I dont say this often. I'm very objective in everything and honest to god I dont usually feel banning characters or demanding nerfs is ever an answer. It should almost always be a case of learn the matchup and learn to adjust your gameplay.
I also play Bane and he honest to God handles Scorpion. The big guy kind of hangs back and plays
"Captain Turtle Mc'punish-fiend" anyway.
I vote YES to banning Scorpion.
My reasoning is fairly straight forward. The way blocking is set up in this game is directional. Now you can just hit down though and it counts as a block so you are fine against Scorpion's teleport in this regard. However, doing it on reaction isn't always easy. Also he can do it in the air...there is NO air blocking in this game.
Why I just dont feel Scorpion should be allowed in tourney is as follows.
- Jumping can essentially NEVER be used unless it is as a punish and you read correctly. Jump at any time...even backwards and you cannot air block and Scorpion can do his port and punish you
- Interactibles that were meant to help cover character weaknesses by NRS are essentially unusable outside of a combo. This means they no longer have any meaning regarding footsies in the game. Scorpion can flat out ignore the fact you are under a tv, or near the flower or anything else...if you go for it he will teleport into full combo.
- You HAVE to play the game at his pace no matter what because its not the easiest thing to deal with his port on reaction. It can be done. Hell I do it, but unless you were riding that crouch block every other moment anyways you will likely not enjoy the match. What this creates is a scenario where you do not get to play your characters footsies in most cases. Only a few zoning tools can really be used in this matchup out of the entire roster, no jumping is safe and your only real approach is dash in or to use offensive tools that march you forward...essentially you are left with very little safe methods to control space versus Scorpion. Essentially the port is so good that most offensive tools folks use are off the table. It becomes an ENTIRELY reactionary matchup and this kills the excitement of matches and the enjoyment for players both casual and tourney.
- Mixups from blockstrings are a pain. Block high, block low block...uh oh...blocked the wrong direction and at the port. Even on block with a normal combo he has the scariest mixup tool in the game. Its not a case of high low...its a case of when will he port. Essentially if he touches you once you have to use pushblock. You cannot risk the mixup from his block string. This throws out a lot of meter management some characters rely on in their gameplay.
I just dont feel that a character who removes so many elements of the gameplay from every matchup is something supportable. The game loses hype, it loses most character's depth and makes the match insanely predictable on approaches, and overall he is this dominant this early in his life and has barely been cracked into. When a character can win this easily and be considered a bad matchup for nearly the entire cast then its safe to say he is bad to support in the cast.
Honestly I dont know how to deal with this character issue unless the move itself was so ridiculously scoutable that it wouldn't matter and I dont like having useless tools on a character. I'd rather see his teleport replaced with a teleport that hit in the front than that or just a plain old teleport like Ares.
For now though Scorpion shut down the meta of the game. Its currently a completely reactionary meta revolving around this character being selected all over that one tool. For that reason alone I feel it is obviously something that I cannot support being allowed at tourney. Sorry folks. He's fun, but that move shuts down the meta and I cannot support him for that reason. He is pretty much the next Kabal in the making at this point and just remember this...NRS themselves said on the record when asked about how they balanced this game was to make certain KABAL was not in it. If we have another in the making who shuts down meta ...well...then that makes this game an ironically bad punchline to that Kabal moment.
