What would you do to balance 3rd Strike?

Classic Fighting Games Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike
41

There’s a few things I’d do that I can think of off the top of my head. Firstly I’d make Chun-Li’s c.mk a link. Fair enough it’s a nice cancel, but she has far too much priority as it is. Restricting it to a link would require at least a little effort to use her effectively.

Secondly I’d give Ibuki normal stamina. She’s a great character imo, she has a lot of potential. But that damn stamina just ruins her completely. If she had the stamina of the twins or even Ken, it would improve her quite conciderably I think.

I’d also allow Makoto to block during Tanden. It’s a cool super imo, but the fact she can’t block just ruins it. I would make her meter longer though, the damage she does already with it is insane, if she could actually block it would be too short for what it is.

I can’t really think of much else now, I’m not trying to think of ways to bring the top tiers down, but bunch everyone else up to their level. Things like 3 Aegis or 2 Denjins I’m not too sure about, they’re pretty broken as it is and I think there could be better things done like damage tweaks etc. Some characters need their moves adjusted like Sean and Twelve, but I think recovery times and stamina etc will play the most part further down the list.

42

what to do to get 3s balance … give them all a good shower …
because they stink

43

Oh, I’d also possibly remove quick standing. Imo quick standing is the reason a lot of lower tier characters are where they are. Characters with unblockable set-ups like Ryu (Denjin), Oro and to some extent Urien all get penilised because of it. Of course a good Urien can predict a quick stand and know to throw a medium reflector, but for the other two there game is decreased dramaticaly because of it. And to be honest other match-ups don’t really have much use for it, it can be used to build meter but apart from that it’s pretty pointless in my eyes. Removing it might of course have too much of an effect on the tiers, but it would make some changes at least.

44

3s is pretty balanced but there are a few things I would change.

Ken: Less easy combos, less damage. take away his mp, hp chain.
Chun: A weaker SA2 and give her b.fierce, c.mk and low jab a nerf.
Yun: Yun’s fine. But if they were gonna nerf his genei-jin in ANY way at all they better make up for it by giving him more options without meter and give him more stamina.
Makoto: Nothing
Urien: nothing really.
Dudley: nothing really.
Yang: He’s fine the way he is.
Ryu: nothing
Oro: nothing really. Maybe a better throw.
Akuma: nothing.
Alex: Better supers.
Elena: ???
Ibuki: She takes too much damage. Give her just a LITTLE bit more endurance.
Remy: Make him do more damage, stun and give him some faster normals.
Hugo: He’s fine. He’s got obvious weeknesses, but if you take them away he’d probably be too good.
Necro: faster jump.
Q: make him a little faster
twelve: give him some good combos.
Sean: He’s supposed to suck

I’d also probably make throws 1 or 2 frames slower, make command grabs fast enough to beat normal grabs, and MAYBE have an alternate throwbreak command to make throws a little more effective in mixup situations. But I guess the throw system is fine as it is.

45

Let Oro use his other arm

46

i’d take away the shitty pointless ‘what if’ and ‘tier list’ threads.

47

He does. All three of his supers show him using his other arm for the EX versions.

48

Having the stamina of the twins wouldn’t help Ibuki a lot. The twins only have better defense than her by a few points. The twins are known for having bad defense as well. The real reason why the twins are a bit higher on the tier list is mainly cuz Yang can verify a lot of damage quickly with his EX mantis slashes. SA2 gives you enough bar to do crazy damage off of c.MK to EX. IF the opponent isn’t blocking low, GGPO to a 1/6th of their life bar (more on characters with low defense). Yun is better because of Genei Jin…he’s just too beastly with that super.

The main reason why Ibuki has low defense to begin with is because when played correctly, she’s one of the trickiest characters in the game to fight against. She has frame advantage on way too many of her normals and has some pretty damaging EX combos. Her rushdown game is too sick and like Makoto, she can randomly get away with near perfect rounds just by simply outguessing the opponent multiple times.

If she messes up though…that’s when she takes it bad. Otherwise, Ibuki generally doesn’t have a lot of matchups that she really can’t win. I would say the top tiers and Makoto are the only characters she has real trouble against. Which means she has more going for her than some of the other characters in the game for sure.

She has the poking game/offensive game to deal with a majority of the characters in the game. Solid AA options, not very easily shaken up on wake up (people usually just stay away from her after knocking her down because of EX dp), air chains to mess people up as she’s jumping in and generally just more ways to mix things up than you can shake a stick at.

You’ll see a new mix up from Ibuki just about every other match vid you see with her. She has tons of ways of making the opponent guess during her pressure game and that’s what makes her powerful in the right hands (even with the low defense). If Ibuki did have better defense power she would easily be pretty close to top tier. It is unfortuante that making one mistake can put Ibuki in a big whole after performing so well in a round but…that IMO is what makes her fun to play. Learning to limit your mistakes and always be thinking of a new way to out-think the opponent.

49

True, still, her stamina needs increased.

50

I agree, her stamina is decreased a bit much for a character that just doesn’t do the damage she used to in Second Impact. She would need more than Yun/Yang’s defense power to move up though. At least on the level of Ken or Chun Li to really move up. A lot of people agree that nerfing her combos/supers was enough and that making her defense power insanely low really degraded her as a character. She could easily move up in the tier list but it’s that low defense that always keeps her a step below.

She didn’t take damage the best in SI either but she made up for it by basically being Chun Li with a better rush game. She had a low hitting confirmable chain (c.LK, MP) into her Hashin Sho super that could set up ridiculous combos. Not to mention she also had most of the awesome pokes she does in 3S (and still had the slide attack from 3S). She had combos in SI that could pretty much deplete half of your life bar if she had enough EX.

51

To make Remy’s SAIII better - make it an antiair, perhaps when he parries the hit, he does a ‘giant’ flash kick that does a decent amount of damage.

52

I’d only nerf 3 things;

Chun SA2 becomes one meter.
Yun SA3 takes 75% longer to charge.
Ryu SA3 takes 75% longer to charge. Takes 50% longer to boost up the fireball.

Then try to bring all the characters to roughly where Ken is. I don’t think he’s broken in any way and is by far the most complete of the characters. Some characters do need boosting, but by and large I’d just try to bring all those wasted Super Arts into play.

Sean:
Get rid of the crazy recovery on specials.
Get rid off the mashing on that DP super.
Faster recovery on Hadou Burst, so it could juggle with multipe stocks, like Ryu SA1.

Twelve:
Add 2 or 3 target combos to give him some combo potential.
A command overhead.
Shorter bar and faster recovery on XCOPY.
Make XFLAT easier to land, somehow.

Ken:
Stop SA1 missing after 4 hits. Slightly better horizontal range on startup.
Get rid of that mashing nonesense on SA2.

Akuma:
SA2 as per Ken SA1
SA3 moves forward a bit on startup.

Urien:
Replace C.MP with something to link to SA1 and SA2. Gives him reasons to go low.

Q:
Quicker normals that allow him to actually capitalize on successful parries.

Alex:
Decent frame advantage off some normals.
Give Hyperbomb Giga’s like startup.
SA2 stops missing after 1 or 2 hits.

Makoto:
Make SA3 only last 1/3 as long. This would be an advantage.

Hugo:
Much better priority and damage on SA2.
Activate SA2 in mid air too.

Remy:
SA3 cancels off everything, like Shungokusatsu. Mostly for when stuff is blocked.

53

I’d just heavily nerf the damage on SA2.

I’d make the bar as long as Denjin is.

I’d just make his s.MK slightly faster to recover. Why would you touch Denjin? It’s the main reason he’s viable.

Fix the specials, give that roundhouse its old linkability. Raise the stun on some of his moves. Higher priority dp.

Just up his damage a little.

“Vacuum” SA1? Maybe.
Tone down the damage on that target combo, or at least scale a little more.

Vacuum shoryureppa works.

[/quote]
Urien
Replace C.MP with something to link to SA1 and SA2. Gives him reasons to go low.
[/quote]

Reasonable enough!

And some priority for the love of god.

Chop off a little of the startup on some of those slower normals.

Or just let her block and tone the damage down a slight tad.

o_O

Why not just give him another super?

54

I’m not sure about drastic changes, like replacing supers. With existing characters we know what the problems are (even if we don’t all agree on how to fix them).

Chun wouldn’t be the same if people weren’t afraid of eating SA2. She’d be like Twelve. People would rush her down relentlesly. But without altering the damage, you’d still get all the pressure play from one stock, while getting rid of dominating scenarios like when Chun has max meter in the middle of round 2.

I agree about the length of Yun SA3. Even without Genei Jin he’s still a better character than some of the lower tiers. It’d be interesting to see him doing more work outside of Genei Jin, even if it’s just attacking for meter.

Ryu’s stun ability, plus the insane stun you can get (very easily) by knockdown Shoryuken xx Denjin is just too easy. By increasing the fireball charge times (the flashes from spinning the stick) you’d get rid of scenarios where Ryu can knock down and hit them with full strength Denjin on wakeup. I don’t recall off hand just how much damage this does, but If they miss the first parry, the round is practically yours.

I think Ken is perfectly balanced. If he wins, it’s by consistently landing small combos and creating opportunities to hit with SA3. Most basic Ryu combos do equal or better damage than Ken SA3 alone.

I think Twelve would really benefit from some target combos. They wouldn’t link or cancel into supers, maybe into a special, I don’t know. But after doing crappy damage Twelves problem is a lack of options. His normals are garbage, leaving him with throw, specials and IAD’s. With a target chain like LK, MP say (no cancel or link potential), or J.MK, J.HP, DRA (all in the air, or air to ground) he’d at least have more options. Nearly all his air normals are useless for jump-ins. Some of them should come out faster.

Makoto’s SA3 is pretty unique. I like that you can’t block. The problem with it is that after you do what you intended (combo, punish, whatever) you’ve got a long period where you’re a sitting duck. Once your opponent is back on his feet, they’ll hit you with everything that’s hard to parry. If the super lasted 1/3 as long, this vulnerability would be lessened. They miss say, psychic Shoryuken, you block activate super and land anti air Fukiage on their way down, juggle (possible? I don’t play Makoto) and soon after they’re back on their feet, you’re back to normal. The meter should probably be shortened too.

55

What I Would Do For 12 to make him better

[LIST]
[]Make Standing close MK cancelable into specials
[]Make crouching MK cancelable
[]Make crouching LP/LK able to chain into themselves
[]Remove the effect where the characters are moved a character’s length away when 12 activates SA1
[]Make NDL, EX NDL comboable
[]Command Over-Head
[]Make jumping HK cancelable
[]Have aerial AXE have juggle potential so 12 can land first and juggle the opponent with a AXE maybe I dunno
[]Also make jumping HP cancelable and verifiable for SA2
[]Give BMK a larger hit-box
[]Give SA1 more vertical range and cover all the ground in front of him, cause it doesnt come until a character’s length away from which is bad for AA close-in jumps lol
[]more damage lol uh duh
[]make EX AXE able be comboed
[]Get all 18hits out of SA2 when it hits as an AA
[/LIST]

56

In general probably what would make most people happy would be:

Chun-Li : SA2 reduced to 1 Stock so that it can justify her taking off half your life from her c.mk hit confirm more reasonable. I say just make it so that her c.mk is better off as a cheap c.RH that knocksdown for less damage… but maybe that’s just me.

Ken : He’s a solid character and honestly I just don’t think he’s as bad as everybody puts him out to be. A good Ken player is a good Ken player, but at least all his moves don’t out-prioritize you. His SA3 does shit damage anyways and it’s pretty much there to guarantee that he can play mind games with you after he puts you down… again. Probably if anything though, I guess SA3 getting it’s stock reduced to 2 and having 3/4 max bar would satisfy everybody except the Ken players.

Yun : Fine as he is. He’s dominating because people put work into him, he’s not as easy to play as most people forget to credit him for and doing most of the things he does requires a lot of time. Pretty much doing anything to him will gimp his character except maybe lowering his damage while in GJ by 2/3 of what it is now.

The 3 big bosses of 3S right there is dealt with minorly. For me, I just find that Chun-Li was the worst person to fight just because all of her moves had some bs range and priority and her SA will always hit you if you decide to do any sort of jump in attack which in turn has a high chance of getting parried and you will get punished for it.

As for other character improvements for fun… I probably only see a need for Sean and Twelve to receive and upgrade and as well as a couple of SA from the lower-mid tiers.

Sean :

  • Reduce recovery after his hurricane kick on hit so that he can combo it and make full use of the 6 hit system.
  • For such a crappy angle on the uppercut he should at least either have more priority or damage… or both. I wouldn’t mind if his HP Uppercut had better range as well since it tends to whiff a lot after doing certain combos unless you started your combo really close.
  • Increase in stun would be nice as well so that at least he’s a viable character and if anything make his basketball taunt faster so that at least he can play mind games with it like Dudley does.

Twelve :

  • It’d change his game a lot, but maybe allowing him to cancel any air attack to any other air attack would be nice. It doesn’t feel so extreme to me, but at least you can do something if they parry that one hit.
  • Allow him to super jump cancel off of any attack that hits, parried or not. Continuous Air dashes isn’t easy and having the option to is nice with certain moves since it allows you to run away if you need to.
  • Give SA2 2 stocks and the ability to cancel off air moves and dashes.

Stun increase might be a nice addition, but then again they only need enough to be viable, adding stun or stamina is overkill as you have enough tools to prevent damage already.

Only SAs I really believe need tweeking are:

Remy’s SA3 - Just make the move cancelable whenever. The SA just isn’t usable at all. Having it cancelable means that you can use it as a mindgame as well as something to that can be used to extend combos and for the amount of bar it takes to charge up, it’s a good trade since you lose a lot of Remy’s strong lockdown attacks such as his EX LoVs. It’s a fine, but not so fair trade for Remy users since in the long run it’s still a novelty to current Remy players, but it can become a lot more viable then it is now.

Ibuki’s SA3 - Just give it another stock. I don’t really see why they gave this SA 1 stock, it’s ridiculous since the damage isn’t even that great. 3 Stocks and a Ken size meter would probably make this SA something people would consider using over SA1.

Of course at high level play these changes won’t do much, but they would enhance low-mid level play.

57

You forgot about Makoto

58

Makoto is perfect the way she is. In the hands of a beginner she is incredibly predictable and easy to beat. In the hands of a skilled player, she becomes a beast. You need to have a more random/wild style of play to be able to play her with success at the higher levels of intermediate and high level plays. She’s a beast on rushdown, but what about on knockdown? She is fine how she is, tweaking her SA3 won’t do much for her game at all. You have SA2 as the meter and combo offensive style and SA1 as the defensive style. SA3 right now is defensive for buliding up meter (which I don’t like anyways since if you’re stuck on the ground, you don’t have SA1 to bail you out) and you can’t end the SA, so you’re a sitting duck unless you can parry like a pro. Raising her defense would contradict the whole point of the going crazy and losing your defensive capabilities in turn for power. If this were MvC2, you could just throw Super Armor on her and she’d be a wrecking train that nobody would want to play anymore.

Her assets are her offensive game: Speed, Comboability and Stun. Why lower these when her defensive capabilities are extremely crap?

You want to tone somebody down, tone down Dudley’s 60% Stun 4 hit combo that doesn’t require meter and does as much damage as a super… but I won’t complain about him since Dudley is who he is and Urien will always hate Dudley.

59

Yeah Sean’s Tornado sucks, everytime someone uses it on me and it connects, I get a free throw lol. Give him 2I SRK back. Better recovery on everything. Make Hadou-Burst t least 2 hits, so the opponent has more to parry. Give more range to SA2 be able to reset to SA2 as well maybe.

60

They could just make Sean’s Hadou a 1 hit stun fireball. That’d roll some heads and some eyes.