Competetive needs to add the special abilities!

[Eric The Scruffy]

HAHA Kombat Code don't compare whatsoever.

True.
Kombat Codes would be logistically easier to implement into a tournament setting than abilities would.

 

[knight x1868]

True.
Kombat Codes would be logistically easier to implement into a tournament setting than abilities would.

Absolutely! You're so right!

 

[PetulantWaste]

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.


Specifically I mean that this game is following the "Free to play"+ microtransactions system that most games are doing nowadays. While some games only have cosmetic items available for unlocking (Overwatch) some games hide content behind RNG loot boxes. Of course, everything can be had without paying extra money however there's literally no way to ensure what kinds of content you get. So, you might be a Catwoman main who never gets XYZ ability. The goal, of course, is to get you to buy mother boxes, source crystals, etc in order to unlock them. I'm not being controversial here. They could've made these things available at the start and let people experiment and have fun with them but instead it's completely up to grinding.

I don't really care about cosmetics or gear abilities for the most part so I'm not spending a dime to get them, however, I truly believe that they handicapped some of the character's move sets and made certain moves gear moves that could've easily been part of their original moveset. I already gave some examples of this.

 

[dribirut]

Why would you add abilities which take up half of a characters specials for "shits n giggles" or "just for fun". What a joke and complete waste of time by nrs then

 

[ChaosTheory]

Lol this is a total bill. Show me one post from before this one where anyone complained about MKX having too many options. If there are people who complained they were the minority by a large margin. In fact, in all my MKX time I actually remember exactly 1 thread where someone suggested that they would've liked 2 variations instead of 3. This is just a bit of revisionist history to avoid admitting that the gear system is a just a watered down, money grabbing, super-unbalanced, version of variations.

I don't know why you're applying motive to my post. Especially that motive.

But regardless, you tend to be happier with fewer choices. You don't want 700 items on your restaurant menu and you don't want to play Virtua Fighter.

 

[ChaosTheory]

Why would you add abilities which take up half of a characters specials for "shits n giggles" or "just for fun". What a joke and complete waste of time by nrs then

They'll get paid. The time for being surprised by douchey business practices is past.

 

[Lokheit]

Listen, I was a pro-abilities zealot pre release, I would campaign hard because I loved the customization options and for what I'd seen before release, the skills weren't so powerful.

Then I got my first gear ability, luckily for my main and I had to eat my zealous words.

The ability was Poison Ivy's Flowing Earth (the slide). Almost every Poison Ivy gear ability is crap, some of them even worse than the moves they replace, but Flowing Earth... it completly changes the character and makes it jump multiple tiers.

It's a low profiling (evades high attacks and projectiles), long range advancing 9 frames move (Ivy lacks a special that she can use from D1 without it), that hits twice (armor breaking), is safe (-4), launches for full combo meterless (with excellent damage scaling, much better than all of her launching moves) takes only 1 slot and doesn't even replace a existing move.

That is f***** nuts. I'm playing multiverse a lot and I've developed a dependency on that move that I can't use on competitive.

Basically you could trade Datura Hammer, Bark Skin, Bed of Thorns (worst move in the game) with the Slide and the character would be better. You don't even need to use B2D2 (her best neutral tool) because the slide is faster, reaches further, low profiles, is as safe as the last hit of the string and launches with much better scaling than B2D2Datura2 while also removing the problems of that string against big bodies (it needs its hitbox fixed).

The move makes you base your whole gameplay around it.

I was a pro-abilities zealot BECAUSE I thought they would put some thought into balancing them. Apparently they're just a bunch of random skills with no care for balance (I thought needing 2 slots was for skills too powerful but the slide takes just 1 without replacing another one) as most of them are pure crap but others are the most OP thing ever.

So, seeing how they seem to be designed "for fun" without any intend to make them balanced, I can no longer support the cause. Abilities shouldn't be allowed in tournaments unless devs make a pledge to make them balanced (and that would be a lot of work on their current state).

The only use for abilities in my opinion is that some could become vanilla if a character needs buffs in the future (for example, let's say that Ivy was hipotetically low tier, adding the slide suddenly makes her a competitive monster).

 

[Eric The Scruffy]

The only use for abilities in my opinion is that some could become vanilla if a character needs buffs in the future (for example, let's say that Ivy was hipotetically low tier, adding the slide suddenly makes her a competitive monster).

Just out of curiosity, would anyone actually have an objection to this? Adding new abilities to characters with new versions of the games seems not atypical for most fighters. No reason it only has to be restricted to frame data or damage IMO.

 

[xWEBSx]

3 page thread so far where differences are quite varied and everyone involved is passionate- yet it has remained civilized and mature- bravo mates (no sarcasm).

I see both sides of the fence, and looking through various character threads, there seems to be a common theme- and just using 2 examples... Wonder Woman and Captain Cold.. that common theme is "this character does not feel completed, and if they just had... SOMETHING ELSE.. it would make them that much better and competitive." That something else happens to be a move or two that happens to be present in their ability set.

Let's look at a two character comparison:

Aquaman and Wonder Woman:
Aquaman- as he is, is already a VERY good character- dare I say top tier? Aquaman does not NEED any additional moves or abilities to help or complete him. He appears to be a fleshed out character and operates as intended.

WoWo- as she is, appears to be a half finished character (on the release video it is her and Harley- they say... Harley performs much better without her random trait.. then go on to introduce WOWO'S RANDOM FUCKING TRAIT!!! Have I lost my fucking mind?!?!) I hate to say it- but NRS did cut corners, and some of the cast feels gimped. Does anyone think that WoWo would be a tier nightmare if she had some of her abilities placed into her regular move set? I don't think so- in fact I would argue it would make her feel more complete, therefore better able to compete. What hurts is it feels like NRS cut corners on certain characters- and not maximizing their full moveset with additional moves as abilities and just cut their move set short- placing the rest as abilities. Shame shame!!
If NRS wants to come clean and make nice- they need to re-flesh out the incomplete cast members, buff up their normal move list with an ability move or two from the already established list, and create new abilities for said characters. That is the NRS 100% come clean which has a 5% chance of actually happening. At this point- I would just take some abilities put into regular moveset and don't worry about compensating the ability pile.

Again: the balance should be looked at and some characters should be given one or more of their abilities to fully flesh out the character. TOP TIER cast are fine as is and don't need any support.

 

[justang2112]

You absolutely cannot add abilities to a true competitive playlist. A game that is legitimately competitive requires that all players have access to all the same things at all times. A character currently has access to a bug/tactic that controls the game? Doesn't matter because it's fair if we can both pick that character.

Abilities are random loot. This means that in theory I could get a broken move and have it available to me while you could potentially NEVER get it. In a casual setting this is fine but in true competitive play, especially where money is on the line, you're out for blood not for fun.

On top of that, you're also asking the playerbase to learn several more moves for each character. They have plenty of moves to learn how to counter now, let's just leave the knowledge curve where it's already at

 

[Tanno]

Damn. I'll have to create some "What if..." combos for those abilities included. lol

 

[HellblazerHawkman]

Just parroting some other points-there isn't any resource to buy abilities as of right now (if there were, I wouldn't be bitching about that Cat Call trophy every week) which would be a fucking nightmare for TO's. I'm at like 35 hours and still don't have half the abilities for the cast because RNG is totally cool.

And I don't think you can talk up some characters benefiting from it while ignoring the characters who don't need it. Aquaman is arguably the best in the game, that Trident Rush chip+ ability would make him broke. Do you really think we'll see more character diversity when Aquaman, Superman, Batman, Black Adam and Deadshot all get stuff that make them even more broke?

 

[Marinjuana]

Why would you add abilities which take up half of a characters specials for "shits n giggles" or "just for fun". What a joke and complete waste of time by nrs then

Because it's a video game which is meant to be fun...

And lot of these abilities are probably considered before being cut as gear abilities. Even tower modifiers from as far back as MK9 look like moves that were cut, maybe they try them out and decide the regular kit doesn't need it. They probably always have some extra specials lying over from development.

It's not like they are going to give a character 12 special moves.

 

[knight x1868]

Basically 2 types of abilities: Those that add moves and those that replace moves. It would make since to limit competitive abilities to one or the other.

ANYWAY

Since this is such a loaded and tired point with everyone being too damn stubborn to actually listen to the other side, could we all just concede?

 

[xWEBSx]

Basically 2 types of abilities: Those that add moves and those that replace moves. It would make since to limit competitive abilities to one or the other.

ANYWAY

Since this is such a loaded and tired point with everyone being too damn stubborn to actually listen to the other side, could we all just concede?

To concede on a topic such as this hurts everyone. Something has to be found and agreed upon and brought up as a potential solution. Bringing up a problem with no attempt at a solution is just bitching.

 

[Swindle]

I'm really having a great time with all of you who are spouting all this talk of "competitive play", when just about none of you actually compete on any level that matters. I would hope that at least a few of you would realize that simply going online doesn't make you a competitive FG player. Here's a thought for all you backseat drivers: Level up all the fighters to Level 20, put on just the default gear, equip whatever abilities you unlocked, then hit up your friends and go nuts. Loser buys Little Caesar's. There's your "competitive w/abilities" option.

 

[Shawnzzy]

3 page thread so far where differences are quite varied and everyone involved is passionate- yet it has remained civilized and mature- bravo mates (no sarcasm).

I see both sides of the fence, and looking through various character threads, there seems to be a common theme- and just using 2 examples... Wonder Woman and Captain Cold.. that common theme is "this character does not feel completed, and if they just had... SOMETHING ELSE.. it would make them that much better and competitive." That something else happens to be a move or two that happens to be present in their ability set.

Let's look at a two character comparison:

Aquaman and Wonder Woman:
Aquaman- as he is, is already a VERY good character- dare I say top tier? Aquaman does not NEED any additional moves or abilities to help or complete him. He appears to be a fleshed out character and operates as intended.

WoWo- as she is, appears to be a half finished character (on the release video it is her and Harley- they say... Harley performs much better without her random trait.. then go on to introduce WOWO'S RANDOM FUCKING TRAIT!!! Have I lost my fucking mind?!?!) I hate to say it- but NRS did cut corners, and some of the cast feels gimped. Does anyone think that WoWo would be a tier nightmare if she had some of her abilities placed into her regular move set? I don't think so- in fact I would argue it would make her feel more complete, therefore better able to compete. What hurts is it feels like NRS cut corners on certain characters- and not maximizing their full moveset with additional moves as abilities and just cut their move set short- placing the rest as abilities. Shame shame!!
If NRS wants to come clean and make nice- they need to re-flesh out the incomplete cast members, buff up their normal move list with an ability move or two from the already established list, and create new abilities for said characters. That is the NRS 100% come clean which has a 5% chance of actually happening. At this point- I would just take some abilities put into regular moveset and don't worry about compensating the ability pile.

Again: the balance should be looked at and some characters should be given one or more of their abilities to fully flesh out the character. TOP TIER cast are fine as is and don't need any support.

I agree that there are huge disparities in power. I play both Aquaman and WoWo, and when my friends ask why I don't play WoWo competitively more I respond with your sentiment "She is a fun character, but there are other characters that do what she does much better." It's the sad truth, but it is also in every fighting game. Some characters just don't work as well in the meta. When we get a bigger patch I hope that we can see her get something. Regardless of her power though, I still enjoy playing her in her current state. I'm not advocating that anyone is wrong in feeling their character isn't as strong as the top, but fighting games are like this by nature. If you play for fun, then have fun and don't care what the meta says, if you are playing competitively then you need to make that choice of how hard you want to work to be viable.

I say we keep playing, have a good time, and wait for the broken tech to start coming along.

 

[xWEBSx]

I agree that there are huge disparities in power. I play both Aquaman and WoWo, and when my friends ask why I don't play WoWo competitively more I respond with your sentiment "She is a fun character, but there are other characters that do what she does much better." It's the sad truth, but it is also in every fighting game. Some characters just don't work as well in the meta. When we get a bigger patch I hope that we can see her get something. Regardless of her power though, I still enjoy playing her in her current state. I'm not advocating that anyone is wrong in feeling their character isn't as strong as the top, but fighting games are like this by nature. If you play for fun, then have fun and don't care what the meta says, if you are playing competitively then you need to make that choice of how hard you want to work to be viable.

I say we keep playing, have a good time, and wait for the broken tech to start coming along.

I see what you are saying and I agree.. I mean tiers exsist as a structure to basically let you know how hard you are going to have to work for a win, but the angle I'm getting at is- for BETTER balance, identifying these incomplete characters (shamefully WoWo being one of them) could actually be MADE competitive by say... making her trait not random, making her air dive in her main kit- BAM.. you would be able to use her competitively. My point being.. WoWo is a victim of NRS cutting corners, not just being non competitive tier and a bad character... and her fix is potentially ALREADY in game.

I digress, however- for I am just a scrub who had been playing fighting games for money prior to a majority of the community being alive, and we have no knowledge or use unless you are top 5 on twitch, EVO, rando tournie of the month...

Cheers

 

[xWEBSx]

Just out of curiosity, would anyone actually have an objection to this? Adding new abilities to characters with new versions of the games seems not atypical for most fighters. No reason it only has to be restricted to frame data or damage IMO.

I believe Ivy is an exception to this rule since she is so far out of the realm of "typical" NRS fighters, tech needs to be done and a few majors need to pass before judging her tier value. That aside, I am absolutely in favor of compensating the low tier with their already in game ability/abilities- and I'm willing to bet that there is a correlation between the bottom tier characters and their abilities being cut from their original/official move set.

I'm not even a WoWo main- but for chrissakes.. how does she go from a decent power house in IGAU, to the train wreck she is in I2? No air dash, no advancing strings, poor sword reach, a bracelet absorb that can block 1 of Deadshots 52 projectiles, all while riding a high from a new movie release? Shit just don't add up.

 

[God Confirm]

But that's my point. Do we really want to take a gamble on NRS balancing something when they actually somehow got it almost right on the first try?

And to Tony's point, some abilities just aren't able to be balanced without nullifying the point. Superman's unblockable or Catwoman's Cat Call, for example. Look, I would love to have instant air shots as Cold, but would never take them if it meant allowing them in.

A gamble implies there is something at stake here, that we risk losing. There isn't. If a gear-on tournament isn't fun for anyone, it simply won't take on popularity.

 

[Kroaken]

Not yet read to the end of the thread, but while I do agree that some of the ability moves are not balanced in such a way that it makes all of them unusable competitively as a group, I do think one thing is kind of funny.

Some people feel that because they aren't usable, they are wasted, clearly. The commonplace response is to use them in the non competitive modes. However, should you WANT to do that in order to make use of said moves, you're instantly a scumbag for not turning on competitive mode.

I personally prefer competitive mode. And while maybe there exists a character or two who would be more well rounded with a key ability move (Fate comes to mind), there's just no reasonable method currently to justify their use.

 

[dribirut]

Because it's a video game which is meant to be fun...

And lot of these abilities are probably considered before being cut as gear abilities. Even tower modifiers from as far back as MK9 look like moves that were cut, maybe they try them out and decide the regular kit doesn't need it. They probably always have some extra specials lying over from development.

It's not like they are going to give a character 12 special moves.

But why not make it fun like mkx where over 90 different variations with different specials are catered to competitive play as well. Why take a step backwards

 

[xWEBSx]

But why not make it fun like mkx where over 90 different variations with different specials are catered to competitive play as well. Why take a step backwards

I can respect NRS in their decision to keep properties separate- variations is a MK thing, gear is Injustice thing... cross gear into next MK title... I will flip holy shit!!! Kidding, but would not put much faith in what NRS intends to do going forward.

 

[Marinjuana]

But why not make it fun like mkx where over 90 different variations with different specials are catered to competitive play as well. Why take a step backwards

For one, it was really challenging for them to balance that. This game so far has been way more balanced then MKX was for the majority of its life.

 

[JoeKing]

Just wanted to chime in, as a long time player of many games with dual modes like this.

I think its fair to say that some characters just aren't hitting the mark. I would LOVE if joker had his crowbar fling at least. A buff of his base moveset doesn't help much IMO. But I sure as hell don't want sonicfox to have some shit like that when I'm playing him to get out of pools at evo.

Personally I think that as a community we should just respect each other's spaces instead of trying to invade. When I go to player match online its cool if you want abilities on. I'm going to play the match out. Just don't get mad at me if I only want to play one fight.

Some of us are trying to improve and rise on the competitive circuit. Which have rules for a reason. I will also echo that even if the selections were limited, it would still take too much time to set up load outs for every fight. Now you're asking nrs to include all of these extra abilities in their balancing.

"But the base roster isn't even balanced." I saw infiltration win at evo with hakan. If you want swamp thing in ceo top 8, its totally possible if you want to work hard to do so. Black Adam won't be top tier forever. Nerfs, buffs, and adaptations will happen.

The most plausible conclusion would be to ask organizers to host gear enabled side tournaments. Would it ever be a main event? Depends on how big the demand is I suppose. Ultimately this thread will never end lol.

Instead of each side just saying the other is wrong for wanting something different, we should really just step aside. If you want gear enabled tournaments make a push for it, gather people that want it. If it becomes the majority it will. Dont just demand competitive mode changes because you disagree. That's not going to change anything.