Originally Posted by xero901

So, I haven't seen too many tutorials explaining the basics of Toribash (Or that good in my opinion), so I think it's only fair for me to bring my own perspective or opinion to how you should start out toribash.

I'll be writing this a few articles at a time, so if some things are missing, I'll most likely add in more later.

First off, if you have any martial arts training of any kind, this will help you a-lot since you'll already know how to do some moves, if not; it'll probably take you longer.

Now, lets get some basic joint movements down;

Explaining Joints and what they can do

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There are several joints in the shape of balls on your Tori with names that are related to body parts (Chest, Elbow, Knees, Glutes, Etc)

Now, you want to study the Tori's body a bit to understand it and what they do, in short=
Elbows bend your arms back/forth, and shoulders raise your arms up and down

Knees will bend your knees, but only that, the hips(Above knees) are what drive the legs forwards and backwards.

Glutes are what make your legs in or out, what I mean by that is it will rotate/move your legs in to the center, or out of your center.

The chest will rotate your torso a bit, but won't get you far unless you use your lumbar to shift your weight to said side.

Ankles and wrists are used later, and the neck is usually useless.
Abs will bend everything on top of your abs (Lol, no kidding) forwards or backwards.

Remember, with mods; Joints can change the directions they turn, or be in different areas all together, you have to adapt to your body if this happens and play. But consider doing that after you get a good footing on your basics.

Now, we'll explain briefly on what all the "contract, hold, relax, extend" means. But, if you paid attention in biology class and understand what your muscles do, they're exactly what you think, and you're good. Still, consider reading this part to ensure yourself.

movements

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If you didn't pay attention in biology class, or its just been too long, I'll be here to explain it.
Contracting means what you would think, it's basically bending the muscle to make it come in, for example;

When you bend a knee or elbow, it will come in towards your body, with the abs it will bend down as that how it's naturally meant to bend.
Extending is basically that; mirrored.
Instead of coming in, it'll come out - Simple, right?
Elbows come out, knees, abs, etc.

In short, contracting will bend your muscles in, and extending will shoot them out. When you're confused as to where a muscle will go, just remember how easy it is to bend one way, that's the contract.

Relax is just when your joint has no command to it, and it'll just flail about. I suggest not doing this until you have a really good understanding of what'll happen with certain movements and etc.

Hold is what happens when you click on a joint and it's just filled in whole. It will stop/freeze your joint in place so you can have it secured. I suggest using extend if you just want it straight out or something.

"Now how do I make attacks now with all that mumbo jumbo?"
Take your newfound knowledge and try to make some of your own moves yourself, but before doing so, you need to learn some basic moves in order to build off of to understand.

attacks

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The front kick=
Just bend your knee and extend it? Right?

Wrong, you're just going to hit air that way.

Well, how do you kick hard and fast then? First off, you have to shoot up with your knee in order to kick that area, you just can't shoot your knee down low, and expect to come high.

You need to use your hips to shoot out that leg - Contract the same hip with the knee kicking, and extend the other to make your other hip shoot out more.

The sidekick/roundhouse.

You're going to do the front kick, but you're going to extend both glutes and use your pecs to turn your whole body in order to gain distance and even more momentum to go up to the body/pec and dm some people.

You're going to turn and bend the chest and lumbar with your leg you're going to kick with (Right turn/bend with right contracting).

As for pecs, it's mirrored on the other side.

(Left pec contract, Right pec extend / Right turn chest and vice versa).

From that, that's all I can give without holding your hand through the game.
What you can do now is try to modify these moves to your own style, or make your own moves in general.

Edit 2:
Grabbing is kinda of a luck game as to whether it'll help you or not, consider only using this as a last resort or to fake someone out.

Grabbing

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Assuming you've practiced your moves and you're somewhat more good at toribash then you were before, now let's learn about grabbing (You know, when you click on your hands and they become rectangles?)

This is basically what allows you to grapple with, or to pull enemies towards you. Remember, in any case when you grab with a-lot of momentum, one or two of either three things will happen;
1. You will grab your enemy and he will be stuck to your hand until your hand stops grabbing, or your arm comes off.
2. Your wrist will dismember itself from impact and stick to your enemy, don't worry about the hand if Wrists don't dq (Sumo mode).
3. The momentum coming from your hand will dismember the body part being grabbed and act as if it was a chop or punch.

Normally you want to go to 1 and try to kick as you'll get more range as opposed to trying to dm with grabbing (Does not apply to kickbox, one move that is unblockable.)

Now remember, at any time when you're grabbing and you can attack your enemy, they can attack back and in most cases, this can backfire on you if you're not a very advanced player.
-Adding more at a later date-

Will add on more when I see fit.
Edit:
If you need re-clarifying or any of the sort, I'll put them in this spoiler.
Make a request and it'll be good.

Advanced explanation.

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