THTB
Arez | Booya | Riu48 - Rest Easy, Friends
Coming from a pretty heavy discussion in REO's stream today, the topic was brought up that Smoke may be pretty close to Cyrax on the tier list. While obviously tier lists take matchups into account (which for an interesting note, Smoke is currently the only character who is noted to have an advantage matchup worse than 7-3 against a character that is potentially top 5), these notes may make you look at his matchups a little more and look and say "maybe I'm not as correct about this as I thought...". Let's look at some of the relative similarities.
Damage: Let's be up front about this...both characters can convert practically ANYTHING into 50+% if they have a bar. Hell, with enough meter, they both convert to 100%. The main outlier is Cyrax has better unbreakable damage and, if you want to make it a point, has less difficult combos to perform. He also nets more damage on average. So Cyrax wins this one, but it's not like Smoke hits like a week-old kitten, and is still a strong talking point as they both need just 1 touch to end your life, put you at a heavy deficit, or even come back.
Neutral: Cyrax's neutral game is generally considered pretty good, as is Smoke's. Cyrax's projectiles keep opponents on their toes and more careful with their own use of projectiles, and generally covers a good deal of space. Smoke's one projectile doesn't cover as much space, but controls other characters grounded projectiles very well, and due to shake, he can make even instant air projectiles off-limits. When it comes to the closer parts of footsies Cyrax isn't bad here either, with normals and strings such as d1, d3, d4, f2, 21, and 121, and even using net and bombs to make opponents be wary of how they approach him. Saw is also a solid overhead option that can be spaced to be a safe poke that gives Cyrax bomb opportunities. This works well in tandem with EX ragdoll, which is a very fast low. Smoke's close-up game is really solid, too. With great normals in d1, d3, d4, b23, and 3d12, and a solid retreating option in smoke away, Smoke can be very treacherous to approach. To compare the two, Smoke's b2 has insane range and gives him a very powerful normal to keep opponents in line from really far out. While Cyrax has f2, which has a retracting hurtbox on startup and is very advantageous on block, it isn't the fastest option Cyrax has. Both characters can space out their projectiles to be safe on block. It's hard to say who is better objectively, as both characters have their perks and downsides to their neutral options.
Pressure: Both characters scare you out of pressing buttons just because letting go of block can lead to death if done at the wrong time. What they can do with that is fairly different, though. Cyrax can open up your guard by using a command throw that leads to a safe jump into more fear of letting go of block. This is also aided by the fact that Cyrax can reset you back to standing after combos, so that you don't have an opportunity to wake up if he chooses to save his meter. Smoke's b2 is a fairly quick overhead that can lead to combos, while his d4 has very heavy advantage on hit. Getting hit by d4 can put you in a nasty guessing game of high/low 50/50s. Do I continue to let Smoke slowly whittle down my health? Or do I take the chance and block low to stop this little game, while opening myself up to a b2 into oblivion? Not to mention, Smoke can pepper you with d1s and d3s cancelled to smoke bomb to make you weary of counter-poking. Pretty scary. Maybe not as scary as Cyrax's general offensive onslaught, but enough to make you hate having to block him.
Defense: With all these advantages, both characters have one notable shortcoming...a lack of useful armor/any armor. In a game where it can be difficult to escape pressure without using it, it's definitely a problem for both characters, as they have to rely on poking their way out. Smoke gets a slight saving grace here, just because of EX shake functioning as a parry. On wakeup, Cyrax is subpar outside of EX ragdoll, with regular ragdoll not activating fast enough to cover the wakeup invincibility and anti air being a decent escape on overzealous opponents. On Smoke's side, teleport is invincible until he leaves the screeen and even hits the opponent, so that's worth something, though it whiffs on crouching opponents. But Smoke also has smoke teleports, which allow him to escape. Without meter, however, they are stuffable. He also has EX shake, which can be stuffed with low attacks, giving him a general difficulty dealing with crouching opponents. On the anti-air side of things, Cyrax has an actual invincible anti-air, but outside of that, both characters do a really solid job of knocking opponents out of the air with their normals and low profiling things. So it's another actually tough call.
These are just really simplified notes, so things don't end there. But with some of these things in mind, what do you think? Is Smoke not that far from sitting in the S-tier court as Cyrax? Or is the idea just a pipe dream?
@R.E.O.
Damage: Let's be up front about this...both characters can convert practically ANYTHING into 50+% if they have a bar. Hell, with enough meter, they both convert to 100%. The main outlier is Cyrax has better unbreakable damage and, if you want to make it a point, has less difficult combos to perform. He also nets more damage on average. So Cyrax wins this one, but it's not like Smoke hits like a week-old kitten, and is still a strong talking point as they both need just 1 touch to end your life, put you at a heavy deficit, or even come back.
Neutral: Cyrax's neutral game is generally considered pretty good, as is Smoke's. Cyrax's projectiles keep opponents on their toes and more careful with their own use of projectiles, and generally covers a good deal of space. Smoke's one projectile doesn't cover as much space, but controls other characters grounded projectiles very well, and due to shake, he can make even instant air projectiles off-limits. When it comes to the closer parts of footsies Cyrax isn't bad here either, with normals and strings such as d1, d3, d4, f2, 21, and 121, and even using net and bombs to make opponents be wary of how they approach him. Saw is also a solid overhead option that can be spaced to be a safe poke that gives Cyrax bomb opportunities. This works well in tandem with EX ragdoll, which is a very fast low. Smoke's close-up game is really solid, too. With great normals in d1, d3, d4, b23, and 3d12, and a solid retreating option in smoke away, Smoke can be very treacherous to approach. To compare the two, Smoke's b2 has insane range and gives him a very powerful normal to keep opponents in line from really far out. While Cyrax has f2, which has a retracting hurtbox on startup and is very advantageous on block, it isn't the fastest option Cyrax has. Both characters can space out their projectiles to be safe on block. It's hard to say who is better objectively, as both characters have their perks and downsides to their neutral options.
Pressure: Both characters scare you out of pressing buttons just because letting go of block can lead to death if done at the wrong time. What they can do with that is fairly different, though. Cyrax can open up your guard by using a command throw that leads to a safe jump into more fear of letting go of block. This is also aided by the fact that Cyrax can reset you back to standing after combos, so that you don't have an opportunity to wake up if he chooses to save his meter. Smoke's b2 is a fairly quick overhead that can lead to combos, while his d4 has very heavy advantage on hit. Getting hit by d4 can put you in a nasty guessing game of high/low 50/50s. Do I continue to let Smoke slowly whittle down my health? Or do I take the chance and block low to stop this little game, while opening myself up to a b2 into oblivion? Not to mention, Smoke can pepper you with d1s and d3s cancelled to smoke bomb to make you weary of counter-poking. Pretty scary. Maybe not as scary as Cyrax's general offensive onslaught, but enough to make you hate having to block him.
Defense: With all these advantages, both characters have one notable shortcoming...a lack of useful armor/any armor. In a game where it can be difficult to escape pressure without using it, it's definitely a problem for both characters, as they have to rely on poking their way out. Smoke gets a slight saving grace here, just because of EX shake functioning as a parry. On wakeup, Cyrax is subpar outside of EX ragdoll, with regular ragdoll not activating fast enough to cover the wakeup invincibility and anti air being a decent escape on overzealous opponents. On Smoke's side, teleport is invincible until he leaves the screeen and even hits the opponent, so that's worth something, though it whiffs on crouching opponents. But Smoke also has smoke teleports, which allow him to escape. Without meter, however, they are stuffable. He also has EX shake, which can be stuffed with low attacks, giving him a general difficulty dealing with crouching opponents. On the anti-air side of things, Cyrax has an actual invincible anti-air, but outside of that, both characters do a really solid job of knocking opponents out of the air with their normals and low profiling things. So it's another actually tough call.
These are just really simplified notes, so things don't end there. But with some of these things in mind, what do you think? Is Smoke not that far from sitting in the S-tier court as Cyrax? Or is the idea just a pipe dream?
@R.E.O.
