Your thoughts on character loyalty

[GamerBlake90]

I fully intended to follow the road of the character loyalist once MKX landed, but I am once again playing multiple characters as I did in MK9. -_-

...at least it isn't 50% of the roster like before. At best I've played up to only three characters, one variation each.

 

[Tony at Home]

It's up to the player really.

However, don't be a character loyalist and then do nothing but complain if your character doesn't turn out the way you want him or her to.

 

[GreatKungLao]

Tier-whoring, inherently has a negative name, and people HATE on this really hard. Using the best tools available to you at any given time is always the best thing to do in a competitive situation. Maybe the best tools to you are the Relentless Jason you put 500 hours into and know every match up. Maybe the best tool for you is your day 3 Quan because you can reliably find a hard-to-blockable set up and abuse it to greater success than your old main.

This is pretty much the thing that made me realise that I'm not created for competitive play, because at the end of the day you will be forced to start counter picking, because game didn't made justice to your favorite character in the meaning giving him all necesarry tools.

I have a very different way of picking a character in a fighting game than other peoeple I read here.

I pick a character based on his story, design (how he looks, moves, acts, etc.) and personality. When I find the one that I have some sort of spiritual connection with, character with whom I can associate myself, I choose him and only then I start learning his gameplay, no matter how hard or low-tired it is. Liu Kang to me is a Superman of Mortal Kombat, a boyscout super shaolin hero who always does good and the right thing, without expecting anything in return. That's how I remember him from original timeline and I hate what NRS is doing with his character in rebooted timeline, but play him still because I know that Liu Kang is a true hero deep inside still, even in that blasphemy version NRS is creating since MK9. I literally can't force myself play as villains, even if they are the only counter picking options and I simply don't like any other character as much as I like Liu Kang in Mortal Kombat series for example and I just can't learn and play a character I don't like, so that's why I use Liu Kang only and it's just kind of personal philosophy of mine - play 1 character per fighting game series. I play more characters only in those games where it is mandatory like KoF13, TTT2 or UMvC3.

My loyalty endures double time because of my character is experiencing injustice from developers both in gameplay and story. And Liu Kang has some very bad match-ups in MKX, where counter picking might be the only option, but I can't go that way, even if Liu Kang vs Tanya feels like 10-0 sometimes.

I'm just a sad example of a player whose favorite character wasn't granted with universal options against an entire roster and I can't force myself to play a character that is absolutely dislikeable to me from story standpoint.

As I said in my post, as long as tier system exists, character loyalty won't bring you 1st places, simply because your character might be a bottom tier.

 

[Invincible Salads]

im not loyal to jack shit xD, mostly because i' hate having a character nerfed after i just got comfortable with em, so i like to use multiple just in case.

 

[ZigZag]

Also,as one argument that floats around, do you think character loyalists hit a glass ceiling as players?

Discuss..

I think a good example of this is Reo playing Jason, he takes that character above and beyond it's limits but the character will simply hold him back, If he were to focus all his attention into someone better we'd see him definitely doing even better.

 

[Mr.EditUndo]

Nothing wrong with learning all characters but Im loyal to my main, I mained cage in MK1, Lao in MK2, smoke robot/human UMK3, Sub MK4, Lao MK9, and Kitana now. Every game is unique.

 

[JerzeyReign]

Well, at the moment I'm a novice player loyal to a "bottom tier" character, Mileena. Fortunately for me Saltface has reached top 8 with her a couple times this year with a 9th at EVO (?) so my "glass ceiling" is pretty damn high.

I do learn other characters to an extent but thats only so I can do their strings/combos in training mode to practice against.

I also sense that MKX players are "tier whores" in a way. I know SF is a different game but those Japan players run through entire tournaments using the same character. Rarely do I see a counterpick, they win or lose with their main.

 

[juicepouch]

Well, at the moment I'm a novice player loyal to a "bottom tier" character, Mileena. Fortunately for me Saltface has reached top 8 with her a couple times this year with a 9th at EVO (?) so my "glass ceiling" is pretty damn high.

I do learn other characters to an extent but thats only so I can do their strings/combos in training mode to practice against.

I also sense that MKX players are "tier whores" in a way. I know SF is a different game but those Japan players run through entire tournaments using the same character. Rarely do I see a counterpick, they win or lose with their main.

SF is just much more fleshed out. You have a better chance playing your main at the top level in a more uncomfortable matchup than you do throwing out some half assed counterpick once everyone learns their mu's. The amount of time that you would have to put into a character to counterpick when you could just continue grinding with your main creates a point of diminishing returns that isn't present in a game as new as mkx

 

[Swordzman321]

Been playing sub zero since Armageddon, cept in mk9 i played scorpion... but in mkx i seem to have accidentally amassed a small army of pocket characters along with the ice man. Although i'm not particularly good at them, i can play them and at least pretend to have an idea of what i'm doing. i'll probably wind up pocketing the roster if i continue playing. To actually try and answer the OP

loyalists do sometimes have a glass ceiling look at pig and kenshi, or sometimes there are loyalists to significantly better characters who have a much less extreme ceiling, an example being cowboy and shinnok. I like watching loyalist vs loyalist matches, it's more entertaining to watch something like tom brady vs pig, who will play only the character they are loyal to, rather than sonicfox's group of strong characters to counter pick with, vs a character loyalist. These are all just examples of course and i don't mean to bash the fox or his abilities. Just simply i like watching a loyalist play another loyalist.

 

[OmeMark]

I don't want to be loyal or anything, but I only like Kano... :'(

 

[MrProfDrPepper]

Character loyalty is a good trait. Lower tier characters get a voice when their character desperately needs help and it's helping this game achieve a level of balance that we didn't see in MK9/IGAU. Their tireless work put in on finding tech helps us learn MUs so we don't get caught with our pants down the first time we face a competent player of the character. It keeps things interesting so we aren't always facing the FOTM or top tier characters.

I prefer to think of myself as a "family loyalist". I love Johnny Cage but he didn't click with me in the early life of the game (later picked him up) and really enjoyed Cassie's style and her play in all variations. So I've gone from "Cage loyalist" to "Cage family loyalist". Just lucky that the characters with whom I've clicked have all been pretty solid in all of their games.

I'm a kenshi loyalist but I am technically since you put it in your terms family loyalist so that is fairly accurate to me since my secondary is lasher Takeda, I still use balanced way more but I like lasher too much and fits me like a glove wonderfully, the more I played it the more similarities I found to balanced and I really like it, of course kenshi is and always will be my main man but the takahashi family is a fine family to be loyal too, even if they are on the lower side of the tier list, especially kenshi, but doesn't matter takahashi family loyalism for me.

 

[Dja_Homies]

I live and breathe Johnny. The only character that makes me truly enjoy this game. If it weren't for him I don't know where I would be in this game. Johnny is the greatest. Back on topic I have always been a character loyalist and plan to be the same for a long time. For mkx I will always be with Johnny. I'll die with the shades on.