jokey77
Character Loyalist
So if there is one final balance patch in the making, what should be changed for Predator?
Personally I only know HQT, so what I would suggest are these changes:
nerfs:
- Let the framedata of lowplasma remain the same, but slightly increase the duration of blockstun (e.g. by increasing the amount of active frames once the plasmashot hits the floor).
The idea is to make it easier for the opponent to gain momentum, once a low plasmashot has been blocked. Right now spamming "d4 into another lowplasma" is encouraged, mostly because it is hard to react to. If this was easier, the opponent could make better use of his plusframes.
Besides increasing the active frames would make it easier to punish whiffed lowplasma shots, which is not necessarily a bad thing either.
buffs:
- ex-scimitar should get double armor
Right now heavy pressure kills Predator. To a certain degree this is perfectly fine, because Predator is an offensive powerhouse. Then again some rushdown characters don't rely on fast multihitting strings (e.g. Goro) while others do (e.g. Liu Kang, Johnny Cage, Tanya). Thus against some characters ex-scimitar works like every other armored combostarter, while against other characters it is simply not worth the meter. Besides Predator has no backdash either, so some sort of universal defensive option is much needed. Giving ex-scimitar two hits of armor would be such an option. The move by itself could still be reacted and easily punished, but not by "accidentally" mashing buttons.
- b1~plasma cancel should be like +8 on block. (or b1 should get a 10f start-up and be +5 on block.)
If Predators lowplasma shots were nerfed (as suggested below), his rushdowngame would suffer too. Thus I suggest to give him some (execution heavy and not-braindead) options upclose. The b1-string offers no mixups by itself. Currently noone uses it anyway, mostly because upclose 2 is superior while at sweep distance people go for d4-lowplasma (faster, hitting low, better plusframes, ...). However if b1~plasma cancel would provide 8 plusframes, all of a sudden this would become a threat of some sort. Even though there was an armourable gap, 21[hitconfirm]2 would be a great frametrap. Due to autoblock having f12 link would not be a big deal, yet some sort of mindgame. Generally Predator could then work around his biggest flaw that hinders his rushdown: not having a viable mid.
Personally I only know HQT, so what I would suggest are these changes:
nerfs:
- Let the framedata of lowplasma remain the same, but slightly increase the duration of blockstun (e.g. by increasing the amount of active frames once the plasmashot hits the floor).
The idea is to make it easier for the opponent to gain momentum, once a low plasmashot has been blocked. Right now spamming "d4 into another lowplasma" is encouraged, mostly because it is hard to react to. If this was easier, the opponent could make better use of his plusframes.
Besides increasing the active frames would make it easier to punish whiffed lowplasma shots, which is not necessarily a bad thing either.
buffs:
- ex-scimitar should get double armor
Right now heavy pressure kills Predator. To a certain degree this is perfectly fine, because Predator is an offensive powerhouse. Then again some rushdown characters don't rely on fast multihitting strings (e.g. Goro) while others do (e.g. Liu Kang, Johnny Cage, Tanya). Thus against some characters ex-scimitar works like every other armored combostarter, while against other characters it is simply not worth the meter. Besides Predator has no backdash either, so some sort of universal defensive option is much needed. Giving ex-scimitar two hits of armor would be such an option. The move by itself could still be reacted and easily punished, but not by "accidentally" mashing buttons.
- b1~plasma cancel should be like +8 on block. (or b1 should get a 10f start-up and be +5 on block.)
If Predators lowplasma shots were nerfed (as suggested below), his rushdowngame would suffer too. Thus I suggest to give him some (execution heavy and not-braindead) options upclose. The b1-string offers no mixups by itself. Currently noone uses it anyway, mostly because upclose 2 is superior while at sweep distance people go for d4-lowplasma (faster, hitting low, better plusframes, ...). However if b1~plasma cancel would provide 8 plusframes, all of a sudden this would become a threat of some sort. Even though there was an armourable gap, 21[hitconfirm]2 would be a great frametrap. Due to autoblock having f12 link would not be a big deal, yet some sort of mindgame. Generally Predator could then work around his biggest flaw that hinders his rushdown: not having a viable mid.