Airk

This generally sounds pretty good, but What does that mean? Just that it doesn't knock away or anything?

Holy smoke. It's like Christmas in August. Konan destroys the world.

There's a lot to be said for playing in person. Mostly, it's just more fun. On a related note: Right now, I think Friday is the day when people show up because Friday is the day when people show up, if that makes any sense. If you want people to come down and play on a different day, just say so (preferably with a bit of advance warning), and hopefully folks who are free that day will come out. It's organic.

Duh, right, mappings. Listen to this man. I did say I wasn't a pad player. :P

I'm not a pad player, but my experience from other games that ask for multiple simultaneous button presses is that -sometimes- it's more convenient to move your hand so you can press the buttons you need with your index and middle finger, but GENERALLY you're going to want to play with your thumb. But really? Who cares what you 'read somewhere'? Play however it works for you. I can tell you that you're not supposed to hurt your hand. :P (What you're not getting is a stick, obviously.)

There was no mockery. You are reading something that was not there. I don't really see why it's rude to point out why I'm not there at noon.

But it's 100% possible for Tager to do JUST that. Though usually he kills you in ONE throw and a few other random hits beforehand. My example exists. Your "one minute combo barrage that you can't escape" doesn't. They're not tangents. They're comparisons. Essentially, they are other game mechanics to which you could apply your argument, exactly, word for word, and have it be just as (in)valid. Well, sorry have made it such an unpleasant process.

But that's really just lack of knowledge and skill. How is this different from "they just get attacked and attacked until an overhead hits them"? There are SO MANY situations in fighting games where "if you can't X, you're screwed" that I don't really feel that an argument at such a high level of generality has any merit. If you can give specific examples of specific ways the guard primer system is flawed, then I'm entirely willing to listen, but "I saw some dude online get blown up because he couldn't figure out how to get out of an attack string that contained 6 primer breaking moves." is just an argument on the scale of "I saw Tager kill some dude in TWO THROWS! How is that fair!?!" Just... what attack chains do you feel generate these circumstances? Almost every primer breaking move in the game is either negative on block or has substantial startup. No character is capable of putting together anything that resembles a tight attack string that breaks more than maybe 2 primers without significant expenditure of resources - usually in the form of rapid cancels. Also, I submit that if these players can't figure out how to get out of these attack chains, they're going to eventually get hit by an overhead anyway. If they take so long to figure out how to get out of that string, they are already doomed, because they're incapable of turning the match around and are clearly outclassed. Learning how to avoid guard breaks is a skill in the game, the same way learning to block overheads and how to tech throws is a skill. So far, your only argument against this system has been "well, it's hard and not much fun for a newbie to get hit by!". It's hard to avoid Tager's frame traps. It's hard to block Hazama's 6A overhead. It's hard to react to Tsubaki's unblockable. It's hard to react to Bang's bumper mixups. And none of those things are fun to get hit by. Do you believe that all of those are flawed systems as well? Your argument here seems to be primarily emotional, which isn't a good way to evaluate game systems.

Sorry. I wasn't actually trying to be snarky at all. I just wanted to make it clear: A) Friday during the day is probably not a good time to show up. B) Why this is. C) That I am pretty sure that P4A _will_ happen in the evening. I probably should've added that we're talking like 8pm here, so there's not actually all that much time left in the day at that point. Actually, I can't even see how you read that as snarky. =/

Yes, but not in the way you want me to agree. Do you feel this way when Tager command throws you for 50% of your health? Why are you letting them do that? It's much easier for him to do that than it is for anyone to break your guard. Primers don't just magically disappear. And even if you're down to one you still have options. I also find it sortof hilarious that someone playing Valk, with his "Hey look, this move is an overhead, plus on block AND breaks a primer, oh and did we mention it's an awesome starter?" 6C is complaining about this. Do you also complain that you don't have a DP? I sense great salt in you. Seriously. I don't think either of us should be pretending this is some sort of objective evaluation of the system. No, sorry, actually, I AM going to say that the game is balanced with primers in mind. You have yet to provide any reasoning behind why it is flawed beyond "It sucks when I get guard broken" even though getting guard broken requires you to either burst (in which case you are experiencing a consequence for getting out of that combo) or to block a primer breaking move -4- times in relatively short order, AND to forget to use barrier to prevent it. How often do guard breaks happen in high level play? Not very often, and usually when they do, they are clearly the result of a mistake on the defender's part. Far more often, you see someone losing because of the actions they took to avoid being guard broken. Guard breaks do require you to play in an intelligent fashion to avoid them, such that you work to avoid situations in which you might have to block primer breaking moves. You might have to spend some meter on a counter assault. You might have to risk a backdash where you might not otherwise. This is, IMHO, superior to "I can defend forever as long as I can block overheads and tech throws." Are guard primers necessarily the -best- way to implement that? No, but they're an interesting system that adds some depth and strategy to the game by adding consequences to actions. Ugh. Sorry. I keep derailing P4 threads with this crap. =/ In my defense, this WAS pretty much set up as a comparison thread, and I'm sucker for systems discussion.

I don't think there's going to be P4A going on "for a bunch of the day" - a lot of people have jobs that preclude them showing up at noon on a Friday. That said, it is almost CERTAIN that there will be P4A going on Friday EVENING for several hours.

You were anticipating. You HAVE to break throws on reaction. Maybe the window is even longer. Heh. Why don't you just take the head start and run with it? See, this is because you don't understand the system apparently at all. It's like Dusk said - you need to understand and use the Option Select; It generally beats throws until you start doing TRM setups. Many of which will lose to a jab or some other defensive choice because they involve delaying your throw slightly to trigger a TRM on someone who is using the option select. There was a TON of "Oh, BB throws SUCK! Throws in GG were TWO FRAMES!" back in the day. Eventually people started figuring things out and quieted down on that. Yes. As in "you may not want to green burst twice in the same round even if you can." And also "Some characters are more dangerous to your primers than others". Depth. Variety. Options. Leads to people considering other options, rather than just "Save both your bursts for the last round and use them both to break out of combos". It's a bit too early to say how the P4A burst system is shaking out, but right now, I'm seeing a whole lot of defensive bursts and not much of the other kinds in what I've watched so far. So the system is bad because some characters are better at exploiting it that others? Really? That's your issue with guard primers? Do you also have issues with throws because some characters have larger throw ranges than others? Do you have issues with invulnerable reversals because some characters don't have one without meter? Now I just don't know what you're trying to say. "Synthesized and better"? Dusk: What are the hard knockdowns in P4A? Sweeps definitely aren't "hard" by any definition of the term that I know.

I concur; TRM is one of the smartest throw systems I've seen this generation. It punishes people for guessing and rewards smart play. It blows my mind that after years of hearing people BITCHING about how much throws "suck" in BB because of the long tech window, they're now all mysteriously silent when P4 comes out using a very similar window but without all the things that made the BB throw system smart. Guard primers? I can take them or leave them, but I generally feel that having some sort of guard break system makes games more interesting. I feel this is something that's a little lacking in Persona. That said, in games that move as rapidly as all these games do, turtling isn't really a big issue that needs a complicated system to solve. On the first hand though, I really like the level of strategy that primers add to BB's burst system - P4A had to add an entire new type of burst to even approach that level of depth.

Just P4, I believe. Not enough people showing up to play BB. =/ (I think there were literally two of us last friday.) P4 is 'hot' right now though.

It's really not that important, unless you're really planning to try to develop your own combos, and even then it's basically just "high numbers = good". I really can't think of any reason you would ever really care enough to "do the math" on a combo unless you were away from the game and really wanted to figure out if something "should work". Otherwise, the Proration numbers are mostly interesting for "Okay, so my best starter is X" and "If possible, I should use 5A instead of 2A because it has a better P1" or "I really don't want to start with Y, but rather to combo into it" - which are all just looking at the numbers and understanding what they mean, rather than sitting down and doing a bunch of math.

Gee, thanks. I suppose this is better than BJ and the obligatory animated gif though. Yes, obviously "punish damage" only applies to situations where you can use a "punish combo" - by which we mean "a combo off the starter of your choice." That shouldn't even need to be explained, and I thought it was pretty self-evident. No, you can't, but then, all of this that you posted here is mostly irrelevant because it's character level stuff and way more specific than the level of the discussion. Obviously there are going to be differences between characters and some characters are going to do more damage than others and all "A combo does X%" numbers are going to be generalizations up to a point, but you can still draw conclusions from generalizations because most games don't vary so widely for them to be useless. I'm sure there ARE games where one character's max damage off anything is 20% and someone else's is 90%, but in general, for games that aren't completely broken, there's going to be some norm that you can expect. Note: All hypothetical games are hypothetical. You'll note already if you've actually read what I've posted in this thread that I was looking for something between the "Street Fighter 4" level where most combos that don't involve an ultra do like 20% damage, and something in the BB/P4A zone where one good read can net you a 60% combo if you have the meter for it. The 10%/35% vs 30%/50% comparison was strictly to point out that, in fact, high damage doesn't necessarily lead mistakes meaning more - you can make mistakes meaningful in ways OTHER than taking 75% off someone's life bar, and I'd like to see more games designed around those sorts of concepts, because I feel like we're basically playing the same baseline "design" in all these games. Also, I disagree that "random" is a meaningless term, or that I am overusing it. I have a very specific meaning in place for it - a game is "random" if results are weighted more towards single events than towards trends. Games that have very high damage numbers are weighted towards single events. Games which feature strong "slippery slopes" like powerful oki are weighted towards single events. Older school fighters with fewer options for monstrous damage and with few oki options other than high/low/throw/meaty mixup are more likely to reward trends. Anyway, amateur game design hour is over, back to your regularly scheduled discussion of how cool P4A is. Edit: Special mention for Dive Kick. It's rather a unique case, because ANY hit will get you the win, guaranteed. There is no 'weighting' here, because essentially, your round victories are your life bar and every round completely resets the situation and all mistakes are equal. It's a fascinating model, and while it seems to defy what I've stated here, it's more accurate to say that it is outside what is stated here.

You're right; I didn't play GGXXAC, and hearing this, I'm glad. Sorry, but for me, games where one mistake costs you 60% of your health are too random. Yes. Random. The higher the damage numbers, the more stupid and random the game becomes - it's part of why Marvel is such a dumb game in my opinion; If you can play solid for 90% of a round and then lose from a huge life lead on one combo, the game is random. What I think all the people who assert that "Oh, that makes your mistakes matter" don't understand is that, in fact, how high the damage is in a game is only a part of how much mistakes matter. Yes, obviously if a combo does enough damage to kill you it matters more, but the real factor is how much damage a 'punish' combo does vs a 'normal' combo. Let's say you've got a game where BnBs do 10% health and a massive punish combo does 35% health. Mistakes matter more in that game than they do in a game where BnBs do 30% and punish combos do 50%, because you need 4 BnBs to "come back" and take a lead from being punished in the first game and only two in the latter. And since high damage has the undesirable effect of pushing the game in the direction of becoming a random "whoever gets the first hit wins" affair, I think it's better design to keep overall damage low and punish damage relatively higher. Resource expediture can help mitigate this somewhat ("you need meter to make a big comeback") but usually those resources are in good supply if you don't waste them, so it makes less of a difference than you might think - especially in games where you get meter for taking damage. I realize some people like this style of play, but I think I don't, and I wish more people designed the types of games I want to play, because I feel they are objectively better, because they reward solid play more than just making sure you get the max damage off of two opportunities. Uh. Anyway, none of this really has much to do with P4A, as it's no more or less random or damaging than BB. I wish it was less so, but I still like it as is, and I'm thrilled to see all the Capcom players breaking out of their comfort zone and playing a less boring (if from SF4) or lame (if from Marvel) fighter. I have no issues at all with the accessability features, and for the most part, I think they've been implemented very nicely. The reduction of basically all moves to QCF motions also eliminates a significant barrier to entry as well. I'm not 100% sure if I like the "two button DP" mechanism, but I haven't really seen what it does to play yet, so I'm withholding judgement. Thumbs up to Arcsys for this though.

I actually meant the 3C you ENDED the round with - after doing that 7.2k. Doing something risky while your opponent has a big lead and you have resources to convert into lots of damage and/or rapid cancel is one thing. Doing something risky while neither you nor your opponent has hardly any health and you DON'T have any meter to RC is another. He could've taken that round from you even after your big comeback if he'd just blocked on wakeup. =/

I have no idea. I was just complaining about this the other evening. Rematch button should be in every game, along with Skullgirls' "Tournament mode" where you have to hold a button to pause.

Yes, yes it does. It's kinda funny how they made the game easier to learn by ADDING stuff though, because P4A actually has a TON more "system mechanics" to remember than BB does. Short hops, evasive action, air turn, SB moves, a third type of burst, sweeps, furious action, all out attack... when the only system mechanic they removed was barrier. And guard breaks, I guess. I suppose you could argue that they reduced the number of "command normals" (6A etc), but since they're still there and still super character specific, I don't think that's much of a change. Having to shake out of ice is super stupid though. :P

While I heartily endorse the 7.2k 5charge mugen blowup there, the 3C at the end of the match was kinda uncessarily risky.

I guess. Sadly, I like the Lambda combo better because I can actually SEE WTF is going on, whereas the Aigis combo is just like "Oh, yeah, some explosions?" It actually looks weird to me how little time there is between hits because it makes it feel like nothing has any 'impact' behind it. That kinda sucks for me. What's the point in having another game with huge arse 50% combos? =/ It seems like everything is either a Street Fighter style "yeah, like a couple of hits together" game where the average combo damage is maybe 20%, or a BB/SG/P4/MvC explosionfest where one combo can do 40+% damage. Seems there has to be a compromise in there somewhere. I agree with the first two statements.

I must be defective, because I don't really feel the difference much at all. None of this "everything feels tighter" or "oh wow, so much less hitstop" or...anything, really. Maybe I'm not hardcore enough, or too old or something, but this is all just not registering for me. I guess "requires proper meter management for high damage combos" means "doesn't have Extend Ragna in it", but otherwise? Really? Maybe it's because my BB character requires TWO different meters in order to do good damage? Frankly, I can't honestly understand why someone would like P4U and not BB unless they really need/like the accessability features or the persona gimmick. Or I guess the different system mechanics. The games feel very similar, except BB has more variety in character selection, and seems, at the moment, to be a bit more combo heavy - though I gather that P4A will be featuring plenty of 50% combos as people get better at it, which is a bit of a disappointment. I would've liked a lower damage, less combo heavy game. Still enjoying P4A, but not buying into all the arguments about why it's the second coming.

/nitpick EX meter in SF4 carries over from round to round. It makes for an interesting strategic level since you don't want to waste your meter if you can't win. He also mentioned in a recent interview that they were going to change the way some(?) supers worked while in overdrive, but that wasn't ready for this loktest.

Varies by move and we don't really know. They are "consolidating" a lot of different versions of moves, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily going to be the same - or different - from the same version in Extend. No info. Yes. Sorry. It's charge back then forward. What does this even mean? Why would you get charges in the next round? This information is impossible to get from a loktest. Yes.