Yeah yeah another "serious" pun.

Kazuya's not that bad people, but he is extremely hard to play, in the sense that you have zero flexibility due to his stacking mechanic. In order to play Kazuya, you must have :

4x Kazuya
4x The Hunt is On

And the following are strongly suggested :

4x Mishima Family Bloodline
4x Spinning Demon
4x Unnatural Grace
4x Lightning Uppercut

* * *

I can hear you say "Why Unnatural Grace?" First, it matches all three of his symbols. Second, it triggers the Combo E off of Lightning Uppercut (which is sexy in it's own right) and third it allows for easier playing of Destruction in his Wake because it'll make the attacks easier to pass (oh, by the way, LU is Mid, so it's the first part of the DihW combo).

The rest should be obvious.

Also, Kazuya's main momentum gain will come from Kazuya's Gloves as it's a possible two. I'm playing through Chaos, so I added Hoping for a Real Challenge (again, for the LU) instead of Ascending Zephyr because Zephyr tosses two from my hand and I already need to toss those to power the speed of my attacks and Mishima Zaibatsu Leader. These help immensely.

Standard game should go like this.

T1 : Building
T2 : Attack tossing for momentum (through MZL if they attacked you first or Kazuya's Gloves/Hoping for a Real Challenge)
T3 : Lightning Uppercut brah (will probably do around 13-22 damage, which combined with the second turn of attacks, should be enough for a kill).

You may also build on T2 if you're confident you'll get enough attacks/actions to do the T3 kill. I added Lion Slayer for flavor and because I don't feel comfortable playing without a 2CC. However, it's not really needed. It does help fill out the Kazuya's Gloves part of being a punch though, it's also a good secondary kill condition as just by buffing itself it comes in at 4 mid 10 off the combo. Add in Kazuya for a +1/+2 global buff and you're set to go.

Spinning Demon fetches Kazuya, Mishima Family Bloodline allows for card draw and easy stacking characters. The Hunt is On helps in getting those characters back as well.

Protip : When facing Rashotep, toss LU right after the Unnatural Grace and blow up a foundation ASAP. Rashotep's "lolzuya" stance will be delayed for an attack, allowing you to get a +1/+2 speed buff on the LU.

Protip- play a demon slayer before you attack a rashotep. Also lighting upper is not an auto include. Although spinning demon kills things, ALOT.

tannerface said:

Spinning Demon is overrated, to be honest. It's good, don't get me wrong, but it's not as AMGSOAWESOME as most of you would have me believe. My current kill/enabling standing has 3 kills due to Lightning Uppercut and one due to Lion Slayer, none of them by Lion Slayer. Enabling kills I would give to Spinning Demon... once because it's a Kick and thus triggers Lion Slayer's combo.

Spinning Demon should, however, be packed in every Kazuya deck. It may kill, it may not, but a possibility of fetching two characters? Yes.

So you're running Hoping for a Challenge and Kazy's Gloves...I assume Treacherous Offspring and Maniacal Laughter, too?

Also, how do you push through Lightning Uppercut?

MarcoPulleaux said:

Lightning Uppercut doesn't need to be pushed most of the time. A +2 speed helps far more than most realize.

TO and ML aren't included, if only because I want my ML to go into my tri-symbol Omar Chavez deck... and I have NO Treacherous Offsprings. I would probably include them over my Solitary Assassins which are only there for one reason - it gives me a momentum in case I don't have 2 characters to fetch with Spinning Demon.

But let's say you DID have TO and ML.

Would they be in Kazuya?

See, I've been thinking about Kazuya, and I just don't know how good he REALLY is this block. TBH, I'd rather use his E than his F, and at that point, I can really think of better chars.

MarcoPulleaux said:

TO would, ML no. It's good, but I'd use it in other decks.

He's... special to use, as I've said. The F hasn't been as useful as I thought it would, but Unnatural Grace helps in that regard. Play UG then F Kazuya, then attack string. However, if you're going the Lightning Uppercut route... yeah. Not as good.

If you started with UG into Kazuya's F, I'd likely go with a more Upper Claw - Leg Slash - Lion Slayer - Backhanded Axe Slash route (needing a 3-4-5-5 respectively to pass all attacks), and in a perfect world, the grand damage total would be 22.

MarcoPulleaux said:

Don't play Lion Slayer if you're not planning on playing Kicks. If there's one thing I've learned is that in Kazuya, you can't afford to spit on free damage, and that's what Lion Slayer gives you.

I'm assuming all this goes through Death?

Yes, and needless to say, the attack line-up wouldn't require Kazuya, but if they have no foundation, they can only hope to block 1 of these attacks, I'm certain.

MarcoPulleaux said:

Honestly I'd play that in Ragnar in a Death/Fire build than in Kaz. Fire for For the Money, obviously.

But, overall, is his F REALLY the big scary Infiltrating it was made out to be?

and, how does he stack up to Nightmare? I find NM better...

Out here, Russ runs Communing with the Ancients . Commune, Commune, board whipe with Kazuya, attack string for game. Hard to block w/o foundations.

MarcoPulleaux said:

It's about time some of you are seeing this.. I said it from day one he's not that good. Ok at best. But I a glad to see nobody with my Kazuya build yet

If this game starts to slide back into a rut of control, he'll be great. Until then, he's utter garbage (sorry Hatman).

He's just simply too slow in a fast paced game at the moment. Those symbols don't have enough defense in order for him to support his slower paced game.

Yes he can wipe the board, but then what? He builds up his techy control, while the fire toon spills their massive aggro foundations, then powerbombs his face into oblivion? It's also not hard to play against Kaz, just keep a small staging area

B-Rad said:

I'm not saying he's not, just saying he's better than most realize because of his E. Even then, if it wasn't that his E pumps speed and damage, he WOULD be complete trash.

Also, I find the board reset to be most useful if you've had a bad start. It tends to coax another turn of building which can be definitely beneficial. Using it offensively is going to backfire more often than not, unless you're using what ARMed_Pirate said and Communing into Unnatural Grace (in such a deck I'd forego the Lightning Uppercuts completely and concentrate on Spinning Demon/Lion Slayer. Since the Demon can't profit from Merciless Fighter double-dipping, you're almost better off comboing into Lion Slayer for massive damage.)

Also, Brad, control Kazuya will get his face caved-in at around turn 3, turn 2 if he's unlucky. That's why I built him to be aggro.

Screw it I'll post what the deck should be on the Deckbuilding forums. It's not amg toptierz but it works pretty well when it does (and I would definitely want it to work better but I lack cards).

If you can go first and play a kaz, then he is good...otherwise he just seems to fall behind.

Well I suppose spinning demon isn't awesomesauce kill face in kazuya, however, in heihachi it eats babies.

Edit: Also olexa has a pretty good build going with him that isn't really all that slow, but it can go the long game cause he can sweep the board.

tannerface said:

I retract my Spinning Demon statement.

Combined with Merciless Fighter, it eats babies.

But again, what do you guys think makes Kazuya better than similar characters, such as Nightmare and Zhao Daiyu?

MarcoPulleaux said:

I'd dare say they're on the same power level.

Nightmare profits from blowing up your opponent's board and your own.

Zhao Daiyu damages the opponent as she snipes the opponent's board.

Kazuya drops a nuke, but doesn't get any extra benefit from it.

This is the deck I have for him.