Should NRS legalize custom variations for competitive play? (Poll)

[spidey300]

good thing there's a maybe because there's some stuff in custom variations that would need to be looked at. I'm not trying to fight people with their custom super characters

 

[Jynks]

Variations can't get into competitive play until nrs builds a FAST interface like button config onto the vs screen.

 

[Tanya-Fan-28]

Personally I think the unpredictability would be fun. Its like the SC6 OC dilemma where the height and body types affect different outcomes from specific moves. There are no rules to fighting games the way I see it. Even if I hate fatal blows, I still respect that they're there and that other people still use them. So if I have to adapt to a custom variation in rank, so be it. All the more challenging, plus its easy to see when a player put some thought into there variation.

 

[stokedAF]

Why not just open up all of those presets? There like 7 for each character including the tournament ones.

 

[grandabx]

I guess is this would be absolutely brutal on the dev team for upkeeping balance. Would love to see it though

Not really. They have the community to assist with that.

 

[Xerclipse]

I want custom variations. And the cost of it is that there is gonna be more work done to balancing them. The devs and community would need to put their heads together and find out how to balance them. The fear that "its gonna be unbalanced" is true, but only the first month or two until we figure it out. Thats gonna be fixed to the best of our ability when everyone is committed to custom variations. I feel like this would increase the hype in tournaments that Im missing when I watch MK11 vs watching MKX. More characters would be nutty, and you'll have characters you dont see in tournaments skyrocket in the meta. Would Dvorah give Geras a challenge in custom? Probably but we don't know yet for sure unless we all try this out. Kabal air dash combos are gonna be fun to watch. I would advocate for more tournaments hosting custom variations.

I would not be saying this if the majority of the legal variations we have were mostly fun. Many of those variations feel rushed. They either need to tweak those moves or change the move list they have altogether.

 

[LawAbidingCitizen]

I guess is this would be absolutely brutal on the dev team for upkeeping balance. Would love to see it though

I feel like they never should have limited access to all variations to begin with. It's not like balance isn't an issue with set variations cuz it is. Either way the game needs to be balanced. With custom I feel balancing will happen all together and allow characters to feel more open and free. If they keep it preset then it will take forever to balance every character combination making me fear the game will never be quite balanced.

Custom was what they say us and I say they go fully custom. If something is broke or a combination is too strong it's a patch away from fair. Every game has balance issues, characters with 7-3 and characters with 3-7, there are so many benefits to making it custom and only one legit con (balance might be harder).
If the game was perfectly balanced on day one I'd understand the holdback but it's not we have Geras and we have D'Vorah matchups.

I made a thread about MK11 lacking depth (Which 70% of TYM felt the same) and custom variations would be a great way to mitigate that issue.

I know many feel there is balance issues and many have different solutions to fix it. I think more comboability and more character tools would benefit nearly every character but others want custom to fill that hole which I welcome to see if it is what we need. I say give it a chance and if it's not working then go back to presets. The world isn't gonna crumble if we test out custom variations in ranked/tournament.

 

[ChatterBox]

Didn't one of the devs say a while ago (I think on twitter?) that if they went the customs in tournament route, picking them on the character select screen would be super easy for them to put in the game? Can anyone find that? I think a good UI for picking them, and the symbols for each move replacing the text for the variation name in tournament mode would be enough for people to know what's up.

Also, yes I would like it. I say after EVO let's open the game up and let people get crazy for a while. I want my darn clone divekick please!

 

[LawAbidingCitizen]

Precisely this. How can someone train against a custom variation that they've never seen before, and regardless of the same character, fighting someone else is probably always going to be a different variation, meaning a different unknown matchup.

These problems are not legit reasons to not even try custom. Honestly none if it is broke, the only thing that will come off it is different tier placements and balancing can easily fix that.
As for training against unknown specials that has allready been solved. Ability icons that are displayed on customization screen, character select screen, loading screen and in game below health bars.
Kabal with: NDC, Low Hook and Extended Hook.
Kotal with: Kahn-cut, CG and Totem.
This allows players to know what they are up against and know the matchup. This also helps eliminating counter picking.
All competitive players have to memorize characters moves and this is no different. Right now players are only memorizing the most viable tournament variations and the rest is left for dead.

Many characters mid tier to bottom tier can benefit greatly from custom variations giving them freedom and fixing poor variation loadouts. If anything happens to be broke it needs to be balanced anyways and this is the quickest way to get it noticed. Not in casual online where most players don't even punish -18 moves on block or kotals 41 frame startup sword Pound kissing them in the face.

I for one hope they do this because many characters loadouts are lacking and the Characters suffer from it in many ways.
I think most of the problems are poor loadouts, poor frames, poor Krushing Blow requirements that are causing many characters to lack compared to well rounded characters like:
Sonya, Geras, Erron, SubZero, Scorpion.

 

[Bliss]

No. I like the presets. I don't like the open field option. I hope NRS sticks to their guns; but, I bet they'll change it. Everyone so happens to cower to complainers these days.

 

[youthinkyoubadyouaintbad]

No, variations are dumb and have always been dumb. At least mkx had 3 variations set in stone and was tolerable. If casuals want to throw poop at each other with custom moves they can be my guest. Wake up people, NRS has no idea what they are doing with the variation system this time around - alarm bells should be ringing in your head when the tournament variations aren’t even the default ones and you have to set them for every single character. Next game is going to have some kind of customizable frame data at this rate. Imagine if tekken 7 had ‘custom variations,’ all the pros would be turning against harada/Namco. I suspect street fighter players would have a similar reaction against the devs to ‘custom variations.’ But for some reason the NRS community either likes it/accepts it or mildly disagrees at most. Yeah thanks NRS I don’t want more characters or have a complete coherent character just give me more variations please

 

[Deleted member 35141]

I would have said yes a couple days ago but ive witnessed some broken moves lately. Baraka has some dirty moves that say screw neutral.
On the other hand I feel my mains have non variation moves that fit their/my playstyle better.

 

[Peckapowa]

there's some pretty strong moves in there

 

[Kroaken]

Too many things to remember or one OP combination - pick one argument. Christ.

 

[OzzFoxx]

What would custom variations really add to competition, the special moves in this game are so muted that I don’t think it’d have a big effect. I don’t believe a worse player w a custom variation would beat a better player w a tourney variation. Just about all that seems to matter is who has good strings/normals and who doesn’t.

 

[Lt. Boxy Angelman]

its completely laughable people are using balance as an excuse when currently the game is so unbalanced.

Please compare a kollector vs geras
scorpion vs shaokahn
erron black vs kotal

The game is already unbalanced. lets at least make it fun

Seconded.

I'm in the boat that believes the game was always originally intended to have open builds, but they decided to scrap it at the last minute so they can add it to an expansion as an appealing "HEY LOOK WHAT WE FINALLY DID" perk to draw in more players.
Because why give us now what you can sell to us a second time later?

Anyway, legalize everything.
There are too many characters who feel incomplete as fuck because they can't use everything they have at their exposure, especially since it'd be fair to say we already have our Top 5 (Erron, Geras, Sonya, Scorp, Sub).

 

[Hellbringer]

Dont put things in a game that ur not gonna be able to use. Its the dumbest shit. Why waste effort in making abilities that ur not allowee to use? Balance? Maybe next time dont give everyone 15 different abilities. Never seen this in a game before where your not allowed to use all of the tools. Never seen a fighting game where they put so much time in singleplayer trying to make it a grindfest.

 

[grandabx]

im for kustom variations but how would it work? wouldnt you not know which moves you opponent has until they use it on you? if you had a minute to see which moves your opponent equipped then it seems fair. like another user said theres way too many moves characters have locked away. if theres no kustom variations at least bring in more variations.

They design a universal Tournament Mode.

It has a 20-25 second time limit to select the below options:

1. Character and color (no new outfits)
2. 1-3 custom variation moves
3. Button configuration/button test
4. Stage select is locked on random select (no player advantage)
5. Game can't be paused until after the victor is announced (no more of that excitement-killing pause & rematch nonsense)

Every move in the game has its own unique symbol/emblem and they are displayed at the versus screen and are visible underneath the respective character's stamina bar.

Tournament organizers
just have to turn on tournament mode and they're good to go.

Every move in the game can already be used in the lab.

 

[Ck AeroVoid]

f*ck'n Hell Yea!
IT Should have been in since the beginning!
If something is broken patch her up!

 

[grandabx]

Too many things to remember or one OP combination - pick one argument. Christ.

#1 Casual statement of the thread.

Kroaken: Too many things to remember.

Starcraft 2 player (or any RTS, which have a FAR bigger mainstream audience): Hold my beer...

Ever heard of "the fog of war (FOW)"? Fighting games don't have to go through that even with it's limited tools. Know how many units a single faction has and how many different ways they can be used in Starcraft all while applying The FOW?

 

[scrubjesus111]

What would custom variations really add to competition, the special moves in this game are so muted that I don’t think it’d have a big effect. I don’t believe a worse player w a custom variation would beat a better player w a tourney variation. Just about all that seems to matter is who has good strings/normals and who doesn’t.

This is not true for most characters. Some specials can completely change the mix ups and damage that a character gets, and the neutral options. It changes everything.

 

[ChoseDeath]

I say no. I have played competitively before (locals only in MK9) so I understand that whole aspect of it.

As someone who will never, ever play in that environment again (love to watch only) and is going to be playing single player and with my friends 90% of the time, I would offer this view. If you allow Custom variations in the tournament scene, it follows that you will have to patch moves accordingly if you find something broken or OP. But NRS obviously intends players to grind the absolute shit out of the single player content. So if we do find ridiculously OP stuff, I want that in the game to help the massive grind in the Towers. I don't want the competitive tournament scene to overshadow the offline, casual community's fun. I like the separation of the two spheres.

 

[deathstroke187]

this is why thrump is your president

 

[Kroaken]

#1 Casual statement of the thread.

Kroaken: Too many things to remember.

Starcraft 2 player (or any RTS, which have a FAR bigger mainstream audience): Hold my beer...

Ever heard of "the fog of war (FOW)"? Fighting games don't have to go through that even with it's limited tools. Know how many units a single faction has and how many different ways they can be used in Starcraft all while applying The FOW?

I really recommend you re-read my post, friend. These are the arguments of the anti-kustom krowd. And they conflict on a basic level. Which is hilarious to me. If you've been around, you'd know I've been for kustom variations the whole time.

 

[xSkeletonSmasherx69]

Since this is the official MK forum let it be known custom variations are now official. The vote has ended. Spread the word.