That’s a slippery a slope for you. One mistake can cost you the match in any game, it’s not exclusive to MvC3.
Dropping links, eat that shoryu FADC Ultra.
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Remember MvC2 Cable? AHVB until victory.
I nominated.
That said, I don’t agree with EVERYTHING in the post, but a lot of it, I do. I know that things will change as the life of the game goes on, but at this current point in the game, I don’t see it having a very long life.
Where will the damage output evolution go? Every character has a damage ceiling (their lifebar) that will cause you to drop even the flashiest of combos once you reach that threshold. We hit AND BROKE that threshold weeks ago. A Level 3 XFSent is capable of killing a storm dummy 3.2 times over in one combo with 3 bars, and without bar will kill her from full health. I don’t see this game evolving much in 1 year, let alone 10 to keep it alive for that long. The only way the game can evolve is in defense and tactics. As it is, unless the damage is tweaked, every match will be reduced to kill two of your opponent’s characters, hope you don’t lose to XF[insert character here, probably Sent].
In other words, a bunch of horeshit that’s supposed to be supportive of an utterly moronic argument that will only even be supported by the very people who don’t give a fuck about learning the game.
And this is where your entire idiotic diatribe shoots itself in the foot.
ProTip: the ideal design is one where mid-level players trying to learn the game have to sharpen their claws against people better than them; people who have a greater understanding of the game. Not people who don’t give a flying fuck about learning the game and don’t understand anything about the game.
Sorry ******, we don’t live in some magical dimension where it’s possible for everyone to account for every situation at every given time. At best, you have lame design decisions that allow you to cover multiple options in ways that don’t make sense, but instead abuse inherent flaws in fundamental components – see SF4 option selects. And even if it did, option selects were largely worthless against the very type of scrub player you’re trying to champion with this bullshit.
To add to the sheer magnitude of stupidity that comprises your monologue, the fact is that even pros playing retard scrubs in scrub-friendly games get bored out of their goddamn minds dealing with this shit. And that’s what it comes down to: mid-level players boring themselves to death until they figure out what beats the brainless faggotry that scrubs use. Then they bore themselves to death every time they have to implement it to beat a brainless scrub.
Since you’re too up your own ass to figure it out, let me simplify it: not only is it boring, it’s unproductive in use against people who are actually good at the game. It’s the online gaming equivalent of gamer tax, where you spend a lot of time doing shit that doesn’t actually fucking matter. In singleplayer games, it amounts to padding; in multiplayer games it involves dealing with lowest-common-denominator trash.
It’s not good design. It’s not fun. It doesn’t lead to good habits. It’s not conducive to competitive play. Nominate that, online warriors.
You just called option selects lame design decisions as if they were knowingly added and exclusive to SF4. Your post is terrible.
First you compare this game to an RTS then an FPS, which have absolutely nothing in common with fighting games. Then you go and make a straw man’s argument as to how this game is not scrubby. I am impressed.
nominated
U MAD? WHY U MAD THO?
More seriously, instead of attacking another member for saying what he feels is the issue, why don’t you be a little more constructive and post an opposing argument?
Besides, your argument that building techniques to counter low-tier players is tissue paper, Caim. If I can develop a technique to shit on low-skill players, what’s stopping me from developing a technique to handle people on my level? I ask this because, those of us who make use of more than six brain cells know enough to approach every situation differently unless we have actually been in that exact situation frequently. NOTHING is worse than using the same weatherbeaten techniques on someone who has enough metal faculties to avoid them repeatedly.
When you can do meterless 70 + % off a jab, m, h, launch button it’s fucking stupid.
Not if there are two more lifebars to empty. That 70% combo is more like 25%. And a large portion of it is red health, which can be healed.
Hello, Welcome to Marvel vs. Capcom, how can I help you? We have big-damage combos, more big-damage combos, full-screen instantaneous supers that combo into themselves repeatedly, and today’s special: big-damage combos.
I agree with your point, but not completely, especially the examples you used.
For SC1, you have to acknowledge that during the early days, there was no replay system, nevermind VODs or streaming like we have today. To even consider learning a build order, you’d either have to see it done in person or read up on it on TeamLiquid.
Not to mention mechanics. SC1 was probably the first competitive RTS game, and prior to it, there was no notion of “build orders” or “scouting.” Nowadays, even decent players know how to scout, and better players will adapt their build to counter yours.
Also btw, 4pool definitely got nerfed. I remember in the first days, Spawning Pool used to cost 150 minerals. Somewhere in the timeline, Blizzard patched that shit and today it costs 200 minerals. Not to mention many leagues are played on multi-player maps like Python which has 4 spawning points, forcing you to either guess where your opponent is or spend precious time and minerals on a scouting drone.
With the case of the “Noob Tube,” it was never really complained about at the competitive level, as you say. Basically, only random noobs playing online would bitch about it. So then the hidden question is: should the game be balanced at the pro level, or the casual level?
-First of all before I go further I wanna say that I’m not trying to whine about Sentinel being op, but just that your examples and analogies don’t really compare. In fact I picked up Sentinel on my team just so I can join in on the fun of making noobs cry.
Now, let’s fast forward to today with “Sentinel OP” being the most debated topic so far. We have tons of youtube VODs and streams, every single day, so quickly learning/picking up strats is not terribly difficult, and so it shouldn’t take another 10 years to learn how to counter Sentinel. Now, while Sentinel is dominating low level play, even at the high level, we have pros saying that he’s op (Marn, JWong, etc.). Wouldn’t that mean anything? How exactly does the “Noob Tube” analogy fit into this?
The common argument used for the “Noob Tube” is “if it’s so cheap, why don’t you use it?” Then we continue to see noobs using the grenade launcher attachment and still getting pwned by good CoD players. With Sentinel, noobs and pros use it alike, and we often times we see Sentinel making huge comebacks like 1v3 OCV’s, which really should only be limited to situations like Phoenix with lvl 5 hyper, or a really really good player with a bit of luck (like JWong and his Cyclops OCV).
You give a list of other complained MvC3 strategies, but all of them have clear counters, like assist punishing, pushblock then punish, etc. But with Sentinel you basically have to play a perfect game and not make any mistakes, since one mistake = dead character. At least with the other strats, you’ll need your team and assists to do that kind of damage, as well as lots of hyper meter. With Sentinel you can nearly KO your opponent by himself with just 1-2 meters, and you’ll already build one meter with his easy launcher combo into OTG into HSF lol.
Again I want to emphasize that I’m not trying to complain about Sentinel. I’m trying to point out that the difference in “broken-ness” is huge compared to the other “broken” strategies you listed, and the examples and references you used don’t really justify it, imo.
Lastly, let’s use some more fitting examples. In RA3, people at the competiive scene were considering making their own “community patch” because
-the game degraded into build order poker and 1base all in or similar cheese
-EA stopped releasing patches only about a year after the game came out
Here’s an example of their community patch: http://www.moddb.com/mods/red-alert-3-community-patch-113
In WC3, nearly everybody complained about BM (orc blademaster hero) being a complete dps monster that was pretty easy to use (simply right click an enemy hero and watch that hero die within the next couple seconds; want an example of this? [media=youtube]g9mVkhCCOgI[/media]). It’s been a couple years since WC3 has seen a balance patch.
I know.
i love the game soo far…my biggest issue is fucking blocking…even when i block i get hit n sht…i can do the damn combos no prob ut my defence sux ass…i really need some help…im about to smash this game against the wall if some one could add me n teach how to properly block that would awesome…
My opposing argument is that his initial argument is fucking retarded, for the reasons given. Way to read.
Because the sad fact is that the very things that work against people who don’t have six braincells doesn’t work against those who do. And when outside factors like bad design decisions or lag come into play, most scrubs aren’t going to treat every situation as dynamic, but as one in which they try the same stupid bullshit over and over until it hits. And dealing with this is incredibly boring.
The basic effect is that while a pro is going to change his gameplan to suit the immediate circumstances, the average scrub isn’t – but can, very slightly, and often without realizing it. Most of the time it’s actually a complete fuckup. And as with the scrubbier chars in SF4, that problem is magnified when those fuckups can still lead to really big damage off of really easy to execute moves. In SF4 it’s ultras, in Marvel 3 it’s X-Factor high-damage bullshit that a chimp could pull off.
In those terms, the obvious answer is to bait it and punish. Unless you’re playing someone who isn’t retarded, then baiting it assuming they’re being stupid causes you to lose pressure, and thus momentum. The difference in a game like Marvel 3 is that getting this wrong once can lead to a combo that even the biggest online dipshit can do to get enough damage to hose a character, which may actually compromise the integrity of an entire team dynamic. And if you’re just starting to get the concept of team dynamic this can result in a loss that wasn’t necessarily because the better player made better decisions, but instead because the lesser player got one lucky hit that led to a few more easymode hits, which ultimately saved his ass and artificially increased his chances of winning. Sorry, but pretty much anyone can drastically turn the tables in Marvel 3 with bullshit like sent’s armored launcher – they don’t even have to time it right, they can just press it during any attempt to get in, from ridiculous range, and the superarmor property means it beats the attempt and leads to an easymode combo for HUGE damage. Same with Dante and his bullshit hitboxes with his sword, or Akuma’s tatsu.
In many ways, the mid-level is where you most play the game based on the overall design as opposed to the player. It’s the same as it was with the SF4 engine in the sense that a scrub doesn’t have to know anything about an SRK other than that it works more often than not, while to beat it you need to know when it’s punishable, when it’s likely to come out when playing someone smart, when it’s going to come out when someone stupid is playing, and how much you can do to punish it.
The argument isn’t that mid-level players can’t learn how to deal with this lame shit, it’s that they shouldn’t have to in a decently designed game. As with SF4, there’s a double burden on mid-level players who have to not only learn what specific tactics beat objectively better players (more technical, more tactical, more knowledgeable in general), but lesser fuckwits as well. It’s at this level that the tiers are the most obvious, because at this level you’re playing against the chars more than the players themselves.
What’s the example of the well designed fighter then? I honestly can’t really think of a game where there isn’t some low level tactic that requires some knowledge to consistently and easily overcome… Really, discovering a strategy, then discovering ways to augment it or counter it is pretty fundamental to how players and metagame evolve ( or fail to evolve )… pretty much universally.
LOL, this is fucking retarded. You should and must learn how to deal with everything. If you don’t know how to deal with dumb shit, a good player can and will kill you with that same dumb shit. The classic example is that if you can’t deal with throws, I can and will throw you until your lifebar is empty. Be fucking glad you get to practice it with idiots first.
Everything else you’ve said is unspeakably dumb, too; I just thought this particular sentence was its own special case.
Nice post Mingo, like a lot of what you’re saying, this is the kind of stuff I enjoy reading. Thanks for the rest of the feedback everybody. Even the people who disagree.
To answer the SC stuff: I agree I could have clarified that portion a bit more. There were points in the game where it was on the side of busted, but for most of the game’s lifespan that I can remember it was only a truly viable tactic against unprepared people. As you said, sometimes the map itself was a hindrance since back then not everything was 1v1 maps. Many of the early balance patches made Zerg OP or unplayable depending on who you talked to at the time and the specifics of each patch. It was weird. Main point is this, people hated on the tactic moreso than it needed to be considering it’s usual returns. I dumbed down the example to not make it longer than it already was, but another sentence or two probably would’ve saved me a response. Thanks for fleshing it out a bit further.
re knowledge / designing toward making a player base: It really depends on what you want. If the goal is to encourage a player base and attempt to grow it, Marvel already was doing half right by having tons of shiny stuff and lots of crap going on to stare at. The other half was attempting to show that YOU can play this game and from a company standpoint that’s definitely something you want. From a tournament standpoint that’s something you want as it increases player bases, prizes, etc. In an ideal world you could design it to have a beautiful curve that seamlessly joins leveling up, having fun and learning stuff. In the real world what I find usually happens is people understand that the hardcore / best players will still be the best even if they ‘dumb down’ the game a bit and open up to a wider audience. Magic the Gathering did that over the past couple of years and a lot of Pros really rallied on the company for it, a few years later they’ve had unprecedented growth of the base and shock of shocks, the majority of pros were still cashing / winning tournaments even if the playing field had leveled out a bit.
While spreading knowledge is easy, getting newer players to take it in, let alone really grasp why it works is something that’s still very difficult. You can’t even get people to agree what the hell Marvel was. =)
Re: Sentinel: I’m not trying to argue that Sentinel isn’t OP, just that we should give it more time and allow counter strategies to be developed before declaring him so. The discussion about him should be established, but not the ‘wah wah, he’s too fucking good’ part of the complaints. Is he the best character in the game and if so, by what margin? Him being the best character because of his one-hit = kill nature might not be the biggest issue if it turns out more characters have the same thing going for them as the combo and proration system is fleshed out. At that point he might just be a bigger and easier target than someone with similar damage dealing capabilities.
Similarly does he have weaknesses that have yet to be exploited that are known to him? Could a metagame develop where he’s the best character and slightly OP, but teams are designed in such a way to counteract him (Say more infinite’s on big characters are found or 100% combos that only work on large hit-boxes, things like that). You seem to grasp what I’m trying to say, so it’s my fault for not being clearer, I’m primarily concerned if he’s OP in the ‘broken’ fashion, rather than just OP in the SF4 Sagat fashion and then after that can come the discussion of how to tweak him assuming a balance patch or patches actually are in the game’s future.
Re: Damage: Like Sentinel this is something I worry about as well, especially the effect X-Factor level 3 has as a system on the game. I personally think it lasts too long and deals too much damage as it stands and that level 1 X-factor was a good way to implement the system if they really wanted it in the game. Instead of having it as a comeback mechanic just have it as an option to be used like everything else in the game, making it into a Puzzle Fighter-esque comeback mechanic was pushing it really far. There was part of a thread on here talking about ways it could potentially be tweaked and that’s good. Same with the general damage in the game and everyone killing in 2 combos if they have meter. I fully encourage the discussion, just less knee-jerk reactions about how everything is terrible because characters all are capable of killing in a few combos. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that aspect, but there’s certainly drawbacks to it. The idea that a select section people can just go,’ No, that’s wrong, the developers fucked up. My vision of the game is correct’ without a trace of irony or sarcasm is beyond me.
Re: general
I’m not trying to say the game is perfect, but that actual discussion should take place and there needs be a line drawn behind what’s causing an issue on the player side and what on the game mechanics side is legitimately OP and may want to be tweaked down the line. Master Chibi’s thread on damage was a good example of bringing the topic up and trying to get some dialogue and debate going without the thread being soaked in salty tears. Constructive criticism / complaining is a hell of a lot more useful than what you get from generalizations (see Akuma infinite / corner pressure threads in the Akuma forum) and bitching. For every legit thing I’ve seen brought up and should be discussed I see a bunch of garbage derailing that stuff with tiny sample sizes and lack of applied knowledge or skill.
re Caim:
Based on your use of scubby, bullshit and retarded in just about every single sentence describing the gameplay, I can see your argument is without flaw and I concede to you. You may leave the thread at any time.
But Caim, wakeup SRK works in ANY game that has an invincible reversal of any sort…
I don’t understand what you’re trying to say, due to the fact that, again your argument is tissue paper. Not nearly substantial enough to prove any sort of point. NO MATTER WHAT GAME YOU ARE PLAYING there will be some sort of noob tactic employed by a noob player that you WILL have to account for if you want to continue to be successful. Play a novice in chess. See what they do. Play a master in chess. See what they do. Watch a master play a master in chess. Watch a master play a novice in chess. See what that master does an how quickly he does it. Do you know why? Because he has techniques meant for dealing with that shit.
A noob will almost always play entirely randomly. No FUCKING CLUE what they’re doing, but if you notice, after a couple of lucky hits, they will (usually) get handled, due to the better player catching on and devising a tactic that the noob won’t recognize due to being a noob.
Seriously, Caim. Think about this shit, b.
Lots of good posts in this thread so far, I’m glad to see some actual rebuttals and not pages of “Nominated! OMG!”
I think people’s cries over Sentinel are pretty justified since he actually affects critical decisions we consider for the game.
When people say that lowering the damage level will help alleviate some of the pains with this game they don’t realize that it would only make Sentinel more overpowered, since he still has the most health in the game and the highest output. It would also in affect knock keep away characters like Arthur down to the bottom of the tier list making him almost near useless strictly because of his inability to deal with Sentinel anymore.
When a character is that critical a component to how we evolve the game I think it’s safe to say that there might be something fundamentally flawed with the character.
Of course MVC2 was for the most part the same way, in which characters value were determined by how they could handle the top tier teams. That was against teams though, as in having to counter the team strategy with another, not how to deal with 1 overpowered character on that team. When individual characters would be killed off in MVC2 the team would weaken as a whole, and victory would become more favourable with every elimination. In MVC3 it works almost in the opposite way, where dismantling a team only creates a potentially more lethal hurdle to get around for all your effort and strategy.
I think we can all agree that MVC3 would have been ultimately more amazing on release day if we had never even heard of X-factor. The game did not need to be anymore than a simple 3v3 with the same familiar mechanics of its predecessor. God mode for 1/5th of the match was completely unnecessary.
great article nominated
Last I checked, you made one mistake in MvC2, you lost your entire team.
Which reminds me, back around June of last year, everyone was whinging about how low the damage of the game seemed. At the same time, folks were writing articles about how one of the most important bits of Marvel play was how it was high-risk and that it was the fighting game version of all in high stakes poker. And now we see people whining about getting exactly what they wanted months ago.
Why shouldn’t they and what game is “decently designed” because there’s low level tactics that work on people who never learnt to beat it or can’t adapt to it in time.
You talk about learning to adapt and then knock a game when there’s a low level tactic that wins. That would be a clear example of not being able to adapt properly. The mid level player needs to learn to identify the situation and adapt to it quickly, that’s one of the things that separate mid-level from high-level players.
If you don’t want to deal with or learn to deal with low-level tactics, don’t play them, stick to playing people you would consider “mid-level”. The low level stuff is obviously exposing your poor defense.