Beyond the initial trolling, which was a little over-the-top, but I'll do that for laughs sometimes - I really am trying to help.
I want to see Triborg in tournaments. I love watching high level play with all characters, but especially with Triborg. To me, its pure hype.
Your not going to unfortunately, i know of 2 pro players that actually still use this character, and both of them have/had new mains already, and their both European, that is UsedforGlue and Madzin, both of them openly said they moved on and only keep him as a pocket, so unless some tortured soul decides to pick up this pile of bolts and screws, that wont happen unfortunately.
But for the sake of argument lets analyze CSZ with what standards are needed in this game for a character to range from C all the way to S
For anyone that has no interest in my opinion or wants to skip this wall text evaluation from me plz do so, if you wish to comment or discuss this please i urge you to read this in its full entirety in order to avoid miscommunication, Thank you guys.
So lets begin, a Character most have at least the some of the following qualities to be even considerable of mid tier:
1.Good OH Low pressure
2.Good Zoning
3.Good pressure overall (including how good his Mids are)
4.Meter Building
5.Good Reversals
6.Good poking game
7.Good Mix ups (lets say this in the CSZ case has HTBs)
8.Mobility
9.How easily can open the opponent up (as in Punishing whifs and stuff of the sort)
10.And last but not least, damage output
So given this standards Lets see how CSZ fairs on the different categories: (this is subject to my opinion and factual experience from myself only)
1. Good OH Low pressure: its barely there anymore, the fact that meterless his options range from only 1 comboable low and his 111, if you do not have meter ( something cyber Sub doesnt make a hol lot of, but well get there) the opponent has no need to respect your options, and considering his other option B2, has so much start up and its so easy to see coming and such low damage from converting off it, the opponent truly does not have to respect cyber sub in the neutral... So in the instance of 1. this point is, Low tier point
2. Good Zoning: Now one could argue that before the patch he had good zoning. I Stand on the side of things that disagrees with this statement, he had good space control, but never good zoning. Good Zoning requires that your tool does chip damage and/or is able to control and push back the advancing opponent (Kenshi for instance), with that being said CSZ had neither, a good player could inch their way in safely, without taking any damage what so ever and be on CSZ face in no time, so saying he could zone is dodgy at best, he could control the space/speed in which the opponent could get in But not stop him from doing so. So 2. This point is, low tier point
3.Good Overall pressure: This is a simple one, Without a safe Meter special or decent mids/pokes This character is basically a hit and run with little to no options when engaging in a trade of blows, Like
@GAV even said, he literally runs away, so while this is a solid strategy, it most be complimented by something, and this something is a solid zoning which he doesnt have... so 3. Also Low tier point
4.Meter Building: The ability to get tons of meter to convert from his meter heavy combos, Well here CSZ is only fair, considering most of his options rely heavily on meter even his mix ups i would put him as only fair at doing so... And ill explain why. Whilst before the patch the fact that his Iceball was so fast added with the fact that he could grenade the hell out of the ground his opponent needed to use in order to get in, net him incredible meter incredibly fast, while this was a bit to much pre patch, thats not the point, cause we are analyzing him as he is now, So in that regard with his newly nerfed fireball, his ability to get meter fast safely atleast, is only fair. So in the case of 4. his probably only mid tier considering Rekka and pressure intensive characters and zoners can probably farm meter much faster than he can.
5. Good Reversals: Now we are entering the field where a lot of argument can be had but ill try to keep this simple, a good reversal in this game can range from, being able to take you of the opponents pressure / being a launcher / having tons of armor / being extremely fast and punishing or the one we are going to talk about here, Offering tons of fast mobility: In this CSZ is quite good, his reversal ( Icy Slide ) offers him a fast punishing move that makes his hurtbox quite low to the ground whilst being extremely fast and moving him across a good part of the screen. Now its not safe, but thats obvious, and the fact that its such a good overall move in so many occasions nets him on 5. a Top tier point
6.Good Poking game: speaking solely on Down pokes and standing pokes his game is probably among the worse in the game, everyone knows this so im not even going into much depth regarding this issue. 6 nets him a low tier point
7.Good Mix ups: Considering that pre patch his HTBs had holes and you could always armor out of them while characters like for instance Johnny Cage can HTB using meter (like us before) but while jailing the opponent and almost making them so hard to block that its almost guaranteed, Our now post patch HTBs are a very reluctant Mid tier... so in 7. i give him a mid tier point.
8.Mobility: In this i think its quite arguable, because his mobility comes at the price of being unsafe at certain instances, but it cannot be denied that his does have very good mobility for all around purposes, so in this instance 8. i give him a top tier point.
9.How Easily can open up his opponents: Now this is different than mixing your opponents up in the sense that, how easily can he punish whifed moves or specials and convert from them... Well not easily anymore in my opinion. Pre patch we had F13 that even tho was a initial high, was fast and efficient at providing CSZ with foward momentum and ability to convert meterless from it for something like 28% to 30%, this was pretty good, not the best in the game good, but quite solid... Unfortunaly this also was taken from us, so now his only reliable whiff punish move comes in the form of 111 or B3, which honestly is not horrible , but its not winning any awards for greatness... so in this regard i give 9. mid tier point
10. Damage Output: extremely mediocre, he would not enter the gates of Valhalla with such mediocre damage, even when you convert using meter and DS his damage output is still quite bad in comparison to the remaining members of the cast. at 10. i give him a Low tier as in CSZ was witnessed and everyone gave him a Mediocre...
So to some it up. in all 10 points i gave him 5 low tier points, 3 mid tier points and 2 top tier points which in my opinion the top tier points do not give him much when compared to the topics in which he is given low scores. So this character is quite Bad, he might and this is a big (if) not be the worse of the crop, but its 1 step away from joining them... and thats my semi in depth evaluation of his abilities at a present date.
