Prologue

 

This document is based on how I view fire after years of practice and coaching others. 

While reading this document will NOT make you a better player, applying my theories to your gameplay will. 

Your main goal should always be to discover what mistakes you’re making, and to practice making the right decisions until they’ve become embedded in your playstyle, even if it means temporarily slowing down or even playing at a lower level.

Discord Server.

(Credit to Woohoojin for supplying the graph.)

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The fundamental truth of bending is that in order to win, your opponent needs to reach 0 health points before you do.

Because many of the element’s abilities are projectiles rather than hitscan, fire requires more prediction than it does precision. (This means that when “aim” is mentioned, we’re referencing the ability to read your opponent’s movements rather than your skill with mouse control.) 

On a similar note, since reads are inconsistent, and, are commonly described as “nuanced guesses”, to build a layer of consistency in your fights, much of this guide, and my playstyle, focuses on gaining an innate advantage before committing to an exchange so that you don’t have to rely on raw prediction, but rather on the advantages you’ve created that increase the likelihood of landing your moves, making it easier for you to maintain control over your opponent. While there are no laws stating that players must follow these rules to succeed, that’s the beauty of fire, and it’s completely acceptable for you to be creative, innovative and experimentative with different playstyles. As of this document, of all the dominant top fires, none have shared the same style.

 

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Fire can be pretty intrusive during fights, because of this, players often use low fire resource packs and disable smoke in Optifine’s Animation settings: VanillaTweaks | Optifine.

 

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Element Match-Ups can be abbreviated by using the first letters of both elements. Fire’s matchups would be:

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FvF | Fire vs Fire
FvA | Fire vs Air
FvE | Fire vs Earth
FvW | Fire vs Water
FvC | Fire vs Chi

 

This guide primarily focuses on FvF as every match-up has its own intricacies, but some of the information found here can be useful for other matchups, especially those found in Useful Strings & Strategies. 

 

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PK Commands:

Common Commands & Shortcuts:

 

/projectkorra

/bending

/pk

/b

 Any of the above aliases can be used instead of ‘pk’ in the following commands.

 

To display moves

/pk display fire

 ‘d’ can be used instead of ‘display’.

 ‘f’ can be used instead of ‘fire’.

 

To bind & clear moves

/pk bind (move)

 ‘b’ can be used instead of ‘bind’.

/pk clear (slot_number)

 ‘c’ can be used instead of ‘clear’.

/pk copy (player)

 ‘co’ can be used instead of ‘copy’.

 

To create and use presets

/pk preset create [name]

 ‘p’ can be used instead of ‘preset’
‘c’ can be used instead of ‘create’

 

/pk p bind [name]

/pk p list [name]

/pk p delete [name]

 ‘b’ can be used instead of ‘bind’

 ‘l’ can be used instead of ‘list’

 ‘d’ can be used instead of ‘delete’

 

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Moves:

 

You can usually abbreviate move names starting with ‘Fire’ by mentioning the second half of the name and applying ‘F’ at the start, for instance, ‘FBall’. Other notable abbreviations will also be stated.

 

Offensive Moves

FireBlast (FB) > [LMB] or hold [SHIFT] and release to perform Charged FB (cFB.)

FireShots > [SHIFT] -> [LMB]x(Number Of Configured Shots.)

FireBall > [LMB].

FireBreath > Hold [SHIFT].

FireBurst > Hold [SHIFT] and release.

WallOfFire (WoF) > [LMB].

Discharge (Disch) > [LMB].

Lightning > Hold [SHIFT] and release.

LightningBurst (LBurst) > Hold [SHIFT] and release.

Combustion (Comb) > [SHIFT].

 

Utility Moves

HeatControl (HC) > [LMB] or [SHIFT] to extinguish fires, melt ice or hold [SHIFT] to temporarily solidify lava.

FireJet > [LMB].

FireShield > [LMB] or [SHIFT].

Blaze > [LMB] or tap [SHIFT].

WallRun > Sprint, Jump and [LMB] against a wall.

 

Combos

FireKick > [LMB] FBx2 -> [SHIFT] + [LMB] FB.

FireSpin > [LMB] FBx2 -> [LMB] FShield -> [SHIFT] FShield.

FireWheel > Hold [SHIFT] FShield -> [RMB] at a block x2 -> Blaze -> Release [SHIFT].

 

JetBlast > [SHIFT] FJetx2 -> [SHIFT] FShield -> [LMB] FJet.

JetBlaze > [SHIFT] FJetx2 -> [SHIFT] FBlaze -> [LMB] FJet.

 

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Necessary Moves

FireBlast

HeatControl

FireJet

FireShield

Blaze

Standard Moveset

FireBlast 

HeatControl 

Combustion/FireBall

FireShots 

Discharge 

WallOfFire 

FireShield 

FireJet 

Blaze 

Unorthodox Moves

FireBreath

FireBurst

Lightning

LightningBurst

 

While this works as a general guideline, I highly recommend being creative and finding which moves work for you and what hotkeys you feel most comfortable having them on. It’s quite common for players to edit their keybinds as well, some common binds for QWERTY keyboards include: [Q, E, R, T, F, G, Z, X, C, V] as they’re all relatively close to your [W, A, S, D] keys.

 

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Concepts:

These principles are based around the objective of pushing and maintaining an advantage, and operate on the logical implications, where “if x is the case, then logically, y is also the case.” However, it’s important to note that if you do decide to rely on a less aggressive style of fire, there’s a chance that some of these concepts won’t be as reliable or even applicable to you, as you’d be playing fire with a significantly different goal in mind. All of these concepts build off of one another to give players a keen understanding of what they should be doing in each situation based on how I play.

 

-=Basics=-

“Rules”/Guidelines

There are two/three fundamental “rules” that beginner/intermediate players should abide by. This is because of their punishable and easy-to-abuse nature. Players are able and actually encouraged to “bend the rules” once they’ve reached a high-enough level as principled play can often be predictable and punishable. (Exception to creativity, of course.)

 

• FireBlast is your friend.

  • FireBlast typically deals 1-1.5 hearts of damage with a measly 1.5 second cooldown, this means that it has one of, if not the highest DPS in fire’s kit. You should be using it as much as you can.

 

• Don’t FireJet first.

  • FireJetting first requires ample knowledge on positioning as it is your only mobility tool that’s accessible at all times, and as a result, can be highly punishable when wasted. Even experienced players can often reach tense positions or even lose entire matches off of intentionally risky FireJets. At this level, play disciplined and only FireJet when you need to, or in response to your opponent’s.

    • Be careful with your movement.

Building off of this point, you generally want to be careful with your movement. For instance, strafing in the same manner or running towards walls to set up for a WallRun are both easy patterns to predict. One of fire’s limitations is its lack of safe mobility options. Once you’ve understood and applied the theory behind positioning to your gameplay, you can take more calculated risks.

 

• Be creative.

Fire, scrap that, bending as a whole gives you so many options, from your move choices, to the freedom of expression in your playstyle, don’t limit yourself to what others do; That’s not to say that you should disregard advice, but that you should explore and experiment. As cheesy as it is, don’t try to be the next SpiralOfGames or Leon_XO, innovate and make a name for yourself as the first you.

 

Strings

Even though ‘Strings’ are typically called ‘Combos’ in-game as it’s easy to understand which is intended based on context, to easily differentiate between predefined-combos such as FireSpin, and attack sequences such as FireBlast -> Discharge, I’ll be referring to each as ‘Combos’ and ‘Strings’ respectively.

As previously mentioned, strings refer to a sequence of moves. Strings are oftentimes not guaranteed and require the user to predict their opponent’s strafing pattern. The following GIF demonstrates a string on a stationary target.  

 

 

I-Frames

I-Frames last 500 ms. This means that for the duration of 500 ms after hitting someone, they cannot receive damage (If you deal more damage within that time-frame, neither additional knockback is applied, nor are their I-Frames reset, but the higher value of damage replaces the original damage given.)

 

Because of Hit Invulnerability/I-Frames, not all of my punches are registered. (It is difficult to tell without sound, my apologies, try it yourself!)

 

Stunlocks

Stunlocking is a relatively simple concept. It refers to when you repeatedly stun someone to keep them indefinitely incapacitated. 

A stunlock is performed when a move is landed when I-Frames have ended, but while the player is still airborne or just about landing, and has limited movement.

Contrary to popular belief, you should not constantly be dishing out stunlocks or spamming moves unless your aim somehow justifies it. Stunlocks are simply the most optimal (but not necessary) way to continue a string once you’ve managed to start one. Missing an important move is worse than not using the move at all!

If you’d like to practice the timing, I’d recommend punching a target, preferably to a (120 BPM) metronome or this song, which is also used by some traditional PvP players.

(Credit to Grinchist for supplying the links.)

 

(P.S The server looks much better than that, I’m just silly and decided not to play on the native version or use the resource pack, theowner’sflaming meplshelp)

 

Buffered Moves

Although stunlocks are the most effective method for dealing damage in quick succession, they shouldn’t be exclusively relied upon as the only way to output damage. An alternative approach is to simply wait out your FireBlast cooldown to poke in “Neutral”, avoiding the risk of throwing out punishable moves (A term explained later on.)

Another slightly advanced method would also be to buffer your moves. Upon landing a move, instead of instantly committing to a follow-up, you can wait until your opponent just about starts strafing to land your follow-up move. By doing this, you’re taking advantage of the fact that they haven’t fully accelerated yet (So that it’s relatively easy to land your moves) and slightly reducing the remaining cooldown on your recharging moves. Furthermore, by combining this with the correct “spacing,” you can get some seemingly inescapable extended strings going. FireBlast -> (Buffered) Discharge -> FireBlast can be seen below as a reaction to Grinchist’s wasted Discharge.

 

-=Intermediate=-

Trades

Trading at face-value refers to the exchange of abilities between players. Winning your trades (Dealing more damage than your opponent in a shorter period of time) is an essential practice to get down as trading lies at the heart of gameplay given that the ultimate goal is to kill your opponent before they kill you. By winning in neutral-game, and punishing your opponents’ mistakes, you are guaranteed to win your trades. 

A common misconception is that landing more moves equates to winning trades. To demonstrate why this belief is flawed, consider FireBlast vs FireShots. Although you may connect more attacks with FireShots, the damage dealt by both players still equates to 1.5 to 1.5. Funnily enough, the person using FireShots is actually disadvantaged here as their damage was spread across a longer period of time and they’ve now put their FireShots on a 6 second long cooldown opposed to FireBlast, which inflicts the same damage in one hit for just the price of a 1.5 second cooldown.

FireBlast Trading-

FireBlast Trading is absurdly important, especially at the higher levels of fire where missteps against skilled opponents can often result in game-changing punishments, and at even higher levels, potentially lost games. To avoid this, it is favorable to adopt a safer and more methodical approach when neither player has an innate advantage. Playing around FireBlast in the “Neutral Game” allows you to manage your valuable abilities and enables you to punish your opponent and control the fight when given an opportunity to do so. FireBlast Trading is the core of fire’s mechanics, and is the single most important mechanical skill you’ll need to develop in order to progress.

 

Move Conservation

Whenever you miss a move, you effectively remove that move from your move-set for the duration of its cooldown, as a result, it is important to manage your resources so that you always have the critical moves whenever they become necessary, and the damage output to equalize or win trades against your opponent.

 

You should only consider using valued abilities in a risky manner if you have compensation in some other way. That is to say, a situational advantage that justifies the risk of losing a trade in favor of further simplifying the match. You can also consider doing so if you’re at a major disadvantage and need to make a desperation-play.

Simplification-

Just as in the game of chess, where simplifying the position is the most straightforward way to win when your opponent has blundered a piece and you hold a material advantage, a similar principle applies to fire. By capitalizing on your opponent's wasted moves and forcing a trade, you are heavily favored to gain a damage lead as you've had more abilities to ensure that you win the interaction. To further explain, in chess, if you trade down while having a material advantage, you are expected to retain that resource advantage in the end-game. Similarly, in bending, trading down with more abilities allows you to deal more damage as you’ve had more moves to utilize.

 

The GIF above illustrates two instances of poor move-conservation practices. Although he used landed Discharge, it did not have the same impact as when it’s used as a follow-up out of FireBlast. This is because Discharge on its own only deals 1.5 hearts of damage. I punished this mistake by using )FireBlast -> Discharge -> FireBlast), winning the trade with 4.5 hearts of damage dealt.

 Another unadvisable practice is to trade FireShots moves such as FireBlast & Discharge as it's unfavorable. While FireShots is useful for applying pressure, managing space and poking due to its high knockback, it isn’t nearly as effective at dealing raw damage as a result of its low damage. In the time that it takes to deal 1 heart of damage with FireShots, I can deal 3 with FireBlast -> Discharge, taking advantage of how I-Frames work. 

 

JetRushing

TBA.................................................................................................................................

 

Punishes

Punishing, as the name suggests, refers to capitalizing on your opponent’s mistakes and gaining a lead as a result. There are many instances in which this can occur, from something as simple as your opponent FireJetting or WallRunning poorly, to having bad positioning or poor move-conservation. The following GIF demonstrates a wasted Discharge being punished, followed by a Jet Punish.

 

Resource Management Punishes-

TBA.................................................................................................................................

FireJet Punishes-

It is important to recognise why using FireJet is punishable. Since it’s your only source of mobility that is accessible at almost all times, by giving it up, you’re putting yourself in a position where your opponent still has mobility and you don’t. At this point, your opponent can avoid your FireJet and punish with their own, leading to a huge advantage, or simply reposition to advantageous terrain. 

FireSpin Punishes-

Similar to FireJet being fire’s only completely accessible source of mobility, FireSpin is fire’s only defensive tool. If your opponent wastes it, commonly when wrongly anticipating a rush, or at lower levels, in a JetRush, you should try to close the distance between you, or even JetRush as their only option to create space between you both is by escaping with FireJet. 

WallRun Punishes-

TBA.................................................................................................................................

 

Pressure

Pressure is a universal concept that you’ll often come-across no matter what genre of game you play, from FPS, to MOBAS, to Fighting Games. Even Chess has mention of pressure. This concept refers to keeping constant tension with your opponent by aggressing and taking away their space. You can often limit their options and seemingly “force” your opponent into giving you an opening. While one playstyle is to play passively and out-aim your opponent, knowing when to pressure them into making poor decisions can also heighten your game-play. 

 

Positioning

Positioning refers to the distance between you and your opponent and the relation between you and the terrain around you. Positioning well enables you to have access to more tools, while poor positioning can do the opposite.

Spacing-

Spacing refers strictly to the distance between you and your opponent, and how your abilities perform in that space. If you’re playing at the edge of FireShots’ range, you may be able to bait your opponent into using it, wait it out, then push with your own, pressuring them back.

If your opponent has missed a crucial move such as Discharge, it’s also a good time to push forward and close the distance between the both of you. By closing the gap, you raise your chances of landing Discharge, which can help push that advantage.

Managing Space-

In areas with unbalanced terrain, such as uneven environments or those with water, it can be beneficial to control areas and force your opponent into unfavorable positions with pressure through ground fire, abilities or simply strafing. For instance, pushing them back until they’re stuck against water or a wall can limit their movement and make it easier to land your moves, this is what you want.

 

-=Advanced=-

Reads

Reading involves making a nuanced prediction of your opponent’s next move based on their past decisions.

Fire can be likened to a game of chance; It is similar to flipping a weighted coin as it is impossible to accurately predict an individual's next move with perfect consistency, especially when they purposefully mix-up their gameplay, given our prior understanding on “aim”, this means that using raw mechanics at the highest level is certain to fail. By capitalizing on their mistakes, as we've discussed in the past, you end up limiting their options and give yourself favorable odds to work with. 

 

This all said, there are times where you have a read on your opponent’s habits, or where the situation simply calls for a risky play. You’ve realized that your opponent has a predictable pattern? Take advantage of it. Bend the rules you’ve been taught and adapt to the situation.

In the case of being disadvantaged, if you’re trying to crawl your way back into a fight, you simply need to take risks against a skilled player, otherwise, they will gradually push their advantage and suffocate you to death. Typically, to win in these positions, you need to play back until you find an opening or find a way to break their momentum and take control of the fight.

Conditioning-

Conditioning builds on the concepts of reading. If you’re fighting a good player, they’ll most-likely be trying to pick up on your habits to adapt. Conditioning plays with this. Strafe a specific way until they expect it, then mix it up. If they’re playing hastily, confuse them and punish their impatient predictions. Don’t be afraid to play mind-games.

//GIF TBA

Strafes-

Strafing refers to the side-to-side or diagonal movements often seen in fire and earth mains. Strafing allows the player to reposition, keep their aim focused near the opponent, and avoid moves. Strafing inherents similar concepts from “Reads”, and can be incredibly overwhelming, especially once you’re at a level where landing the first FireBlast is game-changing.

//GIF TBA

How reads affect punishes-

 

Game-States

In fire, there are 3 main states, when you have the advantage, when your opponent has the advantage, and when neither of you do, in fighting games, this state is typically called the “Neutral Game.”

While it can be complicated to first understand, it’s just important to know that neutral is usually stated as when both players are trying to find an opening.

Neutral Game-

The neutral game refers to the stage in which neither player has a significant advantage or disadvantage. In FvF, this is typically where both players are poking at one another with FireBlast and FireShots trying to create an opening. In high-level play, this stage is often broken when the first FireBlast lands.

//GIF TBA

Advantage State-

The advantage stage is exactly what the name implies. This is when you’ve gained the advantage in a fight. There are many ways to create an advantage. Creating pressure, gaining a better position, punishing a bad play and so on are all ways to gain a lead. Being aware of your advantage, and playing accordingly can make a world of difference.

 

Insert types of advantages

Disadvantage State-

This, as the name suggests, happens to be the opposite of the advantage state. This is when the opponent has created an advantage and is pushing a lead. While playing on the backfoot, it’s important to try to return to neutral as soon as possible. As previously mentioned, the key to winning in these positions is to create space between you or try to go for reads that enable you to turn the tables and create pressure against your opponent.

 

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Useful Strings & Strategies:

 

While it’s fine to have predefined Jet Rushes & Jet Punishes and regular strings outside of those, you should mix up your move-usage patterns to avoid being punished. While some credible players do cycle abilities, I strongly advise against it.

Strings-

Drq’s Bread & Butter String:

FireBlast > (Buffered) Discharge > FireBlast

 

Drq’s JetPunish:

JetBlaze > WoF > FireShield > FireWheel > FireKick > Discharge > FireBlast

 

Leon_XO’s JetPunish:

JetBlaze > FireShield > FireWheel > FireKick > Discharge > (Tap) Combustion

 

Disda1n’s JetPunish (Including because of how dogshit it is, it’s honestly inspirational):

JetBlaze > cFB

Tech-

-Diagonal Strafing

While strafing usually consists of left & right movements, strafing diagonally or turning 90° to reposition faster can sometimes be useful.

Credit: SpiralOfGames

-Ground Fire

Ground Fire is a great tool for creating pressure as it denies your opponent area unless they use HeatControl. FireTick also requires the person to make an active decision in which they either have to hold HeatControl for an extended period of time to stop the burn, or continue fighting while on fire.

Credit: N/A

-Aiming at Legs

Shooting FireBlast towards your opponent’s legs is a good strategy as if you miss, it still creates the active threat of Ground Fire near them.

Credit: N/A

-Volleying

Volleying is performed by exchanging cFBs with your opponent. While this strategy was more prevalent in TLA, on some servers, you can volley by blocking your opponent’s cFB and aiming yours towards the left/right of where you predict they’ll strafe to. By aiming like this, you make it harder for them to block your move. This will typically be seen on old PK servers.

Credit: Chkirby

-Juggling

Juggling refers to hitting an airborne opponent multiple times. While it’s not commonly seen in FvF, in every other fire match-up, you’re often put in a situation where your opponent is airborne with limited strafing. To punish this, try to juggle them with strings such as (FireBlast -> Discharge.)

Credit: N/A

-Diagonal WoF

When a diagonal WoF, with the top facing away from you, is placed on a player, knockback will carry the player in the direction of the WoF, creating a juggled effect. This can sometimes be so effective that your opponent may take fall damage.

Credit: N/A

-WoF Circling

As knockback hits the player away from you, by placing a WoF and FireJetting around it, your opponent is continuously knocked deeper into the WoF. This can be a highly-effective Jet Punish.

Credit: N/A

-Sticky WoF

By placing WoF on a player, depending on the server, you can either spike them slightly upwards or cancel their momentum. This can act as a setup for longer strings.

Credit:N/A

-Area-Denial Techs

By placing WoF around your opponent, you’re effectively denying them access to that area, which can help greatly with controlling space. A niche alternative can be done by shooting two moves aimed at different directions to force your opponent into getting hit by one. 

Credit: N/A

-1 Tick FireBreath

Given FireBreath’s hitscan nature, you can oftentimes use its first tick to start or buffer a stunlock. Please note that you should only go for extended strings such as this if you’re already heavily pressuring your opponent.

Credit: Drqgn

-FireShot Canceling

You don’t always have to commit to all of your FireShots. If you’re using FireShots in a string or for pressure, it can sometimes be preferred to prematurely switch moves to take advantage of a timing.

Credit: N/A

-3D FireJet

This refers to using FireJet on Minecraft’s Y axis as well. This can be useful for getting around objects and moves such as FireSpin or for movement mix-ups while charging cFB.

Credit: Leon_XO

-Mini-Jet

A mini-jet is performed by using the momentum after canceling FireJet to propel yourself forward slightly. It can be a great tool for micro-positioning and mix-ups.

Credit: snowblast

-Charging on FJet

Moves can usually be charged while using FireJet. This takes away a lot of the risk associated with charging moves as you’re not stationary.

Credit: N/A

-Collisions

Some collisions like FireWheel -> FireShield can be used to create pressure. If someone uses FireWheel, you can use FireShield to block their move and use the same FShield to create your own FWheel. In order to block your FWheel without giving up FB, your opponent now has to swap back to FShield, which is slow and gives you an opportunity to pressure. On old PK servers, you should also learn how to block Combustion with FireWheel consistently as Combustion is arguably worth more than FireWheel.

Credit: N/A

-FOV Abuse

TBA.................................................................................................................................

Credit: N/A

//GIFs TBA

 

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Conclusion:

 

I created this guide to document my knowledge and how I play. I don’t know how much this helps anyone, but I hope it, at the very least, serves as my contribution/way of giving back to the community.

Contact:

• Discord: drqgongz | Discord Server

• E-Mail Address: drqggz@gmail.com

• Youtube: Youtube Channel | Montages | Friends

(If you’re looking at my montages for educational purposes, please ignore the early clips of “Java”, I was not good back then.)

 

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Last Updated: [08/04/2023]

 

Note: While most of the guide is finished, it’s still unpolished and missing many GIFs, Strings & Techs.

-Rewrite

-Insert Gifs
-Proof-Read

-Insert Strings & Techs

-Proof-Read

-Highlight important parts

-Proof-Read