Scrub Tier List

[wsj515]

People are getting hit by the equivalent of random Mileena Ball roll - in the form of Nitara string into Ferra Mix - because they refuse to lab it, and rage. It is fake. Doesn't mean it won't hit ever, or is useless - it means it won't catch people paying attention, exactly like the random ball roll. It is that simple.

Again just a crazy position to be taking. Is stagger pressure fake? Is Rain's cancel pressure fake, because he's almost always negative and can't ever jail anything? We both know its real, every time Rain does a cancel he's forcing you to guess on how to respond.

I think the biggest bill sold by the FGC is an overrating of people's general ability to react to things. The best pro players in the world still get hit by Smoke, Sub, Ashrah etc. overhead offline - they definitely block them a good amount, but their consistency is overrated. Like others have already mentioned, mental stack exists. You're 100% not reacting to Ferra being called every time and interrupting with a button. If you're armoring, great, but that's something the Nitara player can bait and full punish depending on the armor.

Now lets assume you are actually a reaction god, and your reaction time is so good that you are able to react and interrupt a non-jailing Ferra call with a normal button every single time. The Ferra player has multiple courses of action - they can just let it rip, they can jump back/up, they can dash back - all of those will change how you have to punish, and you'll never be able to convince me you can deliberately initiate the proper punish on reaction.

Say I'm Reiko, if I try to s1 punish and Nitara walks back, I'm dead. If I b3 to beat the walk back, I'm dead to jump. If I s1/3 to beat the jump options, they walk back and I'm dead. If I armor and Nitara jumps, I'm dead. If I do nothing, I have to hold a safe 50/50.

Yeah, super fake.

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

Okay, let's break this down by parts. I won't comment on Rain, as I've never played him and never labbed against his options.

Like others have already mentioned, mental stack exists. You're 100% not reacting to Ferra being called every time and interrupting with a button.

No, as you are also not 100% blocking that random ball roll, as I've explained. Why is it then that people don't demand the roll nerfed or call it scrubby?

If you're armoring, great, but that's something the Nitara player can bait and full punish depending on the armor.

Nope. If she calls Ferra from f1, b4 or 124, you are 100% armoring every time if she goes for overhead/low/grab and full combo punishing if she goes overhead/low, as you will punish before Ferra gets off her back. Unless you mean she does the full f12 string, or b3 full string, in which case your armor wont come out and if you are trying to s1 punish you will just get knocked down. She CAN cancel into the upflight thing, but then has to spend a bar for safety/launcher.

Now lets assume you are actually a reaction god, and your reaction time is so good that you are able to react and interrupt a non-jailing Ferra call with a normal button every single time. The Ferra player has multiple courses of action

Again, nope. If cancelled from her f1 or b4, only thing the ferra player can do to not get stuffed by a s1 is do the ferra grab or the upflight. From certain distances, she can do 124 into ferra and have enough time to backdash (if the other player is hesitant) and do overhead/low.

they can just let it rip, they can jump back/up, they can dash back - all of those will change how you have to punish, and you'll never be able to convince me you can deliberately initiate the proper punish on reaction.

No, as I've explained above. Unless you mean she is cancelling from another string other than f1, b4 or 124. I admittedly havent tested s1 into ferra or s2 into Ferra, so what you are describing might be possible from those strings - though I'd be surprised.

Say I'm Reiko, if I try to s1 punish and Nitara walks back, I'm dead.

Only from certain distances from 124 can she have time to backdash, and if you are hesitant, from what I've tested.

If I b3 to beat the walk back, I'm dead to jump.

If I s1/3 to beat the jump options, they walk back and I'm dead.

If I armor and Nitara jumps, I'm dead. If I do nothing, I have to hold a safe 50/50.

All those points are explained previously - she doesn't have time to walk back or jump. She can grab with ferra but that's it.

Yeah, super fake.

I'm completely open to have my opinion changed, but I'll need some further explanation. I'm down to playing some friendly matches if you'd prefer.

I'm most interested in the "academic" discussion and research of Nitara/Ferra tech, not in "being right", so I'll apologize for sounding arrogant in my previous posts.

 

[wsj515]

Okay, let's break this down by parts. I won't comment on Rain, as I've never played him and never labbed against his options.


No, as you are also not 100% blocking that random ball roll, as I've explained. Why is it then that people don't demand the roll nerfed or call it scrubby?


Nope. If she calls Ferra from f1, b4 or 124, you are 100% armoring every time if she goes for overhead/low/grab and full combo punishing if she goes overhead/low, as you will punish before Ferra gets off her back. Unless you mean she does the full f12 string, or b3 full string, in which case your armor wont come out and if you are trying to s1 punish you will just get knocked down. She CAN cancel into the upflight thing, but then has to spend a bar for safety/launcher.


Again, nope. If cancelled from her f1 or b4, only thing the ferra player can do to not get stuffed by a s1 is do the ferra grab or the upflight. From certain distances, she can do 124 into ferra and have enough time to backdash (if the other player is hesitant) and do overhead/low.

No, as I've explained above. Unless you mean she is cancelling from another string other than f1, b4 or 124. I admittedly havent tested s1 into ferra or s2 into Ferra, so what you are describing might be possible from those strings - though I'd be surprised.

Only from certain distances from 124 can she have time to backdash, and if you are hesitant, from what I've tested.



All those points are explained previously - she doesn't have time to walk back or jump. She can grab with ferra but that's it.

I'm completely open to have my opinion changed, but I'll need some further explanation. I'm down to playing some friendly matches if you'd prefer.

I'm most interested in the "academic" discussion and research of Nitara/Ferra tech, not in "being right", so I'll apologize for sounding arrogant in my previous posts.

You talk about how everyone just needs to lab and they're so blind to how fake this is - and yet, I actually don't think you've labbed past Ferra layer one. I don't have time right now but I'm inclined to respond to each of these with a clip showing each options. I shouldn't have to, because you place so much value on "labbing" but something just isn't happening on your end lol.

For example - LITERALLY 2 seconds in the lab, and I proved again (I already knew, because I labbed) that Nitara can full combo punish an armor attempt off of b4 xx Ferra.

The hilarious part of this response is I somehow momentarily forgot Ferra had a grab, and you reminded me. Her options are already so degenerate that she doesn't even need it, but of course the grab just makes things exponentially worse lmao

 

[Felipe_Gewehr]

You talk about how everyone just needs to lab and they're so blind to how fake this is - and yet, I actually don't think you've labbed past Ferra layer one. I don't have time right now but I'm inclined to respond to each of these with a clip showing each options. I shouldn't have to, because you place so much value on "labbing" but something just isn't happening on your end lol.

For example - LITERALLY 2 seconds in the lab, and I proved again (I already knew, because I labbed) that Nitara can full combo punish an armor attempt off of b4 xx Ferra.

The hilarious part of this response is I somehow momentarily forgot Ferra had a grab, and you reminded me. Her options are already so degenerate that she doesn't even need it, but of course the grab just makes things exponentially worse lmao

I will get home after work and test what you are describing, I must be misunderstanding what you mean when saying b4 xx ferra can punish armor.

 

[wsj515]

I will get home after work and test what you are describing, I must be misunderstanding what you mean when saying b4 xx ferra can punish armor.

More than half the cast's armor gets full combo punished if they try and armor b4 xx Ferra.

Hope you are playing the 12/27 characters that can punish, hope you have bar, hope you can even get a combo off your armor. Now you don't have breaker, so hope you don't get opened up again and eat 50% - lets not forget that Nitara has 1050 health now, so getting hit for 110 damage from an armored move means way less to her than before.

This is still only considering armoring the cancel, not trying to punish with a normal. At layer 1.1, a 7f jab is whiffing to b4 xx Ferra dash back.

 

[SaltShaker]

I think the biggest bill sold by the FGC is an overrating of people's general ability to react to things.

I will die on this hill.

I remember Nightwing in Inj1 having a "reactable" 50/50 because his OH was 22F, so Saucy said it's impossible to react in real matches because you have to watch out for Nightwing pressure and lows so you'll be hit often by the OH unless it's a read. Other pros called him out saying skill issues etc and anyone can react. So he put a bet saying he'd give $20 to anyone who could react and block it 10 times in a row in a match, and that it would be streamed, and if they lose the bet they have to give him $10, a fraction of his payout loss. Not a single pro player took him up on the offer.

I remember you could "react and punish" the MMH teleport in Inj1 too so you just needed to "get gud". It's a shame that the literal best players in the world never appeared to get gud for too long in a match or set.

Also remember prepatch Kung Jin in MKX that was "mid tier at best" because his OH was "reactable and easy to fuzzy behind his low". It took all of one major of being completely infested with Kung Jin players everywhere to declare him a unanimous Top 2 character in the game, mainly do to his "reactable" 50/50 that lead to massive damage.

Even right now in Tekken 8, Jin's D2 is such a "reactable low". We spent 6 months saying how "reactable" it is because it's 22F and has a bunch of huge lights on activation. Recently, current Evo winner Arslan Ash kept getting hit by it non-stop by Atif Butt and has now changed his tune from "of course it's reactable" to "you can't see it if the player is mixing it up well with Jin's other options". Yes, yes, that's what we non-Evo winners have been saying since January.

There's countless, COUNTLESS, examples of this. Again, if there's one hill I'd die on, it's this one.

 

[ImpostorOak]

Oh damn they nerfed Ferra

Who could have seen this coming

Lowered her health and made the low -7

 

[Eji1700]

I will die on this hill.

I remember Nightwing in Inj1 having a "reactable" 50/50 because his OH was 22F, so Saucy said it's impossible to react in real matches because you have to watch out for Nightwing pressure and lows so you'll be hit often by the OH unless it's a read. Other pros called him out saying skill issues etc and anyone can react. So he put a bet saying he'd give $20 to anyone who could react and block it 10 times in a row in a match, and that it would be streamed, and if they lose the bet they have to give him $10, a fraction of his payout loss. Not a single pro player took him up on the offer.

I remember you could "react and punish" the MMH teleport in Inj1 too so you just needed to "get gud". It's a shame that the literal best players in the world never appeared to get gud for too long in a match or set.

Also remember prepatch Kung Jin in MKX that was "mid tier at best" because his OH was "reactable and easy to fuzzy behind his low". It took all of one major of being completely infested with Kung Jin players everywhere to declare him a unanimous Top 2 character in the game, mainly do to his "reactable" 50/50 that lead to massive damage.

Even right now in Tekken 8, Jin's D2 is such a "reactable low". We spent 6 months saying how "reactable" it is because it's 22F and has a bunch of huge lights on activation. Recently, current Evo winner Arslan Ash kept getting hit by it non-stop by Atif Butt and has now changed his tune from "of course it's reactable" to "you can't see it if the player is mixing it up well with Jin's other options". Yes, yes, that's what we non-Evo winners have been saying since January.

There's countless, COUNTLESS, examples of this. Again, if there's one hill I'd die on, it's this one.

It’s because animations matter.

The edge of reactable in a truly random situation is in the 15-20 frame area. There used to be a great flash game using Mills’s overhead to demonstrate which was 18 frames and damn near impossible in a true random scenario. Thing is they’re often not totally random. There’s obviously spacing to account for and things like fuzzy guarding to auto cover options.

Further any sort of lag or delay does affect this. Doing it in person and doing it online are two different things, and we’re still looking at the edge of the bell curve.

You’ve also got to consider what % of hits with the mix were not because the opponent was actually mixed by the animation so much as they chose an option that would have lost anyways (sub has some corner setups like this where you’ll land a raw b2, but more because they armored and got double hit by

I don’t think anyone is going to seriously argue you shouldn’t be able to block 25+ frame activations, especially shit like GG’s dusts with their bright orange “fuck you block high” flash.

I do think there’s things that even decent players don’t bother to lab (like armored punishing ice clone on reaction ) and thus you’ll see people get away with murder in sets but rarely if ever in a tournament.

For the specific mix, I don’t have much to say. I’m not good enough to matter and I haven’t had time to play. Still it is very much a multifaceted thing and not JUST frame data.

 

[Blakfellow]

These nerfs are an absolute joke… scorpion can still jail you with b3 into either ferra oh or low which is safe!!!! So you still have to take the 50/50 mix. And it’s a safe mix since the b3 is done from a distance. You can only punish if it is done in blank range.. this kameo needs to take away 50 health or make the low option completely unsafe. I mean -20. As it stands this just went from unbelievably ridiculous to just plain ridiculous.

 

[Blakfellow]

I’m sorry but anyone saying that is not an overpowered kameo either uses ferra or truly just understands the game at a moderately competitive level. Yes we know you can interrupt most strings canceled into Ferra but the mental stack of other pressure options like staggers, throws, back dash whiff punish etc still makes it very effective. And that’s not even taking into account the characters that have strings that jail into this pressure, or guaranteed setups, or the vortex it gives scorpion, or the safe wake-up and 3 way mix it gives home lander, etc. or the ridículous way it complements nitara in her damage..

this nerf was not enough

 

[SaltShaker]

It’s because animations matter.

The edge of reactable in a truly random situation is in the 15-20 frame area. There used to be a great flash game using Mills’s overhead to demonstrate which was 18 frames and damn near impossible in a true random scenario. Thing is they’re often not totally random. There’s obviously spacing to account for and things like fuzzy guarding to auto cover options.

Further any sort of lag or delay does affect this. Doing it in person and doing it online are two different things, and we’re still looking at the edge of the bell curve.

You’ve also got to consider what % of hits with the mix were not because the opponent was actually mixed by the animation so much as they chose an option that would have lost anyways (sub has some corner setups like this where you’ll land a raw b2, but more because they armored and got double hit by

I don’t think anyone is going to seriously argue you shouldn’t be able to block 25+ frame activations, especially shit like GG’s dusts with their bright orange “fuck you block high” flash.

I do think there’s things that even decent players don’t bother to lab (like armored punishing ice clone on reaction ) and thus you’ll see people get away with murder in sets but rarely if ever in a tournament.

For the specific mix, I don’t have much to say. I’m not good enough to matter and I haven’t had time to play. Still it is very much a multifaceted thing and not JUST frame data.

I don't fully understand the first part. No one, not a single person, is going to react to a 15F or 16F OH/Low mix-up. This isn't even a debatable point. This isn't the "edge of reactable", it's literally unreactable in any scenario. If you're ever consistently blocking a 16F OH or Low it isn't reacting, that's a read giving the false illusion that you're reacting.

Fuzzy guards and option selects aren't reacting either. Or at least not the type of reacting I'm talking about, because you're only reacting to the original first move and doing a follow up action that's always the same. If someone has a 16F Low and a 22F OH that they keep doing over and over (cough), you aren't reacting to blocking them, you're making a read that they'll go for the mix-up and covering both options. This is why when people throw off their timing after another layer of yomi or start mixing up how they apply it, they start getting hit often by the same "reactable" mix-up they were blocking before.

As far as the rest, it may not be "just" frame data, but frame data is the biggest part of it, becauseeee of the other options the character has, i.e. pressure options or a 50/50 that is close in frames. The best example I can use is Tekken. Arslan Ash is the best player in Tekken history who has won 5 Evos. 5 Evos. For almost the whole year he said Jin's 22F low was reactable because of the startup animation and 4th of July fireworks-level lighting up when he does it and offline it's easy. Now that he was hit by it non-stop live he has changed his tune to "you can't react to it if Jin is mixing up all his options". Yes, we know, thank you Evo champ. But just a month ago if you said it was hard to react to even offline you got "get gud" comments because people were selling that.


Which is the Pinnacle of the point. It was never about "stand still like a mannequin and block this one move". In that scenario yea, the 22F low that not even Arslan Ash can block in tournament matches might be reactable. Practice mode reactions. But that's not realistic, and not how matches are played. When that 22F low has a bunch of non-low options that can launch you that you have to watch out for, it becomes impossible to "react" to the 22F low, which is when it becomes unreactable. At that point it's reads. That's the problem with the reactable vs unreactable argument.

 

[Eji1700]

I don't fully understand the first part. No one, not a single person, is going to react to a 15F or 16F OH/Low mix-up. This isn't even a debatable point. This isn't the "edge of reactable", it's literally unreactable in any scenario. If you're ever consistently blocking a 16F OH or Low it isn't reacting, that's a read giving the false illusion that you're reacting.

Fuzzy guards and option selects aren't reacting either. Or at least not the type of reacting I'm talking about, because you're only reacting to the original first move and doing a follow up action that's always the same. If someone has a 16F Low and a 22F OH that they keep doing over and over (cough), you aren't reacting to blocking them, you're making a read that they'll go for the mix-up and covering both options. This is why when people throw off their timing after another layer of yomi or start mixing up how they apply it, they start getting hit often by the same "reactable" mix-up they were blocking before.

As far as the rest, it may not be "just" frame data, but frame data is the biggest part of it, becauseeee of the other options the character has, i.e. pressure options or a 50/50 that is close in frames. The best example I can use is Tekken. Arslan Ash is the best player in Tekken history who has won 5 Evos. 5 Evos. For almost the whole year he said Jin's 22F low was reactable because of the startup animation and 4th of July fireworks-level lighting up when he does it and offline it's easy. Now that he was hit by it non-stop live he has changed his tune to "you can't react to it if Jin is mixing up all his options". Yes, we know, thank you Evo champ. But just a month ago if you said it was hard to react to even offline you got "get gud" comments because people were selling that.


Which is the Pinnacle of the point. It was never about "stand still like a mannequin and block this one move". In that scenario yea, the 22F low that not even Arslan Ash can block in tournament matches might be reactable. Practice mode reactions. But that's not realistic, and not how matches are played. When that 22F low has a bunch of non-low options that can launch you that you have to watch out for, it becomes impossible to "react" to the 22F low, which is when it becomes unreactable. At that point it's reads. That's the problem with the reactable vs unreactable argument.

Don't think I conveyed myself well because you're kinda arguing points i'm not trying to make.

To keep this short, while there are some edge cases we could haggle over, I'm basically saying that I agree with you. Frame data is a good starting point to determine if a mixup is reactable or not (no one is saying 10 frames is reactable and no one is saying 60 frames isn't), it's not the be all end all of the situation.

You can have two moves with identical frame data, and one will hit players more often than the other just due to animations/noise/environment/predictability.

Then on top of that you get tons of bad info from players because they see some pro blocking it every time not being aware it's a fuzzy guard or some such thing, or conversely watch something like R1ps arena, where I'll bet money half the fucking viewing audience is better than me, let alone the players, but you still see them sometimes get away with
murder because they don't know the matchup.

Edit-

Another BIIIG part of the noise in the conversation is Pro's themselves will pitch a fucking fit about something being unreactable until they lab it, and then they stfu. You don't get some twitter rant explaining that they were actually wrong and the setup is not that bad once you know to downblock unless you see a specific spark in a certain spot or something, just one about "X character is bullshit". God knows pro's are good, but that doesn't mean they're always reasonable, and then they get signal boosted by the whole "Well pro Y said it can't be handled!"

 

[SaltShaker]

Don't think I conveyed myself well because you're kinda arguing points i'm not trying to make.

To keep this short, while there are some edge cases we could haggle over, I'm basically saying that I agree with you. Frame data is a good starting point to determine if a mixup is reactable or not (no one is saying 10 frames is reactable and no one is saying 60 frames isn't), it's not the be all end all of the situation.

You can have two moves with identical frame data, and one will hit players more often than the other just due to animations/noise/environment/predictability.

Then on top of that you get tons of bad info from players because they see some pro blocking it every time not being aware it's a fuzzy guard or some such thing, or conversely watch something like R1ps arena, where I'll bet money half the fucking viewing audience is better than me, let alone the players, but you still see them sometimes get away with
murder because they don't know the matchup.

Edit-

Another BIIIG part of the noise in the conversation is Pro's themselves will pitch a fucking fit about something being unreactable until they lab it, and then they stfu. You don't get some twitter rant explaining that they were actually wrong and the setup is not that bad once you know to downblock unless you see a specific spark in a certain spot or something, just one about "X character is bullshit". God knows pro's are good, but that doesn't mean they're always reasonable, and then they get signal boosted by the whole "Well pro Y said it can't be handled!"

Yea definitely agree there. Makes a lot of sense.