Basic Mechanics

Lilac's mechanics, on the whole, give her an incredible amount of control over her aerial movement and a wide array of combat options.

Like the others, she cannot simply run to her top speed, therefore much of her playstyle revolves around using her abilities and the environment to gain and maintain momentum.

For the sake of keeping this page readable, it will be assumed that you have at least knowledge on the basics of how these moves work. Also, controls will be simplified to A = Jump, B = Attack, C = Special(dragon boost).

Dragon Boost

(C)

Your primary way of gaining speed; Note that it doesn't bring you to top speed, just adds a large amount to your current speed.

A large portion of Lilac's routing involves squeezing in as many boosts as you can, but reckless use can screw you over if your meter doesn't recharge by the time you get to an area where you really need it.

If you boost upwards, you'll be subject to air-friction when you come out of it. You can mitigate that by dive-kicking as soon as the boost ends, but you're guaranteed to lose at least some speed.

Dive-kick

(↓+B while in air)

You'll spend huge amount of your airtime divekicking, mostly because it negates air-friction entirely. In other cases, you're just falling and want to fall faster. Can do counter-intuitive things to your height and jump arc(see: Float-Kick, below).

It is very much worth getting the hang of sliding your thumb from A to B so that you can turn a jump into a dive-kick as quickly as possible.

Cyclone

(A while in air)

Cyclone is great; You can gain extra height on your jump anywhere, and you can manipulate its arc by holding ↑ or ↓.

Worth noting, that while using cyclone consumes your meter, it does not actually require meter to use. Basically, it will take meter if it can, but it'll work just fine even if the boost meter is completely empty.

If you want to cancel your cyclone early(and in 90% of cases you do), just Kick out of it.

Cancelling your cyclones lets you get to the ground faster, preserve your meter, and due to the speed your meter recharges, it lets you actually boost right after having used a cyclone to extend your jump.

Ground Cyclone

(↓+B while running) They work exactly like normal cyclones, except it's easier to ignore air friction with it; Basically, if you're cycloning at an angle higher than flat horizontal, you'll slow down. And since you can just 'run' off the edge of something while cycloning, not going higher than horizontal is easy. Ironically, if you're actually using this to travel across the ground, you're doing it wrong. Unconfirmed, but slopes seem to have a bigger impact on your speed if you cyclone up/down them.

Uppercut

(↑+B while grounded)

Mainly used as an alternative to jumping in certain places, because it has a weird arc and a delay.

The uppercut has a delay on it, which can be abused by inputting the command just before running off the edge of something; Lilac will fall momentarily, and then use her mighty fist to fling herself upwards from in mid-air. This is great for making jumps where low ceilings are in the way.

Note that Uppercut will always try to push Lilac directly upwards, even if she's running vertically or upside-down.

Damage

Lilac's damage output is very simple: Cyclone is bad, everything else is good.

The reason being cyclone may hit more often, but only does half the damage per tick as anything else, and most of her attacks tend to 'tick' multiple times anyway, so literally anything else will get you more damage output. It's not useless though; it still hits all around you, and it's still a good way to increase height so you can get more attacks in during a single jump.

Dragon Boost will do the most damage by far, if you can place it right. So if you can find a good opportunity to use it, do so, but don't bother if it'll only damage the enemy for a few frames.

Other than that, all your attacks do basically the same damage, so it's up to where the target is in relation to you. Most of the time, that means kick them a lot.

Techniques

Boost-slide

(sliding across the floor while charging DBoost)

Long Dragon Boost

(holding A)

Stuck-Boost

(sticking to edge of screen to damage bosses better)

Bend-Boost

(wonky directable boost from boosting up during forec-running sections)(no current use)

Brain Damage/Wall-Climb

(dail2 tactics)

Superswim

(swim fast)

Superswim-climb

(swim up fast)

Upperkick

(Gaining height via DK)

Float-Kick

(DK without losing jump height/distance)

Dive-Kick Slide

(use DK before landing -> 'run' off edge -> DK goes off after ledge because animation delay)

Long Uppercut

(↑+A+B)

Stopclone

(↓+A in air, kills vertical momentum)

Cyclone Slope-Jump

(ground cyclone->jump while going uphill = super-high jump)

Spring Cyclone

(cyclone off springs for height/distance)

Major Tricks

Stairs Zip(Relic Maze)

Barrel Zip(Thermal Base)

Box Zip(Thermal Base)

Water Skip(Thermal Base)

Lift Zip(FD2)

Blocks Zip(FD4)

The Most Bad-Ass Damage-Boost(FD4)