Ok, so after some time away to think through what I want, and actually writing it out, going over it, and essentially double checking, I think I know HOW to word what I want...
The game will have an emphasis on short confrontations with shorter combos. A full combo should take off, depending on the character and the combo in question, about 40-45% HP. With a chain-system, meaning certain moves cancel into specific other moves, and with the emphasis on short confrontations, however, characters will most likely be focusing on getting high damage early in a combo and possibly using a reset or okizeme early to keep the opponent from getting an advantage back over them. How is this done? I'll detail below:
DEFENSE:
BURST:
Each Round of a Match, both players have a free burst they can use at will. This burst is about as effective as the one's in Skullgirls so it can be good to stop most combos. It is possible to bait this, as usual, by throwing a weak combo you know extends into a long one. Much the same most bursts in general, how it can only be used when in the middle of a combo, and only after taking 3 hits, so no special bursts that boost you if you hit the opponent with it outside of their combo.
E. BURST:
E is for Emergency. When your HP is below a certain amount (probably about 30%), you can use an E. Burst. There is no limit to the number of E. Bursts you can do, however, it DOES cost 75 meter, but also has almost no recovery, meaning that after use, you burst knock the foe away, and are almost immediately able to react, put yourself into a prime offensive or defensive position, etc. You can technically use E. Bursts an infinite number of times during a match, but with meter gain scaling, at most you'll get maybe 3 uses, but that's only if you used the E. Burst at 30% HP and reversed the match with the foes at 100% with a certain character. Needless to say, E. Bursts are your last gambit to prevent those longer and/or more deadly combos.
PERFECT GUARDING:
If you block or low-block an attack by pressing the back/down-back movement during a certain period of time when at attack would connect, you do a Perfect Guard, which is basically a Just Guard from Guilty Gear. You take no chip damage and increase block stun ever so slightly on said attack, slowing down their combo if they follow up and giving you a larger opening. Additionally, doing a Perfect Guard puts you in a PERFECTION state. Essentially, PERFECTION state means that, for so many frames after executing a Perfect Guard, you will block mid, low, high, and overheads with just holding the back movement. Now, this will maybe net you one extra free block, maybe two depending on the moves being thrown, but executing a Perfect Guard puts pressure on the enemy to let up ad back off, and gives you time to see their next move and retaliate or get them away.
All this adds up to make for a system that makes short, quick strings of attacks, maybe following with supers, far more effective than long combo strings that may be possible, depending on how things go and each character, but given that eating a burst puts the attacker at the disadvantage means that you'll want to bait and overall avoid that if possible. Now onto the offensive portion of this post:
OFFENSE:
Scaling: Scaling will depend on the moves used. The game rewards higher damage non-supers by applying less damage scaling, but of course higher-damaging attacks cannot chain as effectively as lower damage attacks, and most supers cannot be comboed off of. Put all this togethor, and it makes it more efficient to go for a short combo using higher-damaging moves that you end and put your opponent into a reset than it is to go for a full combo where you get more damage off the combo itself, but allow your opponent to get up and fight back much more effectively. On the meter side of things, it's a bit the opposite. Most moves net you the same amount of meter either way, but the longer your combo, the larger the boost to your meter. After so many hits, the amount of meter you get improves during said combo.
SUPERS:
Supers would be scaled, too, obviously. Since meter gain will often be lower, meaning it takes quite a bit more to get up to taht 50% to score a super, supers can be fairly devastating in their own right, so using them to finish off a combo may net you a damage boost, but would it be better to just save it as a counter or finisher? It's up to the player and these will be the kind of situations I'd like to create.
AERIAL:
While the air game will be there, it will less emphasized. Aerial offense will act mostly for finishers to longer combos or be used to set up certain situations. Aerial finishers will often knock the opponent away from you and increase their gravity slightly, so using it closer to the ground will allow you to hit the gound and get into a better position over them as opposed to pulling off a short string to avoid the scaling. Aerial moves may have a special game to them depending on the characters, too, of course, but most will have some sort of anti-air and moves that can also generally catch foes in the air. On the opposite end, however, many air attacks, especially medium or heavy ones, can act as overheads, so if you can do an effective jump in, you can use the high damage to start a short OR long combo, but start with lower scaling and a good hit in.
With all of these, playes are given the tools to counter each other and focus on jumping in and out of offensive and defensive roles. Effective use of the burst system IS necessary, as if you use it early or waste it, you may find yourself getting hammered with the longer combos, allowing the foe to wrack up more meter and devastate you. Saving it and being ready for the opponent to counter your actions and put you on the defense is key. Of course, how characters do these combos, create setups, and all of that will depend on the character. For example, Helma is a very in-your-face kind of character. Meant to get in and go for a combo. She's capable of both long and short streaks, and is just effective in general. On the flip side, you have Fleur, who needs to set these plants Rachel Alucard style, and then activate them via the pheromone he gives off, which can be done a numbe of ways. These plants then act like mines, grabbing foe that passes by them, able to do both air grabs (though these are blockable) and ground grabs (which can miss if the foe is thrown by them), meaning he has to manage the plants and use his low combo damage to go for a burst bait if possible and rely on his meter more than others to get the damage across. Still, both of these characters have tools to do short combos and play offense and defense.
On a side note, I'm thinking of doing away with the ASSIST system, it might make things convoluted. Also, the Opening Post is heavily outdated in some areas, and hopefully I will be able to update that. As far as explaining how things work, how does this work? Is it enough of a description to get the idea across, even with my limited vocabulary? Does it sound like it'd wok?
