Gief nerfs still rolling in

Classic Fighting Games Ultra Street Fighter IV
1

? Zangief’s Punch Lariat will whiff crouched characters from 2nd hit onward.

? Gief’s grabs didn’t get nerfed, but his non-grabbing skills did (like Banishing Flat, Lariat).

? Changed something about Zangief’s jump, not in a good way, to encourage less jumping.

Not sure why tbh.

Full Translation (thanks as always Azrael)

Finally, tell us about the adjustments for Zangief.

Okada:
I believe that Zangief was recognized as one of the stronger characters in the last game, and we developers also felt the same. He was especially strong on wakeup pressure. One of his best tools for that was the Lariat. We spoke about this on a previous blog, but we have nerfed the Lariat a little bit. Generally speaking, we made it so that from the second hit, if the opponent is crouch blocking it will whiff. So its no longer the get out of jail free card up close that it used to be.

Sano:
Also, in IV since the Banishing Flat (Green Glove) was fairly functional, he felt more like a heavy-hitting character than a grappler. So we’ve kept the power of his throws but tuned down his attacks, so this is more like the real Zangief. I feel like the Gief everyone wanted is finally here.

Okada:
Also, in IV, Gief’s jumps were good enough for him to be called “Flying Zangief”, so we’ve looked at the functionality there. But, everything else you can still use as-is, and for many of you using his Short Jump, etc, we haven’t changed that at all. Gief’s basic concept is a strong ground-based fighter, so I believe we’ve gotten closer to that image now.

It sounds like his opportunities to win against characters has decreased.

Okada:
Yes. I feel that Gief is a lot closer to his original image now, but in general if you look at it a certain way, he’s the character we had to adjust to hold back the most. But that’s not to say that he’s weaker - his new ultra, the Siberian Blizzard is pretty interesting. Its an air-to-air throw that won’t grab grounded opponents, but if you input the command skillfully in the air, you can counter jumpers of course, air-bound moves like the Shoryuken, or even use it against people trying to run away. Like an elevated Hurricane Kick. So like in IV when Ryu would run away from Gief with an air Hurricane, if you use this move well you can snatch him out of the air with ultra. A 720 motion in the air is hard, but if you get it down it has a nice wide range of uses.

Also, just because: Gief vs Hawk [media=youtube]JykqtsG9Gdc[/media]

**
Zangief:**
“Life has gone down, Lariat is much easier to punish. Normals do less damage. Banishing Flat (Green Glove) does less damage. Ultra does less damage. Ultra 2 has some uses. He’s still a dominating character however. His Lariat is still scary and his match ups probably won’t change much, if at all. He won’t kill you in a few hits now.” ** From Arcadiagamers podcast**

2

Gief’s jump shouldn’t have been changed.

Everything else is fine. A lot of character’s moves got damage reduction so that doesn’t bother me. Spamming lariat gets you hit by a lot worse than sweep against good players.

Gief should have 1150 stamina though. There is no reason for a more drastic reduction. Suddenly Sagat’s nerfs don’t matter for helping out Gief given Giefs nerfs… I hope Blanka’s EX up ball and slide do less damage to keep that match up winnable. Blanka better not have more than 1000 Stamina either.

3

I like your optimistism. :slight_smile:

However, atm, I feel these are too much. Guess I should wait to play the actual game before crying wolf.

Gief boards seemed dead. Thought I would share the latest translations of the Jap blog.

4

I dont understand why Capcom nerf a B-tier gief so much
any other B-tier characters doesnt get this kind of nerf, actually most of them get a little buff.
Then I reckon gief vs chunli will be 3-7, and vs honda wil be the same.
Too bad they listen to scrubs and push geif to buttom tier.

5

Since we are all pretty manly in this part of SRK

We should continue to play the character because we like him.
:slight_smile: I know I still will be. I’ll enjoy embarrassing other players of equal or greater skill level than I. :slight_smile:
but let’s not be blindly optimistic. This will give us all a chance to break our plateau’s and improve as players in general. We won’t have as many tools to deal with certain things, but we are receiving at least SOMETHING in return to develop new strategies around, and improve in the general sense by accepting the fact that our character has a few more weaknesses than the previous iteration.
That being said, I would like everyone to watch these videos.

I may have been a smash kid once, but that’s something that’s take-it-or-leave-it to me now, and I am a pretty solid player in the community, and I have been improving every day through hard work and dedication, something that in our continuation of playing this character will undeniably increase as we progress down the competitive road.

Here are the videos. Gimpyfish is one of the most recognized and well known players in the SSB Community
[media=youtube]ltqgP-Xgceg[/media]
[media=youtube]K9khDedACgY[/media]

6

I gotta agree with Xeris. The higher you get with Gief, the tougher the match ups can get anyways. Let’s just stick to our guns and prove to everyone why we play Gief in the first place. At least now people can’t complain about him being the monster he was in 4!

7

what… the… nerf…

weaker jump ins?

weaker green hands?

weaker hp?

dont tell me he is going to have weaker normals too…

8

Will I stop maining Gief? Prolly. but it has nothign to do with nerfs and more to do wih just wanting something new shrug - Gen & Sim…yay…however

This is just ill advised. It was mentioned that the people working on thhis game are nice, if they are that nice then they know and understand where Gief fits in in the game - destroys weaker characters - loses to the tourny characters. Played at a low level he’s easily dismisabale, played at a higher level he’s destructive. It just was his design. But of all things, in the sake of ‘balance’ you don’t take away or weaken his tools. Of all the characters in the game, there are few people with fewer tricks as his high level game is (IMO) more mental…so taking away tools and/or their effectiveness just doesn’t make sense. Nerf lariat as a trump/get out of jail free card? Sure I don’t care, once you evolve past s.PPP 4tw, its a throw away strat that gets you destroyed anyway. Lowering ability to take damage, meh…that goes AGAINST what they are talking about trying to do. I don’t know what exactly they did to GH, the non-EX version while it has its uses, is already spotty as fuck, and the EXGH is a finisher/punisher…no reason to nerf it.

I’m sorry I just don’t see the logic in any of it. Oh and the jump alteration…WTF 0_o really…is this them trying to nerf/destroy the headbutt or make getting around fireballs harder? Sounds like they just made the Sagat/Seth match-up even more miserable, and the mirror match…

  • :bluu:
9

I was under the impression that they’ve nerfed his combos so that players have to focus on throws a lot more.

10

Thanks, and yeah, like most of us would agree, the weakening of his tools didn’t need to go THAT far.
Yeah, at least they can’t complain now. XD GG NO RE.

11

if they made lp green hand safe on block and faster so we can stop fire balls with out being psychic i wont complain

12

^ Yeah, like in ST…like they’re suppose to be. Really, if they reduce the recovery frames on it, that’s all Gief would need to get in on projectiles.

13

They don’t seem to understand that it’s kinda hard for Gief to be a powerhouse grappler if he can’t get close to his opponents.

14

quite a concept wouldn’t u say lol? seriously, a lot of people at capcom must really hate gief for some reason cause there’s no doubt he got reamed the most.

15

Oh really, his lariat? You sure? You sure anyone even a little bit ok at this game used lariat in wakeup pressure? And this is one of the guys responsible for balancing Zangief. Totally great.

Imo this pretty clearly means that green hand is worse in some way, whether it be worse or not work in combos or do less damage or something, but it might also mean that some other of his attacks are nerfed either instead of or in addition to that. Totally great! So now the main reason that anyone felt they should sit still in Gief mixups, namely the threat of being comboed into green hand, is now nerfed. Totally great.

So, what, does that mean that his jump attacks have worse hitboxes? Or that his jump arc is worse? Something’s worse. Two of Gief’s tools for getting in, green hand and jump, are both nerfed. Totally great.

He just straight up says that Zangief has fewer chances to win and that he’s the character they nerfed the most. And not only that, but apparently the original image of Zangief is as a bad character. Totally great! Here’s a character who’s outside the top tier, top 5 or 6 at best, and you nerf his life, his lariat, his green hand and/or other attacks, and his jump. What in the balls are you thinking?

Hakan looks like he’ll be fun. Or Hawk. Or Dan.

16

hahaha, yeah, he pretty much just said screw you to all the Zangief players. In his mind, Zangief is meant to be a bad characters so now he is closer to his original “bad” image. Absolutely nobody who knows how to use gief uses lariat on wake up. Nerfing the jump and GH is just mind blowing. Initially, I thought I might play gief as a second, but now I’m not even sure about that anymore. I’m going to have to see how T Hawk and Hakan are. Word on the street is that Hakan sucks. But you never know…

Poor poor Zangief, the world sheds a tear for Mother Russia. He got taken apart just like the USSR. At least give the man back his sickle and hammer. :frowning:

17

They nerfed zangief becuse capcom think he is better than he is.
according to them, its like this(the best characters):

  1. Sagat
  2. Ryu
  3. Zangief
18

lol did Capcom even get balance tips from tournament players? What exactly is the QA people doing? Are they the same scrubs whining that geif is broken?

Geif has no way to get in his green hand is super unsafe and it’s crappy at stuffing fireballs. People constantly press up and back and he has nothing to chase people down with since a wiffed glove can be punished, punished on hit, punished on block and now it’s been nerfed in some way.

Pressing UP+Back also avoids his “grabbing game” his running bear grab still sounds like nothings change… he has no normal air grabs…and his jump is crappier. So people who jump back can run away even better.

While Hakan and T-hawk look like they have heavy hitter moves, awesome pokes, a move to close the gap, a lp command for mix and hp command for damage…a move to catch people jumping constantly and a move to go past fireballs. Seriously Capcom wtf are you thinking? Basically T-hawk and Hakan have everything Geif NEEDS to be a contender, while they take nerf his shortcomings and “fairly functional” moves.

19

I think it’s ridiculous that they gimped his ability to get close, considering how hard it is already for him inside in high level play. Can’t wait to fight runaway akumas with the new and improved gief.

20

Hey Coins, don’t diss the QA team. They know what they’re doin, right Seth?