• As part of the relaunch of Skullheart, ALL previous threads have been archived. You can find them at the bottom of the forum in the Archives (2021) section. The archives are locked, so please use the new forum sections to create new discussion threads.

Drama Bar??? I really don't understand.

blueberrymilk

blueberrymilk

lurker of threads
Joined
Oct 27, 2013
Messages
83
Reaction score
33
Points
18
Age
33
PSN
blueberrymilk (if that doesnt work try 2 k's)
Filia Parasoul Fukua
I've read the official dramatic tension post but I still don't get its concept or how it will help me in battle. I'm asking now cause I've never really paid any attention to it but I've been losing a lot lately and in the matches I've lost I've seen it go up pretty high. I just want to know how I can utilize/understand the dramatic tension so I will not be so stupid and maybe even turn the tide of battle...or something.
 
Dramatic Tension's the super move meter. Every character has three or more supers that consumes at least 1 meter, those moves that briefly pause the action and flash a picture of the character for a second. These moves are very powerful in the right situations and can be chained into from just about any attack, but they also carry hefty punishment frames if you miss or get blocked. If you have enough meters in store, you can use higher level supers that consume more meters, or chain your current super into a backup partner's super by inputting one of their super commands before it ends.

You can also use one meter on Outtake moves (QCF + a pair of tag out buttons) that do no damage but instead kicks the enemy point character out and forces them to swap in one of their backups for a while, or on Stunt Double swaps (Forward + a tag out button combo) that are used when you're in block stun, swapping out your point character for one of your backups who will come in with very brief invulnerability and immediately use whatever assist move you set for them. Naturally, these two moves will do nothing if there are no backups to swap with.
 
Arrei said:
Dramatic Tension's the super move meter. Every character has three or more supers that consumes at least 1 meter, those moves that briefly pause the action and flash a picture of the character for a second. These moves are very powerful in the right situations and can be chained into from just about any attack, but they also carry hefty punishment frames if you miss or get blocked. If you have enough meters in store, you can use higher level supers that consume more meters, or chain your current super into a backup partner's super by inputting one of their super commands before it ends.

You can also use one meter on Outtake moves (QCF + a pair of tag out buttons) that do no damage but instead kicks the enemy point character out and forces them to swap in one of their backups for a while, or on Stunt Double swaps (Forward + a tag out button combo) that are used when you're in block stun, swapping out your point character for one of your backups who will come in with very brief invulnerability and immediately use whatever assist move you set for them. Naturally, these two moves will do nothing if there are no backups to swap with.

oh, man I'm so stupid - I mixed up the names of what I'm talking about....It's the bar under that that fills up just with a solid green color. I'm sorry for the confusion.
 
I think its called tension scaling or something? it's the thingamajig that came out with Squigly I believe.
 
That's the Undizzy Bar, in Skullgirls it's called Drama.

I'm not so clear on its function myself so I'll let someone else explain what it does.
 
It essentially scales combos. It fills up the longer your combo is, and when it's full, your opponent can burst out of it your combo.

Combos combos combos. Wombo combo.

Anyway, hope that helped.
 
Yessssss, that's what it's called....thank you....I mixed up the two. lol apologies...
 
BeatNinja said:
It essentially scales combos. It fills up the longer your combo is, and when it's full, your opponent can burst out of it your combo.

Combos combos combos. Wombo combo.

Anyway, hope that helped.

oh sooo...pretty much it benefits the player who is currently losing? well what about the players who pulls off those combos that go on for over a minute? They somehow manage not to trigger the bar unless I'm missing something.
 
blueberrymilk said:
oh, man I'm so stupid - I mixed up the names of what I'm talking about....It's the bar under that that fills up just with a solid green color. I'm sorry for the confusion.

Ok, so that is drama.

Do you understand how the IPS works?

The IPS works in stages, where stage 1 is your optional jumping string and stage 2 is your first ground string.

Neither of these stages will build any drama.

From stage 3 onward, which is to say, after your first ground string OR if you don't perform a ground string and opt for multiple air strings, you will build drama as such:

Lights: 15 drama
Mediums/Specials: 20 drama
Heavies: 30 drama

This is the green bar rising as you see normally.

Once you reach stage 5 of IPS, the final stage, if you START a string over the maximum drama of 240, the opponent will glow green and will be able to burst.

Once you let them out of hitstun, drama will begin to drain, if you hit them again during this time, it will count up from where it is currently.

NOTE: You can actually have more drama than 240 by continuing to hit them after that threshold and you can have less than 0 by landing a counterhit, which subtracts drama similarly:

Lights: -25 drama
Mediums/Specials: -50 drama
Heavies: -100 drama
 
  • Like
Reactions: RadicalFuzz
blueberrymilk said:
oh sooo...pretty much it benefits the player who is currently losing? well what about the players who pulls off those combos that go on for over a minute? They somehow manage not to trigger the bar unless I'm missing something.

Supers don't effect Undizzy, so they can DHC a lot and not trigger it. It's really a great mechanic, vanilla SG combos were pretty bad. Looking at you barrel loops.

Edit: Tomo explained it better than any of us.
 
Tomo009 said:
Ok, so that is drama.
nd will be able to burst.....

Ok, I see. Thanks for the IPS lesson, it was always confusing but I think I understand it a tad bit better now. Well, I gueesss my question is now, how exactly can I utilize it to my benefit? I am aware some people want their opponent to burst as a means to keep attacking them ( is this burst baiting?) while others try to figure out what combos wont trigger the bar as to use unrelenting offense. Do you have a tactic or anything when it comes to the drama bar? I just think everyone knows what they are doing and I do not.
 
blueberrymilk said:
Ok, I see. Thanks for the IPS lesson, it was always confusing but I think I understand it a tad bit better now. Well, I gueesss my question is now, how exactly can I utilize it to my benefit? I am aware some people want their opponent to burst as a means to keep attacking them ( is this burst baiting?) while others try to figure out what combos wont trigger the bar as to use unrelenting offense. Do you have a tactic or anything when it comes to the drama bar? I just think everyone knows what they are doing and I do not.
There are multiple ways to play around with drama, I'm not going to mention everything haha.

But generally you tend to chose between either short damaging drama efficient combos into multiple resets OR my personal favourite:

Full BnB into 50/50 air throw / burst bait into kill combo if they burst.

Because bursts can be baited out and punished when they whiff, you can set up situations where your opponent thinks you will air throw them but will trigger a burst when you hit them from a safe range instead, resetting drama to 0 AND allowing you to land a counterhit into a full combo, killing in most ratio matchups.

Of course this way is a bit more difficult to pull off from an executional standpoint usually, requiring you know how to convert from your bursts on every character. You also need to find a setup into the same situation, from an air throw that uses no drama so you can condition the opponent and scare them into a situation where they eventually have to throw tech or be thrown to death, causing a burst and their death anyway.

Either approach is completely legitimate and should really be both used as you see fit, but that just sort of gives you an idea of how to play around with drama and actually use it in the mindgame with your opponent.
 
  • Like
Reactions: blueberrymilk
blueberrymilk said:
well what about the players who pulls off those combos that go on for over a minute? They somehow manage not to trigger the bar unless I'm missing something.
If you'd be so kind as to record one of those minute-long combos I'd be happy to help, but unless they are spending massive amounts of super meter I doubt you can get close.
(You are probably being reset and not blocking.)

For this bar:
- As you get hit your bar goes up. If the bar is full and they start a new chain (a new "section" of the combo), you can burst anytime if they keep hitting you. You can tell this because there'll be green hitsparks, or just mash a button and see yourself burst. Try turning off "Escape Infinite Combos" and "Ground Recovery" in Training Mode and then repeating a simple combo like Parasoul's [LKx2->MKx2->HPx2 -> LP Napalm Shot] or if you play the Beta Fukua's [j.HK->HP, land, jump] and watch the bar and the hitsparks. Red hitsparks mean you repeated the same attack more times than you were allowed, which in the case of these combos happens quickly, and green means their bar was full. Either color means they can burst immediately.
- The bar goes down slowly when you are not being hit, and doesn't go up for the first few chains if you are reset (that is, if they stop the combo and start a new one and you didn't successfully defend in the space you had to do so).
- Attackers will use the bar as an indication that they should stop comboing you because otherwise you'll be able to burst, so as the defender when it gets higher you should look for them to go for a reset and be ready to react.
- It's possible to go over a full bar and continue to combo if you keep the same chain going (L->M->H->special->super->DHC to another character's super) but that's all you can do when the bar is full, anything else will grant the defender a burst.
- If you are counterhit, meaning if you are mashing buttons and you are hit out of your own attack, a different amount of bar is subtracted depending on what hit you. The bar can go below empty. So the more you mash, the longer combos the opponent can do on you by counterhitting you.
- If you ground-tech (B/F+button when you're knocked down) the bar clears completely, so a small part of the strategy is to not ground tech if you know they can't hit you off the floor, which will force the next combo they do to be much shorter than normal if it starts with you having bar left.

Hope that helps. And yes, we need a tutorial for this. :^P
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Nappa Cabbage and blueberrymilk
Tomo009 said:
There are multiple ways to play around with drama, I'm not going to mention everything haha.

But generally you tend to chose between either short damaging drama efficient combos into multiple resets OR my personal favourite:

Full BnB into 50/50 air throw / burst bait into kill combo if they burst.

Because bursts can be baited out and punished when they whiff, you can set up situations where your opponent thinks you will air throw them but will trigger a burst when you hit them from a safe range instead, resetting drama to 0 AND allowing you to land a counterhit into a full combo, killing in most ratio matchups.

Of course this way is a bit more difficult to pull off from an executional standpoint usually, requiring you know how to convert from your bursts on every character. You also need to find a setup into the same situation, from an air throw that uses no drama so you can condition the opponent and scare them into a situation where they eventually have to throw tech or be thrown to death, causing a burst and their death anyway.

Either approach is completely legitimate and should really be both used as you see fit, but that just sort of gives you an idea of how to play around with drama and actually use it in the mindgame with your opponent.

aw, man....this sounds like some hard pro stuff... -gulp- im still pretty scrubby if that matters.... i notice i don't really fill up the drama bar so I guess I have to get some control over that first. back to training i go. lol
 
Is there a possibility of having the undizzy bar change colors when it's maxed out in a future update?
 
blueberrymilk said:
Ok, I see. Thanks for the IPS lesson, it was always confusing but I think I understand it a tad bit better now. Well, I gueesss my question is now, how exactly can I utilize it to my benefit? I am aware some people want their opponent to burst as a means to keep attacking them ( is this burst baiting?) while others try to figure out what combos wont trigger the bar as to use unrelenting offense. Do you have a tactic or anything when it comes to the drama bar? I just think everyone knows what they are doing and I do not.
To put this in really simple terms, Skullgirls has two ways of preventing massively long combos. IPS and Undizzy (Drama).

For clarity, I'm going to call the attacker Player 1 (P1) and the defender Player 2 (P2).

The first system is the IPS, which was went over above. If P1 does the same thing in a combo too many times P2 will get a chance to burst out of that combo for free. IPS burst gives off Red Sparks when it's available to use.

The second is Undizzy. As P2 takes hits from after a certain point in a long combo, their Drama meter (the green bar) will start to fill. Once that bar is filled, if P1 does another combo of a decent length P2 will get a chance to burst out of that combo. Undizzy bursts give off Green Sparks.

A few seconds after P2 falls out of a combo, their undizzy meter will start to empty. However, if P1 starts attacking again too quickly, the undizzy meter won't empty and P2 will soon get a chance to burst if the combo goes on too long. Remember though that even the undizzy bar is completely full, P2 will only get to burst once P1's combo goes on too long.

One of the things Undizzy is designed to prevent abuse of 'resets', which are where P1 will intentionally drop their combos, then start a new combo really quickly when P2 is not prepared. This resets the combo meter and IPS will not let P2 burst. Undizzy carries across between resets, so it stops P1 from doing gigantic combo into gigantic combo into gigantic combo.
 
  • Like
Reactions: blueberrymilk
This in particular is a really valuable thing to be aware of about the undizzy meter:
Mike_Z said:
- Attackers will use the bar as an indication that they should stop comboing you because otherwise you'll be able to burst, so as the defender when it gets higher you should look for them to go for a reset and be ready to react.
 
Mike_Z said:
If you'd be so kind as to record one of those minute-long combos I'd be happy to help, but unless they are spending massive amounts of super meter I doubt you can get close.
(You are probably being reset and not blocking.)

For this bar:
- As you get hit your bar goes up. If the bar is full and they start a new chain (a new "section" of the combo), you can burst anytime if they keep hitting you. You can tell this because there'll be green hitsparks, or just mash a button and see yourself burst. Try turning off "Escape Infinite Combos" and "Ground Recovery" in Training Mode and then repeating a simple combo like Parasoul's [LKx2->MKx2->HPx2 -> LP Napalm Shot] or if you play the Beta Fukua's [j.HK->HP, land, jump] and watch the bar and the hitsparks. Red hitsparks mean you repeated the same attack more times than you were allowed, which in the case of these combos happens quickly, and green means their bar was full. Either color means they can burst immediately.
- The bar goes down slowly when you are not being hit, and doesn't go up for the first few chains if you are reset (that is, if...

You know, I think those were resets. (just looked up a video explaining them lol) I'm not that great at blocking when I should in those instances so I think you are right. I'll pay attention more closely in my next matches though. Thank you for the elaborate explanation of the drama bar, especially what it indicates to my opponent and myself. I definitely won't ignore it like I used to. Annnnd I certainly will not button mash, I had no idea(!!!!) it could be hugely detrimental, I thought if anything, that could improve my chances of breaking out of the reset/combo/corner. lol
 
Cellsai said:
This in particular is a really valuable thing to be aware of about the undizzy meter:

Yes! I would never think that the Drama Bar was so important. I just thought it was for combos but boy was I wrong. It changes my whole perspective on the gameplay. That's most likely why it seemed like my opponents knew exactly what my next move was.
 
blueberrymilk said:
You know, I think those were resets. (just looked up a video explaining them lol) I'm not that great at blocking when I should in those instances so I think you are right. I'll pay attention more closely in my next matches though. Thank you for the elaborate explanation of the drama bar, especially what it indicates to my opponent and myself. I definitely won't ignore it like I used to. Annnnd I certainly will not button mash, I had no idea(!!!!) it could be hugely detrimental, I thought if anything, that could improve my chances of breaking out of the reset/combo/corner. lol
If the combo counter goes back to the low numbers, you were reset at some point in time. If you flash red, you were just counterhit.
 
  • Like
Reactions: blueberrymilk
Mike_Z said:
- If you are counterhit, meaning if you are mashing buttons and you are hit out of your own attack, a different amount of bar is subtracted depending on what hit you. The bar can go below empty. So the more you mash, the longer combos the opponent can do on you by counterhitting you.

OMG! I didn't know this. I wonder how many many other things I don't know.
 
  • Like
Reactions: blueberrymilk
Lol, as you as you put that there, I've been reading it. Thank you.
 
Something that I've never seen explained... lets say I'm Peacock, and after my first launcher (before the infinite detection thing goes to level 5) I do
j. LP j. MP j.HP adc j.LP j.MP
Now, this obviously is seen as an infinite but the system doesn't let the opponent burst because it is below level 5.
However, why is it that I cannot start a new string with j.MP afterwards (they can then burst)? Technically, j.MP was never used to start a string.
 
that's a very important thing to note about how IPS works :
From stage 3 and beyond, every move you use in your chains (not just chain starting ones, but every one) will be considered as "used" for the rest of the combo. Your confusion comes from the fact IPS only looks at the first move of a chain to decide either the opponent can burst or not, depending on if the chain starter has already been used. So using again an j.mp after a jumping light won't trigger the burst as long as the light wasn't used before, but the j.mp will still be considered used, even though it never was used too start a chain.
 
How can you guys understand this so quickly? It can be quite complicated.
 
never said it was simple, just give it some time and research
 
blueberrymilk said:
How can you guys understand this so quickly? It can be quite complicated.
"Starting a chain" easy test: If you would have been able to block at the time you did the attack, that attack starts a new chain.
So, LP->MP->HP->special->super is one chain, but LP->launcher /\ j.attack, the j.attack starts a new chain because you could have blocked before you did it.

IPS Rules:
- Don't start a new chain by using an attack you have ever hit with before in that combo.
- Standing and crouching attacks "count as the same thing". So hitting with s.LP means you can't start a new chain with s.LP or cr.LP after that point.
- All strengths of the same special move also count as the same thing, so LP Updo = HP Updo, and Cerebella's DP+P moves all count as the same.

That's...the whole IPS ruleset. If you follow those rules, you will never trigger IPS, ever. That bit's easy.

If you wish to extend you combo longer than those strict rules would allow, then you can use the extra exceptions to eke out more stuff:
- IPS will only trigger for chains started in Stage 5, but that doesn't mean everything before then is free.
- During Stage 1 and 2, anything you do is completely ignored by IPS.
- During Stage 3 and 4, anything you do will not trigger IPS but is counted for later, so if you use j.MP during Stage 3 then you can't start a chain with it in Stage 5 or it will trigger.
- Air and ground versions of the same special move count separately. (Squigly's stance specials all count separately because if they didn't she'd barely be able to do anything neat.)
- Supers are ignored completely by IPS.

Drama is separate, because if IPS were the only thing that existed then combos go on for a long time.
Basically IPS requires variety in a combo, and Drama limits total length.
 
Thanks for the explanation. I understand it for the most part but there are some parts I'll need to repeat to myself and test out to better understand. Yeaaahh, I'm more like a visual person so excuse my dullness. c:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back