How to Play Dead or Alive: Dealing with the Defensive Hold

Dealing with the Defensive Hold







There are two types of situations in the game where Defensive Holds aka Counters/Reversals show up in the game. This is inside Critical and outside of Critical. Outside of critical is pretty much when you or your opponent are able to move around freely and attack one another. Inside critical is basically when one of you has become staggered by an attack and this is when you are trying to break free of the stagger so you can fight again, and at the same time your opponent is trying to hit you with more attacks to deal damage or set you up for more damage either with a launcher, knockdown, knockback or bait you into a throw for even more damage.






I hope this helps some of you players understand more so how Defensive Holds work because a lot of people tell me how they dislike the hold and the primary reason is because they don't know how to properly deal with it.



Outside of Critical:
To avoid getting countered you have to properly mix up the way you attack and not rely on the same hit level and formula of attacking. Also try to use attacks that are harder to react to while of course throwing in attacks they are a little bit slower to throw off your opponents timing. Also it is a lot easier to get countered low or high because there isn't a mix up between punches or kicks like their is for middle attacks. Middle attacks are really good to use for poking. Use lows and highs when you see your opponent is trying to hold you mid to throw them off and discourage them from trying to hold you. You can also mix in throws.

Inside of Critical:
Inside critical holds deal less damage so you can take advantage of this. You want to make sure you are mixing up your launchers and or knock down attacks if your character doesn't have a launcher to cover a specific hit level. For example Kasumi has a high kick, a mid punch and a mid kick launcher and she also has lows that knockdown as well.

The opponent only has a 25% chance of choosing the correct counter and of course they can "try" to react but it is hard. The more options you character has of course the better and then they still have to worry about reacting too fast and then getting thrown. On top of that you can option select their hold with a regular standing grab and a crouch grab and then follow up with an attack, a throw or a offensive hold.

Attack will counter hit their attack if they happen to try to slow escape out of the critical stagger, but the attack can still get countered of course. The throw will catch them if they decided to slow escape and then block or slow escape and then counter. The offensive hold will pretty much cover all bases but it works like a throw as far as whether they are ducking or standing, but the offensive hold will catch their attacks, grab them out of their guard and grab their holds. It will lose to throws though, but if someone is slow escaping into a grab they are really being risky lol.


The next entry will cover dealing with the start of the round.