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Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate First Impressions Tier List by Dragon and Honey Bee

Eddy Wang

Skarlet scientist
There is a one frame difference. My cousin, who used to play me for thousands of games, used to be able to fuzzy guard Tremor's 2,1,2 and 2,1,d+4, which also has a one frame difference, nine out of ten times offline so I believe Dragon.
I believe in dragon too, since you guys could also block an 18f overhead on reaction and a 8f low from the same move that could come out at any time.
I almost forgot you guys are super humans.
:DOGE
 

M2Dave

Zoning Master
I believe in dragon too, since you guys could also block an 18f overhead on reaction and a 8f low from the same move that could come out at any time.
I almost forgot you guys are super humans.
:DOGE
Huh? What are you talking about?
 

Marlow

Premium Supporter
Premium Supporter
My understanding of tiers:

S: Clearly top 1-2 characters in the game, borderline broken/banned from tournament play.
A: Very strong character, above average tools compared to the rest of the cast.
B: Average strength character, can compete just fine.
C: Below average toolkit but still competitively viable, just generally an uphill climb compared to the rest of the cast
D: Simply not a viable character

I guess if you wanted you can use a +/- appendage to try and subdivide a bit more.


I think pretty much every character in MK11 fits into the A-C range.
 

RoboCop

The future of law enforcement.
Administrator
Premium Supporter
lol this community can't even decide what the tiers mean, much less which characters belong where.

To me, putting everyone in the very tippy top tier is like Spinal Tap writing an "11" on the volume knobs of their amps so they can "turn them up to 11". It's still a 10, it's just labeled as an 11. The label literally has no meaning. It's all relational. That's why I think assigning any inherent value to the tiers is flawed, since tiers don't dictate power level, just the difference in power level between characters.

These lists also seem so arbitrary. As far as I'm concerned, "tier lists" are utterly useless. I put much more stock into matchup charts, like Billsticker's amazing MK9 Matchup Chart. If you lose a matchup 7/3 or worse, it really doesn't matter what tier your character is lol.
 
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Marlow

Premium Supporter
Premium Supporter
As far as I'm concerned, "tier lists" are utterly useless.
I think they're nice to look at in a general way, just to get an idea about a character. My main dislike of them is that people seem to spend way too much time arguing about tier placements, and the nerfs/buffs needed to change a tier placement, and don't seem to invest as much time discussing strategy, character matchups, stuff like that. Tier lists just get too much attention.
 

RoboCop

The future of law enforcement.
Administrator
Premium Supporter
I think they're nice to look at in a general way, just to get an idea about a character. My main dislike of them is that people seem to spend way too much time arguing about tier placements, and the nerfs/buffs needed to change a tier placement, and don't seem to invest as much time discussing strategy, character matchups, stuff like that. Tier lists just get too much attention.
They may be nice to look at, but saying "Character X is S+++ Tier" without any explanation is useless. What makes them great? What are their weaknesses? What characters best exploit those weaknesses? Maybe Mr. Unstoppable S+++ tier has that one weird 2/8 matchup, completely negating their tournament viability. Maybe Mr. Unstoppable is only really S+++ Tier if you play like a Jedi with Mr. Fantastic fingers, so non-pro players will never see success with them. Without adequate information backing up the tier list, there is absolutely zero benefit.
 

Arqwart

D'Vorah for KP2 copium
These lists also seem so arbitrary. As far as I'm concerned, "tier lists" are utterly useless. I put much more stock into matchup charts, like Billsticker's amazing MK9 Matchup Chart. If you lose a matchup 7/3 or worse, it really doesn't matter what tier your character is lol.
I do agree that matchup charts carry considerably more weight than tier lists as matchups are what matter (as you said). My question is, though, whether a matchup listing could even be practical when custom variations are available. The inconsistency between variation move options means the #/# scale is going to be in flux a LOT.

For example: is Cetrion / Baraka a 7/3 matchup? Maybe as a baseline, but maybe it's 8/2 instead when Cetrion has teleport. However, maybe the Baraka has charge for a quick way to shut down her movement. Maybe Baraka uses the flag charge to armor through her wall pressure. What if Baraka uses the lunge command grab? Do any of these bring it back to 7/3? 6/4? Is the Cetrion using other moves that alter the matchup drastically, such as the tornado or the wind area lockdown? Are the characters assumed to be using the "best" combination of moves in response to the opponent's? Is that even possible when certain moves are specifically chosen as counters which would likely result in their opponent swapping variations if they lose?

I feel like outside of very specific matchups where one character clearly counters the other as a baseline (such as Cetrion making Baraka look like a fuckin chump), a matchup chart isn't going to work appropriately in the world of MK11.
 

RoboCop

The future of law enforcement.
Administrator
Premium Supporter
I do agree that matchup charts carry considerably more weight than tier lists as matchups are what matter (as you said). My question is, though, whether a matchup listing could even be practical when custom variations are available. The inconsistency between variation move options means the #/# scale is going to be in flux a LOT.

For example: is Cetrion / Baraka a 7/3 matchup? Maybe as a baseline, but maybe it's 8/2 instead when Cetrion has teleport. However, maybe the Baraka has charge for a quick way to shut down her movement. Maybe Baraka uses the flag charge to armor through her wall pressure. What if Baraka uses the lunge command grab? Do any of these bring it back to 7/3? 6/4? Is the Cetrion using other moves that alter the matchup drastically, such as the tornado or the wind area lockdown? Are the characters assumed to be using the "best" combination of moves in response to the opponent's? Is that even possible when certain moves are specifically chosen as counters which would likely result in their opponent swapping variations if they lose?

I feel like outside of very specific matchups where one character clearly counters the other as a baseline (such as Cetrion making Baraka look like a fuckin chump), a matchup chart isn't going to work appropriately in the world of MK11.
I think the easy solution is just to base it on best-case-scenario matches. So you just assume that for a Baraka/Cetrion MU, he's going to be kitted out specifically for it and so is she. So, when Baraka and Cetrion fight and both characters are prepared for the MU, who wins on average?

You could also do it with specific popular loadouts, though that would still be one hell of a giant MU chart.

As limited as those methods would be, they would still be miles more effective at educating players on the characters' strengths and weaknesses than some arbitrary tier list.
 

colby4898

Special Forces Sonya Up-player
Judging by some of the things they said (Honeybee's match with 2EZ), this was shot a week ago. So they were definitely early impressions. Honeybee actually found a D'vorah kustom he likes with Tele + Strep. I don't think they were aware of Dragon Stance Sheeva at the time either.

Does anyone else miss when S-tier meant something more than top tier? I do.
The letters shouldn't matter. All it means is that one is slightly above the tier below. It could be S, S- or A, B or Apple, Orange. Its the same thing. The idea that S- is just slightly worse than S is literally the point of a tier system, so why not just call it A. If its the idea that ots between S and A then thats the point of there being 1 more tier than it either wise would be. What the tiers are called is literally meaningless, its just who is in them and how many there are.
 

CrimsonShadow

Administrator and Community Engineer
Administrator
The letters shouldn't matter. All it means is that one is slightly above the tier below. It could be S, S- or A, B or Apple, Orange. Its the same thing. The idea that S- is just slightly worse than S is literally the point of a tier system, so why not just call it A. If its the idea that ots between S and A then thats the point of there being 1 more tier than it either wise would be. What the tiers are called is literally meaningless, its just who is in them and how many there are.
Kinda, but I still think that accepted conventions actually help people understand what you mean.

For example, if a character is D tier, it makes far more sense that they're actually really bad. If you started, for example, putting top characters in D tier just because they're a bit less strong that some other top character (to an extent that it's probably highly debatable anyway, because this isn't an exact science), then it makes the entire list pretty worthless.

Whereas if D tier is "We can all agree that this character is terrible and needs a ton of help even to compete with average characters" vs. the A tier, that's a lot more meaningful and useful.

Likewise, if we put 20 'good' characters in S+ tier, then what happens when an actual broken DLC ends up being released? Do we now have to invent new tiers, like S+++? At some point it just becomes pretty ridiculous.

So while it may not make sense to have super strict guidelines, I still think that keeping things to reasonable range just makes these lists easier to interpret/use overall.
 

cR WoundCowboy

WoundCowbae <3
We aren't shocked. This is old people being old about how things were better back in our day.
Not at all. MK11 is definitely more balanced than previous games, but putting everyone in S tier tells us nothing. It basically would mean that essentially everything is even/characters don’t matter. That is definitely not the case.

S tier is supposed to be reserved for characters who clearly stand out above the rest. That’s how it has been in literally every fighting game ever made.
 

Second Saint

A man with too many names.
Not at all. MK11 is definitely more balanced than previous games, but putting everyone in S tier tells us nothing. It basically would mean that essentially everything is even/characters don’t matter. That is definitely not the case.

S tier is supposed to be reserved for characters who clearly stand out above the rest. That’s how it has been in literally every fighting game ever made.
Keep in mind I was the old person who brought up the issue of S-tier being meaningless in this thread. I'm just aware that meanings evolve, not always for the better, and that seems to be what's happened to S- tier, given that this is hardly an isolated event.
 

Obly

Ambiguous world creator
The letters shouldn't matter. All it means is that one is slightly above the tier below. It could be S, S- or A, B or Apple, Orange. Its the same thing. The idea that S- is just slightly worse than S is literally the point of a tier system, so why not just call it A. If its the idea that ots between S and A then thats the point of there being 1 more tier than it either wise would be. What the tiers are called is literally meaningless, its just who is in them and how many there are.
Yes the letters do matter, if you actually want to communicate effectively. Everyone can intuitively understand what "A, B, C" means. No one would have a clue what "Apple, Orange, Banana" means. So using "Apple, Orange, Banana" to mean the same thing, when you could have used "A, B, C", automatically makes your tier list a worse communication tool.

A break in natural language order should have specific meaning, not random. Use S to say "These characters don't fall in the natural order with everyone else. They're not A, they're not A+, they're something else entirely." That's a good use of S. But using "S, A, B" to mean the same thing as "A, B, C" (for... reasons??) automatically makes your tier list a worse communication tool.

One of the reasons tier lists are useless is exactly because creators just make up their own rules every time. You're never really sure what you're looking at. If we actually did have consistent, agreed-on rules creators would stick to, we could compare and aggregate lists and they might actually communicate useful information.

As is, tier lists are just clickbait that creators throw up for cheap views (because they know people love to talk about them, even though we all know they're useless clickbait... what does that say about us??)