| Carl Clover |
|---|
 |
|
Overview
Carl Clover, the son of Relius Clover, was a student at the Military Academy along with Jin, Noel, Tsubaki, and Makoto. His academic career would not come to fruition however as Carl would eventually drop out to become a travelling vigilante. Together with his sister, Ada, whose soul is trapped in the Nox Nyctores Nirvana, Carl goes out to search for his father in order to stop whatever plans he may hold.
Drive: Automaton
Carl's Drive revolves around controlling Nirvana. Pressing and holding the D button will cause Nirvana to become active. Once active, she can move forward (by holding 3, 6, or 9) and backward (by holding 1, 4, or 7), attack by releasing the D button while either holding a direction or after completing the inputs for one of her special moves, deactivate by releasing the D button without any directional input, or get hit by an opponent.
Nirvana has her own life bar at the bottom of the screen, above Carl's heat gauge. It goes down when Nirvana is active, uses an attack, or gets hit by the opponent. Most of Nirvana's attacks have a continuation cost that make it so that if she uses another attack before being deactivated, it will cost even more life. If Nirvana's life bar reaches zero, she will be disabled and recover health slowly, but you won't be able to use her again until a short time after her life bar completely refills.
Other than her Distortion Drives and Astral Heat, Nirvana's moves act independently of Carl, meaning they don't put him in any kind of vulnerable state and can be used even if Carl is already doing something else. However, if Carl blocks or gets hit, most of Nirvana's moves will stop and she will deactivate, and she can't be activated until Carl recovers from the blockstun or hitstun.
Overdrive: Synchro High Speed
Carl's overdrive grants Nirvana a power up. The recovery of Ada's moves will be lessened and many of her moves will gain new properties. Ada's walk speed is also faster and her meter recovery speed is also increased. Carl will also have access to a new distortion drive during OD.
Pros/Strengths
- Strong and safe pressure
- One of the best mixup characters in the game
- Practical unblockable setups
- High damage with the right setups
- Unorthodox neutral game
Cons/Weaknesses
- Low life and sub-par defensive options
- Unimpressive normals
- Limited mobility options
- Very dependent on Nirvana, especially for neutral and offense
- Has some of the highest execution requirements in the game (This may or may not be an actual weakness, depending on the player)
External References
- Japanese Name: カルル＝クローバー
- Japanese Wiki
- Japanese BBS
- Arcade Profile Dan Rankings
- Character Video Thread
