Hello all! So, for some time now a few players have known about grab invincibility which occurs after block stun. For those of you who are unfamiliar, here is an explanation:
Whenever you block an attack, you are put into frames of "block stun". Obviously, you cannot be grabbed during block stun. The odd thing is, in KoFXIII, characters have a few frames of grab invincibility, even after block stun frames have finished. That's right, you have a few frames of grab invincibility, even once your character has recovered from block stun and is in a NEUTRAL STATE. In KoFXIII, the annoying part is that this grab invincibility lasts for DIFFERENT PERIODS OF TIME amongst different characters.
I decided to conduct some testing with Vice's string, D -> Fwd. A -> A version Splash, which is an air to ground grab. I came up with some interesting results. The splash whiffs on about half of the cast, but connects on the other half. This means that the group that avoided the splash have relatively longer block stun induced grab invincibility than the group that got grabbed. Through this testing, I was able to separate the cast into two groups: Group A, which didn't get grabbed, and Group B, which got grabbed. These were the results:
Group A (longer grab invincibility):
Kyo, EX Kyo, Terry, Billy, Ash, Saiki, Claw Iori, Flame Iori, Elisabeth, Duo Lon, Hwa Jai, Mai, K', Kula, Maxima, Kensou
Group B (shorter grab invincibility):
Daimon, Andy, Benimaru, Joe, Ryo, Robert, Takuma, Mr. Karate, Mature, Vice, Shen, Kim, Raiden, King, Yuri, Ralf, Clark, Leona
The special cases in this testing were Chin and Athena. Chin and Athena were able to be grabbed with Vice's string mid-screen, but never got grabbed in the corner. I have no clue why this happened, or what implications being in the corner have for block stun induced grab invincibility.
Because of the nature of my testing, I cannot conclusively say any frame counts regarding the two groups. The different number of frames of invincibility between them might be large or small, and there probably are even frame differences within the groups themselves. What I can say conclusively is:
EVERY CHARACTER IN GROUP "A" HAS LONGER BLOCK STUN INDUCED GRAB INVINCIBILITY THAN EVERY CHARACTER IN GROUP "B", AT LEAST BY 1 FRAME.
Now, the implications here may be somewhat significant or not, depending on your perspective. What this means is that your tick throw or tick command throw setups which work against characters in group B may not work against characters in Group A, especially if they are very frame precise. In a nutsell, the characters in Group A may be harder to tick throw than the characters in Group B. As for Chin and Athena, I dunno!!!
Anyways, I hope this information is somewhat helpful! Peace!
UPDATE: Here is some additional info about throw invincibility from arcadia magazine, translated by laziefreddy:
- Jump weak attacks (group A, column 1 and 2), Stand Weak attacks (group B, column 3 and 4), strong attacks (column 5 and 6) induce different lengths of throw invincibility
- Exceptions to the above rule are Mature, Raiden, Ryo, Yuri, Maxima's standing weak attacks, which below to group A
- The window of throw invincibility could be shortened if you press a button (column 1, 3, 5 details the minimum length)
- Throw invincible frames during wake up= 11
- Throw invincible frames after air reset = 6
- Throw invincible frames during quick rise = 0
- Normal throws have 1 frame start up
- You cannot do a reversal normal throw on wake up, but it is possible during a quick rise
- The game has a 4 frame window for "simultaneous inputs." e.g. if you press C, then input forward within the next 4 frames, a throw is registered. However, some arcade cabinets may have set this to 2 frames instead.