THE POWER OF MAGNETISM: The History of Iron Tager Through the Blazblue Series 

CORRECTION: He actually got the ability to cancel Voltec Charge into Sledge follow up in CSEX, not CP.

Incredible how Tager and Pot both had the same issue of gradually growing out of the grappler tier hole, becoming one of if not the best character in the cast, then getting nerfed all the way back down into the hole in the very next game

I love the use of English Tager voice clips, such a simple thing adds so much charm.

I know nothing of Blazeblue or Tager but this was oddly a joy to watch. I guess, I just joy enjoy the history of magnetism... And it applications in pure robbery.

As a CF player, I had heard legends of CP Tager's power. And man... Even as someone that doesn't play grapplers, I can feel the pain. It must be sad to have your main nerfed to low tier hell knowing that this is probably the last version of the character that there'll ever be. You know, what with ArcSys forgetting that BB exists and Mori leaving the company

I love that Blazblue is a series where people appreciate the dub.

Love Tager, he's absolutely the coolest grappler in any fighting game imo. Solving the problem of a slow character getting in on an opponent by pulling them to him is such a cool and creative way to do it with magnetism being nice and flavorful. It's balanced too, since he has to land a touch without the magnetism first. And spark bolt is such a cool and well-designed move. One of the most powerful projectiles in the game on a grappler sounds weird, but it needs time (or a sometimes risky or costly special move) to charge. And playing as or against Tager is such a different vibe when he has vs when he doesn't have spark bolt, it really defines his entire playstyle. He's so cool and well balanced from a base design perspective. Though I'm not a Tager main myself and only really play him on occasion for fun, I love the character conceptually and I have a lot of respect for Tager mains.

The kid name Gadget Finger:

Hi Frankentank, absolutely loved the video. I love grapplers and haven't had a chance to try Blazblue for real, but I might have to kick up CF on Steam because of this video. Your love for the character absolutely shines through the entire thing, and does a spectacular job of sharing the highs and lows. The pacing between games were also extremely good, ditto the music-selection. The small touches of humor also kept it fun throughout. Minor gripe though, I'd like it if the text was on screen slightly longer. I'd like to think of myself as a decently fast reader, but I've had to pause and rewind more than a few times, such as on 25:09. It could be a me-thing, and it won't stop me from watching more of your videos. Thank you for the effort you put in. This will definitely be a pleasant rewatch down the line. Fingers crossed that Tager may get a chance to suck... People in again in the future. And, yes, Motorhead II is terrible.

I love CF Tager despite his flaws for many reasons, but for one reason especially. Watching the agony my friends experience after running directly into Wedge Catapult and realizing that they have to hold that L.

Never played blazblue but frankentank videos are always worth watching.

Man, the mere mention of the Tager Circus made me very happy.

This is absolutely god tier content, love these videos

Sadly I only ever played his variant in cross tag battle (He is definitely not the full fledged character in that game as he is in the mainline series). BUT being that he was considered a low tier character on a top tier team, I had some of the best runs with him. Waldstein/Tager being double grappler felt like one of the few times that being a "big char" was no longer a hindrance with movement, but instead a trait that was favorable just to take up the screen. Wedge catapul off of assist to tick throw was dirty as there was very small windows to actually jump or backdash out of it. Tager and wald could active switch into each other's grabs and combo, and wald's neutral tools plus tagers knockup and spark bolt was some of the funniest things you could do. While tager himself wasn't great, the fact his best partner was ALSO a grappler made for some fun shenanigans that was great in it's own right. It's a shame I never played Tager in the mainline series, but seeing this makes me appreciate all the shenanigans like backdash resets. However, one thing he did get in cross tag battle over the mainline....AERIAL GENESIS EMERALD TAGER BUSTER!

Awesome video! You've absolutely sold me on Tager's gameplay identity, and your analysis on his struggles and strengths throughout the different versions of the Blazblue series makes me feel like I could pick him up right where you left off! If I were to move to Blazblue's Tager from Strive's Potemkin, I believe I would be pleasantly satisfied, given how the character looks and feels, but also through your informative character breakdown, version-to-version. Damn fine job. Salutations, Soldier! o7

Dayum, so I wasn't the only one who felt CF Tager was a huge downgrade to how *godly* he was at CPEx. Man was a dream to play there and I really struggled to make him work in CF after losing so much (especially the 5C>6A>3C link, which is *so* essential to his combo game). Incredible video. Been a Tager main since CT and it's been a treat to see his transformation over the years. Cheers!

awesome content! When I see Iron Tager's facial design resemble the look of the legendary FAB (spiky hair and a pair of glasses) I know this is the game I will forever be in love with. Thank you for your time and effort to cover one of my favourite FTG characters.

Wonderful vid! I've never taken a really close look into the Blazblue series before, but you managed to explain things in a way that kept me both hooked and also understanding of all the things you discussed.

Great video! Even though I've never made an attempt to play him seriously, Tager has always caught my attention for how interesting and unique he is. Loved getting the rundown on the history of this big red dude.

Utterly wheezing at the minute long air grab whif combo

to summarize everything about tager he doesn’t come to you, you come to him

I never got to play this game at all, so getting the history of the character was fun and educational. I feel like we see a bit of Potemkin in this. He's mid to bad, gets really good once, then pays for that one time he was good for the rest of the franchise's lifecycle.

This kind of video is purest ambrosia to me. Thank you!

This is GODLIKE. I'd really hope other people would upload videos like this on other characters one day. It really shows how much the characters and games changed with the time.

This is awesome. While I didn't stick with the series very after CS, he is the one character that got me into grapplers. A neat history of the character and be curious to see other characters as well.

My friend bullies my ass tager a lot and I've been looking for an excuse to learn him and this was actually beautiful. I can feel the love from this video and I hope to try and learn to appreciate him for what he is. Iron tager is so cool. 😭

this video is SO COOL and probably took a very long time and lots of efforts to make. This is incredible! Loved every second of it and secretly hoping we could get these for other characters or games, altough I would understand if that's not the case since Tager and Potemkin must be two of the characters you know the most in FGs and researching for another one would be a LOT more work. Great video and love ya!

Incredibly well documented and well made video, really like how it turned out. Even if I don't know much about the game or the character I managed to understand everything.

Frankentank thanks for making this video i play a lot of fighting games and in every single one of them i play the grappler and its fun and not fun at the same time from the hate and the lack of understanding how difficult our neutral is on every fighting game ...... but i am happy i have you someone i can relate to and thanks for giving love to my boy tager he is one of my favorites ...... you are awesome keep doing awesome videos man !

See, I had BBCT just sitting in my steam library forever. Went to check it out recently, figure out if I would be interested in getting into the series, playing through the games etc.... I gave Tager a very brief spin in practice and was a bit... "Yeah, nah... Where's the hugs in this game even?" and just walked away from it, really. So this actually sounds like just the type of video I needed =3

Just commenting to day you are my favorite fighting game RU-vidr, every god damn video you put out is so well made, keep doin what ya doin

I love grapplers in fighting games, but two of my favorites are the somewhat non-traditional ones, being Persona 4 Arena Ultimax's Kanji and Injustice's Solomon Grundy

Amazing video! I would've loved to see CF2 being covered towards the end (since it's the game we all play) but nevertheless it must've taken a titanic effort to record all this and have it cross-checked by other Tager mains. Awesome job!

This is actual content, very cool. Would watch more something like this in your channel chief. EDIT(1): I had a good laugh at the end there.

I know practically nothing about Blazblue, but this was a joy to watch, great video!

Awesome video well done my man!

love the video, subscribed!

I didn’t realize how burned into my memory the dub for this series is. Great video, might have to give Tager a spin.

Im still in the pre roll ads and im liking and commenting for the culture and keeping bb alive

You should make more videos in this style, you're pretty good at it!

excellent video, love to see it

Now this, is my kind of vid. Proud of ya, fellow Red Devil Enthusiast

Loved this video! So detailed informative and entertaining! It is worth noting that that the Tager player, Molotov Tager won an online tournament AniClash 75 (pre rollback of CF). The player ZT has made grand finals at Xanadu weekly at least twice only to lose to Coma both times a Nine player, arguably his worst matchup. The player PredoBidan tied 5th-6th place as late as April 24, 2022 at an in-person Brazil tournament Heaven or Hell 2022. Tager still has a presence in CF. Clearly people were fearful of Tager so much from CPEX that they felt it was necessary to nerf him. Despite that, I do think you are right about him potentially still being a low mid tier character. He may have a lacking neutral, but spark bolt combined with his magnetism and armored moves definitely gives him a better neutral than plenty of characters. He is also still capable of dumping out tremendous damage, even if less than earlier BlazBlues. My friends still think he does too much damage and think it is so cheap that he can apply magnetism on block. But the top tier characters in Blazblue have always been rough for Tager to deal with. Blazblue is on another level with their characters and their potential. And while Tager certainly struggles against the best of the characters in his series, you could pit him against any other grappler from any other game and end up beating them, IMO. Mori has blessed us with a man and a game for the ages. May Blazblue live on! Now someday you gotta do a tier list of all grapplers from all games. Looking forward to more content. Perhaps you can do a video about Waldstein from the Under Night series next. Thanks for your excellent effort!

Amazing video! ill drop this in the lucid slayer cord so they spread it around. One quick question tho, what do you edit with ive wantrd to make conteng myself for a bit

Thanks for the history

Great video. Whenever I run into a good Tager nowadays they give me combo anxiety. Because I know they will make me land in front but somehow hit me from the back and also purple throw me.

Thank you so much for the video. I appreciate the tremendous effort you put into describing the character. Tager has always been my favorite in BlazBlue, despite lacking basic tools or getting nerfed when he was good. What are your opinions on Tager from Central Fiction?

Damn good video!

I was wondering when the timer scam talk would come up In a vacuum it's hilarious to watch somebody get spun around like a yo-yo, but yeah, it's really dangerous to keep for fear of it defining the character and overshadowing the main strengths that make them interesting.

You forgot the worst thing about Tager in CT.... He was never truly in the corner so you can do left right mix in the corner on him with some characters like Litchi

oh man, even with the warning I was stunned at the aspect ratio. Great video king but LMAO you deserve a better card for all you've done for the grappler community imo

6:14 Guard Libra is the red and blue bar below the timer. It's an alternative guardbreak.

You know, this video brought a tear to my eye, been playing BlazBlue casually since csex, and I absolutely love this nerdy, dorky hunk. All I hope for is some small balance patch to make him at least middle again, not just a meme. He is still lots of fun, and I prefer to suffer with him, than switch to "better grappler" - Bullet

I forget which BB I played, but after my second wind into fighting games, playing more grapplers and big characters, wish I played him more. Pulling the enemy to you as a grappler is a unique way to close distance.

Man I remember in CSE just getting people with gadget and then practically autopiloting them to death because I could so easily just do whatever off of 5A, assuming I didn't just get another grab. Also noticing when the opponent is almost out of guard primers and getting them to non-barrier block a full screen spark bolt so I could do a FULL SCREEN 720 off of a guard break. I earned those rage quits. Overall kinda ducked out around when CF happened (for unrealated reasons) so I guess I missed the tragedy. Probably for the best. Thanks for the trip down memory lane, I was there from the beginning!

i wish there were videos like this for every BlazBlue and gg character

still remember getting put in the infinite block sting (until guard libra broke at least) by rachel in CT... god that was a struggle bus

Great video, just wanted to mention since I think you forgot about how another reason CT Tager was bad was because technically he could never be in the corner, I.E if someone put Tager against corner they could *jump over him* , and land in the corner instead, allowing for people to get 4-way mixes on him that we’re otherwise impossible outside of mid screen. Still great video on my favorite Blazblue character otherwise

In CF 2.0, there are weird character-dependent and possibly screen dependent followups for Gadget Finger. Specifically, it's possible to actually combo out of Gadget against Ragna with a 5A, then into another grab / reset / etc. Not sure how or why this works on some characters, but I only really noticed now in the video with Jin being dropped really far away in comparison to the characters that I usually play against (Ragna, Bullet, Nine). That aside, great video! I only really got into playing Tager during CPEX, and didn't really a good grip on the game until CF1.0, so it seems like I missed some of the glory days. Other than the super fast B Driver.

The tried and true arcsys way of making a character great and then breaking them in the next iteration/installation

Man, I miss CPEX Tager. Wallbounce 5D was so fun.

I love BlazBlue and I can tell you the story about most characters, but the history of their buffs and nerfs? Their good moves and bad moves before CF? I can tell you next to nothing. But this was a great look into how a character evolves. I know it's a big ask for the work to be done, but if you could do a shorter video on Bullet I would LOVE IT.

It's MY BOY!

i believe the idea of magnetism came from magnet arcana in arcana heart. its no secret bb team were fans of that series and took many ideas from it. Cathy and Magnet arcana were introduced in AH2, back in ps2 era, and bbct was released during ps3 era.

Finally, a video to send to people after they say BBCF Tager's damage is fine and that he wasn't absolutely gutted from CPEX. Even then, forget damage, at least he could meaningfully confirm!

Do you have a link to that shinsou instrumental you used during the CS section? I've never heard that before!

The powers of electromagnetism

we need more BB videos like this

Basically he's a grappler with all the bad movement, but grabs that reach half the screen when the opponent is magnetized

Right in the nostalgia seeing Tager disintegrating people after a baited burst in CT. Wasn't aware he ended up so badly in CF, that's a bit of a shame.

when i saw gigantic tager driver, i immediately got ptsd of potemkins heavenly potbuster

I know people don’t really like English Dubs in FGs, but damn if Tagers dub voice in the early BB games and BBTAG is SUPER good also great vid btw, Tager is one of my favorite grapplers, up there with 3S Hugo and +R Pot.

In your opinion what was the best blazeblue game/ version in general?

I only ever played two versions of Tager: CF and… one other. So seeing his journey throughout the entire series is very interesting. I still can’t believe he didn’t have Gadget Finger in his first appearance. The only thing that’s stopping me from naming this video a masterpiece is that, for comedic effect, you didn’t include one version of Tager. The jankiest of them all: The Tager That Does Not Exist (BBTAG).

I thought you weren't going to talk about the circus until I heard the music lmao

So I’m Central Fiction he could only do good damage with meter, but he also needed meter to play his defense properly… as a season 1 strive Faust player, this sounds very familiar

Nice Now do a (much shorter for obvious reasons) version for Bullet.

Love this and i was waiting the whole first section to hear GADGET FINGER

I've been hoping for a good while for someone would make a viability history video on a BB character. And Tager is definitely one that deserves to be talked more about, with how sick the core design behind his playstyle is. Well done! -Also, I love that we all can can unanimously agree that MOTORHEAD II sucks.-

Could you cover tager from bbtag, that is where I found my love for grappler. I liked to run with waldstein, both cuz of funny meme team and cuz I liked those two grapplers. The problem of zoners however, was even more prevalent, since now there was two to deal with😂.

i think i can say for all of us IRON TAGER BUSTER!

Hey Frank it's Udongein from Tagercord (left the server got boring) appreciate the vid I know you remember me fool 😡

Hold up, there's a Tager Discord?

I like Tager but he’s always been a character I struggled with trying to learn (then again I struggled with trying to learn BlazBlue in general) but I always felt like that had to do with his movement which to me felt very limiting, like I get why it’s like that because magnetism but at the same time I always felt like could he at least have like a double jump? I’m really hoping BlazBlue does get another game and the next game sorta reboots the series since hardly anyone understood the story and if they do reboot BlazBlue I hope they take some cues from Strive in terms of either gameplay, story or both

HOW DARE YOU SAY MOTAR HEAD II WAS A NERF IT WAS A BUFF AHHSMASMAMSJSHNSWM Haha jokes aside, awesome video! It was so worth the wait.

Question. How was he in bbtag? Just a bit curious

CF Tager being nerfed just makes me feel better every time I grab Nine and throw her against the wall.

Based

FU, I have PTSD because of the CF Tager.

I love FG analysis videos like this. Can you look at Adachi p4au 1.1? Very silly character I never hear much about

dear god, I forgot how godawful the hit sound effects became for chronophantasma. Legit had to lower the volume at Magna Tech Wheel.

How is it that BlazBlue has one of the coolest grapplers and coolest zoners (Nu-13) in the same game. Also they should never have nerfed gadget finger it was the move that made his entire gameplan work.

Tager is simply the average tale of a grappler, ass until one version, then nerfed to low tier hell back again (and I'm here for it bc I don't like grapplers). In all honestly though, even though I think magnetism is a little strange in principle as its main purpose is walking back the main problem a grappler has (getting close), Tager is still by far the most interesting of any of the big body grapplers you can pick, in any game. As a side note I play Azrael and think it is extremely funny that his option to get out of just cancelling into gustav all day is "do reversal A buster or actually just get stuck in a blockstring infinite"

Learning more about grapplers so that i can hate on them more accurately

Next need to be Granblue Vasegara, a heavy fighter with few grabbing skills

I played the crap out of CT Tager and it was ALL about the resets and tech trapping. It destroyed people not expecting it cause it could result in literal full screen Genesic Tager Busters if magnetized. However once you got people that knew what they were doing and suddenly all those techs/resets were useless. It boiled down to how many different situations you could sneak in the 360/720 without it being obvious and magnetism made for some REALLY whacky techs. Then there was the fact that Nu, Rachel, Arakune, and Carl existing. CT was a total mess of a game looking back

150% meter combos? As a Terumi main, I raise a glass to you, Tager players.

It's kind of sad. It's almost like the devs just never wanted Tager to be good, and the one time he WAS good, they immediately nerfed him into the ground afterward, like they were shocked at how good he became.

I think there are aspects of CF Tager that are genuinely improved. Wedge Catapult back to corner combos are genuinely really powerful and the addition of EA does help him on defense. Sure Gadget Finger puts you farther, but its now +10 on block versus 3. Tager also gets great damage in CF overall despite the lower damage to throws. It isn't exactly fair to say that he's bad in CF just because he was better in CPEX because alot of characters were powerful in CPEX and were toned down into CF

I think I find it ironic that Tager doesn't speak at all during the CF segment considering there was no dub in that game.