Dhalsim changes discussion & how it affects the meta

Street Fighter V Dhalsim
1

I think Dhalsim’s a very well and uniquely designed character for SF5. He’s tons of fun. I’m not approaching this from a “Dhalsim sucks I want buffs”, cus he doesn’t. This is more of a freeform discussion about what changes could be implemented for Dhalism and how they’d affect his matchups and/or his overall style of play.

It’s early and changes won’t be anytime soon. But it’s still been long enough that we have decent experience and understanding about Dhalsim to begin discussing our opinions and analysis.

So for this thread, please explain what your changes will correct/aid in terms of Dhalsim’s general or character specific matchups. Feel free to be as modest or brazen as you like. But the intention should be to keep Dhalsim balanced. This thread is welcoming to both those who play Dhalsim or play against him. So if you want a nerf, so be it! Just maybe give a buff to make up for that nerf plz :stuck_out_tongue:

2

Did this list of buffs a few months back. Still don’t think having all of this would make him too good. Maybe nerf one or two other things to balance it out.

3

i like the idea of a back float.

i would love for his critical art to hit crouching.

4

I made this post a couple of months back. I still stand by it with a couple of changes I’d like to see in the next update. What I mainly want for Sim are buffs to the startup, active, and recovery frames of his far normals.

As usual with Capcom, they compensated Sim by making him good up close with improved drills, gale, and close normals. But made him quite a bit worse at mid to long range with slower to much slower far limbs, arcing yoga fire, and the absence of a good mid range poke like SFIV st.lk.

Frame data of Sim’s far normals for comparison:

SFIV frame data;

St.mk 9/3/14
St.mp 9/3/14
St.hp 10/6/16
St.hk 13/4/16
St.lk 7/4/8
D/Df.lp 9/4/11
D/Df.mp 12/3/16
D/Df.hp 14/3/21

SFV Frame data;

St.mk- 10/2/14
St.mp- 12/2/17
St.hp-20/3/22
St.hk-16/2/23

While having a considerable difference in raw numbers, you also have to factor in the greatly diminished utility of his far normals. In IV, Sim had 7 different far normals that were viable to combat an opponents counter poke attempts. They all varied with different hit and hurtboxes and carried less to much less risk if you were to get jumped in on.

In V, his far limbs are much more easily counterpoked because of decreased utility, less varied hit and hurtboxes, overlapping hurtboxes, slower speed, CC, priority system, etc.

To counter a counterpoke with Sim in V, you have to mix up the use of St.hk and St.hp because of the slow startup to throw your opponent off. Now, if either of those buttons get jumped in on, it’s the same, frame data wise, as throwing out a hadoken. It’s a big risk for a move that can be counterhit and is -5 and -6 on guard (-6 can be punished by Chun, Nec, Balrog, and maybe Cammy’s super.)

2017 changes I’d like to see:

St.mk- 10/2/14 to 9/3/14; +10 damage

St.mp- 12/2/17 to 10/3/15; Lower hurtbox size reduced. This move shouldn’t get poked by crouching normals that don’t hit vertically nor standing normals that hit the lower body area.

St.hp-20/3/22 to14/5/19; Damage-90 to 80
St.hk-16/2/23 to 12/4/20; Damage-90 to 80
B.mp-8/4/11 to 6/6/11 (the same as SFIV).
B.hp- 12/6/24 to 10/6/22
J.mp tagged to hit grounded opponents.
St.lk startup changed from 5F to 4F
Cr.lp startup changed from 4F to 3F
Lk.slide special cancellable up to the third active frame
Super changed to hit while opponent is crouching.
Less recovery on his backdash or improve the distance traveled by 1/2 the current distance.
Yoga fire (all versions) startup changed from 15F to 12F

More, but less likely changes:

J.mp/mk/lp able to cancel into Yoga float at the current lowest height restriction.

Yoga fire gains kick variations. Lk.fire travels near the same arc as Lp.fire, but lands in the space in-between Sim and Lp.Fire. Mk.fire travels the same arc as Mp.fire, but travels at the same speed as Hp.fire. It lands in-between Lp and Mp.fire. Hk.fire travels near the same arc as Hp.fire, but travels the same slow speed as Lp and Mp.fire. It lands where HP.fire lands. KK.fire is Sim’s EX.fire from Omega SFIV. It travels horizontally very slowly, but dissipates at half screen distance

Gale on CH leads into a juggle state. 6F or less moves are able to hit.