Down, Down-Towards, Towards + Medium nets you Dante's Crystal attack. He'll briefly wind up, giving time to cancel into the next move, then strike downwards which causes four large pillars of ice to fan out from directly in front of Dante; the first is vertical thrusting straight upwards while each of the subsequent pillars of ice come out one after another in a fan like motion, so each at a gradually greater angle until the fourth comes out almost parallel to the ground, basically creating a huge semi-circle of damaging ice.
Though it will negate projectiles it counts as four separate hits, making it unideal for that situation as multihit beams will go through it with only a hit reduction of 1 to 4. Basically the crystals form too slowly to be able to reliable eat up the full four hits off a quick multi hitting projectile, so a |Dr Doom beam or whatever will just blast right on through even with the best of timing. It should be a great move for characters with slower projectiles however, I'm talking Modok style, or perhaps someone like Morrigan or Phoenix who can shoot out multiple single hitters from multiple angles at once, since it does fill up lots of screen space for a long enough period of time. But that use is situational, you don't want to get into a standard fireball war with this.
Again the slow start ups makes this a move that won't effortlessly slot into combos, too slow, and you don't recover fast enough to combo out of it in and of itself. But while it might seems like just a big juicy situational setup move don't write it off as such just yet. Though sure you can toss one out raw at the right momment to counter or catch the opponent but you'll need meter or x-factor to really convert more damage out of it, which is crucial in MvC3 since a single hit often means a dead character. And yes Crystal -> X-Factor -> Rape is perfectly effective, just remeber you only get one such setup pergame and that essentially <i>anything</i> X-Factor'd can result in death, a point I'll keep pointing out, so you're really better off learning the non-x-factor potential for a character before you start messing around with quick and easy x-cancels. Luckily however Dante is not alone out there.
Though you can use the prior attacks in conjuction with your partners and their assists to build attack set ups and crossup oppurtunities (a crossup basically means you want to get your opponent blocking left while you attack from the right. They'll get hit. Easier said then done... but only slightly in Marvel) I think Crystal is the first move that allows for Dante to step up and take offensive control of his partners.
Instead of using Acid Rain to setup your approach Crystal is a move you'll want to use after you're already doing damage. I said it won't combo normally, but with an assist that keeps the opponent in hit stun long enough you can throw it onto the end of simple ground chains. I like going crouch.Heavy, Assist, towards+Heavy, Crystal, con't. Dante's "Stinger" (t+H), normally ends chains and isn't special cancelable (unless you do the input very very quickly after the t+H is pressed. But then you only cancel the attack into a special attack, it won't combo since the Stinger doesn't actually come out) however tossing in the correct assist attack, with the proper timing which you'll need to find depending on your chosen teammate, will hold the enemy in place long enough for Dante to revocer from the Stinger and then preform a Crystal, which will then connect. If you have a really good assist Dante will recover from Crystal quickly enough and be able to start a "new" combo before the opponent lands from the privious attacks, thus creating one really big combo. If you're concerned about and don't want to limit your team building due to assist picking for these kinds of set ups a good thing to remember is that in corners tons of moves will work, outside you'll need to fine the right move, so don't if you favorite team doesn't have the proper assist to do this mid screen, they'll have other strengths to exploit and you'll likely still be able to do corner combos with one of your two guys.
So Congrats, you just took a move that doesn't combo from basic strings and with the use of an assist to back it up were able to use it to not only end one combo but segwey into the next.
But while that's very useful it not hardly the best part. Cystal OTG's. OTG moves are very important as they are generally the easiest way to murder someone in Marvel.
OTG means either "On The Ground" or, as I prefer since it suits MvC3 better, "Off The Ground". Fighting game terminoligy isn't set in stone though, so don't sweat little details like that, its how it works that matters not what its called. Normally in a fighting game you hit the other guy hard enough and at some point he hits the ground on his back and needs to get back up. This is a crucial moment in fighting games as it gives the opponent a strategic advantage, since he's not lieing on his back, as well as setting up all sorts of other things like wakeup attacks, rolling, whatever. To OTG however means that instead of waiting for your downed opponent to recover you attack him while he's down and keep the damage going. The caveat is that most attack will not hit a grounded opponent since, well, they're static and tuned for the most part to hit opponents who are standing up and fighting back. A good OTG move however can really save the day and usually you can recognize them by the visual cues, they look like they'd hit a grounded opponent.
Oh how the art direction and gameplay compliment each other in a good fighter. Incidentally while OTGs are in games like King of Fighters and are super important in Tekken I do believe Marvel game spopularized the idea if only because back in the day when these games were first hitting arcades the closest thing to a "Training Mode" we had was the five or six seconds at the end of the round where you get to attack the fallen opponent. You'd want to not only show off by landing as many hit as you could but the practicle side of it was that you could then preform these OTG combos in game if you were good enough to pick up fallen opponents mid fight, which can be tricky since you stay on the ground for a short amount of time.
Anyways Crystal OTGs for one hit which will allow you to pick the fallen opponent up off the ground very briefly. This is huge for Dante because he can follow up with almost anything; his gun super, his level 3 super, use an assist to reset into a new combo as detailed above and so forth.
My favorite trick though? Devil Trigger. In the corner at least you can just go into a launcher off cancelling Crystal with the Devil Trigger (QCB+PP) which is sick since the easiest way to land OTG's is simply at the end of a simple air combo. This gives Dante yet another way to extend his attack which, as I toy with him and I'll talk about in the future, I'm quickly learning is something he does amazingly well.
Devil Trigger is ridiculous though as it's just a level one super cancel. But that's it. It simply cancels. Doesn't attack. Seems silly at first but as detailed here the ability to cancel Dante's various specials into Devil Trigger and then follow up with more attacks is pretty wild as it kind of give Dante a "X-Factor Lite" for the cost of one bar of meter. Though not nearly as powerful as a real x-cancel the Devil Cancels are super useful.
Especially since you can DHC off of it. That's a tag out super or Delayed Hyper Combo. Basically OTG with Cystal, Devil Trigger activation then do whatever the next character in lines super command is, immediately since Devil Trigger activation is over pretty quick, and laugh while your opponent unexpected and unavoidably takes Arthur's Lv3 in the face after a Dante triggered air combo. Disgusting stuff. It's great.
I suppose it's worth mentioning that Crystal Bit and Acid Rain can also be Devil Canceled in this way, but it's less immediately useful I think. Though a crafty player can turn almost any little advantage into murder; just watch a good Spencer player to see someone do everything with only a couple moves. Think what Dante can do then.
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