I'm still at a loss to how this trait even works.
People give some confusing descriptions of it, but the way it works, literally, is this:
When you activate Water of Life, Aquaman temporarily takes
dramatically reduced
non-knockdown hitstun from the next attack (i forget whether it affects multiple attacks) he receives. To the point where strings that naturally combo on hit won't combo anymore. Aquaman will recover in time to block the rest of the string.
And he's allowed to pop Water of Life in
any state while the game is in progress, even if he's in the air or flat on his ass from a knockdown. (Don't pop it there, of course; it does you no good.) So he can use the trait not just reactively, but predictively, to avoid punishes when you can't be launched by the first move in a punish combo. (e.g. b2, oh fuck it got blocked, pop 4)
So when people describe his trait as a combo breaker, that's what they mean. However, the effect only works on hitstun from attacks that don't knock down. So if you want to escape a combo with it, you need to pop Water of Life before you get launched.
Since the trait has so many drawbacks now, you need to be
very selective of when you pop it. You should generally only reserve it for situations where you'd take way more damage from eating the combo or mixup than you would from taking the chip on block. I still don't like how the trait is right now, but I'm not ready to call it utterly useless/counterproductive now. Knowledge is key now to know when trait really is the preferable option in a bad situation.
