AKAYUKI: Steel Blossoms Red Blade Clashes and Poise
Understand Iai’s blade-contact modifiers, draw costs and kill recovery, plus the different parry conditions described for Iai and Dual wield.
Quick answer
Iai and Dual wield draw-cuts are described as cutting through blades. An Iai miss can be parried; a still guard parries Dual wield draw-cuts. For your next Iai draw, keep its draw cost, blade-contact effects and recovery on kill separate.
These are the patch 1.3.11 values for Iai; check the current build’s patch notes if a later update changes them.
| Iai action or event | Poise effect in patch 1.3.11 |
|---|---|
| Perform a draw-cut | Costs 40 poise, reduced from 57.5 |
| Your blade hits another blade | You take 5% less poise from that contact |
| The same blade contact affects the other blade | You deal 10 more poise to it |
| Get a kill | Gives back 40% poise, increased from 35% |
The contact modifiers and draw cost describe different parts of an exchange. The 40-poise figure is the cost of performing an Iai draw-cut; the 5% reduction and additional 10 poise concern what happens when its blade meets another blade. Keep those numbers separate when judging what you can commit to next. In particular, the reduction is a percentage, while the extra amount dealt to the other blade is 10 poise.
Iai’s ability to cut through blades also needs to be understood alongside its parry risk. The draw-style gamepass describes Iai as draw-cuts only, with attacks that cut through blades, but a miss that can be parried. Blade contact therefore matters differently from missing your attack: cutting through a blade does not remove the stated risk attached to a miss. Before committing another draw, consider both your available poise and whether you can land that next attack.
The lower draw cost makes the patch’s resource change substantial: each Iai draw-cut costs 17.5 less poise than the previous 57.5 value. Kill recovery also rose from 35% to 40%. Those changes affect different moments in combat—spending poise to draw, then recovering poise when you secure a kill. For your next move, use the poise you currently have as your budget and treat the kill recovery as conditional on finishing the opponent.
Iai’s description also includes a faster sheathe. That sits alongside its draw-only attacks and recovery on kill as part of the style’s handling, while the exact contact modifiers come from patch 1.3.11. For more on the style itself, see the Iai guide.
Dual wield has a different stated parry condition. Its draw-cuts also cut through blades, but a still guard parries them. If you are using Dual wield, that guard condition matters when choosing your next draw. Iai’s description instead specifically warns that a miss can be parried; preserve that distinction when comparing the two styles.
Dual wield’s poise description says that “hits take less poise and draws cost more.” It also gives a recovery action: R performs a blood flick that fully restores poise. These are Dual wield’s listed properties, so use them alongside its still-guard restriction rather than carrying Iai’s numerical costs across to it. Iai and Dual wield are separate draw-style gamepasses, each listed at 499 Robux in their supplied store descriptions.
Finally, distinguish cutting through a blade from passing through a character. Patch 1.3.11 changed clean Iai hits so they no longer pass through bodies, even at point-blank range. The blade-cutting description concerns blade interaction; the clean-hit change concerns contact with a body. Keeping those interactions separate helps you interpret what happened during a close exchange and which poise condition matters for your follow-up.