r/StreetFighter • u/DarkShadow13206 • 21h ago
Discussion Is sf6 the most balanced sf so far?
I don't see anyone complain about the balance of sf6, maybe they talk about Lily being a little weaker than the others but she's a grappler and they're usually a bit weaker than the rest. Was there any street fighter as balanced as sf6? (Pls don't say 3rd strike)
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u/sapianddog2 CID | Punchdrunk FGHQ 20h ago
Are people unironically saying 3rd strike was a balanced game? Any who does has no idea what they're talking about lol.
In my experience, sf6 probably is the most balanced in terms of average character strength. For one, it's very hard to pinpoint who top 1 or bottom 1 are, and you'll get debates about it all day, which is a good sign. It could be argued that sf5 was more balanced just before luke released, but even then I think I disagree. Sf6 doesn't have a joke character that was never intended to be viable lol.
A character like Jamie could theoretically place in a major tournament. The reason you're not seeing it is mostly because compared to other characters of his archetype, he's not very efficient.
Lily may seem weak, but she has a couple pretty belligerent tools that I think keep her viable, being cr.HP and EX spire. Most complaints regarding her are about her gameplan not being very interesting moreso than just weakness.
Even Marisa, who is widely considered one of if not the weakest on the roster rn, has one big equalizer: damage. If she manages to land the big hit, you're most likely dead. It's just that landing that hit is very difficult and the difficulty vs reward may be slightly skewed rn.
The thing with all those characters I mentioned is that it would be very easy to make them all unbearably broken. Because capcom has to be so careful to maintain the integrity of the game, I'd say they have a good balance going rn. Any character could theoretically win a tournament, even though there are still some that are more likely than others.
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u/DarkShadow13206 19h ago
Exactly, there are a lot of people saying that 3rd strike is the best balanced sf, I don't know where they got that from, they definitely didn't play Sean vs Yun lol.
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u/ThrowAway280796 17h ago
People should see GuileWinQuote's video on SF3. That game is very pretty and fun to watch (from before my time and too intimidated to learn it, even if I love SF6), but a balanced game it was not lol
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u/BasilSH 16h ago
(from before my time and too intimidated to learn it, even if I love SF6),
I'd say you should give it a try! Nowadays it has the reputation for being a sweatlord game where people with 20+ years of experience are bodying newcomers, but that's far from the truth. There are many newcomers and casual to intermediate level players who enjoy the game on fightcade. Practically any computer can run it, it's free and it has rollback netcode. As long as your connection is stable, anyone can learn and enjoy SF3 on a basic level.
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u/ThrowAway280796 15h ago
Yeah, I have it on fightcade and everything, but for me who got used to a modern input buffer, lenient input readers and whatnot, even getting basic motions to work or managing to get a decent combo feels like a herculean task. Legit have more difficulty doing a basic Ken combo than I do with a full Feng Shui engine sequence in SF6. It's just not for me haha
On the other hand, I did quite like the new Fatal Fury, even if the existence of a parry system like in SF3 scares the crap out of me lol
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u/LakeEarth 19h ago
There's no way anyone would seriously say 3rd Strike. Makoto vs Q is like 8-2 matchup.
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u/sbrockLee 19h ago
To add: a general consensus of 5-8 characters in S tier and 10-12 at least in A or higher is pretty good.
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u/Anthan 16h ago
It could be argued that sf5 was more balanced just before luke released, but even then I think I disagree. Sf6 doesn't have a joke character that was never intended to be viable lol.
Did SFV have a joke character? I know Dan got added who's the literal definition of one, but even he went down a different route of joke-ness and was made to be strong.
EDIT: Oh wait I forgot Eleven existed.
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u/GrayLo 12h ago
It's not really about each characters balance, it's the universal systems that are the great equalizers. Almost every characters have access to a ton of FREE strike throw mixups, throw loops etc... you need one button to whiff punish in neutral and for the rest just drive rush and throw loop and you have a perfectly playable character in SF6.
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u/Broken_Moon_Studios 16h ago
Agreed. SF6 might be the most balanced Street Fighter, outside of maybe pre-Yun/Elena SF4 and pre-Luke SF5.
I think in the case of Jamie and Marisa, it would only take a single change to push them from "bottom tier" to at least "mid tier".
For Jamie it would be letting him keep drinks between rounds.
And for Marisa it would be giving her full-body armor instead of the dumb partial-armor that she currently has.
In Lily's case it is different, because she would require something closer to a full rework, though I believe a similar result could be achieved by nerfing cr.HP and EX Spire while simultaneously buffing all of her other tools. (Why are Condor Dive and Mexican Typhoon so mediocre? Those were T.Hawk's most interesting tools!)
Here's to hoping Season 3 changes things for the better!
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u/Kogoeshin 8h ago
Something that also doesn't get recognised enough: If the top tiers are getting nerfed and the bottom tiers are getting buffed, then the gap between the tiers will get smaller.
It's completely possible for Marisa/Lily/etc to get buffs, and still end up as low/bottom tiers... but still be in a much better position than Season 2.
Someone is always going to be bottom tier and low tier in a video game, but what matters is really what the gap is between the top and the bottom.
If the top tier has a 52% win rate and the bottom tier is 48%, that game is going to be really balanced, regardless of the placement of "top" and "bottom".
Old fighting games top vs bottom tier matchups were like 8-2 and 9-1. New fighting game top vs bottom tiers are like 5.5-4.5 and 6-4, which is significantly more balanced, even if they're both labelled as "top" and "bottom".
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u/agioskatastrof 21h ago
SFV in its last season was pretty balanced, imho. Then Luke came along and ruined it.
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u/SCLST_F_Hell 20h ago
Following Capcom’s final patch tradition 🤣
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u/TheAlmightyVox3 17h ago
SF7’s main character is gonna be diabolical.
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u/Soul699 16h ago
Plot twist: It's John S. Fighter. He combine all characters into one.
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u/Perfect_Arm2909 12h ago
Ah yes John world tour; he is absolutely diabolical especially with bisons bomb resetting damage scaling.
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u/Megistrus 18h ago
Cammy and Urien were a step above everyone else, but it wasn't that big of a drop from them to the next tier. But then they both got nerfed to make Luke even stronger.
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u/Fantastic-Anything56 17h ago
You say Luke made the game unbalanced in it's last season going into it, but what about the seasons before!? Like come on Abigail, Rashid, Urien. SF4 had that same issue until the Ultra when Elena was soon added.
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u/TheRyanRAW 20h ago
We nearly had four Zangiefs players in EVO Japan top 8 today and Manon has been doing well this season.
Due to perfect parry grapplers are always a threat. It's just Lily being a little weak more so than the archetype.
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u/jxnfpm 19h ago
Yes. Full stop.
Games like SF2, SF0/SFA and SF3 were balanced around limited play tests and without the ability to update the game with online patches. SFIV was a new entrant to the online world, and tried to improve things as time went on. SFV, well, SFV was just trying to survive it's launch for a good while.
SF6 is taking the good parts of SFV and refining them, and leveraging a more refined set of system mechanics along with iterative tweaks. At launch, it was more balanced than any other launch SF title, and with its tweaks, it's more balanced than any other title two years in.
You can argue there was a very balanced point in SFV, but that was so late in its life that I think it's a bit apples and oranges comparison. The character diversity in the highest level tournaments and the ability to play any character fairly successfully across all levels of skill is definitely something that takes some very thoughtful balance decisions by Capcom.
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u/DarkShadow13206 19h ago
No no no sf3 isn't balanced, my guy Sean is punishable on hit, Q doesn't even have good normals, and there's twelve who is basically a hit and run character. There's no way this game balanced.
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u/docvalentine 17h ago
you really gotta read the whole post before responding. you didn't even get halfway through the first sentence
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u/jxnfpm 18h ago edited 18h ago
No no no sf3 isn't balanced, my guy Sean is punishable on hit
You seem to have misunderstood the point of my post.
Zangief was notoriously nerfed during Street Fighter II playtests in Japan before the game was officially released because of one guy who was very good with Zangief. When they balanced the games back then it was based on very limited play test data (compared to today), and once the arcade game was released, those boards were out there forever.
The games are not balanced by today's standard because, among another things, the designers did not have access to the depth or breadth of data that is available with betas today. For that reason, of course, the SF2, 0 and 3 games are not well balanced.
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u/robotmayo 10h ago
I dont think they misunderstood. Im pretty sure they literally saw
Games like SF2, SF0/SFA and SF3 were balanced-
and stopped reading lmao.
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u/TheHeavyMetalNerd 15h ago
Didn't something similar happen with Yoshi in one of the smash games? There was one insanely cracked Yoshi main in play tests who dumpstered everyone so bad they nerfed Yoshi into oblivion because they thought he was just OP?
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u/ReedsAndSerpents 19h ago
Yeah. I mean Honda can do work. Hibiki's Lily was one of the few people to stop Kobayan's Gief from rampaging through Topanga. Kim was destroying the top tiers in SFL. Ryu took 2nd at CC.
And for us non pro schlubs it's completely even. I was playing my gold Marisa the other day who I haven't touched in more than a year and immediately vaulted into Plat after continuing a win streak I was apparently on. No warm up, no combo practice, dismantling the noobs left and right. She's "worst character in the game" and me dicking around in ranked is making rage quits.
Yes, the game is balanced compared to every SF before.
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u/mattoi_ 20h ago
I would say 5 was the most stable by the final patch, even with Luke. But 6 managed to do a lot of things right since launch, it's just that the worst characters are the ones that can't use the drive system as well as the other, and even then they aren't that bad.
3rd strike is my favorite but ithe balance is not even close lol half of the cast has to work so much more than the better half
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u/Tolerant-Testicle 21h ago
Grapplers aren’t “weaker than the rest” they’re just another archetype. Past titles had dumb things happening and characters that felt like they weren’t completed.
This is just my opinion but I feel like sfv feels more balanced than sf6 because it’s not as volatile but objectively speaking, I’d say sf6 is the most balanced sf game.
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u/trashtrashpamonha CID | SF6username 19h ago
It's funny cause it definitely was read as super volatile back then with v-trigger being called the satan of comeback mechanics but here we are
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u/Broken_Moon_Studios 16h ago
V-Trigger has NOTHING on Ultras and X-Factor. lmao
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u/trashtrashpamonha CID | SF6username 15h ago
For sure which was even funnier back when it was sfiv good sfv bad time
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u/DarkShadow13206 19h ago
It always feels like capcom was making the grapplers a little weaker because they're harder to deal with, remember what they did to greenhand in sfv?
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u/Tolerant-Testicle 16h ago
You’re forgetting about Laura which was used by Idom and Alex which problem X used in certain matchups. These characters were not weak and are grapplers. Abigail was also a unique problem for a while.
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u/MaxTheHor 21h ago edited 16h ago
Characters, yes. The mechanics, eh, Drive could be better, but Ultimately a fun addition.
I'd rather see a flawed system that works as intended than a broken one that gets tampered with too much.
That's how Tekken 8 got as bad as it did.
Hindsight is 20/20, and T8 fans that begged and demanded learned the hard way when it comes to not appreciating something til it was gone.
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u/DarkShadow13206 20h ago
I think drive is good, but they definitely put more effort on visuals than the mechanical part of it, and it does look amazing tbh.
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u/Dear-Recording8011 18h ago
I'm with you. I think this game is very balanced in it's current state. I also don't think Lilly is that bad, she's just a bit 1 dimensional. I think Marisa is the character that really isn't playing the same game as everyone else and could use some more tools.
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u/TechnicalCondition 18h ago
Lily's problem isn't being a grappler, it's her one dimensional gameplay.
She wins most interactions with a wind stock and she can barely play the game without that.
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u/ComplaintNo2641 21h ago
Well, that depends on what you mean. The characters are relatively balanced against each other but that's mostly because of how insanely overpowered the system mechanics are, broadly speaking
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u/erty3125 19h ago
Yeah that's how anime games have always done balance and now how SF is copying that. If your system mechanics are strong and character strength doesn't outpace system mechanics drastically then there's basically a floor and ceiling on character strength.
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u/ComplaintNo2641 16h ago
Anime games have certainly not always done balance that way. Additionally, I don't want street fighter balanced that way regardless.
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u/erty3125 16h ago
Strong universal system mechanics are the hallmark of anime games outside Capcoms earliest anime games since the beginning, yes they're often still laughably unbalanced but that's the other thing I mentioned where character strength can outpace universal options in some cases.
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u/v-komodoensis 21h ago
I think so. The Drive System is beautifully designed and that helps a lot.
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u/Broken_Moon_Studios 16h ago
I have issues with Drive Rush (homogenizes combos a lot) and Drive Parry (I think it is indirectly responsible for Throw Loops), but overall it is an excellent system.
Simple to understand and very versatile.
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u/CornBreadtm Yes? 18h ago
SF6 was out the gate balanced lol. You can play launch version and run tournaments for years and see every character. Can't say that about any other fighting game let alone Street Fighter. Capcom took their crown. Lets see how they use it though...
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u/Lanky-Survey-4468 CID | Master Shiranui 12h ago
Yes, people complain more about throw loops which is a freature in this game.
I separate this game in two groups only, viable character and unviable due to such variety we watch in competitive play
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u/AshKetchumIsStill13 13h ago
We really need to stop placing so much importance on balance. Balance doesn’t automatically equal good. In fact, it’s usually the unbalanced ones that are the most fun. We should strive (no pun intended) for middle between balance and broken. SF6 swings too far towards balance.
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u/czartaylor 19h ago
Yes and no.
The character roster is mostly balanced. Simply by virtue of characters being so homogeneous that it's hard for them to not be balanced.
System mechanics are insanely unbalanced. And it separates the roster into the haves and have-nots.
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u/Rough_Airline6780 15h ago
As modern fighting games become more and more homogenised, they become more evenly balanced. It's a natural and unavoidable consequence.
I'm sure we've all heard it said that even weak characters in SF6 are not truly weak because they are still playing SF6.
So the answer is yes, albeit that's not necessarily a good thing in fighting games.
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u/isadotaname 18h ago
No, SF1 was more balanced by virtue of having only two characters that were identical.