The King of Fighters XIII/K'/Strategy

Spacing

Far Range

• K' can play it safe from this range. He can easily anticipate and zone out projectiles that are thrown his way with EX/Eins + Shoot. However, therein lies the problem. From this range K' can only really zone. K' can build meter but only if the Eins + Shell hits the opponent (guard or not) otherwise it won't work. The range issue can be remedied by using moves like Eins + Blackout to quickly dash across the screen and into the opponent's face, then follow up with a crouch B combo starter. If there is have meter to burn, K' can also get by by using EX Minutes + Narrow Spike since it goes a good distance and it's much more safe on block than the weak/strong versions. EX attacks aren't of much use from this distance so stick to zoning/building meter. Drive/super canceling is out of the question.

Mid Range

• K' isn't as proficient with special moves here because a whiffed Eins Trigger + Shell is likely to get punished. K' can still get away with playing it safe though. Using moves such as Eins + Weak Blackout can help out from time to time when trying to get behind the opponent. As for offensive options, s.A as an anti-air poke, j.B/C/D for jump-in purposes, j.CD for that extra push, and crouch B will be his main combo starter. As mentioned before, whiffing Eins + Shell will get punished but is still usable. Timing is required, never just thrown randomly. Minutes + Weak Narrow Spike can also be used efficiently within this range. Crow Bites can work too, but be wary of punishes. This is also where K's DMs come into play. Chain Drive works after Eins + Shell, but the main DM of choice is Heat Drive because it plows right through the opponent after a juggle attack. EX attacks are of more use here but not of high priority. Super/drive cancelling options will come up from time to time.

Close Range

• This is where the fun starts. K' can pretty much go all out and run right through his opponents defenses. His combo starters run from his s.A to his CD attack. Crouch B is great for starting BnBs from low attacks, while his stand C can go into his command normal and so on. Weak Eins Trigger is extremely good for building meter up close because it comes out really fast and goes away fast, making it a safe and pretty spam-worthy move. Eins + Shell juggles the opponent and sets them up for a variety of follow-up attacks. Crow Bites + Plus/Minutes + Narrow Spike/Heat Drive/Chain or EX Chain Drive enders. Drive/super cancelling have a myriad of uses here. Minutes + Narrow drive cancel loop works very well. Super canceling his Crow Bites to either DM is also good. Minutes combos into Air Minutes too here. NeoMax Hyper Chain Drive can be used as anti-air, but only if you feel like burning the meter to finish them off.

Cornered Opponent

• K' can literally toy with opponent here. Everything from Eins Trigger to his j.CD works here. Cr.B is great, his j.D can be used in heavy blockstrings, and if they ever attempt to GC roll away out of the corner just run up and throw them. NeoMax can be comboed into as long as you use it after a juggle attack. Eins + Shell knocks the opponent into the air giving you a lot of options to continue with, namely his One Inch command normal. That can then combo into his Heat Drive and his EX/Chain Drive DM's.

Cornered

• The main objective here is to get out of the corner, Blackout to EX Blackout are really good here. Just do whatever it takes to get K' out of there.

Tips

Frame Trap and Links

• (L) = Link, can be a frame trap as well.

• "(n) frame gap" = The amount of frames that opponent has to counter a frame trap. If n is 0 or -n, the particular frame trap is, initially, a block string.

1.) st. A > cl. C - 3 frame gap between st. A and cl. C. St. A whiffs on couching opponents, except on Raiden and Maxima when they are in guard position.

2.) st. A > cr. C - 4 frame gap between st. A and cr. C. St. A whiffs on couching opponents, except on Raiden and Maxima when they are in guard position.

3.) st. B > st. A - 3 frame gap between st. B and st. A. St. A whiffs on couching opponents, except on Raiden and Maxima when they are in guard position.

4.) st. B > cr. A - 3 frame gap between st. B and cr. A.

5.) st. B > st. B - 4 frame gap between st. B and st. B.

6.) st. B > cr. B - 3 frame gap between st. B and cr. B.

7.) st. B > cl. C - 4 frame gap between st. B and cl. C.

8.) cr. B > cl. C - 4 frame gap between cr. B and cl. C.

9.) qcf+AC > st. A - -7 frame gap between qcf+AC and st. A. St. A whiffs on couching opponents, except on Raiden and Maxima when they are in guard position.

10.) qcf+AC > st. B - -6 frame gap between qcf+AC and st. B.

11.) qcf+AC > cr. B - -7 frame gap between qcf+AC and cr. B.

12.) qcf+AC > far C - -1 frame gap between qcf+AC and far C.

13.) qcf+AC > far D - -2 frame gap between qcf+AC and far D.

14.) qcf+AC > cr. D - -3 frame gap between qcf+AC and cr. D.

15.) qcf+AC > st. CD - 3 frame gap between qcf+AC and far C.

16.) (corner) qcf+AC > cr. A - -7 frame gap between qcf+AC and cr. A.

17.) (corner) qcf+AC > cl. C - -6 frame gap between qcf+AC and cl. C.

18.) (corner) qcf+AC > cl. D - -4 frame gap between qcf+AC and cl. D.

19.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > st. A (L) - -2 frame gap between qcf+C and st. A. St. A whiffs on couching opponents, except on Raiden and Maxima when they are in guard position.

20.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > cr. A (L) - -2 frame gap between qcf+C and cr. A.

21.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > st. B (L) - -1 frame gap between qcf+C and st. B.

22.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > cr. B (L) - -2 frame gap between qcf+C and cr. B.

23.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > cl. C (L) - -1 frame gap between qcf+C and cl. C.

24.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > cr. C (L) - 0 frame gap between qcf+C and cr. C.

25.) (corner, meaty, and hit on last frame only) qcf+C (+6 on block) > cl. D - 2 frame gap between qcf+C and cr. D.

Character Matchups

Andy Bogard

Ash Crimson

Athena Asamiya

Benimaru Nikaido

Billy Kane

Chin Gentsai

Clark Still

Duo Lon

Duolon is a very heavy mixup type of character. He's got a rekka series called Suteki Juryu which are generally unsafe, but his Hike Kyaku Zen, his teleport, allow him very good mobility to avoid being punished. He has a lot of right, left mix-ups. That is to say, he can make an opponent confused which side he can be on and force them into difficult blocking situations. He has very useful command normals, his f+A being a long high poke similar to Dhalsim and his f+B which hits on the ground from anywhere.

Duolon's d.A and d.B are fairly fast and dangerous to challenge. However, his other normals are not very long reaching. His only decent anti-air from the ground is d.C. Attacking from the air can be a viable option if Duolon lacks meter. Using advantage of the super range of j.D, you can poke him from the ground and harass him into bad situations. With meter, Duolon has access to his EX teleport which is invulnerable and allows him the ability to move around. Keep this in mind so you can be prepared. His f+B hits you low, but during K' fireball, he is airborne and goes over this move. Use C Ein Trigger to control space and deny him the ability to poke you with f+A or advancing on you. You can throw the fireball from far away, but do not give Duolon the opportunity to jump over it into full combo at close/midrange. Stick to qcf+C at close/mid

During a rekka series, Duolon can free cancel into his teleport forward. The B version moves him fairly close while the D version moves him very far away across the screen. You can grab him out of the teleport with a normal throw, but the timing is very difficult. It becomes more difficult when the person chooses to delay the rekkas to throw off your timing or impossible when they use EX teleport. You can guard cancel roll the last hit of the teleport to put your close to him after he finishes his light teleport. Whether they did EX or light, you be close to them. For K' though, the heavy teleport can only be punished with Heat Drive and that's a tight window. If you lack meter or are not confident in this strategy, simply running after Duolon to close the distance will keep him honest or throwing a fireball to encourage blockstun.

Keeping moving and denying your opponent air space is important. You do not want to let Duolon control the air as he can use his f+B in the air as a double overhead and his f+A as an air-to-air. Use your normals and get as much damage as you can out of exchanges by using Air Minute spike after each exchange. Whittle away at his life and pressure him into the corner as Duolon lacks anything without meter to get out of K' corner pressure.

Elisabeth Branctorche

Goro Daimon

Hwa Jai

Iori Yagami (Claw)

Iori Yagami (Flame)

Joe Higashi

Joe vs. K' is a match of keep away. Joe employs frame traps such as light Thrust kick and Bakuretsuken(TNT Punch)to trap people in safe pressure. However, there are some holes in his strategy. All versions of his Golden Heel, Tiger Kick, and punches after 5 for Bakuretsuken are unsafe. Joe can cancel many of his normals into his f+B command normal and slide. st.A or st.C into this normal can be guard cancel rolled on the first touch of f+B because it's not safe on block. If they cancel into f+B into a special, it's not safe, you can do a regular roll or GC roll for a full punish as it is not a true blockstring (I.E. Joe does starter into f+B into Hurricane upper, roll through the hurricane upper). You can also risk using K' EX Blackout or Chain drive to blow up the follow ups he might do to his frame traps.

Key things to do against Joe is block and deny him the air. Blocking light Thrust kick and Bakuretsuken and waiting for your opportunity to attack is the best idea (But be wary of throws!). Joe has very little safe movement on the ground and his normals, while decent, do not have a lot of horizontal range. Keeping in his face denies him the ability to safely apply frame traps. You can hop over Hurricane upper as well, giving Joe little time to react with his relatively slow DPs. Be careful though: Joe's EX Hurricane upper will stuff your regular and EX Ein Trigger into second shoot. However, you can GC roll the first one and go through it or use K' Chain drive which trumps his EX fireball.

K'

Kim Kaphwan

King

Kula Diamond

Kyo Kusanagi (XIII) (mirror match)

Kyo Kusanagi (NESTS)

Leona Heidern

Leona vs. K' can be a frustrating match up. Keep in mind of her instant overhead j.A and j.D which can lead into a free combo or V-slasher with meter as well as her command overhead f+B. Make a note to, if you're on the defense, to give yourself some room and move as much as you can so she can't set you up to get hit. She has really strong normals like her low B which is positive, her st.B which hits low, a very long and fast sweep, st.D which is lower body invulnerable and a great HD hit confirm and her st.C which is a good poke since it moves forward really fast. Her Baltic Launcher and X-Calibur are useful tools to pressure people, collect extra damage, and to get in. With Moonslasher and Baltic launcher, it's even more difficult to get in! She has her earring bomb as well that allwos her to react with V-slasher if you full jump. So how does the Beast of Prey get in on such a hard mark?

When Leona does any of her instant jump attacks or her air normals, she's not safe. You can score a full punish on her or just throw her on the way down. Keep track of what people like to do and at what certain spacings. On the defense, you should be mindful of her f+B overhead. After jump-ins, during light B pressure, or after safe specials, that overhead can cause problems and also has hard knockdown. However, it is slow. Being aware it might come will let you react with a punish like heavy crow bites or st.C. With meter, you have to be wary when you jump at her to avoid EX Moonslasher and V-slasher for their fast start up and invincibility. Make use of empty hopping to toy with their reactions and make them gamble on the wrong option. Try to keep in Mid/Close range so Leona does not have the time to react to your pressure. Using blockstrings like d.B, d.B, Ein Trigger will put you just close enough to walk forward and poke her with st.B or hop in for an attack. You can also choose to do nothing and block an expected reversal. Use this to keep at perfect distance or bait out reversals.

Don't make a habit of using Ein Trigger from far screen, just throw out the C version and leave it unless they commit to running or X-calibur. Earring bombs have varying trajectories: Light goes 50% of the screen and bounces, so does EX but has longer bounce time. D version goes almost the full screen. Depending on which one, you can hop as it's descending. This is difficult, but you'll be able to block immediately if you do. If you're not confident in this tactic, walk forward and block, it's simple and lowers her spacing opportunities. Keep in mind that X-calbur's light version is not safe and the heavy version is only safe if you block crouching. Alternate between blocking crouching and standing often to take advantage of that with K' and quickly punish her with d.B.

No version of V-slasher is safe on block so successfully baiting Her V-Slasher does not hit an opponent in an air-reset state unless it's counter hit so back dashing on a wake-up takes away a few options Leona could use on you. Your goal should be testing the reactions of the player and pressuring her into mistakes, but being mindful of her meter.

Baltic Launcher is annoying, but it's not active for the whole time. You can sweep her through her active frames or use chain drive or an EX fireball to through it. You can sweep her after the active frames are gone on whiff. On block, however, it's very safe. Try to stay out of that range. Her heavy version is a bit higher so you can sweep her immediately if she whiffs that. Guard cancel rolling isn't a good idea, just be patient and wait for her.

Overall, patience and proper spacing is the key to winning this match. Without meter, she's not very dangerous, but with meter, you must be careful. Either way, one mistake will be her last.

Mai Shiranui

Mature

Maxima

Raiden

Ralf Jones

Robert Garcia

Ryo Sakazaki

Saiki

Shen Woo

Sie Kensou

Takuma Sakazaki

Mr. Karate

Terry Bogard

Vice

Yuri Sakazaki