Lokheit
Noob
There has been a lot of talk about Balanced, some think the variation is dead, others that he's fine, some need more time to judge... but I'm not seeing enough talk about another of Kenshi's variations that IMO is going to suffer a lot more in the new meta: Kenjutsu.
On his current state, Kenjutsu is like if Balance lost the zoning, the safety on EX Rising Karma and Push, the hit advantage on combo ender and the meterless damage and replaced all of it with just a faster OH option while still having the same armor issues. On top of that, some of his launchers have crazy bad damage scaling.
Here are some of Kenjutsu's biggest "philosophy" flaws IMO:
- His only ranged option, tele-toss, can be ducked and is really unsafe. On hit it leaves opponents at the worse distance imaginable: close enough to risk a full combo punished if you whiff a second attemp and too far to pressure the wakeup properly (push or bladenado won't reach without a short run in).
- Tele-toss is also his main combo ender, which isn't optimal to keep momentum and you need to sacrifice damage if you want a better situation after a combo.
- His push is unsafe, even the EX one, and the reward is too small as throwing an opponent to full screen leaves him with just his tele-toss (completing the cycle of bad synergies).
I want to use this thread to propose and hear ideas and opinions on how he could be enhanced to be usable in the current state of the game.
This is something that I've been thinking, about how he could fit in the current meta without having 1 bar armored launchers while trying to make his moves synergize with each other instead of sabotaging his gameplan:
- Remove his DB4 tele-slam/hold move (I know I know, I said this was about buffing him, but keep reading a bit more).
- Keep the block advantage on push the same as it is right now (keep reading this will make sense in a moment).
- Make his push have the option to meter burn on hit, and when you do it, the current EX DB4 animation and effect is triggered (toning the damage scale from the current 0.95 to around 0.75 or something similar, in adition from the scaling of the push itself).
So what does this mean?
- Opponents would need to respect Kenjutsu when they're at midrange. The push goes from "bad reward bad synergy and unsafe" to a tool that has to be respected.
- He still has the same bad ranged option, but now at midrange opponents will respect him and many times they will try to camp at long range if they have the tools to fight there, which Kenshi can use to create more situations where he can hit them with it.
- If he doesn't meter burn the push, opponents still need to go through that midrange distance if they want to get in.
- Now the fact that tele-toss leaves opponents at the bad distance that I described above, is actually balanced, it leaves opponents in the verge of entering his midrange distance without directly putting them there.
- He still needs 2 bars for an armor launcher trade like most characters with that option.
- Finally (this isn't really important just cosmetic), using more pushes per game make his beautiful brutality come more often.
Something as simple as removing a move and adding its effects to another one in exchange of meter would make Kenjutsu really interesting (sort of what happened with Cryo or Warlock too back in the day when a string was removed and transformed into a special move).
He could also have some quality of life stuff like increasing the advantage of his meterless Rising Sword as it currently sucks big time for some reason, but I think the change I described would help him big time and make him relevant.
Just wanted to share this and hear other Kenshi players opinions and ideas for this variation.
I'm probably missing a lot of Kenshi players, tag any that I miss: @Pig Of The Hut @ismael4790 @Immortal @DarksydeDash @MrProfDrPepper @Fellow_Swordsman @coconutshrimp @DDutchguy
On his current state, Kenjutsu is like if Balance lost the zoning, the safety on EX Rising Karma and Push, the hit advantage on combo ender and the meterless damage and replaced all of it with just a faster OH option while still having the same armor issues. On top of that, some of his launchers have crazy bad damage scaling.
Here are some of Kenjutsu's biggest "philosophy" flaws IMO:
- His only ranged option, tele-toss, can be ducked and is really unsafe. On hit it leaves opponents at the worse distance imaginable: close enough to risk a full combo punished if you whiff a second attemp and too far to pressure the wakeup properly (push or bladenado won't reach without a short run in).
- Tele-toss is also his main combo ender, which isn't optimal to keep momentum and you need to sacrifice damage if you want a better situation after a combo.
- His push is unsafe, even the EX one, and the reward is too small as throwing an opponent to full screen leaves him with just his tele-toss (completing the cycle of bad synergies).
I want to use this thread to propose and hear ideas and opinions on how he could be enhanced to be usable in the current state of the game.
This is something that I've been thinking, about how he could fit in the current meta without having 1 bar armored launchers while trying to make his moves synergize with each other instead of sabotaging his gameplan:
- Remove his DB4 tele-slam/hold move (I know I know, I said this was about buffing him, but keep reading a bit more).
- Keep the block advantage on push the same as it is right now (keep reading this will make sense in a moment).
- Make his push have the option to meter burn on hit, and when you do it, the current EX DB4 animation and effect is triggered (toning the damage scale from the current 0.95 to around 0.75 or something similar, in adition from the scaling of the push itself).
So what does this mean?
- Opponents would need to respect Kenjutsu when they're at midrange. The push goes from "bad reward bad synergy and unsafe" to a tool that has to be respected.
- He still has the same bad ranged option, but now at midrange opponents will respect him and many times they will try to camp at long range if they have the tools to fight there, which Kenshi can use to create more situations where he can hit them with it.
- If he doesn't meter burn the push, opponents still need to go through that midrange distance if they want to get in.
- Now the fact that tele-toss leaves opponents at the bad distance that I described above, is actually balanced, it leaves opponents in the verge of entering his midrange distance without directly putting them there.
- He still needs 2 bars for an armor launcher trade like most characters with that option.
- Finally (this isn't really important just cosmetic), using more pushes per game make his beautiful brutality come more often.
Something as simple as removing a move and adding its effects to another one in exchange of meter would make Kenjutsu really interesting (sort of what happened with Cryo or Warlock too back in the day when a string was removed and transformed into a special move).
He could also have some quality of life stuff like increasing the advantage of his meterless Rising Sword as it currently sucks big time for some reason, but I think the change I described would help him big time and make him relevant.
Just wanted to share this and hear other Kenshi players opinions and ideas for this variation.
I'm probably missing a lot of Kenshi players, tag any that I miss: @Pig Of The Hut @ismael4790 @Immortal @DarksydeDash @MrProfDrPepper @Fellow_Swordsman @coconutshrimp @DDutchguy
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