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[Blank Mauser]

As I told Cape on AIM, I don't feel the Sonic changes in that set are really worth it. They're subtle, but a step in the dark when theres a brighter path for him.

I can eventually get to editing Sonic, Pika and Ivysaur if people seriously won't step up for them, but as Leaf pointed out this does seem a little underhanded. We aren't cogs in a machine cranking out this product, we're all people who can handle/pitch in for different areas. I for one, don't see why if I wanted to help program for one character I have to do three, but if I don't then I end up simply playtesting six? When I could easily volunteer to help staff a character?

Regardless, I'll playtest Ness, Diddy and Snake.

 

[CT Chia]

This is the complete wrong way to go about it. The criticism posted here is correct.

Cape, this is not how we make changes. This is not how we should make changes. Most of us (afaik) haven't heard about this until now, and you're dumping a completely different game on us. You're changing so many different core aspects of the game it's completely throwing the 5.0 that we all worked on out the window. You're adding decay, changing the hitstun, changing recovery options for the entire cast one way or another, putting buffs on characters that don't need it and nerfs on others that don't deserve it, changing rapid grabs, changing shield stun, omg I could go on forever.

This is a giant **** you to the whole community that actually enjoys 5.0, which mostly everyone afaik does. This is throwing out the months of testing we've done for this, all of the big tourneys happening for this codeset, and will only ruin the credibility we finally got after we decided to kind of sit tight with 5.0 It was called RC1 because it was a release candidate. Aka, we're getting close to a final release, with something we're getting content with having (I know 5.0 is certainly close to what I'd like to see in a final build) and this new proposition you're making is completely out of no where.

We don't make changes based on when you want to. We don't make the changes only you want to do. This isn't the CapeBackRoom, it's for all of us, and so far this is already garnering a lot of negative feedback just from the WBR itself, heh, just remember I told ya so if you ever decide to tell the public about this.

 

[goodoldganon]

Been playing most of the afternoon with friends. Mostly 1v1s but a few FFA and team matches. The feedback for the most part was lukewarm. Their were some good changes (we all enjoyed fighting Snake more and found it less of a chore.) but overall it was like playing an entirely new game. If I wasn't forcing people to test we all wanted to go back to 5.0/RC1 cause it was just a lot more fun. The whole thing just felt...slower.

But...what we did all agree upon was that lower hitstun and that hybrid NADT we talked about way back when would be a lot better for this game. The cast doesn't need this many changes. A few characters (Bowser for 1) need a few buffs and a few characters (Ness, Fox) need a few slight tweaks down. But overall the feedback from RC1 set is nothing but positive. Slightly lower hitstun, the hybrid NADT, remove the last bits of autosnapping, the footstool fix, ledgeteching, and a slight amount of balance tweaks, and we have a really good game.

No offense but what my one friend summed it up pretty well: "He took a hacksaw to fix a problem that required a nail filer"

 

[Shell]

Well, Chibo, as for the mechanics changes, you might notice that many more people than just Cape have been trying these alterations. Everyone that's tried .44 hitstun with NADT has said that it's done good things for the game, that much we can agree on.

Shieldstun and decay changes are a bit more out there, but I'm certainly willing to try them.

As for the buffs and nerfs, I think it's hard to tell how these mechanic changes (esp. hitstun) will affect characters, and I also think that there are some characters who weren't amazing that got some nerfs. However, I think that the changes do a pretty decent job at adressing things that can be generally stupid or unpolished. Yes, things'll have to be rebalanced from there, but it'll be a better game for it.


This is why I didn't really want to simmer to much on a set when I knew we would eventually be improving the core mechanics so much.... /shrug

Of course all of the changes need thorough review, but let's not dismiss something a lot of people have put work into so quickly.

 

[Magus420]

It was called RC1 because it was a release candidate. Aka, we're getting close to a final release

No. It was called RC1 because certain people decided it'd be a good idea to label it as something it wasn't to get people hyped.

 

[Veril]

Although I won't question why so few in the WBR knew of this set until now.

Really. I question that. Everyone who didn't know should be questioning that.

 

[leafgreen386]

Really. I question that. Everyone who didn't know should be questioning that.

Ryoko appears to have been nice enough to answer that one for us.

21:09 <RyokoYaksa> the difference between cape's set and RC1
21:09 <RyokoYaksa> is that awful players don't have a say in the change
21:09 <RyokoYaksa> s
21:10 <RyokoYaksa> *thumbs*

 

[goodoldganon]

That's hysterical

 

[Veril]

No, it isn't. Its a slap in the face.

 

[shanus]

It's ryoko's way of buffing zelda without us complaining! carry on, ryoko, carry on!

 

[Veril]

Its hard to work with

Spoiler

a**holes

people that openly insult you.

I look forward to meeting all of you at BtL2.

 

[shanus]

Zelda's changes are over 9000!

 

[leafgreen386]

The funny thing about zelda's changes is that they're all small buffs and nerfs, except for that one on din's fire, which is a gigantic buff. I like the idea of making din's fire better for camping, too!

 

[Veril]

I don't care about that so much as simply wanting an apology.

Din's fire buff lolno

 

[goodoldganon]

Let's really not let the WBR devolve into this. I guess I'd like to hear from Ryoko and Cape why these changes are needed. Besides a few gameplay mechanic tweaks and a like maybe 3-4 character changes the cast is pretty much perfect and nearly everyone agrees.

 

[Veril]

Push back the first date of Nov 15th at least 3 days, if not a week - so we can wait for all videos from BtL2 to be uploaded. We can use video reference as proof to changes.

Oh look, its like there was a topic here once.

 

[leafgreen386]

Oh look, its like there was a topic here once.

There was? I must not have seen it.

 

[Magus420]

I had a difficult time getting hit by that Din's on stage while falling asleep and going out of my way to be as sloppy as possible at getting around it to punish her. If you somehow manage to get camped by that 'gigantic' buff that's pretty sad.

 

[leafgreen386]

I had a difficult time getting hit by that Din's on stage while falling asleep and going out of my way to be as sloppy as possible at getting around it to punish her. If you somehow manage to get camped by that 'gigantic' buff that's pretty sad.

...

Well, the method I usually use to get around din's fire is aerialing through it, although I guess you could SHAD >_>

 

[CT Chia]

Most of the characters are great as they are. However, you can easily divide the cast into like two tiers, mediocre and amazing. There are a ton of characters that have characteristics that rly shine among the rest, such as Ness Fox Marth Falco Luigi Falcon etc, but there are other characters that just seem to be left in the dust, such as Samus, DK, Bowser, ICs, etc. There aren't many of these characters left, but they really need to be fixed and this is what we should focus on. Almost the entire general public agrees that the engine we have now is great. Our main focus atm should be balancing, and for minimal amounts of characters at a time. Tone down the extreme ones (aka Ness), and work on finding new things for these lower characters

 

[Blank Mauser]

Its pretty silly that we're so segregated communication-wise people are more inclined to work on their own. The WBR is just so agreeable that we'd rather work unhindered from each other.

Which is what we'd be doing here basically.

Either way, no elitist attitudes will get the game any farther then pure logic. And quite frankly, a whole lot of the characters lack logic altogether. They have little patches and fixes to help them keep up, but their held up on wobbly structures/movesets. Another problem I think is that characters are buffed and nerfed overall rather then moves being balanced within themselves. "Oh this char can have X" buff but then get rid of X." Just seems cheap.

If I were to keep progressing the game on minute changes I would never be satisfied, in fact I'd be much more elaborate and I still think its strange how people can be complacent with anything less. Just my opinion, its not "fixing the game with a hacksaw." its making a steady base to work on top of.

And no I don't blame the WBR for many shoddy faults, we just had a pretty unstable core to begin with and I don't think we ever compensated for it. Its easy to make a character playable, but harder to make them worth playing.

 

[shanus]

i dont actually care about the zelda changes, i just find it funny that in almost every patch, her changelist is probably by and far the largest each time lol

 

[shanus]

Its pretty silly that we're so segregated communication-wise people are more inclined to work on their own. The WBR is just so agreeable that we'd rather work unhindered from each other.

Which is what we'd be doing here basically.

Either way, no elitist attitudes will get the game any farther then pure logic. And quite frankly, a whole lot of the characters lack logic altogether. They have little patches and fixes to help them keep up, but their held up on wobbly structures/movesets. Another problem I think is that characters are buffed and nerfed overall rather then moves being balanced within themselves. "Oh this char can have X" buff but then get rid of X." Just seems cheap.

If I were to keep progressing the game on minute changes I would never be satisfied, in fact I'd be much more elaborate and I still think its strange how people can be complacent with anything less. Just my opinion, its not "fixing the game with a hacksaw." its making a steady base to work on top of.

And no I don't blame the WBR for many shoddy faults, we just had a pretty unstable core to begin with and I don't think we ever compensated for it. Its easy to make a character playable, but harder to make them worth playing.

Its more of a fault that there is a large disrespect for one another that they'd rather work alone as no one back here seems to respect each other's opinions.

 

[Blank Mauser]

i dont actually care about the zelda changes, i just find it funny that in almost every patch, her changelist is probably by and far the largest each time lol

I actually like the Zelda changes better this way. I think Ryoko gets rather in-depth and meticulous about the changes, and thats what makes them fine characters.

Its more of a fault that there is a large disrespect for one another that they'd rather work alone as no one back here seems to respect each other's opinions.

Yeah, I think theres a certain magnanimosity being passed around sometimes. I stopped expecting to get the benefit of the doubt here long ago.

The WBR needs a google wave-like application. Something so that we can post a giant changelist, each argue our propositions on every change we may have a problem with, post our own prospective changelists and even tier lists/matchup charts up for others to criticize, and have polls built in so that everything can be agree'd upon. Everything would be color-coded, organized, and no opinion would be left unsaid or unreferenced. It would make everything so much easier to collaborate on. It'd be so easy to scour through everything, drop a line, then a +1 or -1 and be able to see everyone's case at the same time.

 

[goodoldganon]

The WBR needs a google wave-like application. Something so that we can post a giant changelist, each argue our propositions on every change we may have a problem with, post our own prospective changelists and even tier lists/matchup charts up for others to criticize, and have polls built in so that everything can be agree'd upon. Everything would be color-coded, organized, and no opinion would be left unsaid or unreferenced. It would make everything so much easier to collaborate on. It'd be so easy to scour through everything, drop a line, then a +1 or -1 and be able to see everyone's case at the same time.

NO NO NO. We don't need gigantic changelists! We need fine tuning.

Or we could admit that the game and most of the characters are all, for the most part, fine. This unbelievable idea you guys have that every character will be great and that we can balance 39 characters (a feat real game developers for other long time standing fighting games have been unable to do) is nothing but a silly pipedream. We need focus on the few characters that are a little too good (Ness, Fox, maybe MK) and fix a few characters that aren't quite good enough (Bowser, Samus)

No characters is so abominably bad that they are unplayable (unlike Melee were about 1/3 to 1/4 of the cast was terrible). Fix the few that need a few buffs and a few nerfs, find out what gameplay mechanic tweaks we want in (do we want lower hitstun, ledgeteching, etc) and then call it a day. Watch out for any broken tactic that might emerge and watch as the game can finally start growing.

I really can't believe people still believe we need to rework so much about the characters. You guys need to get this delusional idea that somehow you can balance 39 characters out and instead take pride in the fact that we made a game that has 39 usable characters.

Can we finally sit down and talk about the gameplay mechanics we want in and go from there? After we have concrete mechanics we can fine tune a few characters (like cape did for Ike's u-throw for example) balance out the 7-8 characters that are a little outstanding from the cast, and go from there. I repeated myself a lot, but I'd hate to see this game changed so much AGAIN when we really have a great cast as it is now.

TL:DR Most characters are fine. Let's get a list of the gameplay changes we want in, fine tune the balance changes that will make, and then buff and nerf the 7-8 characters that are outstanding. SIMPLE

 

[The Cape]

TL:DR Most characters are fine. Let's get a list of the gameplay changes we want in, fine tune the balance changes that will make, and then buff and nerf the 7-8 characters that are outstanding. SIMPLE[/B]

This is actually what I was shooting for on the set that I put together. Most of that changelist is related to either characters who are a bit overpowered or to work with the new mechanics. Its also a test set and is no way complete or stable, I will continue to update it no matter what in that instance because the tournament scene that has tried it out already finds it to be a much better alternative because there are more options and more of a requirement to play smart and trick your opponent which is what a good tournament game should have. Once the ALRs are put in, which is being worked on now, the set will be a good deal more stable, but I still dont think stable enough to release.

 

[goodoldganon]

Well I'd really like to get on working on an agreeable final game mechanics. I think we can all agree that the footstool on d-taunt, ledge teching, no auto snaps on side-bs (and Lucario's up-b), and probably no auto-jabs are good for the game.

I'd like to discuss hitstun, NADT, and shieldstun though. I always thought shieldstun was fine in B+, the OoS options are already mad good, no need to lower the shield stun IMO. Still, is there anyone against a meeting to discuss mechanic changes soon before we start this project listed here?

Characters can come later cause that might take more time. For example, you think ZSS is too good, I think her cookie cutter combos are lame but she is far from the realm of too good and needs a nerf.

 

[The Cape]

Well the sheildstun is a lower multiplier. Weak hits stay about the same while the strong hits do slightly less sheild stun. I think you lose a frame for the first time at about 7 dmg and then its 1 frame every three damage from there. The big moves were the issues.

As for thing like ZSS. Her cookie cutter combos was what I address. Gave her some throw mixups, made U throw, D tilt and Uair not all auto combo and things of that nature. The things I addressed were due to the physics changes that I implemented and toning down insane characters like Fox.

Few of the changes I made I probably wont even want to keep, but its all at least worth testing and I can defend them all.

 

[CT Chia]

This is actually what I was shooting for on the set that I put together. Most of that changelist is related to either characters who are a bit overpowered or to work with the new mechanics. Its also a test set and is no way complete or stable, I will continue to update it no matter what in that instance because the tournament scene that has tried it out already finds it to be a much better alternative because there are more options and more of a requirement to play smart and trick your opponent which is what a good tournament game should have. Once the ALRs are put in, which is being worked on now, the set will be a good deal more stable, but I still dont think stable enough to release.

This is laughable.

So your set only changes characters that are a bit overpowered or ones that need new mechanics, though you changed practically the entire cast.
It's also somewhat agreed that two lacking characters are Bowser and Samus. For Bowser you just buffed the **** out of his upB, which is really not the way you should go about it. You're taking a single good move of his and putting it into overdrive which is really going to limit his gameplay options and rely on the same thing over and over. And for Samus, you didn't even make any big gameplay changes to Samus. In fact, you made Samus even worse!

You say you will continue to update this, so your going to work on updating this completely separate version of Brawl+ you're making instead of working on fixing the main build we have here that people have come to enjoy?

Lol what "tournament scene" has tried this build of yours. Sorry I haven't seen any Brawl+ 9.0 RC82 tournaments yet. I've also seen a lot of negative feedback in this thread about it in general so I fail to see what you mean. And if members of the public do know about this - wtf.

 

[Blank Mauser]

NO NO NO. We don't need gigantic changelists! We need fine tuning.

Or we could admit that the game and most of the characters are all, for the most part, fine. This unbelievable idea you guys have that every character will be great and that we can balance 39 characters (a feat real game developers for other long time standing fighting games have been unable to do) is nothing but a silly pipedream. We need focus on the few characters that are a little too good (Ness, Fox, maybe MK) and fix a few characters that aren't quite good enough (Bowser, Samus)

No characters is so abominably bad that they are unplayable (unlike Melee were about 1/3 to 1/4 of the cast was terrible). Fix the few that need a few buffs and a few nerfs, find out what gameplay mechanic tweaks we want in (do we want lower hitstun, ledgeteching, etc) and then call it a day. Watch out for any broken tactic that might emerge and watch as the game can finally start growing.

I really can't believe people still believe we need to rework so much about the characters. You guys need to get this delusional idea that somehow you can balance 39 characters out and instead take pride in the fact that we made a game that has 39 usable characters.

Can we finally sit down and talk about the gameplay mechanics we want in and go from there? After we have concrete mechanics we can fine tune a few characters (like cape did for Ike's u-throw for example) balance out the 7-8 characters that are a little outstanding from the cast, and go from there. I repeated myself a lot, but I'd hate to see this game changed so much AGAIN when we really have a great cast as it is now.

TL:DR Most characters are fine. Let's get a list of the gameplay changes we want in, fine tune the balance changes that will make, and then buff and nerf the 7-8 characters that are outstanding. SIMPLE

How is balancing a cast of character's not possible? Especially for a game as simple as smash?

The reason developers don't balance their fighting games is because of many factors. For one they aren't informed. They're hardly involved in the competitive scene at all, and make changes based on what little they get from fans. Guilty Gear Accent Core (In my opinion the worst) was made completely based off a fan, BlazBlue had lots of fan input, yet its unbalanced. Not to mention theres no money in balancing the game. Fighting games appeal, are bought, they make money. You think many people take balance into consideration when they buy the game? Very few, and those that do will probably still end up buying the game anyways. In the end still making developers money.

Also, fighting games are not Starcraft. The line between a character being broken and people just not handling the matchup well is too thin in the eyes of these developers.

The characters are not just fine. Its Brawl, we had a very shaky source product to work with. Many moves are filler, have no purpose, plenty of them clash with each other, risk vs. reward isn't balanced, and the characters don't point towards a constructive or inspired end goal. Whether anyone is happy with what we have is a different story, but its hard to justify that half of this cast really has direction in them. And thats just how it is because we're working with Sakurai.

 

[VietGeek]

Cape, for your set, you didn't set Marth's fsmash to default.

As explained by this picture:

It's not perfect since it's a snapshot from a replay but you understand I guess.

Spoiler

Those ****ing animals are in cahoots with Ryoko. Only they would smile like that in my misery) <_<

And it's when GnW is in his descent btw, so no invincibility frames

It's just something to keep in mind; I can change it myself no problem.

But then I'd have a say.

fufufufufu~

 

[shanus]

LOL viet, those last 2 lines were epic

 

[RyokoYaksa]

The Goto offsets in that Marth pac are incorrect for FsmashHi/Low due to an unnecessary addition and removal of lines. Fsmashes that don't have different animations or hitboxes through angling still use a goto for the hitboxes of the normal angle Fsmash. If they direct to an updated offset without being updated themselves, they redirect to now nonexistent hitboxes.

It's just an issue of the pac having been mishandled. The settings are otherwise default.

 

[The Cape]

Yea, already updated the .pac with it. Thanks Viet

 

[goodoldganon]

How is balancing a cast of character's not possible? Especially for a game as simple as smash?

Because we have 39 unique characters with varying strengths, flavors, and weaknesses. Every characters in Brawl is usable, just a few aren't good enough or are too good. If you don't like the way some characters plays then play someone else. I refuse to change a perfectly usable character (Sonic for example) because someone doesn't like the way he plays.

The reason developers don't balance their fighting games is because of many factors. For one they aren't informed. They're hardly involved in the competitive scene at all, and make changes based on what little they get from fans. Guilty Gear Accent Core (In my opinion the worst) was made completely based off a fan, BlazBlue had lots of fan input, yet its unbalanced. Not to mention theres no money in balancing the game. Fighting games appeal, are bought, they make money. You think many people take balance into consideration when they buy the game? Very few, and those that do will probably still end up buying the game anyways. In the end still making developers money.

You are kidding yourself if you honestly don't think any serious fighting game has extensive testing to make sure things are balanced. Extensive frame by frame testing to make sure most things work out as they had planned. Fighting games are the most competitive games by nature and any real fighting game goes through testing to make sure things are balanced. The reason games end up with tiers is because of flavor between characters. Even games like Street Fighter make sure that the developer and series favorites stay balanced.

You mention BlazBlue but that is a wonderfully balanced fighting game and it's kinda where I think Brawl+ stands now. A few characters that are a little too good (Nu, Rachel, Arakune) and a few characters not up to par (Tager and Hakumen) but overall a majority of the cast is balanced, plays well, has strengths, weaknesses, and plays differently. That's what every fighting game should strive for and it is what Brawl+ is close too. I'm sorry that every game will have characters/teams/etc better then others but to say we have a cast of nearly 39 somewhat equal characters is something to be proud of. The only massive balance issues with Brawl+ are the really goods vs the really bads.

Also, fighting games are not Starcraft. The line between a character being broken and people just not handling the matchup well is too thin in the eyes of these developers.

What does this even mean? The better player will more often then not win in both fighting games and Starcraft. Unless it's a straight counter pick (which SC has counter strategies) the better player will more often then not win. Of course upsets happen but that's part of any competitive activity.

The characters are not just fine. Its Brawl, we had a very shaky source product to work with. Many moves are filler, have no purpose, plenty of them clash with each other, risk vs. reward isn't balanced, and the characters don't point towards a constructive or inspired end goal. Whether anyone is happy with what we have is a different story, but its hard to justify that half of this cast really has direction in them. And thats just how it is because we're working with Sakurai.

What in the world do you mean by 'direction?' I saw you and Neko spout in the Sonic topic and it sounds dumb. Every single character in Brawl+ has an idea on what they should and should not be good at and how we want to obtain it. Every character is designed to win. I really don't get what 'most characters lack direction' really means.

 

[CT Chia]

How is balancing a cast of character's not possible? Especially for a game as simple as smash?

The reason developers don't balance their fighting games is because of many factors. For one they aren't informed. They're hardly involved in the competitive scene at all, and make changes based on what little they get from fans. Guilty Gear Accent Core (In my opinion the worst) was made completely based off a fan, BlazBlue had lots of fan input, yet its unbalanced. Not to mention theres no money in balancing the game. Fighting games appeal, are bought, they make money. You think many people take balance into consideration when they buy the game? Very few, and those that do will probably still end up buying the game anyways. In the end still making developers money.

Also, fighting games are not Starcraft. The line between a character being broken and people just not handling the matchup well is too thin in the eyes of these developers.

The characters are not just fine. Its Brawl, we had a very shaky source product to work with. Many moves are filler, have no purpose, plenty of them clash with each other, risk vs. reward isn't balanced, and the characters don't point towards a constructive or inspired end goal. Whether anyone is happy with what we have is a different story, but its hard to justify that half of this cast really has direction in them. And thats just how it is because we're working with Sakurai.

Are you kidding? Perfect balance is practically impossible. There's simply too many different types of characters. The very nature of what characters are like shows who is good and not. Easy example: 64 and Melee had hitstun, Brawl did not, + gave it back. + Also has changes in aerial lag, which were in 64 and Melee.

Falcon in...
64 - Great
Melee - Great
Brawl - Awful
+ - Great

The very nature of the character is simple built for this kind of engine

Fox in...
64 - Great
Melee - Amazing
Brawl - Mediocre
+ - Amazing

Same thing.

As for companies balancing games, you couldn't be more wrong. Of course game companies strive to make the most balanced game possible. It improves the lifetime of the game, and if games can catch on in a competitive sense like this it gives it a whole new fanbase in addition to the casual audience they strive to get.

Companies such as Capcom have hired professional game players to help balance their games such as ones in the Street Fighter Series. A perfect example is Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix (did I get that right?) In the original SF2, Akuma was banned. Too good. When making HD Remix and balancing it for the 100th time, there was not only help from a great team of game designers, but professional gamers as well. The game was designed to have the entire cast as balances as possible. The game comes out, and guess what, there's still a tier list. Even more, Akuma was still banned despite trying to be balanced by players and designers more credible than we are as a group. Given he wasn't as bad as he was originally in SF2, but still banable. Call me crazy but I find it be the clear nature of the character. And with situations like this you can't just overbuff some things and undernerf others (like what Cape did multiple times in his build) for reasons I've somewhat stated before. If Akuma's air fireballs are too broken, sure they could have made it so they have no knockback and do like 1% health damage. Guess what, that's not how game balancing works.

If you honestly think perfect balance is achieveable at all, you might as well quit the group and project right now, because you will never ever reach your goal.

 

[Veril]

Whether or not perfect balance is possible is not a question I care to tackle. What I do believe is that all characters should be both fun to play as, not overly tedious to play against (B+ falco for example), and viable at a competitive level.

That is an amazingly ambitious goal. We should stick to that as our aim until we actually achieve it.


While I commend Cape for his efforts creating this set, I also believe that abandoning the core mechanics of b+ makes it impossible to judge the balancing changes made AND vice versa... but since its clear you don't respect me, there's not much point in me continuing to argue the point.

 

[The Cape]

While I commend Cape for his efforts creating this set, I also believe that abandoning the core mechanics of b+ makes it impossible to judge the balancing changes made AND vice versa... but since its clear you don't respect me, there's not much point in me continuing to argue the point.

Well I dont disrespect you, but I am unsure as to where you got that idea so believe whatever you want.

As for the set, the changes were made after the core changes were made and tested. Most of the changes on the change list are to equate to the new physics and sheild stun and such. I also aimed to remove alot of the guaranteed combos with the lower hitstun and a few minor changes to help with that.

Examples:
ZSS D throw was changed so that it did not autolink into an aerial at almost any percent as it does in the current set. Moves that bounce off the floor of the stage have a higher hitstun than other moves of similar damage and KBs and therefore should be looked at as such. Having these moves be given an option to DI for a possibility of escape is neccasary in a tournament game, while something like D throw to uair at just about any percent is not. Calling a DI or a jump to get a good followup and a possible longer combo is.

The lower hitstun assists in forcing the players to DI and the person doing the combos to better chase the DI or predict it. Reading your opponent is also a good thing for an in depth fighting game. The lower hitsun and the lower sheild stun on heavier moves allows for the heavies to be "less of a joke" (as was stated by a few people testing the set) and because the sheild stun on the stronger hits in the current set tended to lock the sheild for a good amount of time more than was neccesary.

So in short, the changes that were made were made to address the new core mechanics that were implemented into the game and have actually brought about a good sense of balance and made more characters viable and less as over the top as they were.

 

[Blank Mauser]

Are you kidding? Perfect balance is practically impossible. There's simply too many different types of characters. The very nature of what characters are like shows who is good and not. Easy example: 64 and Melee had hitstun, Brawl did not, + gave it back. + Also has changes in aerial lag, which were in 64 and Melee.

Falcon in...
64 - Great
Melee - Great
Brawl - Awful
+ - Great

The very nature of the character is simple built for this kind of engine

Fox in...
64 - Great
Melee - Amazing
Brawl - Mediocre
+ - Amazing

Same thing.

As for companies balancing games, you couldn't be more wrong. Of course game companies strive to make the most balanced game possible. It improves the lifetime of the game, and if games can catch on in a competitive sense like this it gives it a whole new fanbase in addition to the casual audience they strive to get.

Companies such as Capcom have hired professional game players to help balance their games such as ones in the Street Fighter Series. A perfect example is Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix (did I get that right?) In the original SF2, Akuma was banned. Too good. When making HD Remix and balancing it for the 100th time, there was not only help from a great team of game designers, but professional gamers as well. The game was designed to have the entire cast as balances as possible. The game comes out, and guess what, there's still a tier list. Even more, Akuma was still banned despite trying to be balanced by players and designers more credible than we are as a group. Given he wasn't as bad as he was originally in SF2, but still banable. Call me crazy but I find it be the clear nature of the character. And with situations like this you can't just overbuff some things and undernerf others (like what Cape did multiple times in his build) for reasons I've somewhat stated before. If Akuma's air fireballs are too broken, sure they could have made it so they have no knockback and do like 1% health damage. Guess what, that's not how game balancing works.

If you honestly think perfect balance is achieveable at all, you might as well quit the group and project right now, because you will never ever reach your goal.

What?

Capcom hired David Sirlin, and I honestly don't even like that guy. He gained publicity with fans through his contrived blog posts and had a little following for sure, which is why Capcom noticed him, but he ultimately failed in balancing HD Remix and did Capcom do anything about it? No, because HD Remix already made them money. And you say its the nature of Akuma's character? Then why isn't he broken in SF4? He still has his pressuring nature, the ability to capitalize on many situations, yet hes not the same beast he was in SF2 because they simply balanced his moveset. He no longer has better moves in every regard (Thats Sagat now). Balancing really is that simple.

It is nature for there to be tier lists, however matchups are always manageable. If you really look in-depth into matchups you can see the proof of our work. Also, mainstream games may not be balanced but that doesn't mean there aren't fighters out there that are balanced. And they're balanced because they have a dedicated team who plays close attention to the scene and creates patches etc. We aren't going to have a perfect tier list where everyone is on the same tier (Because its impossible), but that doesn't mean the characters won't be able to win.

 

[JCaesar]

No one is saying we're going to have perfect balance. Obviously that's impossible. But it's no excuse not to strive for better balance than what we have.

You guys shouldn't look at the number of changes, you should look at the purpose behind them, and try out the set. Everyone in MD/VA who's tried it prefers it to RC1. It was actually difficult to get everyone at my smashfest last night to change back to RC1 to train for BtL.