Where NRS are going wrong with the patches

[JennyCage]

There's nothing wrong with a move having a 6 frame startup, as long as its punishable--which KL's spin easily is and Reptile's dash soon will be--you just have to bait it.
I completely agree that Baraka's ex charge should go fullscreen, but not because other characters have it.
Kano's upball is more punishable, but he also has 10x better zoning and doesn't do bad up close, while JC relies on being in your face.

It's all about balancing each individual character's tools based on their arsenal, not saying "other characters have this so I should have it too"

edit: also, about kabals projectile properties, I'm pretty sure that's a glitch so hopefully NRS will take that out

You see nothing wrong with a character that can get out of most frametraps with a full combo, whereas most of the cast has to rely on a 1% damage low 3?

Nothing wrong when Reptile can do the same thing (sans combo), and can cross you up three times when you're down while building meter for it?

Your Cage excuse is translated to me as, "I don't want to have to think before using a move."

Kabal will still be able to spam IAF at Skarlet dagger speed.

There's plenty more stupid stuff where that came from, too. Let's add to the list:

NRS believes:
Sub-Zero and Cyber Sub-Zero's enhanced and non-enhanced iceballs, when they hit an airborn opponent, should drop them out of the air in 2 seconds, but Cyrax's regular net with 5x the hitbox will leave them hanging in the air long enough to eat a sandwich, take a shit, check the sports scores and scratch your ass before they fall.
It's wise to leave Cyber's bomb inputs on 3 instead of 4 when 3 is involved in his best mixups.
It's wise to release content without testing or polishing (Freddy, Skarlet)
It's wise to buff the strongest characters in the game before the weakest (NW, JC buffs in the previous patch)

I mean honestly the list goes on and on. I'm not trying to be an asshole or whatever, because I do love MK9 and I know this forum can't stand naysayers, but there are real problems in this game for a lot of players. NRS doesn't exactly make themselves look with many of their balance and design decisions. These opinions are subjective but they're not illegitimate, despite the efforts of this community to shun any criticism of the game.

At the end of the day, though, our opinions mean fuck all because NRS supposedly doesn't pay attention to community feedback. Our words are falling on deaf ears. All these threads do is give people a place to vent or don their whiteknight regalia to defend the fair lady NRS.

 

[shura30]

my 2 cents

until some years ago, when gaming platforms (jamma boards, mvs, atomiswave, ps. ps2 etc etc) wouldn't allow patches and hotfixes
most of good fighting games never had the chance to be played at a decent level (unless in some strange country or event)
only the biggest software houses released decent fighting games out of several attempt
there are only few king of fighters games and street fighters that are still playable after more than 10 years mostly due to game breaking glitches and imbalances that will never go away

NRS with mk9 is doing a great job and this could set another standard for fighting games (patches already happen in fps games though)
in some months from now people will not pick sheeva out of boredom like they did with hugo in 3s but because she will be patched until become competitive
players will learn to play out of their skill instead abusing moves that aren't supposed to give such advantages

and no, it's not 'you need to learn the matchup' that was years ago
if something is broken (do not use the scrub dictionary where everything is cheap please) there's a good chance it will go away

i wonder how many tournament and players would have picked mk9 if kunglao had the initial damage and combos and kabal still had the block infinite
really, think about this and about mk never getting to the level it is now

on the other side, patch info can't be gathered from online communities where everyone can blame whatever they think it's cheap
luckily NRS manage to partecipate in a lot of events where they can share opinion and watch the actual high level gameplay (and still get bashed while having fun at an inside tournament to test the patched game)

balance patches are supposed to give lower tiers more tools to compete against the higher ones
and if there's someone thinking that giving armor here and there is a mistake (and there is none in the current unofficial patch note)
either they don't understand a single thing about balance or they're so above their sparring/tournament partners where picking lao or sheeva won't make a difference

ps: cage still dies to projectiles, red kick can be baited and punished and against some character it's a bad idea to throw them to the same distance they were before for 1 less stock and few damage %
but it's still better than nothing when facing projectile spammers

 

[THTB]

Food for thought. Reptile has to be unsafe if he wants to use a 6-frame move. If he wants to be safe, he's forced to use an 8-frame generic low with terrible range, or a 9-frame generic low with slightly better range than the 8-frame one. The character doesn't even have an armored move outside of X-Ray. Reptile's defense when pressured is actually pretty ass in the grand scheme of things. Yes, I get the knockdown and meter building, if I hit. If I miss, though, yeah...considering how hard everyone in this game hits...I don't even like using elbow in the middle of strings unless I'm SURE it'll work.

 

[Badboy Takuma]

NRS believes:
Sub-Zero and Cyber Sub-Zero's enhanced and non-enhanced iceballs, when they hit an airborn opponent, should drop them out of the air in 2 seconds, but Cyrax's regular net with 5x the hitbox will leave them hanging in the air long enough to eat a sandwich, take a shit, check the sports scores and scratch your ass before they fall.
It's wise to leave Cyber's bomb inputs on 3 instead of 4 when 3 is involved in his best mixups.
It's wise to release content without testing or polishing (Freddy, Skarlet)
It's wise to buff the strongest characters in the game before the weakest (NW, JC buffs in the previous patch)

I mean honestly the list goes on and on. I'm not trying to be an asshole or whatever, because I do love MK9 and I know this forum can't stand naysayers, but there are real problems in this game for a lot of players. NRS doesn't exactly make themselves look with many of their balance and design decisions. These opinions are subjective but they're not illegitimate, despite the efforts of this community to shun any criticism of the game.

At the end of the day, though, our opinions mean fuck all because NRS supposedly doesn't pay attention to community feedback. Our words are falling on deaf ears. All these threads do is give people a place to vent or don their whiteknight regalia to defend the fair lady NRS.

THIS
my english is too bad to writing this, but thnx u do it for me XD

 

[NRF CharlieMurphy]

I play as Shang Tsung, you don't have to tell me about aggravating match ups against characters who are good at everything and aren't particularly bad at anything. I don't agree with Reptile's EX Armor for a second, I Don't agree with Sub Zero's EX Armor for a second. Ducking state? Of course, Armor? HELL THE FUCK NO.

You really don't want Sub being able to slide all duckable projectiles with no repercussions. you REALLY don't want that. I've noticed that most every armored move... when blocked, is HIGHLY punishable. So there is a risk/reward to it. It also is a bar of meter. Some characters X-ray doesn't mean much. Breakers do to ALL characters. Meter management is huge. So giving another chess piece makes the game deeper.
I play sub... online, not well just casually.... but even i know how unfair being able to slide under just about everything would suck for all zoners. Kitana, Mileena, Shang, Skarlett to a degree, sub mirror, Sektor... the list goes on. They would never throw out a projectile. That makes them one dimensional. Makes reads much easier. See where i'm going? Plus I don't lose that bar of meter. Huge advantage. Now... because he gets armor on exSlide... I get the same above effect with the side effects of that i take damage and I push you back into the situation I really didn't want to be in. We don't know if clones will break on armor hit... but lets assume it does. Its not game breaking. Neither is red shadow. The risk reward only happens at the end of matches ... or when in a severely desperate situation.

However, I do agree that some of the lower tier characters need an improvement. I think the common theme of low tier are at least one of two things. They have all slow normals, they don't have a complete armor EX. Sindel being the exception of having just an awful design. Dancock has documented this highly. The above would really change how the game plays. If stryker and sheeva and baraka to a degree gained just one thing.. they jump into that long list of A tier ... where skill rules.

 

[salvificblood]

You really don't want Sub being able to slide all duckable projectiles with no repercussions. you REALLY don't want that. I've noticed that most every armored move... when blocked, is HIGHLY punishable. So there is a risk/reward to it. It also is a bar of meter. Some characters X-ray doesn't mean much. Breakers do to ALL characters. Meter management is huge. So giving another chess piece makes the game deeper.
I play sub... online, not well just casually.... but even i know how unfair being able to slide under just about everything would suck for all zoners. Kitana, Mileena, Shang, Skarlett to a degree, sub mirror, Sektor... the list goes on. They would never throw out a projectile. That makes them one dimensional. Makes reads much easier. See where i'm going? Plus I don't lose that bar of meter. Huge advantage. Now... because he gets armor on exSlide... I get the same above effect with the side effects of that i take damage and I push you back into the situation I really didn't want to be in. We don't know if clones will break on armor hit... but lets assume it does. Its not game breaking. Neither is red shadow. The risk reward only happens at the end of matches ... or when in a severely desperate situation.

It isn't game breaking even if the tanked hit doesn't pop the clone because you only have to wait about a second while the clones up before throwing porjectiles again, because the clone will disappear before the ex slide will push you into it. The clone shouldn't pop when he takes the hit. People just need to learn Sub-Zero's clone timer.

 

[Ravox]

It isn't game breaking even if the tanked hit doesn't pop the clone because you only have to wait about a second while the clones up before throwing porjectiles again, because the clone will disappear before the ex slide will push you into it. The clone shouldn't pop when he takes the hit. People just need to learn Sub-Zero's clone timer.

Actually you can freeze the enemy on the clone if you do the ex slide on the right timing.

 

[DanCock]

There are only 2 things NRS has gotten wrong with all these patches


1 ~ the speed of kanos knife toss should have never been changed
2 ~ day one patch should have never removed 4 into special move for sindel

Those are the 2 biggest mistakes thus far.


Sent from my iPad 2 using Tapatalk

 

[Shady]

I am going to handle a few things at once here.

Griefa: Where was I complaining that they should abandon it? Ne-thefuck-ever. I was saying they are perhaps doing it a little bit too frequently and we are seeing certain changes that don't need to be made. I don't even play Kung Lao so I could give two shits about the hat recovery frames, never was my issue. It's a good thing, but they are often overreacting with some of these patches, proof in one where they took away Quan Chi's runetrap only to later realize that he is complete and utter shit without it and gave it back. (I believe happened after PDP after someone used it and possibly caused a mass panic over at NRS). I know it doesn't take a lot of time to adjust to your own character changes, but to all the match ups perhaps. Yes you can learn the character in a week, but developing a play style is ongoing. You constantly adjust to some tactics your opponents use and sometimes it takes a little more time to find some new tech to stuff something they're doing. Yes, they should fucking fix the broken stuff, non-escapable resets, Cyrax's in air net (also basically a lot of stuff Jenny was talking about). But at the same time, for other balancing issues it should be at least 4-5 months periods.

KT Smith NYC: Please read through everything and see where I claim that the EX Shadow Kick is game breaking? I'll wait for that one.

Sub_Crash: Honestly, I'd rather ducking than armor, because with ducking state it becomes a mind game. Can sub bait a high projectile and go under it for a hit or can the other person bait a slide and do a different projectile (Kabal saw, Shang ground skull, Sindel low). With armor it becomes, no matter what you do as an opponent I can get in. The only way to bait it would be to actually not do projectile and block (which is the solution a lot of people are saying for Cage's EX kick). But even a half decent player can recognize an animation for a projectile, and because the armor has the move the WHOLE WAY through full screen they can do it as soon as they see the animation, not in anticipation of it or anything like that and most of the time due to recovery on most projectiles it will hit from anywhere but full screen.

Also, to all those arguing that patches are a good thing. They are, I've never argued that. And yes, Jax needed some of his patches to make him as good as CD Jr. makes him look, but they also over react and don't fix the stuff that's necessary. It's clear that NRS don't have a good idea of how to balance the game so they obviously turn to the community. If they listen to online at all, they're a bunch of retards because online community cries oceans. They probably listen to respected community players, only problem is... some of the respected community players sometimes tend to get salty and say certain things that should not be fixed. REO for example bashing Mileena way back when and then taking her to the top like I said. I agree with CD Jr. take the time to play the game. Like I said fix the shit that actually needs to be fixed right away, that's not even a question, for a lot of other stuff, let the community have at it for 4-5 months. I guarantee you that if they never added EX Armor on SC until now there wouldn't be that many complaints and Cage would still ridiculously good.

Finally: just for kicks, for all of you Cage players who disagree with me mostly. If I accept that NRS doesn't do unnecessary buffs or nerfs..... How do you feel about F3,2 not being linkable into nut punch? Leave you that.

 

[hardwire]

i think this patch is coming at the right time


the scene is dyeing (not dead) but way worse then it was b4 evo and i think its cuse people got sick of the glitches and the kung wow/reptile/raiden crap


this patch can not come soon enuff

any one that thinks these nerfs or fixes were not needed are blind or bias.

 

[ForeverKing]

so what happens if i get an infraction on one of my posts? what does that mean

 

[Saint]

There are only 2 things NRS has gotten wrong with all these patches


1 ~ the speed of kanos knife toss should have never been changed
2 ~ day one patch should have never removed 4 into special move for sindel

Those are the 2 biggest mistakes thus far.


Sent from my iPad 2 using Tapatalk

Wasn't kanos knives as fast as freddys projectile?

 

[Jandek]

More :en moves having armor actually improves the gameplay and meter management/mind games.

Before NRS started buffing/nerfing and fixing the game, most enhanced moves were completely useless and there was no good reason to spend meter on anything but breakers.

Now characters are getting better enhanced moves for wake up, position advantage and combo potential, it makes things more interesting and fights more exiting.

well said

i'm not an advocate of excessive patching, but your statements on the ex moves is dead on.

 

[rev0lver]

the scene is dyeing (not dead) but way worse then it was b4 evo and i think its cuse people got sick of the glitches and the kung wow/reptile/raiden crap

...and what exactly is your evidence of that? The super hype Summer Jam tourney? Maybe it's just the area you're from.

 

[Shady]

i think this patch is coming at the right time


the scene is dyeing (not dead) but way worse then it was b4 evo and i think its cuse people got sick of the glitches and the kung wow/reptile/raiden crap


this patch can not come soon enuff

any one that thinks these nerfs or fixes were not needed are blind or bias.

Yeah, fixing the glitches should obviously be done ASAP, everything else needs to be given time.

 

[THTB]

i think this patch is coming at the right time


the scene is dyeing (not dead) but way worse then it was b4 evo and i think its cuse people got sick of the glitches and the kung wow/reptile/raiden crap


this patch can not come soon enuff

any one that thinks these nerfs or fixes were not needed are blind or bias.

The scene is dying? Just a few weeks ago, 60 people showed up to a tournament not too long after EVO in an area that was getting hit with pieces of a hurricane...and as a result, some had to deal with missed schedules (Myself included...hell, I almost got stuck in Pittsburgh for the following Monday night). Not to mention, the hype was with MK9 throughout.

If MK9's dying to you, then I think you need to be attending more tournaments, man.

Also, HAT TIER! *throws hat at the ground*

 

[salvificblood]

Actually you can freeze the enemy on the clone if you do the ex slide on the right timing.

Where did I say that wasn't possible? What I said was that the window for actually doing it is tighter than people who don't main Sub-Zero know. The ex slide has to come out very shortly after you put the clone up for you to actually hit somebody into it.

 

[NRF CharlieMurphy]

Your point about Cage's ex is the same for Sub if he could slide all duckable projectiles. I can see the animation and go. no reading. No mind game. then i'm in your face applying pressure. Plus i burned no meter and took no damage. How do you really want that? How? That makes no sense. NONE.

 

[Pig Of The Hut]

The scene is dying? Just a few weeks ago, 60 people showed up to a tournament not too long after EVO in an area that was getting hit with pieces of a hurricane...and as a result, some had to deal with missed schedules (Myself included...hell, I almost got stuck in Pittsburgh for the following Monday night). Not to mention, the hype was with MK9 throughout.

If MK9's dying to you, then I think you need to be attending more tournaments, man.

Also, HAT TIER! *throws hat at the ground*

THTB it's dying online

Yea man 3 weeks ago there were 5 tourneys in one day, 3 on east coast were there was a hurricane.

 

[Shady]

Your point about Cage's ex is the same for Sub if he could slide all duckable projectiles. I can see the animation and go. no reading. No mind game. then i'm in your face applying pressure. Plus i burned no meter and took no damage. How do you really want that? How? That makes no sense. NONE.

Because like I said, if I bait it I can do buzz saw and it is also easily controlled by low projectiles. EX Shadow Kick is not. It has full armor, low, high, medium, doesn't matter. With Sonya I can do Ex Rings and one hits low, can't do that on Cage EX. With Shang I can do an up scull in front of ground skull close to stuff the slide, can't do that on EX Shadow, with Kabal I can bait with iAGB and buzzsaw, can't do that on EX Shadow.... Even though yes, you can react the other opponent has more options when it comes to dealing with it.

 

[ZeroEffect]

NRS believes: Kabal's projectiles should be unstuffable and as spammable as Skarlet's kunais.

^This. Is a Major problem. Because it doesn't make sense. Kabal's rushdown with dash cancel mixups, is one of the best in the game. Now, think about this... There's absolutely NO reason, for a character with this degree of in-close mindgames and pressure to also have the BEST air control and zoning in the GAME! Seriously, a low projectile that knocks down, and the fastest air projectile in the game that has no cooldown, and gives free combos? It's mind boggling. Yes.... Kabal can be beaten. But how did this move design ever be allowed to make it through the concept stages?

So my solution would be to tone one of them down. If they're gonna base Kabal more on his mixups and pressure, make the air fireballs much less spammable. if they want him to be more of a zoner, do something about the in-close pressure. The point of great zoning is to force your opponent to try and get in. But, once they get in, they face Kabal's pressure... There's a disconnect here.

Personally, I think the zoning aspect is the easier fix. Don't change his damage or his resets or nothing over the top, just put more of a cooldown and recovery on the air fireballs. He'd still be able to do what he does, he just won't be able to spam iAFs at people for 10 seconds while they try to cross the screen.

 

[NRF CharlieMurphy]

Because like I said, if I bait it I can do buzz saw and it is also easily controlled by low projectiles. EX Shadow Kick is not. It has full armor, low, high, medium, doesn't matter. With Sonya I can do Ex Rings and one hits low, can't do that on Cage EX. With Shang I can do an up scull in front of ground skull close to stuff the slide, can't do that on EX Shadow, with Kabal I can bait with iAGB and buzzsaw, can't do that on EX Shadow.... Even though yes, you can react the other opponent has more options when it comes to dealing with it.

This is all at full screen ... where sub NEVER slides.... because it won't hit. I can assure you ... you haven't thought the slide through. It totally will stuff zoners. They won't be able to keep him out at all. I don't care to eat a ground saw if I catch a iAGB or just a regular one.... but thats how it is ANYWAY.
Ask Mileena if she wants that. They all will say no... because her solution to Sub is to bait sub into cloning or throwing an ice ball. with the change... he doesn't have to come at her. at all.
Kitana matchup would change dramatically. So would Sonya. See where I'm going?

 

[NRF CharlieMurphy]

^This. Is a Major problem. Because it doesn't make sense. Kabal's rushdown with dash cancel mixups, is one of the best in the game. Now, think about this... There's absolutely NO reason, for a character with this degree of in-close mindgames and pressure to also have the BEST air control and zoning in the GAME! Seriously, a low projectile that knocks down, and the fastest air projectile in the game that has no cooldown, and gives free combos? It's mind boggling. Yes.... Kabal can be beaten. But how did this move design ever be allowed to make it through the concept stages?

So my solution would be to tone one of them down. If they're gonna base Kabal more on his mixups and pressure, make the air fireballs much less spammable. if they want him to be more of a zoner, do something about the in-close pressure. The point of great zoning is to force your opponent to try and get in. But, once they get in, they face Kabal's pressure... There's a disconnect here.

Personally, I think the zoning aspect is the easier fix. Don't change his damage or his resets or nothing over the top, just put more of a cooldown and recovery on the air fireballs. He'd still be able to do what he does, he just won't be able to spam iAFs at people for 10 seconds while they try to cross the screen.

honestly... he isn't as dominate without the supreme air control. If you are used to countering the iAFs, they aren't THAT bad. Its the ground saw coming out no matter what. I'm pretty sure Vulcan has the same view and ideas on this. Whatever the fastest frame for a projectile is... thats when the saw should "appear". I don't mind it coming from behind. It shouldn't come out no matter what.

 

[Shady]

This is all at full screen ... where sub NEVER slides....

Except that say, Shang's close ground skull will probably go in front of the slide at full screen and stuff it right away at about half way because of the start up on it. Yeah, but then armor makes it just as bad because armor can't even be stuffed with ANYTHING where is the ducking state at least gives people some sort of an option (how good or effective we won't know).

 

[ZeroEffect]

honestly... he isn't as dominate without the supreme air control. If you are used to countering the iAFs, they aren't THAT bad. Its the ground saw coming out no matter what. I'm pretty sure Vulcan has the same view and ideas on this. Whatever the fastest frame for a projectile is... thats when the saw should "appear". I don't mind it coming from behind. It shouldn't come out no matter what.

Well ok. In my case, I play Mileena. And Mileena counters his zoning pretty easily. But I'm disregarding my character's perspective and thinking about the concept as a whole. If Mileena was given Kabal's rushdown pressure, it would be stupid, right? So I'm just trying to point out that something like this shouldn't be the case. The ground saw just complements the other stuff.

He may not dominate at every area of the screen anymore if they were to change this. But honestly, why should anyone be able to in the first place?