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- Seen Aug 19, 2019
Since I've been maining Blaziken for about a good week or two, I think I feel confident enough to make a thread on how he works. Mind you, this is just my experience with the character, I may even actually use him differently than you. But I hope I actually teach you something you didn't know, yet.
General:
Blaziken is a Fire/Fighting type (I hope you knew that already) labeled as a Standard fighter. But really the way he feels to me he's more like a mix of Power/Speed. His strategy is simple: Get up in your opponent's face-> stay in your opponent's face-> win. For Power players, you're pretty used to that strategy, but the difference between your big guy and Blaziken is: Blaziken is faster. Like, much faster. He can keep your opponent pinned to the wall really well, which is a position you want to be in.
Field Phase:
Field Phase isn't exactly Blaziken's forte. Most of his projectiles don't have very long range on them, so mostly what you're aiming for is a quick rushdown with either your homing attack or Blaze Kick. However, that is not to say Blaziken doesn't have any good Field moves.
First off is his side-Y attack: he kicks a sizable horizontal stream of flame toward your opponent which actually travel a pretty good distance. And then there's his aerial-Y: which has him produce a fireball in the air, and kicks it if you press Y an additional time. But wait, THERE'S MORE: just after you produce the fireball in the air, you can press side-Y to have him kick a vertical stream of flame straight at your opponent. So with his aerial attack alone, he has a three-in-one mindgame. Either: you can kick the fireball to hit them from a distance; instantly go for a side-Y to catch them off guard; or you can simply leave that fireball to float in the air so that opponents who decide to home you from the air (most commonly Weavile for some reason) will run in to it. It's hilarious when it happens.
As far as stages go, to make most of his field moves worth ANYTHING, it's best to go for the smaller stages if you're not playing on random. Off the top of my head, Neos City is a good stage with him. I don't really pay attention to each stage's length.
Duel Phase:
With Blaziken you want to head into Duel Phase ASAP. That's where the meat and potatoes of his character really are. As I mentioned above, Blaziken loves to wall pressure his opponents, so make sure you get them nice and panicky once you put them between you and the wall. A good approach tactic is Blaze Kick, which can combo into a Flare Blitz if you press X just after the first kick; if you do this, you can even pierce counters. Now that you got them near the wall, you're probably thinking, "But what if they try to jump over me?" Two words: Sky Uppercut. Problem solved.
However be mindful: his Pokemon moves have recoil, so don't just throw them out willy-nilly. Personally I don't like using his Brave Bird attack all that much because it lags before he attacks, leaving him open for just about anything from grabs, counters, and other attacks. Heat Wave is fun to use if you read their approach: if you fully charged it and they take it near the end, they get an attack nerf. Blaze Kick is my favorite one to use though, since not only is it usually a pretty good approach attack, but it can combo into a counter piercing Flare Blitz, and trust me, you're gonna run into a lot of counters. Sky Uppercut while charged can combo into any air attack, which is nice, but I usually don't pull it off because, for me, it almost always throws them into Field Phase again.
I've seen a pretty common pattern on Ranked Mode: once you go into Burst Mode, the other guy's gonna either back up out of range or straight up gonna keep up his guard unless they too go into Burst Mode. If they insist on guarding until your Burst runs out, make them feel like the complete fool they are by spamming your grab. Trust me, you'll have the opportunity to do that. If they do, however, decide to get out of their block and try to challenge you, applaud their fruitless effort with a Burst Attack.
However I see that Blaziken has a very difficult time against Lucario. Since not only does Lucario throw his moves out faster than you, he also has range on you since most of his attacks involve a Bone Rush. On top of that, they WILL put you against the wall if you allow them to. To fix that, spam your light attacks, since that's about the only thing you have that's fast enough to challenge him in this state, and that's not even a guarantee. Or y'know, just charge a counter if they're not smart enough to go into an immediate grab. Which, to be honest, I'm not gud enough to go for that counter; always slips my mind.
Support:
My favorite support set to use with him is Rotom/Togekiss. Rotom gives you an easy punish option for opponents who tend to attack from the air, like Charizard and at times, Garchomp and Gardevoir. Togekiss gives you a good Speed boost, and also recovers some HP for you, which is nice considering, well, all of your good moves recoil you for damage. Here's something actually funny with Rotom: as with Burst Mode, people's immediate instinct when seeing an active Rotom is to go into a guard. See, I understand wanting to guard against some supports, like Diglett and Reshiram, but Rotom? Rotom only hits you when you jump in the air. I can literally just walk up slowly and grab you; come on, guys, are you even trying?
Some other good sets are Cubone/Diglett and Frogadier/Evee, for obvious reasons that I'm too tired to explain because it is literally midnight as I'm writing this. Or just don't waste your time with those fools, and go for that God-Tier Magicarp instead. And only use Magicarp, because between you and me, I think Pachirisu is complete trash.
So overall, Blaziken is pretty solid. All he really takes is about 30 minutes- 1 hour to learn how to play. At least that's how long it took me to learn him. Though I feel there's still more to him that I should learn. I hope any of this helped.
General:
Blaziken is a Fire/Fighting type (I hope you knew that already) labeled as a Standard fighter. But really the way he feels to me he's more like a mix of Power/Speed. His strategy is simple: Get up in your opponent's face-> stay in your opponent's face-> win. For Power players, you're pretty used to that strategy, but the difference between your big guy and Blaziken is: Blaziken is faster. Like, much faster. He can keep your opponent pinned to the wall really well, which is a position you want to be in.
Field Phase:
Field Phase isn't exactly Blaziken's forte. Most of his projectiles don't have very long range on them, so mostly what you're aiming for is a quick rushdown with either your homing attack or Blaze Kick. However, that is not to say Blaziken doesn't have any good Field moves.
First off is his side-Y attack: he kicks a sizable horizontal stream of flame toward your opponent which actually travel a pretty good distance. And then there's his aerial-Y: which has him produce a fireball in the air, and kicks it if you press Y an additional time. But wait, THERE'S MORE: just after you produce the fireball in the air, you can press side-Y to have him kick a vertical stream of flame straight at your opponent. So with his aerial attack alone, he has a three-in-one mindgame. Either: you can kick the fireball to hit them from a distance; instantly go for a side-Y to catch them off guard; or you can simply leave that fireball to float in the air so that opponents who decide to home you from the air (most commonly Weavile for some reason) will run in to it. It's hilarious when it happens.
As far as stages go, to make most of his field moves worth ANYTHING, it's best to go for the smaller stages if you're not playing on random. Off the top of my head, Neos City is a good stage with him. I don't really pay attention to each stage's length.
Duel Phase:
With Blaziken you want to head into Duel Phase ASAP. That's where the meat and potatoes of his character really are. As I mentioned above, Blaziken loves to wall pressure his opponents, so make sure you get them nice and panicky once you put them between you and the wall. A good approach tactic is Blaze Kick, which can combo into a Flare Blitz if you press X just after the first kick; if you do this, you can even pierce counters. Now that you got them near the wall, you're probably thinking, "But what if they try to jump over me?" Two words: Sky Uppercut. Problem solved.
However be mindful: his Pokemon moves have recoil, so don't just throw them out willy-nilly. Personally I don't like using his Brave Bird attack all that much because it lags before he attacks, leaving him open for just about anything from grabs, counters, and other attacks. Heat Wave is fun to use if you read their approach: if you fully charged it and they take it near the end, they get an attack nerf. Blaze Kick is my favorite one to use though, since not only is it usually a pretty good approach attack, but it can combo into a counter piercing Flare Blitz, and trust me, you're gonna run into a lot of counters. Sky Uppercut while charged can combo into any air attack, which is nice, but I usually don't pull it off because, for me, it almost always throws them into Field Phase again.
I've seen a pretty common pattern on Ranked Mode: once you go into Burst Mode, the other guy's gonna either back up out of range or straight up gonna keep up his guard unless they too go into Burst Mode. If they insist on guarding until your Burst runs out, make them feel like the complete fool they are by spamming your grab. Trust me, you'll have the opportunity to do that. If they do, however, decide to get out of their block and try to challenge you, applaud their fruitless effort with a Burst Attack.
However I see that Blaziken has a very difficult time against Lucario. Since not only does Lucario throw his moves out faster than you, he also has range on you since most of his attacks involve a Bone Rush. On top of that, they WILL put you against the wall if you allow them to. To fix that, spam your light attacks, since that's about the only thing you have that's fast enough to challenge him in this state, and that's not even a guarantee. Or y'know, just charge a counter if they're not smart enough to go into an immediate grab. Which, to be honest, I'm not gud enough to go for that counter; always slips my mind.
Support:
My favorite support set to use with him is Rotom/Togekiss. Rotom gives you an easy punish option for opponents who tend to attack from the air, like Charizard and at times, Garchomp and Gardevoir. Togekiss gives you a good Speed boost, and also recovers some HP for you, which is nice considering, well, all of your good moves recoil you for damage. Here's something actually funny with Rotom: as with Burst Mode, people's immediate instinct when seeing an active Rotom is to go into a guard. See, I understand wanting to guard against some supports, like Diglett and Reshiram, but Rotom? Rotom only hits you when you jump in the air. I can literally just walk up slowly and grab you; come on, guys, are you even trying?
Some other good sets are Cubone/Diglett and Frogadier/Evee, for obvious reasons that I'm too tired to explain because it is literally midnight as I'm writing this. Or just don't waste your time with those fools, and go for that God-Tier Magicarp instead. And only use Magicarp, because between you and me, I think Pachirisu is complete trash.
So overall, Blaziken is pretty solid. All he really takes is about 30 minutes- 1 hour to learn how to play. At least that's how long it took me to learn him. Though I feel there's still more to him that I should learn. I hope any of this helped.
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