It is hitboxes. You can tie and both hit, or in some cases cancel each other out with a clash. Moves strike in 3 areas: high, mid, low. Mids act as overheads, so in this game you don't want to crouch block unless you see a low or a high. If something says Special (like special mid or low) the hit box will conenct like a mid, but it can be block standing or crouching . Evasion is a big thing. While you may be at disadvantage you can make use of moves that have built in ducking, crouching, stepping to beat out an attack. So if they respond high, you can beat them by doing a move that crouches as it performs. Same as SF, but it's a much bigger factor here as the Z axis makes stepping and anti-stepping attacks a big deal.
There are no 'repeat jabs' in this game, only strings so you either have to play the back and forth game of baiting a whiff and poking where you can, or go for yomi by evading the attack as you go in.
We have auto impacts that work in a sense like super armor. So an attack may blow through verticals only, and then hit them. You also have guard impacts to give you tons of free damage. Throws are another way to get past guard and are very big since they are always a guess to break (if they break).
and that's just pocky yoshi. He just types like that on everything.
