Street Fighter 6/Manon/Introduction

Introduction

A super model and world champion judoka, Manon is an idealist, forever seeking self-improvement in the pursuit of beauty. She struts the catwalk of street fighting to become the world's strongest model.

Manon's distinct playstyle features center around long, far reaching normals that control the opponent's position and enhance her strike/throw game, mixed with command throws that scale up in damage every time she manages to hit with them, which gives her a lot of power once she has the momentum.

The centerpoint of Manon's gameplan is based on medals. Landing her Manège Doré command throw or her Renversé hitgrab will grant her an additional medal, up to a maximum of 5. Each medal gained increases the damage of both these moves by a notable amount; Manège Doré itself becomes one of the strongest command grabs in the game if Manon manages to hit 5 medals. Additionally, these medals are carried over between rounds, giving Manon incredible potential to mount powerful comebacks and dominate a match-point game with a well-placed Manège Doré; this is especially dangerous when Manon has enough Drive Meter to go for a Drive Rush Manège Doré, as its effective range increases drastically when used this way.

To complement these two moves and her medal system, Manon's long limbs let her play a strong mid-range game to poke and prod the opponent, with quite a few of her grounded and jumping normals having long reach, and several moves having target combo followups that pull the opponent in or otherwise reposition them for Manon to throw them. Many of her special moves and even a few of her Super Arts are also built for callouts or helping Manon to maneuver past tricky situations; Renversé can be feinted for projectile invulnerability or canceled into a fairly far reaching kick that retains a little of that invulnerability too, while she can use Dégagé to either duck under attacks with the light version, punish opponents just out of range of her longer normals or end combos with the medium version, or go for an advancing overhead with the heavy and Overdive versions. Her 2HP is one of her moves with a target combo followup, allowing her to turn anti-air situations to her advantage by dropping the opponent right in front of her, and both her Level 1 and Level 2 Super Arts (Arabesque and Étoile) function as powerful reversals for the ground and against air attacks respectively.

Manon mainly struggles if she lacks Drive Meter, as many of her strongest conversions and pokes or oki setups may require her to Drive Rush Cancel her normals in order to be a threat. Some of her neutral tools also have noticeable recovery windows in exchange for their speed and reach, meaning that a wary opponent can punish her for them if they make the right call on what she's going to do. If you like to dance around opponents and see them fly through the sky, then pirouette into place with Manon.

Pick if you like:

Avoid if you dislike:

Big Normals: Manon's moves have above average reach, threatening screen space quite well. 5MK, 2MK, 5HK, and many of her special moves have deceptively good reach in ways that can make opponents unsure of what range to play against her. Great On Hit: When Manon lands a hit, it almost always leads into a very favourable situation for her. 5HP and 5MP are solid poking normals with target combo follows up that instantly pull opponents into a strike/throw situation on hit. 2HP~HP pulls opponents out of the air and knocks them down at the perfect range for strike/throw mix. Dégagé and Renversé are great callout options to catch opponents off guard in the midrange. Overall, Manon can completely walk over opponents that don't know the right times to press against her. Win Condition: Manège Doré and Renversé earn Manon a Medal Level when they complete their animations on hit. These levels persist through rounds and increase the respective move's damage from below average to absurd. Any reckless opponent that gives Manon the chance to build medals lets her easily turn a bad round into a lost match.

Bad on Block: Manon's moves have absolutely no advantage on block without using Drive Rush or putting the opponent in Burnout. While this isn't too big of a deal for some characters, it greatly impedes Manon's ability to make wary opponents respect her command grab. She struggles with this significantly more than other grapplers, who all have meterless ways of forcing an opponent to guess. Drive Reliant: Having to use Drive Rush to create proper strike/throw scenarios makes Manon a very Drive reliant character if the opponent isn't giving her opportunities to land hits. This frequently puts her at a net loss of Drive, which in turn lets opponents spend their Drive to counter or pressure her with little fear of being at disadvantage.