MK1 Patch Notes

[Juggs]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1720495561952854336

I like Dragon, some stuff I'd have no issue with but I'm gonna pass on some of these suggestions.

I think Scorpion F32 mid is a boring idea for a change.. like you just get a combo on block no downside? Its not that it sounds too cheap just.. unimaginative

Both of Shujinko's punch and kick are +1? That's a plus mid with a gap for everybody. How about the punch be plus or and the mid stay as is so they both have more uses?

I think Sonya is fine and doesn't need a projectile ambush.

It's an interesting suggestion but one that Dragon caveated by saying might be broken but I've seen this suggestion made around.. Darius kick needs to stay one bar or it's going to be hard to blockable city

F32 absolutely should be mid-mid. And what does “like you just get a combo on block no downside” even supposed to mean? Anyway, I think that’d be a good buff and also making 21 mid-mid. These are very small buffs but I think that they’d help Scorpion out a lot. He definitely would need more but I genuinely would satisfied with this for now as it’s a good start

And the Darrius kick should not cost a full bar of Kameo meter imo. Yes it’s really good but it’s not so good that it should cost a full bar of Kameo meter. I think it costing around 60% (MAYBE 70%) would be more than sufficient.

People still aren’t understanding that you don’t want to get rid of good moves characters and Kameos have, and you want to make decent moves even better. Especially on characters and Kameos that are either low tier or very mid mid tier. You want character and Kameo teams to have awesome synergy, combos, setups, etc, and not just every character having to use the same Kameo (aka Cyrax). And you do this by not super nerfing everything good, but only SLIGHTLY nerfing the REALY GOOD stuff, and buffing the rest of the stuff. And how much you buff the rest depends on how good they already are. Essentially, on a scale of 1-10, your goal should be to either make moves a 7, or to make a Kameo’s synergy with a character a 7 or higher. That doesn’t necessarily mean bringing a 10 down to a 7 or a 1 up to a 7, but working towards making that the goal in general with of course a bunch of exceptions should, imo, be NRS’ goal. ¯\(ツ)/¯

 

[CrimsonShadow]

People still aren’t understanding that you don’t want to get rid of good moves characters and Kameos have, and you want to make decent moves even better. Especially on characters and Kameos that are either low tier or very mid mid tier. You want character and Kameo teams to have awesome synergy, combos, setups, etc, and not just every character having to use the same Kameo (aka Cyrax). And you do this by not super nerfing everything good, but only SLIGHTLY nerfing the REALY GOOD stuff, and buffing the rest of the stuff. And how much you buff the rest depends on how good they already are. Essentially, on a scale of 1-10, your goal should be to either make moves a 7, or to make a Kameo’s synergy with a character a 7 or higher. That doesn’t necessarily mean bringing a 10 down to a 7 or a 1 up to a 7, but working towards making that the goal in general with of course a bunch of exceptions should, imo, be NRS’ goal. ¯\(ツ)/¯

The tricky part is that when you start buffing tons of things, it's easy to overcalculate.

Everyone talks like it's easy, like you just pick number "7" on a scale, instead of "10", and that's how you patch a game. But it never goes that way.

Buffing is how we ended up with Supergirl, Takeda, Cetrion (a lot of people forget that she was buffed), MK11 Forceball/Shades Johnny Cage, and a whole list of characters that dominated the meta. The "buff everything" strategy has never worked in principle.

The only way to end up with a reasonably balanced game is to tone down things that dominate the meta to a large degree, and to be very conservative with buffs. Pushing toward the middle always works better than trying to make everything top tier.

 

[BarakaTile]

It's easy to overcalculate when you're buffing/nerfing several things on one character. Usually that's been the NRS way to balance a character out and it's proven many times to be unreliable. It can raise the character up to the appropriate level, Make them busted or fail to address any of the character issues and leave them in the same crap place as before.

Aside from some fixes Nitara got 1 buff, just one. Arguably I think that helped her out more than if they gave her 8 different things in a scattershot attempt to make her good. I don't think she needs anything else to be viable but the Nitara players will have to come at me over that one.

 

[Juggs]

The tricky part is that when you start buffing tons of things, it's easy to overcalculate.

Everyone talks like it's easy, like you just pick number "7" on a scale, instead of "10", and that's how you patch a game. But it never goes that way.

Buffing is how we ended up with Supergirl, Takeda, Cetrion (a lot of people forget that she was buffed), MK11 Forceball/Shades Johnny Cage, and a whole list of characters that dominated the meta. The "buff everything" strategy has never worked in principle.

The only way to end up with a reasonably balanced game is to tone down things that dominate the meta to a large degree, and to be very conservative with buffs. Pushing toward the middle always works better than trying to make everything top tier.

You obviously can’t 100% make sure everything is a 7, but that should be the goal for the most part. As long as they’re doing their best to get to that, that’s all that really matters. And you’re not making every move a 7, but more so every character’s strengths and weaknesses end up averaging around there.

Again, that’s like the 30th time you have mischaracterized what I’m advocating for. I’ve never said they should take a “buff everything” strategy. The issue with pushing everything to the middle is even if you’re successful, you’re left with a painfully boring game at best. Making everyone good will accomplish the same goal of balance, but the game will actually be fun to play and everyone would have their dirt, but no one would have anything that dominates the meta. We have tried the “make the game as boring as possible” with MK11, if you want to play that game there’s nothing stopping you.

You never want to force players to drop a character because they were overnerfed. You don’t want to make it a habit of having players invest hundreds of hours into a character only for that character to completely change so much, that all that time was completely wasted. This of course isn’t referring to a completely broken character that everyone know is going to get nerfed, to be clear. Anyway, this is why the slight nerfs to the characters that are dominating the meta, and buffing the bottom tiers, should be the approach that they take. Then you keep doing this with each patch. To put it in another way, you shouldn’t want to drop your character because they’ve become so different and so much worse. The only reason you should want to drop your character is because another character that either got buffed, or it’s just a character that has now caught your eye and may be worth investing time into. That way, you can still use your main and that time wasn’t wasted. And also, the players who already mained that character that got buffed also are rewarded for grinding with a bottom tier character.

I’ve never understood your pushback against this.

 

[BarakaTile]

Well the problem with making it like MK11 is most characters were roughly in the middle and usable.

And then you had Fujin, Jacqui, Kabal, Cetrion, Sub-Zero, Robocop, Maybe Kotal, Maybe Kano. Characters that were so good compared to the mid to lower mid tier, they might as well have been playing a different game.

 

[Marinjuana]

F32 absolutely should be mid-mid. And what does “like you just get a combo on block no downside” even supposed to mean? Anyway, I think that’d be a good buff and also making 21 mid-mid. These are very small buffs but I think that they’d help Scorpion out a lot. He definitely would need more but I genuinely would satisfied with this for now as it’s a good start

And the Darrius kick should not cost a full bar of Kameo meter imo. Yes it’s really good but it’s not so good that it should cost a full bar of Kameo meter. I think it costing around 60% (MAYBE 70%) would be more than sufficient.

People still aren’t understanding that you don’t want to get rid of good moves characters and Kameos have, and you want to make decent moves even better. Especially on characters and Kameos that are either low tier or very mid mid tier. You want character and Kameo teams to have awesome synergy, combos, setups, etc, and not just every character having to use the same Kameo (aka Cyrax). And you do this by not super nerfing everything good, but only SLIGHTLY nerfing the REALY GOOD stuff, and buffing the rest of the stuff. And how much you buff the rest depends on how good they already are. Essentially, on a scale of 1-10, your goal should be to either make moves a 7, or to make a Kameo’s synergy with a character a 7 or higher. That doesn’t necessarily mean bringing a 10 down to a 7 or a 1 up to a 7, but working towards making that the goal in general with of course a bunch of exceptions should, imo, be NRS’ goal. ¯\(ツ)/¯

Meant that F23 hitting mid while being safe on block string giving combo launch is a boring idea out of all potential changes

 

[M2Dave]

And then you had Fujin, Jacqui, Kabal, Cetrion, Sub-Zero, Robocop, Maybe Kotal, Maybe Kano. Characters that were so good compared to the mid to lower mid tier, they might as well have been playing a different game.

But those characters were considered the fun ones. LOL. Well, except Robocop, who was overrated, but that is another discussion.

As far as Scorpion goes, there are issues with making f+3,2 jail. No character in this game has a safe, 12 frame mid string that requires no resources to launch. f+3,2 would essentially become the biggest "Why not?" string in the game.

I support high power levels for characters, but unfortunately this game will revolve more around nerfs and less about buffs, as evidenced by the most recent patch.

Many players are also hypocrites. They ask for strong characters, yet if they ever fought a top tier zoning character like back in the day, they would be screaming at the top of their lungs at NRS, and hence the state of zoning in this game.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

But those characters were considered the fun ones. LOL. Well, except Robocop, who was overrated, but that is another discussion.

As far as Scorpion goes, there are issues with making f+3,2 jail. No character in this game has a safe, 12 frame mid string that requires no resources to launch. f+3,2 would essentially become the biggest "Why not?" string in the game.

I support high power levels for characters, but unfortunately this game will revolve more around nerfs and less about buffs, as evidenced by the most recent patch.

Many players are also hypocrites. They ask for strong characters, yet if they ever fought a top tier zoning character like back in the day, they would be screaming at the top of their lungs at NRS, and hence the state of zoning in this game.

Because those characters were broke, not just top tier

Don’t get me started on Kenshi’s armor and mix, Kabal’s entire kit, Zod’s mixups and lockdown offense, MMH’s entire kit, etc. None of them would win against the top tier if they just had to do it with zoning.

 

[M2Dave]

None of them would win against the top tier if they just had to do it with zoning.

I do not disagree. The combination of tools is what makes a character strong.

My point is that the reason a character like Johnny Cage is one of the best characters, if not the best, in Mortal Kombat 1 is because of what traditionally was a counter to his gameplay style (i.e., oppressive zoning and the ice clone) is either absent or very weak in this game.

Johnny is a top tier character in Mortal Kombat 9. His offense is twice as good in that game, but he is regulated by top tier zoning characters like Freddy and Kenshi. Even a low mid tier character like Sub Zero is a difficult match up for him.

Yes, I know that zoning will remain limited and the ice clone will remain trash while Johnny will be nerfed very hard because of the casual audience...

Boring and predictable!

 

[Bloodfang]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1720495561952854336

I like Dragon, some stuff I'd have no issue with but I'm gonna pass on some of these suggestions.

I think Scorpion F32 mid is a boring idea for a change.. like you just get a combo/being safe on block no downside? Its not that it sounds too cheap just.. unimaginative

Both of Shujinko's punch and kick are +1? That's a plus mid with a gap for everybody. How about the punch be plus or and the mid stay as is so they both have more uses?

I think Sonya is fine and doesn't need a projectile ambush.

It's an interesting suggestion but one that Dragon caveated by saying might be broken but I've seen this suggestion made around.. Darius kick needs to stay one bar or it's going to be hard to blockable city

I can't read the list because it says Dragon's account got deleted.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I do not disagree. The combination of tools is what makes a character strong.

My point is that the reason a character like Johnny Cage is one of the best characters, if not the best, in Mortal Kombat 1 is because of what traditionally was a counter to his gameplay style (i.e., oppressive zoning and the ice clone) is either absent or very weak in this game.

Johnny is a top tier character in Mortal Kombat 9. His offense is twice as good in that game, but he is regulated by top tier zoning characters like Freddy and Kenshi. Even a low mid tier character like Sub Zero is a difficult match up for him.

Yes, I know that zoning will remain limited and the ice clone will remain trash while Johnny will be nerfed very hard because of the casual audience...

Boring and predictable!

I'd rather have a character with more varied offense, then have to' fix' a character that's a terrible MU for much of the cast due to one overpowered tool (F3) by having 3-4 characters with insane, safe armor and very few downsides as a "balance".

The solution is to make characters less one-dimensional, which is, for the most part, the design philosophy behind MK1.

F3F3F3F3b3 doesn't make for engaging gameplay.

And Johnny should be adjusted. He has an entire unique mechanic, Star Power, which is barely being utilized because he is practically just as strong without needing it. If you tone down his frames a bit, then the balance of having to build Star Power and having it be meaningful will make for much more interesting matches as intended.

 

[mrapchem]

I do not disagree. The combination of tools is what makes a character strong.

My point is that the reason a character like Johnny Cage is one of the best characters, if not the best, in Mortal Kombat 1 is because of what traditionally was a counter to his gameplay style (i.e., oppressive zoning and the ice clone) is either absent or very weak in this game.

Johnny is a top tier character in Mortal Kombat 9. His offense is twice as good in that game, but he is regulated by top tier zoning characters like Freddy and Kenshi. Even a low mid tier character like Sub Zero is a difficult match up for him.

Yes, I know that zoning will remain limited and the ice clone will remain trash while Johnny will be nerfed very hard because of the casual audience...

Boring and predictable!

It's a strange day when I find myself agreeing with M2Dave over Crimson Shadow!!! But yes, M2Dave is correct - JC was at least 1.5 times as strong in MK9 as he is right now in MK1. But in MK9, Sub-Zero's Ice Klone was 3 times as strong as it is now; also, we did indeed have lots of strong zoners/keep-away characters that countered him.

This is not to say that MK1 needs Freddy/Kabal/Kenshi-level zoners, but it is to say that there needs to be some slight/moderate buffs to character keep-away and zoning in this game. Ice Klone needs a buff, Kitana's arc projectile needs to not go away on hit, Reptile should be able to move after a Forceball, etc...These and other changes would bring Johnny Cage down without changing a single aspect of him because now he has hard counters. And it would bring other characters to the top-tier list for high-level players to use.




What this will not do is stop people from whining about the game and demanding that characters be nerfed. We will never get rid of that because for 10 years now, NRS has acquiesced to the demands of casual players that conflate strong/annoying with broken. MK11 was all about NRS preemptively toning everything that people used to complain about down - only to receive exponentially more complaints, whether they were legitimate or not.

But, to Crimson's point - if we do in fact buff everyone up, the community then needs to STFU about complaints about character matches/tools, especially when fighting characters that appear to be broken because this is what we asked for. If we ask for NRS to do a thing and then they do exactly what we ask for, then we need to be quiet and lie in whatever bed we made.

 

[ShaolinGunFu]

@M2Dave you cant say Robocop was overrated REO beat your Kotal to prove his zoning, and sonicfox I think won a few tournaments with him

 

[M2Dave]

The solution is to make characters less one-dimensional, which is, for the most part, the design philosophy behind MK1.

This design philosophy is incompatible with Mortal Kombat 1 because the characters who have access to superior base tools (i.e., Ashrah, Cage, Kenshi, Raiden, etc.) will always benefit from kameos more than the characters who have average or below average base tools (i.e., Nitara, Reptile, Scorpion, Sub Zero, etc.) In other words, by design Raiden will be better off with any kameo than Sub Zero. There are very few exception to this rule (i.e., Rain with pre-patch Cyrax).

I do agree that NRS should design and implement more gameplay aspects that are unique to a character (i.e., Star Power as you mentioned).

At the end of the day, I really do not want this game to turn into another Mortal Kombat 11 once the last patch is released (i.e., the top five or so having interesting gameplay styles while the rest of the cast does d+1, jab, and throw).

Perhaps one of the biggest ironies in fighting game history is the fact that NRS tried so hard to regulate the balance of MK11, yet the grand finals at the game's last EVO was a mirror match. LOL.

 

[Rodney Quillz]

The tricky part is that when you start buffing tons of things, it's easy to overcalculate.

Everyone talks like it's easy, like you just pick number "7" on a scale, instead of "10", and that's how you patch a game. But it never goes that way.

Buffing is how we ended up with Supergirl, Takeda, Cetrion (a lot of people forget that she was buffed), MK11 Forceball/Shades Johnny Cage, and a whole list of characters that dominated the meta. The "buff everything" strategy has never worked in principle.

The only way to end up with a reasonably balanced game is to tone down things that dominate the meta to a large degree, and to be very conservative with buffs. Pushing toward the middle always works better than trying to make everything top tier.

What you stated wasn’t them “buffing everything” though, buffing everything insinuates giving mid tier/low tier buffs to compete with top tier, you aren’t “buffing everything” if Johnny and Cetrion are getting buffs while Geras and Jacqui are getting nerfs that’s not “buffing everything” that’s just the normal tier sliding that happens in every nrs game and what’s going to happen after the Omni man patch.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

This design philosophy is incompatible with Mortal Kombat 1 because the characters who have access to superior base tools (i.e., Ashrah, Cage, Kenshi, Raiden, etc.) will always benefit from kameos more than the characters who have average or below average base tools (i.e., Nitara, Reptile, Scorpion, Sub Zero, etc.) In other words, by design Raiden will be better off with any kameo than Sub Zero. There are very few exception to this rule (i.e., Rain with pre-patch Cyrax).

I do agree that NRS should design and implement more gameplay aspects that are unique to a character (i.e., Star Power as you mentioned).

At the end of the day, I really do not want this game to turn into another Mortal Kombat 11 once the last patch is released (i.e., the top five or so having interesting gameplay styles while the rest of the cast does d+1, jab, and throw).

Perhaps one of the biggest ironies in fighting game history is the fact that NRS tried so hard to regulate the balance of MK11, yet the grand finals at the game's last EVO was a mirror match. LOL.

I’m not talking about the Kameos. I’m speaking about the base kit.

If a character’s base kit is one-dimensional and dominant, that doesn’t make for a great meta. Most characters have interesting mechanics and tools, but if a character doesn’t even need their most interesting tools (like Johnny), then they need to be adjusted.

Put another way, if Kenshi was so strong that he was top tier without ever having to use his puppet, which is the main feature of his character, something would be wrong. Likewise with Geras and his hourglass.

 

[BarakaTile]

It'd certainly be nice if Reptile could move after his EX Forceballs but I'd rather see them plug the gap of b31 more than anything. I don't think he needs more or less than that.

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

It'd certainly be nice if Reptile could move after his EX Forceballs but I'd rather see them plug the gap of b31 more than anything. I don't think he needs more or less than that.

I think he needs a lot MORE than that. For starters, the invisibility should have the same properties as Smoke's - that is, being fast and not going away on blocked hits. He should be able to cancel f3,2 into any special move (or perhaps, any EX special, like forceballs and the run). I can also see no harm in making at least ONE of his strings plus. Nor can I see any harm in making f3,1,1 special cancellabe into forceballs or the dash. His only armored move, the slide, is not only slow as fuck, but gets armor broken very easily, being useless as a get off me tool.

 

[ShaolinGunFu]

You want smokes inv but we dont get reptiles forceballs

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

You want smokes inv but we dont get reptiles forceballs

They're death on block, don't travel full screen and can be jump over. The only half-decent one is the ex slow forceball, otherwise they are mostly for some fake midscreen pressure and mid-combo extensions. So yeah, you can keep them lol

 

[BarakaTile]

I think he needs a lot MORE than that. For starters, the invisibility should have the same properties as Smoke's - that is, being fast and not going away on blocked hits. He should be able to cancel f3,2 into any special move (or perhaps, any EX special, like forceballs and the run). I can also see no harm in making at least ONE of his strings plus. Nor can I see any harm in making f3,1,1 special cancellabe into forceballs or the dash. His only armored move, the slide, is not only slow as fuck, but gets armor broken very easily, being useless as a get off me tool.

Eh.

-Personally I don't care that much for Invisibility to want it buffed to be like Smoke's anyway. It's a cute little gimmick you can build on with Sub-Zero and Scorpion, It's fine the way it is imo.
-Is there a reason why you would want to cancel more specials from f32 or special cancel from f322? Seems like it's just to give him more combo routes.
-Feel like Plus strings or the faster Slide will just get people to bitch to NRS about it later.

If you had to give him something crazy, I'd love to see him be able to stop any traveling Forceball with a bar of Meter. That was the most fun thing about him in MKX and I would welcome the return of that.

But that's not going to happen so just plug the gap in b31 and let's see what happens to him afterwards.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I said probably not and we shall see what the future holds. I highly doubt Tweedy would use him in tournament post patch. I hope I am wrong.

Tweedy played him in a tournament tonight. With Stryker.

 

[Blakfellow]

I swear some of you act like you’re new to nrs games. If there is one thing we all should have learned by now playing nrs games since mk9 is that we would muuuuuuch rather have a game where nrs takes risks and have some broken stuff than have to play a boring ass vanilla game where everyone is more or less balanced.


Also all of you saying we don’t want to buff because it’s too risky, I challenge you to name just one single instance in nrs history when a low tier character was overbuffed to be broken in the game. It hasn’t happened a single time. Stop being so scared of having a game that is actually fun.

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

Eh.

-Personally I don't care that much for Invisibility to want it buffed to be like Smoke's anyway. It's a cute little gimmick you can build on with Sub-Zero and Scorpion, It's fine the way it is imo.
-Is there a reason why you would want to cancel more specials from f32 or special cancel from f322? Seems like it's just to give him more combo routes.
-Feel like Plus strings or the faster Slide will just get people to bitch to NRS about it later.

If you had to give him something crazy, I'd love to see him be able to stop any traveling Forceball with a bar of Meter. That was the most fun thing about him in MKX and I would welcome the return of that.

But that's not going to happen so just plug the gap in b31 and let's see what happens to him afterwards.

There is no reason for his invis to be unlike Smoke's, imo. It's the same gimmick, except one works and is usable and the other requires a specific set play with kameos to be barely usable. But I guess we agree to disagree here.

Special cancelling from F322 would allow him to combo without Scorpion as a clutch - perhaps, adjusting the frames on the dash special, we could even have the juggle-into-whiffed-dash combos back from UMK3, MK9 and MKX. F3,1 into forceball would also allow for a little more damage/combo routes without depending on Scorpion.

A single plus string on him should be a given, as he has ONE mid starter lol. Maybe make 11 +2, or 114 +2. Otherwise, there's little point in enforcing his f2 upclose.

The slide is, again, borderline useless as an armored reversal - either give it more armor or make it faster, either one would be ok.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I swear some of you act like you’re new to nrs games. If there is one thing we all should have learned by now playing nrs games since mk9 is that we would muuuuuuch rather have a game where nrs takes risks and have some broken stuff than have to play a boring ass vanilla game where everyone is more or less balanced.


Also all of you saying we don’t want to buff because it’s too risky, I challenge you to name just one single instance in nrs history when a low tier character was overbuffed to be broken in the game. It hasn’t happened a single time. Stop being so scared of having a game that is actually fun.

Supergirl, Takeda both went from being not great to broken.