One question I've always wanted to ask Vane players. (DS/OS)

why do you use certain stances, and when do you switch/why?

This is what kept me from playing Vanessa back in the day. I'm just curious to see why folks do it, and if it's uniform or person specific.

 

My response will sound stupid to you at first hand, but this is pretty much the main reason why people swap stances.

To access the other stances' movelist.

"But, but... Is that it?"

Vanessa is a character with a big movelist torn in half.
We swap stances to access one half or the other.

There's no deeper reasoning behind.


The same applies to this question: "What do you base your choice of stance on before you start a round?".

Answer: To access a given move (or moves) from that stance right from the start.



If your question is deeper... Say: "Why pick those moves then?", then the answer is more specific as well, and is in regards to said moves.
Drawing comparisons between DS and OS is unnecessary since you're not forced to use only one. It's not the same as comparing two different characters.

The first sign of a new Vane player, is that they feel overwhelmed by the choice.
That is until they comprehend that there is no choice to be made. It's a simple switch that can be turned left or right during a match, closing a door, and opening another.

 

I switch depending on the player and the situation.

I prefer playing in DS stance, because I can counter sabaki attacks.
But I will use OS stance to either pressure more or to change my play-style against someone.

Also for people who aren't familiar with the two stances, you can take advantage of the situation.

 

It also depends on the version of the game you're playing:

In VF4evo vane couldn't switch stances before the round started so DS saw more play than OS.

In VF5 vanilla vane had a lots of stance transitioning strings with great properties so transition was almost mandatory.

In VF5fs with the removal of stance transitioning strings it's really up to the player to pick their favorite stance. The only reasons that could entice a player to switch seem to be

• using to floor scrape/create frame ambiguity on sideblock/stagger hoping the opponent won't unstagger fast enough
• counterhitting with DS (guarantees )
• if i'm reading the command list correctly is 4f faster than
• transitioning to IP using OS while falling FUFT
• sidecrumpling with DS

Finding an alternative to the last one is one of my priorities.

 

I feel that OS is the better stance all-around, but I have difficulties dealing with enemy mid attacks, and to a lesser degree, excessive crouchers. (In that sense, strong players who don't crouch make life easier for me, unless they have enough technique and overwhelming offense to counter this advantage they give me or I just fail to take what I could.)
I don't like the OS crouching attacks, and the awesome jumping attack is pointless against someone who's not afraid to keep attacking with mid/high and rarely uses lows.

I find DS more rewarding in these cases, but otherwise OS is just better and more fun for me.


Most of the time though, I purposely switch to either stance only because the animations are different so it feels a little less like I'm spamming the same 5 attacks.

 

I choose based on character/opponent. Against a new opponent I've never fought before I'll always start with DS because it's.... well... defensive, and gives me more time to get a feel for how they play.

Then I usually do OS in the second round to change things up and see how they respond to pressure, and after that it's a matter of what I want to do at different times in a round. Mid-round stance switches, especially if you can mask it for a second or so, can really throw people for a loop and net you a bit of damage.

It gets more mind-gamey in room and player matches when you know people's styles and they know yours.

 

I learned to play her in Vanilla. As Erdraug mentioned most of her strings had moves that changed her stance, and to get maximum damage often times it was necessary to use them. As a result I became used to always fluid moving from stance to stance and learned to make the best of both of them.

I like the natural meta-game and psychological effect of the stances on my opponent. They try to keep track of which version of Vanessa I'm playing in order to effectively mount their offense, but she can be played anyway you feel in either stance. It's extremely easy to play completely abare in her defensive stance(always struck me as ironic), but a true test of skill is to do the same in offensive stance.

In this version Offensive stance is clearly the better of the two, but it is often times necessary to revert to my old abare tactics in defensive stance against skilled opponents. They're not like to open themselves up to the strong, yet basic tactics of offensive stance.

TL;DR - If you don't play both of her stances fluidly then you're not playing Vanessa.

 

You can be surprisingly aggressive in DS, yeah. I remember once against a really good Aoi player I once completely flipped out and went psycho with repeated 46KP into other moves over and over. Since a lot of Aoi's moves are punches he kept getting sabakied, lost the round, and played the rest of the match really tentatively.

Not that I'd recommend that as a strategy, mind. Now and again though I've found it does work out, especially against people who know me and expect me to be all defensive and sensible and things.

 

I mostly use the Shoulder Tackle to switch styles, so the reason for switching could just be as simple as fishing for some damage with a stagger combo (the ducking forward movement of this Mid attack catches a lot of people off-guard especially after they use a fall recovery, and heck, it's only minus 2 on block so I don't feel bad about tossing that shoulder out there like she's Akira!). That being said, an experienced VAN player will most likely come to see that while there are differences to each style, there are moves that serve the same purpose in each style and are nearly identical. Whether you prefer one style or the other, learning those moves will help you feel more comfortable in either style. I'd really like to get further into this topic once I've experimented a bit more.

 

So I was going to start a new thread asking this exact question but I'll just bump this one to bring it to the fore. What are people's thoughts now that VF5FS has been out for several years? Has one stance shown itself to be stronger all around? Is it still personal preference which stance you rely on or is comfort in both stances what defines a strong Vanessa?

As a brand new player I'm restricting myself to OS for now to become comfortable with it because I feel like its combos are easier to dojo and it's a more straight-forward stance. The idea is to then play DS only to get comfortable with that and eventually combine the two. From where I'm standing, OS seems like you're playing your own game, DS feels like you're playing off your opponent more. The latter is scarier to a new player.

 

paging @MakiLeSushi ^^

 

I ll drop here my opinion. Ds or os is depending also of char u play against and style of player. For exemple vs abare players os will be good to, like said marly, make respect ur adv with 6_k for exemple or players who tends to use punishable moves... Ds is to steal opponents frames thx to sabakis moves it s for more prudent players.
Like i said it depends also of char u play against, exemple vs aoi akira sarah or taka ds is more adviced, vs lion pai jacky or goh i ll go more on os. But this isn t a rule ofc.
In fact I don t think there s a stance stronger than the other (i know marly will disagree) the combination of both stances make vanessa such a good char.
Imo Os lack of full circ ds lack of fast punish moves, mid or even high.
There s so many things i could say about her but since u just started it will be enough. Feel free to ask anything

 

First about covering both sides, there s no mid so 6_k or 4pk is vs ecd useless. 2k+g is -15 so if it s blocked or evaded on good side and since she s a lightweigth...
For the rest about os i agree with u.

For sure ds doesn t have good mid but wsp is good enough to substitute an elbow, i mean once u feel comfortable with 335p. Stagger on ch +1on nh fuzziable on block -5...
Then 6p is also good, half circlar 16fr move etc i mean u know the move and his properties.
Otherwise she has 2 ch low launchers for a such good enough dmg whiat os doesn t have.
Also she s got more wall set ups front and parallele and the dmg is almost the same (if it s not more...).
To resume both stances have their strengths and weaknesses and from my xp both are almost equal.
We can debate a lot about that like full circ mid kick safe on guzrd or os 9p or ds 1p etc what i wanna point out once again, her strength come from the combination of both stances...

About aoi, ds is more adviced but once again it depends of opp fighting style. She s better in ds imo thx to her 1p+k 2kp (both opp back to a wall leads to wall combo) throws full circ attacks in other word evthing which is good vs yy.
It doesnt mean os isn t good, 9p make ravage on her 6_k also and k+g for yy-ers but let s say it s 50-50 u succed 1 combo u almost win the round. But vs yy, reversals, sabakis that aoi got, it s not an easy affair.

About strat it s risky to be agressive vs aoi or u can be moderatly, so being in defensive u ll be, like u said, feed up by ur opp for sabakis.
in case of attack, 1p+k will help u to keep pressure since it s -1 on block.

Another thing i wanna point out is about her unsafe moves, almost all aoi s moves are -13 so pk will be what u ll use more often then os 6p+k for punish is almost useless i said almost coz i know she has 1 or 2 -15 move which can really be punished...

About her sweep it s -18 but she can go in yy and make pay hardly the 9k u attempt so not a big argu here too.

 

Sure but the point is if u follow ur 6P with 3k it will track and u can get some good dmg. but if opponent evades and doesn t do anything it won t tracks then u ll have to see what he tends to do an go for throw or other mix ups. tbh it doesn t disturb me at all when i play in ds the fact that she doesn t cover the other side, even if 6k is successly evaded the 3k make the opponent hesitate to attack. It s like a "psychological" covering of the other side

 

Hm idk that really doesn t disturb me. However if i notice the opp always evade to stomach side i ll use her circ or delay my moves or throw i mean it s not like she doesn t have other options.