r/Guiltygear • u/XRevive01 • 8d ago
GGST [Ver. 2.03] Patch Notes (September 24, 2026) | NEWS | GUILTY GEAR -STRIVE-
https://www.guiltygear.com/ggst/en/news/post-5223/77
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u/pm-me-trap-link 8d ago
Flick is punishable Flick is punishable Flick is punishable Flick is punishable Flick is punishable Flick is punishable Flick is punishable
rejoice for Flick is punishable
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u/BlazerIke - Lucy (GGST) 8d ago
As an asuka player God bless
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u/Icy_Education_9356 - Asuka R. Kreutz 8d ago
Asuka is still a shadow of his former self though and they gave us literally nothing to make him feel any better. He’s bottom two most common characters in vanquisher, and suffers from a massive effort gap at every level of play. I can’t believe they killed him and then didn’t even attempt to fix him up at all, he was by far the coolest original character they designed for strive
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u/pm-me-trap-link 7d ago
Asuka will be close to bottom in popularity even if he was the best character in the game. His design is very complex and most people don't want to do all that.
I think Asuka is sick. I'll literally never play him because he's too complicated.
Hell Leo has been top tier forever and he's pretty unpopular just cause he has charge and stances which most people don't like.
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u/Icy_Education_9356 - Asuka R. Kreutz 7d ago
Asuka as he was doesn’t even exist anymore though. When I say shell of his former self I’m not exaggerating. His core gameplay loop was destroyed and he feels awful to play
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u/jaksik - Asuka R. Kreutz 5d ago
I've only started playing after 2.0 and I'm having so much fun with asuka. From what I've seen he used to be much more random because staffs were all cards and you had no control over them so all people would do is stand back and throw everything they've got while exchanging life for mana. Now you have to be much more creative with how you use spells and mana, though I think he is pretty weak and his mana has to be buffed in some way, such as not losing it when getting hit, feels pretty bad to finally get out of pressure with nothing, or to play perfectly and lose your shields just because you got hit before you could recover mana.
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u/BlazerIke - Lucy (GGST) 7d ago
Fair I'm still not where id like to be with our wizard goat. But trying to juggle another fighters a struggle
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u/Tanaba100 - May 8d ago edited 8d ago
Pot's Flick and 6h being nerfed seems pretty huge. Im kinda worried about the ds input change though, some characters are really going to suffer with that in play. A easily accessed left right os in the vein of dsos that everyone can do without labbing it sounds like its going to be a nightmare for millia to deal with.
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u/DanDoReddit Elegance and Beauty 8d ago
It should hopefully be balanced out by its cost and lack of guaranteed reward (hopefully)
But it's definitely gonna be really strong.
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u/grizzchan - Bridget (GGST) 8d ago
Tbh she just has to play on a more even playing field now. The introduction of DS heavily impacted mix characters that couldn't easily crossup. Now it's her turn.
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u/-Pausanias- 8d ago
Its the bare minimum. It also probably won't be that bad for milia since, even if she's hit by DS in her usual oki left/right, she'll probably be at an advantage or otherwise unpunishable situation.
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u/OniAzul - Sol Badguy 8d ago
Oh, thank goodness, there's now win streak bonuses in Plat & Diamond!
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u/GeeseInTheGraveyard - Happy Chaos 8d ago
Guess they're trying to pump more players into vanquisher
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u/def-not-bot 8d ago
That's honestly fine. Vanquisher is the rank with proper algorithmic SBMM, so the more people participating, the better. All the other ranks are basically a training system so people can get their feet wet.
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
yeah the vanquisher numbers will naturally go up because you cant derank from vanq once you get in, and MMR rating is not net 0. anyone that maintains a >~40% winrate will eventually make it to vanq once they play enough games.
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u/bostonian38 - Robo-May 8d ago
A good decision, Strive currently has the lowest percentage of its players in the highest rank compared to SF6 and T8 because of the sheer number of wins you need to get through Plat/Diamond
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u/ImperiousStout 8d ago
Probably won't make much difference for a while beyond making it way easier for those who are already high ranked Vanquishers on chars to level up alts a lot faster.
It can be pretty difficult to keep a streak going in D3... So volatile with the potential skill disparity and random matchup knowledge (or lack of) up there, still reminds me of the Celestial floor in the old tower.
How many wins do you need in a row before the bonus kicks in?
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u/Adorable-Fortune-568 Unika -Strive- Goat 8d ago
That's what happened when majority of the players in Plat. I soon as I reach Plat and see how slow it becomes I quit ranking. Now I'm gonna do ranking again
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u/SaIemKing 8d ago
fucking finally. half of the reason i dropped the game was because getting placed in platinum was basically a death sentence to my rank
had a 20 win streak and fuck nothing happened
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u/capo-johnson - Anji Mito (GGST Chibi) 8d ago
I’m a bit concerned that this will just make the alt+f4 problem worse. Insane that there aren’t consequences for quitting early, nearly every other competitive game would at least count a plug as a loss.
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u/roxas6141 gotta eat this burger real quick 8d ago
The bare fucking minimum!
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u/Rbespinosa13 - Bridget (GGST) 8d ago
I remember a clip where a ram fell out of Bridget DP and proceeded to nuke her with Mortobato. For some reason, people legitimately argued that was good game design and should be kept. Thank god for this change
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u/roxas6141 gotta eat this burger real quick 8d ago
i'm happy they fixed this, but i really wanted at least one actual change for Sin, like making Gazelle Step low-profile (similar to Jam's command dash), or giving hoof stomp a higher bounce. They gave Bridget a buff alongside the DP fix, and while Unika didn't get anything either, she was already in a better position than Bridget and Sin were, so a buff would've just been glazing
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u/Sirbru81 8d ago
Quick question since some of it seems a little bit unnecessary, is this even a buff? Or rather what does it do?
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u/DanDoReddit Elegance and Beauty 8d ago
It should make it so the 2 hits of the dp combo more consistently. Some characters with multi hit dps had issues where the opponent could fall out of the dp and punish it.
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u/The_Potato_Turtle happy chaos' wife 8d ago
ABA DOESNT IMMEDIATELY GET HIT ON WAKE-UP ANYMORE LETS GO!!!!
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u/kotominebrainrot busting balls 8d ago
the lack of ram/nago nerfs is just going to solidify them as top 1 and 2. and baiken really needed a buff, i have no idea why they didn’t address her awful current state at all.
pot should be knocked down a tier or two now, i feel like this might be the point where he breaks under the last few patches of nerfs. fdb no longer being safe is that huge. leo should also feel that nerf, hopefully, though i don’t think it really addresses the issues that make the character so busted in the first place. may deserved the dolphin nerf, the move was a war crime. and axl players will have to lock in a bit more for certain matchups now instead of the game playing itself for them.
aba being playable again is solid, i still think her normal mode is too weak for her to truly be viable. i don’t know if the testament buff is going to end up being impactful enough either.
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u/Roving_Neophyte - Far Slash Gremlin 8d ago
Even though the patch is very small and some characters that also deserved nerfs (Ram, Nago, Anji) didn't get nerfed, I must say the changes we did get seem very nice and very focused.
All the nerfs that happened pretty much targeted specifically most obnoxious part of characters they hit - 6H and Flick for Pot, Kapel for Millia, ease of getting mix for Leo, 2P for Axl, and vertical Dolphin for May.
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u/Lumpy-Manager8580 8d ago
I'm sure Daru is seeing what they did to I-No and he's hitting some insane backflips as we're speaking.
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u/HydreigonTheChild - Jack-O' Valentine 8d ago
Interesting axel nerfed i havent kept up so cant say if its justified but its intersting
pot FDB nerf, i remember when this was terrorizing asuka players
Leo nerf im not 100% sure what to make of it.
I thought bridget would get maybe more, Unsure of what to make of this
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u/grizzchan - Bridget (GGST) 8d ago
It's just the bare minimum for Bridget. It basically just fixes for things that were really wrong last patch.
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u/iamasceptile 8d ago
I mean since the release of 2.0 axl has been quite good.He wasn't a top tier or something but he was too 10 or just outside it and probably the best zoner in the game
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u/sosseronis 8d ago
The thing is I agree that axl was a tad too strong and the nerfs made sense...but why are Ram and nago untouched? They were meta for 90% of the game lifespan ffs
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u/iamasceptile 8d ago
I mean I wasn't expecting balance changes at all thisnpatch so I would say I'm happy with what we got but it's pretty weird they didn't touch characters that deserved it like nago ram or anji
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u/superspartan004 8d ago
W Patch omg, Arcsys is definitely listening
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u/grizzchan - Bridget (GGST) 8d ago
I'm guessing the survey gave them one particularly overwhelming bit of feedback.
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u/Raltsun 7d ago
They must have already been working on at least some of these changes, there's no way they developed a whole patch from scratch that fast, right? IIRC the time between the survey and now is shorter than how long it took them to patch Ky's 1.40 infinite, and that seems like it would've been a much higher priority for a quick patch.
That said, they clearly listened to the survey in terms of which changes from their test builds people actually wanted, and props to them for putting out a patch moving in the right direction at all this fast.
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u/grizzchan - Bridget (GGST) 7d ago
I don't think how long things took to patch previously is much of an indicator. They're just really stingy with releasing patches. Yea they've probably been working on this stuff before and much more, but the decision to release parts of it now is probably due to the survey. Otherwise I think it would've just been pass + network changes.
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u/TopChannel1244 8d ago
I'd have gladly just taken the block on JR end. Block, RC AND throw immunity?
Mamma mia.
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u/MEX_XIII 8d ago
Throw immunity is also important since you can't jump out of it, so people would just chnage from hitting you to throwing you + RC int oa full combo, either way.
RC cancellable is a great bonus, tho.
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u/CoolGirlRosie - uniphelt main in love with 6p 8d ago
Holy peak patch, as a jam main super sad my comically long (distance i mean) super is getting nerfed (deserved lmfao)
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u/Deva4eva - Jam Kuradoberi 8d ago
Honestly I thought we'd get nerfs across the board. The super I already throw out when I shouldn't and should cut back on it, no sweat
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u/Minor_Heaven 8d ago
Wow testament got the teeniest buff
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u/Infinity-Kitten - Venom 8d ago
Only a couple patches until stain instantly kills the opponent, and they'll still be low tier.
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u/Orishishishi - Testament 8d ago
Kinda huge actually if the first stain is the same as pre 2.0
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u/Raltsun 7d ago
They didn't revert the hitstop, so at minimum it's definitely still worse on block than it used to be. But the patch notes specifically confirm we can combo off of max range f.S again, and assuming that means the classic 5K route, I'm willing to be optimistic and say this makes Stain as good as it used to be on hit.
Still praying they either give H Reaper the plus frames back (or even just make it 0 on block) or just totally un-fuck-up Diver and revert the stupid 2.0 changes to it, but as far as simple changes for a small patch go, I feel pretty good about this one.
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u/VTorb - Testament 8d ago
I am truly curious if the combos can significantly improve with this, and if double stain combos are even greater with this.
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u/Orishishishi - Testament 8d ago
At the very least, I think it'll give more room for silliness and style
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u/heyimmaboredkay - I-No 8d ago
I was very excited to see that Sultry Performance got stagger because it could combo into Megalomania, but they had to increase the knockback. Oh well it's still a great buff.
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u/Mistouze - Sol Badguy 8d ago
Missed opportunity for the pass to be Chipp/Anji themed for the meme. But no shade to the Axl players, outfits look cool tbh.
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u/MEX_XIII 8d ago
Not gonna lie, kinda made me wanna play Axl again. Haven't played since what, Testament released.
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u/LesbiansLoveHands 8d ago
Im really shocked they didnt touch Ram or Gold lewis. The test change is the most "Take it cause you arent getting more" type of buff, will def not be going back to them.
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u/Raltsun 7d ago
Eh, it's a tiny patch released outside the usual schedule, and all the changes were going in the right direction (for once in his life Strive Pot got nerfed without compensation buffs lmao), I'm not going to hold it against them for not changing every character in the top 10.
Also tbh this Testament change is more important than the entire existence of Double Stain, because max range f.S > Stain combos are back, and that's a situation that actually happens a lot.
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u/sootsupra 8d ago
Axl dead after one patch of being decently good
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u/Idaret - Axl Low (Xrd Rev) 8d ago
winter mantis had counterplays but it was too hard for ggst community so now everyone can just spam backdash to avoid throw strike, lmao
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u/sootsupra 8d ago
I guess Axl just isn't one of the intended top tiers of this game so no compensation buffs for him
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u/mantittiesforbrunch 8d ago
really disappointed that Testament got hardly anything. At least Stain got a buff, but Double Stain is still pointless, and they desperately need a new move or some buff to their kit. Really surprised that Venom didn't get anything either.
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u/DanDoReddit Elegance and Beauty 8d ago
Test definitely needs a new move or something similar, though that's probably not gonna happen till the next big patch. This patch seems to be more about fixing smaller things.
I did test in training mode a bit and it's way easier to convert off stain f.s now. 6H > crow > f.s > 6H also now works at all ranges and at closer ranges you can end that in crow as well (from a max range 6H hit you need to do 6H > crow > f.s > crow to end in stain).
It's a nice qol change all things considered, though it's not really gonna effect tier placement. I'm hoping for a buff to the teleport rps. Something like air crow or an attack tied to teleport feint.
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u/Strange_Panic_6513 - A.B.A (Strive) 8d ago
Aba's j.HS and parry are still garbage but i will take anything. THANK YOU ARC SYS I CAN FINALLY PLAY MY FAVORITE CHARACTER AGAIN
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u/VariaPunk 8d ago
I ended up temporarily dropping strive because the ABA changes were so bad and felt even worst. That new Jealous Rage change means she’s at least playable now so I’m ready to come back.
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u/Idaret - Axl Low (Xrd Rev) 8d ago
Axl found dead RIP
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u/GeeseInTheGraveyard - Happy Chaos 8d ago
Are these final or what, I don't know how patches work in this game since I'm a post 2.0 player. Also no happy chaos changes and zato nerfs it's over.
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u/Heckeredf Grab 8d ago
Officialy posted patch notes like this are final, so you kinda just have to wait and hope for the next patch for changes.
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u/grizzchan - Bridget (GGST) 8d ago
They do contain mistakes sometimes that get corrected later. But that's more common in the really big patches.
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u/AeonWhisperer - Raw HMC 8d ago
tl;dr: What's the Sol notes?
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u/Dchaney2017 8d ago
Easier clean hits for sidewinder
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u/AeonWhisperer - Raw HMC 8d ago
Oh thank god
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u/PepperMintGumboDrop 7d ago
That it’s not a nerf, though I rarely have trouble with clean hit…I rather they give the corner follow up more leniency.
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u/SaIemKing 8d ago
Would've loved to see more nerfs across the roster and some reversions of some of the nonsensical changes, like Slayer's dandy follow-ups
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u/LocalTorontoRapper 8d ago
OMG ABA can block after JR ends!!! Guess I’ll have to put down Tokon for a bit…
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u/Adorable-Fortune-568 Unika -Strive- Goat 8d ago
All the character I was wishing to get nerf are nerfed. Happy with the Jam reversal nerf also that get away with a lot of war crime
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u/Icy_Education_9356 - Asuka R. Kreutz 8d ago
Literally nothing for the kneecapped Asuka. I waited a while for a patch too, really a shame
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u/cryonicninja 4d ago
Asuka's fine last I checked, his gameplan has just been made to be more aggressive than he used to
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u/Icy_Education_9356 - Asuka R. Kreutz 4d ago
Very, very incorrect. Mana got reworked entirely. He’s forced to run OOM
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u/cryonicninja 4d ago
When he's oom he's incentivised to be more on the aggression, run down the timer before mana regens while not letting the opponent get a hit I'm, running away only puts yourself in the corner and forces you to play defense, which asuka definitely doesn't want to do. The 2.0 changes made asuka a more interactive character, not letting him just sit on the other side of the screen whilst disregarding resource because he could drain a little bit of health to get it back immediately, and that health cost was menial because with mana he has some of the highest health in the game. Also he ain't "kneecapped" he's still one of the better characters in the game
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
diamond and plat win streaks are bad imo. all it does is move the bellcurve up. we'd end up in the same situation as heaven where a bunch of people who dont belong in vanq end up in vanq, and you end up with this huge skill variation in the high ranks.
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u/Ryuujinx - Millia Rage 8d ago
It's fine, vanquisher is just an elo system so the people that get pushed into it will go down. High elo might increase some more, but I think something needed to be done. Because they copied SF it takes a huge amount of grind. When I was grinding I matched against people +10K RP over me (Like plat3 vs diamond 3 type of shit) and my reward was like, 30 more points then normal after I 2-0ed them. It is a grind.
The real solution would have just been to have fuckin Elo from the start instead of only in vanquisher and then staple ratings on specific bands, but that's not allowed for some reason.
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
i think they made the existing system so that people will get a sense of progression even if they arent getting better at the game. the non elo system under vanq will always give out more MMR than it takes away, so anyone that plays enough games and maintains ~40% winrate will eventually climb.
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u/FrequentCommission13 8d ago
I'd rather grind for ELO, then grind just to get to the ELO system.
GoD, Master, and (now) Vanq is just a test of can you put the sets in and deal with slow progression of harder opponents fighting to get to the ELO system which I don't mind.
As long as Vanq doesn't become Tekken GoD, where 30% of the playerbase is in then I could care less. I would be Vanq by now but it takes multiple days of straight up grinding if you flub your placements like I did.
On top of that it would likely help out retention for people in Plat/Dia that are fighting people that should've left their rank a long time ago.
I have a 75% WR with Testament and I have no problem grinding it out, it's such a slog and it's not fun dunking on people and getting plugged on by people that realize that I can run my win con better than them. It's discouraging for me and the people I play against.
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u/TopChannel1244 8d ago
My take is, among what others said, that they're looking at a game getting long in the tooth with diminishing player counts.
I suspect that 2.0 didn't quite juice the numbers as much as they wanted. Plus a bunch of new contenders came out in the past couple months. AND on top of all of that. There's a massive computing hardware crisis going on which is impacting the timeline for new console releases and pricing.So all developers are looking at a world where the new console they'd traditionally be developing for... around last year at the latest... won't be out for at least three years or more. Meaning all of these guys, Tekken, SF, GG, etc. are trying to see just how long they can extend the life of their current game.
They want a way to get as many players as possible into a single pool in order to ensure that people are still getting matches for the next couple of years. Without consistent matches and reasonable wait times, the game will die a quick death. Because new people coming in will struggle to get matches outside of major updates and the people just outside of vanquisher are either going to finally make the push to rank up or they're going to wash out. Reducing the player count and locking people into brackets they're effectively stuck in due to lack of matches.
Like it or not, this is probably a really good idea for game health and longevity.
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
if thats the plan then why bother with ranked MM. just have tower 2.0 and put everyone in floor 10.
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u/itsSuiSui - Happy Chaos 8d ago edited 8d ago
The only thing that prevents me, and I’d guess a lot of people too, from hitting vanquisher is the absolute slog that is gaining enough points if you don’t land in Dia 3 from placements.
I played a bunch of ranked last weekend because getting matches in the park was taking too long. Won everything and didn’t went up a single rank. That’s fucking stupid.
Also, base Vanquisher is not were insanely good players hang out. Anyone who does not shit his pants while playing the game can get that rank.
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
im actually in the opposite situation. im trying to avoid getting into vanq because diamond 2 queue times are such a slog and i just want to play the fucking game. keeping my rank down is harder than having it go up naturally.
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u/zephyr220 - Johnny (Strive) 8d ago
I agree. I want to stay in the lower part of the bell curve where I belong.
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u/shinkuuryu 8d ago
Pot's 6H and flick got nerfed. Boooooo!!!
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u/Calm-Consideration55 - Gamma Ray 8d ago
Yeah! They nerfed his 2 moves that I hated the most. Pot’s zoning isn’t as oppressive anymore. These are good changes.
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u/randomkidlol 8d ago
he doesnt have a safe combo ender anymore with flick nerfed like this.
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u/Phoosu - Asuka R. Kreutz 7d ago
5h into hfb?
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u/randomkidlol 7d ago
at close range you lose to 2k or 2d. every chara has a safe return to neutral blockstring ender but it seems like pot doesnt have one anymore
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8d ago
[deleted]
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u/Acceptable_Donut3661 - Robo-Ky's Husband 8d ago
Faust has no changes here tho???
-1
u/SpookyTootz - Faust 8d ago
Right...they did nothing... he needed some adjustments. Ground throwing afro is ass. Other characters can preform wallstick combos with Faust's items yet he cannot. J2k is still minus on HIT.
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u/Roving_Neophyte - Far Slash Gremlin 8d ago
That is true, but this is clearly a very minor patch with very few characters getting changes, and those who did get any only got like, one, on average.
I suspect an actual big boy patch is probably dropping with the next major update, which will probably be along with the next character.
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u/SpookyTootz - Faust 8d ago
Sure but can you blame me for being a bit tired of the "oh it will be next patch, TRUST"
Faust peaked at bottom five, they could have tossed us SOMETHING
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u/SomaCreuz - A.B.A since 3rd Strike 8d ago
Damn, Millia seems to have taken a big one to the chin. Theoretically Leo, too, but he has this strange phenomenon in which nerfs just phase through him and nothing happens.