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The Truth About Nerfing and Buffing: Let's be Real

Hellbringer

1 2 3 drink
So when dearhstroke got nerfed and most of the complainers dropped the game anyway, what are u gonna do if they start complainig about cyborg? Or sinestro, or ares? Nrs didnt hire casuals to test the game...
 

jaym7018

Warrior
The thing is nobody uses Cyborg yet. Sin ain't so popular either.

The problem casual players have is how fast they are, that's all.
Im not gonna pretend to be comic book guy. But didnt deathstroke just have his run cancelled the dude aint popular either. Hes just the easiest character to get wins with from an intermediate and below skill level.
 

Zoidberg747

My blades will find your heart
I -think- I can understand what you're saying lol. But for the game to really be balanced in the eyes of players don't you have to understand its basics?
Yeah, it happens all the time. You think NRS is bad, try Ubisoft i.e has a super OP tactic and buffs it while nerfing everything else.
 

RYX

BIG PUSHER
Im not gonna pretend to be comic book guy. But didnt deathstroke just have his run cancelled the dude aint popular either. Hes just the easiest character to get wins with from an intermediate and below skill level.
Not from a comic perspective; he's everywhere in game because he's easy at low level of play. That's all. :)
 
first of all a lot of casual players will only play the story mode. second most casual players only play online so there will always be some characters that give more problems during lag its not the character itself thats is giving people problems.

and the question is will they sell more injustice copies if X character gets nerfed? Dont know if anybody has seen that video of that guy who says nrs cant balance a fighting game and proceeds to call noob saibot broken. casual players will never know the difference.
 

Gesture Required Ahead

Get on that hook
Are you saying the top players will quit if balance changes are made to appease intermediate players? Cause they wont not as long as they can win money.
That can't even be linked to what I said whatsoever. But the hand-holding devs do nowadays have to stop. Especially if it affects others playing the game.
 

UPR_Nova

Apprentice
In my 2 hours of total play time with Deathstroke I find his zoning to be great but nowhere near OP. When I shoot a gun (doesn't matter the gun just shoot a gun period), I feel as if I'm standing there waiting to get blown up. It is nowhere near, say, a blocked or whiffed Dead Air from Grundy, but it's kind of in the same ball park. I feel as if I'm just waiting to be punished.

Say he was nerfed to help out the 99% of scrubs that play the game casually. I don't know how you would do that maybe possibly more recovery on the projectiles. So, adding more recovery on the projectiles and making it to the point that his guns are completely ineffective on a blocking and ducking opponent. He already recovers slow. We have seen that in the Brady and Reo video and pretty much anyone can pick up the guy and shoot and see that it's slow. Therefore, you add recovery and make him stand there with his dick out waiting to get fucked up for utilizing what was the best tool that he has. That's balance? Even for Joe and Johnny scrub that doesn't sound like balance.

If you want to mention NRS catering to the few then aren't they catering to the few when they nerf Deathstroke? From an outside looking in perspective, it seems that balance is a double edged sword for a company. You give ALL the characters some super, down-low, messy, dirty ass stuff and it all eventually gets taken away unless you leak like Cyrax. You give the characters no super, down-low, messy, dirty ass stuff and the "community" will call for it's characters to have something more. In the end, what the hell do you do?

Hopefully, NRS has a plan for that. Other than that, it's just going to go down the same road of "take stuff away from him and give me more". Nerfing and buffing is nothing more than that. Sometimes, things in life aren't fair. Your favorite character just might suck. I have loved Sub-Zero since the very first time that I saw him freeze and uppercut someone, but until I picked up Johnny Cage, I never played to my fullest potential.

The truth is you can never have a perfectly balanced fighting game, or any game for that matter. Halo competes with BR's only at the highest level because they work the best. If you had perfect balance, we would see assault rifles as well. To even drive it home further, the tougher things to do in life are the most satisfactory. Playing golf isn't easy but damn, you feel great when you first go under par. If you want to get serious, what does that say about the majority of the population? "Just hand it to me on a silver platter" is the thought that goes through my mind. Money, success, fame, fortune, love and everything needs to be given and we work for nothing. I spent 2000 matches of online frogger fest in MK before I even learned fighting mechanics as it was my first competitive fighter ever and I got my ass spanked. I had to earn that respect from others, and when I did, I never looked back.

We all talk about how these guys are scrubs and whatnot, but in the end, why are you playing them if you consider yourself to be high level? And instead of retorting with hate, why not offer assistance? If they don't want that assistance, shrug your shoulders and move on. You have to want change and help before you can be helped.

In the end, I don't think NRS gives two fucks about the scrubs because like a fellow poster mentioned, the next Call of Duty will take them away from this. They have made that 60 bucks up front. Sure you would like to keep them in while that DLC gets released, but who cares if 50,000 of MILLIONS don't play again? With that being said, the competitive community is the life-blood for maintaining the growth and the overall play of the game years down the road. If you truly consider yourself to be a competitive high-level player, then you should be able to adapt with ease. Adapt to the patches that come. In the end, you really have no say at what they do and don't patch. You don't work for the company.

If you want to get really picky, think about the characters that received the least amount of nerfs and buffs from the patches in MK. Two really come to mind in Kabal and Kenshi. Now, think about the learning curve for those characters. Nobody is picking those up overnight. So, those characters with high publicity will get the most criticism and messed with the most. Right now for Injustice it seems to only be Deathstroke (and I feel Grundy once we hit the scene). We need to talk about infinites more than little Joey crying about bullets. As "high-level" players, why are we wasting time talking about Deathstroke and not Cyborg? Just playing devils advocate here.

Maybe stuff gets nerfed based around the 99% of Joey's out there and what they cry for in addition to what is talked about most in the competitive community. So aren't we just fueling the fire here? Possibly ignoring the nerfing and buffing posts completely would help. Or if someone was to mention it, kindly recommend them to the great pages and write-ups about yomi, fighting philosophy and playing to win. That way we indirectly blacklist the nerfing and buffing bull shit, whilst keeping the "scrubs" happy. Hell, I am on an official Call of Duty protest because they just copy and paste and make millions. Has it stopped because I have stopped?....hells to the no. Also, the developers patch the stopping power of guns in that game to accommodate for the casuals, but you don't see the high level play changed. The MP7 in MW3 will always be the MP7. If you can shoot, you can shoot. And in the end, if you can fight, you can fight.

Have I ranted...yes. Have I missed the point of the thread...no. But as I have seen in this thread, you can't say someone is incorrect in their viewpoint here. From a business persective, then yes, you cater to casuals. From a longevity perspective, then you cater to the "pros" mostly. You can't balance perfectly, you can't make a game that everybody likes and you CAN'T FUCKING MAKE EVERYBODY HAPPY. Quite frankly, that's the way the world works, not just fighting games.

To really be a dick, if you are complaining that you favorite character is getting nerfed and you refuse to pick up another character then (to borrow from Cossner) aren't you just a Filthy Casual as well? Yes, because you might play to win, but you aren't playing the competitive game to win at all costs, even if that means using a character that you don't "connect" with personally. Hell, I hated Johnny Cage and his fake ass swag in the story, but when it came time to either play Sub casually and accept losses just because or pick up another character to win more, I gave Johnny a chance. Actually turns out to be my favorite character (I like the way he bounces when he stands there). Picking up someone else just might let you uncover a hidden gem and let you wreck the community. Nobody ever thinks about that though.

So talking to guys that "play competitively", let's just find some damn tech and ignore this other shit. In the end, it doesn't really matter because regardless we will still play the game. The posts I find on this forum at least say that its soooooooooo goooooooood and that we all fap to it on a daily. Instead of posting threads dealing with the mindsets, positives and negatives and perfect balancing around the majority and minorities of the community let's just play the damn game. Business is business, pleasure is pleasure, nobody is wrong because nobody is right because nobody here directly changes anything about the game unless you pay attention to it. Rant over.
 

Hellbringer

1 2 3 drink
In my 2 hours of total play time with Deathstroke I find his zoning to be great but nowhere near OP. When I shoot a gun (doesn't matter the gun just shoot a gun period), I feel as if I'm standing there waiting to get blown up. It is nowhere near, say, a blocked or whiffed Dead Air from Grundy, but it's kind of in the same ball park. I feel as if I'm just waiting to be punished.

Say he was nerfed to help out the 99% of scrubs that play the game casually. I don't know how you would do that maybe possibly more recovery on the projectiles. So, adding more recovery on the projectiles and making it to the point that his guns are completely ineffective on a blocking and ducking opponent. He already recovers slow. We have seen that in the Brady and Reo video and pretty much anyone can pick up the guy and shoot and see that it's slow. Therefore, you add recovery and make him stand there with his dick out waiting to get fucked up for utilizing what was the best tool that he has. That's balance? Even for Joe and Johnny scrub that doesn't sound like balance.

If you want to mention NRS catering to the few then aren't they catering to the few when they nerf Deathstroke? From an outside looking in perspective, it seems that balance is a double edged sword for a company. You give ALL the characters some super, down-low, messy, dirty ass stuff and it all eventually gets taken away unless you leak like Cyrax. You give the characters no super, down-low, messy, dirty ass stuff and the "community" will call for it's characters to have something more. In the end, what the hell do you do?

Hopefully, NRS has a plan for that. Other than that, it's just going to go down the same road of "take stuff away from him and give me more". Nerfing and buffing is nothing more than that. Sometimes, things in life aren't fair. Your favorite character just might suck. I have loved Sub-Zero since the very first time that I saw him freeze and uppercut someone, but until I picked up Johnny Cage, I never played to my fullest potential.

The truth is you can never have a perfectly balanced fighting game, or any game for that matter. Halo competes with BR's only at the highest level because they work the best. If you had perfect balance, we would see assault rifles as well. To even drive it home further, the tougher things to do in life are the most satisfactory. Playing golf isn't easy but damn, you feel great when you first go under par. If you want to get serious, what does that say about the majority of the population? "Just hand it to me on a silver platter" is the thought that goes through my mind. Money, success, fame, fortune, love and everything needs to be given and we work for nothing. I spent 2000 matches of online frogger fest in MK before I even learned fighting mechanics as it was my first competitive fighter ever and I got my ass spanked. I had to earn that respect from others, and when I did, I never looked back.

We all talk about how these guys are scrubs and whatnot, but in the end, why are you playing them if you consider yourself to be high level? And instead of retorting with hate, why not offer assistance? If they don't want that assistance, shrug your shoulders and move on. You have to want change and help before you can be helped.

In the end, I don't think NRS gives two fucks about the scrubs because like a fellow poster mentioned, the next Call of Duty will take them away from this. They have made that 60 bucks up front. Sure you would like to keep them in while that DLC gets released, but who cares if 50,000 of MILLIONS don't play again? With that being said, the competitive community is the life-blood for maintaining the growth and the overall play of the game years down the road. If you truly consider yourself to be a competitive high-level player, then you should be able to adapt with ease. Adapt to the patches that come. In the end, you really have no say at what they do and don't patch. You don't work for the company.

If you want to get really picky, think about the characters that received the least amount of nerfs and buffs from the patches in MK. Two really come to mind in Kabal and Kenshi. Now, think about the learning curve for those characters. Nobody is picking those up overnight. So, those characters with high publicity will get the most criticism and messed with the most. Right now for Injustice it seems to only be Deathstroke (and I feel Grundy once we hit the scene). We need to talk about infinites more than little Joey crying about bullets. As "high-level" players, why are we wasting time talking about Deathstroke and not Cyborg? Just playing devils advocate here.

Maybe stuff gets nerfed based around the 99% of Joey's out there and what they cry for in addition to what is talked about most in the competitive community. So aren't we just fueling the fire here? Possibly ignoring the nerfing and buffing posts completely would help. Or if someone was to mention it, kindly recommend them to the great pages and write-ups about yomi, fighting philosophy and playing to win. That way we indirectly blacklist the nerfing and buffing bull shit, whilst keeping the "scrubs" happy. Hell, I am on an official Call of Duty protest because they just copy and paste and make millions. Has it stopped because I have stopped?....hells to the no. Also, the developers patch the stopping power of guns in that game to accommodate for the casuals, but you don't see the high level play changed. The MP7 in MW3 will always be the MP7. If you can shoot, you can shoot. And in the end, if you can fight, you can fight.

Have I ranted...yes. Have I missed the point of the thread...no. But as I have seen in this thread, you can't say someone is incorrect in their viewpoint here. From a business persective, then yes, you cater to casuals. From a longevity perspective, then you cater to the "pros" mostly. You can't balance perfectly, you can't make a game that everybody likes and you CAN'T FUCKING MAKE EVERYBODY HAPPY. Quite frankly, that's the way the world works, not just fighting games.

To really be a dick, if you are complaining that you favorite character is getting nerfed and you refuse to pick up another character then (to borrow from Cossner) aren't you just a Filthy Casual as well? Yes, because you might play to win, but you aren't playing the competitive game to win at all costs, even if that means using a character that you don't "connect" with personally. Hell, I hated Johnny Cage and his fake ass swag in the story, but when it came time to either play Sub casually and accept losses just because or pick up another character to win more, I gave Johnny a chance. Actually turns out to be my favorite character (I like the way he bounces when he stands there). Picking up someone else just might let you uncover a hidden gem and let you wreck the community. Nobody ever thinks about that though.

So talking to guys that "play competitively", let's just find some damn tech and ignore this other shit. In the end, it doesn't really matter because regardless we will still play the game. The posts I find on this forum at least say that its soooooooooo goooooooood and that we all fap to it on a daily. Instead of posting threads dealing with the mindsets, positives and negatives and perfect balancing around the majority and minorities of the community let's just play the damn game. Business is business, pleasure is pleasure, nobody is wrong because nobody is right because nobody here directly changes anything about the game unless you pay attention to it. Rant over.
This post should be frontpaged so everybody could finally shut up.
 

Jy0

Destroyer of Lazy
thinly veiled nerf DS thread now? online netcode is problem with online... and balancing for people whe don't learn the game well will lead to a character innefective at high level play... oh he'll still be effective online against those casuals who won't be playing anyway in 4 months but now character is ineffective for the rest of us that will hopefully be playing a year from now.... doesn't reason out. We will wait and see though what happends will happen reguardless of us here.
 

Lumpymoomilk

Online Punching Bag
My only real complaint so far that I can say is interactables do too much damage, 18% because you can press a bumper and they are hard to avoid, unblockable and most can be done fullscreen.
 

CrimsonShadow

Administrator and Community Engineer
Administrator
So it seems like 50% of people got the point. For the 50% that didn't seem to understand, I'll re-state and summarize:

At some point, balance patches will hit this game. A lot of people will be mad, people will cry, and a lot of people will complain. Also a lot of hate will be directed at people like Paulo for perceived injustices against various characters.

But the point is to remember that, these guys have considerations far beyond a couple hundred people that have based their lives around trying to reach a professional level. So instead of flaming the dev team for two more years because your favorite character is no longer what you think he should be, or some other character got more love, etc., just be aware that these guys have to take into account a lot more factors than people are admitting.

Guys like Hec and Paulo come in and really support the community; they answer questions on the forums, support streams for comunity shows, watch and tweet about tournaments etc. And instead of appreciation, they have to hear crap about how the game was ruined for 20 Kano players.

It's a tough job, and it's a 'balancing act'. But the stakes are a lot bigger for them than they are for you and me. So try to look at things from the dev's perspective as well.
 

MorbidAltruism

Get over here!
This is coming from a casual player who is VERY aware of the pro scene. I understand the ramifications and follow tournaments. I come from a hardcore fps community as well. So I know about the "1%" and fully support it. But to be honest, Deathstroke is the only reason I don't play online. I don't have the best connection in the world an getting hit one to many times really hurts the experience. I felt the same way about Noob. I couldn't block the tackle once I got hit once because my connection was so bad. Then they baby me. Not really too enjoyable. So I honestly think that NRS should cater to the 99% without blatantly disregarding the hardcore community.
 

Hexin_Wishes

Likes nerds with big ...
Because why should NRS listen to someone who doesn't know anything about the game beyond 3 hit dial combos and jump-in mashing?

The game should not be balanced on the whim of someone who doesn't take the time to learn the game but has all day to bitch about it.
Because games are not geared towards the pros. Games are geared towards the casual buyer. The fans and the fighting game pros are only a small fraction. When you alienate the casuals (i.e. the general public), you risk getting bad reviews resulting in no one wanting to buy the damn game. Everything is done for profit.