Competitive balance: DOA5U mechanics changes

grap3fruitman

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Attacker has more advantage than the defender when someone is stunned, and thus the odds are in their favor. Every option the defender has the attacker has an option as well, plus more (one option from the attacker is more likely to beat out multiple options from the defender than the other way around). The pay off for most of these options on the attacker's side (from a smart player) is higher than the payoff for a successful option on the defender's side. The attacker has more options than the defender from a stun situation, and thus has the advantage and is favored. Not as much advantage as it should be, but advantage nonetheless.

May be a semantics thing, but the way it was written was strange.
This is pure nonsense.
 

Brute

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Everything grap3 says is nonsense. Thank the lord for the ignore button.
 

grap3fruitman

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Everything grap3 says is nonsense. Thank the lord for the ignore button.
Why should someone that lost on defense get any sort of chance for escape? Not to mention that they get four or five chances in this game. You really think that's justifiable? You've played DOA4/5 so long that it's scrambled your brain.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
Having an unlimited use option in stun is plain bad, period. Look at other fighting games, more often than not their counterpart to holds is limited by some form of meter.

But it's not unlimited.
Aside from recovery and punishment of holds, there are multiple unholdables stuns and launchers

The tools are in the game and the thread advocates improving them.
 

d3v

Well-Known Member
But it's not unlimited.
Aside from recovery and punishment of holds, there are multiple unholdables stuns and launchers

The tools are in the game and the thread advocates improving them.
But as long as you have to play the stun game, they might as well be. Nothing like in BB where you can go for a combo to burst bait, and then punish the burst (assuming you baited it successfully) with a full combo, nor like UMvC3 where you can simply opt not to TAC (which is akin to laying the stun game since counter-TACs are a near unlimited burst) and just kill a character off with a regular BnB.
 

HoodsXx

Well-Known Member
Just go straight into a launch. There does exist guaranteed damage. Not a lot, but...
You do know cough holds cough are there to stop your launches right? Therefore even if you say "use launchers" it doesn't really merit anything good. And against heavyweights like Bass you're pretty much forced to play the stun game in order to get rewarded properly. On top of that if you try to do a launcher and they SE and block your launcher? Free throw punish lol... So like, it's not as black and white as you may think.
 

StrikerSashi

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
You didn't read his complaint. I'm saying for punishing a baited hold, you can go for guaranteed stuff (launcher, sitdowns, or obviously throw).
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
I want Lei Fangs pony tail back .. shes low tier without it.

Did you get any info from the Japanese players?

Also, it seems we have a consensus, so on the issues of life setting, holds, and guaranteed damage, players in this thread have been very aligned.

So that would mean Europe, USA, Australia, others - all want the game to strengthen its competitive base by enacting changes like these.
 

TRI Mike

Well-Known Member
Don't forget Latin America. All players in Venezuela (I know all of them but only two of us post in this site) agree on the changes proposed in this thread.
 

MrMoon360

Well-Known Member
Attacker has more advantage than the defender when someone is stunned, and thus the odds are in their favor.

Stuns do not equal advantage. Its merely a limiter of your opponents options -- and their options are to do counter damage with a hold (remember advanced holds and their properties as well) or wait out the stun and guard a hesitant follow-up. That is unless of course the stun is unholdable.
(In my opinion, more useful ones are needed across each character since it is the fulcrum for guaranteed damage in DOA5. If holds are to stay in-stun, then the mechanic at fault is the stun threshold, punishing the attacker.)

With a 0 frame hold that can essentially stop any follow up to the stun you initiated, advantage is either uncertain, reversed or nonexistent while in a holdable stun. Pick one.
It just becomes an unfair guessing game with a few chances too many for the defender to right a wrong.


Basically, DOA5 is unique in that it makes a complex system. "High risk and high reward" doesn't apply the same as other fighters because another taxing mind game happens after the spacing, footsies, and poking were won. More often than not, it frustrates me instead of entertaining me.
This conveyance of frustration and uncertainty is common among casual fighting games. That's because its not to be taken seriously.

Look at SSBB and its random trip mechanic.
Although that game still managed to make it to EVO (deeeum), the mechanic was implemented to enforce casual play and strip tournament viability.

DOA4's excessive deep-stun guessing mechanics, random stage hazards, nerfs, etc., that were implemented seems to have made that game quite casual as well. (not to mention, a widely frowned upon title in DOA history)

Not to say DOA5 isn't better than DOA4.
Just not by much imo.
 

Brute

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Stuns do not equal advantage. Its merely a limiter of your opponents options.
Yeah. That's exactly the advantage is. Limit your opponent's options. That's also what frame advantage means and why it's significant. Because it effectively limits the options available to the opponent.
That's what advantage is. Having more options.
 

MrMoon360

Well-Known Member
Yeah. That's exactly the advantage is. Limit your opponent's options. That's also what frame advantage means and why it's significant. Because it effectively limits the options available to the opponent.
That's what advantage is. Having more options.


You're right.

In DOA however, the player at disadvantage, no matter which character, is given the opportunity to do counter damage or change the tide of the fight before the attacker receives a considerable reward for landing a counter hit, or just causing a deep stun. This is where the attacker's advantage is complicated.

And since the system's balance of the triangle is not the only thing in question of its integrity, match-up balance is just that much more horrid. Think of a slow striker that gets a deep stun. A hold that recovers or dodges their next attack means they put themselves in a bad situation by putting their opponent in a deep stun. Naturally, a slower character has to commit to the next strike they intend and cannot compete with a 0 frame hold in stun.

Man fuck it. I'm nitpicking based off preference aren't I?
If the system doesn't simplify in favor of the attacker via DOA5U, I'm not promoting this game anymore lol.
 

Brute

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
You're right.

In DOA however, the player at disadvantage, no matter which character, is given the opportunity to do counter damage or change the tide of the fight before the attacker receives a considerable reward for landing a counter hit, or just causing a deep stun. This is where the attacker's advantage is complicated.

And since the system's balance of the triangle is not the only thing in question of its integrity, match-up balance is just that much more horrid. Think of a slow striker that gets a deep stun. A hold that recovers or dodges their next attack means they put themselves in a bad situation by putting their opponent in a deep stun. Naturally, a slower character has to commit to the next strike they intend and cannot compete with a 0 frame hold in stun.

Man fuck it. I'm nitpicking based off preference aren't I?
If the system doesn't simplify in favor of the attacker via DOA5U, I'm not promoting this game anymore lol.
1) Nothing you said there is in opposition to anything I have said previously
2) Complication/simplicity is not the real issue.
 

EMPEROR_COW

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
Did you get any info from the Japanese players?

Also, it seems we have a consensus, so on the issues of life setting, holds, and guaranteed damage, players in this thread have been very aligned.

So that would mean Europe, USA, Australia, others - all want the game to strengthen its competitive base by enacting changes like these.

I did I put like A whole wall of text regarding their opinion around last Thursday.
They seem to be on a "close" page as us. not 100 % but certainly not far from what we want. check it out :)

(btw.. ur turns coming up ;) ... almost done with J.Wongs vid)
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
I did I put like A whole wall of text regarding their opinion around last Thursday.
They seem to be on a "close" page as us. not 100 % but certainly not far from what we want. check it out :)

(btw.. ur turns coming up ;) ... almost done with J.Wongs vid)

Ok I found the post you made... a flurry of stuff at that time and I missed it
http://freestepdodge.com/threads/co...5u-mechanics-changes.2972/page-11#post-104564

I will link it from 2nd post to highlight how the Japanese player attitudes have changed.

Good stuff

I'll respond next to your side note on sit down stuns.
 

Berzerk!

Well-Known Member
On your side note regarding sit down stuns, you've come a long way in your thinking, and I believe you'll see the wisdom of making sit down stuns unshakeable - If you get hit with THAT stun, you deserve the follow up.

The fact that they aren't guaranteed, introduces looseness and guesswork to what should be a clear cut move for the attacker to advance the threshhold or just get damage.

The game could be so much more solid and guaranteed damage wouldn't be a "wishlist" item in this game, if the sit down stuns worked properly. Shaking out to make the follow ups "sometimes" but "not really" guaranteed defeats the purpose of these moves.

Its the third rail that could make DOA (truly) great, to have specific moves in addition to neutral hit launchers that the defender needs to watch for and FEAR - the move that causes sit down. Because the next thing WILL hit you. It will give the attacker something real to aim for besides just poking and reading each and every part of the stun. It will make it more competitive and better to watch. Commentators will be able to educate viewers - here comes the sit down stun - he got it! There's the setup he wanted - now the payoff.

If I hit you into a stun, then take the risk to restun, and that move is a sit down, I don't have to worry about hold for that next move. Except that strategy is currently flimsy because it can be shaken and blocked or counterattacked. That's not a strategy. So this should change. Sit down stuns need to last long enough for specific follow ups to ALWAYS work (with reasonable timing).

The added benefit for Team Ninja for doing this is they can more assuredly balance the characters because they lower the variables for what can happen when someone is hit with an unholdable stun, what moves to award this property to, etc.

There needs to be this reward for overcoming defense.

It also will give the game a reason to make defense BETTER - better control with reason to sidestep, fuzzy guard, backdash. The neutral game will improve because you'll actually care more about being hit. (Couple it with a longer recovery for holds).

In any case, unholdable stuns need to actually lead to something. Players want Guaranteed Damage and in this system, this is what it would take to be meaningful.

On the other items its really pleasing the Japanese have moved to understand the system better and the benefits of its more solid, competitive aspects.

NOW LETS BRING THIS TO THE ATTENTION OF TEAM NINJA - THE PLAYER BASES ARE ALIGNED: 270 LIFE: LOW HOLD DAMAGE: GUARANTEED DAMAGE
 
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