SSF4 AE v2012 - Official Akuma Changes Discussion

So the Akuma changes have been translated and this is what they are as seen on the front page.
-Demon flip punch (palm) is no longer an overhead
-Forward throw has 2 more frames of recovery
-Teleport cancelled into U2 damage has been buffed to 421

So far it seems as though these changes aren’t anything major or too bad. It seems as though U2 is getting better and better which will make it much better in certain matchups. Kinda annoyed about the palm as I used that a lot as an overhead but oh well, I can live with that. As for the forward throw having 2 more frames of recovery, I imagine that will fuck with timing a bit on certain setups but I’m not too knowledgable in the frame area to comment specifically on this. What do you guys think of this? For me personally this is nothing too major, dunno why they decided to touch Akuma seeing as though he was perfect but oh well, I can live with it.

Fuck that.

No overhead Palm = no palm whiff > low short mixups.

It also takes away from alot of pressure they opponents have to deal with.

All in all, fuck Capcom for touching Akuma.

Ahhh yeah, I use the palm A LOT for that and I didn’t realise that this change would affect it. Fuck that then, the palm high low mixups are a huge part of my vortex game.

Only thing palm is good for now is baiting shit out and safe jumping.

Yeah thats pretty frustrating, Akuma honestly needed no changes to setups. I could have dealt with a slight damage nerf but now the high/low mixup seems pretty stuffed :confused:

Akuma is already hard-as-fuck to play…and yet they want to nerf his vortex? Forward throw > dash > j. rh is an essential safe-jump setup, this nerf probably means we won’t have it anymore. The palm also lost quite a bit of effectiveness. But we got a buff to U2, a character-specific ultra that is still not the dominant choice over U1.

This game is so shit, lol. Good thing Deus-Ex and SF3 just came out.

I know right, if this goes on I’m just gonna fucking go get 3S OE right away tomorrow. Capcom are fuckers man, they nerf assholes like Bison but they feel the need to nerf Akuma? Fuck you Ono.

Really capcom, you nerf an important tool for his vortex? I think i may be done with Sf4, i’ma just go ahead and stick to 3rd strike.

Only in the sf4 series can you block a fucking jumping attack while crouching -.-

Lol exactly. Well these changes might not go ahead so you never know, gotta keep our hopes up. I might as well pick up Sakura, at least then I know there’ll be no pointless nerfs and only buffs.

A substantial amount of Akuma’s setups have just been snuffed out with this forward throw recovery nerf, including a lot of matchup specific safejump setups. Think Yun, Fei, Sagat, Cammy.

On the flipside, I’m curious to see if this added recovery opens doors to any new safejump and attack setups now that we have 2 extra frames to reliably bank on (by adding normal whiff frames on top, we now have new calculations to make).

Palm being crouch block possible is irritating and impacts some whiff mix-ups while the U2 damage buff is somewhat welcome. Its perhaps too early to pass judgement, but Akuma’s setup game just got substantially weaker which has a direct impact on his vortex and also initiating it in some situations.

Any Akuma player worth his salt knows full well that once you land a forward throw, its game time. Removing (or at least at this stage - changing) this key setup method significantly alters Akuma’s game plan, which will force us to look at other ways of digging our heels in and establishing setups.

Akuma got nerfed. If you do not play a setup focused game, these changes won’t be immediately noticeable. If you do however, this forward throw change is going to require some coming to terms with. Here’s hoping that while it closes setup doors, it perhaps opens some.

I’m really thinking about quitting AE.

Lol I know, 3s OE looks more and more juicy right now.

Its hard and pointless to fireball zone in this game, so at some point we have to rushdown. That just got ALOT harder. Not that I’m a good Akuma or anything but I can already see the effect of this. That forward throw nerf is huge, its going to effect the exploding heart technique AND the basic safejump necessary against Cammy, Dee-Jay, and so forth. The palm nerf is also huge, we can say goodbye to SRK>FADC>Red Hadou>Opposite Palm>Low Mixup.

He’s going to sniff B-tier now, especially when Ken just became the top shoto.

I might just be done with SF4 especially since i like 3SO so much

Just gonna copy/paste my post from the wishlist thread:

WHAT A LOAD OF FUCKING CRAP, WTF!

DF palm is so fucking hard to smack crouching opponents because the thing has like only 2 active frames and they made it non overhead now :S

2 more recovery frames on forward throw? Was this really FUCKING necessary ? Akuma’s forward throw x2 dashes setups is a CRUCIAL part of his mixup game after that throw, now it can only safejump 7+f reversals at Best? ARE you FUCKING SERIOUS CAPCOM? Was that their RETARDED SOLUTION TO REMOVE UNBLOCKABLES?

FUCK THAT 20 damage U2 BUFF.

/RAAAAAGEEEEE

I think what I have always assumed is true, Capcom developers are all taken from a mental asylum, not right in the head.

But yeah, these changes better not stay, hopefully the arcade location tests haven’t all finished (can’t remember the dates or be bothered checking) but yeah, hopefully after this they’ll realise how much of a big bunch of retards they were and revert the changes. This is certainly un-needed and unwanted, all these bitches crying about Akuma being broken will still be crying, not knowing that it wasn’t Akuma that was broken, they just suck and can’t learn matchups.

Now if I were leaning toward a vortex-style Akuma, I’d be damned pissed.

But lately I’ve been focusing more on solid footsies, yomi, and zoning, and they’re all working better for me than relying on 60/40 mixup games unless the match is especially horrendous (Hi Yun!). Losing two crucial vortex options isn’t a huge blow for me since I’m wanting to model my game towards Momochi’s Gouki in Vanilla than Tokido now.

I AM a vortex-style Akuma.

I’m super fucking pissed. Capcom can eat a motherfucking dick.

I guess it’s hard to say how much of a difference 2 frames would really make to all the safe jump/vortex options. Also it seems that the whole tatsu issue was changed for Ryu, but not for Akuma :(… not looking good.

Man, for the first time in my, more then 2 years playtime with SF4 series, I admit - I too am joining the army of haters of Ono, and for the first time, I’m considering quitting SF4.

Like, I don’t even know what to say, you wanna tell me they didn’t know about his forward throw setups? Of course they did. Why did they nerf it? Well probobly cause they wanned to remove his unblockable setup on shotos, and make his vortex game weaker. For that purpose they nerfed his Palm as well.

Now here’s the quistion I have - why would you do that? You think Akuma is overpowered? It takes from 4 to 5 mixups to stun youre opponent from a hard knockdown you think that’s overpowered? You stuiped or what?
Ok, maybe they think his waaaaay to easy to pick up and play, so they take away one big part of his setup game (f.throw). Really? It took me like a year to even beggin being any good with the character (yeah, I was new to fighting games when I started out with SF4), you think that’s easy? Look at your Yun then, and compare the effort needed to be good.

I don’t know, I want this nerfs gone, if they’ll stay up, I don’t know what I’ll decide, but I seriously don’t want to deal with even more problems when I’m playing this character, I love him, I didn’t care much about his super nerfs, they were mostly justified, but that’s all he needed to be done to him, he doesn’t need anything else, he’s perfect the way he was with all his strengts and weaknesses, take that 20 dmg to his U2 back, I don’t need that shit, I need his mixup potential.

P.S. whoever was the guy that suggested to balance the whole cast again, was a fucking moron. Nerf the fucking twins, THAT’S ALL they needed to do…