Hassun
Noob
I feel like I've been saying from that start that Kotal is unsafe and does not want to be in people's faces.
For War God this makes sense (carrying a big sword and all) but I think that people get confused by it in the Blood God and especially the Sun God variation because they think he's a grappler.
To me Kotal is the kind of character who wants to stay just outside of the opponent's range and use his slower, far-reaching pokes to keep them in check. Then when he finds the opportunity he uses his fast forward movement to get in and land a devastating combo and/or throw. If the combo is over and the opponent is not dead he backs off outside of their range again and starts over. This also clearly illustrates why War God has been his best variation from the start. It has exactly the tools you need to play like this.
I understand Qwark wanting him to be a bigger close-range threat but I don't really expect it will happen. I'm also often frustrated by the lack of good high/low mixups and general lack of safety but I suppose that, instead of making it harder for his opponent to block his attacks, they wanted it to be more about either blocking his attacks or getting command grabbed. I also think we're just going to have to accept that Kotal does not get a big combo punish off of frame traps.
That being said I'm not really calling for Sun God buffs again just yet, hell the buffs he received were exactly the buffs I asked for: Making his command throw game more powerful. Sure he has problems both at long range and at very short range (short range problems being lower than the other two variations because of the command grab) but I am just not a fan of releasing too many balance patches too quickly.
I do think Blood God needs something else though. If Sun God has holes in his game, Blood God has a Grand Canyon-level crevasse. I don't think upping his damage helps in this regard because I feel it just makes it more a gimmick variation than a competitive one.
For War God this makes sense (carrying a big sword and all) but I think that people get confused by it in the Blood God and especially the Sun God variation because they think he's a grappler.
To me Kotal is the kind of character who wants to stay just outside of the opponent's range and use his slower, far-reaching pokes to keep them in check. Then when he finds the opportunity he uses his fast forward movement to get in and land a devastating combo and/or throw. If the combo is over and the opponent is not dead he backs off outside of their range again and starts over. This also clearly illustrates why War God has been his best variation from the start. It has exactly the tools you need to play like this.
I understand Qwark wanting him to be a bigger close-range threat but I don't really expect it will happen. I'm also often frustrated by the lack of good high/low mixups and general lack of safety but I suppose that, instead of making it harder for his opponent to block his attacks, they wanted it to be more about either blocking his attacks or getting command grabbed. I also think we're just going to have to accept that Kotal does not get a big combo punish off of frame traps.
That being said I'm not really calling for Sun God buffs again just yet, hell the buffs he received were exactly the buffs I asked for: Making his command throw game more powerful. Sure he has problems both at long range and at very short range (short range problems being lower than the other two variations because of the command grab) but I am just not a fan of releasing too many balance patches too quickly.
I do think Blood God needs something else though. If Sun God has holes in his game, Blood God has a Grand Canyon-level crevasse. I don't think upping his damage helps in this regard because I feel it just makes it more a gimmick variation than a competitive one.
