The Power of One.

[Kitsuziza]

During the Tornament at SCR It was brought up that there were no Solo's that made it to Top 8. Now I know this has not always been the case Khaosmuffins made it to top eight in Evo but I often wonder if solo's have it too tough.

Mike Z said "Solos are a good option when your learning the game and there are several solos that are pretty viable but they require you to play a lot better then teams do generally." at SCR

Now I personally play valentine and Peacock so this does not effect me but I always thought solos should have something to combat the fact that teams have the ability to call assists and the ability to regen health.

I'd like to start a discussion on whether solo picks should receive some type of buff and if so what?

Personally I think solo's should be able to use a defensive burst like in Blazeblue. Just one per match or round in addition to IPS and undizzy. If this is a horrible idea it would be taken out of course but I think giving solo's a defensive burst would give solo players a chance to get a second wind similar to how a well placed napalm pillar can turn someones Rushdown against them. Right now there seems to be a trend that to play this game at a high level you need to pick up more than one character. I don't think that's a bad thing per say but I think a sign of a well balanced game is when every character can hold there own. In MVC2 some characters were basically nothing more than assists I think SG strives to make every character pack a unique punch lets talk about doing something to make solo's as viable as teams.

 

[klaww]

I get bodied by enough solobellas as is....
However a defensive burst may be an understandable compromise.

 

[DDB]

It ALWAYS comes back to the burst idea.

 

[Ruin]

all solos should be as good as solobella onv

 

[IsaVulpes]

When's a thread that tries to make Squigly/Peacock/Valentine-Team -all with s.LP assists- work by specifically allowing them to burst once per match?
Never? Why not? Because you can just not pick a shitty team with bad assists and yay? Well then don't play Solo Valentine either.
It's a "team" you can pick and it's a bad choice, you won't get every single team to be as good as every other team.. soooooooo pick a better team.

Teambuilding and adapting to characters that synergize with what you want to do even though you don't like X about them is part of "Player Skill", if your skill in this area is bad your team sucks. The ennnnnd

 

[NCV]

You don't need an extra function for Solo because you already have the most damage, you never have to worry about incoming mixups or protecting assists, you have to get hit more than other ratios to lose, and you have to worry about fewer match ups. That's the balance.

 

[fracassio]

Honestly, my only issue with balancing solos is red health. If you want to sacrifice assist pressure and defence options to have a bigger damage output and more deadly combos, that is entirely your responsibility. However, not being able to recover red health is a balance problem when different attacks leave a different amount of red health (most notably Cerebella's grabs), which make solo-ing by itself a bad matchup against certain characters.

I would like to have some way from solos to recover red health. I would suggest taunts (since they have a risk involved, so it's still fair), but they are already serving another function on Big Band's case.

I'm inclined to oppose anything more drastic than that (like the defensive burst). Giving a solo an specific and exclusive tool/move to rebalance the ratio system is artificial and inelegant design, which would make the gameplay more clunky and context-specific. I would rather have no high level solos than a messier, more unnecessarily complicated game.

 

[gold163]

What if we turned the tables? What if a team versus a solo couldn't regenerate health? This is probably a terrible idea for any number of reasons, but I'd like to hear why.

 

[TechPowah]

Maybe let solos chain Blockbusters for one-character BB Sequels/DHCs, but ramp up the damage scaling to keep it from being OP.

Personally, I think it's fine as is, but there's my suggestion.

 

[Spencer]

You don't need an extra function for Solo because you already have the most damage, you never have to worry about incoming mixups or protecting assists, you have to get hit more than other ratios to lose, and you have to worry about fewer match ups. That's the balance.

Hasn't this been shown to be demonstrably false? That hit for hit, solo is stronger, but once you factor in DHC combos, solo loses out? If memory serves (and no doubt I'm 5 minutes away from someone jumping down my throat for saying this, but...), there are zero solo TOD and there are a handful of team TOD, no?

Incoming math which could all be wrong. If WorldJem's chart is up to date (and my math is correct), solos have a net 11% life advantage (adjusting for damage). Red health comes back at 1% a second meaning that the entire solo damage/health advantage is completely mitigated by 11 seconds of regeneration. Even if you never see the full 11 seconds, just know that you are removing 1% of damage/health advantage every second which narrows the solo advantage. Now keep in mind that we paid for that advantage by not including updo, pillar, *insert whatever assist you have problems with here* as well as no safe DHC and less options to handle any situation.

As to those that say that its balanced because you can always pick a team... that is a flawed way of thinking about it. You could take SF's huge roster and buff one guy until he is untouchable by anyone, but would you really call it balanced since both people could pick him?

edited to add:

@gold163

The only real reason I've heard is because it adds interesting strategy (which I think is generally false), I've not actually heard someone talk about it making solo OP or teams UP though.

 

[Dime]

Ive said it before and I'll say it again:

I LOVE BALANCE... Like seriously, the world i live in has servbot making like the first word in his name and just giving folks the what for.

Having said that, the issue of solo character teams versus multi character teams is in my mind an issue that is not solvable.

If you make solos just as good as multi character teams, you are basically going to kill multi character teams. This is obvious because it will take 3-4 times longer for a multi character team to reach its full potential than it would for the solo player to reach their potential. There's also the issue of learning your team forward (the order you put them in) and back (the order the team becomes after 1 dhc) and a completely different order (the order after dhcx3) then there's also alpha counters, assists, matchups, corner combos, midscreen combos, character specific combos and resets etc etc etc... Made much harder by having to learn them x3.


So no solo shouldnt be as powerful as teams. It is unfortunately balancing by execution, but how else would one do it? The point is basically that multi character should never have been allowed to play against solo in the first place. It creates to big of an imbalance to be able to fix save for 1 solution:

Give the solo characters executional things that only solos have that make them just as hard to learn as a trio or duo, and make sure that those things are a double edged sword... Like calling assist at the right time is very good for multi character teams, calling assists at the wrong time is very bad.


Solos imho, if they want to be equal to multi character teams, imho should have good decisions unique to them that when done the right way are very good but when done the bad way get them f'd over just like everyone else.


Other than that i cant really see any way of making solos as viable as teams without crushing the team meta and basically making the game 1v1 game in necessity.

 

[Mike_Z]

OH MAN there is an ignore feature on Skullheart. That's just about the most amazing thing.

 

[Spencer]

I agree with you Dime. I think it is likely impossible to balance solo vs team. I don't think that means we should stop trying though. While 5-5 for every MU regardless of teamsize is a pipe dream, with a roster of 10ish characters, we can certainly get it up to 4-6.

That said, the "ought" question you bring up, I think, is a non-issue. Yes, the game ought to balanced if possible even if execution is easier. For example, I think Filia is likely one of the easiest cast members to pick up and play. Does that mean she should be automatically less viable than Parasoul who is harder? Absolutely not.

I'll add more later, but I've got to close up at work...

 

[Skullmageddon]

If you make solos just as good as multi character teams, you are basically going to kill multi character teams.

@Dime_x, what exactly do you mean by "just as good?" Do you mean in terms of health and damage output? Or do you mean in terms of functionality and versatility? I'm curious because I want to make sure that I understand your side of the argument.

I know you've gone through this discussion before (in a thread that I don't think I need to name), but I have to side with those that state that increasing the execution difficulty doesn't actually balance anything. For example, let's say we gave solos a new mechanic that was somehow more or less equivalent to a dhc, and let's also assume that this new mechanic is extremely difficult to execute. In the short term it may seem that it's relatively balanced because it would allow a solo character to output more damage in the same way that teams do, but at an extremely high risk due to difficulty in execution and the penalty of failure. But what about two years from now when people have been playing for so long that execution is no longer an issue and they are able to utilize the new mechanic with greater ease? Suddenly the tables have flipped and solos begin to have some advantages over teams. Now I know this example is by no means accurate, but hopefully I'm making myself at least somewhat clear.

If they were to take solos and somehow make them even more comparable to teams, it wouldn't have as great of an effect on how people make their team selections as you might think. Regardless of how you balance team choices, there will always be the factor of player preference and character match-ups. Teams will always have the advantage of having more options through assists in the way of mix-ups, cross-ups, resets, etc. Teams will also have a different feel in play-style, which some people may or may not prefer. Teams will also have the advantage of being able to better deal with character specific match-ups, which is something that could never really be balanced for solos.

In short, balancing solos to be more on level with teams wouldn't "kill" teams. Some people might switch to playing solo, some won't. If they manage to balance things relatively well it will all come down to preference in play-style.

Also I personally don't think anything needs to be changed. As it stands, some characters are fairly good solo and some aren't. A lot of this has to do with character match-ups rather than whether or not teams and solos are equal in strength because some characters simply have deficiencies that give them a hard time against specific characters. This won't change as it's the nature of the game, so it's something that people should simply learn to play with.

 

[blufang]

What if we turned the tables? What if a team versus a solo couldn't regenerate health? This is probably a terrible idea for any number of reasons, but I'd like to hear why.

This would actually be an awesome experiment. Teams could still DHC, and Alpha counter so tagging would still have a purpose.

Anyways shouldn't this be in the gameplay discussion?

 

[Mike_Z]

Just to note, I come from a background of people doing true-kara-demons and 1f FRCs in match play, so my design philosophy with regard to execution is simple:
Ignore it entirely. Assume that if something is possible to do, and useful, players will do it and they will do it consistently.

It makes things much simpler to examine, since you can ignore how difficult anything is and focus on merit alone.
That doesn't mean making things simpler is bad, rather the opposite - since execution is irrelevant you can and should make everything that's game basics easy. Not requiring 3 buttons, leniency on everything, QCT command grabs, etc., since players will find difficult combinations of things anyway.

Back on topic, for those of you not ignored:
NOT that I think anything should be done, because y'all are down on solos for the wrong reasons, but...what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

 

[Spencer]

@Mike_Z (assuming of course I'm not ignored...)

What are the right reasons to be down on solos? As in do you think there are legitimate concerns regarding solo vs team?

Regarding your idea, it would be an interesting one and would certainly add an interesting element to snap. As it is right now I use it when someone has a fraction of a life or for a Happy Birthday making it rather binary (there is virtually no strategic consideration relative to the rest of the game).

I'd be curious what the team folk think?

 

[lolster2nite]

Just to note, I come from a background of people doing true-kara-demons and 1f FRCs in match play, so my design philosophy with regard to execution is simple:
Ignore it entirely. Assume that if something is possible to do, and useful, players will do it and they will do it consistently.

It makes things much simpler to examine, since you can ignore how difficult anything is and focus on merit alone.
That doesn't mean making things simpler is bad, rather the opposite - since execution is irrelevant you can and should make everything that's game basics easy. Not requiring 3 buttons, leniency on everything, QCT command grabs, etc., since players will find difficult combinations of things anyway.

Back on topic, for those of you not ignored:
NOT that I think anything should be done, because y'all are down on solos for the wrong reasons, but...what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

Interesting concept, but that may end up prolonging the game's time frame, which in turn disrupts that fast-paced feeling I get when playing SG in general.

 

[Dime]

@Spencer and @Skullmageddon

You both bring up good points.

As far as "just as good" i am talking about functionality. I dont know how to equate "just as good", to be via health or damage since there are so many factors to consider how much health one gets versus how much damage they do.


I also think "just as good" and "equal" are bad metrics at least for the English language when comparing 2 different entities in fighting games. But its pretty hard to come up with something better as a metric. In the end i just say that perfect balance is unachievable and leave it at that. Though i do agree with spencer that balance is something that can constantly be tweaked and refined. I think those nuts over at dota 1 are still tweaking the game after 10 years...

I dont agree that making solos as good as teams wouldnt upset the player balance of team players versus solo players... But hey, it would be interesting to be wrong. I just look at prevailing evidence that shows in most/all fighting games that most people pick characters based on a combination of looks and personality, ease of use, and strength. Most people throw those 3 separate things together and come up with the character they want to play. Funnily enough though, most people tend to stay away from high execution characters, even if those characters are strong.

This is relative though. What is high execution for one person might not be for another when it comes to move execution and timing.

I also agree that balancing via move execution and timing does generally tend to slip at the end of a games life. But i am not talking about balancing via move execution or move timing. I am talking about balancing via decision making/quick thinking execution. Everyone out there slows down when they reach a point where they have lots of decisions to process. Which is exacerbated by decreasing time.

If we were to balance this game by oh, say, giving solos some number of damage and health buffs. And thats it.... Then we are giving solos buffs without making them think any harder.

An example would be painwheel against the rest of the cast. She was seen as having some pretty decently big issues strategically against most of the rest of the cast.

Now, she could have been made into the best character in the game by simply giving her a 200% damage buff. But that is a really bad way of balancing her... Even if the buff were different such as oh say 5% damage buff.

The way she got buffed, and the way i personally agree with buffing or nerfing characters, is she got more options, but all of those options have downsides if she uses them at the wrong time... So she has more options but at the same time has more bad decisions she can make as well. To me this seems like a perfect way to balance characters and that was what i thought i was eluding to in my above post.


Perhaps i didnt say it well, and perhaps i am totally wrong.


To me, all of this, is much more just hypothetical thought.

For instance i would have hypothesized that skullgirls itself would have been a much more popular game than it is, for many reasons, but i would have been wrong.

So i could very well be wrong here, but in this case i think my eventual wrongness could be completely arbitrary. Ie in a parallel timeline sg takes over the world and labzero are worshipped as gods.... I could see that happening... Sg as a game is good enough in my eyes for people to go bonkers over....



Rambling, sorry. I gtg to work now. Be back in about 15 hours....

 

[Skullmageddon]

what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

Stealing portions of read health from the opposing team via snapping is an interesting idea.

Alternatively, what if solo character's stole back health based on ips stage? For example, let's say that once a solo character's combo has reached stage 5 of ips they begin to regain small portions of health for every hit they make against their opponent. The amount they gain depends on the moves they hit with and they can only "steal" from the opponents red health. This limits the amount that a solo character may recover health by giving them a variable pool of health to recover from while also forcing them to reach stage 5 of ips in order to even begin healing.

The idea of being able to vampire health is interesting, i just feel that being forced to use a meter to recover health won't seem worthwhile or advantageous. Of course I have no real justification for this thought, it's just how I imagine it would work out.

 

[Mike_Z]

What are the right reasons to be down on solos? As in do you think there are legitimate concerns regarding solo vs team?

Eh...not really. If you could choose solo Magneto for 1.5x damage and 3x life in MvC2 some people would certainly do it. It just requires knowing more about the character.
Like I said, one of 'em (solo or team) will always be worse, and I'd rather it be solos...and there will always be some bad solos just like there will be some bad teams, but it's nowhere near as hopeless as everyone not-ignored seems to think it is.

As it is right now I [snap] when someone has a fraction of a life or for a Happy Birthday making it rather binary (there is virtually no strategic consideration relative to the rest of the game).

That's you not paying much attention to what snaps do, then. When you snap someone out, the incoming character has to play solo for a decent amount of time, and you're also a solo, so assuming you can work with that situation you can do a lot of damage into another snap and keep them playing without assists OR healing.

 

[Skullmageddon]

@Dime_x thanks for explaining in detail, it helps me understand both sides of the argument better. As it turns out I pretty much agree with everything you've said.

Also I don't really mean to say that people won't switch to using solo characters if they were "more" balanced, because many people definitely would. In particular, I could see new players having the tendency to stick with solos simply because it's easier to learn one character at a time, while some veterans may also make the switch due to personal preference. I guess what I'm really trying to get at is that some people want to play solo, but they feel like they are at a disadvantage in doing so, therefore they play with teams. These are the people who would play solo if things were changed, while those who prefer teams would simply play as they do now.

But in the end I still don't think any changes should be made with regards to team balance. I would agree that overall playing solo is more difficult, but that's it. Some characters have the right tools to play solo, some not so much. Some teams are relatively good, some are not. I personally think the current balance is fine.

 

[GrunkleBarlowe]

I've been playing Solo Squigly for as long as I can remember, and it's no secret that it's a pretty awful setup . But I have very, very rarely been in a situation that I can blame on my team choice as opposed to my own play. As make said, playing a solo can be pretty rough but it's definitely not unplayable. Some characters make excellent Solos (there's a good number of Solo Fortunes running around for a reason), and some don't. I don't think there is anything wrong with that.

EDIT: Someone can correct me if i'm wrong, but I'm not completely sure that Solo's need to be hit more to get killed faster in Encore. At least on a team you have a chance to defend again with an incoming, but a solo character could theoretically be burst baited/reset mid combo infinitely.

NOT that I think anything should be done, because y'all are down on solos for the wrong reasons, but...what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

Not completely sure about this, but I would be more than willing to play around with this if it went on to beta.

 

[Dime]

@Mike_Z (assuming of course I'm not ignored...)

Lol im pretty sure it was me :^)

As far as solos are concerned though, i do like to get my solo on from time to time... And if i lose to a solo such as bella or fortune... I usually fight them with my own solo, till i get bored, then i will usually duo them with a pillar assist... Or something of that nature.

 

[fracassio]

Back on topic, for those of you not ignored:
NOT that I think anything should be done, because y'all are down on solos for the wrong reasons, but...what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

I actually like that solution a lot. It addresses what I think is problematic (even though I might be wrong, I forgot to make note of that on the previous post) without recurring to something that feels too arbitrary or specific (which is actually my major concern regarding any changes on solos). It may not work, but I'd say is worth a try.

 

[Broseidon Rex]

Back on topic, for those of you not ignored:
NOT that I think anything should be done, because y'all are down on solos for the wrong reasons, but...what if a solo snapping in (or out?) a team member vampired some of the red health that the team lost.

Questions on Vampiring:

• Would this favor some characters more than others (Cough Cough Cerebella)? I don't play other characters so I don't know how much red health their combos create but Bella's creates a bunch of it. Edit: Forgot that red health is also generated by punishing assist, so not as bad as initially thought it might be.
• Would it only be on snapbacks or also when you kill a character and the next character with red health gets some of theirs stolen? Or is it too much to punish the other player to not only lose a character but also heal the solo player?
• Seems like it would discourage DHCs (since you wouldn't want to have a character sitting on too much red health), is that okay?

This could be good since it's situational and it forces the solo player to decide between a dead character/good positioning versus healing up and burning meter. Plus, do it in the corner and hello incoming mixups (a team's FAVORITE position to be in)

 

[Spencer]

The reason I don't use snapback to lock out the assist and punish is because it lasts 5 seconds (right? Is this the right number?) for meter. This generally means if I don't properly catch them on their way in, I just burned a meter for no gain.

It is high risk and high reward, but I've not found the risk to offset the reward. With HI, extra damage, PBGC into Thresher, it seems more of a waste of meter than anything else. That said, I'll try it out some more to see if I'm missing something which is entirely feasible.

Does anyone have decent snapback advice?

 

[Number 13]

Moving this to the more appropriate gameplay section.

On topic..

I go out of my way to land a SnapBack (underrated tool for solos outside of lucky double snap scenarios) if I see someone with a ton of red life and have the meter to spare if my opponent tries to be cute and raw tag and especially if they DHC where the opponent paid at least two bars. The lockout moment needs to be taken advantage too since that is when teams are most vulnerable and you can bully them.

Solo ratio doesn't have to be as stingy with meter compared to teams because of the general buffed damage, no DHC, and no AC. More so with Filia because her level 3 has limited situation uses to be worth the meter cost.

Edit: interested about the proposed vampire effect especially if it encourages more snap back use due to added utility. Don't think solo needs blatant buffs like increased damage/health, solo isn't that bad depending on your character pick, but maybe more subtle indirect buffs should be fine enough. That by no means should ruin the status quo balance of teams remaining a bit more effective then solo from a design perspective.

 

[KhaosMuffins]

If I could go back in time to EVO, I would tell myself, "Don't YOLO, don't go solo."

 

[Jason]

The reason I don't use snapback to lock out the assist and punish is because it lasts 5 seconds (right? Is this the right number?) for meter. This generally means if I don't properly catch them on their way in, I just burned a meter for no gain.

It is high risk and high reward, but I've not found the risk to offset the reward. With HI, extra damage, PBGC into Thresher, it seems more of a waste of meter than anything else. That said, I'll try it out some more to see if I'm missing something which is entirely feasible.

Does anyone have decent snapback advice?

Usually I only use a snapback when either the opponent has a heavy reliance on a particular assist or there's a big chunk of red life that I can get rid of.

 

[Dime]

Thats pretty much what i use it for as well. I still dont see the point of snapbacks mostly though (outside of the scenarios i just agreed with) if you are already hitting a character, then just reset and kill it. Resets seem to be higher percentage of hit than incoming mixups.


Like the way i see it against a near full health team:


Do a combo to the point character, point now has half life or so before any meter is spent (especially true if its a solo that hit the point character) snap out the half dead point character and snap in the full health problem character. Start from square one against problem character and you have to actually have a viable mixup that worked, in order to justify that snap in.

Note that if the snap was to be able to get rid of a problem assist... What if the shell is like para/double?

You snap out a good assist for.... A good assist.



Idk but in my experience against both sides of snapping, it has rather limited use for strategic purposes. Though yes it does work on occasion.

 

[Kitsuziza]

I feel that a lot of people have been saying things like you'll never be able to make solos and teams balanced or solos will always be worst than playing teams. Taking what Mike Z said into account.

Like I said, one of 'em (solo or team) will always be worse, and I'd rather it be solos...and there will always be some bad solos just like there will be some bad teams, but it's nowhere near as hopeless as everyone not-ignored seems to think it is.

I don't think we should be trying to have a discussion about trying to make a perfectly balanced game. If skullgirls had to put a focus on solo's vs teams I also think the focus should be on teams. I think the discussion we should be having is why are some solos better than others, how well do the best solos stack against the best teams, is there something that can be done to all solo's to bridge the gap a bit without breaking it. When you think about all the utility that having two characters give it just seems that solo players should have at least one trick up their sleeves.

Another way to think was the question could be (Tier list value speculation aside) If you could put every skull girls setup on a tier list like Val/Fil/dbl or par/pea/bb how far down would you have to go before you got a solo.

I think the Vamp snap back is a step in the right direction a small change that is exclusive to solo's that might be just the push that some solo picks need. Personally I don't think giving solos a defensive burst would be a terrible idea but it is a slippery slope. Right now in skullgirls we have two kinds of burst IPS and undizzy both which the attackers have a certain amount of control over.

Someone on the offensive know when the IPS is about to be tripped as well as when the opponents undizzy is about to kick in. Giving solo's a defensive burst will give players an option to get out of the next reset or burst bait that might be in store for them and while you could say solos should just play the game better this is about giving solos a tool they can use were currently other than their HP and atk they have none.

Not saying it's the best idea but I would like to hear an argument against it.

 

[KhaosMuffins]

I don't think we should be trying to have a discussion about trying to make a perfectly balanced game. If skullgirls had to put a focus on solo's vs teams I also think the focus should be on teams. I think the discussion we should be having is why are some solos better than others, how well do the best solos stack against the best teams, is there something that can be done to all solo's to bridge the gap a bit without breaking it. When you think about all the utility that having two characters give it just seems that solo players should have at least one trick up their sleeves.

Someone on the offensive know when the IPS is about to be tripped as well as when the opponents undizzy is about to kick in. Giving solo's a defensive burst will give players an option to get out of the next reset or burst bait that might be in store for them and while you could say solos should just play the game better this is about giving solos a tool they can use were currently other than their HP and atk they have none.

Not saying it's the best idea but I would like to hear an argument against it.

How to succeed as a solo:
- Have good neutral tools and/or mobility
- Have great mixups or some way to /somewhat/ deal with push blocking
- Good (preferably meterless, but hitstop is a thing so...) defensive options
- Not have hopeless matchups
- Added this on late but AN AIR SUPER

So basically: Fortune. Honorable mentions to Filia and, to a lesser extent, Val. Solo Bella is scary until you play the matchup (she hurts but still needs 2 good hits to kill like every other solo).

Solos don't need defensive bursts since with their health they already have plenty of opportunities to get out of resets. The defensive options in this game are already powerful enough; you don't have access to alpha counters, but you have access to PBGC'd reversals that are powered up by your damage ratio and just devour your opponent's health if you can combo from your reversal.

Solo's are weaker than teams but the balance is fine. You just have to make better usage of the options that the game already gives you since you already get a higher reward from them.

 

[Spencer]

@KhaosMuffins

While the "reward" is higher, I think there is a decent argument that it is artificially higher. Without discussing anything but health and damage, teams have metered potential to out damage solo and with red health, solo loses both their health and damage bonus in 11 seconds (less if you are just considering health and ignoring total damage).

I do think that any solo buffs or nerfs need to be well-tempered. I imagine it would be easy to push a solo over the top on damage alone (being solo should not mean one confirm = death).

I like the invuln assist nerf being tried which will help defensively shitty solos (like mah PW) from being trapped in a corner by an aggressive champ and updo.

 

[blufang]

Vampire snapbacks is an awesome idea. It gives more incentive to use snapback combos, gives solo a way to restore health exclusive to them, and should slightly close the gap. I think this is a very safe idea to try out, it isn't going to push solos over the top or make them even to team, but just make them more competitive.

 

[GirlyStyle]

i think vampire snapbacks is awesome, and great for balance, but here's a question for y'all from an ignorant man:

if you have a meter, and a super won't kill, why wouldn't you snap, and does the idea of a predominant tactic bother anyone? keep in mind its pretty easy to manage you always having one meter since you start the round with one, and combo -> snap next [incoming mixup] combo will most likely build another full meter in every situation.

EDIT: playing devil's advocate here more then anything

@KhaosMuffins
I like the invuln assist nerf being tried which will help defensively shitty solos (like mah PW) from being trapped in a corner by an aggressive champ and updo.

okay now what about all those non-invincible assists that are better at lockdown ;)

 

[Dagwood]

hell no. solos are soo annoying and random as it is already.

 

[Spencer]

i think vampire snapbacks is awesome, and great for balance, but here's a question for y'all from an ignorant man:

if you have a meter, and a super won't kill, why wouldn't you snap, and does the idea of a predominant tactic bother anyone? keep in mind its pretty easy to manage you always having one meter since you start the round with one, and combo -> snap next [incoming mixup] combo will most likely build another full meter in every situation.

EDIT: playing devil's advocate here more then anything



okay now what about all those non-invincible assists that are better at lockdown ;)

To answer both, I'm going to look more into snapback. I almost certainly under utilize it, for sure. The question is whether or not the meter is worth it. I won't be comfortable answering that until I dig deeper, but up until now, I at least assumed the answer was no.

As far as invuln assist, the reason it is so hard to do anything against is it punishes both aggressive and defensive play. You jump in, you get hit. You block, you give point time to come back in. Not to mention that they have phenomenally aggressive hitboxes, are nigh impossible to hit on incoming (without extremely solid timing), and are useful at all stages of the game (very much unlike a lockdown assist). Add to that, it encourages a super passive gameplay. I can't count the number of times I read updo, avoid it, come in only to get blocked and updo'd (something this change should prevent). Lockdown is super strong for sure, but it is very specific and counterable, something I don't think invuln assist is (requiring instead an opponent to fuck up rather than your own good play).

I do echo your concern that it is opaque and unfriendly to beginners (though I think SGs is definitely better regarding that than most), and I don't think anyone wants assists to be toothless, so that is a concern... but I do think this is a reasonable nerf that won't lower assist power except in a few specific situations.

 

[GirlyStyle]

To answer both, I'm going to look more into snapback. I almost certainly under utilize it, for sure. The question is whether or not the meter is worth it. I won't be comfortable answering that until I dig deeper, but up until now, I at least assumed the answer was no.

i meant this in context to the vampire change, where you get some health back. considering you would get health back, an incoming mixup, have complete advantage in neutral while their assist is locked out, AND mixup their team synergy, why NOT go for it every time you have the bar to spend unless a super kills? Again this isn't a balance thing, just do people mind a best strategy every time thing.

As far as invuln assist, the reason it is so hard to do anything against is it punishes both aggressive and defensive play. You jump in, you get hit. You block, you give point time to come back in. Not to mention that they have phenomenally aggressive hitboxes, are nigh impossible to hit on incoming (without extremely solid timing), and are useful at all stages of the game (very much unlike a lockdown assist). Add to that, it encourages a super passive gameplay. I can't count the number of times I read updo, avoid it, come in only to get blocked and updo'd (something this change should prevent). Lockdown is super strong for sure, but it is very specific and counterable, something I don't think invuln assist is (requiring instead an opponent to fuck up rather than your own good play).

i think you are pretty wrong saying reversal assists aren't counterable with things like "you jump you get hit" (you can block while jumping) and "its nigh impossible to hit on incoming" (when its a calculable constant and i see people hit invincible assists all the time with certain frame trap setups) but its all beside the point because i agree with you that solos lose the match. i also don't think there is anything objectively wrong with having to play passive, but i can understand if you personally dont like it.

my point was i don't think this change is really going to affect the MU getting better in a significant way (or at least from what I have seen from me experiences). it will still flat out beat you in neutral which is the biggest advantage, and all those scenarios you described are still completely present as long as I didn't make a shitty assist call before hand.

i only really see this affecting the kind of level of play where people are mashing on assists and making bad assist calls that are for some reason going unchecked.

interested in what @KhaosMuffins thinks of this since he was the highest placing solo at evo (despite him and his time machine saying he would play teams now)

 

[Spencer]

I think the problem with being forced into passive play is it mitigates the solo advantage (as I've mentioned in other threads, every second of ticking red life is a second our only real advantage is diminished).

I think the reason I'm fine with it being targeted at invuln assists is because they are easily the most popular assist (updo, butt, FU, Pillar) as they are effectively all-purpose. I do agree that this will mostly influence mashed assists and bad assist calls, but I think it could have a positive affect on more aggressive play.

It also isn't that they can't be hit, but that the window to do so is tiny, especially when being pressured.

Of course I'm just theorycrafting, but I do want to hear how some beta matches go. I might even get to play some if midterms ends soon...