Hello, So I was looking through my collection and I was thinking of potentially trying the Eldrazi Displacer Combo with Brood Monitor +. The semi-flush mount shade (#1) and the chandelier (#4) seem extremely related thanks to chunky dark metal and the shades they both have. Meanwhile, the sconce (#3) which features a black and brass combo, acts as the bridge to the antique brass and mercury glass pendant (#2), which shares some similar tones.
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There’s a lot to learn with any new fighting game release, but when you get a brand new fighter that’s the first in a series, like Dragon Ball FighterZ, you have to learn everything from scratch. One of the most important game mechanic to learn is how the combo system works. Dragon Ball FighterZ combos may seem a bit daunting at first, but once you understand how the combo system works, it’s not overly difficult. This article covers Dragon Ball FighterZ character combos and how the combo system works in the game, so you can start creating your own combos!
Combo Basics
There are four main attack buttons in Dragon Ball FighterZ: Light (L), Medium (M), Heavy (H) and Special (S). In addition, you can call your assist characters with Assist 1 (A1) and Assist 2 (A2). You’ll be using all of these buttons in a good number of combos, although if you’re more of a novice player you don’t have to worry too much about incorporating assists into your combos. If you haven’t already, be sure to check out our detailed coverage of the basic game mechanics and controls so you’re well-versed in everything that will be discussed in this combo guide.
Combo Flow
While you can add and change up how combos flow in Dragon Ball FighterZ with Vanish, assists and other mechanics, the basic combo flow in Dragon Ball FighterZ is: Light > Medium > Heavy. You can mix between standing attacks and crouching attacks, but generally speaking you only want to use one of each in a combo, and you must go in the proper strength order of Light > Medium > Heavy. For example, you can start a combo with Light, then use a crouching Light before moving on to a crouching or standing Medium.
Most Heavy attacks will launch an opponent toward the wall, causing a wall bounce. If you press Down + Heavy, it will launch the opponent into the air. Both of these Heavy attacks can be followed by a Super Dash. You can manually press Super Dash (Heavy + Special), or just tap Heavy a second time and your character will automatically perform a Super Dash.
Going back to the combo flow, once you use Heavy or crouching Heavy and follow with a Super Dash, you’ll shift to an aerial state. In the air you can follow the same combo flow of Light > Medium > Heavy, which gives you a basic combo of: Light > Medium > Heavy > Super Dash > Light > Medium > Heavy.
If you use Heavy at the end of an aerial combo, it will send the opponent flying back down to the ground. However, if you use Down + Heavy instead, the opponent will fly higher into the air. Take a look at the combo limits section below to find out when you can extend combos beyond this point.
Jump Canceling
A very important part of the combo system is learning to Jump Cancel. You can Jump Cancel a normal attack by pressing Up or diagonally Up/Forward immediately following the attack. For example, if you wanted to Jump Cancel a Medium attack, you would press Medium, then quickly press Up/Forward. Using Up/Forward instead of just Up keeps your character a bit closer to the opponent so it’s easier to continue the combo. When we add Jump Canceling to combos in Dragon Ball FighterZ, you can extend your combo quite a bit.
Light > Down + Medium > Medium > Jump Cancel
This combo string starts on the ground, but after the Down + Medium the opponent will be knocked off their feet and in an aerial state. With this, you follow with the standing Medium and Jump Cancel it so you can follow the opponent into the air. If you have a hard time confirming your combo hit (and wasn’t blocked), you can add another Light attack to make it easier: Light > Down + Light > Down + Medium > Medium > Jump Cancel.
Using a Jump Cancel, you can save your Heavy attack until later in the combo, which not only gives you a combo extension, but also allows you to use a Heavy attack at the end of the aerial combo to cause a ground slide. During the ground slide you can use a super move to catch the opponent before they get up. A full combo with Jump Cancels looks like this:
Light > Down + Medium > Medium > Jump Cancel > Light > Medium > Down + Heavy > Super Dash > Light > Medium > Jump Cancel > Light > Medium > Heavy > Super Move (back on the ground)
Instead of the Heavy > Super Move at the end of this combo, you can opt for a special move, then a super move. Your team composition, available meter and the special moves of your character all play a role in deciding which route to take. For instance, if you have a team with mostly ground super moves, you’ll want to end the combo with Heavy to knock them back down to the ground before you perform a super move.
You’ll notice in the combo above that there are two Jump Cancels. The first is the Jump Cancel on the ground that moves the combo into the air. The second comes after you’ve knocked the opponent even higher into the air with Down + Heavy. It works exactly the same way as the first Jump Cancel, by pressing Light > Medium > Up/Forward > Light > Medium during this portion of the combo.
Base Combo System Examples
When we put everything together, you get a few different combo options. While combos will vary somewhat depending on your characters of choice, most characters can follow the basic and intermediate combos listed above. Generally speaking, you want to start you combos on the ground so you can use crouching Medium > Medium > Jump Cancel to get into the air. This gives you a great combo extension by not using Heavy on the ground.
If you want to take it a step further, you can try the advanced combos above. These use the aerial Light auto combo (which simulates Light > Medium > Heavy) to give your character a bit more lift in the air compared to the manual version of it. Using the added lift from the auto combo you can actually Jump Cancel a second Down + Heavy in the air to get even more damage out of your combos.
Character Tags and Assist Supers
If you hold Assist 1 or Assist 2 during a combo, that assist character will tag in with a Super Dash. Anytime you would normally Super Dash in a combo, you can hold A1 or A2 to have an assist character come in and continue the combo instead. You can also tag into an assist following a Vanish, then continue your combo from there.
Another way to get an assist character in the game is to perform a super move. There are two ways you can do this. If you get to the end of your combo and perform a super move with your point character, you can press A1 or A2 and an assist character will follow the first super move with a super move of their own. After the second super move, you can press the other assist button to add a third super move (assuming you have enough meter). You can even use a level three super move by pressing QCB+A1 or A2, but you can’t follow a level three super move with another super. Keep in mind, not all super moves attack at the same height, so make sure you have a team that synergizes well so all of the super moves hit.
The second way you can get an assist character into a combo is to press HCF+A1 or A2 or HCB+A1 or A2 (for a level three) in the middle of a combo. That’s a full half-circle instead of a quarter-circle, which is what’s normally required for a super move. By using this notation you can tag in an assist character with their super move, without using a super move on your point character.
Vanish
You can extend many combos by using the Vanish ability if you have at least one bar of super meter available. When to use the Vanish does vary a bit from character to character, but a general rule of thumb is to use a Vanish after a special move or Heavy attack. While you can usually only get one wall bounce in a combo, the Vanish wall bounce does not count toward this total. So you can score a wall bounce with a Heavy attack or special move, then get another wall bounce with a Vanish attack.
Depending on the situation, you can usually follow a Vanish with a Super Dash, Dragon Rush (throw), tag, assist, or super move. If you’re still on the ground you can even follow with a full combo. You may need to dash forward a bit depending on your positioning, but since the Vanish will knock the opponent off their feet, you can continue a combo with something as simple as Vanish > Medium > Jump Cancel if you get a wall bounce from the Vanish attack (depends on position and when you use the Vanish in the combo).
Combo Limits
There are some limitations on what you can do in combos in Dragon Ball FighterZ. While there are some exceptions for certain special moves and characters, you can generally only get one wall bounce using a special move or Heavy attack. In addition, if you use a wall bounce other than Vanish, you cannot get a ground slide as well. You get one or the other, which is why the Jump Cancel combos are generally preferred over the combos that use Heavy attack early.
The game also limits combos to a single Super Dash, but this does not count tagging in another character (who comes in with a Super Dash). If you start a combo with a Super Dash, the only way you can use a second Super Dash in the combo is by holding one of the assist buttons to tag in another character. If you attempt a second Super Dash with your point character, it will not execute.
If you manage to get an extended ground combo, there is a limit to the number of hits you can perform. We’re still narrowing down that number, but it’s somewhere in the 12-hit range depending on the assists used and other variables. Of course you can still perform longer combos, but you need to launch the opponent into the air, go into a super move, Vanish or some other mechanic before you hit the ground combo limit.
Character Specific Combo Mechanics
While we’re still going through the characters and will update this section as we detail how their combo ability varies from the rest of the cast, some characters have to make adjustments to the general combo flow in order to complete a full combo.
Android 21 - Her aerial Heavy attack does not slam opponents to the ground like most other characters. Because of this she can use Light > Medium > Heavy > Down + Heavy in the air, then follow with Light > Medium > Jump Cancel > Light > Medium > Heavy before going into a special move or super move. If you want to slam the opponent down to the ground, use the Hors d’Oeuvre Stab (QCB+L/M/H).
Piccolo - Unfortunately, Piccolo has to spend meter to knock an opponent down to the ground after an aerial combo, if you want to follow with a super move. First off, his aerial Heavy attack will not slam opponents back to the ground. In addition, while his Light Demon Slicer (QCB+Light) will bring the opponent down to the ground, you can’t follow with a raw super move like most other characters in similar situations. You have to use the Heavy Demon Slicer (QCB+Heavy), which costs one bar of super meter. This will give you the ground slide so you can follow with a super move.
Yamcha - Yamcha’s Heavy attacks do not function the same way as most of the other characters in the game. His normal Heavy attack will not combo if you try Light > Medium > Heavy, so you’ll have to use his Down + Heavy on the ground instead. In the air, his Down + Heavy is a dive kick and will not knock the opponent higher into the air, while his normal aerial Heavy attack won’t knock an opponent back to the ground for any kind of ground slide. Instead, you’ll need to use his Medium or Heavy Wolf Fang Fist: Gale Claws (QCB+M/H) to get a ground slide from an aerial combo.
For more strategies and advice, including the best assists in the game, check out our Dragon Ball FighterZ game hub!
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Bryan Dawson has an extensive background in the gaming industry, having worked as a journalist for various publications for nearly 20 years and participating in a multitude of competitive fighting game events. He has authored over a dozen strategy guides for Prima Games, worked as a consultant on numerous gaming-related TV and web shows and was the Operations Manager for the fighting game division of the IGN Pro League.
I've run some test games with the bring to light package and have to say it's great.I just love the tool box feel of the deck. Quote from I play Bring to Light with the 8 ramp spells. I've never had a real problem with casting BtL with 4 different colors. I also think if you add too many ramp spells the deck becomes more inconsistent. You already play 25 Lands + 8 ramp spells. To get the 7 or 8 Lands should be the smallest problem.I might change my white with black and swap Ojutai's Command with Sultai Charm. Sultai Charm seems very sweet.
Killing Tasigur/Angler, Eidolon, Spellskite, Nexus, Bloodmoon and if you don't have a target you just draw 2.Sultai charm does seem good.Arguments could be made for both.What about kolaghan's command? Re-buys your ramp or snapcasters and helps in some difficult matchups.Yeah I will test Sultai Charm tomorrow. On paper it looks really good. Kolaghan's Command seems like a good Sideboard card. But I would't play to many black/white spells.Maelstrom Puls is another good card we should consider.I'd honestly just run terminate and be done with it. Deals with all the rubbish that we have been running Roast to try and deal with.
Makes us actually the control deck.Maelstrom pulse is very good though, as is abrupt decay. There are some great options for us in black. Not a huge fan of changing the deck and adding a color simply to help Bring To Light work, but I see what you are all saying. I like the idea of utilizing the fourth color if it does come to that though.
However the decision of which to use can be a debate that leads me more towards testing. Terminate/Go For the Throat definitely pushes my attention towards splashing black (leaning more toward go for the throat because i dont like dealing with color difficulties to cast my removal), so the package deal seems appealing there, but I dont think the splash can facilitate removal unless we completely rework the manabase. Quote from I play Bring to Light with the 8 ramp spells. I've never had a real problem with casting BtL with 4 different colors.
I also think if you add too many ramp spells the deck becomes more inconsistent. You already play 25 Lands + 8 ramp spells. To get the 7 or 8 Lands should be the smallest problem.I might change my white with black and swap Ojutai's Command with Sultai Charm. Sultai Charm seems very sweet.
Killing Tasigur/Angler, Eidolon, Spellskite, Nexus, Bloodmoon and if you don't have a target you just draw 2.Sultai charm does seem good.Arguments could be made for both.What about kolaghan's command? Re-buys your ramp or snapcasters and helps in some difficult matchups.Yeah I will test Sultai Charm tomorrow. On paper it looks really good. Kolaghan's Command seems like a good Sideboard card. But I would't play to many black/white spells.Maelstrom Puls is another good card we should consider.I'd honestly just run terminate and be done with it.
Deals with all the rubbish that we have been running Roast to try and deal with. Makes us actually the control deck.Maelstrom pulse is very good though, as is abrupt decay. There are some great options for us in black.To be honest. I would run Sultai Charm over Terminate all the time. Sultai Charm kills the biggest mono colored Thread (Goyf, Tasigur/Anger/Mandrils) It also kills all creatures affinity is running + plating.
And it can always cycle, so it will never be a dead draw.Abrupt Decay seems also like a good sideboard card against twin, jund, affinity and infect.right?there's so many options.like i said previously though, charm looks solid. Three mana is a pain to recur with snappy, and i do like what terminate would add to the deck, but i think you could go any number of ways on this. I don't think these new lands add anything to the mana base. You don't want to really replace basics. All of the ramp spells in the deck grab basics, and you rarely want to grab basic mountains, so cutting any basics is always a risk. Besides, cutting basics makes the new lands worse.Also the 3 islands and 2 forests let you play all of your spells through blood moon.
Cryptic command is the main way to deal with blood moon so not having 3 islands takes it off the table. If you're not using any double green sideboard cards then dropping one Forest is feasible. I don't think going below 6 basics is a good idea.Every time (in the last few years of playing this deck) that I've tried to dramatically change the mana base, I've always ended up going back to the classic setup. Unfortunately, rug scapeshift doesn't have any real flexibility in the mana base.
This is one of the weaknesses of scapeshift as a whole.Also, adding blighted woodland means you should add MORE basics, not cut them. Otherwise there will be a lot of games where it's just dead.
Quote from I don't think these new lands add anything to the mana base. You don't want to really replace basics. All of the ramp spells in the deck grab basics, and you rarely want to grab basic mountains, so cutting any basics is always a risk.
Besides, cutting basics makes the new lands worse.Also the 3 islands and 2 forests let you play all of your spells through blood moon. Cryptic command is the main way to deal with blood moon so not having 3 islands takes it off the table. If you're not using any double green sideboard cards then dropping one Forest is feasible.
I don't think going below 6 basics is a good idea.Every time (in the last few years of playing this deck) that I've tried to dramatically change the mana base, I've always ended up going back to the classic setup. Unfortunately, rug scapeshift doesn't have any real flexibility in the mana base. This is one of the weaknesses of scapeshift as a whole.Also, adding blighted woodland means you should add MORE basics, not cut them.
Otherwise there will be a lot of games where it's just dead.Thanks for the input. I've been testing that configuration and it seems that cinder glade is a no brainer for 01 mountain. But for the 2nd forest I'm not sold yet.
The same for the lighthouse, this shines when the games go long, and usually if it is going long you should be winning.Which 24 would you suggest? For a 24 land list, you would typically want more cantrips, ideally some serum visions main deck. I think that's the way to go. Most decks are moving more towards cantrips with fewer lands now. If you run a cantrip-heavy version, you typically don't run things like lightning bolt. Why prairie stream over another hallowed fountain?Also, supreme verdict will really stretch this mana base into needing triple blue, double green AND double white.Having zero can trips makes you completely at the mercy of the top of your deck. You also have 12 ramp spells, which lowers your draw quality, making cantrips even more important.I think bring to light could have potential in the deck, but I think it'd need to be a more linear, streamlined version of the deck that seeks to combo as early and consistently as possible.With that many bring to lights and scape shifts and ramp spells, I'd probably cut anything that doesn't contribute to the combo and replace it with cantrip+effect cards (into the roil as an example).
I'd also remove the white cards from the main deck and just use the mana to cast bring to light. Maybe put some white hoser cards in the side?Now that I'm looking at it, black almost seems better (sideboard terminate/abrupt decay, damnation)My problem with bring to light is it makes the deck go bigger when I think it really needs to go leaner and more efficient like a lot of the other control decks in the format. I'm excited to see what people can do with it, but I do remain skeptical. As kind of a follow up, sorry to gush, but my mind is working now!What matchups does bring to light help us with?The bad matchups for scapeshift are typically other fast combo decks. Decks like amulet bloom, grishoalbrand, burn, and infect.
Bring to light does nothing at all in these matchups.The good matchups are small creature midrange decks (like coco and pod in days past), other midrange decks with no counter spells (abzan/jund, as long as they don't land Liliana) and almost any control deck. Bring to light is very helpful in these matchups.
Zoo and tokens are such good matchups that bring to light really doesn't even matter. Delver decks were good matchups before the grixis variants.Affinity is either very good or very bad, depending on your build and sideboard. Bring to light would likely be boarded out in this matchup.The even matchups are decks like UR splinter twin, ad nauseum, or combo-control decks that are not particularly fast but can threaten to win at any time.
Let's also bundle the mirror match in here. These games are often decided by timing and mana efficiency (who can cast the most spells in one critical turn). If we can ramp effectively, these matchups get easier. But if we can't, we suffer from the inefficiency of our counter magic (using cryptic over things like spell snare or dispel).
These are matchups where you'd ideally like to draw scapeshift late.In fact, in almost any matchup, you'd really never want scapeshift in your opening hand. It's much better to draw into it 4 or 5 turns in. Bring to light hurts a lot in this respect because you have another, more expensive card that can be in your opener.TL;DR VERSION:-Bring to light makes our good matchups better-It actually makes our bad matchups worse (or would be sided out)-It is highly situational and clunky in even matchups (where mana efficiency is paramount)-It is another card (on top of scapeshift) that you don't want in your opening hand.-It forces you to weaken the deck's mana consistency and makes it more vulnerable to blood moonI'd love to be proven wrong as I love innovation. Hey guys,I was thinking about bring to light this morning and then I started watching some old scapeshift videos. There was a card that stuck out that I haven't considered in a while:.I think that prismatic omen makes bring to light a lot more playable and ties into other synergies in the deck.I never liked prismatic omen in the rug scapeshift lists, but bring to light makes it much better.How about a core like this:4 bring to light2 scapeshift4 prismatic omen2-3 primeval Titan4 tribe elders4 search for tomorrowThis would play more into the 'ramp as alternative wincon' gameplan. Maybe run 3 valakuts instead of 2 and a super heavy mountain mana base. Think if the rg breach mana bases.
Quasar,Don't think of it as hate. I really like the card bring to light, but I want to be as critical as possible.We have all seen awesome cards that, when they work, it feels amazing. But they can be super swingy and inefficient and make a deck less consistent.If I am super critical now, and we can all prove through testing that it does actually improve the deck, then we can honestly say to ourselves that we are not using it as a pet card, and that it actually works.I've been playing the deck for a while and there have been a few big innovations in the past. Think of things like Makeshift (rg breach), Giftshift, Goyfshift and Nightshift (clutch of the undercity). All cool, and all did well at tournaments.Maybe some day we'll all call this version 'Lightshift'.
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Hrm, I didn't consider the Prismatic Omen combo with the card. However, I don't think I would play 4. That seems to be too far in on the combo. You seem to be shifting back to the old-school version of the deck that relies on Primetime. It's definitely worth trying and testing out, but the card doesn't fit in the shell with Cryptic Command very well imo. I would keep in 4 Scapeshift considering it to be the win-con you want. I would core it like this:4 BtL4 Scapeshift2-3 Prismatic Omen3 Prime Time4 Sakura-Tribe Elder4 Search of Tomorrow4 RemandRemand is still playable.
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