Katarina neutral

Neutral is when both players can act freely. It makes up most of the game, so learning how to play it is critical. There's no point mastering all the combos and setups if you can't use them in an actual game.

This page contains a brief overview of this character's key neutral tools followed by advice for putting them together.

Basic Gameplan

Katarina excels at using small pokes to annoy and frustrate an opponent into pressing buttons. She capitalizes on this using her above-average movement to bait whiffs and punish them, and to bait counterhits. She gets rewarded for these with above-average combo damage. Most of her tools put her in frame-ambiguous situations (-3 to +3) where neither player has too many of their options restricted, especially related to movement. This requires her to read opponent tendencies well to capitalize on them.

Pokes

Katarina wants to use her poking tools to chip away at opponent health and pressure opponents into retaliating. Her key poking tools are:

1

basic i10 high jab which is +1 on block. Use it to keep up pressure and watch for opponent responses

1,1

basic jab string which has extensions to discourage opponents from taking their turn, even though it is minus on block (see Mental Frame Advantage). Use it to keep up poke pressure

1,1,2

high-extension to 1,1 which gives a whopping +7 on block, but can be ducked and launched. On block, d/f+4 is a common frame trap, but good opponents will simply backdash or sidestep if you try these flowcharts. The best option is to dash in and continue pressure

1,1,1

mid-extension to 1,1. Mix this with 1,1,2 to discourage opponents from ducking

d/f+1

basic i13 mid-poke to prevent opponents from using big moves, and catching them ducking or using high-crushes. It is -2 on block, so a magic 4 will trade with retaliatory d/f+1s and CH-launch anything slower

d+3

i16 standing low poke which is neutral on hit and -12 on block. Use it to chip away at opponents who are stand-guarding too much

d+4

basic i12 low which high-crushes and is minus on hit. Use it to chip away at opponents

Counterhits

Katarina wants to use her CH tools to catch an opponent disrespecting her frames. Use them after a plus on block move like a jab after keeping up pressure and forcing an opponent to stay still for a while. She can also fish for CHs using them if she has a read on her opponent's timing. Her main counterhit tools are:

4

standard i11 magic 4 which is -12 on block but has extensions so is typically not punished unless overused. Requires a tricky pickup with f,F+2 or f,F+4 for a full combo.

4,4

extension to magic 4 which allows for an easier pickup into a full combo. Can be sidestepped right, but this is tricky to do

d/f+4

standard i15 mid CH launcher. It is a knee, so it is unparriable by generic reversals.

Whiff Punishers

Katarina wants to use her above-average sidesteps and backdashes to cause opponent retaliation (from her poke pressure) to whiff and capitalize on these with some great long-range whiff punishers. Her main whiff punishment tools are:

1,1

use for small whiffs when in range, typically after jab or d/f+1 whiffs from a sidestep

2,2

use for medium whiffs, typically after a backdash. Be careful because this is -12 on block if you misjudge the timing, and a high-high, so the opponent might duck after whiffing.

3,3,3,3,3

an i14 mid string which can be hit-confirmed. Use it for whiffs out of sidesteps or backdashes. It is safe (-9) if you can hit-confirm and stop after 2 hits. If you stop after 3 hits (which is easier to do), you still only eat an i10 punish. This can lead to another ambiguous situation if you transition to HAR to evade the punish. This string can also be used as a poke.

u/f+4,4

generic hopkick. Kat's hopkick has above-average range, so make use of it.

u/f+3

a big somersault which leads to great damage but is -15 on block. Use it only for the biggest whiffs.

f,F+2,4

this has great range due to the f,F input, so use it for long-range whiff-punishes. Beware of opponents ducking and launching the second hit if this gets blocked.

Dealing with stepping

Katarina's key poking tools all have a common weakness - they can be easily stepped to the right. An opponent who knows how and where to step Katarina's tools can be difficult to deal with, and greatly limit her moveset. Kat has limited and low-reward tools to deal with stepping. Use these when you think an opponent might step. Kat's best tools to deal with stepping opponents are:

b+1,2

a safe i14 mid-mid string which tracks SSR. It has good range.

d/f+2

a safe mid i17 mid poke which tracks SSR. It has follow-ups to create mental frame advantage.

d+3

previously mentioned as a poke, also tracks SSR

d+4

previously mentioned as a poke, also tracks SSR

f,F+2

a slow homing move with decent range. It is -13 but has pushback which makes it mostly unpunishable except at the wall. Use it to discourage stepping at range 1.5, but beware of whiffing since it recovers very slowly.

Breaking Turtles

Katarina's poking arsenal lacks an effective tool to encourage opponents to duck. d+3 and d+4 do not do much damage, nor do they give Kat +-frames to continue her pressure. Her bigger rows are slow and very risky, and therefore inadvisable. Her best tools for this situation are her full-crouch mixup and Harrier mix-up, the former of which can also be entered from Harrier. If an opponent is turtling or they've been sufficiently conditioned to respect your frames, you can enforce these mixups to get more damage.

FC Mixups

Katarina has a medium-risk, medium-reward FC mixup. Kat needs to stay at range 1-1.5 for it to be a threat, so ensure the opponent is sufficiently respecting you so that you can crouch in their face. Katarina's tools to use for her full-crouch mixup are:

ws4

standard i11 mid from crouch. Use it to test opponent responses from FC. If it catches them, you get +8 to continue pressure. If it gets blocked, you are only left at -3

ws3,3,3,3,3

similar to the standing version, use this to catch ducking opponents. Gives more damage than ws4, but needs to be hit-confirmed for safety

FC d/f+4

a chunky i17 low which is -16 on block. It is unseeable but risky, and the best option to use to encourage opponents to duck. This can be abused on characters who don't get a full launch if they block it (e.g. Steve, Marduk)

ws2

standard i15 launcher from FC. It is -13 on block, so use it only when you have a read on the opponent ducking (after using FC d/f+4)

Harrier Mixups

Katarina has decent options for mixing up opponents from HAR if they respect it. HAR mixups are somewhat dependent on how much the opponent knows the Katarina match-up, since the tools can be easily neutralized if they know how to. The risk/reward goes increasingly against Katarina the more your opponent knows the matchup.

Katarina can enter Harrier from a number of strings, and this affects the usefulness of her options from it. These are explained in more detail in the Harrier section. This section will just detail Katarina's tools to mix-up from Harrier, which are: