Competitive balance: DOA5U mechanics changes

MasterHavik

Well-Known Member
I would prefer there be less of them, and they became catch throws. I feel too many characters have them. It should be a very character-specific thing.

On dragon gunner, it makes sense. On Bayman's moves, it makes sense. For Bass to have one or two, it makes sense.

For everyone and their mother outside of that circle, it does not make sense. And Zack sure as hell does not need one. He's fast enough with his mid without giving him extra pressure.
:( i'm going to miss his 236T OH in DOA 4...it was so good and was a great way to keep pressure. But I can how he may not need one. But I feel they are important to his pressure game.
 

Tones

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
...from a tournament level 240 life with a REDUCTION in hold damage, to emphasis the benefit of damage via attacks, is preferred.
It would be a good way to make a point, but I think 240 is too little life. Unless you want a throw to take 1/3 of your health off on high counter or 1/2 from normal.

Perhaps a way to scale throw and counter damage like one can do health could be a solution to keep everyone happy.

Life setting - 300 was shown to be much too high and 270 widely accepted as a good change for the game.
This should be maintained to keep the game fast and exciting. Important for tournaments to run on time and avoid boring players watching, including wider fighting community.
5 minute a game is now not really seen (thank god).
 

EMPEROR_COW

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
I honestly not a fan of making judgements on something I dont have my hands on but I am on the same boat as most of you.

-I was against the health reduction at first but I grew to appreciate the more aggressive fast paced short rounds of the current 1.03a and find returning to 300 HP sort of a set back. But we dont know how this new version plays out in terms of aggression and reward so I am still reserved with this opinion till I have a better understanding of how the whole system plays out now, or more preferably some hands on time with the game.

-I was the one who suggested increasing 5 frames to holds in stun to Shinbori because there were situations where just frame holding would let you recover faster than the fastest stagger escape. Shinbori mentioned that with the increased nerf to hold that he would have to come up with some sort of compensation damage-wise in order to keep the triangle system balanced. I understand where he comes from in that respect but I dont think the damage boost was necessary. Still if its more punishable in stun then I welcome this change at the price hes putting as long as the damage buff is not too drastic.

-I have to admit that I am not very happy with the loss of some frame advantage situations, including guard breaks, safety (and + on block), and the loss of some forcetechs. But we still dont know for sure whether the characters were compensated with other tools such as different forcetechs, different moves that became safe, or more favorable situations. Thats why I can't really comment because I just dont know the overall change. But if there were no compensations then yes I am unhappy with this change.

- slightly related to the last point, force techs are a nice tool that I grew to like and create scenarios and strategies around. I was never a fan of DOA4 and was mainly a DOA3 player and that game had no forcetechs so to me this is sort of a nice new strategy. But I do feel that losing or reducing it is a major setback. In fact, I felt this since the E3 version when I lost ayanes 4K forcetech from the alpha demo, then lost LeiFangs 6H+K forcetech in ver. 0.75. I like the agressive momentum it grants you and would hate to see it gone.

-With all that being said, lets not neglect the positives added to the game mechanics. This includes flop stuns which grant more guaranteed follow ups. Granted flops may not give you a large juggle height but the followup (however short it may be) is guaranteed nonetheless and I am interested to see how this plays out.

-another plus would be powerlaunchers. This may not be the go to punish all the time but it may be a cool thing to strategize for max damage with over a powerblow, particularly when theres an open space and room for a long juggle. Another thing we don't know about is the implication of ceiling stuns to power launchers. I am curious to see the possibilities that come from this.

-another plus is the redifined tag mode. I personally am a huge fan of tag and am looking forward to this along with the mechanics that accompany it, including tag burst.

-to my understanding and what i have heard from Shimbori himself along with reliable people that have tried DOA5U, the game at the end of the day is still DOA5. This means that all the core elements we grew to like in 5 in terms of the stuns, to the ground game, to the environmental involvement will remain intact. I just wanted to say this to reassure you all.

-I said this before in the other thread, I do appreciate all the changes done to the system as well as the rebalancing done in ver. 1.03a. So I have faith in the end result that Shinbori and his team will deliver.

-For the record, the top Japanese players who were against the game mechanics before have grown to appreciate and like DOA5 ver.1.03a. This includes top players like Mochi-A, Light-K, hiropon, yuu (mist online), and Uuroncha .. all of whom I have spoken with on and off stream.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
I'm ok with that - throws get blown up by strikes, so they're only so effective.
We tested this at the time and even Bass was unable to seal out a match with two big throw setups .. .there was always a little bit extra to do - another mindgame to win.

We got 270 and that was a good compromise but 240 is where the game should be balanced from.

Look at VF, Wolf can take half life with Burning Hammer, but its slower than other throws (14 frame to 10 frame). These types of tradeoffs are in the system and slow vs fast, high vs low, and being able to read the player or get punished, are what will make the game more vital and exciting.

Its also important that grapplers get rewarded for grappling. I have no problems with throws, since in the overall system they are a weak part of the triangle.
 

J.D.E.

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Good comments ... but lets be aware that we don't have a lot of information about force techs and wouldn't take rumors of their removal as a given.

Force techs will still be in the game, but may be reduced and the demo kiosk players haven't found them yet. Its a problematic system because its not very consistent. They need to streamline it and make the situations where you can force tech very clear, while avoiding vortex loops. The reduction of force teching may be part of that, it may be a removal.

Force techs can be good but overall not as important as giving characters ways to put pressure on waking opponents generally, while at the same time the defensive player has smart options to evade or outlast pressure.

Basically, players that don't think and just press buttons on wakeup, should be easy to punish, players that are smart and punish poorly applied pressure should be rewarded by turning things around.

For everything else, there are good reads and holds.
Right. But it did help characters in terms of pressure and advantage, which is something that I liked about them. That is also why I say it may not be as bad as we think
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
EC thanks for chiming in. By the way you certainly weren't the only one to request adjustment to holds. It was a major topic from all the western players in the patch summit as you know.

I do agree (as stated in the main postings) that the core game is good, but they should not walk back on positive changes.

The life setting is absolutely pivotal to how the system is balanced and how the game is perceived by other fighting game fans.

Large life means slow, dragging - read - BORING - matches. That will be the death of us in a tournament and streaming context.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
Seems to be a consensus about Force Techs, we like them, but should not be a major strategy in itself (Helena loops).

It seems they should be streamlined and made very clear - only certain moves to grant force tech with the only advantage being you don't have to deal with a wakeup, but you're essentially attacking a neutral opponent who can block, evade.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member

Tones

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
If you remove the benefits counters give, the less likely one will counter, the less likely one will be high counter thrown. That said I'm going to 6pp/k all day until I can land her 63214p+h for that possibility of 2/3 health on high counter or 1/2 on normal and then 2k for that extra (guaranteed) damage. Oh wait... I already do that.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
Counters will always give a huge benefit no matter the damage. The point of requesting a damage reduction is to balance against a reduction in life setting. Low life is great for every other aspect of the game, but counters need to provide relatively minor damage compared to strikes and throws, because they take more work to set up or land.
 

Tones

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
Lower life takes away playing according to the health disadvantage or advantage. DOA5 gives great opportunities of coming back but I do not want to see games go as following.... P1 gets hit by a hard attack then is jabbed, P1 is thrown, P2 gets hit by a powerblow, P2 messed up a counter and is thrown... P1 wins.

This is not Divekick Or Alive. Matches like that, would be shit to play and shit to watch.
 

Saber

Well-Known Member
Counters will always give a huge benefit no matter the damage. The point of requesting a damage reduction is to balance against a reduction in life setting. Low life is great for every other aspect of the game, but counters need to provide relatively minor damage compared to strikes and throws, because they take more work to set up or land.
Holds disrupt the opponent's attack flow. That in itself should the main reason players use holds, not for damage.

The damage buff on holds shouldn't change...anything. I'd rather recovery on ALL hold heights be nerfed instead of limiting it to low holds only.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
Lower life takes away playing according to the health disadvantage or advantage. DOA5 gives great opportunities of coming back but I do not want to see games go as following.... P1 gets hit by a hard attack then is jabbed, P1 is thrown, P2 gets hit by a powerblow, P2 messed up a counter and is thrown... P1 wins.

This is not Divekick or alive. Games like that, would be shit to play and shit to watch.
We need to play on 240 again so you can see how many setups and combos it actually takes - you'll have to make one less read overall, which makes for a sharper match without reducing it to something else.
270 is still a long round and not the way DOA has been played in the past. It's just a slightly better compromise than abysmal 300 life.

Think back on the BAM finals matches - it took a long, long time to get through. We have multiple rounds to allow players to work through their reads and beat the opponent.
A lot of long comebacks also involve a lot of doing nothing, spacing for no competitive gain or no pressure, just guessing to get the next opening, when you should have been rewarded for having taken the opponent down in life already.
Its a long way from Divekick. Its not even close enough to Virtua fighter, which is more damaging and exciting, and that's the "boring" 3d fighter.

Anyway, I think the main thing is we ALL agree 300 is a NO GO.
 

Koompbala

Well-Known Member
I personally think hold damage is fine where it is now. Also I agree with Tones on life to put it in perspective. Tina's HCH J.O.C. does 120 exactly all it would take is 2 of those to take the exact amount of health needed. Also a lot of environmental combos a lot of characters can reach 240dmg. Others already can kill given the right situations.
 

EMPEROR_COW

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
EC thanks for chiming in. By the way you certainly weren't the only one to request adjustment to holds. It was a major topic from all the western players in the patch summit as you know.

I do agree (as stated in the main postings) that the core game is good, but they should not walk back on positive changes.

The life setting is absolutely pivotal to how the system is balanced and how the game is perceived by other fighting game fans.

Large life means slow, dragging - read - BORING - matches. That will be the death of us in a tournament and streaming context.

I am with you on this. I am happy with the health level of Ver. 1.03a ..

But, again we haven't had our hands on it. We don't know the overall balance changes. MAY BE (with emphasis on the may be) its not so bad with everything else factored in.

But I do agree that the more aggressive pace of 1.03a was way better than the slower paced 1.02.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
Yes but high counter throw is a punish of a defensive holding opponent - which means she needs them to try countering her first. That's a setup, and one that the opponent can control by NOT COUNTERING. That's a good thing for the game to instill fear of getting the counter hold wrong.

Not to say damage of such throws couldn't be adjusted slightly, but the point remains, heavy punishment for bad reads is a GOOD thing in this game - people will learn to stop overusing counters and use strikes and blocking more.

But yes, again, we can agree 1.03A levels of life setting and hold damage are ok. A change to smaller would suit some, but a change back to 300 would be bad for everyone
 

Matt Ponton

Founder
Staff member
Administrator
Standard Donor
I was on my phone earlier so I was not able to give this much of a proper reply.

I feel that the jump for concern towards the removal of the ground game, although warranted, is a little too "leap before I look" for my tastes. I do believe we do not have the full understanding of what has changed in the system, and it's causing people to jump to conclusions.

In my opinion, the removal of the ground game is fine if there is some further buff to the system that they are (or planning on) doing. For example, we still do not know the limits and specifications to the new launch animations and "bound" properties. It's very possible they removed the ground game because they provided more natural combos and/or guaranteed damage opportunity, and that they felt this accompanied with the existing force tech game would be too much. I'm only speaking hypothetically, but I could see reason why they remove that system.

As for the change in threshold. I don't believe this will be altered in Ultimate. My reasoning is primarily due to time left before release. If you alter the critical threshold limit you are also asking them to revise the entire trial mode that teaches you combos and critical burst set-ups. Not a huge reason, but something I think is a major factor in such a decision.

Lastly, the life increase. I would have to play it out to see if 300 is just as slow in Ultimate as it was in 1.02/1.03a. However, my default gut reaction is that it is too much health. I honestly would still prefer 240 in 1.03a but I'm able to deal with the Normal 270 damage just fine.
 
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