How to Read DBFZ Frame Data Charted by kaiokek
My way of noting frame data are mostly influenced by how shtkn does it.
This guide serves to let readers understand all the numbers I've put down, for future charters to accurately put new numbers down, and also a reminder for myself.
Startup and a few general notes
I use the First Active Frame convention. A plus (+) sign denotes a Super Flash. A tilde (~) means either the startup can change depending on the distance between the characters, or that the move can be held to delay the startup.
Square brackets [ ] are often used for fully charged data, or general data that changes based on contexts. For example I would write "34 [20]", then note below that "Values in [ ] are when used mid-combo".
For assists, startup is counted from the first frame A1/A2 is released. This matches up with the in-game startup counter, so it's all the more easier to check.
I try to avoid inputting this field for moves without any attacking hitboxes. Movement based moves should use Recovery field for this purpose, counter based moves should use Invul field. This might not be ideal, but it's how I'm currently doing it and thinking it's for the best.
Active
Numbers inside parentheses/rounded brackets ( ) denote the frame gap between hitboxes. If the gap is 0, it'd be a comma (,). Don't confuse these gaps with First Active Frame, if a move has active frame of "2(3)4", it's active for 2F, then 3F of no hitboxes, then active for another 4F before going into recovery.
Curly brackets { } are use for groupings of frames. For example 1{(2)1}×3 is the same as 1(2)1(2)1(2)1. I try to always use curly brackets for this purpose to avoid confusions with square brackets.
X denotes a projectile going active. When multiple projectiles are involved, an "X" to me takes up a frame. So a move with Startup of "10", Active "X(5)X" would mean the first projectile goes active on frame 10, and the second projectiles goes active on frame 16.
Recovery
For moves with active frames independent of the characters, or has no active frames at all, I note the Total animation duration.
L is short for Land or After Landing. So "Total 41+3L" means it takes 41F from start to finish, then 3F after landing. There are many different types of landing recoveries in DBFZ, so moving forward I wanna keep these "L" specifically for non-cancelable landing recovery. If a move puts the character airborne, recovers for 10F in the air then transitions to 5F on the ground and is cancelable throughout, I'd just write Recovery as "15".
For assists, recovery is counted until the frame before they leap into the air and become invulnerable.
On-Block Advantage
Advantage if the move makes contact on its earliest possible frame. I'd like to only include "variable" frame adv for special cases such as divekicks, where the adv changes based on how high the move made contact. For most other cases with notable adv like good meaties, I think it's better to just write down a sentence under the move's description.
If it's a multi-hit move with gap(s), then the adv is for the final hit.
For assists, this is the adv for the point characters. DBFZ players care more about this data as opposed to "can you punish the assist after blocking it".
Invuln
The format is "first frame-last frame What it's invulnerable to", so something like "4-17 Head". I like using a dash (-) for this since tilde is already been used for "variable frames". You can sometimes see "9-16~26 All", this means the move is fully invulnerable starting from frame 9, then lasts until frame 16 at minimum up till frame 26 depending on the context (could be distance based or it's a chargeable move).
All assists have 1F of full invulnerability before they appear on screen. I do not note this for each assist's entry.
Damage
Damage is one of the most new-player-friendly data, since they can easily replicate the damage values in-game and confirm whether the data on-site is correct, or if they performed the correct move.
Due to that, I'd like to keep this value as simple as possible on the main page. If it gets more complicated than a single addition or multiplication, then the data is often no longer useful. For those cases, I believe simply charting the raw numbers you get from doing the move in Training Mode is enough. I still wanna keep the accurate data, but just keep it off the main page.
A slash (/) is used for uh basically I wanna keep it: "Raw" / Non-Smash / Smash. There aren't really any reasons for this ordering, but I'd just like to keep it consistent. Almost all "Raw" values can be found by hitting armors, usually with Z Broly as the training dummy. Non-Smash is simply hitting the move after you've exhausted its Smash.
Hitstop/Blockstun/Hitstun/Untech
A plus (+) here can mean multiple things:
- Extra hitstop: Hitstun "5+20" means defender suffers 5F more hitstop than attacker, then a regular 20F of histun
- Different properties: Untech "59 + Slide 34" means 59F of untech, then whenever they hit the ground, transition to 34F of OTG-able sliding knockdown (the entire knockdown duration is longer than this, but I think only the OTG-able portion is meaningful). "39 + WSplat" means the entire duration of pre-wall splat + after-wall splat is 39F.
Note that each attack will override the Hitstop/Blockstun/Hitstun/Untech value of the previous one. So a blockstun of "2+15×5" means each hit of this attack deals 2F of extra hitstop, 15F of blockstun, but the full attack does not deal 17×5 = 85F of blockstun, as each hit is rapidly overriding the last one.
For future frame data charters: DBFZ players like to call the assists' "on-block adv" as "blockstun". This is fine for casual conversations, but please don't input these on-block values into the Blockstun field. On-block adv is comprised of hitstop, blockstun, and overriding if it's a multi-hit assist. The same goes to assists' "hitstun".