Community Discussion: Canceling Reversals into Safe Specials

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Hey everyone, LCD back again with another controversial discussion topic. You guys know I love to keep things active around here and keep people thinking about the tough questions. This one is surrounding the topic of spending shadow meter or another character specific resource (like Kim’s Dragons) to keep yourself safe on a normally considered risky or unsafe move.

Example: Full Screen Windkick into Shadow Endokuken
Example: Wakeup Puddle Punch into Shadow Hail
Example: Wakeup Kneebuster into Shadow Itchni-San

How do you guys feel about this kind of stuff being in the game? Keep in mind before answering the question though that each situation is different and some characters can benefit more than others. This was one of the biggest complaints about Maya for the entirety of S2 and early S3 where she could make all of her DPs safe by throwing a dagger afterwards, which coincidentally enough they removed from the game in a recent patch where she can no longer do anything after a blocked DP. In my personal opinion I feel that philosophy should carry over to the other characters as well.

Waking up with a DP should always be a risk and not something that develops the mentality of well I’m just going to do this and make it safe afterwards because I have a bar of meter. This is a very popular thing to do for Jago players especially because of his potential to get a massive benefit afterwards. Just throw out a yolo windkick and if it hits cancel into instinct or shadow endokuken into massive health gain and unbreakable damage as well, all off of a quote unquote “unsafe” move. Correct me if I’m wrong but Shadow fireball is only -3 on block which for the most part is safe against most the cast.

Lets examine another character like Glacius who actually has a reversal he can combo off of and if it doesn’t hit make safe with Shadow Hail which leaves him at +21 on block leading to a free mixup. Granted at certain distances there is a gap in which you are free to use a projectile invincible move to get through however a high level Glacius player is very aware of this and in most situations it will be a true block string with the hail. Isn’t that a little much off a quote unquote “unsafe” move?

What about the argument of well “hes spending a bar of meter to do that”? Meter in this game at least in my opinion, is in an overabundance; there are very rare situations when a player doesn’t have meter especially if you’re playing one of the above mentioned characters like Glacius or Jago who are meter kings in this game along with Omen and Shadow Jago. So from my point of view I don’t see how spending a resource in which you always have justifies these types of things.

I don’t want to compare SFV and KI because they are completely different games so I’m not going to. However I will say it feels amazing to actually block a yolo reversal in that game and get a guaranteed crush counter punish into like 40%.

Anyways that’s my two cents on this topic and as always I’d love to hear from everyone else as well. Lets have fun with this guys, no disrespect towards others.

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Yes and no. You should be able to make it safe. However,it it hits,you should not be able to do anything from that. Risk and reward. Low risk low reward. High risk high reward.

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Gonna just correct some mistakes here before I say my opinion.

This is a very good change for the game, but it’s mostly because this was a meterless way of doing it. I think there is a huge distinction between doing it with meter and doing it meterless (and in Maya’s case, she got more than just unsafe DP… she also got a combo on hit AND resources + frame advantage on block. Compare to that someone like Jago, who doesn’t get a combo on hit and is still minus on block, plus has to spend a bar, the difference is important).

It’s -4, which means it can be punished by anyone with 4f or faster DP, and many characters with shadow (Wulf’s shadow ragged edge punishes, for instance, and Raam always punishes with light grab). Not punishable by normals, but -4 is worse than -3.

I can find no spacing in training mode where light or medium DP canceled into shadow hail is a true block string. There is always a gap. It is tight after heavy DP, but that doesn’t get a combo on hit, which seems like an important distinction to me.

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This is sort of a sensitive topic for me. I can’t tell if I want this removed or not.

One near surefire problem I could see with completely removing this is that some combos will be removed from certain characters because of this.

But here’s my overall take:

Yes, that unsafe → safe special crap can be very annoying. I feel like they could fix this by lowering the blockstun on most, if not all, unsafe specials (you can make moves like heavy wind kick recover slightly faster to compensate the negativity if need be, so Jago doesn’t get demonic despaired or something). That way, if it is cancelled into a shadow projectile, characters can easily shadow through them for a punish. There’s really no reason to have so much blockstun on these specials anyway since they’re SUPPOSED to be unsafe. Maybe there could be a consequence to this idea that I’m not thinking of, so forgive me if that sounded ignorant at all.

As a Glacius main, less blockstun on my puddle punch might make my hail setups trickier, but I can manage.

One last thing I need to point out, though:

Jago, yes. Glacius? Not really.

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As for my opinion, I would support them moving away from all invincible moves canceled into shadow, and only this. I would still allow invincible moves to be instinct canceled, or dragon canceled for Kim, or feral canceled for Wulf. And I would still allow non-invincible moves (like Arbiter rush, or Jago wind kick) to be canceled into shadows.

My reasoning for the invincible moves thing is that invincible moves are always incredibly strong in all fighting games. In fact, if a new SF game launched and you wanted to make a guess at a tier list, you could put all the characters with invincible reversals in A tier, and everyone else in B tier, and your guess would probably be a lot more accurate than you’d think after 6 months (feel free to do that experiment for SFV! Nash is the only character without a reversal that is in the running for top tier in that game, and ALL the characters with meterless reversals (Ryu, Cammy, Ken, Necalli) are regularly in the discussion for top 5).

Anyway, KI is not SF and doesn’t have to follow its rules, but invincible reversals are still very strong in KI.

As far as punishing DPs, I think the math supports that KI DP punish damage is very high; always at least 16-19% if you spend a bar up front (and as LCD says, you very often have bar in this game), and then you are at level 2 or 3 ender and get a free manual of your choice. So I think in the worst case (your manual is broken) you get about 20%, and in the best case (counter breaker) you get like 65-70%. Average all the cases in between where you one chance and cash out, you try to extend and get broken, you try to extend and get a lockout, etc etc, I think over 50 DP punishes, you will average at least 40% on your punish.

That is comparable (and possibly higher) than crush counter damage in SFV. I understand the allure of getting a “guaranteed” 350 damage in SFV every time you make the right decision, but I think the allure of getting upwards of 50-60% in KI with one more correct decision, and still 20-25% if you’re wrong, is just as strong, to me. If I bait a DP in SFV and my opponent has 60% life, I know I can’t kill him. In KI, I know it’s possible that I might.

As far as non-invincible moves canceled into shadow, I don’t see the problem. It’s not really that common, because not many characters have shadows that can’t be shadow countered, and to me getting hit by wind kick in KI is not at all yolo, it’s just … using the move. The move exists, so… when would you prefer the opponent use it, if not at the best chance to hit you? Is it that much different than Ryu doing dash up, sweep, v-trigger cancel in SFV? In my opinion, if a Jago wants to try and make heavy wind kick safe by wasting a bar, he’s more than welcome to. I’d rather Jago dump his meter on that than use shadow wind kick or shadow DP for cashouts. He doesn’t get anything meaningful off this, even if it hits (except with instinct, where he has to activate yet another resource). But all KI characters are scary if they want to dump 1 meter + instinct (Mira shadow bats + vampire mist, for example). I don’t think this is out of line with what other characters can do at all.

So yeah, to summarize: invincible DPs are very good in all games I can think of, so canceling them into shadows to make safe-ish is something I would support being removed. I would like all other cancels to stay in the game, though.

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I pretty much agree with this, though the Jago heavy wind kick into shadow fireball is VERY annoying when it chips your life away. Uggghhh.

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Training mode data says it’s -3 but it could be wrong; and yes I’m very aware that some characters have guaranteed punishes for it as I stated in the OP but there are still a lot that don’t mostly because of the push block.

Correct, the heavy puddle punch version cannot combo after but again canceling into shadow hail still leaves him + afterwords because it is also the heavy version that creates the true block string at close range. The medium and light ones are never used, at least in the sets I’ve played with top glacius players…they always use heavy.

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Ah, so it does.

But yeah, it’s -4 for sure. Tested with frame step. Also tested with 4f moves (Raam light grab is guaranteed punish, e.g.).

But yes, most characters can’t punish this. They can take their turn back, but they can’t punish.

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That’s really odd to me. Just cause they can make it safe? It’s not like the heavy version is a free hit, it can be beaten somewhat reliably by jumping or stuffing it on the way up.

Considering Glacius’ damage output, I’d take the combo from the light/medium versions. Only reason I’d use the heavy version would be for AA’s.

I suppose you don’t play Glacius so you can’t answer this question any better than I can lol sorry

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I like your suggestion for record, mostly because Instinct is a much rarer resource than shadow meter is. This also keeps players a little more honest instead of relying on craziness to get damage.

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As I said in another thread, I’m philosophically against invincible reversals being made safe through the use of meter. If you want an invincible way to strike out at your opponent, then I think you should be forced to accept the risk that comes with having it blocked. I think Jago is probably the most egregious character on this point though, since he nearly always has a bar of meter with which to make his crazy-damage DP safe.

I’m ok with regular (non-invincible) specials being made safe through meter, though, as well as invincible attacks being made safe through instinct cancels. The former aren’t super strong and can make the game a touch more interesting in neutral at points, and for the latter the resource is considerably more rare and precious.

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Wow, we’re all starting to agree on something?

I’d make a cynical joke, but I don’t want to ruin the moment. Keep up the discussion guys :slight_smile:

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This isn’t a case of cancelling a DP into something safe, but it’s really annoying that Thunder can cancel into Skyfall from a blocked DP with such a wide cancel window. Maya got hit with that nerf, but somehow Thunder can still do it (even on his Shadow DP), and it leads straight into possibly the strongest flipout mixups in the game. If you respect his light DP, you’re opening yourself up to getting hit with an incredibly fast crossup Skyfall or a wakeup Shadow Call of the Earth, which he can do a lot more often now that he doesn’t have to spend meter on a real wakeup anymore. Whenever I knock Thunder down, it feels like I’m the one being mixed up.

I also hate that Arbiter’s grenade wakeup is a reversal that’s guaranteed to go unpunished every time, but that’s a bit different.

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You can grab him out of it.

But yeah that’s not really related to our discussion.

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100% agree

200% agree

People who posted here are among the most clever and analitic among the forum users. You speak with wisdom and logic, and that leads us to a common understanding and agreement

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Hi @crazylcd i generally dont like ur kim wu but u are tottally right with thise one thats just true :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: and also u didn’t even understand that this game do have much haters ,because of this because of that, and the @developers follow them without thinking about all these peoples behind the nerfed characters! from there the divided community IMo.
for maya after a missed dp they could just make it 0% damages for the daggers. u forget cinder dp and flamme wall
and thunder and fulgore ( i think circa nicky spam it enought to make his missed dp safe with a shadow air laser ) but they just hate on maya IMo cause i dont see the difference with the others . im sorry but u are just right with what u complain right now. thank u :kissing_closed_eyes:

anyway i dont ask or support any nerfs to all theses characters after missed DP but they should regive maya her skills . please @developers

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All the others you mentioned need resources to make their stuff safe. Maya doesn’t use a resource and actually gains resources of its blocked. Although I think thunder doesn’t use shadow resources but he doesn’t gain any substantial garenteed resources or anything off of it.

I think devs had a solid reason for taking maya safe do away instead of simply listening to haters. Although I do think maya could use some buffs. Her 4 pip knife attack could be better. Like idk she keeps her knives during it or she auto gains it back after it finish. Maybe it actually does impressive damage which incentivize her to quickly open you up to let the damage rock

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I’d definitely agree with removing the inv reversal > Shadow cancels on block. I really don’t think it makes any sense to have inv moves be safe at the cost of meter, which you gain so easily in KI.

I’d leave instinct cancel and other singular situations alone, though, simply because one is a far more precious resource to use up and I feel this justifies the safe reversal and the other is based on a specific character’s mechanics and should be balanced individually so.

Maya’s DP into dagger was much more degenerate IMO, since it was meterless. Still, I think it’d be a 100% positive change to also remove the DP > shadow cancels on block across the whole cast.

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I don’t think moves that are a)fully invincible, or b) send you into the air should be cancelable into Shadows for safe blocking. If it cam be canceled into something long afterwards and/or at the cost of a character specific resource, that’s more manageable. Something like Dragon Cancels, Shadow Air Lasers, Fired Up Fireflash, or even the unsafe Sammamish follow-ups can be reasonable, and especially since there’s still room to punish them.

The big thing is a DP shouldn’t be cancelable before you leave the ground. Things like DP into fireball are just silly. Grounded stuff at least makes sense from a movement standpoint, like instinct canceling Wind Kick or an equivalent.

Over all, fewer safe set-ups for reversals the better.

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I’m OK with dragon cancels, air laser and fired up fireflash. Not with shamanism, because unlike the others, it’s free, you don’t need any resources. Even more, you can make H skyfall safe with one charge of cots or instinct. So thunder gets a mix up from blocked shamanism, for free.

Maybe you could follow up a blocked shamanism with skyfall IF you have cots up(or instinct), but right now it’s pretty degenerative, as others have said