3.6 ZSS Discussion

[Ouroboro]

Giving her seperate grabs through taunt seems like its taking away from the unique aspect of og samus's gameplan. Though in the same respect, this is still samus.

 

[Shokio]

Giving her seperate grabs through taunt seems like its taking away from the unique aspect of og samus's gameplan. Though in the same respect, this is still samus.

^Exactly, that's why it'd be so perfect.

 

[JANKX]

I just started scoping out a thread in the General Discussion, I disagree with how 3.5 approached balance, and everything just starts making sense now. From the "Trimming the Fat" design blogpost, it becomes clear that 3.5 is not necessarily a balance patch, it's a redesign patch containing as many buffs and nerfs as they were able to fit within the time constraint. I can understand that limiting options now will make it easier for the dev team to approach balance in an upcoming patch. Since 3.5 was a major release that gutted so many characters, incremental balance update will be easier on both the developers and the players. The future seems brighter, despite the harm done to our character.

I know that most people really hate the new changes, but one of the most important thing we can do right now is test out the waters with the redesign and try to discover as much cool stuff as we can. That way, we can make more objective comparisons with case analyses between the two versions, thus opening the door for compromises to be made in a future build. I have a gut feeling that the new addon feature might pave the way for the team to release alternate builds of characters in cases such as these where there is so much backlash (if the legality of character versioning worries people, it should be possible to implement an MD5sum in the PM launcher to make sure that people aren't modifying characters in tournament play).

As of now, I'm equally skeptical of both sides, so I'll do my best to explore as much as possible in 3.5. The greatest hope I have for PM overall is that with all the combined controversy with the redesigns of various characters, that we are getting close to freezing them so no heavy modifications will necessary, just minor tweaks for balance issues.

@ Shokio I made a similar proposal earlier for taunt-toggling to change her movesets. My idea was that it would toggle between slow-paralyzer/tether-grab and fast-paralyzer/standard-grab. Different colors for the beams, too. It would be perfectly analogous to OG Samus, and transfrom ZSS into a versatile character that anyone can enjoy!

 

[Ouroboro]

Im gonna say the taunt change seems like a lazy design option. imo

 

[Foo]

Im gonna say the taunt change seems like a lazy design option. imo

I disagree, I like the taunt idea a lot. I HIGHLY doubt it will happen, but it's not bad design. You don't have to choose the difficult design option just because it's harder. If the easy choice is best, choose that. That's generally how great games are made.

 

[Ouroboro]

Just seems like the "everyone is happy yay" option. I think id prefer an overarching cohesive design plan that is laid out and followed through. Everyone will start wantinf taunt movesets and then we get custom movesets. Balancing around both options in the rest of her design would be the hard part. I dunno. I think id rather one or the othet, even if its not the one id prefer.

 

[JANKX]

I disagree, I like the taunt idea a lot. I HIGHLY doubt it will happen, but it's not bad design. You don't have to choose the difficult design option just because it's harder. If the easy choice is best, choose that. That's generally how great games are made.

Team taunt-toggle FTW! @ Ouroboro , I feel that it would be lazy if it was a feature that was just tacked on without valid justification and tweaks, but I honestly feel that the concept could be amazing if handled properly. @ Foo , I think taunt-toggle for different movesets is actually the more difficult option if you would consider that changing the beam would also indicate that nair and side-b should differ, as well, since those moves also utilize the gun. At that point, ZSS could become the next Shielda, which sounds incredibly compelling. @ Oro?! , take notes.

+= (Who else is hype for this?)

 

[Foo]

Just seems like the "everyone is happy yay" option. I think id prefer an overarching cohesive design plan that is laid out and followed through. Everyone will start wantinf taunt movesets and then we get custom movesets. Balancing around both options in the rest of her design would be the hard part. I dunno. I think id rather one or the othet, even if its not the one id prefer.

Slippery slope fallacy. Giving ZSS a taunt moveset wouldn't inevitably lead to custom movesets. It would fit with og samus having one, and would also fit well into her duality.

ZSS has a built in dichotomy of having short ranged cqc moves that are fast and safe, but not overally strong. She also has really slow long ranged moves that are laggy but rewarding.

 

[InfinityCollision]

I would be entirely content with such an option. Do I think it has the slightest chance of happening? No, but I'd be okay with it.

 

[JANKX]

I have developed a rough concept for the case of using taunt-toggle for altering Samus' movesets with appropriate symbolic themes. You'll see that extending the taunt-toggle to affect so many moves seems rather complicated, almost to the effect that ZSS becomes two clone characters for the price of one, but the idea is still rather compelling.

Ice Gun: The core of 3.02 moves cause the opponent to cling to you. As such, you have the tether grab that pulls the opponent toward you, nair which can be strung together due to the knockback and trajectory, side-b that also pulls the opponent toward you to allow potential followups. DCP could return in this mode, with adjustments made so that it's not as OP or "useless" as it was once perceived. This mode is used for the combo-game.

Fire Gun: The core of 3.5 moves cause the opponent to push away from you. This is why we can't string nairs anymore, and the gun becomes useless as a tether so ZSS needs to grab the opponent with her bare hands. One benefit of the fire gun is that the projectile travels faster, but it is so hot that you would not want to chase it immediately (hence, no DCP). Side-b in this mode could possibly be adjusted to produce more damage and knockback (similar to how it functions in the other Smash games). This mode could be used for keeping your opponent at bay.

 

[Shokio]

Yeah, I don't think the chances are very high that the Dev Team would even consider it, despite a similar system already in place with regular Samus. And maybe there's some programming barriers and limitations that might prevent it from being done. But it would still be awesome nonetheless.

 

[Legit]

No programming barriers. If they can do it with Samus, they can do it with any character. But yeah the chances of getting a taunt-toggle are the same as getting our character reverted.

That means not good.

 

[Yeroc]

It's really unlikely. I was the person who figured out how to get Samus's beam swapping working for Fair, the most technically difficult part, and trying to do something similar for grabs would be even more difficult, if possible at all. Grabs work through very complex interactions between the characters, and tether grabs have even more specialized routines of code they have to follow. I'm not saying it's too hard to try, but getting both types of grab working in the same .pac and switching between them on the fly would be exceedingly difficult. Even for the sake of developmental testing, doing something like that would be a lot of work. Additionally, complex features like that take up a lot of filespace, something that ZSS is especially limited by, since she still shares a .rel with Samus.

 

[Oro?!]

16 frames is not the fastest projectile, but it is fairly fast. In addition it has one of the shortest cooldowns of any projectile in the game.

In regards to attempting to make the dash cancel on laser further, the laser was always cancellable from the frame the laser was released from blaster until the move ended. That's a large margin for error. That isn't necessarily the problem though. Imagine we pushed the dash cancel 10 frames after the laser was released. Now you have an arbitrary dash cancel point and you have to memorize how far the laser travels until you have to cancel. That's why that is an unintuitive and bad compromise for dash cancel.

Blaster speed is definitely a nerf IF dash cancel was still involved. Without the dash cancel all it does is make your projectile reach the target faster. It has both positives and negatives.

The dash cancel was problematic even in 3.02 and prior. From max blaster range you could grab your opponent while they are still in shield stun. It was a problem mechanic. The only thing preventing it from being broken beyond belief in 3.02 and prior was how slow ZSS grab startup was. Knowing your opponent would shield your laser meant a free grab 100% of the time though.

In regards to the PMDT's message of not looking at characters in a vacuum. The intent behind that message was that there was a significant amount of change to virtually every single character in the cast and you cannot tell how overnerfed or buffed characters are from simply looking at the changelog. Looking at Mewtwo or Lucas for example and comparing to Ganondorf tells you absolutely nothing about the strength of those characters or how well they do against each other in 3.5.

@ Shokio I will admit that ZSS' new throws are very underwhelming at this point in time. There is certainly a sweetspot where things work and a large void where things do not on most of the cast. For instance, I regularly find myself connecting dthrow-> drop zone fair at mid-high percents and netting it into a kill. The frame window is very tight and it doesn't work on every weight or gravity class, but exploring those types of things will show you that there are setups, they are just generally risky and not so "free". I can understand the frustration of how her new throws work, especially when in general your reward for landing a grab is either a tech chase or a single hit. However, there is something to be said about the positional advantage that you receive from her throws as well. It isn't directly a combo, but often leads to one or a edgeguard situation if you make a right read while you have that advantage.

 

[Legit]

@ Oro?! , what do you think of the suggestion of having dash cancel with a faster blaster shot? Do you think that would still be broken even with her old grab?

 

[Oro?!]

Tested and still led to grabs while your opponent is in shield stun frame wise.

 

[Erik Aldereguia]

i think im the only one who is (only slightly) annoyed with the size decrease of the up-b plasma wire. although i guess i can see why it was nerfed. it was a little too easy to do the pull-into-blast-zone shenanigans.

 

[Foo]

@ Oro?! Why is it unintuitive? SO many characters have IASA frames, why would ZSS laser be unintuitive if it had some too?

 

[Shokio]

@@Shokio I will admit that ZSS' new throws are very underwhelming at this point in time. There is certainly a sweetspot where things work and a large void where things do not on most of the cast. For instance, I regularly find myself connecting dthrow-> drop zone fair at mid-high percents and netting it into a kill. The frame window is very tight and it doesn't work on every weight or gravity class, but exploring those types of things will show you that there are setups, they are just generally risky and not so "free". I can understand the frustration of how her new throws work, especially when in general your reward for landing a grab is either a tech chase or a single hit. However, there is something to be said about the positional advantage that you receive from her throws as well. It isn't directly a combo, but often leads to one or a edgeguard situation if you make a right read while you have that advantage.

Thanks for your response and understanding. I have a question though: SHOULD ZSS be doing drop-zones just to get a proper follow-up? Does that fit throws without actually thinking what new purpose the throw would serve. What are we supposed to use it now? 10%-windows where a drop-zone Fair works?

As far as positional advantage, did ZSS need a new grab that gave her that? Didn't Fair already serve that purpose? We now how to grabs that do the same thing, making one useless now.

So:

1) What new purpose does her down throw serve? What is it's functionality? If it's tech chases.....it's pretty bad with those.

2) Why is she not allowed to combo off of grabs anymore, when the majority of the roster still can?

3) Since the new angle and BKB of the grab makes it extremely hard to follow-up as-is, why was the endlag added?

4) With the DC lasers gone, and the frontal hitbox of her Nair decreased, what are her new approach options? Was that thought about during development? What is her new neutral game?

Tested and still led to grabs while your opponent is in shield stun frame wise.

5) Were all the DC laser tests done based off of shielding and shield stun? Were they based off of the premise that if ZSS uses the charged laser, the opponent will ALWAYS stand in shield? Cause if so, that's kinda silly. Jumping and fair'ing her was an option, escaping to a platform was an option, doing a fade-away jump was an option, and rolling toward her while she was approaching with the laser was the best option. It sounds like your guy's laser testing was done under the premise of constant shielding, as if there were no options to take to combat the move, when there way.

 

[Oro?!]

The point of the laser cancel was that you could run at any point after the laser was fired. Reducing cooldown on laser further does the same thing as creating an IASA at the end of laser.

 

[Foo]

The point of the laser cancel was that you could run at any point after the laser was fired. Reducing cooldown on laser further does the same thing as creating an IASA at the end of laser.

Huh? Unless that patch notes are wrong, the cooldown wasn't reduced, just the startup. That technically lowers the FAF, but what's important is how quickly you can move off the projectile, not when you can move in general.

 

[Oro?!]

Thanks for your response and understanding. I have a question though: SHOULD ZSS be doing drop-zones just to get a proper follow-up? Does that fit her? Is that what the Dev Team had in mind for their initial design of her? It really feels like you guys adjusted her grab without actually thinking what new purpose the throw would serve. What are we supposed to use it for now? 10%-windows where a drop-zone Fair works?

As far as positional advantage, did ZSS need a new grab that gave her that? Didn't Fair already serve that purpose? We now how to grabs that do the same thing, making one useless now.

So:

1) What new purpose does her down throw serve? What is it's functionality? If it's tech chases.....it's pretty bad with those.

2) Why is she not allowed to combo off of grabs anymore, when the majority of the roster still can?

3) Since the new angle and BKB of the grab makes it extremely hard to follow-up as-is, why was the endlag added?

4) With the DC lasers gone, and the frontal hitbox of her Nair decreased, what are her new approach options? Was that thought about during development? What is her new neutral game?



5) Were all the DC laser tests done based off of shielding and shield stun? Were they based off of the premise that if ZSS uses the charged laser, the opponent will ALWAYS stand in shield? Cause if so, that's kinda silly. Jumping and fair'ing her was an option, escaping to a platform was an option, doing a fade-away jump was an option, and rolling toward her while she was approaching with the laser was the best option. It sounds like your guy's laser testing was done under the premise of constant shielding, as if there were no options to take to combat the move, when there way.

The throws were made to be somewhat mediocre intentionally to be honest. Should ZSS be doing drop zones for proper follow ups? I think most characters have setups in combos, edgeguards, or after throws where doing a drop zone or running off stage with an aerial is the optimal response. Does the new grab fit her? Honestly I feel like it does.

1) D-throw is primarily a tech chase throw. You can punish bad DI with a fair or other things, but it is primarily a tech chase.

2) The intent across the cast was to make throw games more dynamic. If you look at every character sans Fox in Melee, there are percent windows where throws amount to a certain optimal follow up that keeps changing. Granted ZSS' uthrow has a useless window, a very small optimal combo window, and eventually nothing but positional advantage it is among the weaker side of the intent.

3) The endlag was added because;

Uthrow was unreactable for DI, creating apparently easy combo conversions

Dthrow allowed ZSS to tech chase relatively easily. It wasn't 3.02 MK, but it was very good.

4) Nair is still a disjointed hitbox, and decent for approaching. RAR bair, grab, and dsmash all are relatively safe and have high reward for connecting as well.

5) It was not assumed that your opponent would always be shielding when doing testing. It was a baseline of lasers being unacceptable. Any time projectile on shield->grab is a true combo, it is kind of an issue. Even the best projectiles like Sheik needles and Falco lasers cannot offer that point blank, where as zss could approach from cross stage and react based on your opponent shielding or not. ZSS lasers in 3.02 put your opponent at extreme disadvantage by either forcing shield, rolls, or platform camping which ZSS is very good at beating. Every laser fired basically could be seen as a free hit no matter what your opponent does in that case sans perfect shielding or having a reflector. Not a good look balance wise.

 

[Oro?!]

Huh? Unless that patch notes are wrong, the cooldown wasn't reduced, just the startup. That technically lowers the FAF, but what's important is how quickly you can move off the projectile, not when you can move in general.

It was not lowered. The cooldown on laser has always been very short, so it was not lowered any further. I was saying that making an IASA at frame 30 is no different than lowering the cooldown to frame 30.

 

[Legit]

Any time projectile on shield->grab is a true combo, it is kind of an issue. Even the best projectiles like Sheik needles and Falco lasers cannot offer that point blank

Pikachu can do it with an aerial tjolt. And that's with a normal grab to boot.

 

[The_NZA]

Numerics, a star ZSS player in New England, had the following to say:


- The idea that a standard grab made the blaster->grab setup more powerful is pretty much not true. Her tether grab was the entire reason that setup was so powerful. The ability to threaten a grab setup from mid-range was only guaranteed by the fact that the dash cancel + tether allowed her to theoretically land the grab before the blaster even got to the opponent. A standard grab severely reduces the range at which it's effective. Safer, yes, but much less potent. And while it is easy enough to avoid the setup by jumping out, that option is covered by nair so it was a 50/50 with a solid combo for guessing right and a hard punish for guessing wrong.

- Blaster needed to be nerfed. It wasn't the best projectile in the game, but projectiles needed to be toned down across the board. Removing the dash cancel, in my opinion, was not the way to do it. Lots of characters can cancel moves in lots of different ways, but ZSS was the only character in any smash game who could cancel a move by dashing. This created a lot of technical depth unique to her and opened up some interesting options for the people willing to figure her out and put the time in. Promoting technical depth is one of PM's stated objectives, so I would go on record saying that removing the technique runs counter to PM's stated goals. I understand for balance issues the projectile needs to be nerfed, but there has to be a better way than removing one of the most unique techs in the game.
- One suggestion, instead of removing the dash cancel, would be to keep 3.5's speed but severely reduce the distance it travels (maybe to 1/3). This would eliminate her followup options at mid/long range but give her a nice setup option in close quarters, while still preventing blaster->grab from being too powerful / guaranteed. And it would be consistent with Metroid Zero Mission where the thing went nowhere.

- ZSS's new dthrow/uthrow are complete garbage. Even with the ability to grab out of shield she's probably still better off resetting to neutral and trying to set something up. The idea of a potential DI mixup with d/uthrow for combo and f/bthrow for kills is interesting and helps freshen up her repetitive throw game, but it only works near the edge at mid/high percents. It would be nice if uthrow and dthrow had opposite escape di for at least a mixup option, but down and away will get you out of both. I'm not saying bring her old dthrow back, but in a game where most every character has at least somewhat reliable followups to a grab, she needs something to make it worth using.

- I'm not sure what to think about the standard grab. The old tether was an offensive grab with great set ups into it and uses as a mid-combo tool, at the cost of not being able to grab out of shield and being laggy if you messed up. The new one is more defensive, just like every other grab. The old tether better fit the archetype of the character as a combo machine with a powerful neutral at the cost of poor defenses, but I can understand the appeal of wanting a safer grab. If I had to vote though I'd go with the old tether.

- I donít mind the change to nair so long as they keep the changes to uair/dair. Mixing it up to keep a combo going is a nice change of pace from just shffl nairing as fast as I can.

- On a more positive note, pretty much every other change I think they did a good job with. They did a great job of nerfing her recovery without giving her awkward handicaps or taking away options.

- For me, the biggest appeal of ZSS is that she's a nonstandard character with a lot of technical potential, but not necessarily requiring fast fingers to play her. She's a character who's unique properties make her somewhat difficult to pick up but a great reward if you put the time and effort into learning her. My fear with 3.5 is that she loses a lot of what makes her unique in the cast, and smash in general, and becomes more of a standard, pick-up-and-go kind of a character as a result.

 

[G13_Flux]

Pikachu can do it with an aerial tjolt. And that's with a normal grab to boot.

are you sure about that? i dont think pikachu can do that. even if he could, it at least would require him to undergo the full duration of the full hop in order to do so which is relatively easy to react to.

i think the lag from landing after a SH would be too great for sure to do that.

 

[Wolf_]

Idk about anyone else but I think she's still good, I'm having fun with her at least

 

[ph00tbag]

Numerics more or less nailed it.

I disagree that dair ought to be kept more the way it is, though. But that's more because I think the way it always pops characters up just looks dumb. No balance considerations go into that.

 

[Stryker]

So. It would seem a character who wasn't amazing was nerfed to allow for better grabs that are actually worse.
While the changes may have been better "design" it seems that most players have ended up feeling like this...

- For me, the biggest appeal of ZSS is that she's a nonstandard character with a lot of technical potential, but not necessarily requiring fast fingers to play her. She's a character who's unique properties make her somewhat difficult to pick up but a great reward if you put the time and effort into learning her. My fear with 3.5 is that she loses a lot of what makes her unique in the cast, and smash in general, and becomes more of a standard, pick-up-and-go kind of a character as a result.

{...} the end of the day I'm left wondering why I should bother when I already play other characters with the same gameplan done better. The only good answer I've come up with thus far is that I want to figure out the changes to the rest of her kit on the off chance that her playstyle is restored and I continue on with her. I want to enjoy 3.5 ZSS, but at the end of the day she genuinely doesn't play the same way and no amount of time will change that.

What does this teach us? Well, it teaches us that changing a playstyle means changing that characters identity. People who originally enjoyed ZSS wont anymore. People who didn't enjoy 3.02 will enjoy 3.5. She is a different character.

If the PMDT were looking to turn her into a different more balanced character, then great. Mission accomplished.
If they were looking to preserve ZSS's core identity and balance her identity in line with other, they failed miserably.

Ultimately, looking at design itself in a vacuum, I don't like how this has gone. I very much enjoyed the 3.02 playstyle and she just doesn't feel right to me. :<
I'm not reading "Wahhh, this stuff is hard now, and it doesn't do anything and I can't win anymore" in this thread.
I'm reading "... This character doesn't play the same way anymore and I don't really like her anymore beacause of it."
It would not have been impossible to keep her old playstyle in tact while balancing her with the rest of the cast. Instead, I feel as though the easy way was taken by brazenly balancing her without regards to her identity.

If this is what the PMDT wants, then expect many players to drop her, and many players to pick her up. This is going to make people drop her.
If you were looking to keep her playstyle and nerf her, you would have found a way for her to keep the playstyle described by so many here but keep power inline.
Basically this...

Then apply the proper changes to balance it out instead of removing it altogether. ZSS #1 strength is her mobility, it's part of the core of her character. The removal of the lasers killed part of the character. Nerfs and tweaks should tone down a character, not damage who they are.
Like I said in the post above, why not just have made them clankable while keeping the DC? If that wasn't enough, then how about clank-ability with a speed up (pretty much how it is now), meaning she'd have a smaller window to try to grab since the paralyzer is traveling much quicker in front of her.
There were many different ways to go about tweaking that. Seems like you guys just chose the easy route of just scrapping it altogether instead of trying to find a middle ground.

You have infinite balancing options. I cannot stress this enough. You were not forced to change her playstyle. If you couldn't come up with anything that worked, perhaps you need to go back to the drawing board instead of killing her character identity. Don't butcher a character just because you're not a good enough designer to balance her playstyle correctly. That's just lazy. That's what people are disappointed in.

 

[The_NZA]

I don't really play ZSS but as someone who gets to watch her play every week, I can say without a shadow of a doubt, they removed the most spectator friendly and enjoyable to watch iteration of ZSS. I've always found the way Numerics plays as the most entertaining way for ZSS to play. As a spectator, i'm very .

 

[wangston]

I don't know how many have seen it yet but here is a GF set of DJ nintendo vs Frozen. Ike vs Zss. http://youtu.be/ljl-lAjxgH0?t=9m32s

 

[Legit]

I don't know how many have seen it yet but here is a GF set of DJ nintendo vs Frozen. Ike vs Zss. http://youtu.be/ljl-lAjxgH0?t=9m32s

I literally found myself watching the Ike over the ZSS, which should not happen with a ZSS main. When I did watch Frozen, I noticed that mid-match, he realized how terrible paralyzer is now and almost never used it.

 

[_Chrome]

I love the idea of the taunt changing moveset! I remember wondering why ZSS didn't get one while Samus did back in 3.0, but I didn't have a Smashboards account so I didn't post and forgot about it.

EDIT: I would really just like to see slightly more favourable throw angles.

 

[Shokio]

I don't know how many have seen it yet but here is a GF set of DJ nintendo vs Frozen. Ike vs Zss. http://youtu.be/ljl-lAjxgH0?t=9m32s

I think this set is very telling and that people should pay closer attention to it. Notice out of all the grabs he gets, he only manages to get TWO follow-ups in the entire set. Notice how 99% of the time, he does a down throw and then.......nothing happens, DJ just gets away. And those 2 times Frozen was able to follow up, DJ held in for no reason or accidentally (since there's no reason to hold back against ZSS anymore). Other times, with the Up-Throw, you can even see Ike getting out of hitstun by the time ZSS actually actually recovers from her endlag.

Then notice the lack of lasers. The only time he really used them was the game on Distant Planet when he was trying to camp things out a bit. Yes, it's just one guy and one set, but Frozen is a competent player and knows what he's doing. His gameplay here clearly shows that he thinks her lasers are virtually useless now, which I agree.

ZSS just isn't a fully functioning character as of right now.

 

[Foo]

Sigh, I think I'm ready to just give up on ZSS. From how intentionally obtuse the devs are being, it seems like they are completely set on ZSS staying like this, at least until 4.0.

I've just decided to pick up falcon instead.

RIP Zero Suit

 

[Shokio]

Im at Infinity & Beyond 32. My OPPONENT brought up how terrible her throws are now.

I just lol'd xD. Im sticking with ZSS, but its very, very painful. Im pretty much forcing myself to play with her, I cant give up on my baby.

 

[Foo]

Im at Infinity & Beyond 32. My OPPONENT brought up how terrible her throws are now.

I just lol'd xD. Im sticking with ZSS, but its very, very painful. Im pretty much forcing myself to play with her, I cant give up on my baby.

I felt like that for a bit, but... it's not my baby anymore. When I first started ZSS, I felt such an intense desire to figure her out because she was so... tricky. She wasn't jank, or gimmick, she was just tricky. At any point, you had so many options, so many ways to approach each hit. Some options were safe with decent reward, some were very risky or hard to land but had great reward. It's hard to explain, but it doesn't feel like that at all anymore. It doesn't feel like I'm in the drivers seat anymore.

Just dash dance, space the bair, yolo a downsmash or sideb, or go for a grab for a potential tech chase.

The character I loved is dead, I'll just move on. I know I must sound really really melodramatic right now, but it hurts when hours and hours of work give such great reward, but then, one day, all that payoff is gone. It was all a waste.

 

[ph00tbag]

I think this set is very telling and that people should pay closer attention to it. Notice out of all the grabs he gets, he only manages to get TWO follow-ups in the entire set. Notice how 99% of the time, he does a down throw and then.......nothing happens, DJ just gets away. And those 2 times Frozen was able to follow up, DJ held in for no reason or accidentally (since there's no reason to hold back against ZSS anymore). Other times, with the Up-Throw, you can even see Ike getting out of hitstun by the time ZSS actually actually recovers from her endlag.

Also worth noting is that, despite the apparent buff to the grab game, DJ Nintendo still avoids, and even punished most of Frozen's raw grabs out of ranged pressure, just by observing that Frozen was leaving the range which the rest of ZSS's moveset makes her strong in. The overwhelming majority of Frozen's grabs came off of successful hitconfirms, or shield grabs (and on that note there were some shield grabs that Frozen could have gotten with tether grab that he didn't even bother with because of the different length). The change to grab wasn't really a buff or a nerf. It was straight up a drastic playstyle change, and it was totally unwarranted.

 

[Shokio]

#Whens4.0?
#FixMyWaifu
#Z-A$$-A$$

 

[InfinityCollision]

It was straight up a drastic playstyle change, and it was totally unwarranted.

This. Over and over, this. We can talk about buffs, nerfs, whatever, at the end of the day ZSS plays like a totally different character now and that's one change that was completely uncalled for. That's the main problem here.

But yes, blaster and her grab game are both pretty garbage now. Frame this, speed that, they still suck rocks and I find myself making very little use of either even when I make a conscious effort to do so.

100% on board with what Stryker and Numerics said as well. ZSS brought something special to the roster, now her playstyle is much more vanilla and nobody fills the gap left behind. There has to be a way to bring those traits forward into 3.5 in a way that satisfies balance and design concerns. Bring the tether back, fix her throws, do something about the blaster, let ZSS be the slippery fighter she's always been.

Still holding out for 3.52.