kill stagger->throw. That will let you set up in the next round basically for free.
- If Hisako is ever whiffing shadow ORZ from across the screen, just tag her with one of those silly bandage normals that doesn’t have a hurtbox. It’s completely free.
- Button->single rekka->button->single rekka isn’t really a thing. Even if you’re afraid to poke back (lots of characters can’t, though I suspect Kan is free to), the sequence will drain Sako’s wrath enough that she won’t be able to counter cancel. Watch her wrath and just punish her with shadow counter.
- I noticed on lot of the clutches I jumped over I got counter hits, not punishes. You probably shouldn’t be pressing buttons after whiffing a move that’s got 50+ frames of recovery
- Later on in the matches you became very afraid. You won’t beat Hisako if you ever let her get into your head that much. Force her to take your options from you - never just give them to her. Push buttons, challenge negative frames, make her take risks to exert pressure.
That’s mostly it. I’ll upload the Rash set when I get some more time and give my thoughts on that one as well, but for now I figure this is probably enough to chew on 
Talk to @nSxTyme2Dul for Hisako-specific setup advice and about how to always make sure you’ve got scarabs out properly to protect - I think he plays this MU just about perfectly.
Hope it helps, and thanks again for the games!
Welp, I just learned a bunch of new ways Kan can abuse Sako, and this makes me sad 
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Let me dust off this thread and ask if you guys would take a look at this set I played. Might be posting more in preparation for May.
The only thing I want to say regarding the games is that it was played at my local; the TV/monitor is bigger than what I’m used to. Also, as time went on, I figured that S0undy was willing to let me rock heavy doubles and that where I should’ve counter broke is on juggles more than grounded combos. Aside from those, be ruthless. Thank you in advance.
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Just a note that I did see this message. Haven’t had a time to watch the set, but will provide feedback once I get the chance
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Bump and tagging additional people if they’d like to review the replay two posts up. Have a good weekend.
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Hello there. I never thought I would post here, but I need some help. I really want to break my limit and improve my playing skills in KI with my Arbiter. So I can become more better player than before. I recorded some ranked matches that I lost yesterday and this morning. I need to know why did I lose and what’s wrong with me.
@STORM179 @deltarayquaza @SonicDolphin117 @ItzTymeToDul @TheNinjaOstrich
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Here is my set with KI4Life. We had so much fine. I’m also REALLY happy I didn’t suck. 
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Hey guys I would love some help with this one-
I’ve faced the number of characters that are pretty good at sticking you in their little vortex but this was a first. We fought a total of four rounds and I’m just not sure how I was to get out of this.
as I stuck in a manual combo string that I was failing to break or was I just getting caught in a mix-up basic mix up string?
(Dlaimer I do have a reasonable grasp on the killer instinct fundamentals even though admittedly I need to revisit them because every day I I play I relearn the fact that I, much like like Jon Snow "know nothing"
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The guy was fighting was a killer with a few Stars I’m guessing he had a strategy that tends to work
-what could I have done?
I think the best thing to do in that situation is block and in between punches dash one step forward, and then repeat (block, step or dash forward). And don’t jump. When you’re blocking, you’re building shadow meter, so it can actually benefit you once you get up close.
Maybe it’s just me, but I can’t play these videos.
No I meant KevBones’ videos. I could see yours.
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I couldn’t play the other ones either