At higher levels, the Guardian can be a little predictable against someone familiar with how it works. It's a commitment that is typically heavily choreographed. Fortunately, you can use the Guardian's peculiar mechanics to mix it up.

Some of the more experienced Guardian users are aware of how you can dash cancel the Guardian. By throwing it out and then immediately input buffering a forward dash, you'll cancel it with minimal end-lag. This will let you throw it back out almost immediately to reset its starting point (thereby changing its range) and health (useful for approaching into spam), or you can cancel into a grab. The Guardian typically stops you from having a grab option while it's out, so being able to surprise people with a sudden grab when they think that you can't can be a great way of catching people out. The other more conventional means of cancelling would be jump cancelling. While it leaves you more exposed, it provides the advantage of landing with charged arms.

The third way to cancel the Guardian is Helix-exclusive. Helix can lean cancel the Guardian. When in tower stance, if Helix throws the Guardian while leaned back and then immediately reactivates it while leaned forward, it'll cancel. You have to reactivate the Guardian while leaned forward. Simply leaning forward after throwing it won't cancel it.

This is a situational technique, but being able to cancel the Guardian as a mix up - especially if you've conditioned the opponent to expect the typical behavior - can be a very good way of disrupting your opponent and making one of the most predictable arms into one of the most volatile.

I hope this comes in handy to my fellow Helix mains.