In Street Fighter X Tekken Ibuki's crouching jab is +3 on block, discouraging Ling Xiaoyu from trying to defend herself and leaving her open to be thrown.
A Tick Throw is a term for a tactic that involves using an attack that is positive in terms of Frame Data, then proceeding to throw the opponent with a regular, command, or 0 frame ultra grab.
Description
Tick Throws vary in effectiveness, on a character by character basis. Some factors that dictate how good an individual's tick throw prowess include:
- Walk Speed.
- Grab Range.
- Frame Data of positive normals.
- Pushback of normals.
- Access to Command Throws.
- Universal start up frames of throws.
Tactics
Here, is an example of mixing up Tick Throws can accomplish. Ibuki does her +2 MP then her follow-up 4-frame crouching LP. With a 2-frame gap Ibuki destroys Xiaoyu's Crouch Tech attempt.
Tick throws are important to learn in higher level gameplay. Alongside overheads they do not allow opponents to simply block holding down-back the entire game.
In AI-controlled characters, Akuma and Charlie Nash, in the Alpha era, is the most prominent character to use this kind of tactic, where they'd attack with a crouching low kick, and if it is blocked, will walk forward and throw the opponent.
For some characters, such as Cammy, tick throws are a strong part of her gameplan. Because she has no overhead attacks, she relies on her speed and plus-frames of her attacks to keep her opponents on their heels and discourage them from pushing buttons. By conditioning her opponent to constantly block, she can sneak another throw or perform tick throws to maintain pressure. After landing a couple of throws, Cammy can utilize shimmies to bait other opponents to tech her throws, thus opening up for more damaging combos. Cammy was also infamous for her "jab pressure" in the pre-2013 version of Street Fighter X Tekken where the positive frame data combined with her walk speed would shut down most opponents and she was free to throw when the opponent stopped trying to attack.
Grapplers also have strong tick throw games, as the higher range of their command grabs tend to make up for their generally slower walk speed and Pushback. Grapplers should take caution to mix-up between regular and command throws, as regular throws prevent some escapes and even punishes that command throws are vulnerable too.
Ultra grabs can also be used to varying degrees. 1 frame grabs are less effective in general due to opponents having a chance to escape after activation (with the cinematic giving them a warning to hold up). 0 frame grabs also work very well due to working instantly after cinematic activation.