I just think people are dumb if they think Chun is clear cut THE best. I also think it’s dumb to list a bunch of tools as the reason why a character is the best… Here’s why:
EVERY CHARACTER HAS LOTS OF TOOLS.
Ok sorry for yelling, but yeah seriously, this needs to be understood.
One can easily list a “This character has this, this character has that” list and make things look good on paper.
The true judgement on what makes a character the best in most games is what their BEST TOOL IS., or better said, what their most broken attributes are. Then couple this with what their weaknesses are in relation to the cast and you start to get a picture of how good a character is or isn’t.
For me, because of her all around toolset, Chun is top 5 theory. But when I look at her “overpowered” options, all I really see is IALL.
Everything else about Chun seems pretty fair when we compare what she has to what others have. Besides IALL Chuns best attribute is her all aroundness, she has answers for everything, but she basically has the best of nothing.
People think “answers for everything” automatically means that those answers are amongst the best answers in the game… But they largely aren’t. So it goes with “all around” characters, they have an answer for everything but their answers are all mediocre in general. It’s not always like this with all arounders, but that’s the gist with them. They do get their attributes distributed in different places though. This all around Chun as an example suffers in throw range and “motion gameplay” she lacks stuff when not sitting on charge. If other characters can force her to approach she loses charge and without charge she loses range, having to rely on her pokes and fast walkspeed.
This isn’t the same as oh say karin since when karin moves forward she doesn’t lose access to any moves and still has far ranged specials that are fast and hard to react to.
Chun is a mixed bag at neutral cause of these attributes. If characters try to approach her at midrange and brawl it out, Chun is monstrous against a lot of characters. But if Chun is forced to approach she loses a lot of power, and similarly if Chun is forced to play the long range game she also loses something since her only long range is a fireball that doesn’t go fullscreen.
With a tweak here or there she would easily be the best character in the game. Like if her fireballs went fullscreen then she would be a powerhouse. Characters couldn’t just sit at fullscreen with no worries and force Chun to approach them.
Getting a life lead with chun is probably tantamount. Once she gets a lifelead and can force the opponent to come to her, she will likely feel oppressive trying to rushdown a character with her speed, her AA’s, her ground pokes and her HP fireballs recovery.
But let’s be clear now:
Defense is chuns best aspect. Her overhead is slow, her jump is slow and low range, her IALL lacks range, her dash lacks range, her v skill is slow. She is a character that is designed with defense in mind, but that CAN attack decently when given the opportunity. Chun struggles against characters that have better defense than her and can outrange her, and characters that can get around her defense.
Luckily her all around toolset allows her to play in the grey areas better than almost any other character so it’s hard to tell when Chun is on offense or defense. And that’s probably Chun at her high level best.
If you are rushing people down with her all day there is more than likely a skill gap, a big one. If you are keeping people away all day it’s likely the same thing.
Chun is best in grey areas and adequate in others but she doesn’t dominate any one aspect of the game from where I’m standing that other characters can’t simply ignore.
IMO.