With Season 3 of Tekken 7 finally out, you can now play as Zafina, the powerful Egyptian warrior.
While Zafina featured heavily in Tekken 6’s story mode, she is only now joining the Tekken 7 roster as the tenth DLC character to be added to the game. She features a new look with longer hair and a deadly new move-set that may shake up the competitive meta.
As for her gameplay, her fighting style of ancient assassination arts is mostly the same, with three fighting stances: Scarecrow, Mantis, and Tarantula.
The Scarecrow style is very similar to Hwoarang’s Flamingo stance, having access to a quick armored attack, but suffering in mobility. Tarantula is reminiscent of Xiaoyu’s Phoenix stance, having the ability to crush highs and some mids. The Mantis stance has the highest damage potential, but has high-risk moves that can be easily blocked.
At the end of Tekken 6, Zafina defeated Azazel, and sealed him within her body, which has given her access to the Cursed Claw, and with it, some mystical new mechanics. She now has a dangerous on-hit combo that is literally called “Cursed Claw” that does 56 damage.
On top of that, Zafina can now parry any attack with the move “Revenge Hand” that does 30 damage.
- The best Tekken highlights from Cape Town Showdown 7
- Battle for Tokyo: Meet Korea’s ONE Tokyo Tekken Invitational Team
Even Zafina’s neutral stance is quite solid, and her basic attacks do decent damage.
However, to maximize her damage you’ll have to master the ins-and-outs of all of her stances. In the next gif, the slight addition of a scarecrow stance buffs the first combo by seven damage.
With more stance-based attacks, your combos will do significantly more damage. Along with the scarecrow stance, a launcher in the tarantula stance adds another eleven damage to our previous combo.
From what we’ve experimented with, you can do a devastating 79 damage combo with just the mantis stance.
As with most stance-based characters, Zafina is a tough character to learn. With her many stance transitions and locks, it’s essential to take time to learn her defensive options and panic moves. But once you’ve perfected her, Zafina is a relentless striker with an unpredictable move-set that’ll leave your opponent in confusion.
READ MORE: Thailand’s Friki goes undefeated to take the Tekken crown at Cape Town Showdown 7
