Like my last suggestion I made on the forums, feel free to shoot me down if you feel like this idea is unnecessary/bad. I will not be mad.
Another idea popped into head about why some characters are allowed to juggle after their resource enders. In the beginning of S3, Spinal’s Searing Skull ender was nerfed so he couldn’t juggle after it and apply curses anymore, because it was a little unfair how he could build a resource and then immediately use that resource while the opponent could do little to stop it. I realized that a lot of characters in the game can do similar things with their battery enders (Jago especially, Glacius, Shago, Cinder on rare occasion) and I’m starting to wonder if consistency is an issue here.
Should these enders be adjusted so that their only reward is meter and not anything extra? Can’t wait to see the responses.
P.S. We’re not including Omen here for obvious reasons.
For Jago and Shago, wouldn’t that require a lot of animation changes or just a maxing out of KV (which may not matter for Jago if using Shadow Fireball after the battery ender)? I’m not aware of all the changes to Spinal yet so what did they do?
I think it’s worth noting that Jago needs the corner to get any kind of meaningful Juggle off his meter ender. He can connect with a wind kick and cancel that into a shadow move off a level 4 ender at midscreen, but it’s pretty pointless. Being able to situationally juggle off meter ender makes corners more worthwhile and interesting, and breaks up the monotony of always having to do launcher ender because the rest of Jago’s enders are clearly worse after the damage nerfs.
If anything, I think the way to go with Jago is to encourage more meter ender, by nerfing his passive meter gain.
Similar remarks might apply to other characters you’ve mentioned.
I rarely ever see a Jago player use the launcher ender.
Also, when I talk about these juggles, I’m more referring to the characters’ ability to use the resource they just got to attack the opponent before they can get back on their feet. It’s the most severe in Jago’s case because of his instinct.
Eh, spinal stacking curses on top of building skulls to stack more curses after he builds more skulls etc. seems a lot more worth removing than Jago just getting a short juggle after his meter build.
I can say that as a middling Jago player, that would really hurt during instinct. He has already had a number of nerfs recently and will likely get more soon. Granted that none are particularly dramatic, but they have caught me in trouble a number of times.
That being said, I do like to use his launcher ender into flip-out when I can.
Could be habit. I still use a lot of DP and shadow fireball → shadow DP because it’s what I know and I never bothered to learn the juggles and oki options. That doesn’t mean that the correct ender isn’t launcher – the damage difference between launcher and DP ender is at most 3%, launcher is very clearly better.
Ah, that’s what you’re referring to. Totally slipped my mind.
I also want to clarify this not meant to be a “nerf Jago/Fulgore/Shago” topic. This discussion should be considered assuming the characters will be compensated and balanced.
I get your point, but I also think this is a matter of jago players not adjusting to changes well enough. Right now I think the golden rule for improving with him is, if you did damage ender, you probably should have done launcher ender.
On topic though, I don’t think it would be a bad change to remove the juggle after his battery ender and give him a bit more meter from it to compensate.
When you say fulgore’s “battery ender” are you talking his HKD ender? Does it increase his spin speed more than the other enders? I’ve honestly never heard about this.
That might be an important clarification. I’m thinking that instincts are kinda supposed to be degenerate, and that Jago’s clearly isn’t the most degenerate in the game, but the response I expect to hear is that characters like Orchid and Sadira are allowed to have degenerate instincts because they’re not top tier.
I believe this is true (not 100% sure) which is why I included it on the list.
To note, I don’t mind keeping the HKD considering the spin speed is arguably less rewarding than meter up front, and the opponent still has a good chance to escape.
I personally don’t agree with this either, but I won’t go any further with that.
I already said I’m not trying to factor tiers/balance into this discussion.
Not sure what to say to that really. But this is a discussion of whether this change would be significant or meaningful, so I guess we’ll keep doing what we’re doing lol.
I mean, that’s the thing, isn’t it? Regardless of whether or not it builds more spin speed, you could take the juggle off that ender and it wouldn’t even be a real nerf, because there’s no point in juggling off that ender. His proper launcher ender does more damage at all levels, and allows for followups midscreen.
I suppose it really doesn’t matter much in my proposition to Fulgore since he doesn’t immediately get meter from the ender like everyone else, so he can’t get meter in the ender and immediately use in the juggle after.
Maybe I’m using the wrong word? I’m calling things degenerate, but I don’t think anything mentioned here is broken or unfun or ruining KI or anything like that. I think Jago’s enders are currently in a degenerate state, in that launcher is correct and DP ender isn’t even really worth considering to clear lifebars, but I don’t think that’s ruining KI.
I’m not even sure if you think “degenerate” is the word to describe Jago’s meter ender juggle, either. Personally I think it’s fine for Jago to have a lifegain ender in instinct that nets him 10% or so of his lifebar back and that’s about all the thought I would otherwise put into it if I hadn’t wandered into a thread where someone was suggesting that the correct perspective might be “no, that’s his meter ender, his reward should be meter and he can figure out how to convert that meter into life in the subsequent neutral if he wants life.”
Okay, so what would you think of Jago getting a new, separate, instinct-only ender, that gave no meter, dealt similar damage to what meter ender does currently, and netted him a set amount of life per ender level, like say, 3%/5%/8%/12%? You’d then cut the meter ender juggles, of course.
On the other side of things, what if Spinal’s searing skull ender juggle nerf were compensated with a separate ender that applied a set amount of curses commensurate with the resources he would otherwise get from searing skull ender?
My suspicion is that the latter might be a problem and the former would be fine. I just don’t think that isolated lifegain in instinct that doesn’t lead to any other shenanigans is a problem, whereas the devs were probably more interested in toning down Spinal’s ability to snowbal on his opponents in the corner. The devs give reasons for certain changes that sound like generally-applicable principles, but often a closer inspection or later comment makes it apparent that there was more going on.
I guess more broadly I think you’re trying to establish a sacred cow, and I think KI is a game about slaughtering those. It’s a bit like how people get indignant about not getting a guaranteed reward off confirming an opening or blocking a DP. Yeah there are situations where the combat designers have pushed a principle (“Because you can juggle after it!” comes to mind), but I think KI does an amazing job of finding new design space in detaching from the guarantees people expect and compensating for it with another mechanic which they can tune elsewhere.