Neutral in one page
Most rounds are decided before awakening. You are trying to touch the opponent with an M1 or a safe skill, then convert before they spend their evasive. Community testing says an aerial M1 beats a grounded dash M1, and that jumping into a jumping attacker is a bad trade. Walk in while holding F instead, then punish the landing.
The fifth M1 breaks guard. Do not spend the whole string on someone who is already blocking unless you want that break. If they face you, your frontal M1s will be blocked. Dash around them.
Armor colors
October 2026 combat notes describe three older armor colors, plus a readability pass from the mid-2026 Update 11 notes. Update 14's public event card did not include a changelog, so confirm the glow in training if a move does not match.
| Glow | Name | What gets through |
|---|---|---|
| Yellow | Super armor | One hit. A second hit, or a multi-hit move, breaks it. |
| Red | Hyper armor | M1 strings and multi-hit moves do not break it. Grab skills do. |
| Light blue / white | Impervious | Described as exclusive to Gojo. Blockable damage goes to the block bar instead of health. A true guard break still stuns him. |
| Blinking vermillion | Ultra armor | Update 11 name. No stun for the whole window, including grabs. |
| White highlight | Active iframes | Update 11 indicator while invulnerability is live. |
| Light orange | M1 immunity stun | Normal stun, except M1s do not add more stun during that window. |
Update 11 also rescripted stun to cut lag when several fighters hit at once. That note does not claim frame data changed on every move.
Giants and the ally buff
Full giant states in the combat notes include Kakashi's awakening, Vegeta's Great Ape variant, and Piccolo's stance-swap C. Giants use a 3-hit M1, the third hit has armor, and Power Rush (X) becomes a retreat. They keep a ground dash and lose jump and uptilt.
Renji and Timeskip Sasuke are described as mini-giants. They keep normal movement, jump, and uptilt. Their ranked 1v1 health in that note is 125. Sasuke's mini-giant uptilt fires upward. Renji's spins a local tornado. Do not give every fighter 125 health. That number was written for those mini-giants.
In ranked and private matches, losing an ally can trigger Spirit Unleashed: a white orb, higher damage, damage reduction, and an upgrade of active super armor into hyper armor.
Utility, rush, and launchers
X is a long-range gap closer on normal-sized fighters. C is Utility. On some kits it swaps the active skill set or spends a personal meter. Todoroki is the example named in the combat notes. Do not assume C is the same button effect on every fighter.
Uptilt is Right Click + Left Click, or a remap such as Space. Use it to start air routes. Air skill variants often require the opponent to already be airborne, so the launcher comes first.
Update 11 changes that still matter
These are the balance lines published with the Josuke patch. They may have moved again by Update 14.
- Jonathan: Zoom Punch gained super armor. Overdrive Rendan holds a wallsplat longer, and the last hit wall-bounces.
- Gohan: Super Dragon Flight lunges farther and checks hits better.
- Zoro: Onigiri has more endlag. Gyuki is safe on block. Enies Lobby Rashomon has more endlag.
- Luffy (Pre-Time Skip): Pistol, Bullet, Bazooka, Windmill, and Jet skills were buffed. Bullet's cooldown was listed at 16 seconds as part of that rework.
- Naruto (Pre-Time Skip): Rasengan can wall-grab. Clones were faster, with armor buffs.
Wall splat stops further stun. Time the next heavy or reset before they recover. That rule is in the evasive guide as well.
What to practice
Use Training. Land five M1s only when you mean to break guard. Block one aerial, then answer. Dash behind a blocking dummy or friend. Spend G and T only after you can say which meter is full. Then open the evasive guide and stop wasting R on pokes.