cause its uh ibukiand sean and some characters have real dumb combos that are too good
I like how you defeat your argument in your own post.
And no, Anji’s (aka lime-key’s) team didn’t win SBO, they placed second. But their team was one high, one low and one bottom tier, Mugen playing Bridget. Not to mention last year’s second place team was a mid tier and two bottom tiers, of which Mugen was a member of again. Guilty Gear is pretty fucking balanced.
I could be less vague about that post, but that would spoil the fun.
after going through what balance is exactly, I learned 2 really important things. the first is that any variation between characters in a game means it will never reach perfect balance… perfect balance as in all chars are equal to each other in worth (ie. Ryu vs Ryu). only a game where both players have access to the exact same options can be balanced. otherwise, harsh objectivity will put every character in their place. even if you balance a game that has variations the best that it could be possibly balanced, the best char will be worth $500 and the worst char will be worth $499… which might be acceptable to people who are playing the game, but people who examine the game won’t like that. people who talk about “balance” are usually people saying they want everyone to = $500 but that’s not gonna happen. the player themselves have to make that happen through their own skill
the second important thing is that reliance on tier lists obscure what’s actually important as far as balance in a game with variety. lots of people are completely reliant on tier lists, and the tier lists are completely reliant on what they see top players doing. both are mistakes, as evidenced by exceptional players and changing tier lists alone. tiers can never determine what actions take place in a fight, so those chances to win can’t be set in stone. also, the highest level players don’t determine the character’s worth; characters themselves have all of their worth innately. something worthwhile may or may not be there (not exactly saying Roll is a pickable char in a MvC2 tournament), but just cause top player A didn’t bring it out doesn’t mean it’s not there
I think balance in fighting game terms really means that there’s no broken character that can touch of death, is piss-easy to use, etc. It would be naive to think that every character is 5/5 regardless of skill.
i wanna make a fighting game where theres 3 characters and one is real good one is kinda good and one isnt that good but you’re only gonna pick a mode when you enter vs mode: easy, normal, or hard. lets see how the balance whiners complain about that, suck it down
SSFIV is the most balanced fighter in history. 
Did that just slip my mouth? OH YES IT DID.
This…
It doesnt matter how you wanna interpret balance this is what it is.
I like high tier characters.
Outside of Karate Champ the most literal balance is in SF1.Virtua Fighter 5 is the only fighter that really feels balanced in recent memory,but as long as fighters have more than 2 identical characters one will invariably be better than another and the idea of top tier will exist.
umk3 to a certain extent, SSF4 seems balanced to me and… KOF98um?
Who cares?