No, some gear moves need to be added to a character's regular move-set. Gear moves should ONLY replace existing moves with slight variations, for example, Blue Beetle can change his projectile to a different one. That's a gear move. But air-mandible strike/ invisibility/ should just be regular moves. If you added them to BB's move set he wouldn't be overpowered or even that much stronger as a result.
Gear moves are this games version of variations but they are such a cheap and obvious money grab that it kind of makes me not want to play this game out of principle.
MKX gave each character 3 variations out the gate. Each character was complete and had to be balanced in their own variation. It was amazing. No stupid RNG grinding, no OP as hell gear moves, no stupid unbalanced player matches where one player has access to moves that the other player doesn't.
If this is the future of NRS games then they can count me out, not that they'll miss me now that people are spending real money just to upgrade their characters to level 20 and get costumes and shaders because grinding is random and unfun.
How is it a money grab? There is unloveable content in the game which can be unlocked by playing the game. There's no need to spend extra money to unlock stuff just enjoy the game and more will come your way.
And to the main topic of discussion, no extra abilities have no place in competitive mode. There are a few reasons for this.
1. This game is still being figured out. We have had Combo Breaker. That's it. Which made a lot of people stop talking about Deadshot when the top 8 wasn't full of him, now it's all Black Adam. We also saw crazy breath setups with Atro. Point being the meta is still shifting, let's play the balance they gave until it is a bit more developed before we start making side rules to "help" characters.
2. I would say most of the abilities are busted. Some of them are really cool, but come on. The characters in this game are really strong as is and it's a wonder that the game is as balanced as it is. You can pick most of the cast and you didn't get a "bad pick", they might not be black Adam but they can win. Unless it's Swampy, they did you wrong boi.
3. The financial burden it puts on TOs is way unfair. I don't know how active y'all's scene is, but for me there have been 3 tournaments since release in my metro. That means that after they bought x amount of copies a month ago and now they are looking to get dlc for setups; would it really be fair to make them have to force unlock everything with cash? Which I'm not even sure how you do that, just keep buying source boxes I guess.
And mentioned before, the time man.
The abilities are fun to play with and they add a layer to the game that could be explored later in the game's life for competitive play, but not a month in. Most people don't even know all the frame data for their character, they need lab time not more moves.
