Stupid capcom trying to maintain some sf4 status quo where ryu always has to be awesome. Nerf ryu, not akuma! 
Add a startup frame to ryus cr mk and ryu players can see how they like it!
youâre joking, right?
why doesnât capcom just give him little fairy wings to flutter around the stage. oh yeah, no attacks either.
If you block his sweep you can punishâŚsoâŚwhyâŚmakeâŚitâŚslooooooooower
I think we need a Wednesday night Gouki where he is just a relax fighterâŚinstead of an SSJ3 Gouki who canât take hitsâŚWednesday night Gouki would have more health but attacks wonât deal so much damageâŚwait
I like biscuits!
you really know nothing do you?
Akumaâs St RH is a setup, most characters can crouch it. taking only the first hit and the 2nd misses so Akuma gets super damaged by missing it.
Akuma is meant to be in your face in SF but SFIV engine prevents Akuma being Overwhelming. And now with the nerfs on a character far worse than Ryu he is now going to have even a harder time. Ryu got less nerfs than Akuma.
We are all fine that Sagat damage and health got lowered. Cuz Capcom admitted that he was OP. Now its fine. Now for Ryu is the bigget Bitch in the game. Dont even get started on how fast his attacks are, how far his Tatsumaki Goes, The Anti Air to Ultra/Super setup, plus Over 9000 sets to do stupid damage to any frigin character.
By far in this game the most balance character I see is Abel, Good Damage, Combo ability, and repetition.
I think Akuma is by far the most balanced character in this game. Can do high damage, takes really high damage as well. High damage ultra, but it doesnât have brainless setups. He really shouldnât be changed at all, ryu should have gotten harsher treatment that he did
Akumaâs standing roundhouse needed a nerf. I realise im going to cop a lot of crap for this given that im saying it in a thread dominated by (for the most part) die hard Akuma fans. Thats it though. Thats all he needed. Everything else about him is perfect. Its an opinion though, so take it or leave it. Flame me, hate me, whatever. I dont really give two shits.
Ryu being compared to Akuma is an interesting comparison though. The speed of their attacks is just about dead even. I wouldnt even call it a point of difference. The point of difference between the two characters is the amount of damage they take. The thing that balances it out is the sheer number of options Akuma has.
Look at the other brief thing that Shintei mentioned. Ryuâs tatsu. In basic terms, tatsu is used either for combos, mixups, or getting the fuck out of the corner. Combos, akuma has more options. Different set ups and weapons in more situations. Damage options are pretty even. Even with a nerf to his standing roundhouse. Mixups, akuma has more options. Air fireballs, demon flips, teleports. Safer options to boot. And as for running away, were comparing Akuma to Ryu. Do i need to explain it further?
This makes it sound like Akuma is lightyears ahead of Ryu. And he would be, if not for his HK. That evens it out. Currently though, the standing roundhouse is giving him too much. Too much safety, and its utility is currently too high. Im not going to give examples of how to use Akumas standing roundhouse to Akuma players, because you all know. But look how many situations standing roundhouse is a good idea.
Ryu is MUCH simpler. And i can understand how Akuma players, who generally have a lot to think about in terms of thier options, would comparatively be quite sore that such an easily effective character has had less nerfs than one as complex as Akuma(by comparison). I genuinely believe though, that unless youre Daigo, youre going to get to a high level with Ryu, and then start to plateau pretty quickly. With Akuma, you can get to a similar level, and still have a lot of room to grow. With the standing roundhouse, the level where your shit starts to plateau is a lot higher than the same skill level on Ryu. But you still have all that skill growth to look forward to. This, in my opinion, is why the nerf to it is justified.
Realistically though, its one weapon in Akumas giant proverbial bag of weapons. If the tier list is currently S: Sagat, A:Akuma/Ryu, B and below: other cast members. (Im generalising here btw. Dont give me that âomg thats not the tiers nubâ bullshit) then, looking at the rest of Akuma as a character, the change (ignoring character buffs/nerfs that ARENT Akuma/Ryu) will probably end up being S: Sagat, A:Ryu/Akuma, B and below: other cast members.
You complain now (and fair enough. Nerfs are never nice), but youâll adapt, and youll realise that it wasnt all that big anyway. Instead of using one trick, youâll use another.
I know someone is going to hate this post. And thats fine. Its my opinion though. And its not going to change. I personally feel that Ryu/Akuma are both good benchmarks for what character balance should be aiming for. (Obviously with the s.RH nerf included)
Donât get too mad. For all we know Akuma has some new wicked wallbounce ability. If they are nerfing a perfectly balanced character, they must have given him something really good to justify it.
What about the sheer number of options that ryu has for landing both his super and ultra? Standing roundhouse is better than all of that? Really?
Apples and oranges. Ryu has a lot of ways to hit a decent damage combo, yes. Its one of his biggest advantages. Akumaâs s.hk controls a hell of a lot of situations outside of that, in ways that Ryu canât even imagine. Some people are going to want the one shot at big damage, others are going to want to be in control from start to finish. In most matches in SF4, id rather have the latter. Obviously id prefer to be playing Ryu than Akuma if im against Sagat for instance, but most of the other matches, i personally would prefer the utility of the s.hk, and the rest of Akumas tools as well.
Akuma deals plenty of damage without LOLDRAGONFADCULTRA. When i say options, im saying that he has MORE ways to land slightly less damage. Id personally prefer to land two 300 damage combos than one 500 damage combo. Or even ten separate hits spaced out that do 60 damage each, rather than chasing some fucker down in the dying seconds trying to land my ultra. Im aware of the generalisation, but i hope the point im trying to make is clear.
Another random thought:
If they HAVE nerfed all ultra damage like it seems they have, then what does ryu have? A bunch of ways to combo into mediocre damage?
Assume capcom instigated this nerf first. Then look at Akuma. Since this nerf basically affects almost the whole cast barring him, that puts Akuma in an even stronger position. And as a top 3 character, this would be a pretty big cock up. So what would you do? Personally, id nerf the only thing he has thats keeping him from being perfectly balanced.
YeaâŚok. Comparing a really good normal like itâs seriously on par with being able to setup your ultra and super at the drop of a hat is quite the joke. Canât wait to see what the other akuma mains will say.
Who exactly do you play as?
Akuma can do the same kind of damage off regular combos and FADC combos. If you land a combo and successfully reset into another combo, thatâs an easy 600+ damage plus a dizzy. Super and ultra options really mean dick all to Akuma.
Everyone has fadc combos, you say it like itâs some attribute akuma has that the rest of the cast doesnât. Ryu can link everything into a sweep, and most chars have great resets/vortexes as well, but the ability to safely spam shoryu 2 or 3 times a round, that if you guess right links to ultra (not to mention light dp into ultra/trade into ultra) is so much better.
And ryus super is friggin awesome, it punishes everything, you can barely do anything with akuma once he gets super, you pretty much have to wait tilll he uses it or eat it before you can start being offensive again.
âwah, wah, wah, I canât loop jab to roundhouse, AKUMA TRASH TIER FTFLâ - this discussion.
Get the fuck over it. We never needed this move in the first place. You never needed this loop, all you ever need is HK into BnB.
Thatâs it. You have plenty of ways of driving people to the corner, losing one of them isnât going to castrate your fucking children.
I think I am more concerned over the loss of other functions of the HK than just the loop.
You have missed the point here.
Akuma, with or without the s.hk has the ability to dictate the flow of the match a lot better than Ryu does. Ryu can take a big chunk of life off out of the blue. Akuma cant. Ive already said that this is an advantage that Ryu has that Akuma doesnât. However, Akuma has plenty of other advantages. With the s.hk, he is given a weapon that, situationally, is too strong. In some situations, the s.hk isnât AS useful, but still is generally a good option. Im not saying âspam the broken HK its an i win buttonâ because its not.
Im saying, comparatively, Akumas strengths are different to Ryuâs, and i find them to be more effective vs the whole cast. Yes you can DP FADC Ultra the whole cast, but against different playstyles, it can be less reliable than Akumas bag of tricks/options.
My opinion (and it is nothing more than that) is that the s.hk nerf was needed, and I dont think it is going to affect his strength as a character as badly as a lot of you think.
As for my characters, i play most of the cast pretty extensively, exceptions being Honda, Gief, Dhalsim and Blanka. I cant find a groove with them for some reason. As for my main, i tend to gravitate towards El Fuerte to be honest. Im a big fan of his unorthadox mechanics.
Im not trying to start an argument here. Im just saying my piece, and im trying to approach it as unbiased as possible. I have no doubt that everyone who mains Akuma will be annoyed at this nerf. I just firmly believe that all the hype surrounding it is a little overboard.
I can understand where Ill Bill is coming from in terms of nerfing Akumas s. hk but imo I think its something Akuma needs. Considering heâs an offense heavy character. Regardless I dont think nerfing it is enough to complete break Akumas game.
im not saying he is losing the loop. i hardly use the loop.
I am mostly a person who relies mostly on demon flip combos. but anyways Akuma is good but the damage taken is like a 5 year old Girl.
Strengths
* Very damaging moves and combos.
* Variety of tools to cater to many play-styles.
* Free three-hit projectiles (i.e. no EX meter required)
* Amazing combo potential
* Controls a large range a space due to many fireballs.
Weaknesses
* Horrible Stamina (can die very quickly)
* Very low Stun rating (can be stunned very quickly)
* A steep learning curve to success/mastery.
* Some moves (i.e. Red Fireball) have very slow recovery time, and leave you wide open.
* Teleport is an Advantage and a disadvantage.
Cross Ups: For mostly Akuma being Cross Uped his moves from a normal SRK becomes a Shakunetsu or if a Tatsumaki becomes a Demon Flip. Shortcuts mostly ruin Akuma in this game, but it also helps. I personally like 3rd Strike cuz you must be accurate to do attacks. :karate:
I donât know if i agree with that, iâd have a harder time with ryu usually regardless of who i was playing. The vortex almost makes akuma like fuerte with the amount of guessing, but itâs harder to do. Ryus crossups can get pretty ambiguous plus he has the burst damage in the super or ultra to boot that are nearly guaranteed to land.
Iâve never found his S.HK to be too strong, but i donât play characters with huge hitboxes, i donât think itâd cripple him just wondering why they went after him when heâs already got weaknesses. Oh well i guess, agree to disagree
they only went after the HK because there wasnât much else they could do to akuma. they already fucked his ultra from being a great ultra into a good ultra by giving the 1 frame grab to his super (normally vs sf4). His new ultra they gave him is trash so far which forces him back onto the old ultra. His super is what it is. What would they do to mess with demon flip? Its already an unsafe way to get in and the only way to make it less useful on wake-up would be to make it unusable in other situations. His tatsu is already trashy other than his lk for combos. They were NOT about to mess with his BnB so they couldnât mess with anythign there. His trip is a signature move for him in this game even more so than his new HK. Its a great although not always safe poke and the untechable knockdown is great. And they canât take that away from him just to be dicks without doing the same to EVERYONEâs trip⌠so his sweep had to stay the way it was. And if the trip HAD to stay JUST as fast and they couldnât mess with his lk tatsu cuz of the BnB then it means they had no way to get ride of his great mix-up to neuter him. His ground fireballs already arenât great⌠they could make them slower but they want super to be a FASTER game⌠not a slower oneâŚand heâs known for his FB options anyway. If you slowed his normal FB youâd have to slow his RED which would make a nearly unuseable RED⌠theyâed have to put a loading sign over akumas head so youâd know you pressed the command it would be so slow⌠I guess they could have messed with his air tatsu so that on hit it did something more like ryu⌠but cross-up tatsu is hardly the game changer some ppl think it is. And that would be a FAR heavier nerf than what they did to the hk.
They could mess with his air fb⌠but why? Its already neutered from old akuma builds and the new air-fb from SF4 seem where they should be. And the werenât about to change anything that matched with the otehr shotos to all of a sudden be slower JUST for him.
So⌠thats why they didnât nerf something else. The reason they did nerf the HK is because they probably wanted to tone him down since they had just toned down Sagat by 100hp and weakened ultras thereby weakening ryu (and maybe making ryu play differently by making his new ultra have a reason to be picked). Since they didnât have many options for what they felt they COULD weaken and they already knew they wanted the loop gone (@100 hp less and weaker ultra sagat is 4-6 or 3-7 against akuma with his loop) so they hit 2 birds by slowing down the hk. Neutring akuma in SOME way⌠AND taking away his HK looping.
But no⌠his HK wasnât too great against the majority of the cast⌠Although if they DIDNâT mean to neuter akumaâs hk and only meant to stop the loop than I really wish they would have just simply made his s.lp the same frames as the crouching so it no longer combo-ed. Without the loop s.lp is useless ANYWAY. Nobody will do hk, s.lp, trip when they can do hk, c.lp, lk. tatsu, sweep for more damage.
really the only thing bothering me is that I really was hoping for a cool new ultra to fiddle with and see how useful it was and when to use it. And one that didnât have âup upâ as the input. I meanâŚfuckinâ STUPID. could have been down up⌠but NOOOOOO they wanted a move⌠that looks like it is only good as an anti-air⌠to NOT be able to be used without a buffer (and has anyone seen if it can cancel from anything like the demon or not? Cuz without that ability it canât even be used as an anti-air). From what Iâve seen the only reasons Iâd take the new ultra over the old would be that it doesnât give them much meter and looks like it might actually be useful for taking on damage after a stun (where demon normally wouldnât be worth using at all).