Lex Luthor: All the Right Tools with All the Wrong Numbers.

[Grashi]

Howdy, guys. First post here. Been lurking this sub forum for a bit now, wondering if Lex would be getting any love, and I'm shocked to see that he has And people don't think he's complete garbage I'M NOT ALONE!

Anyway, I go by the username Iamgrashi on PSN (doubt any of you have played me) and have been using Lex for a little while now. For the most part, I agree completely with the OP. Though, what got me interested in lex is his high/low options. A lot of characters lack a reliable, quick, low or over head attack to throw into their pressure. But see, ALL of lex's moves are slow so "quick" doesn't apply here. What I feel Lex lacks is good Mid hitting attacks...Because 1 whiffs on crouching opponents, it's pretty much useless in my eyes outside of a combo.

The biggest issue I've noticed with lex is his trait...I can't, for the life of me, figure out why and where to use it. However I was not aware of the dash cancel and will probably try that out next time I play. But it seems like a missed pressure window..On the topic of Zoners, the only issue I've really had was from a Cyborg player. That instant air nova blast pretty much shuts down anything I could do besides lance shot in between his jumps when he mistimed it.

But I feel like i'm all over the place now. So, back to lurking I go~

 

[IrishMantis]

Where's J369 and Wonderchef these 2 will do Lex Justice, but I wouldn't be opposed to lex getting. a slight speed buff

 

[Jetm]

Howdy, guys. First post here. Been lurking this sub forum for a bit now, wondering if Lex would be getting any love, and I'm shocked to see that he has And people don't think he's complete garbage I'M NOT ALONE!

Anyway, I go by the username Iamgrashi on PSN (doubt any of you have played me) and have been using Lex for a little while now. For the most part, I agree completely with the OP. Though, what got me interested in lex is his high/low options. A lot of characters lack a reliable, quick, low or over head attack to throw into their pressure. But see, ALL of lex's moves are slow so "quick" doesn't apply here. What I feel Lex lacks is good Mid hitting attacks...Because 1 whiffs on crouching opponents, it's pretty much useless in my eyes outside of a combo.

The biggest issue I've noticed with lex is his trait...I can't, for the life of me, figure out why and where to use it. However I was not aware of the dash cancel and will probably try that out next time I play. But it seems like a missed pressure window..On the topic of Zoners, the only issue I've really had was from a Cyborg player. That instant air nova blast pretty much shuts down anything I could do besides lance shot in between his jumps when he mistimed it.

But I feel like i'm all over the place now. So, back to lurking I go~

The instant air projectile shuts down pretty much the whole cast since, if done perfectly, it can become a blockfinite. Furthermore, activating your trait is not a wasted pressure opportunity if only for the fact that you can cancel certain combo enders into it, dash forward, and be ready to mix up your opponent right away with a 100% damage reduction super armor shield up.

Personally, I mostly use his 1 to combo off of floating d1 hits. Also, his moves aren't really all that slow. d1 is 7 frames, which is decent considering the range and it's only -1 on block. His overheads are some of the faster ones I've seen from simple command inputs, and the fact that his standing low option leaves him at +6 means his mixup is something to be feared. He also has Corp Charge, a 6 frame special that will punish things you didn't even know were punishable, and will leave you at a decent enough advantage.

In regards to mixing up, Lex is great in the d1 poking wars. If he ever lands a hit he ends up at +11, as has been said in multiple threads, which leads into a 50/50 high-low mixup.

 

[Grashi]

I don't even want to talk about Corp Charge. It's pretty much Brainless to me now. Player annoying you at max range? Body check. Arrow thinks he's being slick with his knockdown into super? Body check. batman won't stop jump medium? Body check.

However, I did forget about his D1...It's pretty insane, I'll admit.

From the little I've experimented with the game (20 or so hours) I feel that Lex has an amazing high low game. almost as good as I think hawkgirls is off of B1

 

[Wemfs]

He has an amazing high/low game and becomes a mega beast whenever you get a combo started on his lvl3 trait. I haven't timed its duration,but it lasts all the way through any bnb combo of your choice and then some, making any sort of of mine/probe/beam setup that much scarier for your opponent because that armor opens up so many more options for lex in regards to his setups.

 

[Fenn the Fool!]

His f2 gives you all the time in the world to set something up. Actually yo can f2, lvl3 trait, dash forward, and still have enough time to block any wake up in the game. I tested it against luthor's 6 frame corps charge, assuming his charge is the fastest special in the game.

How bout them apples?

An unsafe move that's impossible to hitconfirm? What a brilliant plan! You CAN use f2 or b2 blindly canceled into the hilariously unsafe db2 MB for the same mediocre damage, but great setup potential, combos that you get off of b13 but it's not a good idea because there isn't a way to do that safely.

 

[rev0lver]

Where's J369 and Wonderchef these 2 will do Lex Justice, but I wouldn't be opposed to lex getting. a slight speed buff

Who the fuck cares about Wonderchef, I'm here.

An unsafe move that's impossible to hitconfirm? What a brilliant plan! You CAN use f2 or b2 blindly canceled into the hilariously unsafe db2 MB for the same mediocre damage, but great setup potential, combos that you get off of b13 but it's not a good idea because there isn't a way to do that safely.

Against Lex, opponents are already conditioned to blocking low as to avoid 112 and b1. If you abuse it you'll get blown up obviously, but throwing it out once per match or so could catch them.

 

[BDMao88]

Who the fuck cares about Wonderchef, I'm here.

Bitch please.

 

[Fenn the Fool!]

Against Lex, opponents are already conditioned to blocking low as to avoid 112 and b1. If you abuse it you'll get blown up obviously, but throwing it out once per match or so could catch them.

Yeah, you can catch them, but it's a pretty big example of why Lex is a bad character. He has zero ways to keep up pressure, none of his normals give him significant frame advantage on block and all of his specials are extremely unsafe to cancel into on block. When you get an opening you have one shot to do your high low mixup. Any other character in the roster will do more damage to you if they block f2 correctly than you'll do to them if they block wrong, you're using your one opportunity to put yourself at a disadvantageous situation. Maybe they are conditioned to block low, but that means you've used all your previous opportunities to condition them rather than actually mix them up. The overall point here is that Lex's pressure is one of the worst in the cast and gets you pretty shitty damage when it does work. Probe, mine, and forcefield give him great momentum, but without a reliable way to safely get them out he's going to be at a pretty big disadvantage in a lot of matchups.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

Yeah, you can catch them, but it's a pretty big example of why Lex is a bad character. He has zero ways to keep up pressure, none of his normals give him significant frame advantage on block and all of his specials are extremely unsafe to cancel into on block. When you get an opening you have one shot to do your high low mixup. Any other character in the roster will do more damage to you if they block f2 correctly than you'll do to them if they block wrong, you're using your one opportunity to put yourself at a disadvantageous situation. Maybe they are conditioned to block low, but that means you've used all your previous opportunities to condition them rather than actually mix them up. The overall point here is that Lex's pressure is one of the worst in the cast and gets you pretty shitty damage when it does work. Probe, mine, and forcefield give him great momentum, but without a reliable way to safely get them out he's going to be at a pretty big disadvantage in a lot of matchups.

Up Lance Blast is safe on block. Probe can come out after any hard knockdown. j3 hits overhead and combos.

 

[Fenn the Fool!]

Up Lance Blast is safe on block. Probe can come out after any hard knockdown. j3 hits overhead and combos.

What exactly are you responding to? Yes, j3 is a pretty amazing normal, but it's not a mixup and Lex's jump is so floaty you'll get punished pretty hard a lot of situations. I said that probe, mine, and forcefield are great momentum tools, but you need a knockdown first and that doesn't come easy. Up Lance blast is safe on block but so are a number of his other normals; if you're talking about using it to make f2 safe well, funny story, on paper 6 frame moves will interrupt the cancel but in actuality it's worse than that, another Lex can easily interrupt it with standing 1. More practically after blocking f2 the entire cast can punish with d1 into whatever combo they like, if you cancel into up lance it whiffs and if you don't cancel you're -8 on block so either way you eat the punish.

 

[Malec]

Yeah, you can catch them, but it's a pretty big example of why Lex is a bad character. He has zero ways to keep up pressure, none of his normals give him significant frame advantage on block and all of his specials are extremely unsafe to cancel into on block. When you get an opening you have one shot to do your high low mixup. Any other character in the roster will do more damage to you if they block f2 correctly than you'll do to them if they block wrong, you're using your one opportunity to put yourself at a disadvantageous situation. Maybe they are conditioned to block low, but that means you've used all your previous opportunities to condition them rather than actually mix them up. The overall point here is that Lex's pressure is one of the worst in the cast and gets you pretty shitty damage when it does work. Probe, mine, and forcefield give him great momentum, but without a reliable way to safely get them out he's going to be at a pretty big disadvantage in a lot of matchups.

lol seriously, i think if lex would have any better normals, that give him advantage on block, he would be to good. with a probe and his trait up, how would you stop him? he already got 22d1 that leaves him +2, is overhead and gives full combo in the corner or a corp charge in the open field. 22b3 low option that is also safe. as crimson shadow already said, up lance blast is -3 or smth like that on block (+10 on hit).
yeah f2 is riski, but you dont always have to do a full combo to make them respect your overheads, you can also use b2,u3,hitconfirm d3 and setup your offence again.
i dont say that lex is perfect and that he has at least 5-5 matchup against everyone, but i think his tools are fine. the only thing i could see beeing a problem, is his slow movement, jumping speed and a horrible backdash and aquamans trait lol

 

[G4S MinotaurLord]

I've been playing lex since the demo as well (and well into the release), and have a few things to contribute:

-people are hella worried about his inability to zone and his inability to "stay in". It was mentioned here before, but he's not supposed to do either. He controls space excellently well. Yes, this means that you'll have to learn every matchup because how to apply spacing obviously varies greatly from character to character. He's "Testament" from GGX2 with a 6 frame advancing move and an unblockable overhead projectile.

-his charged projectile can be a great check against wake-ups. Instead of going for df3 or another set up, it's worth charging the gun sometimes because even on block, when spaced right, can push them back 3/4 screen. I'm not saying you should be using this instead of your other setups, but that it's another tool in his arsenal.

-his combos ARE pretty solid. Most character's bnbs use at least 1 bar, and lex's MB pull is the go to for this. Outside of characters like Supes (who can get absurd damage when compared to the rest of the cast), I don't think his damage output is lacking. Because his trait gives him armor, he doesn't need to MB b3/f3 as much as the rest of the cast and can use his meter a bit more freely for this purpose (especially because he builds it pretty quickly).

Outside of Rev0lver's input (and a few others), this thread looks like it is/is about to quickly devolve into a character downplaying thread. I don't think Lex is as bad as people pretend he is. His online viability might not be great because of lag and all of that, but my offline experience against competent players doesn't make me think he's "bad" by any stretch - his punishes are tight, but perfectly doable. He hasn't been represented offline yet by anyone well known in the community to my knowledge at a major event.

 

[PRS]

Whats interesting to me is that i've jumped from bane to catwomen to nightwing then to lex... Nightwing is easily my most dominant character b/c of his staff pressure and escrima frame traps and imo is def a better than lex... but damn lex is sooooo much more fun to play lol... come tournament time (ECT is the next one i'm heading to) ill go back to nightwing most likely but until then its all lex gimmicks from here on out for me

 

[BDMao88]

Respect the probe? Who the hell respects 2% when they can trade with you for more damage...

 

[Malec]

anyone else having a hard time getting the first hit on the match? i am getting jumped alot at the beginning of the match, i tried to anti air with d2, didnt realy work, tried to jump in myself, but lex jumping attacks are to slow. i checked the frame data of other chars, they have like 5frame startup ji1, lex ji1 is 10frame :/
i know i can just block the ji1, but ji1 is at +frames on block for the most of the cast. backdashing and whiffpunish dosent work, cause lex backdash is horrible

 

[LizardLard]

anyone else having a hard time getting the first hit on the match? i am getting jumped alot at the beginning of the match, i tried to anti air with d2, didnt realy work, tried to jump in myself, but lex jumping attacks are to slow. i checked the frame data of other chars, they have like 5frame startup ji1, lex ji1 is 10frame :/
i know i can just block the ji1, but ji1 is at +frames on block for the most of the cast. backdashing and whiffpunish dosent work, cause lex backdash is horrible

Just hold back at the beginning of the match if its a big problem. It really depends on your opponent's character and style. If they jump in right at the start of every round, then NEUTRAL jump or BACK jump 3. Dont jump in, because as you said, it has slower startup. It has MUCH better range than other jump attacks though to make up for it. Against Green Lantern or Killer Frost, begin blocking low to prevent being hit by GL's low string or KF's slide. Do not leave the ground at the start of a fight with Green Lantern, because I would say a good 90% of the GLs that I have fought open with his lift. The last thing you want is to start a round with a 40 percent health deficit because you got caught by a lift first thing. Just never jump in at the start with Lex. In fact, I would never recommend jumping in with any character at the start of the match, but a neutral jump 3 will stuff any start of the game jump ins from your opponent and can lead to full combo if they are within d1 range after they take the hit.

 

[LizardLard]

I've been playing lex since the demo as well (and well into the release), and have a few things to contribute:

-people are hella worried about his inability to zone and his inability to "stay in". It was mentioned here before, but he's not supposed to do either. He controls space excellently well. Yes, this means that you'll have to learn every matchup because how to apply spacing obviously varies greatly from character to character. He's "Testament" from GGX2 with a 6 frame advancing move and an unblockable overhead projectile.

-his charged projectile can be a great check against wake-ups. Instead of going for df3 or another set up, it's worth charging the gun sometimes because even on block, when spaced right, can push them back 3/4 screen. I'm not saying you should be using this instead of your other setups, but that it's another tool in his arsenal.

-his combos ARE pretty solid. Most character's bnbs use at least 1 bar, and lex's MB pull is the go to for this. Outside of characters like Supes (who can get absurd damage when compared to the rest of the cast), I don't think his damage output is lacking. Because his trait gives him armor, he doesn't need to MB b3/f3 as much as the rest of the cast and can use his meter a bit more freely for this purpose (especially because he builds it pretty quickly).

Outside of Rev0lver's input (and a few others), this thread looks like it is/is about to quickly devolve into a character downplaying thread. I don't think Lex is as bad as people pretend he is. His online viability might not be great because of lag and all of that, but my offline experience against competent players doesn't make me think he's "bad" by any stretch - his punishes are tight, but perfectly doable. He hasn't been represented offline yet by anyone well known in the community to my knowledge at a major event.

Thank you for saving me 20 minutes of typing. The game hasnt even been out for a month and Lex is by far one of the most unexplored characters. He hasnt been represented in a high level tournament by anyone that I know of so it's ridiculous to be making so many judgements. Lex has all the tools necessary to compete in any matchup. The problem right now is that, because of his style, he requires good MU knowledge to use effectively, which is something that will not be possible for a while. I would argue that he takes the most MU knowledge of any character because of how differently he must be played to be effective in certain matchups. He builds meter very fast for a reason. He is meant to be a smart, tactical character that involves good reads, setups, and meter management.

 

[keo-bas]

Thank you for saving me 20 minutes of typing. The game hasnt even been out for a month and Lex is by far one of the most unexplored characters. He hasnt been represented in a high level tournament by anyone that I know of so it's ridiculous to be making so many judgements. Lex has all the tools necessary to compete in any matchup. The problem right now is that, because of his style, he requires good MU knowledge to use effectively, which is something that will not be possible for a while. I would argue that he takes the most MU knowledge of any character because of how differently he must be played to be effective in certain matchups. He builds meter very fast for a reason. He is meant to be a smart, tactical character that involves good reads, setups, and meter management.

Ares almost sport the same style except his simple and reactive base. Lex complexity is illusion of his versatility. lex can approach many situation differently which can mind fuck all on his own. In fact considering how good space control is. Doesn't this make him great contender in using interacbles?

 

[volkmair]

-people are hella worried about his inability to zone and his inability to "stay in". It was mentioned here before, but he's not supposed to do either. He controls space excellently well. Yes, this means that you'll have to learn every matchup because how to apply spacing obviously varies greatly from character to character. He's "Testament" from GGX2 with a 6 frame advancing move and an unblockable overhead projectile.

The spacing knowledge is going to need some major headspace as several characters seem to be able to punish Lex's setup moves from all over the place (though this might just be online). I've eaten so many wake up moves including supers for doing things like charging level 1 trait after a knockdown.

As much as I like the character and playing him it might just be that Lex isn't the character for my 'serious' play as I'm always wanting to be doing stuff rather than being more reactionary.

 

[legion666]

I had Superman attack me but I got the probe up - he started a combo launching me - the probe hit while I was in the air he recovered before I fell and continued the FREAKING COMBO!!!THIS IS USELESS!!!

 

[CalDW19940]

I'd be all up for if they made Lex have a MB Corp Charge that was fully invincible to projectiles (think Iron Tager's Sledge hammer attack from Blazblue) so he has a halfway decent threat against zoners >>

 

[Pig Of The Hut]

Personally i think lex is really good and we'll see how much better he gets tuesday especially if some others get nerfed back to reality

 

[legion666]

Personally i think lex is really good and we'll see how much better he gets tuesday especially if some others get nerfed back to reality

I came up with some useful resets with Lex, but in this game it is really hard to make them 100% garanteed, maybe only with Grundy

 

[ValeDJ]

Probably has been mentioned, but has great range on his d3...great for setting up a mine trap after a JI3 into d3 setup