crLk crLP shp light Gekiro worked. crMp hands worked. Oga to super worked.
Ok I may have exaggerated a bit
Oga to super is not a confirmed nerfs as far as i can tell yet, it’s arguable whether it’s reverted buff or a new nerf.
cr.LK xx cr.LP -> st.HP into light Gekiro was distance dependent though. If it was from further away light Gekiro might miss.
cr.LK xx cr.LP -> st.MK into light Gekiro was mostly universal I believe, but may have whiffed on crouching Chun.
Gen is SIGNIFICANTLY better in AE2012 than Super
crMP in Mantis was 7F startup. 5F startup is a huge jump for such a far move that is special cancelable.
Target combo in addition to increasing hit confirm options and overall damage output also builds him significantly more meter than previously.
crHK in crane got almost double the active frames making it AA better.
Gekiro builds more meter and causes hard knockdown
Those are all things that directly led to him becoming strong. Personally I never felt Gen was below low mid tier at worst in Super, a lot of that was people dropping him due to how harshly he got nerfed from Vanilla and the fact he is a difficult character to play and few people had success. Remember, back in Super people also thought Fei was low-mid tier, some people thought Oni was bottom 5 in the game on release in AE. Super also didn’t exactly have a long shelf life before AE came out. Super - AE is almost the same as AE - 2012 duration. There was a lot of tier list speculation that in hindsight was a bit preemptive. Every single character added in Super except Adon and Ibuki were unquestionably worse than Gen though (many of them still are in AE2012 for that matter)
Knowing what we know now (and for the most part even back then) these characters were pretty obviously worse than Gen in super:
Makoto, Cody, Guy, Thawk, Deejay, Hakan, Juri, Dudley, Dan, El Fuerte(other than Derp U2), Dhalsim(Though he was better than AE for sure), Blanka were all unquestionably worse than Gen in Super. (Makoto really REALLY improved in AE).
I’d also argue that Honda (in hindsight) and Gouken were weaker than Gen but those are less clearcut IMO. Overall that is 12-14 characters easily ranked worse out of a cast of 35 at the time.
As xian said, crane buffs look nice but are basically useless since it’s still going to be hard to land a roll when most of the times you’ll want to be in mantis in those up-close situations, and I think i can agree with that.
The only buffs are mantis U2 (which was announced as a 600 stun ultra and got reduced to 300-450) and the general stun values increased by 50 (funny how gen gets 50+ stun, and e.ryu gets now to 950 stamina having been introduced at 850, supposed to be a “glass cannon”)
Other announced buffs like mantis sHP disappeared.
The rest is nerfs and more nerfs, with the FA nerf being the worst of all, with people claiming they fixed it because it didnt match the animation when 90% of the movelist of the entire cast in SF4 is not matching the animation anyway.
Lk gekiro nerf is also very bad.
Besides everything… Amiyu is still rocking the fock on with gen in japan, raping everyone, ranked 4th in the arcade usf4 leaderboard.
Yeah, crane buffs will require playing differently and/or switching stances a lot. Not even particularly good for the effort required. It’d be one thing if he could combo out of Jyasen as was originally theorized due to a typo of +3F on hit. Even if they made it so he couldn’t loop rolls it might have been useful simply for stance change combo to crMP - Hands. Now it’s just a very difficult combo that has a lot of room for error for only a little bit more damage.
Gen got it harsh. I’m curious to see if the final build has changed DWU indicator or not because if not he might be able to change his setups easily enough on reaction. However his overall reward is lower and his wakeup is now worse too when on defense.
One nice thing is that I’m pretty sure Gen’s mantis crMP will cover both backdash and forward dash punishing most characters DP FADCs now.
Mantis st.MK should be a bit better since it moves him forward more and has more hitstun (so if Ryu just releases focus for example, you’ll most likely be in advantage after trade)
Well, a better Roll on block means it’ll be a safe chip on most characters after hitting with an overhead. I was secretly hoping they would make EX roll on hit/block better as well.
I tried to watch a lot of videos, and I do believe he can certainly change his setups on reaction to the DWU indicator from a forward throw and EX Gekiro. I believe sweep may be possible but I think you have to pay extra attention to the screen.
From what I’ve seem in japanese videos, hard knockdown moves with huge frame advantage can all be ajdusted, like ibuki’s neckbreacker. Moves that requires you to take action immediately after the knockdown, like ryu’s sweep, are the one that suffers the worst.
Hard to say how easy it is, but it’s possible if we find out how to kill those extra frames. Sweep’s advantage might be too short for anything, but ex gekiro will be legit.
Fake crossups and unblockables were all big deal for Gen, but I believe his pressure is still above average. His damage and neutral are what worries me.
I also believe Gen will have to play more like a charge character too. It doesn’t fit his low stamina status, but I guess we’ll have to make it happen.
Which matchups you guys think will see changes? Honda should be better, Fei as well, Guile might be the same, Deejay may get worse (safe chip from lk sobat I think is big deal for him, even though he should still be a weak character, considering most people opinions), Rose will probably be very hard…
Am I missing something or did they buff it?
On another note guys if you have new footage of gen from arcade or anything please post it, I’m having a hard time finding it.
I think Ibuki is the exception because she can adjust her setups during her jump, having more frames to react.
I think Deejay might actually get better. Safe chip isn’t really safe due to it being -3 on block and it should be in HP hands range. However, hands at the max range would be fully punishable with U1 on block (I think it only partially connects in 2012 and Gen can block afterwards).
Rose will certainly get more difficult. I think Juri, Evil Ryu, Vega and Gouken will get harder as well.
It’s actually difficult to tell who else will get easier in terms of match-up.
Obviously. I never said otherwise.
I do disagree that Gen was clearly better in Super than half those you listed, but I think we’d both agree that that discussion is pretty pointless these days.
Ultimately, I just don’t think Gen’s buttons are so much better than everyone else’s that we can reasonably claim he’ll be mid tier in Ultra until we have more actual gameplay experience.
Exactly. I’ve been saying this all along. The crane buffs are much worse in practice since you still want to be in mantis up close.
Why would DJ matchup get better? Something about his changes made him more vulnerable?
Edit: Maybe Crane is better upclose too? I mean, we got confirms with new cr.jab…
L. Sobat usualy avoided cr. mp which was very annoying. As far as I know it shouldn’t anymore.
Oh, good point. I’m a little behind his changes. Good news.
USFIV is a game where you get happy about others characters nerfs instead of your own buffs I guess. =p
Couldn’t have described it better myself. God I do feel ashamed but i fucking love that nerf for dee jay. The ammount of fucking times i used cr. mp out of habbit to get hit out of it. Also yes. I’m a terrible person.
Gen will remain high tier vs intermediate skilled opponents and low at high level.
Yeah of course Crane got definitely better since some kind of hitconfirm is now possible from crLP
But at the same time why would you want to stay in crane upclose rather than mantis considering you don’t have a low hitting light attack to start combos and crouch tech when necessary, no significant tools for frame traps, all with the restrictions of charge moves limiting mobility.
Unless crane combos end up dealing way more damage than mantis, gen’s playstyle shouldn’t change a lot in this area.
They’re trying to make use use more crane stance but the reality is… those are just, even if very useful and needed, a bunch of situational attacks (sMP overhead, sHP scoop, jump-ins, air-to-air, crHK anti-air, some crLK juggles, cHP stun value). You use mantis for most of the work (including up-close situations) and go to crane when needed, then back to mantis right away almost everytime.
The only time I personally go for crane upclose is when i really need that crane crHK crouch tech against dive kicks.
Crane got better in USF4 but mantis should still be predominant unless something big gets figured out.
Is Mantis cr.lk, cr.lp, Crane cr.lp, cr.mp xx l roll not a viable combo? With this you can continue pressure midscreen. Even if its -1 on block, have you seen what Oni gets away with on his -2 slash?
I think stance changing is gonna be a bigger factor in how we want to approach our opponents.