General/Other - Kotal Kahn Kotal Kahn General Discussion

[regulas]

Despite how cheesy it can seem, full auto jaqui is more of an anti zoner then a zoner herself. Once you learn to deal with spam then shotgun or high tech are much bigger threats.

 

[sPaB RoG]

just weather the storm against Jacqui, I'm not sure about the Matchup, but I went to training mode earlier to see her shit, but it seems really linear. She has neutral strings, but kotal kahn has a 5f D1 soooo not sure how it would pan out

 

[Shark Tank]

I call his d1, "the whacker slapper"

 

[You_Need_A_Hugg]

I call his d1, "the whacker slapper"

I call his exdb1 in War God the "Taste the Rainbow of Osh-Tekk"

 

[yungmoney4418]

im startin to like blood god alot more. yea you lose the range that come with war god but it helps me with my neutral game and i feel it got better in these past couple days.

 

[KeyserSoze]

im startin to like blood god alot more. yea you lose the range that come with war god but it helps me with my neutral game and i feel it got better in these past couple days.

I feel the same way.

 

[regulas]

Blood god is mostly about building fundamentals and thus is good at general training. That being said that's partly just because it forces you to. Technically I think you could also just pick "no variation" as well for training.

 

[NHDR]

If you pick no variation against anyone online, ALL you will have is footsies. In fact, Kotal is probably the most useless with no variation. I'm enjoying war god, don't think I'll be touching his other variations at all. I'm not sure the character fully suits me, however, I may perhaps change at some point.

 

[regulas]

If you pick no variation against anyone online, ALL you will have is footsies. In fact, Kotal is probably the most useless with no variation. I'm enjoying war god, don't think I'll be touching his other variations at all. I'm not sure the character fully suits me, however, I may perhaps change at some point.

All that blood god has is totems is the point so with no variation your largely in the same boat you just deal a bit less dmg overall.

 

[Crayraven]

From my perspective, the biggest problem I have with Kotal Kahn , is that he has too many situational moves. In training mode when you can create situational circumstances, the character appears very strong. However, practically against other players, those situations are very unlikely to happen. Thus weakening the character.

I'm still try to understand what kind of character he is:

* Many of his moves push back (very interesting)
* He has a very slow projectile
* The majority of his moves have slow start ups
* Doesn't have a way to open up the opponent
* Doesn't have any real way to deal with projectiles
* Doesn't have a useful wake up
* Situational moves

* Has access to a variety of heals, but they have hefty requirements
* High damage but situational
* Great d1 and d3 pokes

My list is subjective, other's perspective may vary. However, I'm looking for opinions. I want to know what kind of character does everyone feel he is?

 

[regulas]

@Crayraven

Well from this I assume you're not using War God? Pretty much Kotal is a mixed char with various qualities, except for War God who's added abilities almost completely cover most of his major weakness'. War is still a bit weak vs zoners, but you get mix-ups galore (everything you do is now a mix-up at any point), saftey, even greater range, armour EX's for wake-up or counterattacks, as well as extras like a groundshake. You're still mixed on speed but thats not too big an issue with your reach/armor and otherwise.

I mean it literally feels like they balanced all his abilities to be strong or weak, then went OK lets take all the strong ones and they go in one variation, and the other two get whatever s left over.

 

[Second Saint]

@Crayraven

Well from this I assume you're not using War God? Pretty much Kotal is a mixed char with various qualities, except for War God who's added abilities almost completely cover most of his major weakness'. War is still a bit weak vs zoners, but you get mix-ups galore (everything you do is now a mix-up at any point), saftey, even greater range, armour EX's for wake-up or counterattacks, as well as extras like a groundshake. You're still mixed on speed but thats not too big an issue with your reach/armor and otherwise.

I mean it literally feels like they balanced all his abilities to be strong or weak, then went OK lets take all the strong ones and they go in one variation, and the other two get whatever s left over.

I don't know about ALL his strong stuff in one variation. Sword Toss feels like a straight downgrade from Sunstone to me.

Did anyone else watch the pools for Northwest Majors and see Illusions zone the hell out of some people with Sun God Kotal? When I first saw him start doing that, I thought there was no way it was going to work. Then he beat PR Balrog with it. I guess it was so slow nobody knew how to deal with it, and they quickly realized not to try and trade with Sunstone.

 

[Crayraven]

@Crayraven

Well from this I assume you're not using War God? Pretty much Kotal is a mixed char with various qualities, except for War God who's added abilities almost completely cover most of his major weakness'. War is still a bit weak vs zoners, but you get mix-ups galore (everything you do is now a mix-up at any point), saftey, even greater range, armour EX's for wake-up or counterattacks, as well as extras like a groundshake. You're still mixed on speed but thats not too big an issue with your reach/armor and otherwise.

I mean it literally feels like they balanced all his abilities to be strong or weak, then went OK lets take all the strong ones and they go in one variation, and the other two get whatever s left over.

Yea I'm not using war god. I forgot to add that my perspective comes from playing blood god. I just haven't go into war god yet. But maybe I should study it more.

 

[Crayraven]

I don't know about ALL his strong stuff in one variation. Sword Toss feels like a straight downgrade from Sunstone to me.

Did anyone else watch the pools for Northwest Majors and see Illusions zone the hell out of some people with Sun God Kotal? When I first saw him start doing that, I thought there was no way it was going to work. Then he beat PR Balrog with it. I guess it was so slow nobody knew how to deal with it, and they quickly realized not to try and trade with Sunstone.

Quite possible. I found that after you score a knockdown with sun stone, the opponent has a hard time dealing with it. They either have to jump or block. but if their timing is off they will get hit.

 

[Hassun]

@Crayraven I wrote down my early impressions of Kotal Kahn earlier here:

(I will reface this by saying I am a terrible and inexperienced player)

I've now played MKX for 40+ hours, mostly with Sun God Kotal Kahn and I have some impressions/questions.

Sun God Kotal seems like a very bad character. Mostly because his normals are very slow, allowing a lot of characters to beat his moves (seemingly) on reaction. His wakeup also suffers greatly because of this, being cornered seems like a death sentence.

He feels like a medium range fighter who wants to use the range of his normals to keep an opponent at bay. If an opponent gets close he's screwed because their normals will beat his normals, leaving him with just a command throw and a parry. Likewise an opponent at long range is also problematic because Kotal barely has any options to deal with strong zoning. Casting (ex) sunlight on himself is a losing proposition vs zoners.

He doesn't seem to have a good high/low combo starter like some other characters. I have not found a lot of usefulness in the 1,4 combo.
He doesn't seem to have fast multi-hits to blow up armoured moves either.
His metre build seems downright atrocious because he can rarely use his specials and is forced to defend a lot. An opponent getting 6 bars for every 3 of mine is common.

It's very hard to keep the pressure on an opponent. Their faster normals and mixups usually force me into defence mode very quickly where I usually stay. From then on it's hoping for a mistake so I can sneak in a combo and/or command throw.

I know basically two combos right now, both do 38-39% with 1 bar. Decent but not great either. His f2 can result in massive damage but actually landing it is incredibly hard and risky. 1,1,4 seems to be his best option.


I don't want to be a downer though. I still like playing him a lot. His Dry Rub Brutality is one of my favourite things to do in MKX and his normals generally look great.

To improve my game I would like to ask for some advice from the much more advanced players like you guys and gals are:

• Does anyone know of good ways to open up players and/or keep them on the defensive?
• What about air to air moves? I always seem to lose the air battle unless I throw out my attack well before they do.
• What about anti-airs? Are air grab and d2 my best bet?
  
• Any tips on beating corner pressure would also be greatly appreciated normally I try to neutral jump or d4 with a ex parry or command throw if I think I have a read on a player, sadly it seems like a lot of attacks beat nearly all of those options.
• I am bad at combos. Even the f2,1,f2,ex air grab,f2,d2 (39%) took me 2 hours in training mode to figure out and even then I've only managed to do it online maybe 5 times. 1,1,4,ex air grab,f2,d2 (38%) is easier but I've failed at reliably extending that one. Are there other (easy) combos which would be a good addition to my repertoire? I've noticed multiple characters have ~40% combos even without metre.

Thanks for the help in advance and if anyone has questions I will do my best to help.

 

[PooGod]

Did anyone else watch the pools for Northwest Majors and see Illusions zone the hell out of some people with Sun God Kotal?

Does anyone have any VODs of that? I'd like to see this.

I've taken to playing a more mid-screen, reactionary Sun God. Sit just outside their range, but not full screen, make them do something, punish appropriately, for a good chunk of damage, reset to neutral and do it again. EX Sun Choke works pretty well for escaping pressure on wake up, and tick sun chokes from d1 are amazing, and make people scared to block, making it easier to open people up.

I just thought about this, but is F1 special cancellable on whiff? How amazing would it be to learn the distance where a F1 xx Sun Choke would work? To the lab! Once I get home, at least, but then, THE LAB!

 

[LeeVanDam]

I don't know about ALL his strong stuff in one variation. Sword Toss feels like a straight downgrade from Sunstone to me.

Did anyone else watch the pools for Northwest Majors and see Illusions zone the hell out of some people with Sun God Kotal? When I first saw him start doing that, I thought there was no way it was going to work. Then he beat PR Balrog with it. I guess it was so slow nobody knew how to deal with it, and they quickly realized not to try and trade with Sunstone.

I didn't see it, but I could definitely believe it. Sunstone has some very interesting properties if you think about it:

1. It's mid, so you can't duck it
2. It knocks down on normal hit, so it easily sets up them having to take the ridiculous 3% chip from blocking another sunstone.
3. The EX Sunstone is very fast on start up and travel, so it really messes with the timing on the regular sunstone even more. (i.e. I've beat out Jacqui's gun after blocking a volley). It also does 16% damage, which is almost the same damage as the level 3 sun god choke.
4. The normal Sunstone's start up is so slow that if they jump at start up it's likely to hit them on the way down.

I don't think it will ever get old either, because you go from such a slow start up to an almost instant start up with the EX that you still have to make a read for the EX sunstone in order to avoid it.

 

[PooGod]

I didn't see it, but I could definitely believe it. Sunstone has some very interesting properties if you think about it:

1. It's mid, so you can't duck it
2. It knocks down on normal hit, so it easily sets up them having to take the ridiculous 3% chip from blocking another sunstone.
3. The EX Sunstone is very fast on start up and travel, so it really messes with the timing on the regular sunstone even more. (i.e. I've beat out Jacqui's gun after blocking a volley). It also does 16% damage, which is almost the same damage as the level 3 sun god choke.
4. The normal Sunstone's start up is so slow that if they jump at start up it's likely to hit them on the way down.

I don't think it will ever get old either, because you go from such a slow start up to an almost instant start up with the EX that you still have to make a read for the EX sunstone in order to avoid it.

All very good points. I've had some success zoning out characters with Sun Stone, at least those without very good zoning tools themselves. I took a Cassie on who was playing Brawler, and was able to sit full screen, duck gunshots, throw sun stones, then punish her attempts to close distance with a combo. After the combo, we end up near full screen again, with enough time for me to call a sunbeam and wait for her to come to me again. Once she got in, it's hard to block her mixups, but if you can keep her out of your face well enough, the advantage goes to you pretty well it seemed.

 

[KeyserSoze]

I didn't see it, but I could definitely believe it. Sunstone has some very interesting properties if you think about it:

1. It's mid, so you can't duck it
2. It knocks down on normal hit, so it easily sets up them having to take the ridiculous 3% chip from blocking another sunstone.
3. The EX Sunstone is very fast on start up and travel, so it really messes with the timing on the regular sunstone even more. (i.e. I've beat out Jacqui's gun after blocking a volley). It also does 16% damage, which is almost the same damage as the level 3 sun god choke.
4. The normal Sunstone's start up is so slow that if they jump at start up it's likely to hit them on the way down.

I don't think it will ever get old either, because you go from such a slow start up to an almost instant start up with the EX that you still have to make a read for the EX sunstone in order to avoid it.

Totally agree. I personally think Sunstone is one of the more underrated zoning tools in the game.

 

[KeyserSoze]

I don't know about ALL his strong stuff in one variation. Sword Toss feels like a straight downgrade from Sunstone to me.

Did anyone else watch the pools for Northwest Majors and see Illusions zone the hell out of some people with Sun God Kotal? When I first saw him start doing that, I thought there was no way it was going to work. Then he beat PR Balrog with it. I guess it was so slow nobody knew how to deal with it, and they quickly realized not to try and trade with Sunstone.

Exactly. And now, imagine successfully carrying out out a surprise zoning attack with crystal totem activated

And there is no question that sword toss is a downgrade from Sunstone. IMO, War God is probably his worst variation against zoning chracters and Blood God is probably his best.

 

[regulas]

I'm going to maybe be pedantic here but; ranged does not equal zoning.

Yes sunstone is decent when you can compensate for the start-up though it's still overall a mixed attack that works partly because people don't know it's properties well enough.

Aside from that zoning is weak in the game so once you learn to deal with spam wargods sword ranges mean it's pretty easy to close on someone trying to control your position.

 

[Crayraven]

Exactly. And now, imagine successfully carrying out out a surprise zoning attack with crystal totem activated

And there is no question that sword toss is a downgrade from Sunstone. IMO, War God is probably his worst variation against zoning chracters and Blood God is probably his best.

Sounds about right.

With crystal totem and blood sacrifice, sun stone does 31%. One hit does the same as what most players can do with one long combo.

 

[KeyserSoze]

I'm going to maybe be pedantic here but; ranged does not equal zoning.

Yes sunstone is decent when you can compensate for the start-up though it's still overall a mixed attack that works partly because people don't know it's properties well enough.

Aside from that zoning is weak in the game so once you learn to deal with spam wargods sword ranges mean it's pretty easy to close on someone trying to control your position.

good point. I probably should have written "ranged tool", instead of "zoning tool."

People like to act like Sunstone is useless because its normal version is slow as hell, but it clearly has its uses, most notably, after a knockdown.

 

[NHDR]

You don't have to cover too much range with War God when facing zoning. Crouch, block, and take baby steps in. Before you know it you're already in F1 range, from there you can throw it out and cancel to make it safe. Also, saving one bar for EX Sword Throw in order to be able to run in seems like a good investment.

I've been labbing lately and it seems like F1 xx overhead/sweep/saw blade are all safe. Get in that range and you're good to go. And the first two create mixups. Am I wrong? Feel free to tell me if I'm wrong, I want to level up as much as I can. Thanks.

 

[Pnut]

You don't have to cover too much range with War God when facing zoning. Crouch, block, and take baby steps in. Before you know it you're already in F1 range, from there you can throw it out and cancel to make it safe. Also, saving one bar for EX Sword Throw in order to be able to run in seems like a good investment.

I've been labbing lately and it seems like F1 xx overhead/sweep/saw blade are all safe. Get in that range and you're good to go. And the first two create mixups. Am I wrong? Feel free to tell me if I'm wrong, I want to level up as much as I can. Thanks.

How is f1 OH/sweep safe? Against what? I'm pretty sure KJ, ermac, and others can blow it up normally.