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Question - Mileena Meta and Wake Ups

Juxtapose

Juxtapose

Master
Hey all,

It's been a while since I've been an active member of the community. I have the PC version of the game, so for several months now the game I had no longer applied. That all changed this past Tuesday though, as the XL content, Kombat Pack 2, and current balance patch have all been released to PC.

I downloaded the update last night, and I'm really enjoying the game! The PC version is more optimized and I can now run it on a higher resolution, the new content is simply fun, and while I haven't played Online since the PC beta, I'm confident the roll back netcode will be great.

Having said all that, I have next to no experience with the XL Meta, only the previously mentioned PC beta, and I didn't dive seriously into it then since it was a beta. On top of that, the new Oct. 4th patch seems to have changed the Meta again.

So rather than read through several months of threads, could I trouble you all to give me the jist of the major general meta changes I should be aware of with the XL content? I know pokes were improved last winter, and I know about the change the Block Breakers and Stamina draining from both opponents.

With this week's patch, it also seems the Wake Up meta is vastly different, at least for Mileena (and Kitana, my two mains).

Can someone go through with me the thoughts on Mileena's wake up now? I know Flip and Roll now has to be enhanced with an additional Bar to properly pop up, but I can't get the timing right to execute it from the few matches I tinkered with last night.

How has Piercing been affected overall now, and how's Ravenous doing in comparison? I did a set against the Hard AI last night, something I used to dominate in, and just eeked out a 3-2 Victory. Barely. Aside from being rusty as #$@%, there's lots for me to learn now (which is exciting).

I did play with Piercing, but started to get the feeling Ravenous might have worked better with Pounce Wake Up options, but that was just me theory crafting in the moment.

Thanks!
 
BeastOfManila

BeastOfManila

Mortal
Did anyone reply to this yet? I'll bite :)

  • re: Wake ups. EX roll and normal roll now function as "wake up shoryukens"; hi prio moves that can bail you out of trouble but disastrous when blocked. EX Fade is a much safer tool.
  • re: MBing EX Roll. It is kinda tricky but I strongly advise against it unless you are absolutely sure that the combo will close the round.
  • Ignore the naysayers. Piercing B12 is still a very good tool. The high starter balances the fact that it's faster now.
  • Ravenous has that unique advantage of constantly staying in their faces using high pounce. Watch out for armored moves tho (and do remember that you're at -3 on block from high pounce).
  • re: high pounce wake up CAN work but do take note that unlike roll, it's very probable that you'd trade hits with a bunch of moves. Unlike roll, it is safe on block. So use in situational occasions.
  • playing away from piercing has (re) introduced me to 2 good advancing strings; b22 and f23(4). Use them!
  • I can see you're a returning player now that PC players are getting some love. Don't worry. We all have to relearn our match up info! :)
 
Juxtapose

Juxtapose

Master
@BeastOfManila and @Karma Thanks kindly for the replies!

Yeah, I know how to use all of Mileena's variations, but Ethereal only on a very basic level. I think I might look into that variation more now. Ravenous was always my original Variation until Piercing clearly out shined it in most match ups, so it's nice to go maskless again.

I do need to play more overall though and really re-learn (and adjust) my stuff.
 
BeastOfManila

BeastOfManila

Mortal
re: Ethereal

Might want to look up optimal meterless combos somewhere here for Ethereal.

Best I got for today's patch is [combo]>roll>njp>d2

Because NJP now scales less than b34>air sai and the d2 ender does a bit more damage (1%) than f23>sai or roll.

Most important but (IMO) often underlooked tip:

Don't be ashamed to win by d1 spam!!
 
Juxtapose

Juxtapose

Master
BeastOfManila said:
re: Ethereal

Might want to look up optimal meterless combos somewhere here for Ethereal.

Best I got for today's patch is [combo]>roll>njp>d2

Because NJP now scales less than b34>air sai and the d2 ender does a bit more damage (1%) than f23>sai or roll.

Most important but (IMO) often underlooked tip:

Don't be ashamed to win by d1 spam!!
Click to expand...
Ha, dude, I'm not afraid to win by any (legit) means. The objective is to defeat my opponent, not do flashy stuff to look pretty ;).

And thanks for the tips! I actually started replacing b3,4, Air Sai with NJP a little bit ago because I found I connect it far more consistently, so that works for me.

I actually played three sets against the Hard AI last night to practice, the first as Kitana (my secondary character) and my first time playing her since the XL content launched on PC. I'm rusty with her as well but wow, look at the Princess go! I felt very, very comfortable with her, but then again I never relied on armoured launchers with her.

I then did two sets as Ravenous Mileena, and I struggled. I lost the first set (Ermac, who I've always had trouble against) and barely won the second (Kitana). I kept miss timing my B1, 2, 1+3 enders and making other basic mistakes.

I'm actually editing the sets together now, and can post them here if you want to see when they're up on YouTube.
 
leoj89

leoj89

Apprentice
Might as well ask here. What moves if any are safe after using raw foward fade playing as ethereal? should it even be used without ex ?
 
Gooberking

Gooberking

FGC Cannon Fodder
Juxtapose said:
Ha, dude, I'm not afraid to win by any (legit) means. The objective is to defeat my opponent, not do flashy stuff to look pretty ;).

And thanks for the tips! I actually started replacing b3,4, Air Sai with NJP a little bit ago because I found I connect it far more consistently, so that works for me.

I actually played three sets against the Hard AI last night to practice, the first as Kitana (my secondary character) and my first time playing her since the XL content launched on PC. I'm rusty with her as well but wow, look at the Princess go! I felt very, very comfortable with her, but then again I never relied on armoured launchers with her.

I then did two sets as Ravenous Mileena, and I struggled. I lost the first set (Ermac, who I've always had trouble against) and barely won the second (Kitana). I kept miss timing my B1, 2, 1+3 enders and making other basic mistakes.

I'm actually editing the sets together now, and can post them here if you want to see when they're up on YouTube.
Click to expand...
Out of the characters I play, Mileena's timings seem the most different post 10/4. The b12 being faster threw me off, and her juggle and roll popup behavior is a little different - even kind of weird at times. Her Rav corner combo that did 46% now does 45% but seems easier to do now, and sometimes it's like you can see a sudden bump in lift for no reason. Everything I was doing still works, but it took a little playing to get used to it.

Mileena was the hardest character for me to get used to, but you can steam roll someone pretty good if you can stay on top of them and know a few places to branch into guessing games. I'm not all that great though, so my opinion is always suspect, but I can toss the hard CPU around like a rag doll. A lot of what makes Mileena good doesn't really work on the high level CPU though, so keep that in mind when building up a game plan with her.

I would recommend practicing that rollback meter burn launcher. The timing on that is a little tricky until you get used to it, and it's something you should know how to do even if you don't choose to do it very often.
 
BeastOfManila

BeastOfManila

Mortal
leoj89 said:
Might as well ask here. What moves if any are safe after using raw foward fade playing as ethereal? should it even be used without ex ?
Click to expand...
I'm no Ethereal guru but the safest follow ups that worked for me after an EX fade are grab (watch out for whiffs) or sweep (little to no follow ups).

I may be doing it wrong but I don't use the normal fades outside of meter gaining because the window to hit you before and after the teleporting is big enough for a combo starter to nail you.

Hoping the other mileena-mainers here can help.
 
Juxtapose

Juxtapose

Master
Hey all,

Here's the two Mileena sets I did against the Hard AI this past Sunday. The first match in the set versus Ermac went well, but then it was downhill.

Over time though, I did improve by the end of the set with Kitana, and started getting my old Pounce kombos in better. But yeah, _lots_ of practice needed!


 
YoloRoll1stHit

YoloRoll1stHit

Publicly Educated
Don't play with computer you will develop bad habits and can't learn anything
I think someone made a thread about raping very hard AI, and his conclusion is basically "pick Kitana and spam 111 fan all day, the AI never block all the hits"
 
Gooberking

Gooberking

FGC Cannon Fodder
YoloRoll1stHit said:
Don't play with computer you will develop bad habits and can't learn anything
I think someone made a thread about raping very hard AI, and his conclusion is basically "pick Kitana and spam 111 fan all day, the AI never block all the hits"
Click to expand...
Hard will only block about 75% of hits, so doing long strings tends to break it's defenses down pretty quick. It will also let you try and pretend you can occasionally mix and throw, and reward you for being aggressive. It doesn't learn and will train you to NJP all day long as well as repeatedly fail to punish you for any real damage. It's the most "human" experience IMO, but it would be much better if it did higher damage combos.

Very hard will forcibly teach you to counter poke like crazy or die. It will also block about 90-95% of everything and cut you little in the way of slack, so you will be taught to; play defensive, never throw, never mix, and look for the 1 unsafe thing they do and never learn to stop doing. Pros, it will show you where a lot of your holes are, and deal proper damage. Cons, everything else. It's fine for fun and a kind of challenge, and to get a feel for the pacing of fast match. By in large, it's the worst experience for translating into playing people.

The MKXL AI is pretty good at providing an entertaining experience for someone that doesn't or can't play people. It will still be playing the game long after everyone else moves on for anyone that still wants to fire the game up on a random night in 2023, so I'm glad it's there. It definitely flexes different muscles than playing people, so if playing people is the goal, you kind of gotta play the fleshies (not that that has worked out all that well for me.)
 
BeastOfManila

BeastOfManila

Mortal
in my experience, playing against the Very Hard AI will teach you (VERY) bad habits (ie: yolo Roll).

I'm one of those handicapped when it comes to finding people to play with; busy office schedule plus a baby on the way limits my availability to join regular casuals, I either have to play online or go play against the AI.

For reasons unknown, I am an idiot online. Don't ask me why. It's just is. However, this can be an okay alternative to being exposed to different MU experiences.

For polishing your fundamentals and if you're absolutely positive you can't take time to play offline casuals with a group, the Hard AI is an okay alternative as it seems to be "more human" than Very Hard AI (albeit with much weaker combos). Just don't expect it to use common tactics found when playing against human opponents.*
 
Juxtapose

Juxtapose

Master
Hey all,

My situation is similar to @BeastOfManila . I have a very busy professional life with a long commute, and my local scene (one city over :p) doesn't really play the game anymore and hasn't for some time as I understand it.

I never got to go and it won't be practical for me to do so any time soon. Couple that with the PC version of the game having the original delay based netcode until this past October 4th, and my only human vs human opportunities were either horrible lag fests or limited to when my buddy or I could visit one another's places. And considering he's chasing four kids, that's not often.

So the AI is what was best for me, and I've found the Hard AI comes the closest to mimicking a human opponent. Does enough good "reads" while still making mistakes and being vulnerable.

At the end of the day, fighting it will of course be different than a living, breathing person who can think and adapt and not robotically counter, but I've always found it a good training tool.

Now that the PC version finally has the rollback netcode, I'll have a better Online experience, but I know the PC version has many European players while I'm in North America, so I still expect offline versus the AI to be smoother.

Also, if I can't comfortably take the Hard AI, I'm less confident in being able to compete against a competent human opponent, Online or off.
 
Baconlord

Baconlord

Proud follower of the church of Cetrion
Juxtapose said:
Also, if I can't comfortably take the Hard AI, I'm less confident in being able to compete against a competent human opponent, Online or off.
Click to expand...
I've been playing this game since day 1 and I have never ran into a human player harder then very hard commando kano. if you want my advice don't even bother with the ai.
 
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