No they aren't. You suggested I was implying that one variation being not as good makes the best variation worse which isn't what I said at all. You're not understanding what I'm saying and that's where this whole thing is going downhill.
This sentence is where you're wrong:
"Tempest Lao has the best chart in the game in this hypothetical situation, so he's the best character."
because Tempest Lao isn't a character, he's a variation. That was my whole point. When people refer to one variation as the whole character they're not talking about the character which is where people who are just learning more about the game that come onto this site are going to get misinformed.
As for the insinuation that I'm a "contrarian" that's just finding anything to put my argument down which you like to do, even though in this situation I'm correct. You are speaking about a variation and referring to it as a character which is wrong. Or is that incorrect? Is that not a basic fact about MKX mechanics? Or did every variation suddenly become a character? There's a difference between treating variations as characters and referring to them as characters, one is fine the other is flat out wrong. But please, if 3 variations don't equal one character go ahead and explain to me why that's wrong.
Well of course if you're talking about Bone Shaper you're talking about Shinnok, that's not my point. My point is that talking about Bone Shaper as a character isn't right because t's not a character, it's a variation.
You say duh yet there's multiple instances of people not getting that...which is what my point is. Somehow this site turns from spreading misinformation to being against the one person who's just pointing it out: that 1 variation isn't the whole character, which as you seem to realise is obviously wrong.
I am not saying that and this misunderstanding is probably why you feel like I'm saying something weird. I'm saying if a character has 3 at least good variations then of course they're top 5 material, if a character has 2 of the best variations in the game and 1 still good variation then yes they can still be considered top 5 or top 10 or whatever you want, but if a character has 1 good variation, 1 ok variation and one variation that's not even worth touching because it's just lower mid tier or worse then I don't feel like they're top 5 material. Kung Lao is obviously top 5 material because he just has great tools in general with one of his variations being one of the best in the game, another one that's pretty good and another that's probably at least upper mid because Lao's overall tools as a
character are strong. Quan has three good/great variations, top 5
character. You see what I mean now? Please get what I mean now, I don't want to argue something that's not that hard to get
I'm not trying to downplay Shinnok, I understand Bone Shaper is a great
variation. But Shinnok as a
character has three variations and the other two don't just stop being a part of the character because one variation is better. Not one mention of Necromancer because noone even bothers to learn about it because they're too busy looking at one variation to understand him as a
character. I just don't feel a character with a variation like Necromancer is top 5 but that's my opinion. I could be wrong because as a character he's kind of like Kung Lao in that he has a top 5/10 variation, an A tier variation (Buzz Saw might be higher though) and a variation that's pretty mediocre and Kung Lao is a top 10 character so I'll think about it.
But you wouldn't call out Coach Steve for having the same opinions as me right? Typical.