+1
I don’t post here often, and I’m not even that good at the game, but I do understand how tier lists are generated and how matchups are considered. Most people seem to think that matchups are generated through statistics. If 100 random people played characters A and B, the ratio of win/loss should generate a an outcome that dictates matchup probabilities. This is not the case.
When considering matchups, you have to consider things like poking tools, set ups, knockdown opportunities etc. Player skill doesn’t play a role in this equation, and specific match videos don’t really help in this case. What you are considering is 100%-perfect-performance-with-character-A vs. 100%-perfect-performance-with-character-B. This means that each vortex set up, timing on pressing a button on jump in, option-select, safe jump timing, cross up distancing is performed without mistake. Zangief’s cross up splash on wake up is an example of these set ups. a meaty-safe jump-crossup-splash from Zangief cannot be stopped with a wake up jab.
The right way to think about a matchup is to think how much guesswork does it take during footsies or zoning for one character to score the knock down, or beat the other character’s normals. The faster and higher priority the normal the better. Gief’s st. strong is extremely fast and high priority, that takes little guesswork to use, where cody’s st. RH is very slow and very situation specific.
From here, you consider Character A’s knockdown set up oppertunities vs. Character B’s escape options. This includes where character A’s set up leaves him. How much dmg does it do? Does it lead to another set up? Is there a guessing game involved where it leaves character A at a disadvantage? This is scaled against Character B’s escape options. What odds does character B have to escape? Does character B have to deal with an option-select that will beat his escape options anyway? If he does escape the set up, is he still in a disadvantageous situation?
With this in mind, saying that “I had this experience” or “If he does this, i’ll just do that” isn’t really a valid response. Remember, tier lists and matchups are considered at the highest level of play. So thinking in this regard makes me agree with Sakeido. Atleast at the current state, without all of Cody’s set ups and option-selects discovered, I’d say yes. Zangief vs. Cody is a really bad matchup for Cody.
I hope this was informative, and some people learn to consider matchups better. Especially for a thread named “Cody’s worst matchups,” I’d hope people would come to an understanding of what matchups are before they post brash messages.
