She doesn’t have the WORST. But she is easily in the bottom 5 or so.
Here is the thing, each option only covers ONE base and each one is extremely punishable should you make the wrong guess/decision. Characters with good wake up their options can cover 2 or more possible scenarios which reduces the number of possibilities of choosing the wrong move and getting punished.
If you have 10things you can do but only 1 of them is going to be the “right one” your chances of getting the correct one is much worse than the person who only has to choose from 5 different options.
That actually isn’t good enough either. Ryu apparently has bad wakeup options.
Akuma is the only character that approaches having an acceptable wakeup. Every character will eventually morph into Akuma without the health and stun disadvantage. Akuma will be D-tier, but everyone else will be “complete” so the game will finally be playable…until the next EVO when all characters that qualify for top 8 have to be nerfed again.
Let’s not get ahead of our selves and start doing nerfs for people who are pretty balance. Makoto is fine where she is and I wouldn’t mind if they don’t even touch her. Her anti air is hardly the best one in the game when you factor everything.
Pretty much. You don’t see many Makoto players around and people are too worried about the twins and Fei to care.
Plus like mowr said, she’s just right. No need to worry about balancing her - I felt like banging my head on the table when someone around here asked for a Fukiage nerf - so unless she stays where she is in 2012 and turns top tier Fei-style, no one will be whining about her.
wake up is an over rated attribute. if you understand how to apply pressure, and you play against other players that understand it too, you come to a point where all but like 5 characters are on the same level.
IMO, those multi option characters with tools to cover different scenarios are much harder to pressure on a knockdown than a simple dp. with DP characters its either a safe jump or simple ground pressure. shoto 3 framers arent any different. you just have to find a way for your character to jump so they whiff on reversal. or you could mix in a 4 frame safe jump set up and just empty jump it.
with grounded meaty pressure, it mixes them up even more. they have to decide during those 10 or so wake up frames if youre going to still be there by the time that dp goes active. this is a lot less time than if you were to jump, gving them 30+ frames to decide if you safe jumped or not.
i personally have a much harder time pressuring bison or some other multi option character than i do a shoto
The overall theme of the changes I want to see is to make Balrog faster and safer with the trade-off being a reduction in the damage of his special moves across the board.Basically, I want to see Balrog FIGHT more like his Super Turbo form. I guess the best example is this video of Daigo -vs- John Choi http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbMllTeLTR0 starting at 4:10. The crowd gets so excited at Daigo’s relentless Balrog rushdown. That’s what I want to see for Balrog in the next version of SF4. So here are the changes that I think can make that work in a balanced way. Each change has a buff coupled with an inherent nerf to balance it out:
Make all versions of Dash Straight to be neutral or have frame advantage on hit. Currently, from lowest strength to highest, Dash Straights are -2, -1, and -1, respectively. Basically even if you are succesful in connecting a dash straight on - HIT - the pressure stops, because they can just push a button to push Balrog out. If Balrog, tries to push a button to continue the pressure, he gets counter hitted for his troubles. Just for comparison, Bison’s short scissor kick comes out faster, has comparable range, hits twice so it breaks armor, is neutral on block, and knocks down on hit. It only does 90 damage and is a very good move but it certainly is not overpowered. This change for Balrog would allow him to continue pressure for successfully landing his hits and to balance it out the damage can be lowered from 100 to 90 on the jab version. It can be kept the same as it is now on block.
Make all versions of TAP have the same recovery as level 1 TAP. Currently, Level 1 TAP is +2 on hit, -2 on block and does 130 damage. Level 2 TAP is 150 damage -5 on block and -1 on hit. The trend as the TAP level increases is that is more unsafe but deals more damage. The problem is that in high level play there’s seriously no reason to ever use anything past a Level 1 TAP because it is too risky or not safe even on hit. The solution I feel is to make all versions of TAP have the same recovery as level 1 TAP but start the damage of Level 1 TAP at 110, then the next 3 levels (Level 2 , 3 and 4)increase by only 15 points of damage which would make Level 4 TAP do 155 damage on hit but it would have the same on hit and block. The next 3 levels (5,6,and 7) would increase in increments of 20 making Level 7 TAP do 215(Currently, Level 7 TAP deals 410 damage). The next 3 levels (8, 9 and Final) can increase increments of 65 making Final TAP do 410 damage which is still very good (Currently Final TAP does 560 damage). To put it in perspective, currently Level 4 TAP does 210 damage but it is -8 on hit. Considering the way TAP works, you lose access to either 3 of your kicks or 3 of your punches for the duration of the time you decide to charge it, you also cannot tech throws, and basically lose half of your special moves. Why make so many levels of TAP when the only usable levels are level 1 TAP and … FINAL? I think this change would increase the chance of people actually going for higher levels of the TAP. It would be so exciting to see a Final TAP in a tournament. Right now that will probably never happen.
Make ground straights faster startup and safer on block. Currently even the jab ground straight is VERY slow to startup and is -8 on block. It deals 90 damage and causes untechable knockdown. I think a balanced way to change this move is to make it have faster startup but lower the damage from 90 to 70 on the jab version and make it be -4 on block. The recovery frames can remain the same on whiff but the -4 can come from making the move cause more frames of block stun. The strong and fierce versions, same thing, safer but less damage. This would make Balrog closer to his ST form and people would actually start using that move in SF4.
Change the way dash swing blow works. Make jab version much faster but lower the damage considerably (make from 80 to 50). The purpose of the move should not be for damage, it should be to reliably open up their guard. Balrog is a boxer, he’s supposed to wear you down and break your guard. strong should be slightly faster, lower the damage as well but be safer on block because it is slower, and with the fierce version it can stay the same as it is now.
** the combination of 3 and 4 would create a cool mixup with Balrog once he gets in.**
Decrease recovery of short rush upper so that rog can do the ST trick, vs crouched opponents. make them block a low strong then intentionally whiff short rush upper in order to grab them. They can make it so that rog is -1 on on a blocked cr. strong canceled into short rush upper and +1 on hit from a cr. strong canceled into a WHIFFED short rush upper. improve hitbox of short rush upper as anti air. * lower the damage*
Change the way his Super works. short and jab versions should have LESS range but better startup, strong and forward versions should be exactly as the current super works, fierce and roundhouse should have longer range but SLOWER startup. This would add more variety to his super. Lower damage by 40 points. This would make his super be similar to his ST super that is very fast. Lowering the damage by 40 points would make it balanced because since it is more versatile, it shouldnt deal that much damage.
Adjust Ultra 1’s pushback on hit so that it doesnt uncombo during dash ultra’s thru fireballs. Slight damage nerf
Return headbutts back to the recovery from Super/Vanilla. (damage can be kept at 100) Balrog was always able to whiff headbutts to close the gap on fireballs and escape some situations. I understand that it did a lot of damage but it was already very punishable on whiff block, didnt break armor, and couldnt FADC.
and last but not least!!! Change Ultra 2!!! Currently it does 300 damage and 700 stun only at maximum, has poor range, cannot get any oki after you successfully land it because the opponent gets up at the same time Balrog recovers, is jumpable after the ultra flash, and has the worst recovery of all the command grabs in the game. I think the best way they can make Ultra 2 a useful ultra is to make it have “zero” frame startup so that you can’t jump out of it but lower the stun at MAX to 500 (down from 700) and the damage to 190 at max. That is a big decrease in damage and stun but the ultra would actually become very useful because you have to respect it on balrog’s wakeup and if balrog gets in your face you have to worry about just wanting to block all day. If balrog successfully stuns with it he can get a big combo. Balrog’s strongest combos with full super do at max 500 damage. So with full super and ultra he can probably get around 500 to 600 damage after scaling. The power comes from the THREAT of having u2 if Balrog is in your face and the potential resets he can get if he dizzies you.
As an Akuma player there are only a handful of characters in the game with horrible wake options. I rate it as how it easy to use my safe options against them.
3 frame DPs are over rated. Being able to FADC it isn’t. Sagat, Seth, and Cammy still have great wake ups because their reversals can be FADCed if it doesn’t work.
Also another thing to factor in is how easy is the reversal to beat out? For instance Ryu’s DP loses to a lot of other reversals. Those reversals you can out muscle and force them to block.
Now the characters who are free as hell to Akuma on wake up are Chun Li, Balrog, Vega, Cody, Gouken, Rose, and Abel. To a lesser extent Ryu, Juri, Yun, and Makoto.
The S tier wake up goes to Bison. Followed by Blanka and Akuma.
guile should get some of his damage back and take away that silly counterhit shit. it dosent even make sense because he is already being punished by the jump in landing in the first place. no need for the jump in to be a counter hit too
i actually agree with his meter nerfs. i dont think it was ever an intention for him to be beating motion fireballers in a shoot out, or gaining 2 bars for an fadc flash kick on a character that fought to get past the obstacle course
More like A tier. Bison is in a league of his own. Blanka wake up options are hard to beat out and it forces you to play very conservative. If your character doesn’t have a good 4 framer safe jump it is hard to do anything between electricity and the up ball.
Though when he runs out of Ex meter he is free again.
Like I said though this is according to Akuma’s vortex not in general. I stated that at the beginning of my post. To characters like Fei he may not have the same trouble.