Not posting from deep familiarity with the character or his matchups, but I do get the sense that #notamummy is a tad weak, and I do miss strong Kan-Ra.
But also, I’ve heard the perspective put forward by people who I respect, that certain kinds of character being strong makes the game more fun, whilst certain other kinds of characters being strong makes the game frustrating, and that it is ideal to balance such that the former land in a higher tier than the latter – and I still find that view very unpalatable. Whilst observing that balancing is highly complex and that good and bad matchups are inevitable (and even desirable), I’m still of a mind to say that you balance the game in good faith such that the roster is as close to equally viable in aggregate terms as possible, and that’s it. I hope Kan-Ra isn’t being held back.
Kanra is the only character in the game that can’t reversal into instinct which sucks, especially since his only woke up hurts him more then it inflict the person. Also @STORM179 I highly disagree with aganos having a harder time then Kanra overall cast wise! I’ve played 3 very good aganos that have had know issue getting out of a jam. I mean he does have armor with two ways to wake up, super punch and that grab invulnerable shadow move. Kan ra only has sandsplosion which is now imo the worst wake up in the game why? Because on block you get a punish, with potential life into a easy level 3-4 One chance if you re smart. Also most times on hit they recover just as fast as kanra’s sandsplosion recovery. Allowing them to pressure you more or even get a dp puinishment with chars like maya, jago,fulgore If they are really close. It kinda stinks being a setup character but can’t setup lol
That’s a fair point. But I’m also of the mind that “X character doesn’t outright win many MU’s, and has a lot of 4.5-5.5’s” doesn’t bespeak bad-faith balancing. I’m very much of the mind that Kan-Ra is very much not unviable at high level. I think he walks a razor’s edge in any fight, but I think the same can be said about other members of the cast as well - some of them to a greater extent than Ra.
Not winning many fights isn’t the same as being unviable or “too weak” to me. I think Kan can be successful at high level, but he also requires good defense and solid reads at any given moment. That doesn’t make him unviable - it just means that accurate reads and great defense are required components for playing him at that level. It’s certainly not a playstyle for everyone, but it doesn’t make the character bad, not even at high level.
Aganos options on wake up:
-Shadow pulverize: wins to grab , loses to meaty
-Shadow ruin: Wins to meaty, loses to grab very punishable if whiffs or gets blocked
-Backdash: MUAHAHAHAHAHAH Seriously, don’t use it.
Kan-Ra options on wake up:
-Shadow Whirl: Wins to grab, loses to meaty
-Sandsplosion(only with sand): Wins to grab and meaty, very punishable if whiffs or gets blocked. If the sand is setted far away, can be very safe
-Backdash: Although it can lose to some meaties, you can escape from some of them, wins to grabs
So, Aganos has to do a 50% guess: avoid grab, or avoid meaty?
Kan-Ra at least has a backdash which can help him in these situations, and even his reversal can situationally be safe on block
Universal wake up options(jumping, wake up grab, block) are similar to both Although Aganos is bigger, so more suitable to be hit by some setups
Kanra losing chart
Cinder 7-3
Rash 7-3
Spinal 6-4 leaning towards 7-3
Kim wu 6-4
Fulgore 6-4
Aria 6-4
Maya 6-4
Jago 6-4 much harder in s3 then it already was!
Hisako 6-4 always been that way
Sabrewulf 5.5
Omen maybe
Arbiter 6-4
KanRa’s 5-5’s are
Mira
Glacius
Tusk
Eyedol
Gargos (maybe)
TJ
Thunder (maybe)
Shadow jago (maybe)
Riptor
Aganos (maybe)
Winning mu
It used to be 6-4 in S2 IMO, but it’s better in S3 thanks to shadow spike. Cinder can move in many different directions, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s fast enough to avoid getting stung. And if he gets stung, he’s terrible.
I really like the way @dayv0 always lays out a series of facts. I know @F3Sleep and @STORM179 both know very well what they are talking about, but it’s really hard to kind of judge when the case is “I think Aganos has it harder than Kan Ra.” “No way man, Aganos has more (something).”
Having said that, I really respect the way this thread has been civil and I’ve come to appreciate more and more that @F3Sleep is a high level player who is contributing to the community through the forums, not just trying to hawk his streams or drum up followers for something. I’m honestly not sure how to respond to a request like this. The difference between winning and losing at high level can be very small. It’s like two (American) Football teams with 50 people on each team and they play for 60 minutes and one team wins because of a thrown flag. Yeah, the flag may be a bad call, but the team still had the other 50 people and 59.59 minutes to win the game. But everyone focuses on the bad call.
I know that balancing the game around high level play is the only way to do it, but I think they have to proceed pretty carefully when there are only a handful of high level players and their character choices are so well known that it seems like the developers are directly responding to tournament placements. @infilament has said in the past that Kan Ra being too strong isn’t “good for the game” because his keep away zoning is a frustrating play style I have some sympathy to that viewpoint.
As an aside, I have Kan Ra as my draw for the random character tournament on Oct. 30, so I will try to draw some insight from this board before then.
It’s certainly a less advantageous position than if he could reversal into instinct, but let’s be clear - other cast members can’t reversal into instinct either. Some characters don’t have completely invincible strike reversals to begin with (Sadira, Mira, Aganos, Hisako), and they also don’t get to do a true “get off me” move and then make it safe with instinct cancel.
Again, Kan is at a place where I think maybe it would be OK to let him do reversal->instinct cancel, but let’s be precise in both terms and the larger context of the game. Kan’s reversal does beat both strikes and throws, and isn’t OS’able beyond safe jumps and other “scienced” setups - he has far from the worst defense in the game IMO.
I’m personally hard pressed to call any reversal option which beats both meaties and throws the “worst” in KI. Sandsplosion is objectively a pretty solid reversal (beats any straight attack, blows up cross up attempts, situationally safe, meterless) with notable drawbacks (damages Kan, does PD to him, useless if you’re getting mauled with no sand out). I get that getting punished on your “get off me” move sucks, but are you really going to argue that sandsplosion is worse than shadow web cling? Worse on failure than Mira’s mistform, which does waaay more (real) damage to Mira than sandsplosion does to Kan, and is often OS’able? Aganos gets to guess meaty or throw and if he’s wrong, well sucks to be him cause he just spent a meter to reversal and then got wrecked for it. Again, not trying to be ■■■■■■■ or a contrarian, but I think it’s really important to be accurate about the context in which sandsplosion operates.
This one is funny to me because we had a big, hilarious group discussion with @UABass and Floridian Demon about this very thing at CEO. Suffice it to say, a group of like 8 ppl went to a room to test this one out. Kan is advantaged after point blank sandsplosion, and his reversal jab will beat mash jab from an opponent who’s been hit by sandsplosion. While it’s true that a Jago or Fulgore DP will beat anything Kan does, and that mash jab will beat anything fancy Kan tries to set up, it isn’t true that Kan is somehow negative after successfully tagging someone with his reversal. He’s not in the greatest of spots, but he’s a heck of a lot better off than, say Sadira, who gets OS’d by just about every stand normal in the game for trying to use shadow web cling. And that move costs meter.
Reasonable people can certainly disagree, and you and others are free to think that I’m wrong on this one and that Kan really does need some help. But I genuinely do think the discussion around that has to be based on as objective a look at the character’s kit as possible, and with taking a full measure of Kan’s current options within the context of the other members of the cast. Kan isn’t worst off in the KI cast defensively by a lot of metrics, and I think it undercuts your case when you elide that.
