Ultra SFIV - Change wishlist for Abel?

Classic Fighting Games Ultra Street Fighter IV
141

I posted something on the capcom unity balance change thread… I’ll paste it below

[details=Spoiler]
Ok I’ve read some good suggestions but a lot of crappy ones, some are pure terrible and some are too good and not really a “balancing” suggestion…

Although at first I thought it might be too good, I’d vouch for step kick to force stand on hit. Abel deserves this and if Capcom might think its too big of a buff, they can nerf his far st.hk/hp beyond uselessness… to make it balanced.

Id like to voice my disagreement with people wanting to buff wheel kick/falling sky/step kick because those 3 moves are fine as it is right now.

  1. Wheel kick can be made safe if you used it properly at the right distance, if they’re made safer, people are going to spam it more since it gives good damage and get abel close - abel has poke CoD FADC to do something similar right now and thats fair imo since it costs 2 meters.

  2. As for falling sky, EX Falling Sky is a beast of an AA, only a few rare cases where it trades for zero damage, so maybe if a buff is required, make sure that cant happen anymore. His normal version being almost “useless” on its own is not a problem since Abel has plenty other option of AA, one being cr.hp that can lead to a free and easy to confirm FS or even U1. The difficult part is to decided on which one to use and make that judgement in a real match. Some people might not realize another option for abel as “AA”, roll away, seeing your opponent jumping at you, you have more than enough time to just HK roll away.

  3. Step kick is hands down his best move in the game and it needs no change whatsoever. As the game progresses, people who play characters with 3f normals/reversals have come to realize that they can do that as a low risk/high reward option vs a step kick… only if the step kick is cancelled into a dash. Abel players have also evolved that against those characters, it is an option to do a no dash step kick and bait a reversal or immediately do another step kick to get a counter hit against the mashed 3f normals. Its all part of the mindgame, to plant the seed of hesitation in abel’s opponents minds and later on take advantage by their split second hesitation into big damage combo. Another option that is more risky is EX TT but its more of a one time per match thing after you get a good read of your opponent. Ok now I just realized that I’m writing this not because of people wanting step kick to be changed but for cr.lp/lk to be faster.

Other than that I dont really have any “balance” recomendations but I think the game is stagnating not just because of balance, but some people are just bored already with the game so changing some stuff to open up new possibilities might be beneficial to the longevity of this game. Below are some ideas I have (some might’ve been said before) that might be taken into consideration:

  1. Hard knockdown changes, one example being the duration (make it longer - reduce the recovery of the knockdown moves) so abel can have new mixups setups, a specific example is CoD, make it possible to safely roll behind or crossup after CoD - and by safe I dont mean to a point that abel can roll behind and get a meaty cr.hp, maybe a meaty throw or close st.hp.

  2. His overhead right now does little damage although it is kinda fast, I’d like to see it gives either more damage or slightly more frame advantage on hit.

  3. Make his far st.mk like Sagat’s f+hk (as AA) so he can follow up with a falling sky or CoD fadc U1. As of now Abel’s far st.mk usage is really situational and even then far st.mp might be the better choice.

  4. Increase the range of his super, maybe change the projectial invulnerable version (aka the useless version) to a falling sky-ish AA super.

Thats all I guess. [/details]

142

… S…Say it ain’t so!
Not you too man! Not you too!

143

hahahahaha

although come to think again, i think id favor increasing the hitbox for cl.st.hp to hit the likes of honda, claw, fuerte…

ah well

144

lol i reaaallly don’t like how so many people are suggesting to make cr strong 6 frames, giving abel a 3 frame normal, and making regular skyfall “viable” AA. not that i would complain if that did happen…but they are WAY to strong. i really hope capcom doesn’t listen to those~~

145

oh one thing that ive mentioned before(ae2012 days), changing the far st.hp to f+hp so we can (attempt) AA with (close) st.hp better and against certain jumps that might cause far st.hp to come out…

thoughts?

146

Very nice idea HFX the amount of times I’ve eaten jump ins from certain characters because I got fr St hp not Cl St Hp is ridiculous.

Would allowing cr jab, cr jab, cr mp to combo really be too much? Personally I don’t think so but its hard to tell. I also don’t get why people think Step kick forcing stand would be too strong. Works on Fei and he still shits all over Abel. Some of his good matchups would get even worse for them but one would hope the buffs to those weaker chars will rectify that situation assuming we do get that buff.

147

That would allow Abel to easily hitconfirm into COD. I would love that but it would probably be a little OP.

I honestly don’t see why making cl.hp hit everyone after step kick is that broken… Having all this character specific junk just adds artificial difficulty imo.

Also, am I the only person who doesn’t think far mk is COMPLETELY useless? I use it all the time when I have an opponent cornered and they neutral jump.

148

Good point, if we were able to manually do a ‘close heavy punch’ regardless of distance it might be possible to do cr lk crlp ‘cl hp’ at ranged where it wouldn’t normal be possible…

Very strong no doubt, good catch!

I’m with you, I think this normal has it’s uses however I’m also of the opinion that it merits some attention in the upcoming update…
imo, my bff Jill.

149

Maybe I’m the only one but I would like a small walkspeed buff; dude moves like molasses. It’s annoying playing footsies against people who moved like they’re coked up (akuma, fucking cammy, etc.) but i’m sure that will never happen so meh.

I guess I’m also alone in wishing cr.hp had a slight buff, maybe in the form of a lower hurtbox, or more active frames?

150

I think buffing cr Hp is a bit much, considering the move was already buffed in v.2012, and the payoff for landing one is huge. I don’t think is supposed to be a strong antiair.
Regarding the walkspeed - everybody and their mothers want better walkspeed at capcom unity - from T Hawk and Makoto to Ryu and Dudley. I’m afraid that’s not a smart thing to ask. I mean, yeah, Abel walks slow, but what about Cody ? and Abel has great mobility through his dashes, rolls, etc.

I think Abel should be buffed in 2 ways:

  • improve his worse tools
  • give Abel some help in his terrible matches

What I thought so far:

  • far Hp: the move is just plain bad - poor range and very slow (12 fr start up). I think it should become faster (less start up - 1-2 less frames) and/or maybe increase its range (horizontal hitbox)

  • far Hk: the move has good range but at 14 frames start up is just incredibly slow. Reduce the start up with 2 frames at least.

  • Wheel kick: another slow move. At 20-24-27 fr start up is very difficult to catch somebody off guard. I think reducing the start up should help.

  • Falling Sky: the regular version is ass. It needs improvement in order to do it’s intended job. I don’t know, a hitbox buff (maybe increase the hitbox horizontaly, or lower the hurtbox), maybe lower the start up…

  • Cod - 2nd and finishing low - these moves don’t combo, are very slow (22 fr start) and very punnishable on block (-5/-44). Right now is just a gimmick, so I would like to, maybe decrease the start up so it becomes a legit mix up tool.

  • Super: I agree that more range is needed

  • Ultra 2: maybe reduce the start up by 1 frame. I’m not very sure about this one, U2 was kinda… broken in Super, but maybe if the rest of the nerfs are kept…

  • far Mk: reduce the start up by 1 frame (7); +1 active frame (4); buff the hitbox for better AA

  • Overhead: I like Hfx idea, maybe add more hitstun

151

Btw, Juicebox sugestions:

Abel suggestions from Juicebox
Either F+MK forces stand on hit OR improve the vertical hitbox (southward) of close HP

The only reason I can tell for NOT making this change is because some of the higher ups like the fact that some characters can weasel their way out of this combo when they’re not supposed to. The problem is that it seriously hampers his ability to come back in particular matchups where he does not have ground dominance, with the biggest examples being Honda, Claw, and Fuerte.

Abel is +4 on hit, but nothing is guaranteed there on crouching hit against some characters. Smart players of those characters will almost always backdash or reversal in those situations to avoid all followups that aren’t a pure read. Unless Capcom is suggesting that reading the backdash OR the reversal WHILE confirming off of ONE HIT is a key skill for Abel players, then they should make this change to make his gameplan more consistent.

Improve Far HP and/or Far MK

These normals are practically worthless. Considering that the key aspects of Abel are already up to par, these normals could be retooled to help his ground game ever so slightly. One possibility is to remove the forward travel on MK, so that he does it “in place”. This may make it a viable anti-air for divekicks since it will be easier to space properly, particularly against Rufus. In other words, it would function very similarly to Guy’s st.LP. It’s also too slow to use as a viable trick up close (for example, cr.LP x4, whiff far MK, tornado throw), so if the forward motion is kept perhaps the startup can be reduced a few frames.

Far HP does good damage, but is has less range than F+MK making it useless since a F+MK on hit gives you, well, everything you want (unless they are a particular character and are crouching…). If the startup were reduced to the same amount as F+MK then it would perhaps be an attractive counter-poke. Additionally, you may consider giving it the Evil Ryu/Zangief knocks down on counter-hit treatment. Yet another possibility is to increase its hit-advantage, so that counter-hit far HP, link to F+MK becomes possible. However that would enable a 409 damage meterless combo if my math is right, so you’d want to reduce the damage of it as well if you made that change.

No other changes.

Abel has all of the anti-air and footsie tools he needs. More Abels need to poke with CoD (with 2 bars), antiair with MP or EX falling sky and with j.HP (reaction time is key here), cancel an antiair cr.MK into rolls, use LK wheel kick outside of F+MK range, and utilize smart defensive play to win more damage.

He has a major weakness to normal throws, but considering Abel can convincingly turn a match around by beating any of them with a meterless tornado throw I consider this to be a necessary evil.

152

Really? Even juice is suggesting this? I’m surprised he would be of that opinion…

153

YAY i’m so excited
I got a copy of Injustice Gods Among us Early!
I’m playing it now and it’s fantastic
I encourage all of you to give it a try!

154

I’m plannin to get it, will give it a try… Who’s top tier? LOL

155

You wanna go straight for the dirty stuff?!?!?
Pick Deathstroke!

He has a special ability is that his pistol shoots UNBLOCKABLE bullets
and he has a wake up messiah kick like move that seems to be pretty freakin safe on block
really OP at the moment, nobody can figure him out quite yet!

156

Hi guys, I searched capcom unity threads and tried to compile a buff list for most characters, based on the sugestions posted there.
The idea is - stronger characters will receive less buffs, weaker ones more, and top tiers mostly nothing.
I will post the entire buff list on capcom unity this week.

This is Abel’s list:

Abel

  • F+MK: forces stand on hit OR improve the vertical hitbox (southward) of close HP
  • far st MK: remove the forward travel
  • far st HK: reduce the start up by 2 frames (12); reduce the hurtbox (retract it)
  • EX Falling Sky: tweak the hitbox or add more invincibility, so it trades less
  • COD Second and Finish Low: reduce the start up by 4 frames (18)
  • cl HK (overhead): Give the overhead one more frame of advantage
  • far st HP: reduce the start up by 1 frame (11); increase its hit-advantage, so that counter-hit far HP, link to F+MK becomes possible; reduce the dmg by 10 (120)

Explanations:

[details=Spoiler]

  • F+Mk: The only reason I can tell for NOT making this change is because some of the higher ups like the fact that some characters can weasel their way out of this combo when they’re not supposed to. The problem is that it seriously hampers his ability to come back in particular matchups where he does not have ground dominance, with the biggest examples being Honda, Claw, and Fuerte.
    Abel is +4 on hit, but nothing is guaranteed there on crouching hit against some characters. Smart players of those characters will almost always backdash or reversal in those situations to avoid all followups that aren’t a pure read. Unless Capcom is suggesting that reading the backdash OR the reversal WHILE confirming off of ONE HIT is a key skill for Abel players, then they should make this change to make his gameplan more consistent.
  • far st Mk: This may make it a viable anti-air for divekicks since it will be easier to space properly, particularly against Rufus. In other words, it would function very similarly to Guy’s st.LP.
  • far st Hk: right now this move is pretty much useless, with 14 frames start up, 100 damage and a lack luster hitbox. With these buffs could serve as a better whiff punish
  • Ex Falling Sky: Only gripe with falling sky is the “EX trade”, that is to say trading ex falling sky results in abel taking full damage, opponent taking none, abel losing 1 meter, and getting a knockdown with no true setups afterwards. Disheartening, and makes EX Falling Sky useless outside of slightly more damage. Potentially tweak hitbox so that EX falling sky can aid abel fighting people who can change their jumpin trajectories a la Yun, Yang, Akuma, Cammy, Rufus…
  • Cod 2nd, finish low: There is currently no point to this move, and it only works in laggy online conditions. It is too slow to be a mixup device, and continuing Change of Direction to this eventuality will get you punished easily by good, attentive players thanks to the HUGE frame gap between it and Second Mid. Now it’s like Dudley’s Duck but highly situational; but with a purpose.
  • cl Hk (overhead): while Abel’s overhead is really fast, it does merely 30 dmg. Being +6 would make linking into far mp a little easier and linking into step kick on counter hit a little easier as well.
  • far st Hp: Far HP does good damage, but is has 12 frames start up and less range than F+MK, making it useless since a F+MK on hit gives you, well, everything you want. [/details]

Would you agree with this ? anything broken/ too strong ?

157

Hmm…
I like the level of attention being payed to Abel’s normals, it shows that Abel players really care for his footsie game and want to give Abel a stronger fundamental flavor rather than strengthening his already powerful knockdown game.

Although I’m happy for this I have to strongly disagree with the direction being taken on some of these normals, particularly far mk and far hp.
In this post I’ll lay out my ideas in regards to far Mk first and then I’ll go over the other parts of the buff list above.
To me, the forward movement on far Mk is the quality that makes it useful and unique.
Although it wasn’t mentioned, I wager that a good number of posters possible requested that a hit-box/start up speed to make it a better anti-air. I understand how players can want this, the normal comes across as a grounded anti-air and they simply feel it natural to buff it in a way to have it do it’s intended job.

Easy to sympathize with, but the wrong route to take I say.
It’s a relatively old myth but one that is still relatively alive that Abel’s anti-airs is in someway lacking or poor in anyway. It’s known amongst seasoned Abel players that between close hp, cr mk, jump back fierce, Ex falling sky, Abel has virtually spacing in which he is unable to handle an air-born opponent. Continuing on that note, his two primary anti-airs, cr mk and clhp are not only reliable but can be cancelled into for easy 50/50 set-ups that can be very difficult for opponents to deal with.

Alright, why did I point this seemingly trivial point? To demonstrate how redundant a ‘good’ far mk anti-air would be.
If far mk would to get a hitbox/speed make over to be a reliable anti-air, I don’t think there would be a spacing or too important of a scenario where it would counter in a way that would be better than the anti-airs that he already has. In other words, even with an improved far mk, why would an Abel player choose to anti-air with that when they can simply anti air with either cr mk, cl hp which lead to post oki?

No, making far mk a reliable anti-air would be redundant and would leave that normal STILL virtually useless compared to the other tools in Abel’s arsenal.

Now that that’s out of the way and I’ve explained why an improved anti-air mk wouldn’t be a good idea, let me now explain for a second time I believe, what I think would be a good change to the normal, a change that would not only make it useful for Abel but also unique.

I say remove as many frames of animation as possible?
8/3/15

8 start up, remove 2 frames to 6
3 active, remove 2 to 1
15, remove 3 to 12

complete move from 26 to 19 or perhaps lower!

Reason for this? If we were to leave Mk as it is in regards to hitbox but simply make it a faster move animation wise from start to finish, it would serve as a better ‘one button dash’. Often times in zoning match-ups such as Sagat or Ryu, there are some delicate spacings where as Abel one wants to close some distance between the opponent but at the same time does not want to commit to either a roll or a dash in fear of punishment in some form. Leaving the forward movement as it is right now but reducing the animation time would make far mk a VERY GOOD tool for quickly closing in relatively small amounts of distance to better engage footsies.

So ya, lengthy explanation
Far mk: Better anti-air? redundant, wouldn’t serve a good purpose
Far mk: faster normal, serve as a distance closer for certain zoning match-ups…

158

Abel needs absolutely no help in the damage department, any damage buffs in the form of additional frame advantage to create new combos or making previously difficult combos ought to immediately be put under suspicion.

Continuing in this spirit, I really appreciate the buff to Abel’s far roundhouse.
Buffing it’s speed to 12 frames ought to really give Abel a better spacing tool in certain match-ups. A relatively harmless buff overall that would do little more than give slight more relevance to a button that before was seldom used. :slight_smile:

Far fierce on the other hand needs reconsideration.
In the same regards of far hk, it’s a button that is seldom used and is a great candidate for a buff in some form or another.
Despite the fact that this button seldom hits, I think that giving Abel a full BnB combo on counter hit would would then net in an total of ~400 damage is a bad idea.
Again, I can sympathize with the desire of wanting his buttons to have uses and purposes, this however isn’t what we ought to do with it.

It has relatively good range and decent damage on it, why not perhaps give it a techable knock down similar to zangief’s far hp?
just an idea I think would be better.

159

Final comments.

Overhead being +6 on hit.
This I believe was my idea iirc. It’s a buff that was intended to do nothing more than to make a subsequent lk/mp a little easier and by extension, making counter-hit crmp/step kick easier as well.
Possibly unnecessary, but relatively harmless I thought.

Ex Fallingsky: Strong as it is currently I think.

Cod, 2nd low,: I say that if 2nd low were to come out faster and thus become a scarier/practical mix-up, it would be slightly overpowered to keep his frame advantage on FADC; retaining his ability to combo into down+fierce -> ultra.
For a viable second low, I think it would be fair to return the FADC frame advantage to +5 or perhaps +6 thus making Abel’s follow ups on fadc another simple cod combo or a combo into ultra at the cost of MORE meter.

Cod 3rd Low: A buff of any form. Start reduction seems fair.
They could take this move in a number of different directions.
they could give it armor breaking properties like 3rd Mid finish
give it one hit of ex armor to absorb moves
give it increase forward movement to catch ALL backdashes more reliably
give it throw invincibility
make it a TRUE command grab and not a low
make it safe on block

Any one or PERHAPS two buffs would be more than sufficient in making this a viable move.

I’ve already expressed my opinion on stepkick forcing stand: Much too powerful.

160

Nice.

  • far MK:
    yep I’ve read that sugestion - so you were the author, hehe. Most Abels wanted this normal to be an antiair, especially against divekicks
    Now, you make a solid point - no need for an antiair that won’t be used. My question is - do you think far Mk with these buffs (or with a start up /hitbox buff) couldn’t be a good AA agains diveckicks ? (Abel’s nemesys) esp. Rufus. That was my idea.
    If it’s not, then I change it and add your sugestion with the mini dash (interesting idea).

  • far HP: correct, it will lead to 400 meter combo. Why I thought this sugestion (coming from Juicebox) was ok (besides liking the idea of a new combo very much, haha) - is that this combo would require a counterhit with a 11 frames poke that has a meh hitbox.
    I thought this would be quite rare, and if you manage to counter poke with a 11 fr start move, then you deserve the combo.
    But if you still consider this buff too strong, then I remove it.

  • CoD: hmm. ok, on 2nd low - maybe +6 on FAdc ? (

  • 3rd LOw: ok, then what about the start up reduction I proposed (18 fr) and - maybe 1 Ex armor / or make it a true cmd grab (I like this idea quite a lot - but wouldn’t this make it a little too strong ? But the more I think the more I like it - a true cmd grab, hehe).

  • And now - F+Mk forcing stand: I know this has been discussed before, but why do you think it would be too powerfull ?
    I only found an argument against buffing cl st Hp hitbox (you could do crossup-st Hp whic hwould be too strong) - but nothing against step kick forcing stand.

Other ideas that i’ve found (in case we replace step kick buff):

  • wheel kick: reduce start up by 2-3-4 frames for L/M/H version

  • Ultra 2: 1 fr less start

  • Super: more range, for M/H 1 frame less start (something about better AA, better comboing…)