Heh, guard points have been in there for a while, I wasn't messing around when I said "there are many hidden mechanics and techniques." Just recently I realized you can (dash->jump cancel->dash cancel) to move fast as fuck. I don't even remember if I did that on purpose.
Flinch animations would feel nice, but probably make it a lot harder to tell what state they're in. If I was working on a 3D game that shit would have been in there on day 1. I agree the scythe guy's attack animation is pretty awful, I'll probably touch that up soon. I'm also going to be adding distinct attack telegraph cries, so that should also help a bit.
Thanks for the feedback