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Discussion Patches overwhelmingly help NRS games not hurt them

Do you think NRS patching strategy is much better this time?

  • Yes

    Votes: 74 60.2%
  • No

    Votes: 36 29.3%
  • In between overeall

    Votes: 13 10.6%

  • Total voters
    123

PPJ

()
Premium Supporter
NetherRealm Studios
I'm going to address Slips's post in a minute but first let's talk about something real quick. The whole "there are more positives than negatives in the patch, therefore the patch is good!" argument is intellectually dishonest and I'm surprised people are taking that seriously.
It's not dishonest at all. This IS and HAS been true for NRS games. Nobody is saying the same constant patch style ala League of Legends (most popular and patched game... huh?) would or wouldn't work for other fighting games.

First off, as I proved in my last post, large communities playing relatively straightforward games like SF4 have failed miserably to assess the balance of the game after a long period of time, measured in months and years. So when I read through this thread and see things like "XXX, YYY, ZZZ characters were broken, the patch nerfed them, 3 good changes!!!" I want to roll my eyes. You don't know where these characters would have wound up long term, if the community would have found appropriate counters, if the overall tone of the game would have changed making their strengths obsolete and exposing their weaknesses. You rely on an outside source (the patch) to solve the problem rather than letting the players solve it for themselves.
Again, perhaps true for other games. As far as NRS games? It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out Superman was game-killing on day 1. Finding a potential "counter" to him wouldn't have mattered as people's interest would have dropped without the patches and nobody would WANT to find a counter not just because of the balance, but because the game wasn't FUN @huber to play.

Also, when you refer to so many characters as "broken" it waters the word down to the point of meaninglessness. As I said in the last post, Slips mentioned FIVE characters as either broken or incapable of being countered. Even if he was right, that means they're not actually broken and that you have a top tier that a meta can develop around. There is no possible way of knowing if that meta would have been better than the final game, after the next 10-12 patches. So much changes so often that you can't even theorycraft your way around it. I mean in a world with Tanya would initial patch Quan Chi even be "broken" anymore? Seems to me he would be countered pretty hard. I don't even think he was #1 at the time of his nerf anyways, that round of nerfs was questionable to say the least. This version of Sub Zero seems like he does OK on CEO version Tanya, with day 1 non-nerfed GM Sub, that might be a really tough matchup. With a hard counter the Tanya hysteria might never happen and she'd just be another strong character. As I said, we have no way of testing it and it's not even worth theoryfighting about. So please, stop using nerfed characters as proof of success, it's just not true and you know better.
I didn't think Tanya was the best in the game pre-nerf, but it didn't matter because at CEO you literally had the majority of the crowd counting teleports and booing, shades of EVO 2013. Why keep the stain on the game? Just because some people thought the meta of games like MVC2 and Melee revolved around the top tier fighting eachother but invalidating the rest of the cast was interesting, doesn't mean NRS games have to be the same way. If that was the case then people would've been CHEERING Superman vs. Black Adam at EVO 2013. Whoops, looks like that didn't happen. HUGE double standard for some people

Next, I want to talk about the conclusion reached that "patches make it better competitively!" When someone posted my facebook post, Slips assumed that when I was talking about how the game was different at every major that I was saying that these were positive changes. I said nothing of the sort. What I will say is that out of all the majors we've had so far the CEO version was the worst one, and I'm not sure anyone can dispute that. The patching strategy by NRS clearly failed CEO. They tried to nerf Tanya and failed. They weakened 2 popular characters on extremely short notice and lowered the level of play at the tournament. They weakened Fisticuffs Johnny a character nobody was complaining about balance wise simply because DJT vs. SonicFox "looked silly". On Twitter I even called out this nerf while the match was going on, it was something NRS was definitely going to do not for game balancing reasons but because they didn't want people to laugh at their game. So I think all the talk about patching making tournaments better needs to be put on hold when we have actual evidence that for MKX it simply isn't true. After all the patches, we're in a worse position competitively than we were with 0 patches.
Worse position eh? A respectable opinion from an outside view, which, is the majority of viewers, right? Outside viewers from other scenes? THESE same outsiders WERE the ones bitching and chastising Fisticuffs (which is awesome looking and funny imo, balance aside) for looking "silly". NRS doesn't want people to laugh at their game? Then maybe these same people can help the cause by, you know, NOT LAUGHING?

Of course the obvious solution that they're going to take is PATCH MORE.
Hell yeah patches are dope. Progression. Obviously a patch a few days before CEO was unfortunate timing, but that's a different issue people should be angered about, instead of blaming patching as a whole for "killing the game and scene". FUCK YEAH!!! AMERICA!!!! Oh wait, I mean, NRS!!!!!!!

Let's look at MKX's predecessors and how the patching decisions did for their games competitive lifespan. MK9 was released April 2011. Injustice was released April 2013. Marvel 3 was released before both of them. It's still going. SF4 first came out way before both of them. It's still going, still the #1 competitive fighting game despite my objections. Melee came out in 2001! It's going stronger than ever. If the final versions of MK9 and Injustice were enhanced by the patches and put into a long term enjoyable state then people should have still been playing MK9 and watching MK9 streams in 2013-2014 and people should still be playing Injustice and watching Injustice right now. Neither of those have happened. Those games even have a lower interest level now than old versions of other studio games like MvC2, 3s, GGAC, etc. Maybe Injustice desperately needed help because after it's performance at Evo it was an exposed game competitively but it shouldn't have been shipped in that condition in the first place. If the patching truly helped the long term competitive balance of those games, their lifespans should have been extended. But that didn't happen.
Their lifespans were undoubtedly extended. The NRS scene letting their games "die" is a separate event not triggered due to overpatching but other reasons including that our scene was built up from a SMALL unique community. If people wanna be purists then why isn't vanilla MVC3 still being played alongside Ultimate? Vanilla SF4? Calamity Trigger? P4A? Also, MK9 had a side tourney last year at evo with around like 80 people. Not bad I guess.

So maybe it's time to take a step back. These games had a short competitive lifespan and a very short stream lifespan compared to their peers. Maybe it's time to ask why.

Now, let's move on a little bit and address Slips's last post to me where he talked about "the needs of the many" and about how if Kitana, Reptile, Mileena, etc players would keep playing if not for the hope of patches (and we must be talking about hope because even after all the patches, Kitana and Reptile still are not good characters).

Let's start by asking a question. Are these patches designed to appeal to casual players or tournament players?

By context it seems like he was suggesting that we should cater to casuals (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). But if the goal is to keep interest and keep the game strong, this is a losing battle. For the first 2 months of MKX's lifespan it was doing better numbers than SF4/Marvel on twitch and getting entrants on par with SF4. Those numbers have started trending downwards as casual attention has faded. MKX is still well above Guilty Gear, Tekken 7, Persona, etc. in terms of attention but going forward into Evo and beyond it's pretty clear that the casual interest bump that put MKX over SF4 has ended and that SF4 will outdraw it in attention going forward. Appealing to casuals is a losing battle; they cannot be satisfied and will leave on their own for their own reasons. SF4 lost them, Marvel lost them, Guilty Gear lost them, MKX is currently losing them. Appealing to them is not worth it.
Agreed for the most part, but let's see what actually happens

So we must be aiming these patches at tournament level players, right? As the entrant level drop in MK9 and Injustice showed, these patches turned these people off as they are being turned off in MKX. So that can't be true either.
False. Injustice after EVO 2013 but before the October patch was basically dead. The final Patch saved the game for another year and half. MK9 was a bit more steady but if we're talking strictly EVO #'s, the majority of loyal people that played the game and stuck with it from 2011-2013 were the NRS only players that dealt with, didn't care about, or embraced the patches.


Let me give you actual specifics as to what it's going to take me to stay current with MKX. Others (not Slips) have said in this thread and elsewhere that it's just small changes and shouldn't be that big a deal.

I play Sonya. I like CO best (obviously) but I dabbled in SF before it was nerfed and I'm pretty sure there's some juice in Demolition now after 6/23 but it's going to take a lot of work to bring it out. I'm reasonably sure Sonya is a top 10 character as of right now as her natural enemies keep falling by the wayside 1 by 1. She may even be a little better than that. She's also been fortunate in that CO has been relatively untouched up to now.
Demolition is fun.

Let's talk some of her matchups. D'Vorah vs. Sonya pre 6/23 was probably a 6-4 matchup for D'Vorah but it was a matchup I'd played out a bit and felt relatively confident in. Was I ever going to beat Honeybee? No. I just don't have that level of MK fundamentals. But I felt pretty confident that I could hold my own with a lot of D'Vorah players.
Don't sell yourself short, what if you did play Yung Bee and beat him? :>

Even though CO Sonya is primarily a rushdown character I played that match around the tip of my F+2 range because I wanted to stay away from F112 as that's the most likely way I could get myself into trouble and the other person's most likely way to start offense. If I'm slightly out of range I can punish F1 on reaction with low air divekick. I can use backdash and decent backward walking speed to control range as I see fit and also use F+2 xx military stance or F+4 xx military stance/leg grab option select to make sure I don't walk myself into the corner. Even knowing this, this strategy necessitates giving up ground as a smart player would understand what I was doing and walk me down. So I'd be playing out of the midscreen for the most part. Instead of using 21, 21u4 as my juggle ender to gain screen space, I'd use a custom setup I developed myself ending juggles with F+2, max height 124 to get the hard knockdown.

It is (it was) an interesting setup especially on characters whose wakeup games you didn't have a lot of fear of. Instant divekick from upback would get you to land right in front of her on her wakeup before she gets up allowing either 11 xx military stance, overhead, low, throw options or go straight to military stance and evaluate options from there. Instant divekick from upforward would get behind her but not the same options since there would be a slight delay. Going into military stance or straight throw worked out OK but lost to mashing. You'd have to condition someone to get mileage out of that setup. If you either delay getting off the ground for the divekick, lower the height before ending the juggle with 124, or do the divekick slightly higher you can force them to block on wakeup and it was safe-ish on block because it was so low but still not recommended because a slight miscalculation in height leads to F112 and that's just not good. OS to catch backdash, full combo on hit. Pretty decent stuff. Not many other Sonya's really explored the F+2, 124 ender so I got a lot of mileage out of this stuff. 21, 21u4 was far far more common.

Were I to get myself into trouble blocking F112 you could flicker guard going low to high since B+1 was faster. Sometimes I'd even let them have B+1 just to check if they could get a full combo out of it since the execution was so tight (pre 6/23 4f maximum IIRC). For longer sets this kind of thing is useful information. Around patch time I was also working on a lazy man's OS starting with a low block into a backdash since the timing to jail off overhead was so tight. I'd pay the small damage penalty to get out of the situation. I think it was going somewhere but I had lots more testing to do to know whether it was real or not.

This was all pre 6/22. In theory this match got a lot better for me. In reality, it means a lot of work for me.

One of the few nerfs CO Sonya got is 5f extra landing penalty on whiff divekick. So all the work I put into F+2, max height 124 setups, more or less out the window. The setup still has legs but not as many, almost all the stuff involving a go behind is out the window. Landing in front gives just about the same landing situation as landing behind did before. Were I to keep this going forward I'd have to figure out how to incorporate leg slam as an option in here somewhere in order to control wakeup buttons. But I haven't got that far yet. For now this is a matchup where I'll end juggles in 21, 21u4 or F+2, 121 leg grab depending on positioning. Not the end of the world, relatively simple adjustment to make.

But now I'm not exactly sure where to stand. The matchup calculus has changed. Do I allow her into range of F112? I mean it's still a rough situation but only low is guaranteed. Plus low into full combo is even harder meaning drops and suboptimal punishes are more likely if I give that up. If I don't fear the following mixup, doesn't that mean F112 is less scary? Doesn't that mean that I should base less of my gameplan around whiff punishing and just get in there and mix it up? I'm not sure. If I give her the range that I was giving her before and just play the match out as I was doing, don't I allow her to get an unearned advantage by letting her walk me down and not letting me get to the corner? She still outdamages me so I have to play carefully but HOW carefully is optimal?

I don't know.

It's going to take a lot of match experience first off just to test how the changes actually play out, then once I make a decision I'm going to have to play even more to build muscle memory and make sure I'm making the right decision over and over. As much as I wish I could just delete things from my brain, I'm not a computer, muscle memory/reversion to old habits is a real thing. This will take time.

Instinctively I still think D'Vorah probably beats Sonya, although it did get better. But maybe I'm wrong. I just don't know and given that the online is so bad, I don't even know how I can test it going forward since I probably won't be able to get a good long casual set with a D'Vorah until I actually get into Vegas next week.

Ultradavid mentioned that what he hates most in games is uncertainty. He and I have a pretty similar attitude on games (play the same characters in some games also) so I agree with him on that but what I hate even more than that is wasted time. I spent a lot of time working on this matchup because I assessed D'Vorah pre 6/23 as a very strong character going forward. Now I feel like this time was not just wasted but detrimental to me going forward as I'm going to be playing the matchup incorrectly for a little while until I get adjusted.
Understandable for peeps from other scenes to feel rushed in adapting to constant changes. Fortunately a good amount of NRS players are used to this and even have fun in adapting to new changes quickly. It's interesting for me at least.

Similarly let's look at vs. Tempest Kung Lao since it features a similar situation. Previously I gave him space like I gave D'Vorah because I didn't want him to get his pressure started. But the most recent patch from a couple days ago weakened his frame advantage off MB hat and I saw a video where Quan Chi uppercutted him out of the resulting string. Can Sonya do that? If Quan Chi can uppercut that means I can also buffer leg grab from crouch. Pretty sure at least. I honestly don't know, it's written on my “stuff to look at” excel list. I don't even know HOW different that match is yet because I haven't put in the time yet. Also I don't have to worry about changing my juggle and my setups because I respected his wakeup too much to mess with empty divekick setups. So at least I have that going for me, only 2 major points of uncertainty going forward.
Then instead of lingering on to the excel list why not just lab it now?

Again, note that my character is almost completely unchanged. I've been lucky. Far luckier than if I had chosen a different character to work on 2 months ago. Doing this (necessary) process if I was a Scorpion player and not even sure of my character's own options just adds an extra level of headache.

This is what I want to avoid. I don't want to do this re-evaluation process every 2 weeks until NRS decides they're “done”. This is what it's going to take to be a top player at this game, something that doesn't happen at ANY OTHER MAJOR STUDIO'S games. Actually multiply that by 3 because I'm pretty sure you need at least 3 characters to insulate yourself from the patching process. It's just too much.
Well then it's pretty neat that NRS are the non-conformists.

As someone who's competed at the very top levels of other games I know what kind of work it takes to be a top player at a game. It's an intimidating process even without the ground shifting out from under you on a bi-weekly basis. Say what you will about me, but after Evo I just don't think this is for me.
That's fine. I'm not gonna talk down about your choice to quit in any way

And as I said before, this is one man's opinion but as the falling entrant and viewer numbers show, I am not alone. Not by a longshot.
with all that being said, thanks for taking the time to write this all up.
 
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PPJ

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Premium Supporter
NetherRealm Studios
Their are plenty of people who give a fuck that don't like the patching system or eLaw we wouldn't be here debating.
Then you know what you are getting yourself into by playing NRS games. It's fine when peeps dislike how the game is being handled. I just don't like the condescending tones of some people that in their minds it's a fact that the NRS style of patching kills the game and the scene.
 
Hi! I don't post here much at all. I just have to ask a question because I'm confused.

Why do people have to make things so absolute? Why does it have to be "patches are good" or "patches are bad?" Almost nothing in this world is that black-and-white, but that's pretty much been how the discussion here has gone.

I am 100% in favor of fighting games getting patched, but I don't think the information gleaned from the first couple of months, with a few exceptions, is very useful at all in determining what actually needs to be changed for character balance purposes. That opinion is based on a multitude of hands-on and observational experience with a lot of fighting games.

But the problem with patches is about frequency, not that that they happen at all, which is why the "but patches are good!" argument seems like it's directed at nobody. There's a difference between agreeing with patching and agreeing with a patch methodology.

Slips said earlier that it's not like years ago, and that we have access to so much more information that we can break games down faster. While that's true to some degree, it's not as much as it's made out to be. In fact, the abundance of information can actually be a detriment.

I followed MKX pretty closely up to and after its release. I watched most Kombat Kasts and even watched some again when they were done. I watched tons of streams for the first 3 weeks or so. I shared information I learned with other people who were playing. I helped people find deals so they could buy the game and try it out. I can't play the game myself because i don't have a PS4 and the PC version is pbbbth, but I had every intention of going in once either of those changed.

Personal stuff came up shortly after the first patch, and I wasn't watching any streams or really following fighting games closely for about two weeks. I came back to an MKX stream for the first time after that and didn't understand what was going on. Characters I thought were good apparently weren't, characters I thought weren't were, people didn't play what I was expected. It was a bit jarring, considering all I did was take a two-week break. I imagine if I had taken a break from playing, it would have been even more jarring.

Speaking as a person who won't be starting from day one in this game and who hasn't been glued to every detail of every patch and watched every tournament, all the evernotes and youtube videos and guides out there are often an impediment to my understanding because a big chunk of that stuff doesn't even apply anymore. That's an extra layer of research I have to do, an extra layer of filtering to figure out what's even worth learning.

And then in a week it might not even matter anyway. Kind of makes me want to not even bother, or at least wait another 4 or 5 months for the patching to slow down to give it a shot. Of course, some people will say if I was really about it I would have bought a PS4 I couldn't afford and been playing MKX 24/7 since day -4 if I was really going to play it. Who knows, maybe I wouldn't have stuck it out, but that doesn't make an impediment not an impediment.

I like fighting games, and I've played a lot of different ones. Some are a lot older and less popular than NRS games. When people who might otherwise been interested say they don't want to play those older games, I typically hear two reasons:

1. there's just too much information to take in to get started
2. they feel like they're too far behind the good players to compete in a reasonable amount of time.

The frequency of patches has basically replicated this experience for a game that's less than three months old. Hard to say that's a good thing.

If the patch frequency doesn't bother you, that's great for you, but it doesn't make the people who are bothered wrong. These games are still played by human beings with finite time available, so it's a perfectly legitimate reason to be turned off for a lot of players, especially those who play multiple games. And it's not just "Capcom" players either. I guarantee there are NRS fans who never made it as far as TYM or other parts of the competitive scene because of those exact frustrations.
 

BillStickers

Do not touch me again.
At least I gave you that much, unlike you who just ignores all the facts that me and other contributors to this thread have presented as to why patching is more helpful than harmful. But please, continue the attitude of belittling me to some NRS cheerleader.
You have literally done nothing but be NRS's cheerleader since MKX dropped. It's funny because you're trying sooo hard to apologize for this game and meanwhile your own home team i.e. CHICAGO THE BIRTHPLACE OF MORTAL KOMBAT doesn't even want to play this game. 16bit retired before the game was even released and Jeremiah who was looking forward to training with you to get good at MKX thinks this game is so irreparably bullshit that he won't even play in locals WHILE HE'S AT WORK. Wake the fuck up!!
 

Zoidberg747

My blades will find your heart
on paper this seems like a fair old school vs new school mentality sort of debate

in reality its a good amount of players from other scenes complaining about NRS games are not the way they want them to be for various different reasons, one of the main reasons being the patching style

if these people ACTUALLY gave a fuck, they'd accept the game for what it is, whether it be balanced or unbalanced
they can simply drop the game if they don't like it/not having fun but don't go around acting all pretentious and bitching about the way NRS games are handled -> this has been going on for 5 years now

if i pick up a different fighting game i wouldn't bitch about how the devs handle their game. you don't have to believe me
I pretty much only play NRS Games and I agree with everything Viscant is saying. I also dont think the number of patches is necessarily the problem, but the amount of changes they bring. Injustice and MK9 had tons of patches, but I never remember one character getting 10 changes in one patch. And then in this last patch, 3 characters that were buffed a few weeks ago got nerfed because apparently became too strong? Its becoming hard to keep up for some NRS dedicated players as well.

I hate to bring Tanya up as an example, but all they had to do was remove invincibility on her teleport. That would have made her much easier to deal with and limit the amount of teleports she would be doing. But instead they nerfed the damage scaling on EX Tele(Which was already nerfed before) nerfed her zoning in Pyro(because we can't have a zoning character now can we) and added all of those recovery frames. Now her entire gameplan has changed and Tanya mains who were going to EVO are really in trouble. Like I said before I think she is still good but a lot of those changes were really unnecessary.

To try and paint this as a capcom vs NRS thing is very disingenuous. I support all FGs but NRS games will always be my favorite. That being said, its getting very frustrating trying to get better at the game when it changes so drastically with all these patches. Like I said before, even in MK9 and Injustice the patches werent nearly as drastic.

Edit:
How can you buff or nerf before making sure that all the moves come out consistently? Patch things like that before changing the game.
The amount of glitches and hitbox issues still left in the game is mind-boggling and also really frustrating.
 
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PPJ

()
Premium Supporter
NetherRealm Studios
You have literally done nothing but be NRS's cheerleader since MKX dropped. It's funny because you're trying sooo hard to apologize for this game and meanwhile your own home team i.e. CHICAGO THE BIRTHPLACE OF MORTAL KOMBAT doesn't even want to play this game. 16bit retired before the game was even released and Jeremiah who was looking forward to training with you to get good at MKX thinks this game is so irreparably bullshit that he won't even play in locals WHILE HE'S AT WORK. Wake the fuck up!!
bit retiring has nothing to do with patching
jeremiah not playing is BECAUSE raiden's bullshit is not patched out yet
holy SHIT
 

BillStickers

Do not touch me again.
bit retiring has nothing to do with patching
jeremiah not playing is BECAUSE raiden's bullshit is not patched out yet
holy SHIT
Both have to do with the game being dead on arrival. NRS needs to get their head out of their ass and realize that they can't just throw shit at the wall, see what sticks, then hope they have people's interest 3 months later after patching the game to be the complete opposite of what it was on release.
 

PPJ

()
Premium Supporter
NetherRealm Studios
I pretty much only play NRS Games and I agree with everything Viscant is saying. I also dont think the number of patches is necessarily the problem, but the amount of changes they bring. Injustice and MK9 had tons of patches, but I never remember one character getting 10 changes in one patch. And then in this last patch, 3 characters that were buffed a few weeks ago got nerfed because apparently became too strong? Its becoming hard to keep up for some NRS dedicated players as well.

I hate to bring Tanya up as an example, but all they had to do was remove invincibility on her teleport. That would have made her much easier to deal with and limit the amount of teleports she would be doing. But instead they nerfed the damage scaling on EX Tele(Which was already nerfed before) nerfed her zoning in Pyro(because we can't have a zoning character now can we) and added all of those recovery frames. Now her entire gameplan has changed and Tanya mains who were going to EVO are really in trouble. Like I said before I think she is still good but a lot of those changes were really unnecessary.

To try and paint this as a capcom vs NRS thing is very disingenuous. I support all FGs but NRS games will always be my favorite. That being said, its getting very frustrating trying to get better at the game when it changes so drastically with all these patches. Like I said before, even in MK9 and Injustice the patches werent nearly as drastic.
tanya's changes are unnecessary? that is an opinion.
i am not painting "capcom" vs nrs. i am not ignorant and labeling aris and such as capcom players. i actually think of chris g as a marvel and nrs player equally, not to mention he is underrated in sf4. but hey i guess a small outlier of misinformed tym members represents all of us according to ultradavid
 

PPJ

()
Premium Supporter
NetherRealm Studios
This guys inability to make any valid counter argument is astounding with how much was there to criticize. I especially loved the "If people wanna be purists then why isn't vanilla MVC3 still being played alongside Ultimate? Vanilla SF4? Calamity Trigger? P4A? Also, MK9 had a side tourney last year at evo with around like 80 people. Not bad I guess." So you compare titles to capcoms patch versions? Last i checked there were still tournaments for mvc2 sf2 and sf3. For your comparisons sake was it a vanilla mk9 tournament? Did the updated mk9 tournament pull more people? Lol
just like how there are still tourneys for injustice and mk9.
depending on how much changes are in a patch, it's sorta comparable to other game's editions
i don't get how you're trying to insult me or what your point is?? lol
october patch injustice definitely felt like a whole new game to me and basically everyone
 

Hidan

Where the hell is Reiko's wheel kick
The paradox here is that I BELIEVE IN THE PATCHING PROCESS. It should be implemented. Just (ideally) for different reasons other than huge swaths of people who bought your game feel like playing it is a heartbreaking nightmare.

Every scene has crying, the difference is this scene's tears are poured directly into the game. Blah blah blah great power blah blah blah great responsibility. I'll be damned if I haven't agreed with almost... like every single goddamn complaint I've read on this site. I think some of the early ice clone tears were SUPER stupid but that's about it. I'm glad they patched that stuff.

"I'M QUITTING BECAUSE OF PATCHING" can also be interpreted as quitting because you don't want to keep up with a game that actually needs the constant patching. A lot of these changes are kinda just getting the game to a logical starting point. MKX at launch was what I expected MK9 to be. It was like they unlearned vital shit.
Still, the vanilla version was the worst (makes igau look like a diamond)

And patches should address major issues and necessary stuff.

3% won't make sun god decent

slight dmg buffs won't give Reptile a top 8 placement

On the other hand
raiden's f1
tanya's invincibility
kenshi & kitana lists
infinite/block infinite removals

Aye, these were needed. But not one by one. Gather info, then make a ballsy patch that ppl will remember.

The October 1st 2013 (if I remember correctly) was a big day for IGAU

making Shinnok's hellsparks MB on block to be +24, only to change it within weeks to +14, is at least sloppy. Right, but sloppy. They need to put more thought in these things.

Plus the fact they throw so many hotfixes and patches and effort to MKX, makes me sad, when half of them would have made MK9 the SF3 of NRS scene (immortal)
 

GAV

Resolution through knowledge and resolve.
I'm going to address Slips's post in a minute but first let's talk about something real quick. The whole "there are more positives than negatives in the patch, therefore the patch is good!" argument is intellectually dishonest and I'm surprised people are taking that seriously.

First off, as I proved in my last post, large communities playing relatively straightforward games like SF4 have failed miserably to assess the balance of the game after a long period of time, measured in months and years. So when I read through this thread and see things like "XXX, YYY, ZZZ characters were broken, the patch nerfed them, 3 good changes!!!" I want to roll my eyes. You don't know where these characters would have wound up long term, if the community would have found appropriate counters, if the overall tone of the game would have changed making their strengths obsolete and exposing their weaknesses. You rely on an outside source (the patch) to solve the problem rather than letting the players solve it for themselves.

Also, when you refer to so many characters as "broken" it waters the word down to the point of meaninglessness. As I said in the last post, Slips mentioned FIVE characters as either broken or incapable of being countered. Even if he was right, that means they're not actually broken and that you have a top tier that a meta can develop around. There is no possible way of knowing if that meta would have been better than the final game, after the next 10-12 patches. So much changes so often that you can't even theorycraft your way around it. I mean in a world with Tanya would initial patch Quan Chi even be "broken" anymore? Seems to me he would be countered pretty hard. I don't even think he was #1 at the time of his nerf anyways, that round of nerfs was questionable to say the least. This version of Sub Zero seems like he does OK on CEO version Tanya, with day 1 non-nerfed GM Sub, that might be a really tough matchup. With a hard counter the Tanya hysteria might never happen and she'd just be another strong character. As I said, we have no way of testing it and it's not even worth theoryfighting about. So please, stop using nerfed characters as proof of success, it's just not true and you know better.

Next, I want to talk about the conclusion reached that "patches make it better competitively!" When someone posted my facebook post, Slips assumed that when I was talking about how the game was different at every major that I was saying that these were positive changes. I said nothing of the sort. What I will say is that out of all the majors we've had so far the CEO version was the worst one, and I'm not sure anyone can dispute that. The patching strategy by NRS clearly failed CEO. They tried to nerf Tanya and failed. They weakened 2 popular characters on extremely short notice and lowered the level of play at the tournament. They weakened Fisticuffs Johnny a character nobody was complaining about balance wise simply because DJT vs. SonicFox "looked silly". On Twitter I even called out this nerf while the match was going on, it was something NRS was definitely going to do not for game balancing reasons but because they didn't want people to laugh at their game. So I think all the talk about patching making tournaments better needs to be put on hold when we have actual evidence that for MKX it simply isn't true. After all the patches, we're in a worse position competitively than we were with 0 patches.

Of course the obvious solution that they're going to take is PATCH MORE.

Let's look at MKX's predecessors and how the patching decisions did for their games competitive lifespan. MK9 was released April 2011. Injustice was released April 2013. Marvel 3 was released before both of them. It's still going. SF4 first came out way before both of them. It's still going, still the #1 competitive fighting game despite my objections. Melee came out in 2001! It's going stronger than ever. If the final versions of MK9 and Injustice were enhanced by the patches and put into a long term enjoyable state then people should have still been playing MK9 and watching MK9 streams in 2013-2014 and people should still be playing Injustice and watching Injustice right now. Neither of those have happened. Those games even have a lower interest level now than old versions of other studio games like MvC2, 3s, GGAC, etc. Maybe Injustice desperately needed help because after it's performance at Evo it was an exposed game competitively but it shouldn't have been shipped in that condition in the first place. If the patching truly helped the long term competitive balance of those games, their lifespans should have been extended. But that didn't happen.

So maybe it's time to take a step back. These games had a short competitive lifespan and a very short stream lifespan compared to their peers. Maybe it's time to ask why.

Now, let's move on a little bit and address Slips's last post to me where he talked about "the needs of the many" and about how if Kitana, Reptile, Mileena, etc players would keep playing if not for the hope of patches (and we must be talking about hope because even after all the patches, Kitana and Reptile still are not good characters).

Let's start by asking a question. Are these patches designed to appeal to casual players or tournament players?

By context it seems like he was suggesting that we should cater to casuals (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). But if the goal is to keep interest and keep the game strong, this is a losing battle. For the first 2 months of MKX's lifespan it was doing better numbers than SF4/Marvel on twitch and getting entrants on par with SF4. Those numbers have started trending downwards as casual attention has faded. MKX is still well above Guilty Gear, Tekken 7, Persona, etc. in terms of attention but going forward into Evo and beyond it's pretty clear that the casual interest bump that put MKX over SF4 has ended and that SF4 will outdraw it in attention going forward. Appealing to casuals is a losing battle; they cannot be satisfied and will leave on their own for their own reasons. SF4 lost them, Marvel lost them, Guilty Gear lost them, MKX is currently losing them. Appealing to them is not worth it.

So we must be aiming these patches at tournament level players, right? As the entrant level drop in MK9 and Injustice showed, these patches turned these people off as they are being turned off in MKX. So that can't be true either.

Let me give you actual specifics as to what it's going to take me to stay current with MKX. Others (not Slips) have said in this thread and elsewhere that it's just small changes and shouldn't be that big a deal.

I play Sonya. I like CO best (obviously) but I dabbled in SF before it was nerfed and I'm pretty sure there's some juice in Demolition now after 6/23 but it's going to take a lot of work to bring it out. I'm reasonably sure Sonya is a top 10 character as of right now as her natural enemies keep falling by the wayside 1 by 1. She may even be a little better than that. She's also been fortunate in that CO has been relatively untouched up to now.

Let's talk some of her matchups. D'Vorah vs. Sonya pre 6/23 was probably a 6-4 matchup for D'Vorah but it was a matchup I'd played out a bit and felt relatively confident in. Was I ever going to beat Honeybee? No. I just don't have that level of MK fundamentals. But I felt pretty confident that I could hold my own with a lot of D'Vorah players.

Even though CO Sonya is primarily a rushdown character I played that match around the tip of my F+2 range because I wanted to stay away from F112 as that's the most likely way I could get myself into trouble and the other person's most likely way to start offense. If I'm slightly out of range I can punish F1 on reaction with low air divekick. I can use backdash and decent backward walking speed to control range as I see fit and also use F+2 xx military stance or F+4 xx military stance/leg grab option select to make sure I don't walk myself into the corner. Even knowing this, this strategy necessitates giving up ground as a smart player would understand what I was doing and walk me down. So I'd be playing out of the midscreen for the most part. Instead of using 21, 21u4 as my juggle ender to gain screen space, I'd use a custom setup I developed myself ending juggles with F+2, max height 124 to get the hard knockdown.

It is (it was) an interesting setup especially on characters whose wakeup games you didn't have a lot of fear of. Instant divekick from upback would get you to land right in front of her on her wakeup before she gets up allowing either 11 xx military stance, overhead, low, throw options or go straight to military stance and evaluate options from there. Instant divekick from upforward would get behind her but not the same options since there would be a slight delay. Going into military stance or straight throw worked out OK but lost to mashing. You'd have to condition someone to get mileage out of that setup. If you either delay getting off the ground for the divekick, lower the height before ending the juggle with 124, or do the divekick slightly higher you can force them to block on wakeup and it was safe-ish on block because it was so low but still not recommended because a slight miscalculation in height leads to F112 and that's just not good. OS to catch backdash, full combo on hit. Pretty decent stuff. Not many other Sonya's really explored the F+2, 124 ender so I got a lot of mileage out of this stuff. 21, 21u4 was far far more common.

Were I to get myself into trouble blocking F112 you could flicker guard going low to high since B+1 was faster. Sometimes I'd even let them have B+1 just to check if they could get a full combo out of it since the execution was so tight (pre 6/23 4f maximum IIRC). For longer sets this kind of thing is useful information. Around patch time I was also working on a lazy man's OS starting with a low block into a backdash since the timing to jail off overhead was so tight. I'd pay the small damage penalty to get out of the situation. I think it was going somewhere but I had lots more testing to do to know whether it was real or not.

This was all pre 6/22. In theory this match got a lot better for me. In reality, it means a lot of work for me.

One of the few nerfs CO Sonya got is 5f extra landing penalty on whiff divekick. So all the work I put into F+2, max height 124 setups, more or less out the window. The setup still has legs but not as many, almost all the stuff involving a go behind is out the window. Landing in front gives just about the same landing situation as landing behind did before. Were I to keep this going forward I'd have to figure out how to incorporate leg slam as an option in here somewhere in order to control wakeup buttons. But I haven't got that far yet. For now this is a matchup where I'll end juggles in 21, 21u4 or F+2, 121 leg grab depending on positioning. Not the end of the world, relatively simple adjustment to make.

But now I'm not exactly sure where to stand. The matchup calculus has changed. Do I allow her into range of F112? I mean it's still a rough situation but only low is guaranteed. Plus low into full combo is even harder meaning drops and suboptimal punishes are more likely if I give that up. If I don't fear the following mixup, doesn't that mean F112 is less scary? Doesn't that mean that I should base less of my gameplan around whiff punishing and just get in there and mix it up? I'm not sure. If I give her the range that I was giving her before and just play the match out as I was doing, don't I allow her to get an unearned advantage by letting her walk me down and not letting me get to the corner? She still outdamages me so I have to play carefully but HOW carefully is optimal?

I don't know.

It's going to take a lot of match experience first off just to test how the changes actually play out, then once I make a decision I'm going to have to play even more to build muscle memory and make sure I'm making the right decision over and over. As much as I wish I could just delete things from my brain, I'm not a computer, muscle memory/reversion to old habits is a real thing. This will take time.

Instinctively I still think D'Vorah probably beats Sonya, although it did get better. But maybe I'm wrong. I just don't know and given that the online is so bad, I don't even know how I can test it going forward since I probably won't be able to get a good long casual set with a D'Vorah until I actually get into Vegas next week.

Ultradavid mentioned that what he hates most in games is uncertainty. He and I have a pretty similar attitude on games (play the same characters in some games also) so I agree with him on that but what I hate even more than that is wasted time. I spent a lot of time working on this matchup because I assessed D'Vorah pre 6/23 as a very strong character going forward. Now I feel like this time was not just wasted but detrimental to me going forward as I'm going to be playing the matchup incorrectly for a little while until I get adjusted.

Similarly let's look at vs. Tempest Kung Lao since it features a similar situation. Previously I gave him space like I gave D'Vorah because I didn't want him to get his pressure started. But the most recent patch from a couple days ago weakened his frame advantage off MB hat and I saw a video where Quan Chi uppercutted him out of the resulting string. Can Sonya do that? If Quan Chi can uppercut that means I can also buffer leg grab from crouch. Pretty sure at least. I honestly don't know, it's written on my “stuff to look at” excel list. I don't even know HOW different that match is yet because I haven't put in the time yet. Also I don't have to worry about changing my juggle and my setups because I respected his wakeup too much to mess with empty divekick setups. So at least I have that going for me, only 2 major points of uncertainty going forward.

Again, note that my character is almost completely unchanged. I've been lucky. Far luckier than if I had chosen a different character to work on 2 months ago. Doing this (necessary) process if I was a Scorpion player and not even sure of my character's own options just adds an extra level of headache.

This is what I want to avoid. I don't want to do this re-evaluation process every 2 weeks until NRS decides they're “done”. This is what it's going to take to be a top player at this game, something that doesn't happen at ANY OTHER MAJOR STUDIO'S games. Actually multiply that by 3 because I'm pretty sure you need at least 3 characters to insulate yourself from the patching process. It's just too much.

As someone who's competed at the very top levels of other games I know what kind of work it takes to be a top player at a game. It's an intimidating process even without the ground shifting out from under you on a bi-weekly basis. Say what you will about me, but after Evo I just don't think this is for me.

And as I said before, this is one man's opinion but as the falling entrant and viewer numbers show, I am not alone. Not by a longshot.
 

Zoidberg747

My blades will find your heart
tanya's changes are unnecessary? that is an opinion.
i am not painting "capcom" vs nrs. i am not ignorant and labeling aris and such as capcom players. i actually think of chris g as a marvel and nrs player equally, not to mention he is underrated in sf4. but hey i guess a small outlier of misinformed tym members represents all of us according to ultradavid
No, making such sweeping changes so early is unnecessary. They could be necessary in the long run, or they could not. But you cant seriously sit here and tell me we had her figured out in 2-3 weeks. I dont even think Tanya players would argue that.
 

RM_NINfan101

Nine Inch Nails fan from Metro Detroit, Michigan
I personally cannot defend patches that haven't fixed the majority of hitbox issues that are still within the game before letting the meta evolve and then see if it needs change.

Personally, fixes come before buffs or nerfs, and considering Kano still has whiffing mids as well as other characters, maybe those should of been addressed first.

I don't really think I disagree ultimately with the idea of patches, but I do think the game should be out for a while, long before a few months. We need to know what exactly we're buffing, and nerfing, and if it's truly justified. So far we're going on par for the course with every NRS game yet. Bullshit characters that are clearly bullshit need adjustments, and weak ass characters are definitely weak and could use adjustments. This is really no different than other fighters with one exception.

There isn't exactly enough time to show that in time, perhaps these characters were able to be beat or are not as dominant as we perceive them to be without patches. Personally, I think Kabal, Superman, Zod, Aquaman, and more left a terrible taste in people's mouths. Because of this lingering taste, many would rather see the patching method as NRS does it, but I personally would rather them design a better game, knowing that maybe some of these characters shouldn't have what they have. I still dislike their tester system as a whole, but that's not what this topic is about.
 

BillStickers

Do not touch me again.
Guys don't attack @GGA pimpimjim like that. He along with @Slips have been keeping civil and just talking about the game. There's no need for "personal attacks" just because they have their views for the patching system. Come on now...
Theyre spouting bullshit for job security. People should understand that before entering into an argument with them.
 

RM_NINfan101

Nine Inch Nails fan from Metro Detroit, Michigan
Theyre spouting bullshit for job security. People should understand that before entering into an argument with them.
Pretty sure all of GGA doesn't work for NRS, just 16Bit at this point?

Even then, what's the point? Did they come out and say "Hey, fuck you Bill! What do you have to say about our game?"

No... I just, don't see the personal need for that. So what if perhaps those two were testers? Arturo was also a tester, he sees things differently. Maybe they just actually prefer it the way it is? I don't... Get your point here. Not sure if I should!
 
Eh its the internet people are entitled to their opinions no matter the reason i just forget that sometimes because arrogance upsets me too easy. Sorry ppj. I still like you as a player.

Edit: all posts deleted so as to keep this thread about the patch blitz rather than a bloodbath, im sorry everyone.
 
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buyacushun

Normalize grab immunity.
After several posts (mine included), can we stop focusing on who is right or wrong and actually look at the quality we're given. I don't see why anyone is able to boil a character down to one attack (superman and nightwing) or have inescapable resets (cyrax). I'll be the first to cut NRS some slack because I always thought of their first legitimate fighter as MK9 but they have put out a game before MKx plus have witnessed multiple fighters coming out and getting rebalanced before MKx. That is if they truly pay attention. We're still getting simple block infinites and they are doing things like using moving hurtboxes.

I personally see a problem when people can say "the patches completely changed the game for the better". Maybe the game should have been better on release. We should be discussing the steps NRS should take for a better experience overall. Communication of patches, more time given to the players to actually play before changing core gameplay elements, maybe try and give us a beta. We'd probably have found those OSes before release then who knows how things would've turned out. Raiden wouldn't be as much of a pain to fight. Even though the patches do some good they also do some bad. Imo most of this bad is from too much too quick. Everyone counting teleports doesn't have to mean a ton nerfs to teleport and fireballs. If there was no invincibility before CEO I'm good players would've been anti airing bad teleports all day because we saw players actually anti air it before.

I just think people are focusing on the wrong part of the patches and we should be pointing out some of the obvious flaws to actually make it better. To the point where you can tell a player "it's just infinites or dumb advantage or too much damage." Things like that and let everyone actually develop a meta. Viscant posted a fine example of meta changes even for a character who has been mostly untouched and still arguably top tier
 

Smarrgasm

What's a Smarrgasm?
Theres a couple things i think that are being overlooked. NRS releases a new game every 2 years. Sf4 is 5 years old and Marvel is going on its 5th too i believe. The reason these older NRS games have died is not from the patching nature. It dies because the community is ready to move on to its new game. If injustice and MKX never existed im almost certain MK9 would still have a dedicated community similar to street fighter or marvel. Many people still worship MK9 and if it had a version update similar to UMVC3 or USF4 then im almost certain it would still be a thriving tournament game. This leads me to my next point about the timetables that are put on NRS.

NRS is on strict timelines for these games. They have established a 2 year cycle and they have constant deadlines from Warner Brothers when it comes to these games. They are working insanely hard all the time to make sure that DLC characters and an incredible amount of other stuff that we take for granted gets put into the game. Stuff for not only casual players (story, towers, costumes, etc.) but also all of these balance fixes for the competitive scene.

This is their philosophy for their game and there is always going to be differing opinions on how it should be handled. I see the patches as healthy and although at times their timing can be questionable, its overall better for the game and its one of the reasons the games can be exciting IMO. Going into EVO it was a gloomy look after CEO with the threat of Tanya causing another Evo 2013 situation. Now we can look at EVO with more wonder about what characters will truly perform rather than the Yomi + Sonic train of tanyas.

Many characters have their chance to shine at any tournament thanks to NRS. Imo there may be less than 5 characters who cant place really high or even win a major. Thats insane. People will complain about having to learn the game more in depth but thats what is challenging about NRS games. It takes dedication to figure these things out. I know people will argue that having to relearn MUs or even the intricacies of their character is not fun but that may be the drawback of this approach.

I believe that we are all still just butting heads over this when its not truly that big of an issue. This is how NRS chooses to develop their game. I dont see it changing anytime soon and thats been proven over the last 5 years as each game they have released has followed this plan.

If people truly hate this type of cycle then it should be obvious that maybe this game isnt for you. That sucks i realize but its just the truth. Our community is fine right now and is still growing rapidly. Almost 1200 people at EVO is a testament that its moving in the right direction. People may leave becuase of the patching and thats fine but I dont see the game dying out because of some people disagreeing with patching at an increased rate.

Im open to discuss this more but the debate is tiring because its ultimately not going to change how things work. This is the plan that NRS is set on and it differs from what Capcom and other developers are used to. I dont believe that different=worse and i think that other communities should refrain on belittling our game and community because of the differences.