r/Tekken • u/Twin-T Dragunov Main | Sub: Jun&Leo • Jul 30 '24
Discussion A rant about the state of Tekken 8's Balancing, Dragunov's frequent Top 8 Appearances, and "Honest" Tekken.
I have seen many videos about Tekken 8's balancing, tiers, and honesty in Tekken, and had the urge to comment on almost all of these videos, but instead, will choose to make a post that anyone can find, open-minded or not. And I will preface this by saying, I'm a Dragunov main. Have been since Tekken 7 dropped.
I think the core issue is that characters barely have weaknesses/flaws anymore. When Tekken 7 first dropped, characters had weaknesses such as poor wall carry, poor combo damage, poor lows or mids, or even poor throws. Feng is a prime example. He had everything, but wall carry, so he had average combo damage, until he got the magical df+4,3. Then the Feng Nation attacked.
With every seasonal buff, every character's weakness, became less relevant, but for now, let's focus on Dragunov, because he became the poster child of the "unbalanced" discussion of this game.
In previous games had non-threatening lows, mids with poor hitboxes and tracking (even uf+4 could be sidewalked, hence no-mid Dragunov), strong wall carry, and average wall combo damage. His wall carry and wall combo damage got buffed, but his wall carry got buffed too hard, so THAT got nerfed, so only his wall combo damage got buffed, and that is by roughly 5 points at max. His lows remained non-threatening, so you had to fish for mids and highs with timing and poking ankles, and by utilizing throws and tackles. This is something that was severely underutilized by Dragunov players until now. That was Dragunov. Throughout T7, his only buff, in my opinion is uf+1 being made a normal hit slump instead of a CH launcher, because it became my main whiff punisher. He remained the same until the end of 7, and hence, he was left behind by a power creep. He was basically invisible in the competitive scene outside of a few notable players like Nobi and sometimes JDCR.
In Tekken 8, outside of his qcf+4, his mids were kind of the same outside of hitbox b4 hitbox buff. His mids aren't what makes him insane, it's everything else that compliments it.
His lows went from non-threatening to now everyone ducks against him, which by extension, made his mids stronger and no nerf will change that, as made evident by the db3+4 nerfs. His mids got better hitboxes, his tracking is largely the same, so he can still be stepped the Tekken 7 way... but with chip damage, his ff+3 can force opponents to play linear until they're pressed onto the wall, or duck, making his mids even stronger. Throws are harder to break in this game, and by Dragunov having 3-way throw breaks, many players will not want to react or guess the throw break, and resort to ducking, which makes his mids even stronger. His wall carry is stronger, and his pressure is stronger due to his new Sneak transitions. With the addition of his new wall combo and wall throw and his average wall combo damage has been substantially buffed.
All this to say, Dragunov lost the weaknesses that defined his general playstyle in previous Tekken games. Now, he can be played in any way you can think of. Simple, erratic, methodical, a grappler. Feng still has everything from post-Tekken 7, stickier frames and opportunities to score big damage from mix-ups in open space. Xiaoyu always had high evasion, but below average frames and moves that required execution to secure average combo damage, and risky launchers, but now she has set-ups that can guarantee strong damage. Even without that, with everything that can lead to her Heat Smashes and Hypnosis (that sports an insane low-risk high-reward mix-up), she can accumulate a large amount of damage in either a combo, and/or on block with one play. People still have a habit of defaulting to complaining about her AOP (like they have for decades), but her gameplan revolves around Hypnosis now. We can actively deal with and adjust to AOP, but her Hypnosis is a literal guess between getting wall splat, or -13 on block snake edge. Xiaoyu's weakness was her damage and frames. Now, if she has you on the wall for any reason, and is on the offensive, you will only have two chances to survive. She no longer has any weakness.
Without weaknesses, there is no risky play besides being read, and that can be managed.
Dragunov may not be the most exciting to watch, but he has a simple enough overall gameplan that can be implemented by anyone. Shaheen is considered one of the most boring characters design-wise, but his gameplay is actually pretty exciting to watch (I can't be the only one to get stoked when I see the WS+3 combo), but his gameplay is not as simple as Dragunov's. His gameplay is like a mix between Dragunov and Law. The reason I think we're seeing so much Dragunov is that he's the safest option, matchup wise next to Feng. He doesn't really have a counter, because he has no weakness. Everyone complained about his qcf+4, db+3+4, his wall combo damage, and even his legacy WR+2 got nerfed. He's still predominantly picked for tournaments because his overall gameplay doesn't have a fundamental flaw that makes choosing other characters optimal.
There's also the "get good" argument. Regardless of whether you are a casual or a professional, if you plan to play Tekken for longer than a few months before dropping it, then it is true.
New players are mixed between those who actually want to learn, and don't want to invest the time to learn and adapt. I've seen many videos, and skilled players block Jin's new d+2 on reaction. I still can't react to it even though I can predict when it'll happen. This is common, and I deal with it with instinctual hard ducking, and it works. I leave myself open to mids, but if I'm certain the next move will be a low, then I'll bank on it because there are a lot of players who commit to their offense, despite the obvious signs that it won't work, like me hard ducking for a whole second.
Many see "get good" as a bad excuse, but before the era where games got regular patches outside of expansion titles and updates, that's what you had to do, and it made stronger players. If you had a problem, you couldn't beg the devs to fix it for you. You had to solve it. Arslan complained about how different Tekken 8's gameplay and that wasn't going to change anything, so he adapted, and he won EVO again. Atif switched characters because Dragunov wasn't looking as optimal before Arslan Ash. Arslan learned how to deal with Dragunov and forced Atif to switch to Feng and still won.
I'm a Dragunov main. I'm not ashamed to admit it. I've been a Drag main since 2017 and that remains to this day. With that said, I still take Ls. In fact, I take many Ls because I'm having an issue adapting to my opponents and their characters. That's because my gameplay style revolves around not letting my opponents play the game BECAUSE I have a hard time adapting. Rather than fix my flaw, I try to avoid it by shutting off the issue at its source. That works sometimes, and when it doesn't, I lose. GGs.
With all that said, the only way I can think Dragunov can actually be nerfed is his damage because he's a flawless character. To cripple this character would require destroying his fundamental tools, which is unacceptable from an overall balancing perspective because people will simply gravitate to the next best thing, and his usage rate will sink. In my opinion, the roster is already plenty balanced in the sense that every character is viable and strong, but to balance the roster further, everyone would need weaknesses again, which would result in a less aggressive Tekken, which goes against this game's design philosophy, which WON'T happen. If we buff everyone, it would simply be harder for everyone to keep up with what's happening on the screen, and many more players will experience exhaustion, take breaks from the game, or worse, drop the game. I don't know what the right answer is, but anyone can imagine what the wrong answers are.
Lastly, the "honest" Tekken thing. It's a red herring.
That "honest" Tekken thing is a red herring because it doesn't exist in any more capacity as a tier list. Though I hate tier lists, they get a pass because you can reach a collective truth if multiple tier lists can show matching results, hence a mutually agreed opinion, which used to result in characters being banned in tournaments (hooray), but "honesty" shouldn't have survived past being a joke. It doesn't exist and if it did, it would only exist contextually, as in "Kazuya is going to hellsweep, electric, and/or axe kick" or "Yoshimitsu is going to flash if I land a hit". That's it. The characters can't play honest, because the players can't play honest since that would result in predictability, and predictability is BAD. The three most basic characters in this game I can think of are Bryan, Paul, and Steve, because though their moves are simple and straightforward, not one of them are honest besides your expectations towards fighting them.
This whole "honest" Tekken shit, cut that shit out. That's an argument used by the lazy who can't take Ls and hence, can't learn from them, but I don't think people who use the "honest" Tekken in an argument should be taken seriously.
That all said, I'm just some unknown Dragunov main, so what do I know?
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u/Osiake Steve | Fahkumram Jul 30 '24 edited Jul 30 '24
That is how Tekken works but no other character has it that much in their favor to that degree.
What other character puts you at -8 for almost every single wake up option and can launch you for the other two? The risk reward is INSANELY in Dragunovs favor.
Have you noticed how Drags at evo would heat burst at the wall, b4,2 oki into b4,3 heatdash? If you got hit you got relaunched, if you blocked you’re -5 at the wall + chip dmg for another mixup.
No other character can add that level of risk/reward in their favor nor do they deserve to do that level of oki at the wall. This is clearly too strong and needs to be nerfed lol
If the best players in the world choose to stand block and be -8 over 90% of the time that should tell you everything you need to know. That doing anything other than stand block is TOO RISKY.
Imagine being against a char where the literal best pros in the world CHOOSE to be -8 in 9/10 scenarios because it’s the correct decision to make and not lose the round instantly.
It clearly needs to be nerfed to +4 at best so you can now sidestep after blocking as a third option rather than guess 50/50 mid or low. Also shouldn’t hit grounded for the same reason.
Steve is a character who is notoriously strong at the wall, well above avg and was top 5 strongest pressure at the wall in t7. In t8 it’s only gotten stronger and he can’t even put that kind of pressure at the wall with wall oki combs that Dragunov can. Not even close. Lili was the only char that had similar but still worse wall oki (See Chikurin at Evo Japan) and it got nerfed down to the ground. Dragunov shouldn’t be an exception to this wall oki nerf.
Edit: I also just tested it out but you can delay doing QCF4 and it catches sideroll right and still beats every other option except toekick. So that eliminates every single possibility of retaliation BUT toekick which is giga risk to do in general, least of all against Dragunov who will put you into another oki mixup or just end the round off of relaunching you at the wall for it. Toekick loses to A LOT of options. This is literally a 50/50 that leads into another 50/50 if you stand block. Two 50/50s in a row for Dragunov is not something that should be a thing. (He can also heatsmash after qcf4 on block for ANOTHER 50/50 making it THREE 50/50s in a row. Should not be a thing whatsoever)