Question What determines a MU played at the HIGHEST level?

[xKhaoTik]

I was having a great debate with a group of buddies about what actually determines a MU. His argument was "training buddies who know their character at a high level is determining a MU at a high level". My counter argument was "training buddies who know their characters at a high level is more player vs player rather than character vs character".


Here's is a couple examples:

-In MK, everyone knew CDjr and CD were top players with their characters, as well as being training buddies. So in this case, people would say Jax vs Kitana would be played at the highest level from them. My thing is, wouldn't that factor heavily on player vs player rather than character vs character since both players know how the other player plays? JR knows how CD plays, so wouldn't it be better to play another Kit like Bit and I? Wouldn't it be better for CD to play Tyrant? Its mainly CD vs JR rather than Kit vs Jax IMO.


-In IGAU, we have HoneyBee and BioHazard. Same exact situation as the one above. Wouldn't it be better for Bee to play Max and for Bio to play Zyphox?


This debate happened last night, I slept on it, woke up and it was still on my mind, so I decided to make a thread about it. I'm in NO WAY throwing shade to anyone, so please don't come in here with that.

And yes, this debate happened because of the Ra Helios vs Bane BS.


Discuss.

 

[EMPR_MURK]

Its a mixture of both. I feel that you could determine the character with the advantage in the mu when it comes to a player vs player, but the FINAL NUMBER doesn't come from it imo. The FINAL NUMBER must be determined by playing other players with different strategies. People can say that "hey I know because I play the best with such n such all the time so its obvious its very bad" but as I said, it still does not show the FINAL NUMBER.

 

[SaltShaker]

I agree with this 100%. Playing someone you know 1000 times is great for MU knowledge and experience against a character, but after so many games it reaches a point where player vs player seeps in the longer the two of you play.

For example, let's say I main Raven and played an excellent Grundy player 4-5 times a week for nearly a year. I know that MU in my sleep and it helped me immensely against other Grundy users especially being that it's one of her worst MU's. But on the flip side, when I played other good Grundy players who did some things differently it felt completely awkward because I was so used to certain patterns and reactions from my bazillion Grundy matches against my friend.

Imo to have a "MU played at the highest level" you need two players who are top level users of their character, both having MU exp against the other character, but both having minimal exp against each other with the characters.

 

[Pig Of The Hut]

Offline long sets over a long period of time w players who are specialists w each character w offline results who discuss it during this long period of time in great fine detail

 

[HomeLee1121]

Set both characters as cpu on the hardest difficulty. Instant reaction times, no dropped combos, pretty much no room for human error at all...and no lag.

 

[xKhaoTik]

Set both charactets as cpu on the hardest difficulty. Instant reaction times, no dropped combos, pretty much no room for human error at all...and no lag.

Lmao I hate you

 

[BRUTALITY]

i think one could theorise their way to the hypothetical high level setting we are talking about.

"is there a gap in this setup? yes but it is frame perfect and i cant begin to do it in a real fight, but it is conceivable someone better / a computer (character vs character) can do it."

not only is it conceivable but it is simply possible, we know it as a fact in the frame data.

but i dont know how to accurately account for human meta and mind game.

 

[HomeLee1121]

Lmao I hate you

<3!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Awkward Sloth]

Set both characters as cpu on the hardest difficulty. Instant reaction times, no dropped combos, pretty much no room for human error at all...and no lag.

Very hard mode Joker Parries everything. Very hard mode Joker is top tier.

 

[HomeLee1121]

Very hard mode Joker Parries everything. Very hard mode Joker is top tier.

Yup tym just doesnt know

 

[LEGEND]

MU numbers are all bullshit. But bitching about MUs is too much fun

 

[Yoaks]

I vote Homelee for President.

 

[AsiansinaGroceryStore]

I feel as though what Eventhubs does with their tier lists helps determine character vs character MUs. Eventhub tier lists allows people who play the game at different skill levels to give their input as to how the MUs are. For example, Max and Revolver can play the Bane-Lex MU and determine that it's 5-5 or 6-4 or whatever. But if hundreds of people who play the same MU are saying the same thing, then it's not about player vs player anymore, because all these players who play Bane are playing different people who play Lex and at different skill levels.

 

[DreadKnight1]

1.when 2 equally skilled players play it
2.when they are both extremely skilled

 

[BRUTALITY]

I feel as though what Eventhubs does with their tier lists helps determine character vs character MUs. Eventhub tier lists allows people who play the game at different skill levels to give their input as to how the MUs are. For example, Max and Revolver can play the Bane-Lex MU and determine that it's 5-5 or 6-4 or whatever. But if hundreds of people who play the same MU are saying the same thing, then it's not about player vs player anymore, because all these players who play Bane are playing different people who play Lex and at different skill levels.

i dont think the opinion of "hundreds of other people" is necessarily valid when far less than 100 people are playing at the "highest level"

 

[DreadKnight1]

I feel as though what Eventhubs does with their tier lists helps determine character vs character MUs. Eventhub tier lists allows people who play the game at different skill levels to give their input as to how the MUs are. For example, Max and Revolver can play the Bane-Lex MU and determine that it's 5-5 or 6-4 or whatever. But if hundreds of people who play the same MU are saying the same thing, then it's not about player vs player anymore, because all these players who play Bane are playing different people who play Lex and at different skill levels.

Is it just me or is this one MU haunting me on tym?

 

[coolwhip]

Ideally, a match-up played at a very high level (I hate the term "highest level" since you can always improve on whatever you're doing. Though I guess it could be highest level relative to everyone else) would be sort of a gauntlet. Let's say for example Catwoman vs. Flash. It would be 16 Bit running tons of offline sets with Honeybee, Harold, and Zyphox. From the perspective of Catwoman, 16 Bit would then be playing the match-up at the "highest level." However, since this is impossible due to people living in different areas and shit, then we have to settle for two representatives of their respective characters running long offline sets with each other on a regular basis, and maybe, just maybe, attributing the most weight to their opinion on the match-up.

 

[AsiansinaGroceryStore]

i dont think the opinion of "hundreds of other people" is necessarily valid when far less than 100 people are playing at the "highest level"

Oh yea, you're right. Never mind, forget what I said.

 

[STB Shujinkydink]

Are we talking mu charts? Cause IMO that has nothing to do with players. It's just a gauge of options. You can't say "oh play theo or you can't comment on the Aquaman MU" it's a rough estimate on how hard the MU is based on the tools a character has. Our community completely blows these out of proportion and take them way too seriously. If that's not what you meant then ignore rant lol

 

[LEGEND]

To reiterate. If you are labeling a Mu with a number and/or allowing a number to help you decide how to approach a match. . . .

You are wrong

 

[YOMI MITYEAP]

To reiterate. If you are labeling a Mu with a number and/or allowing a number to help you decide how to approach a match. . . .

You are wrong

actually I use numbers/ strats in approaching a matchup. For example, when I saw chris g was in my path the first thing that popped in my mind was that "Aquaman beats him like 9 1" and then I went on to contemplating my strategy to defeat him.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

Simplest definition of "MU # at the highest level" would be:

The average result in a set where both players are correctly making use of every possible tool/strategy the character has in order to appropriately counter every single tool the opponent's character has.

Obviously in practice that's hard to find, since people generally settle on a few favorite strategies, cater to their own playstyle, or are good enough to win as a player that they don't have to mine every nook and cranny for every single piece of tech and damage their character can get.

So you'd typically need to combine multiple people's contributions, some lab rats, a handful of theory and a bit of magic dust.

In the end though, this means that some things are subjective; and that's why we need to stop acting like they are indisputably proven and set in stone forever.

 

[Youphemism]

Ideally, a match-up played at a very high level (I hate the term "highest level" since you can always improve on whatever you're doing. Though I guess it could be highest level relative to everyone else) would be sort of a gauntlet. Let's say for example Catwoman vs. Flash. It would be 16 Bit running tons of offline sets with Honeybee, Harold, and Zyphox. From the perspective of Catwoman, 16 Bit would then be playing the match-up at the "highest level." However, since this is impossible due to people living in different areas and shit, then we have to settle for two representatives of their respective characters running long offline sets with each other on a regular basis, and maybe, just maybe, attributing the most weight to their opinion on the match-up.

Pretty much this.

In my opinion, two offline players with EVO medals playing lots of offline sets does not necessarily ultimately decide the final numbers. That's their opinion and yes of course it's going to have a huge amount of credibility to it. Even though they may have played Zod knows how many sets of the matchup, and decided on their own number, it doesn't necessarily mean that they've played those sets at the highest level and with the best strategy. Another player of one of the characters involved in this matchup (even an online player of the character) could be playing the matchup in a different way which makes the matchup a lot easier to handle, doing things the EVO medallist might not be doing or know to do. Online players also have the lab offline you know, where they can practice things and find things even the top players might not know or do that could make a matchup easier. So to dismiss or degrade an online players opinion because they haven't been able to play in offline competition does not mean that their opinion is wrong, for all you know they could actually be playing the matchup at a higher level and doing all the right things...

TL;DR What determines a mu played at the highest level?
-Two character representatives (can be anyone, ranging from an EVO medallist/consistent placer to an online player with no opportunity to show off what they can do) playing the matchup using every tactic that every representative of those characters would use to beat the other character. This includes punishing everything they can punish, taking advantage of every situation correctly and playing their character's game in the most optimised fashion possible.

Example: Ra Helios says that Catwomen should use meter in combos because they'll gain it back when they get hit. Seeing as how 16 Bit seems to lose to Max a lot without using this strategy and Ra went even with Bio (the top placing Bane at EVO if I remember correctly) in the set they played* whilst using this strategy, then maybe Ra has a point and as such this tactic should be used more often so the matchup can be played at the highest level.

*Side note: I KNOW that using Ra beating Bio in a ft5 online isn't the best evidence to back up an argument but it's all we've got so I have to go with this at the moment lol.

DISCLAIMER: OPINION ALERT. OPINION ALERT. THIS IS JUST MY OPINION. OPINION ALERT.

 

[zerosebaz]

I always thought that "highest possible level" was an unachievable theoretical standard where were combos are not dropped, moves are not wiffed, all 50/50 are fuzzy guarded, every string with a hole is interrupted, every just frame punish is landed and every instant fireball is perfect. If you lose against Doomsday because you had trouble blocking earthshaker, even if you couldn't block it once or twice, you can't take it into consideration in the match up chart, because in the highest level it should be blocked 100% of the times.

I mean, at least that is the way I thought it worked, MU charts being about the tools of the character. Yes, people won't be able to use them perfectly ever, but that doesn't mean the tools are not there.

Right?

 

[Undeadjim]

I always thought that "highest possible level" was an unachievable theoretical standard where were combos are not dropped, moves are not wiffed, all 50/50 are fuzzy guarded, every string with a hole is interrupted, every just frame punish is landed and every instant fireball is perfect. If you lose against Doomsday because you had trouble blocking earthshaker, even if you couldn't block it once or twice, you can't take it into consideration in the match up chart, because in the highest level it should be blocked 100% of the times.

This is my understanding of it MU numbers come from evaluating the tools of character X vs character Y with the intention of seeing who has the most options/better options between them. We have to imagine when creating a MU number that both players are indeed playing at computer like level to keep this variable fixed it doesn't matter if you play 20 different styles of players because all you are doing is comparing tools/options. The number then sets out an average based around 10 games based on the weight of the options only.

I mean, at least that is the way I thought it worked, MU charts being about the tools of the character. Yes, people won't be able to use them perfectly ever, but that doesn't mean the tools are not there.

And this is where player skill comes in, X's character might win this evaluated MU against Y's character 7-3 however player X did not use tools/options/strategy's or lacked the skill to do however player Y did use the tools/options/strategy's and as a result the hypothetical set ended 5-5 you could have a hypothetical set of 1000 games and it would still not change the MU number.

To create and change a MU it requires us the players to find the optimal strategy's/tools and options and put them to practice and determine there usefulness until there is a optimal way to go about a MU. This is why MU's change over a games lifetime as players develop and more information (tech) is found.