Tsubaki’s charge cancel is actually pretty bad - the BEST it can be is even on frames, and that’s ONLY if she does it after 5CC; Doing it after 5B, 5BB, or 5C leaves her at -2, and if for some reason she should do it after 2B, she’s -4. The only real advantage it gives her is the fact that she can reset pressure at any time… as long as she is willing to reset from being -frames, which isn’t exactly really good. Compare to, say, Hazama, who can reset pressure with like 4 different moves all of which leave him at +frames. So basically, just mash and Tsubaki loses. In fact, just mash a lot. If you block pretty much anything, she’s at minus frames, so go to town. The only way Tsubaki wins is if the opponent respects her too much or if she just flat out outplays her opponent.
Also, I have no idea what you are talking about with Valk’s “power coming at the price of his speed” since his 5A is 6 frames - same as most of the cast (like, say, Tsubaki…) his 2A is 7 frames, again, the same as most of the cast. 5B is 10 frames - same as most of the cast and so on and so forth. Valk’s normals are thoroughly average in terms of speed - while he doesn’t have any especially fast moves, neither does he have especially slow ones, and unlike certain characters whose names start with Ts, he has frame advantage off several normals, and a special move that can be used to close ground and is still neutral on block. Oh, and what “frame disadvantage” does his 5A have? It’s even, just like Ragna’s, Hazama’s, and a bunch of other characters. Completely average again.
So yeah, I don’t really think Valk is “giving up” much of anything. Certainly Ragna isn’t. Also, I really don’t understand why people keep representing Ragna as having “predicatable” mixups. Why is a character that can throw a 20 frame overhead after literally everything “predictable” in his mixup? What’s that you say? It’s -11? Sure, but it can be cancelled at ANY TIME into a followup with 100P1. And Ragna gains heat like mad anyway. And has some of the best normals in the game from a space control perspective, and gets 4k meterless from his basic overhead - even at max range. Ragna deserved none of the buffs he got going into EX. They could have transitioned CS2 Ragna to EX and he’d have been 100% balanced. (He was arguably a little below average in CS2, but EX is supposed to be a slightly lower powered game.)
When I mastered that combo I could see why some people think he’s OP. He has amazing mixup and his normals, whilst not incredibly fast. Have respectable priority and incredible range.
Ragna is just bullshit and annoying. Honestly. Pick up and play monster. Controversial? Sure. Honest? Definitely.
I think he should have to pick a bit more between “insane mixup” and “insane damage” - having both is a recipe for an overpowered character. Add “insane movement” to the mix and it just gets silly. About the only saving grace he has from a balance perspective is the fact that he seems to be hard for a lot of people to wrap their head around.
I think his mixup is a lot more important. You can land a lot of hits as Valk. I’m sure landing 1 or 2 more for the kill wouldn’t harm his standing too much. He would be balanced. Or possibly remove a couple of wolf cancels?
I don’t know enough about how wolf cancels work to comment on whether removing them would be good or not. But 5k off 5B in the corner is a LOT of damage, even for 50 meter. (How much heat do you EARN doing that combo?).
Heck, just nerfing the min damage on his distortions (Inexplicably the min damage on Sturm Wolf went UP in Extend) would go a long way to making him a bit more sane - I really don’t understand the logic they seem to be applying here. I don’t want to harp on Tsubaki too much, but seriously - was it too totally awesome that she could tack on 800 damage at the end of a combo if she was standing right on top of her opponent in the corner? When Valk can now do 1300 at the end of whatever with Sturm Wolf? Really? And which one of these characters needs Rapid Cancels more? I just don’t understand. =/
The Valk combo builds exactly 59 heat. So you can do the super every single time you land 5B in the corner (Nacht Jager has a lot of carry so I’d say you could be a fair way out of the corner too).
On the subject of nasty combos. Valkenhayn can get 3.3K from a 2A midscreen.
Valk’s frame assumptions I based on a character guide I read some time ago. I don’t remember the details but I do remember the author commenting his speed in a negative way. It sounded pretty solid even though it wasn’t very specific at all times.
I agree with the damage nerfing, given many of his a-little-more-advanced-than-basic -combos do build up heat, FAST. Outside of comboing, just by spamming Cs you can dish out a lot of damage. Couple of his normals’ damage were actually doubled in Ex.
I personally think the balance is a bit worse. Like Airk said, there weren’t as many problematic characters in CS2, or as many weak characters as well. The main thing that got CS2 were some of the matchups, but to be honest, the matchups and overall balance changes in Extend are not much better.
Try fighting Ragna and Hakumen with Makoto and Tsubaki, and 9 times out of 10 you’ll get your ass handed to you. On that note, some of the changes to some characters like Makoto, Tsubaki, Ragna, and possibly Hakumen and Valk make it look like they didn’t even try, and used a dart board to decide the changes to the cast.
