"Straightforward" Characters vs. Resource-Intensive Characters

General Discussion
21

I can relent on my position with Maya a little and give you that, the loss of a dagger does hurt her, but I wouldn’t say it affects her nearly as much and changes her gameplay as drastically as a Mira who is sitting on a health bar that’s almost untouched but is nothing but grey and one little magic pixel of actual health. At that point, they will likely shift their gameplan a little.

Maya losing a dagger is difficult, but her same basic gameplan isn’t entirely unchanged. Openers and pressure do become more difficult but the player tends to take the same types of risks with minor changes to the approach.

Kan Ra though, he may only have sand trap as his only reversal, but if he’s being played efficiently, I don’t see most opponents getting in to really require the use of a reversal in the first place. That’s probably a harsh oversimplification maybe, but that’s what I’ve observed. I will be trying to play as him in the future though, as I’m trying to level 50 everyone and get perfect achievement score for the game at the moment, so I’ll see how wrong or right I am though.

As for Shadow Jago, Kim Wu, or Cinder though, I don’t consider them resource dependent characters, as I’ll be trying to plant pyrobombs on you regardless of whether I’m fired up or not, and using inferno to inflict white damage, etc., and my reversal options aren’t affected by fired up, it just turns my fireflash into a juggle combo. I can live without it, but when I do get it, it’s an added bonus, rather than a necessity.

22

Well I’m just glad some thought and reasoning went into making this thread. I do agree that there should be at least 1 or 2 more straight forward easier to use characters like jago or orchid but I fear these characters may become too bland when compared to characters like Aria , Kan-ra or gargos that make a match seem so crazy and chaotic and interesting.

23

I still think Maya is fairly dependant on it since the majority of her gameplay revolves around it (openers from practically full screen, unblockable projectiles once buffed, unbreakable juggles, an air to ground/AA command grab that can be used for meterless juggle cash outs, throw damage based on how many daggers she has, access to some great normals, and of course access to her projectile…)

But I will say I don’t think she is AS reliant on them as she used to be. Mostly because now she does real damage without having to build up pips, and that the new Dagger Assault Ender isn’t nearly as popular (though that may be because it risks losing access to your daggers).

24

I played it, and the only character I liked was Ragna.

That story mode is WAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY too anime for my taste. I found it just ridiculously and unnecessarily complex, and the absurd nature of some of the characters is just too much. I can NOT stand Jin, regardless of his English or Japanese dub.

I got Blazblue on the 360 thinking this would help fill the void of Guilty Gear’s absence, since it seemed at the time Arc wasn’t about to go back and make a new one. I tried to give Calamity Trigger a go when it came out as well, but I just couldn’t. It wasn’t Guilty Gear, no matter how bad I wanted it to be.

Carl’s puppeteer control scheme was one character that REALLY annoyed me, since it seemed so setup happy to me. Hakuman was kinda cool from what I remember.

My lesson though, Blazblue just isn’t my game. It irritated me on many levels, from the character design, to gameplay mechanics, and a story mode that was ultimately too hard to follow. If you like it and follow it, then by all means, enjoy it. It just wasn’t my cup of tea.

I want to give Guilty Gear Xrd a try on the PC but I don’t think I have good enough specs to run it.

I could agree with that too.

I don’t disagree with any of this, I just am on the fence about calling her resource dependent at all, but you do make a strong argument to categorize her like that.

1 Like
25

I think if we’re going to go for another example character it would be fun to do a “pseudo-shoto”, kinda like how Tusk played in KI2. A character with a lot of the abilities of a shoto (or at least similar in function) but without the fireball. Buff up certain areas of their gameplay to make up for relative drop in flexibility.

Maybe our possible samurai could be a fun fit for this.

1 Like
26

A long time ago, I started drawing a concept of a Jago antithesis character that was the leader of the cult of Gargos. He was a half wraith type character gifted with power from Gargos himself, with abilities to allow himself to temporarily de-materialize, as shifting between planes of existence, like Raziel in Soul Reaver. He would basically fight with a special staff in a style similar to Kilik’s shaolin style staff stances and strikes. I even came up with like a concept sheet for normal animations and things.

I figured he would be like Jago, being balanced character, but without a fireball, and using his de-materialize abilities in unique ways to create openings and pressure.

Maybe I should post those sometime…

27

A long set between two Relius and Carl players

Some crazyness a Puppeteer could bring to KI

28

I’m not really worried about that because Jago and Orchid are interesting, varied characters with good depth to them that people still use. And they still have their fair share of craziness too, particularly while in Instinct.

29

Gotcha covered lol

shadow-jago-desktop.jpeg1920×1080 1.01 MB

(Disclaimer: The gameplay idea does sound cool)

2 Likes
30

When I meant Jago antithesis… I sorta meant not Jago reskinned, but more or less maybe an archenemy who served at Gargos leisure of his own free will, not possessed by an Omen or anything. One design concept I came up with was that this character would ALWAYS remain hooded. Where you can see Jago’s eyes and hair but his faced is masked, this figure is always hooded, so you can never see his eyes, only a defined nose and a scarred jawline.

And I had a cool idea for the staff as well.

But I’ll give you a like for the sarcasm, I walked into that.

1 Like
31

Glacius zoner lmao.

32

I do like the idea of a robed cultist character, making use of Black Magicks and generally being spooky/mysterious. If done well that could be really fun to mess around with.
Maybe they could take some queues from Diablo 2’s Necromancer class: Bone Cage is the main spell that jumps to mind. Give the character a hint of Predator from MKX so they can temporarily immobilize the opponent.

It may turn out a bit complex to use right and/or hard to balance, but it’d be cool if they used something similar to Glacius’ shatter but with a purely utilitarian effect rather than as a damaging attack.

33

And when they introduced the cult of Gargos in Shadow Lords, they gave the perfect opening for such a character to exist in my opinion. Never played Diablo 2 though so that reference escapes me.

My intention though is if you like playing as Jago, this character should have a similar enjoyment and feel.

34

I must say, this thread is a breath of fresh air. Great, informative conversation about the topic of straight forward characters versus resource intensive characters and the many ways of distinguishing the two. Much appreciated.

I think for me, I tend to love characters that have a lot of layers to them. I wasn’t big in to Sadira back in season one, but after all of the changes and upgrades IG’s given her, she’s one of my favorites and I love all of her juggling options which I’m only now starting to get a grasp on.

Yet I also love Kan Ra and everything he can do with his sand mechanic and his ability to set traps and both move himself as well as the opponent around the stage to activate traps to move in, escape, curse etc. He’s very strategy oriented (to me) and that’s where I see fun in him.

When characters tend to have less moves, less options, less variety in strategies that are both compelling and unique, I start to lose interest. Sonin that sense, for me, there’s more of a divide along the lines of depth in a character’s move set as a lot of fun for me is in the variety.

I’d personally like to see more characters with a greater variety and depth within that variety that makes them more fun to explore. I’d also like to see characters that are comparatively lacking in this regard to get beefed up a bit.

The idea of resource management, for me, isn’t a huge issue so long as the resource is fun and worth keeping / acquiring / using. This is all subjective of course, but I love using Mira’s hard hitting special moves and walking that balancing beam of attacking, but knowing when to forego the attack and recharge. That’s awesome to me.

In contrast, I’m awful with Maya. I’m terrible at building up pips, comboing with her daggers, or using anything the pips give me. I love watching players like Pink Diamond and LCD use her, as she’s a blast to watch in high level play, but I simply can’t use her and because of that, her resource isn’t fun for me.

So for me, it’s not a matter of complex versus straight forward or resource management versus straight forward. For me, it’s variety and depth that I find to be fun versus less of those things and less fun.

Obviously that’s enormously subjective, but so far, most of IGs designs have trended toward the former. I hope to see that trend continue.

35

You also forgot to mention that Jin has EX moves. In the KI example, it would be the same for Shadow Jago so it should count here as well.

Litchi has to manage her staff-placement. It’s not a resource but it is an important part of her gameplay that she does have to be aware of.

Oh and Makoto has to charge her drive but it’s not necessarily on the same level as these other things in terms of resource management.

But yeah, KI is not the only game that involves resources, meters, stances, and stocks. Injustice also has things like this.

  • Aquaman (Water of Life meter)
  • Ares (Sword and Axe switching)
  • Bane (Venom)
  • Batgirl (Gadgets)
  • Batman (Batarangs)
  • Black Adam (Orbs)
  • Catwoman (Cat Scratch stocks)
  • Cyborg (Healing stance)
  • Deathstroke (not necessarily a resource but he could make his gunshots unblockable for a little bit)
  • Doomsday (Super armor stocks)
  • Flash (Speed mode)
  • Green Lantern (Green Lantern’s Light meter)
  • Green Arrow (Arrow types)
  • Hawkgirl (Flight stance)
  • Harley Quinn (Gifts)
  • Killer Frost (Freezing?)
  • Joker (Counter stocks)
  • Lex Luthor (Energy Shield)
  • Lobo (Shotgun ammo)
  • Martian Manhunter (Dhalsim arms mode)
  • Nightwing (Stick switching)
  • Raven (Demon stance)
  • Scorpion (I think he had this flare stance that got turned into an MKX move later on)
  • Shazam (Solomon’s Judgement)
  • Sinestro (Fear meter)
  • Solomon Grundy (Chain grab buffs)
  • Superman (Fury of Krypton meter)
  • Wonder Woman (Lasso and sword switching)
  • Zatanna (Hat stance)
  • Zod (Phantom Wraith)

And I’m certain Injustice 2 will follow the same trend but I have no idea what they are at the moment.

1 Like
36

In instinct sure but I personally find orchid really bland even though she has all the tools necessary for her to win but I personally find her boring to watch and use.

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37

Well, I disagree that shago’s surge should count, so I also disagree that jin’s EX moves should count, lol. And yeah litchi is a very borderline case.

38

Re: The OP’s list. I don’t buy Shago and Gargos as resource intensive characters. They should be in the other list, imo. They build meter normally simply have the option to spend it on something unique (EX moves, Minions).

4 Likes
39

What about omen then? Doesn’t one of his shadow bars increase faster than the others. I was kind of under the impression that since he had 3 bars of shadow it was a form unique resource management but I guess not then.

40

That’s just extra meter. It’s not the same as managing something like daggers or dragons.

1 Like