KITANA
Here is DarkMoon's guide for Kitana: got this from www.ultimitemk.com
Kitana is ranked around #4 in MK2. She is an above average high Mid-Tier character fighting for her position with Kung Lao. She has a few differant styles of gameplay depending on who she is up against. She is a great rusher with her female properties giving her some of the best jabs in the game. Her rushdown is probably the most on spot, accompanied with a great defense and some of the easiest damaging combos to pull off, makes her one dangerous character. Her Uppercut is awesome and can take out most characters jump kicks and punches. Try to distance yourself on her uppercut, It seems to work best when you catch the end of your opponents leg. If the characters jump kick is too far over her body she can get hit. Her female SUJK comes out fast almost immediately and is one of the best in the game. It should work against every character for anti-air. Her attacking jump kicks and punches are decent enough and can beat-out most other characters if you should be both jump kicking at the same time. Works as a great counter to jump backwards and kick someone who is jump kicking at you. Careful though, Her jump kicks can be easily punished by uppercuts, roundhouses and aaDHK's. Her jump punch can be a deadly weapon to turtles who like to wait for a roundhouse or aaHK oppurtunity. If jumping from afar, her JP will break Ninja's roundhouses, Jax's aaHK, Cage's aaHK, and possibly everyone elses. It is a little risky though as the other character could walk forward on you before they perform their aaHK/RH move. Be prepared to block low incase your opponent should try and sweep you instead.
Her HK is nothing special, its useable but it is definately not the greatest for anti-air in the game. If you use her HK for anti-air against most characters, you must make sure that her foot is going to connect with your oppoent's rear-end, starting from his/her thigh to their arse. This means you have to be relitively close when your opponent jump kicks at you. If done from farther away and her foot connects with say Johnny Cage's foot or Shang's she will get hit. You should use her HK for countering cross-overs in upclose battle mainly, any other scenario you should try to get a fan lift in instead. It is possible to get a distant aaHK on ninja's and possibly Baraka, but just don't. Her LK is a decent wake up for ducking characters but not as good as Baraka's. Most characters can still duck underneath it and counter with an uppercut. It is a great wakeup though for people trying to sweep, It will litterally kick them right in the face as the opponent goes in their sweep animation. Ducking HK is good for anti-air against some characters: Ninja's and I think Jax. Don't use it that often though as the player attacking you has to hit her calf / foot area. It just doesn't seem effective enough to be a good solution. Her ducking LK quite frankly sucks. It's horrible, It is so damn short and barely has any reach to it at all. It is only good for hitting an opponent who is jumping in close, but then when you do that, only hit your opponent once with it. It does not have the reach to succefully get two ducking LK's after one another to back up your opponent. Most likely if you try for a 2nd one you will get swept, only do it once and get back or go into rushdown. It does work good however for countering Liu Kang's low fireball. She is so low to the ground when she does it that she will go underneath his fireball. This is a very good tactic and I suggest practicing it and getting it down. Her sweep comes out very fast and has high priority over alot of characters.
Chip damage is a Kitana specialty. She is the best character at creating upclose chip damage in the game, and when it comes down to it, any kind of damage is good damage. She beats out almost everyone in upclose battle. Her jabs as mentioned earlyer are great for keeping the rushdown. It's not very easy to uppercut her inbetween her jabs. Stick the player, get them to crouch and block and the lead is yours. This brings me to her moveset, her Fan Swipe is a very important underused move by most players. When used upclose it is a monster for laying down chip damage. Don't be afraid to spam it but be cautious, a good player can uppercut you between Fan Swipes. Keep alternating between jabs and Fan Swipes, keep it fresh and random. You don't want your pattern to become stale and predictable. Make sure to throw in her lightning fast sweeps incase your opponent lets his guard down low. Their is nothing your opponent can do to you except duck LK to get you back, and then get back themselves. It is a very common thing to see your opponent jump backwards to get away from Kitana after they perform their ducking LK. Watch for this and if you see it, hit them with a Square Wave Punch and get back to rushdown mode.
The Square Wave Punch is a move borrowed from Sonya in MK1. It is a great move for anti-air, getting places, and linking combos. It is as good of a move as it is a dangerous move. Be careful when you use her Square Wave Punch for getting places, you do not want your opponent to be standing in a position where he can uppercut you on your way back down from the air. Make sure to know the distance you will travel, only use it when its safe to do so. Liu Kang can jump punch backwards and break Kitana's SWP leaving her open for him to combo with an air fireball afterwards. Use caution if you are going to use this move against him.
Her Fan Throw is a huge projectile that takes about 1/4th of the playfield up and takes quite a bit of damage away. It can be thrown from the air and used to link combos, this is when it is mostly used. It's start up time is rather slow when thrown from the ground and can be seen from a mile away. However it can still be effective and come as a surprise to people if you just toss it out there randomly from the ground. If they see it coming though becareful they will easily jump kick over it and tag you. When Kitana isn't keeping a rush down with jabs and Fan Swipes, her Fan Throw plays a key part in her defensive strategies. Don't use the fan throw everytime you jump in the air, or it will become predictable and less effective. Instead, just jump around playing with your opponent and then throw it out. This will keep the move fresh.
The Fan Lift is the grand daddy of combo starters in MK2. Their is no reason why you should not successfully come up on a combo after a well placed Fan Lift. Your looking at the bare minimum atleast 30% damage after this move. This move along with the fan throw keeps your enemy at bay, and plays key part of Kitana's defense. Kitana is somewhat of a "dancer" when you see her being played defensively. You will see Kitana pushing B,B,F,B,F,F,Duck,F,B,F,F etc.dancing around the screen. This is too fool you, what the character is doing is buffering between fan lifts and fan throws and waiting for you to either jump in and hit the Fan Lift, or waiting for a good spot to throw the fan out. Be careful when doing the Fan Lift in upclose battle, if your opponent blocks it. For some reason the effect of the lift is broken and he can simply walk through it and uppercut you.
In the right hands, Kitana could be almost unstoppable.
by Jade-Own.....
