OK I just played about six hours with several friends that are decent at the game. In my gameplay style I always tried to deal guaranteed damage via unholdable stuns and bait holds to HCT. No matter what character I'm using, be it Tina, Helena, Gen Fu or Busa (my four "mains" at the moment). The thing is that today I forced myself to focus entirely on what I know they're good at.
For Helena, I used to avoid using the PFT strategy all the time because I didn't agree with it but now, I'm constantly winning, I'm now at peace with the fact that this is how she plays, and I'm doing better with her. In Tina's case, my friends fear holding her because how strong 41236T and WR64T are, so I use that in my favor and apply Critical Burst set-ups so they lose 50% life bar anyway via air grabs. I also apply guard breaks to gain a little advantage, use her weaker throws, etc. And with Fu and Busa, I finally decided to stop playing the stun game and just launch, launch and launch since Busa's air grab and Fu's 6PPP+K don't require any height for juggling.
The result¿ I won more matches, I enjoyed the game more and I might be starting to understand what Cow and Virtuapai are saying. Now, I still think the game could use some frame data tweaks but my opinion that it's "just like DOA4 with a band-aid" is starting to change.
Virtuapai, I know you play Tina and I feel I'm LIGHT YEARS away from being remotely good with her. If you have time, give me some strats via PM or something, if you have videos of you playing her (or anyone good with her) give me the links. I can't play any of you online because of my geographical location and shitty internet speed but I want to make the most of what I do have: This forum and a few decent friends to play with.