How To Make Yang Work Effectively

[WizOfTheWoods]

First off, I want to say that Yang is my favorite character of the bunch, not because of her lines, not because of her moves, but because she is a punch-o-mancer. For those not familiar with the term, a punch-o-mancer practices punch-o-mancy, the magical and powerful art of punching things to death.

Yeah, Yang is the best.

Now, onto the important stuff. Let's take a look at Yang's skills and abilities.

Melee Combat: As previously stated, Yang is a punch-o-mancer. Naturally, she will do most of her fighting up close and personal. This is both good and bad, because while this means she can get out of bad situations with a few kills, it also means that she tends to get into bad situations just because of how she is designed to work. The end of her combo typically results in some level of knockback, which again is good and bad. It means that when her combo ends, she typically has an escape route, but it also means that it's hard to keep a steady flow of combat with her. Fortunately, I have a solution for this, which I will discuss at the end.

Ranged Combat: This is one area where Yang falls far shorter than her teammates. Yang's range is practically nonexistent. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem for her, except that the 4th Chapter has you fighting enemies that are best dealt with at a range. No spoilers. Now, that being said, you CAN deal with these enemies using Yang's ranged attack. You will just be in more danger while doing so. But that's not much of a problem, right? After all, there's a reason you chose the punch-o-mancer.

Mid-Melee Ranged Attack: Each character has the ability to use their ranged attack in the midst of a melee combo, and Yang's is a close range shotgauntlet blast that knocks back and disorients enemies. That being said, it has very little use for Yang, and has a tendency to throw of the rhythm of combat even more than Yang already does. Reccomendation: Don't bother using this.

Skills:

Quake:
AOE
Radius Around Self
Highly Effective
This is your best friend. Yang pulls off the ground pound from the Yellow Trailer and creates an explosion that hits everything around her. Perfect for Yang, who will always be in the midst of melee combat. Using this multple times will pretty much kill off any smaller grim, Beowolves included. Larger grim need stronger skills than this to see any real impact, but you can still use this as the finishing blow if you are working up the skill. Its first upgrade is the charge function, which you should use every time you launch this move from that point on. Its second upgrades are a blast of rocks forward from Yang's Quake site and increased range+damage+knockback. Since you can only choose one, I reccomend the range, damage, and knockback, since they are more versatile. This is the kill skill, however, and will not be available from the get go. But getting kills with this skill is so easy you won't even really notice that you don't have it until it's available.

Sunbreaker:
Single Target
Melee Autolock To Target
Highly Effective
This is your other best friend. Remember how I said that larger grim needed stronger skills to effectively take damage. Well, here it is. This is Yang's uppercut move. It looks a lot like a Shoryuken, but not copywriten. Drop a larger boss grim down to about 500 HP and use this skill a bunch to guarantee you get kills with it. The kill skill for this one only requires 100 kills, but that is offset by the fact that it is single target, so it will still take a while. Not a major problem though, as the kill skill is worth it. The first upgrade for Sunbreaker is increased damage and knockback. The kill skill is triple the already increased damage. In other words, this upgrade makes Sunbreaker one of the best boss killing moves in the game. Definitely worth it.

Blastwave:
Single Target/Short Range AOE
Melee Autolock To Target
Highly Ineffective
This is your worst enemy. This skill has almost no practical use when compared to Yang's other two skills. Essentially, Yang pulls a Falcon Punch with a little forward range. The problem here is that this skill is VERY inaccurate, to the point where grinding it seems like a chore. When it does hit, it does less damage than Sunbreaker, but with about the same effective use. All in all, I would reccomend that the developers either fix this skill or replace it with something a little more useful. It is particularly bad against Beowolves, which for some reason seem to have smaller hit boxes in general. For those curious, the first upgrade is the charge function, which increases range and damage. Don't let this fool you. Increased range just means that you'll go a little further when you miss. The second upgrades are a longer shockwave in front of Yang and three smaller shockwaves fanning out from Yang. The fanning one is the kill skill, and is probably the better one, but if you paid any attention at all, you'll realize that better than awful is still just bad. Avoid this skill. I will give a strategy for grinding it at the end.

Abilities:

I'm not going to mention the abilities that all of the characters have here, just Yang's unique passive abilities.

Second Wind:
When Yang's aura is depleted, she regains all of her special meter. Holy God is this useful. Once you have this, never let it go. Yang is constantly in melee combat and is constantly losing most or all of her aura, which makes having an escape/retaliation move or six pretty useful. The only drawback of this is that this ability has a 30 second cooldown, but with the way the combat works, this won't really be an issue unless you are trigger happy with your skills AND get rekt a lot.

Brawler:
The first attack that hits Yang does not reset her combo counter. Okay, seems useful right? Well, it is, until you actually play as Yang for more than 2 seconds. Yang is designed to take a lot of hits rapid fire, and only the first one doesn't count? This is Yang's lvl 10 unlock, so it seems to me like Yang got screwed big time. Still, I'm sure someone will find a use for it, or a strategy that works with it. Eventually.

Typical Battle Strategy: You are a purely melee character. Your ranged attack is there to make you feel good, and to deal with a certain enemy. Your best strategy is to go up to a group, punch your way in, and follow the strategy below. Your dodge will usually get you out of any situation you can't handle, so make sure you use it.

Typical Skill/Ability Progression: If you are playing with others, I reccomend that all teammates take Medic ASAP, since the difficulty gets harder as more people are present. Being able to quickly pick up your teammates and vice versa will get you farther than anything else. Beyond that, the following is a typical skill and ability progression for Yang.

Lvl 2: Survivor. You will be in melee combat constantly, so staying alive long enough to escape bad situations is in your best interest.
Lvl 3: Aura Regeneration. Getting back into comabat quickly is almost as important as getting out of it.
Lvl 4: Increased Aura. The more you have, the longer you can stay in combat and the less danger you will be in of overextending your health.
Lvl 5: Second Wind. This will allow you to take more risks. The idea here is to use up your special bar, get beat down to regain it, and use it up again. Very effective.
Lvl 6: Improved Quake/Improved Sunbreaker. This depends on which role you want to fill. Slayer of Many, or Slayer of the Mighty. Either way, stick with your choice.
Lvl 7: Improved Special 1. You will need this to maintain the level of effectivity you are used to once you upgrade your primary skill to its stronger, more expensive form. Second Wind makes this less of a problem, but still important.
Lvl 8: Nothing. Save the skill point you get at this level for your stronger skill at Lvl 9.
Lvl 9: Superquake/Starkiller. Whichever tree you started, you finish out. This keeps you from being a jack of all trades, and lets you actually play a significant role.
Lvl 10: Improved Special 2. If you get this far, it doesn't hurt to be able to do more cool stuff.

Note: If you took Medic, then your progression will be largely the same, except that everything will be pushed up 1 slot. Therefore, the Lvl 8 and further progression must be changed as follows.

Lvl 2: Medic
Lvl 3: Survivor.
Lvl 4: Aura Regeneration.
Lvl 5: Increased Aura.
Lvl 6: Second Wind.
Lvl 7: Improved Quake/Improved Sunbreaker.
Lvl 8: Improved Special 1.
Lvl 9: Improved Special 2. Odds are that if you are playing with other people you aren't going to want to grind to Lvl 10, so having extra power at your highest level is in your best interest, even though you won't get access to you strongest moves.
Lvl 10: Improved Quake/Improved Sunbreaker. If you get this far, you won't have enough skill points to max out the skill you started on, but it's a good idea to have the other skill be decent too.

Overall: Yang is a good character overall. You basically just have to know what not to do with her. No range unless you need it, and no Blastwave unless you are grinding it. Speaking of...

Final Notes: Two things to cover here. 1. How not to get rekt in melee combat. 2. How to grind the Blastwave skill.

1. To avoid constantly falling in battle, you basically have to not hold a direction button and spam the melee attack button. This will cause Yang to melee autolock to each enemy that gets too close, essentially making it so that none of the get to close. This method tends to push Yang towards groups of enemies, so keep a finger on the dodge button for situations that you cannot handle. Note, this strategy has a drawback against Beowolves, as they tend to a) group together naturally and b) all use their claw attacks at the same time, making them essentially invincible, and ripping you apart while backing you into a corner. You have been warned.

2. Grinding Blastwave is a chore, and even this method is not perfect, but it's the best we've got. The best way to ensure that you don't miss your target is to engage in melee combat for one or two hits, then immediately push the Blastwave button. This ensures that you are facing the correct direction and that you opponent is sufficiently occupied so as to not move much. As I said, this method is not 100% effective, and Beowolves tend to ignore this, for some reason. But it's the best we have, so get your 200 kills and join the completionist club.

Beowolves are the devil.

[Phailup]

Idk if you read my "infinte combo glitch" discussion (posted like 15 minutes before this lol) but it also pretty much solves Yang's break in rhythm issue you mention.

Constantly attacking/dodging is the way to go with Yang lol

Only downside is that shes in the middle of the fray a lot, but that can typically be solved with Special abilities and cleaning up. Just don't spam attacks and dodge more.

[WizOfTheWoods]

Agreed. Fun to play, but way out of rhythm. Any strategy to fix that is more than welcome.

[Temuldjin^]

Originally posted by Phailup:

Idk if you read my "infinte combo glitch" discussion (posted like 15 minutes before this lol) but it also pretty much solves Yang's break in rhythm issue you mention.

Constantly attacking/dodging is the way to go with Yang lol

Only downside is that shes in the middle of the fray a lot, but that can typically be solved with Special abilities and cleaning up. Just don't spam attacks and dodge more.

it's the way to go for all the characters :)

it's called combo breaking and all the cool kids have been doing it for days :)

[Nuwang]

The inf combo stuff is just resetting your combo over and over using the dodge button to start over after 3 hits and it helps a lot on Yang and anyone who wants to stay on the ground. Doing it prevents Yang from thrusting her enemy away and having the chase it down. It also thrusts herself into nearby enemies because it triggers a dash attack instead of the normal 1st hit of a combo.

Personally though I would take Quake and Sun Breaker sooner so you have an actual reason to spend special points. If you are going to level one of them up though I would go with Sun Breaker, you just need the aoe to mop up small guys when they group and it is kind of buggy sometimes. I would also try to stay away from taking Increased Aura as long as you aren't constantly getting downed because you want your aura to deplete to make use of Second Wind. Slowly take yourself off of relying on the hp bonus and aura recovery as well to make room for upgrading your attack skills and getting your improved specials earlier.

Honestly if you are making full use of your character you should be making it to level 10 easily before the game ends because most people right now are just hitting away at their attack button or experimenting still.

[WizOfTheWoods]

True enough. I'm still relatively new, so I just outlined what worked for me. Personally, I prioritize survival over power, mainly because I've been grinding in single player, where survival is important. To each ther own.

[BlueFountain]

Old topic is old, but informative for newer players (plus some odd reason this doesn't seem to appear on the thread list anywhere, only found it by Google search accidentally).

Overall good info, but I'd agree with Nuwang's thoughts too. Bumping up one of your specials sooner helps a lot, and that Increased Aura is counter productive with how Yang is meant to work.

Personally too, I push getting Medic back a few levels (on any char really). Typically not needed with most teammates until you hit the bridge area. It is partially a judgement call on how well your teammates seem to be doing, but that's the typical time I pick it up is around there.

Blastwave isn't quite as bad as you made it out to sound. That was Yang's first skill I focused on leveling, and in most games used only that skill (or mostly that one at least). Most the time if you do a three Attack combo and follow it with Blastwave it almost always will hit, and kills most enemies with the four moves. Yang also seems to get larger groups tightly bunched around her, and if you can pull away (or they bunch up around another char) you can pretty safely just spam the move into the group and hit something. I've taken out four grimm with the first level quite a few times. The second level doesn't tend to always hit if you try charging it (the charge time gives some grimm enough time to recover and dodge or do an attack that causes it to be ineffective), though charging before entering into a tightly bunched group is nice. Also it's hard to miss the larger grimm. Haven't tried the 3rd tier, and I admit I probably won't though.


That said now that I maxed it out, I doubt I'll level it, though I may still use it time to time. Even "knowing" how to utilize it right, the aiming thing can still be an issue time to time, and more so it seems the other two are better (Quake being able to hit far more enemies, Sun even though its a 1 enemy only move is a safer bet to land the attack). Plus there were times it seemed to glitch on me. Hitting the enemy directly but not doing any damage, and I don't mean when the grimm was doing an attack that often prevents damage.

Even using just Blastwave though, I was typically holding 2nd in the groups, and each game just barely was missing out on hitting lvl 10 anywhere from 500 to 120 points away.

[WizOfTheWoods]

My main issue lies with the inherent problem of enemies becoming invincible when they attack. The other problem is that the hit boxes on this game aren't always the best. Couple those with a one shot move with low accuracy and limited use, and I just find that it's a useless skill that should be switched out for something else. I've maxed out all four charactes by this point, and it's still the worst move I've used among the bunch. But that's my opinion, and if you can make it work then by all means, spam away.

[BlueFountain]

Oh yeah, the other moves are still better by far. Be nice if it hit everything she passes by (like Blake and Weiss's dash moves seem to do) and fixed the targeting. Or replaced it with a range attack as Yang in the show can shoot off those sort of fireballs.

[WizOfTheWoods]

Agreed on all fronts.

[Flykz]

Gotta say, i'm a big fan of Blastwave, especially with Blast Wave Mastery. It's hard to use (the hitbox is indeed terrible) but damn, those damages. I got more than 550 kills on a run with it, and I can't say the same for Quake, wich is more convenient but does not that much damages.
To successfully use Blast Wave I often run and then turn back right away, but I agree that compared to the others characters, it's really not easy to use.

[BlueFountain]

Well tried Blastwave up to the additional damage one (not the 3 shockwaves). Flykz wasn't kidding the damage is insane! Nearly took out two of the big Ursas with one hit!

[Dizzy]

I have no clue why people always bash on Blast Wave, my "main build" on Yang revolves around Blast Wave, at least for Solo play.
I think I even have a screenshot of what I usually put points into.

Without even looking at the damage for now, I dont see Blast Wave being as bad as some people make it out to be, yes, the hitbox can be a little weird sometimes but, once you get used to it, it can be way stronger than Sunbreaker, for the simple fact that it doesnt boost you up in the air, which gives you downtime in damage, unless you want to waste your dodge.

Instead of going up with Sunbreaker, why not use the charged Blast Wave and abuse the iframes you get to dodge an Ursa attack, or a Boartusk roll, much like Weiss can with her lvl 2 Barrage/Nova, Nova being the Quake replacement on Yang, and Blast Wave being the Barrage replacement.

Blast Wave even keeps you in battle after you use it, so you dont have to waste your Dodge after Sunbreaker.

Another big thing is.. if you're good at manipulating Grimm, in terms of their movement you can even hit 3 or 4 enemies with it (think about the spawn before you activate the bomb where you get 3 Ursa).

If you're good at manipulating how the Ursa move, you can end all 3 of them in 3 to 5 Blast Waves max. depending on what angle you're hitting them from and if it hits all 3 or just 2.
It does take some practice, I guess that stuff is easy for me to say with almost 150 hours and about 120 of them on Yang only, but still, Blast Wave is great, if they fixed the hitboxes I'd even go as far as saying its broken and needs a balance fix asap, cause you can literally roll through everything.

[Phailup]

FYI guys the combat is changing in the next couple weeks so not sure if any of these will still apply. We will see!

[WizOfTheWoods]

This is good to know, Phailup. I am excited for that. I have been wanting a revamp, specifically for Yang and Blake, and Ruby too, to an extent, pretty much as long as I've been playing the game. As I said, I maxed all four characters, and I find that, for me, Yang's Blast Wave is the least useful, simply because it is hard to hit with, especially with semi invincible enemies (I'm looking at you, 10 Beowolves pushing me into a corner with spammed claw attacks). And as for its damage, sure, it's ridiculous, but it doesn't matter to me if I can't hit with it. Agreed, if the hit box and invincible enemies issues are fixed, Blast Wave will need to be nerfed, but until then, I have no need for it. As you can see at the top, I play primarily single player, so I find area clearing to be better for me, and as such, I put points into Quake, as I find more use for it than the other two.

Honestly though, I kinda want another game with a completely different organization. I always thought that RWBY would do better as a console game with a relatively close, third person, over the shoulder type view. It would feature more abilities per character, depending on which one you are playing at the time (except Jaune, since he hasn't shown any particular skill).

It would also feature the ability to shift between individual characters that are available in different areas, pretty much on the fly. Additionally, the system for choosing a character to switch to would also enable you to perform combo attacks, with the 'switch in' character being the supporter of the currently selected character. For example, if you are playing as Blake, and you have Weiss chosen as your quick switch character, and you try a combo move, Weiss would throw her speed boosting buff on Blake, which would increase her movement speed, attack speed, and attack distance for a short time.

I imagine a portrait in the upper right hand corner of the screen, with the face of the 'switch in' character in it, which changes as you cycle through your switch characters.

In the upper left, I imagine a rudimentary mini-map, much like that of Grimm Eclipse. Not too much detail, but accurate locations of enemies, and possibly important places or objectives.

The lower left would be occupied by your selected character's Aura, health, and possibly dust supply in your weapon, as an additional game feature [you could purchase dust vials or crystals (which would act like grenades when used) with RWBY money, which I think is called lien, but I'm not sure if that is how it is spelled].

Aura and health would be dependent on each character's individual traits, so some would have more Aura, some would have more Health, and some would have a relatively close mix (I imagine that Jaune would have some of the highest Aura in the game, since Pyrrha comments on him having a lot of soul/Aura in the show). The same would go for Damage Output, Attacks per Second, and Movement Speed.

The game itself would closely follow the story of RWBY proper, and possibly Grimm Eclipse, since it's supposed to take place between Volume 2 and 3.

I could go into more detail regarding the individual characters, but this post is starting to run really long. I fully intend to put it on the appropriate forum, once it's a little more realized, but since this post is still getting attention, I wanted to get it to the public and see how the response is before posting it where the developers could shoot it down. If you guys like the way this sounds, please let me know, and I will be more than happy to elaborate on the control scheme, individual characters, combat system, etc. Also, if you like it, please share it around, so that more people can evaluate it, and let me know what they think. I really appreciate it. I also appreciate all of the response to the original post too, so thank you, everyone above this post, and please respond to this one, so that I can keep realizing this.

[BlueFountain]

That's a lot of dreaming... Personally I'm overall happy with the game. Besides, in RWBY the school forced them to work as teams (despite many at the start not being too happy for it), so it's kinda poetic for the game to do that with us.