Balance Patch Vote: Ivy Discussion

KineticClash

KineticClash

[10] Knight
I feel as though I should bring up the potential patches to Ivy being discussed in the Balance Patch Community Vote thread. If you have not yet seen this, here are the proposed changes:

Ivy
29. CE
a) Decrease speed
b) Decrease damage
c) Change property into AT

30. 22_88bA+B+K
a) Increase damage

31. 6Bhold8_2
a) Less freeze on block

I took the time to tally up all the votes that have come in so far. Here are the results:

29. CE
No changes) 9
a) 10
b) 14
c) 6

30. No changes) 12
Increase damage) 10

31. No changes) 10
Less freeze on block) 11

IF! Namco was to actually consider these votes, it would possibly increase (or decrease?) the safety of 6Bhold8_2. Okay... It would not buff 22_88B BE. Fine. But it would possibly decrease the speed AND damage of her CE. I would be okay with this if it specified maybe lengthening it by 1-2 frames and maybe 5 less points of damage. However, it is left dangerously vague. Hypothetically, if Namco listened to the community, it could nerf Ivy's CE back to patch 1.01.

Now I'll leave this open to discussion. Do you think these are reasonable changes? Do you agree or disagree with the way the community is voting so far?

I personally think the SC5 community is just jealous of Ivy breast size. Maybe a breast reduction nerf would be more appropriate for her ;D.
 
I support the idea of Belial's thread, but honestly... a lot of people just have no idea what they are voting against. As horrible as this sounds, personally I'd prefer if the voting was limited only to certain players.

When it comes to Ivy's proposed changes:

CE - is obviously very strong. But reducing the speed would make it the worst CE in the game again. Imo out of the three options damage nerf (100->90?) is the only that makes sense. AT throw is some kind of a joke, how exactly would that work? i22 blockable mid with almost no range? Yeah, sure. If it had Alpha Patroklos i8 speed then sure.

22_88B, A+B+K - this was actually my idea. I feel like this is her worst BE. The combo does merely 59 dmg. You get more damage of her standard 22_88B 5hit-JF. On block the JG of the second hit is very easy. I think the combo should do around 70 dmg or more. This is also a nice example of people's ignorance. I am almost sure that most people who voted against damage buff in this game has absolutely no idea what this move is, haha.

6(B)2_8 - compared to SC4 and SC3 this move is really bad. Worse pushback, bad tracking, more unsafe and almost two times less damage on CH. More safety is a good option since it at least shouldn't be punishable at far range like now..
 
Ring I actually agree I mean I think some of the stuff people voted against it's just ugh...I was gonna vote but eh changed my mind atm. I think ivy is fine the way she is now, and something must be done about viola, mitsurugi,alpha and algol Imo. Cervantes eh he needs minor stuff down nothing major..like aB to not pushback alot, reduce damage off of CH 1AB, decrease damage off of a air hit IGDR.
 
Ring said:
I support the idea of Belial's thread, but honestly... a lot of people just have no idea what they are voting against. As horrible as this sounds, personally I'd prefer if the voting was limited only to certain players.
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I agree completely with your post (including the Ivy buffs), but especially with this part there.

Btw, I guess it was Sacharja who suggested that her CE could become an attack-throw. But of course (I know) that this included a speed buff to i16. An attack throw at i22 was never meant to be aimed at.
I agree with the damage nerf back to 90dmg. It has so many setups, why so strong? It had to be buffed from 1.01, but I think it got a little too much blessing. Honestly, I don't know why Asta's and Ivy's CE-damage was buffed at all - that was not the reason why they were bad before. =/
 
I think if they were to nerf Ivy's CE down to 90 damage, they would at least have to buff the damage on one of her BE moves. Otherwise her meter game would fall a bit below average.
 
I think even at i16, they would be way too slow (right now CE is i22, but cannot be crouched by i17 so in a nutshell it's actually i17) and almost never work. I can't really imagine how Ivy's CE would work as a blockable i16 mid with such crappy reach. Randomly spend meter at frame advantage in hope for a frame trap? :P

I do think her CE does too much damage now. I'm not even talking about Asta, whose CE is 2x better in reach and does over 120 dmg and has a hidden startup, should be nerfed asap!

I know this is wishful thinking, but for me ideally Ivy's BE attacks should look like:

1B BE - fixed combo hitbox issues with backturned characters
22_88B BE - +10 DMG or more, more blockstun between hits so that you cannot GI/aGI or interrupt with other CE, but JG possible
6B8 BE - ground stun with 8_9B+K guaranteed
66B BE - +5 DMG, KND on NH, LNC on CH
SS +5 dmg, smaller escape window

Right now I think her BE's are in fact a bit below average. Except 1B BE for punishing and 6B8 BE / 66B BE for situational combos the rest is a waste of the meter most of the time.
 
I couldn't agree more. And don't forget about Asta's CE's RO potential!

I also wouldn't mind having a more consistent RO/W! potential for 6B8 BE. Right now it seems as though using 6B8 BE actually lowers your chance of getting a RO. And it seems like the stars have to align to get a successful 6B8 BE W! combo in.
 
Ring said:
Ivy CE
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The heart of the issue is that this move is an unbreakable throw with redonkulous damage. This is what makes it so hard to balance. By nature it will pretty much always be either too strong or too weak. I remember you mentioning that in some of your older posts as well.
The simplest solution is to remove the throw property and turn it into a regular attack where the initial hit combos into the following via an attack throw, thereby making it fulfill the same function as regular CEs. The speed adjustments is supposed to bring it more in line with aforementioned CEs.
Since you ask for possible applications, let me clarify that an attack throw means it actually hits airborne opponents. In hindsight this might make another damage adjustment desireable, but it would certainly solve the problem of the move having no place in her arsenal (apart from block and whiff punishment).
 
The whole problem I have with that voting list is that it's really vague and that a lot of people are being absolute ***** when you talk about nerfing characters they play but shout the loudest when other characters come to play.

Ivy doesn't really need any more.

A buff on 22_88B BE should have been done ages ago. How much does the regular version do?
CE does too much damage like it is now and making it a AT would mean that Asta's CE also has to be a AT. (Which would be a absolute nightmare)

What would really make my day is a stun boost on 3B giving it combo potential. Because it's also as useless as 22_88B BE.
 
I think that reducing her CE damage might be the lesser of the 3 evils mentioned, i dont agree with it. As is right now Ivy CE is a marginal late game threat, if she packing 2 bars toward mid/end of match she makes people really want to consider ducking and their disadvantge as to avoid the throw. Isn't this how it should be(its similar to how i feel against hilde late game with full bar and playing oki, though i think her range is just ridiculous) ? Prior to the patch most people had little to no fear of her CE and the Vet players look to break CS 90% of the time.

As for Her BE's I agree with ring that 22B BE could use a damage buff though I was thinking more like 65 damage, not Gi able, not interupptable by CE's when blocked, JG'ble but no AC when used in combos.
1B follow up not having wiff issues on BT.
6B8 BE having a Better W!/RO( the RO is shamefull to be an Ivy move. OG RO Cannon) and i would actually want to opponents to land a little closer to Ivy so she had more options after the attack.
66B BE is pretty solid, maybe a slight damage boost but thats about imo. (Why do you want a NH KND Ring?)
70 damage SS with a smaller break window would help with Ivy's pressure, if done correctly.
 
That's a good point. Making Ivy's CE blockable gives people almost no reason to duck against Ivy. This would mean SS would need a drastic damage boost in order to give Ivy decent mixups. Also, to give it combo potential, it would HAVE to be faster than i12 because, as of now, an i12 high does not connect with her launcher on NH.

If Ivy's CE would be nerfed in any way, she would have to be buffed in some other way. Otherwise, Asta's CE would have to be nerfed into oblivion.
 
My humble opinions.

CE - Clash knows that I, well.. have never really used Ivy's CE so I have no educated opinion to give of it.
66B BE - launch on NH for guaranteed 6B8 followup, reduce damage of 2nd hit if you really have to for this to balance out.
SS - +10 damage, or +5 and increase clean hit by 1 rank. I won't say no to more difficult escape frames, but it's the meh damage that gets to me the most. Of all the BE throws I've seen in the game, SS only has damage going for it, and it's at the bottom of the pack even then.
22_88B BE - I find this move very hard to justify using given how easy the BA is to JG. It needs some kind of major overhaul to overtake the 3/5-hit JF meterless options which have very similar risk-reward ratios to this BE.
iCS - Much smaller escape window. I would also consider doing away with the randomness of Clean Hit and increasing the base damage of iCS by 20, but smaller escape window (like 3, given the effort to do the move) is enough for me to consider doing dirty favors for PS.
22_88B - I would also consider a higher launch on CH like what 3B does, so this actually leads into 6B8 on CH.
 
WhYYZ said:
What would really make my day is a stun boost on 3B giving it combo potential. Because it's also as useless as 22_88B BE.
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I always had the impression that 3B is one of her best moves, and one of the better moves in the game. It has properties that make up for the lack of NH damage. Also, it does combo consistently on some characters, like Asta.

Kaz said:
66B BE is pretty solid, maybe a slight damage boost but thats about imo. (Why do you want a NH KND Ring?)
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66B BE on hit is +10~11 but opponent is also pushed far away so you can't fully use the frame advantage it grants you. I'd prefer a KND with a wakeup. This move was designed mostly for stun combos and wall splats, otherwise it has minor uses (I sometimes use it as a punisher and frame trap). A NH launch would probably render 1B BE useless, as 66B has similar speed but more range and can be used from FC.

Ryoka said:
My humble opinions.

CE - Clash knows that I, well.. have never really used Ivy's CE so I have no educated opinion to give of it.
66B BE - launch on NH for guaranteed 6B8 followup, reduce damage of 2nd hit if you really have to for this to balance out.
SS - +10 damage, or +5 and increase clean hit by 1 rank. I won't say no to more difficult escape frames, but it's the meh damage that gets to me the most. Of all the BE throws I've seen in the game, SS only has damage going for it, and it's at the bottom of the pack even then.
22_88B BE - I find this move very hard to justify using given how easy the BA is to JG. It needs some kind of major overhaul to overtake the 3/5-hit JF meterless options which have very similar risk-reward ratios to this BE.
iCS - Much smaller escape window. I would also consider doing away with the randomness of Clean Hit and increasing the base damage of iCS by 20, but smaller escape window (like 3, given the effort to do the move) is enough for me to consider doing dirty favors for PS.
22_88B - I would also consider a higher launch on CH like what 3B does, so this actually leads into 6B8 on CH.
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You have made some interesting points.

For iCS, are you proposing a 3 frame escape window or was this a typo? 3 frames would probably mean iCS almost "guaranteed" against people who refuse to duck, it's like a JF timing. I'd say never go below 5 frames. In SC4 sometimes it was impossible to break iCS even if you were mashing A.

Imo the first thing that should be changed in iCS is the fact that it cannot be buffered, which is ridiculous. Change this, reduce the escape window a bit and it's all good. Maybe buff normal damage a bit, to 90 and Clean Hit to 110.
 
Ring said:
For iCS, are you proposing a 3 frame escape window or was this a typo? 3 frames would probably mean iCS almost "guaranteed" against people who refuse to duck, it's like a JF timing. I'd say never go below 5 frames. In SC4 sometimes it was impossible to break iCS even if you were mashing A.

Imo the first thing that should be changed in iCS is the fact that it cannot be buffered, which is ridiculous. Change this, reduce the escape window a bit and it's all good. Maybe buff normal damage a bit, to 90 and Clean Hit to 110.
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The move attracts attention to itself (offline) thanks to its noisy execution requirements and most importantly the bright white flash on Ivy that she has no business doing other than to signify an iCS. I see little rationale against requiring a JF-like break timing against the most difficult to perform JF in the game by far. Mashing was never the way to break out of SS/CS to begin with (in previous games), but rather a precise button press on sight unless you were capable of 12+ single button taps a second. That was also when SS/CS weren't nearly as difficult to perform as iCS is now. For how hard the move truly is to execute in a live match, and for how overt the move itself compared to previous games including IV, a very tight break window to match the just-as-tight requirements to land the throw on a living, breathing target feels warranted. The less surreptitious animation combined with the white flash they absolutely must tack onto every properly executed JF makes the move easy to spot and deal with, either by breaking or twitch ducking. The novelty of iCS being uncommonly used to good effect due to its difficulty wears thin when it's realized just how easy it is to deal with due to being dealt such a bad hand in SCV.
 
Ring said:
I always had the impression that 3B is one of her best moves, and one of the better moves in the game. It has properties that make up for the lack of NH damage. Also, it does combo consistently on some characters, like Asta.
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:Facepalm:

I meant 3A. It does stun but not long enough to combo further even though a lot of other characters have BS stun-combo's.


Ryoka said:
22_88B - I would also consider a higher launch on CH like what 3B does, so this actually leads into 6B8 on CH.
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This would pretty much give Ivy her 22_88B~9 B+K from SCIV back. Which would be awesome but semi-broken.
 
Ryoka said:
The move attracts attention to itself (offline) thanks to its noisy execution requirements and most importantly the bright white flash on Ivy that she has no business doing other than to signify an iCS. I see little rationale against requiring a JF-like break timing against the most difficult to perform JF in the game by far. Mashing was never the way to break out of SS/CS to begin with (in previous games), but rather a precise button press on sight unless you were capable of 12+ single button taps a second. That was also when SS/CS weren't nearly as difficult to perform as iCS is now. For how hard the move truly is to execute in a live match, and for how overt the move itself compared to previous games including IV, a very tight break window to match the just-as-tight requirements to land the throw on a living, breathing target feels warranted. The less surreptitious animation combined with the white flash they absolutely must tack onto every properly executed JF makes the move easy to spot and deal with, either by breaking or twitch ducking. The novelty of iCS being uncommonly used to good effect due to its difficulty wears thin when it's realized just how easy it is to deal with due to being dealt such a bad hand in SCV.
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This is the exact reasoning that made Alpha Patroklos as broken as he is now. I don't like the whole 'execution barrier' thing to make up for ridiculous properties of a move. Besides, it's only a matter of time before people can do it with no problem. I spent over 100 hours on iCS alone, now I can do it almost every time and I spam the hell of it, impossible is nothing.

In the previous games it was impossible to react to iCS/SS animations (different than regular throws) so everyone mashed A or B. The fact that it attracts attention due to noisy execution is also nothing new, it's been like that since SC1 haha. You can deal with this in many ways, though.
 
That's a good point, although iCS is ridiculously hard to perform, that doesn't warrant giving it ridiculously good properties. However, I do think there should be SOME reason to use iCS rather than an 8point damage increase, especially since it can't be buffered completely. Having a smaller break window, better meter gain for Ivy, a bit more damage, or higher clean hit chance... at least one of these things should be added to it, so that it has some purpose.
 
Even if you just do that, this is by far the worst iteration of CS/SS in the Soulcalibur series ever, and it's not even by a small margin like they usually depower them each game. The noise factor of SCV's iCS is a completely different beast that's really only comparable to SE->CS of the SCIII days. There's no sliding or rotational input or a generous buffer window per input to mask the noise, and the bright white flash that is only attributed to Ivy doing iCS makes things that much worse. There are whispers about regular CS being more threatening than iCS because of that flash other than from myself. Hell, people even said stuff about iCS in IV being a bright beacon to hit A because of the flash, and the grab animation itself was otherwise much more deceptive back then. It's not exactly congruent to aPat who has a multitude of fast, in your face normals that have great properties on JF.

Though I do not at all agree at all that a 3-4 frame break window would ever make the move ridiculously good given its other unsavory properties that do nothing but hold it back, it is at least generally agreed that iCS is still underwhelming in some way. Fact is I'm not even the Ivy main in the circle I play with, but I've only studied her enough to know that iCS is a pretty bunk deal. It's nice that one can sit and practice and do iCS somewhat consistently, but how many of those land against someone wise to the move that's sitting next to you? It would only ever sound "ridiculously good" by comparison to what it is now, but in comparison to other games, a 3-4 break iCS in V would still be significantly worse than IV's, unless those would be considered broken, too.

WhYYZ said:
This would pretty much give Ivy her 22_88B~9 B+K from SCIV back. Which would be awesome but semi-broken.
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I'm not sure what setup or combo this is supposed to be referring to in SCV.
 
The comparison to Alpha Pat comes from my conversation with one of the developers in London. I tried to explain that he is broken, has a stupid risk/reward ratio etc and they told me "if someone can do all his combos it's just his talent". I completely disagree with such logic. There will always be people who can master him and he will be practically unstoppable. Sooner or later same thing would happen to iCS. With 3 frame window break it would be very close to what CE is now, haha. That's why I think it should never go below 5 frames.

I think we all agree that iCS should be altered in some way, either by making the escape window smaller or increasing normal damage, making it bufferable etc. but it should be a change within a reason.

Yeah, this is probably the worst iteration of CS/SS but it was never perfect in any game. In SC2 both CS/SS were highly damaging but very slow moves (i21 IIRC) with small range. In SC3 they were amazing in terms of damage/speed ratio (i15) but it was possible to repel them with 6G, unlike other command throws in the game. In SC4 the buffer window was extremely short so it limited the use of iCS a lot.

I for one think that iCS in SC5 is better than in SC4, despite having a larger throw escape window. It create very strong mind games. You only need to show your opponent that you can do CS, then fake the movement into a mid or SS/A+G throw. When you see Ivy doing CS motion, how do you react? From my experience, most of the time people will mash B or duck.
 
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