I forgot that Peacock was a grappler.
Ok, let me just state what I mean by zoning because people keep saying this....
To me, zoning (as well as being a nebulous word that everyone seems to have a different meaning for) is shutting off areas of the screen so your opponents options are limited, making them easier to predict. Like SF poking and counterpoking is a zoning game as far as I'm concerned. Also the classic Ryu fireball to make you want to jump then DP example.
Peacock doesn't really seem like that to me... she plays poorly from a truly neutral situation, she wants advantage, she wants you to block. Peacock doesn't care so much about where you are on screen, just that she has you caged or not. I guess you can call that zoning in a different sense that she keeps you stuck in one zone, but it isn't the word I'm looking for, it is the concept I'm trying to convey. Peacock does not fit the concept of the character I am trying to play.
English is semantics.
So yeah, damage on Fukua's fireballs never really concerned me, what did was the ability to punish my opponent for being predictable. Fukua can still limit approaches but I was struggling to open the opponent up on my own merit in the last patch, I was only punishing blatant mistakes that I didn't really feel I caused. I lost all momentum if I opted to go for a crossup on their approach. Maybe I'm not used to the new Fukua and I should be sticking to the ground more, but Fukua's dominant position of "above opponent while they are in the air" seemed a lot weaker.
Hopefully I can get the patch downloaded tonight before we have our weekly offline meeting so I can test what it is like now the bounce is back and hitstun is varied.
EDIT: I guess Val is a midrange zoning character too... but I like Fukua's projectile based game more. Parasoul also has what I call zoning as an important part of her gameplan, but mostly in a defensive way.