Annihilation move is OP. take it out


Imo throwing it out randomly or based on pure guesses is imo not how it should be used.

Do it as full punish on every DP in the game or any unsafe move that is more negative than the moves startup, If 5f is the startup than there are a lot of moves that get punished by it - wich can not be avoided or reacted to.

And in addition you have the sitting on full instinct on your side - that is a remarkable thing to keep in my mind. At 48% on the scnd Lifebar you are dead if you perform a unsafe move (this includes counter break attempts!).


From my testing it seems to be 6f startup (including pre-freeze). It can punish TJ light tremor (-6) but can’t punish Shago light slide (-5). So maybe it’s 1+5, or 2+4, or something like that.

If you didn’t press a button and Shago does annihilation on you point blank, you have to do something throw invincible or jump (but you have time to land and hit him if you jump backwards so it’s not a big deal). If Shago is like 1 character length away from you, you can press a button, although I’m not sure why you would try when you can just jump backward and press a button.

So I think you can punish anything -6 or worse as long it leaves you super point blank. Not counting blocked DPs, I’m trying to think of moves it would be good punishes for. TJ tremor (you have to “reversal” the instinct activation though, I missed it a few times, I don’t think you get the special move input buffer here?) is a big one, Orchid high/low rekka is a big one, Jago heavy wind kick I guess? Most special moves aren’t -6 point blank so I can’t really think of too many. For example, it can’t punish ARIA heavy shotgun knee, which is like -8 or -9 but does not leave her point blank.

Yeah this is pretty good.


Just by observation of the health bar, it looks like it actually does around 55-60% damage, not 48%.

Unless the visual representation of the health bar is denser at low health due to the guts damage scaling, something isn’t right.


Keits said on twitter this is a known bug and will be fixed in a future patch (as in, it DOES do more than 48% right now but it shouldn’t).


Oh boy. I can’t wait for uninformed people complaining about it after it’s fixed. “They buffed it by adding EVEN MORE damage to it!! Beets please!”


I would like to take a moment to say how much I dislike the “keits plz” meme when it is spewed all over twitch chat or twitter.


Without Surge with you having 1 surge and 1 stock of shadow you can get 40%ish which is the safer route. Also they only need 1 stock of shadow, you cash it out with your own shadow afterwards.


Timing is not strict unless you’re trying to land all 8 hits every time. Just mash and you’ll get it. Sad right? Yes it is breakable, but all 3 strengths look identical. The only difference between them is very very mild startup difference, but since you can delay it yourself anyways, that is irrelevant. They have a 1/3 chance of breaking it on a guess.


Wow… I didn’t time it out, but they have 1/3 (random guess) chance of breaking the first one, but does it lock out long enough to keep them from getting a second chance? Even so, I’m guessing this gets above 48% pretty darn quick, even if you don’t get the cashout.

Just to state the obvious here - these are 100% punishable situations regardless of annihilation. If you are fighting any character and you do TJ’s tremor or Orchid’s rekka and get blocked you are going to eat a combo that will give you 20-65% damage based on the opponents meter and whether you get a combo break. I’m sure @Infilament can give us a good idea of the average guaranteed damage from say a low medium kick into shadow opener as a punish. The point isn’t that all those things are as good as annihilation, it’s that annihilation just isn’t off scale considering it completely chews up his instinct meter.

I’m not trying to be unsympathetic here, but there is no fighting game in existence that I am aware of where you shouldn’t expect to be completely boned after throwing a blocked DP. I mean, if you do a blocked DP against regular Jago when he has full instinct and if he has shadow meter he’s going to get half a life bar BACK from you. Without popping instinct, Thunder can do a naked shadow CoTE for 23% with the possibility for follow up (including a chance at a counter break). Orchid and Sadira with instinct can get you in horrible, nearly unbreakable setups following a blocked DP (or lots of other things). So, with the understanding that annihilation is a nasty, dirty trick - is it really out of proportion to the other dirty stuff people can do in KI?

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You can punish -6 moves, but they usually have to start with a light attack (which worsens your overall damage quite a bit), but yes, all -6 moves should lead to some bad damage against you, even as much as 50% with some meter use and a lockout.

I imagine the expected damage starting with a light attack is probably around 20-25% if you do not insist on one-chance breaks all the time. This is just always the max damage punish for the cost of your instinct, with no chance of dropping it or being broken. It’s also worth noting that it’s much easier to react to a fast -6 move in your face with a single button press (instinct activate) than it is to cancel a normal into a special… this is why many people just do a reaction throw to counter breakers when they should be getting a lot more. But yeah, this is a strong tool in a game full of strong tools (as I’ve said, I would probably rather eat 48% from Shago than deal with 15 seconds of Wulf/Sadira pressure, which will probably do 48% on their first combo and still have instinct time left for more). Other than making the move actually do 48% instead of 60%, I don’t think it’s particularly out of line with the rest of the game. If it was fully invincible to everything, then… maybe that’s too good, but it’s not. I also think Shago has to sacrifice a lot to use it (no tether, no tons of surge divekicks for free), so it’s really good in the last half of round 3 but not super good if he is at a life deficit.

If you get a DP or a shadow ruin blocked, then yeah, all bets are off as to what happens to you. I’m fine with that.


How is your point sound? With 35% damage it would be the Strongest Command Grab in the game. The move is Anti-Grab Invulnerable as in, it can grab Thunder during all versions of CotE, it can Grab Aganos out of S.Clobber-Copter, It’s the longest Grab Range in the game over Kan-Ra’s, and Punishing an opponents unsafe attack with it is disgustingly easy. Did I mention it gives Shago a Hard Knockdown?

Saying it’s useless is like saying Shadow Call of the Earth is Useless for only taking 23%. A free 35% still makes it by far the most powerful single Move in the game. 48% is just too much for how Easy it is to Land. I play grapplers and trust me in KI grapples are very very Easy to Land, Kan-Ra S.Clutch is ridiculously easy to land, Hisako’s grabs are dumb easy to land. Thunder is the only grappler in KI whose grab doesn’t have super easy Lock-down set-ups. Shago has dozens of ways to trick you into the grab let alone legit ways of punishing you with it.

P.S. Annihilation does 58% damage to your health bar, the game say’s 48 but it’s lie.


The difference is those other grabs only cost one stock of shadow meter. Annihilation costs all your instinct which is a much more valuable resource than shadow.


That’s alittle more like an Opinion. Shadow Meter is absolutely necessary for survival in KI where as some players actually do forget about their instinct. However that’s beside the point.

The point I’m making is, Shago’s grab taking 35% is still magnificent damage without any set-up and it’s free. Maybe if they reduce it to 35% at max it will stay that powerful no Matter how much Instinct you have left.


Yours and my definitions of “free” do not align :confused: I’d be annoyed to only get 48% off the entirety of my instinct with either of my characters. For most characters instinct is the far more valuable resource.

Is this actually true? I had an interesting interaction happen the other day where Shago annihilationed through me while I was doing a Hisako command grab. I figured it was a pretty amazing stroke of luck since Hisako’s influence grab invulnerability is somewhat, shall we say, tight. I’d figured it was just two grab invulnerable moves whiffing on one another - it would be kind of amusing if I just got flat out saved by a bug :-p


Which one is Influence? Is that the grab where she jumps into your body? If so that Grab is Anti-Grab Invulnerable too. It completely defeats moves that are Grab-Invulnerable.


@BigBadAndy Well a lockout is about 3 seconds so I would say you can get 1 extra one in for sure on a lockout. I know a throw into 1 Dark Fury is instant level 3 ender for a shadow cashout near 40%. Which is repeatable after a short battery ender combo into another 1 chance break which basically means you can take rounds relatively easily.


Possession is the one where she “jumps into your body” - and no, it is not at all grab-invulnerable. Characters with long-ranging throws routinely toss Hisako out it when done at distance. It does beat throw-invincible moves, however, including annihilation. Its properties are actually more akin to a grounded unblockable (ala shatter) that results in a throw. Which is kind of funny, since shatter is unique in that it has properties like a throw but results in a physical hit.

But no, the “whiffing” annihilation happened on influence, her other command grab. That one is throw invulnerable, so on occasion you’ll have interactions where two command grabs simply pass through each other.


Why do you put the “jumps into your body” in quotes lol?

I’m thinking Thunder’s S.CotE was grabbed by Annihilation because Shago’s grab last longer than Thunder’s. More experimentation needed.


Lol. Because I was using a direct quote - it’s not how I would have phrased that particular interaction :laughing:

That would be my guess. Shadow COTE is so fast that it’s a bit more similar to Hisako’s command grab, where because it comes out so quickly it loses its throw-invincible properties pretty fast. Testing annihilation out against Thunder’s heavy command grab (~24 frames or something like that) should settle the question pretty definitively.


i read you get more out of a instinct than 48%.

Yes you can but you even can without instinct. The thing is that it is always 48% guaranteed.

At higher level this tool will always have its use. Regardless if you possibly can get 70% with your instinct since its not guaranteed. In a game where so many guesses happen guaranteed damage that is easy to land will always be good. Lets assume it 6f startup.

Orchid DP + rekka punishable
Jago DP punishable
Thunder - DP + Stomp punishable, whiffed cote punishable
Glacius - puddle punch punishable?, close shatter punishable before it hits you
Sabrewulf - overhead and blocked eclipse? punishable
KanRa - dp punishable
Riptor - flip punishable
Aganos - superman punch punishable, rock pickup punishable at a certain range

And a lot more for sure. I did not fully researched the -f of those moves but they should all be punishable. A full instinct with Shago is a threat.

Btw i did not say take the move out - i just showed that it will have its use and will cripple the use of the real instinct a lot.

Why not make it 30% dmg + 5-10% potential dmg just as a example - so that its still good but does not stand in front of his real instinct.