Part of what makes grapplers weak is that they often require a detailed understanding of every other character's options. They're usually so slow that they spend most of the match blocking everything the opponent feels like throwing at them before finally getting their turn. Then you have "evolved" grapplers like Potemkin, who have enough options to actually play the game from the get-go.
Really interestingly, near the end of Smash Wii U's competitive lifespan, almost every top player picked up a secondary grappler in either DK or Bowser. The general thought behind it was that the prime meta threats in Cloud and Bayonetta, both more or less rushdown characters, won neutral with about the same degree of consistency whether it was against a grappler, zoner, or rushdown character. DK and Bowser allowed you to take games from Cloud an Bayo in 6 total interactions rather than the 20 another top tier would require.
I know, Bowser in both 4 and Ultimate is also kind of a stasised, meta-proof consistent pick, because he has really good defensive burst options, and always has a resting chance of just killing someone in a couple interactions, even if he's getting his spiky ass handed to him. Less in Ultimate, Bowser with Rage in 4 was silly. In Ultimate, he couples that with a pretty neat rushdown/grappler(esque) hybrid thing. Ultimate Bowser is FAST, and surprisingly difficult to zone out.
Bayonetta could kill either in one interaction lol. Cloud struggled more, but even then it was a winning matchup simply because he could just not interact.
@@Thorognahbayo's side and upb both ignored the weight value of the character they hit, so superheavies objectively faired better into bayo combos than a character like jiggs.
The main problem with grapplers is the same thing that make pixies too good... Devs overestimate the value of health bars and single hit damage. Grapplers often effectively lose access to lots of game mechanics to compensate for their high hp... While pixies are given more and more tools to compensate for their low health... but then, the health bar barely makes a difference. What devs for any game have to keep in mind is that what make a character powerful is how many (effective) options they have. Not how high are their raw numbers.
I'm with you on that one. Damage numbers are more easily adjusted, getting a character's options right on the first run of implementation often determines where they'll end up tier-wise.
yeah you're right but Grapplers sometimes makes extreme damage but the problem is that they have to get close to you and they are slow and hard to play
Yup. And when they do get in, they often have the hardest to execute moves (360 motions/buffering anyone?). Way too much work for too little payoff. Meanwhile most rushdown/pixie characters can do more damage with simple BNB combos and its widely considered fine gameplay. Zoners also get hurt because they are given low health, slow moves, and limited options for the benefits of range (which is fine but often a bit over tuned). I am also a bit dubious about the claims of a high-tiered grappler being inherently unfun. I'm not sure why fighting a grappler is inherently more frustrating than any number of rushdown characters who can 50/50/vortex you at will. Characters like Broly, Potemkin, Clark etc... show you can have fun and effective grapplers that don't destroy popularity/the meta all that much. I think your premise about the overvaluing of single hits and HP bars hits close to the real reason. Its a fighting game 'truism' that people have repeated forever that just really isn't true (outside of a rare few like Potemkin who actually hits like a truck).
So the first grappler character that comes to mind that’s generally really strong is King from Tekken. I don’t think he’s ever been top tier, but I’m fairly certain he’s ranged from mid to high in every game he’s been in. That said, it’s rarely his grab game that makes him so good. He’s also insanely fun to play/watch.
I have very limited tekken experience, so bear with me: I'm assuming wavedashing and kbds are your preferred way of moving. Do characters have different dash startups/distances/qualities and does that translate to character categories? asked differently, is king less mobile than other - specifically non-grappler - characters?
Tekken also doesn't really have projectiles, they still have zoners in a way with some attacks having big hitboxes but in general grapplers are better in Tekken just cause they don't have to deal with projectiles as much. Then even in 7 which added a lot of projectile characters you can still use the z axis to sidestep them much easier than in a 2D fighter
@@ddublu If I remember correctly KBD’s are universal except on characters that have a back sway like Paul or Bryan (they can still KBD but it’s harder). Wave Dashing is exclusive to characters that have special steps like the Mishimas and Bruce. I don’t think King can Wave Dash, but he has other mobility tools like this neat little spin jump. As for dash startup, I actually have no idea.
@@GodOfOrphans Yeah, the only characters that had projectiles throughout the series were the Devil characters. At high level though, even those lasers were useless because of side stepping, like you said, and cause slow startup.
I think it's important to note that for old school fighters, zoners were by far and away the strongest archetypes. SF2 was always dominated by Guile, Dhalsim, and Sagat and it wasn't until later games like Dark Stalkers and everything that came after where mobility started to matter more and rush down characters could start showing their strength. As for a game with a strong grappler, how could you have forgotten Jupiter from Sailor Moon S?
I think a lot of the reason zoners are a little poorer now is because devs remember how strong they used to be in games like SF2. Like, Balrog has several re-dizzy combos in Champion Edition, but he ranks at the very bottom in most tier lists for the game because it is so easy for most characters to keep him from ever getting close enough to unleash his fury. Just updating his Turn Punch to allow it to go through projectiles in Hyper Fighting made a lot of difference in how usable he was against zoners. Still considered low-tier, though, even in HF.
Very interesting, loaded question. A strong deciding factor is the game that the characters are in and the mechanics that govern those characters. Let’s look at Injustice2, a game notorious for strong zoning because of the chip damage, lack of fast movement, the pushback on projectiles, and the large screen size. Zoning was the meta of that game whether it’s strong zoning or strong counter zoning, every top tier could zone or could get around zoning. Then you look at MKX where there’s a run button, everybody does 30-40% damage for one bar, and everybody has 50/50 mix, the rush down characters are the dominating archetype in that game. It just really depends on the game and mechanics
He said all of that though. He mentioned that Nether Realm games typically have stronger zoners, and he specifically mentioned the Injustice series. His point is that in most games zoners aren't great. We can look at the zoner characters in SF2 (pick your favorite version) and they're very strong. Then 3 came out and they became irrelevant due to the parry mechanic. MVC has only had one decent zoner in their entire lineup and that's Megaman from MVC2. But that was more cheese (jump backwards and spam heavy punch) than anything else. Even in MKX, the two best (and frankly only viable) characters were a zoner and a rush down. Even in a Nether Realm game where they like to have strong zoners, the other broken character is rush down. Even the exceptions have broken rush down characters. TLDR; other than a few outliers, zoners have become weak, grapplers have almost always been weak, and rush down is the strongest. That's the new normal for fighting games.
@@fumoffu_l Not only you didn't add anything new, but you only gave wrong information. In MKX, all types of the 4 types of archetypes (Zoning, Rushdown, Balanced and Grapplers) are viable, it's just that Rushdown is the most accessible one, but all 4 of them had at least some chars with Variations for that archetypes that were viable. Also in MVC games there were other strong Zoners besides Megaman, there were Magneto (outside of MVC2), Morrigan (MVC3), Sentinel, Dr. Doom and more. Having Zoning chars not strong is only in the last few years. Yes there are more and more games that purposefully make Rushdown chars the strongest, but it's only really in recent years that this trend is going on, and just like you said SF3 had way back in the late 90's. At the end of the day, it's all about the game and the mechanics, and the characters will get stronger accordingly.
@@RoyArkon I mean I wouldn’t count doom , magneto and sentinel good for their zoning. With doom and sentinel they have amazing assist games. Doom also has great air play and sentinel has a bunch of armor . Magneto will just bash you from the air. They have good zoning but its not what makes them top tier.
@@egekazkayas8968 Magneto and Doom are both well-rounded characters, they both can play Zoning and Rushdown (again, aside from MVC2 as in this game Magneto is indeed not a Zoner) and Sentinel is 100% Zoner, pretty much his entire moveset are projectiles that cover the screen from so many different angles.
My observation is that grapplers as an archetype are not designed for both players to have fun at all points of the match. It's a very different type of grind than other characters but it can be exhilarating to make the right reads and kill your opponent in a few hits. Ironically, grapplers are probably the most realistic archetype in terms of how people fight (think brazilian ju jitsu)
When grapplers are done right they are my favorite archetype bar none. I love the feeling of out thinking my opponent or commiting to a risky move and having it pay off. when you're losing your losing pretty badly but winning makes it worth it. As someone who does actually fight and do some martial arts I wish more game would make grappling accurate to how it is irl. Grapplers aren't big slow heavy guys. They're big fast heavy guys. Grappling is fast not slow.
@@azechase6597 exactly, and instead of ridiculous damage there could be a trade off for unique movement options and better oki. I love ramon for this in KOF but he is still bottom tier somehow...
Figuring out how to do well with a grappler is incredibly rewarding, for sure. I almost always have a secret-best character and they're almost always grapplers where I've figured out something degenerate. You have to keep them in your pocket most of the time lest you anger your friends though...
@@azechase6597 There are a few "fast" grapplers that focus on using grabs for resets rather than pure damage (Android 16 and Kouma from Melty come to mind)
I think Street Fighter 5 has a good variety of characters : -Dhalsim is an excellent zoner -Ken and Luke are excellent Shotos -Alex and G are very good Grapplers -Cammy and Rashid excellent rushdown -Karin and Kolin good neutral characters
I main a character in Killer Instinct called Kan-Ra, who falls into the - I guess - unique category of a "trappler". He plays like - and has the damage output of - a zoner, he can attack like a grappler, he has the respective weaknesses of these two archetypes, but makes up for it via his trap setup game. The opponent can't just run into him and unga-bunga if he has used his distance to make setups. He's such an interesting character because of this.
Everything is fast in Vampire Savior (well, besides Victor and Anakaris) but I really feel like Fish is a trap character mixed with a rush down (possibly the first "trap" archetype ever?)... his dash is good and he has a lot of offensive tools. It's just that he shines when he gets the opponent in a corner and starts throwing out bubbles to trap them. He's the closest thing to a zoner in this game and really interesting.
@ytm23akNess isn't really a trapper. You can bait attacks, but that's with everyone. Ness is a zoner, with next to no grappling. Snake is a trapper, possibly "trappler" since his grabs are a much bigger part of his combo game than Ness.
"Grapplers aren't fun for others to play against"... I've heard this argument before, like Catalyst on event hubs said in one of their podcasts "grapplers should NEVER be top tier." when talking about the end of Street fighter 5 going into street fighter 6. But i disagree... I'll predicate this statement by saying that I do not like to play as grapplers, but I know plenty of people that do. But I think the aforementioned statement is a pretty poor excuse to have grapplers nerfed. Just because their play style doesn't conform to how you want to play the game doesn't mean that they shouldn't be able to take advantage their toolkits. As long as they're balanced, and not unbeatable, there's no reason there shouldn't be variety. Those people that don't like fighting against grapplers have to put in the time to learn how to play around them. I feel it's important to have matchup knowledge and experience against all archetypes.
@@GM_Lemmy 100% this weird fgc philosophy that there is one specific honest and fun way to play the game, wether it be rushdown or neutral based shoto (it really just depends on the game) is kind of annoying. It's honestly just majority consensus, people just don't like losing, which makes sense, but that's an individual battle and not one indicative of game design. The majority of a playerbase gravitates towards shoto and rushdown characters, and because of that, their interpretation of what is and isn't fun eventually becomes the accepted one. But in reality, the grappler is having just as little fun when they're holding down back all game, and the zoner isn't enjoying your full screen burst options whenever they try to get their fireball pressure going. People who complain are going to complain, there just happens to be a larger sample size of complainers in the playerbases for more standard archetypes.
@@jackredfield5993 I have to say I have more fun being zoner out as a rushdown character than rushed down as a zoner. I find space control more interesting part of the game than mix ups. Mix ups and combos get glorified as the most important part of fighting games but we are all different
The problem is that "playing around them" basically means playing like a zoner - don't let them get close to you so they can't threaten you with their grab. Which, unless you're playing a zoner already, might not be a play style you enjoy. In which case, makes sense that fighting them would be something you don't enjoy doing, regardless of their power level competitively, no?
zoners are an interesting case. I'd say that in a vacuum, zoners are the strongest archetype, but in the context of basically every modern game they're pretty weak. If nothing else, I don't think the others mentioned needed mechanics added to deal with them specifically. I wish more grapplers were like Shermie or Ramon (in theory).
He picked frieza, worst example imo , bcs dbzfighters are almost FULL of rushdowns , I think zoners are pretty strong , also because this archetype is famous with being salt-inducing , people can't deal with them when they're not skilled enough 💀
What does "in a vacuum" even mean in this context? It sounds like you're saying "if you take away everything that isn't a zoner, then zoner is the strongest"
I really enjoyed this video. I like when you tackle these topics across the entire fighting game genre. To be honest I don't know how much of that you can really do. Logistically I think you're gonna have to go into specific games a lot more. But I enjoyed this.
From my experience, I’d say that zoners and rushdown characters have the potential to be the most powerful depending on the game. Grapplers are definitely on the lower end. Shotos/balance types are usually high tier/mid because their arsenal just lets them deal with all the other archetypes and rarely have almost impossible to win match-ups like a grappler vs a zoner. Then you have the absolutely borderline broken characters like Swiftmaster who have every tool to win a match, ridiculous damage off any hit, and the pros of their respective archetype, in this case: speed, mix-up, and setplay (rushdown). If they had given him a command throw then that would have just been adding insult to injury.
Nice vid! Some other archtypes that i think are worth discussion are characters who have a gameplan around using armored moves such as Vaseraga from GBVS and also 'puppet' characters you see mostly in anime fighters like Zato and Zappa etc. You can argue that these characters fall into the catagories you've listed, but i think their gameplan is different enough for them to merit a seperate discussion.
Puppet Fighters are weird in meta, as small changes can make them either very strong or very weak. Zappa was not as powerfull in AC untill later revisions added stuff like the sword that he can pressure with fullscreen (including an overhead) and the dog. Zato in Xrd SIGN started out very strong, but by the end of Xrd Rev 2 (the final revision for Xrd), Zato was almost near the bottom, beat by Potemkin. I think what was changed among other stuff was how his drill attack, Invite Hell, worked. DEB went into more detail on her video on Arcsys balance. Allthough, from my research, they're more often really good.
puppet is more like 'playstyle' rather than 'archetype'. for example, dhalsim/axl is a zoner with long limbs. launcher is a zoner with projectiles. zato is a zoner with his puppets. whenever the character is able to put pressure while maintaining distance, they are what we call zoners.
@@mohdnazri7126 just wanted to mention that all puppet characters arent zoners, Devo in Jojo Hftf for example is only made more vulnerable when his puppet is out but if you can get your puppet behind the enemy your combos triple in damage output
I wish the "brawler" archetype was more well represented in fighting games. Close range, trouble getting in, but with short combo strings that do really good damage. Someone that plays like a grappler but uses short strings instead of throws.
@@hoodedstreetmonk352 third strike alex. I know he was low tier, but his move set, aesthetics, and mind game were the most fun I've ever had with a fighter. Psyching out your opponent by swapping between weak, fast grapples and really strong 3 hit strings always made him feel so much more violent than the rest of the cast.
A pretty interesting video (series), I think, would be a deep dive into less common archetypes. Not so much how strong they are, but _what_ they are, what makes them cool and interesting, maybe showing some iconic examples.
I think “level up” characters (susanoo, Zappa, ss4gogeta, etc…) in fighting games usually end up being very polarizing, the strongest or the weakest. Personally though I’m a big fan of the resource management characters! They can also be pretty polarizing in terms of balance. Some of my mains are Jack-o, Umbrella, and Rachel alucard.
I detest fighting Potkemin from GG. But he's a great grappler because he has a counter for everything. I play Cerebella in Skullgirls, she is like a rush down mix, and has plenty of options to get past even projectiles.
If it makes you feel better, most of the high level pro Pot players just don't even bother competing in big tournaments because he also has some of the worst matchups in strive lol. Hell even other Pot mains like myself don't like the Pot mirror
@@AstralTaurus I love the Pot mirror for being absolute chaos. I don't think the better Pot wins with any consistency unless the gap is enormous but damn if it ain't always an absolutely silly spectacle. That said, you're dead-on about high level play, and while he was generally in a okay spot for most of season 1 (only Goldlewis proved functionally insurmountable), season 2 seems to have only made Pot even worse while making some of his worst MUs *worse for him.* He now has a bit most silliness in areas he was already doing okay, but Goldlewis got massive buffs for example while Potemkin lost his only reversal (even if it was a pretty bad one), all while they pushed Potemkin even further in terms of execution demands. I was out here throwing karas all over the place already, but now they want me to 236236S, hold for no more than 11 frames, RC, and then 632146K~P just for a half decent reversal to get out of pressure? Is it hilarious when you do it perfectly? Absolutely. Does it put the fear of god in your opponent when you just facetank through their oki and grab them for a Buster instead? Absolutely. Is it also literally 16 inputs in less than a quarter of a second and if you mess up your super timing you die, if you RC too early, you die and it takes your meter, you RC too late and it takes your meter and you fire into the sky at best resetting to neutral but maybe just dying instead, or you mess up your kara or the buster input and you randomly Megafist (50/50 on dying) or whiff the Buster and then definitely die? *Yep.* I feel like giving complex characters complex inputs is fair (Zato) since you just have the logistical issue of cramming all those things onto the controller, but I'm guessing a huge problem with grapplers in most games is just that they, for some reason, often have extremely taxing and unintuitive inputs. Tager in BB for example has 720 inputs on his regular grabs, part of his basic gameplan, and you can either roll those in to your play and do them more or less at will or you aren't allowed to play Tager, to say nothing of having to often understand underlying buffer mechanics so you can work around the limitations (buffering it while landing from a jump, etc) to do these things in the first place which is often extremely unintuitive. To say nothing of his 1080 input Astral Heat. There are a lot of weird old, misguided, design decisions that have stuck with us for way too long.
@@TheVenerableMrKrieg god 360s/720s still scare me so much and i've been playing potemkin for a few years now and can honestly say just mastering the potbuster input took so much time (i'm also stupit).
@@paatwo those were 2 semi related thoughts put awkwardly together i already told you i was stupit ;-; -i find 360s hard -i still mess up the potbuster input on occasssion despite practicing it for a few years -inb4 "git gud"
There is the unmentioned fifth general character archetype that is debatably on par with rushdown, the Midrange character. The ones that have big buttons, usually a fast walk speed, focus less on mixups and more on good conversions. Often they differ from shotos in that the major tools that the Shoto has are ones that the midrange character doesn't get, at least not so easily. They usually don't have projectiles, or if they do they're rather weak and often piddle out without some sort of resource investment. They usually don't have DPs so getting strong anti-air options and reversals isn't quite as common for them. Instead of a Tatsu, a tool they use for getting in usually only moves them forward a little bit and is intended to be used after landing a whiff punish or it might be something like a command dash. Characters like Karin, Strive Ramlethal, Chun-Li, Hitman, possibly Nova in MVC3... In any case, it's a character archetype that not many people talk about because it's hard to pin down exactly what it is but something that you can tell it's characters who can't be classed as "Shoto, Zoner, Grappler, or Rushdown" since they don't actually have the right characteristics to fit into any of them. Yet it's a character type you can probably think of at least one character in any fighting game to fit inside. It also tends to be extremely powerful, dependent on what sort of mechanics a game has. IMO midrange characters are better in a game where there is more player expression, because the midrange character is a total mystery at the beginning of a match since they can play in so many different ways.
I think Claw from Super Turbo is where this started. Everyone talks about the wall dives (which are busted, don't get me wrong) but to have a character with a fast walk speed and the 2nd longest normals in the game is a DEADLY combo. I honestly think if his wall dive was removed completely he would still be a top tier character. There are some matchups he might not want to go into the air much against, and in those his speed and range makes him amazing at footsies (let alone most of what he can do is safe on block).
The irony of this list is that as a grappler I'd much rather fight rush down characters than zoners or shotos. Like rush down characters are often top tier, but it's the one archetype that a grappler can actually hang with pretty decently.
I've always had the easiest time with shotos, followed a close second by projectile zoners, once I learned to zone. Rushdown, I'm 50/50 with, because the designs of that particular style vary REALLY widely in my experience. *Also, Launcher main. Yeah, life's rough, but when they fail to stop my momentum from building, I am a wall of explosive death that is salt-inducing at the very least.
What i hate is the grappler issues of them losing a lot of the other characters main tools/functions is almost exclusively 2d fighters meanwhile in 3d games like tekken they don't cut off a characters leg just because you want to play a grappler.
Good video but you forgot about the footsies archetype. Someone like Karin from street fighter 5 obviously isn't a grappler, she has no full screen play so she isn't a zoner, she is definitely more offensive then defense so she isn't a shoto and she doesn't really want to get upp in your face so she isn't a rush down character. She is however really strong in the mid range, that's where she want to be, so she's a footsies character
I have never heard of a “footsie” archetype lol. I do get what you mean tho, Vanguard in DNF Duel dominates mid screen with his giant normals. Not quite a zoner but definitely not rushdown either.
Another reason for pixies being the strongest archetype is that they tend to have good matchup spreads. They have the easiest getting in the zoner thanks to their movement, but the same movement advantage allows them to run away from/ run circles around the grappler allowing for easy whiffpunishes. Even against shoto/midrange characters the high speed of pixies allows them to compete in footsies despite usually having worse normals in terms of range
I consider grapplers to be like Megaman boss characters. Gimmicky and punishing, but once you learn how to beat them, they simply cannot win without their opponents making a mistake, and there is usually one character that exploits the grappler’s weaknesses exceptionally well, usually zoners. Strong against newbies or early in a game’s lifespan. Similarly, zoners generally are annoying to fight, but once you understand how to get in they have few tools to turn the fight back around. They’re like late-game megaman bosses that require patience and have no particular weakness, but you can win against them once you get the pattern. There are exceptions of course, but I digress. Strong against newbies as well, but also annoying to face at all stages of a game’s lifespan. Stoto characters are like X in the megaman games, safe and easy to play with a basic tool for everything. Characters like akuma and evil ryu count as super-stoto imo, and are like X with his armor upgrades, but some weakness to balance it, that is unlike anything x would have. Rushdown characters are usually the Zero in the megaman x games, dangerous to use at first, but once you know how to beat the grapplers and zoners that give x a bit of trouble, it’s the most efficient type of character you can play, and usually only slightly struggles against strong shoto characters and over-tuned characters of any given archetype, which everyone would struggle against. TLDR: fighting games are just megaman games without stages to run through, except totally different.
Totally Love the Megaman Analogy. It's how I learned to play fighting games as well (atleast the arcade mode) I treated them as boss fights in Megaman. I got the idea when I realized Magma Dragoon is a Shoto
I feel like grapplers usually feel weak because of their speed. There aren't really any fast grapplers. And with 2D games, they have trouble getting close to their opponent. especially one's with fireballs. 3D games like Tekken and VF feel a bit different with grapplers though. However their best moves are usually really hard to execute.
Dragon Ball FIghterZ has fast grapplers like Android 16 and Broly because everyone in that game is just speedy as hell but it’s compensated by grabs not doing the same amount of damage proportionally in slower fighters like Street Fighter.
one other type that everyone always forgot is the "turtle". tbh, i didnt know whether it is an archetype or just playstyle. Turtle characters are more comfortable defending, their win condition revolve around reacting rather than initiating like for example counter punch, dodge and whiff punish moves, anti-airs or just straight up armored moves.
You're more or less describing a traditional zoner. However, some zoners can be played aggressively. Some characters have some zoning tools, but then combine with mixup or rush down options like Ramlethal from GG Strive.
@@Mykulveli traditional zoner tend to pressure you from distance, poking you away which means they have to INITIATE. turtle characters want you to attack them first and REACT to your moves. one example that i can think of is, if you can imagine guile (probably the OG turtle) squatting all the time charging while waiting for you, thats a turtle character.
A pretty under rated example of a turtle is UI Goku from DBFZ. Everyone knows he is good but no one says why. Its because he has all the defensive gimicks that no other character has. He can walk thorugh ki blasts. He can hop through beam attacks. He can insta teleport behind you if you time it with a normal. He can even insta counter specials with a parry. In a game where every character could be considered a rush down nightmare, its refreshing to see this kind of change up in design.
The game is pretty niche but while we're on the topic of role reversals, most zoners in Under-Night In-birth exe: late [CL-R] are top tier characters if not just a strong pick. Vatista and Yuzuriha are s tier characters with some really unique hybrid archetypes. Vatista not only is a charge character through and through (as well as negative edge) with no motion inputs whatsoever but she's also a zoner/trap character. Forward and backward charge inputs are projectiles, down and up charge inputs are a invuln flash kick and an overhead dive move respectively, and negative edge places down up to 3 traps according to the button held that you can detonate with any of your attacks including projectiles. Coupled with pretty big normals, a levitate, and not being able to get counter hit, she's pretty ridiculous in the right hands. Yuzuriha on the other hand is a zoner/stance character with unreactable projectiles, multiple teleports, counters, and a dodge (both aerial and grounded). The teleports are backwards dp inputs and you can chain them together to mix the opponent up, her grab can chain into combos, and her stance (while making your walk speed mega slow) allows you to do small teleports for minor repositioning, dodge attacks, and do a flurry of projectiles. I've played this game pretty religiously for a couple years and the match up between these 2 is never the same. It really just depends on the player.
The thing about grapplers is that even if they are top. Most games only have one or two at most so unless they are absolutely dominant the meta would never revolve around them. Here’s an idea for a video. How about which characters you think represent the ideal of each archetype better, also maybe add which one you think it’s the strongest and your favorite.
I'm always either a shoto or rush down. I have to be someone that is cool and fun to watch fight. And while a projectile or two in the kit is always good for an opening or a mixup, at the end of the day I just gotta put the feet on you.
I don’t mind that grapplers aren’t top tier, it’s that they almost never have tools to deal with projectiles. Try fighting Happy Chaos or Axl in Strive as Potemkin. Literally no fun.
I really wish there were breakdowns for archetypes in fighting games. I feel like it would lead to a better understanding of the game in general. I'm curious what all the archetypes in MvC2 are, for example.
Thanks for the breakdown. I’m trying to get back into fighting games again and videos like these really help out a lot. Now that I’m 40 I tend to really want to learn grapplers but settle in most games for rushdowns.
@@markmessi9020 Normally I play with a controller but I found a pre owed Xbox fight stick today for the series. Now I can learn with fighting games on Xbox and arcade. I am very excited for this late stage journey.
@@pleaseshutup7053 the Capcom fighting collection especially darkstalkers got me back playing hard again. I’ve always played fighting games but dropped out quickly. The collection has me installing everything I own again. The other would be Muktiverse and I picked up Melty Blood Type Lyle lumina on a recent sale but I’m still learning that one. Thanks everyone! It’s cool for the hobby to be fun again.
I truly don’t know the reason for most grapplers jumping away after doing the command grab. I feel like getting rid of that would put most grapplers at mid tier.
@@GohTheGreat There are usually mechanics to make mixups less effective, even if they can still be looped. FD in Guilty Gear pushes the opponent way and mixup attacks usually scale a lot, so they don't do too much damage (unless it's MVC). With Grapplers, they sometimes just make grabs do as much damage as a combo, but give no Oki to make things less "intoxicating".
@@leithaziz2716 right, and in a lot of fighting games a command grab throw loop is a true 50-50 if they don't have an invicible reversal, much more potent than your typical combo reset
@@jackredfield5993 typically there's a few frames if grab invul or, in blazblue's case, they just let u tech the command grab if they do it on blockstun (or a few frames after) and the window for it is way bigger. This probably doesnt apply to old games tho
To name a few exceptions to this topic: - Thunder (KI2013) he is grappler, and also one of the best characters in the game. He does have great mixups, a DP, a half screen cmd grab and a dash that can pass through a bunch of stuff like a teleport, kinda. He can also destroy projectiles and has pretty good normals. Once he's in you're done, if you don't know the match up. - Nu13 (Blazblue CT) She's a zoner and THE best character in that game, she had mad damage and combo potential, and she could combo you even at full screen distances, and that's like just the tip of the iceberg. She was nerfed so hard that ArcSys actually deleted her from the next game.
Depends. Do projectiles have collision which franchise etc. I love Grapplers in Injustice games the opponent gets mad having to just watch a grapplers animation play out with no escape I loved Grodd but I’m a NRS fanboy Zoners can be toxic af some chars have amazing zoning with good combos that just resend u full screen. THEN the midmatch animations can reset ur position taking u from up close to far and ur having to get back in all over again.
JM with amazing video topics, AS USUAL. Funny enough, Z Broly is a grappler that has one of the best zoning tools in the game. Zoners would be great if chip kills were a thing again. The top zoners in FGs force you to play their game since, if you don't, you simply perish. bring back chip kills, man, I'm tryna play fighting games, not blocking games
In the smash bro's series, there is a character archetype between Zoners and rushdown/shotos. They are swordies. They have disjointed hitboxes and play a midrange game. They try to control your approaches and take advantage of their disjointed hitboxes to protect themselves until they get an opening. In smash, they are often very good.
Strive beta was funny because Potemkin was almost universally agreed top 3 at minimum, along with Sol, the other top tier, having his wild throw damage to 35%. Grappling was amazing in the beta
Abigail in SFV was somewhat viable grappler until they nerfed him. If you think of the pure heavy grapplers, they are usually rough but the lighter grapplers like Abel and R.Mika they are alright. I think ppls just have always preffered rush down. I remember I'd get called certain names for playing Sim in SF4. He was pretty strong in the early iterations. I think a game where there are high tier versions of the architypes may be difficult but now that would be a fighting game.
I always find it so funny that grapplers are without a doubt some of the most consistently bad archetypes (usually mid/bottom tier) and yet EVERYONE hates them lol
@@stolensentience depends on the game but in general it's kinda the opposite. Grapplers seem scary at low levels till you play against solid intermediate+ players who know the proper OS to get out of throw set ups. Unless you're talking about DBFZ Broly
@@AstralTaurus I just mean how you aren’t allowed to play up close whatsoever. You just play keep away because all the up close interactions mean nothing. And don’t get me started on the teleporting into their arms nonsense.
@@stolensentience that's not really "game breaking". Actually most grapplers have pretty slow normals and lack defensive options like reversals so it's not so bad. And they kinda need big grab ranges otherwise the grab becomes kinda useless
Zoners are hands down the strongest. To be honest they're never bad up close. Cable, Sentinel, Iron Man, etc. in MVC 2. Cetrion is damn near impossible to beat in Mortal Kombat. Sucks to face Robocop players as well. Sonic fox made a living off Erron Black.
I think one of the more universal things across fighting games that makes grapplers weaker by default is the risk reward aspect and how inconsistent they are by design. Most other types of characters can run their mixup or vortex (especially in tag fighters) and the reward of guessing correctly against them either means you dont get hit and you still have to block, or you just escape the situation and reset to neutral, however, against a grappler if you guess correctly you are typically rewarded with a punish.
I definitely feel like Zoners are routinely worse than Grapplers now. There's the odd good or even top tier Grappler in some games, but NO game nowadays is gonna let you have a top tier Zoner, you have to go back like 20 years to find one. Not to mention that there's a lot more hybrid grapplers nowadays like Sol Badguy and R Mika showing up who are grapplers but don't have the limited movement of a regular grappler. My vote for top tier archetype is definitely puppet characters because they almost NEVER let puppet characters be bad bc they know the effort they have to put in is more. The only exception is like Rev2.1 Zato (who was top tier for basically all of the prior game) and Enchantress from DNF
The reason why so many people don't like to play grapplers is because of the basic nature of fighting. Our hands weren't design for striking in mind, but for grasping. There's a reason why most modern Martial Arts had evolved into some sort of grappling hussle: it's safer to throw an opponent down in the floor than it is to K.O. them. Of course it's gonna be frustraiting when the archetypical martial arts' fantasy of knocking down opponents, with basic punches and kicks, gets a rude awakening by the more efficient grappling. This also aplies to fighting games.
Sorry this comment just makes me laugh, calling grappling in FGs “less fantasy and more realistic” is funny when you got most grapplers like zangief and potemkin throwing you like a ragdoll 500m in the air flipping 7 times and shit, makes no sense comparing it to real life fighting 💀
Isn't beowulf from Skullgirls an obnoxiously good grappler? I don't play the game, but i remember hearing that he's basically a shoto, but half his combo tools are different variations of grabbing and swinging around enemies, giving him absurd damage output. What I DO know however, is that in BBCF, the meta is dominated by a rushdown that just gets ultra armor for basically free (Izanami) and a Zoner with obnoxious normal and special zoning capabilities (Nine). Although, meta doesn't have much importance in BBCF since most people play characters for their unique play style (thanks to the drive and overdrive systems, that basically forces every character to have an unique gimmick, even the shotos)
Some other chatacters I can think are Stance or maybe rekkas, Stance are like really technichal but someone who plays them can be amazing and rekkas kinda relay on frame traps, delaying moves, different chains of moves, all of these usually creates Mixup opportunities.
that kinda reveal my main issue with fighting game. Despite having a lot of different mechanics in action in a fighting game (footsies, mix up, combo, knowledges checks, frame data) in the end... it's always end up being all about combo. (not that the other mechanic don't matter, but being good at combo over being good in any other domain don't compare)
From my experience not necessarily, you can make do with a simple combo, as long as you can perform a basic b&b combo, that can carry you through a match. Not knowing some of those other things could potentially actually hold you back more. Depending on the game of course
You're definitely right about grapplers, but i do thinks its interesting to look at the exceptions. In general, grapplers are big slow guys who does huge damage when they get in, but because of how good they are when they get in, the rest of their kit isnt really allowed to be good to compensate. The example I am familliar with is r mika in sfv (at least pre-season 4 before nerfs and powercreep kinda left her in the dust). She was definitely a grallper with her command grab which gave her oki, her crouch grab for oki, fast jump back punish and good damage. However, despite being a grappler, her neutral was actually good? Like her buttons were all pretty solid and she was pretty fast for a grappler. Her mid svreen confirms weren't the best, but hit confirm stand strong into ex peach gets her a knockdown at baciallt no risk, she was really cool. Because of this, her oki command grab (i think that was the kick one) while definitely giving her oki didnt do a ton of damage (~120 iirc) but because she had no trouble getting in a situation to use it, she was really good. I think its kinda interesting that an example of a good grappler is one whose main mixup tool isnt even her best source of damage, which i think reveals a fundamental flaw in the design of grapplers, where having them be so focused on landing their big commmand grab forces their kit to be gutted elsewhere to the point where the goal it to get in once or twice and make a couple reads to win, which leads to inconsistent gameplay, which generallt is bad at a higher level. Whereas the grappler where their cmd grab is a mixup tool and not the wincon is way healthier and viable.
I was never into grapplers in fighting games until Injustice 2. Not only is Swamp Thing one of my all time favorite comic characters (read the Alan Moore run of Saga of the Swamp Thing. Trust me), but he's so fun to play in Injustice! He quickly became my main.
Cool video! I think it’s very tough to discern these things, especially because characters change in “goodness” from low level to high level play. For instance it’s easy to stomp your fellow scrubs as Potemkin, but going against high level players puts Pot at a disadvantage. Would love to see more examples, in-depth analysis of other, less common archetypes!
There’s an archetype I think exists that I call Footsie girls. Some examples of these are chun li, rose, ssj4 goku, strive may and umvc3 wesker. These are characters whose main tool is long reaching footsie normals and fast walkspeed. Usually really good low mediums. This is a really solid archetype
There ARE still those instances where grapplers are broken or at least super viable picks like Jason in MKX, King in Tekken, etc. Potemkin I would have mentioned before but he’s falling off a bit now, though everyone in Strive is viable practically so I wouldn’t say he sucks.
Something to take note about grapplers is that they excel depending on the meta of the game... Take dbzf for example, almost all of the cast have some sort of gap closer like teleportation or super dash so grapplers there excel... While on the mvc2 example theres a lot of pushback on hits so they dont excel there... And also depending on the game, like in tekken where everyone has some sort of combo/air juggle, the grapplers like the kings or marduk have options on whether they grapple or not.
The funny thing I noticed is that the Rushdown archetype revolves around speed, the Zoner archetype around attack and the Grappler type around defense. I totally agree with this ranking. I think the zoner archetype is sometimes the strongest in fighting games for specific reasons. It's because movement options in fighting games generally weren't that good or special for rushdowns before even if they're faster than usual until recently. The problem is though that when a rushdown reaches you, he could beat the shit out of the zoner if hey wouldn't have any sort of fast close range option to escape. To me that's because rushdown is naturally the strongest archetype in fighting games from a design perspective. It's the same for rushdowns when they get zoned by multiple projectiles from the other side of the screen but I think it's a bit easier to go through a barrage of projectiles to hit your opponent than it is to escape from a close range interaction if you don't have any get out of me option or a decently fast move. That's why they have it but they end up being very strong in fighting games sometimes with close and long range options. Grappler is obviously the weakest one and they're the rarest of the three. Their only tool is super armor. I think grapplers could be stronger and more interesting if they had access to a better combo game and would be a bit faster. Some grapplers already are like that but they aren't many. I agree zoners can be boring sometimes but fighting games as a all would just be so much more boring if it was just rushdowns.
Shotos, rushdown, and whatever Guile is (Turtle? Charge zoner with some rushdown) Also Chun Li's archetype is usually excellent although her moveset changes a bit game to game. Sometime's she has more anti-air options, and sometimes she has stronger rushdown and fireball options.
Shotos are the strongest in this category, think about this: - Shotos covers certain ranges shooting fireballs and best counter/comeback. Just watch out for good grapplers and rushdowns, other than this not nearly troublesome - Some zoners are typically slow at times and SOME are just not made to counter, nor escape corners/make comebacks. - Grapplers are strong, but only in close range. Trouble in longer distance range. - Rushdowns are there, but typically weak if exposed (either read opponent wrong or combo wrong)
I just want to say that you have motivated me on wanting to do fighting games you and dotodoya are definitely the best fgc content creator and most versatile
Great game but broken as hell in single player mode once you level up, easy infinites galore. Me and my buddy played the hell outta this in the mid 90's.
In the Skullgirls meta, while Ms Fortune, a rushdown character, is currently considered the strongest character, Peacock and Robo-Fortune are among the top 5 highest perceived strength characters, and they are both zoners. Cerebella is also a very good character as a grappler, but she isn't used as much as the aforementioned. In saying that, Skullgirls is a pretty well-balanced game, any team variation of any character is viable, but the most dominant strategies use Ms Fortune, Robo-Fortune, or Peacock (and Annie who's a rushdown-shoto hybrid)
In UNICLR, Vatista and Yuzu are easily top 3, and both are zoners. Vatista being arguably the best character in the game. The other character in that top 3 is Seth, who is a rushdown. The cast is pretty diverse, however, and everyone is viable.
Here's my argument, these tier archetypes often shift around depending on the game that is being played, and perhaps even the match up depending on certain games, here's some examples: A: Grapplers in Injustice 2 (I am using this game as an example because its the most prevalent), first of all they barely exist, and secondly they have to deal, with an Zoners BS, and cant get in to do damage at all, and that sucks (For I am an grappler player) Or another example, GG STRIVE, Potemkin VS Axl Low, and that MU speaks for itself, but in other games and other match ups, an grappler can just DUMP on an rushdown player, because they can eat the damage/chip damage that they throw out, hug them, and shatter their spines into an fine dust, as JM mentioned, Clark, in KOFXV B: Shotos can also shift around, because in some games they dont even exist, and if they do, they're the most HONEST SHOTO AS AN SHOTO CAN BE, take Ryo and Robert Garcia for an example, Meh fire ball, Decent DP, and an flying kick, but they shine in being NOT an "shoto" but their tools that are NOT shoto like While I agree that rushdown is an stronger archetype than most due to their aggressiveness and the "If I press a button I'm going to get hit by this wack ass mix up" there can be cases where they're not as strong, take Injustice 2 (again) as an example, where the Zoning was SO STRONG, and SO PREVALENT throughout the most of the game's lifetimes, that rushdowns barely got an chance to shine
Some have said that _all_ the characters in Melee are grapplers, because grabs are so strong in that game, lots of characters get really good combos off of it including ones that go into a re-grab and loop. (They're not infinites because of the percent knockback scaling, but sometimes are zero-to-death so I guess might as well be infinites). In particular Marth has a really strong chain grab combo on Fox/Falco, and a great grab game in general, and is probably top 3 or 4 on the tier list
You pretty much pointed out why I get frustrated with a lot of games these days. Devs are so worried about people being annoyed with fighting against certain techniques, that they make them barely viable (grappling and zoning). With all the fighting games that have come out over the past 25 years, my two favorites are easily MvC2 and early SF4, why? Because in MvC2, you can play keep away viably, and with SF4, as a Gief main, I could compete so long as it wasn't Seth or Sagat. Devs need to toughen up and just let multiple playstyles rock. "Oh no, people are going to get annoyed with being thrown", mean while I'm playing Galaga against a Ryu spamming hadoken. Just balance the games. Your example of Frieza was perfect, I SO wanted to main him, but then I got DESTROYED as his launcher was garbage early on, and people could just dash through my projectile vomit, in a game where chip isn't really a thing anyways.
Big thing that prevents me from even trying DBZF is that the game is rush down neutral, followed by a giant combo. Maybe I'm just getting old, but I really miss the days of winning neutral not meaning the other person can put the control down and make a sandwich before the combo is over. SF and Skull Girls are the only fighters I can tolerate that are modern, because they either don't have insanely long combos, or in Skull Girls case, a mechanic that literally ends combos if they go on for too long, resetting neutral. I love watching DBZF, but I'll never enjoy getting hit with a jab and then watching my life bar slowly drop to 20% if not lose my character all together with a tod.
![Megan Thee Stallion - Roc Steady (feat. Flo Milli) [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/HozPPyqW0dY/mqdefault.jpg)
Bro you're not telling me Scrimblo Bimblo isn't top tier
Hard to swallow pills
The lovable scrunkus himself
Pls nerf scrimblo bimblo
I think Scrimblo Bimblo for the Scrungtendo 48 SUCKS
Found myself replaying that bit like 5 times, and the first comment I see talks about it. I love it
Part of what makes grapplers weak is that they often require a detailed understanding of every other character's options. They're usually so slow that they spend most of the match blocking everything the opponent feels like throwing at them before finally getting their turn.
Then you have "evolved" grapplers like Potemkin, who have enough options to actually play the game from the get-go.
Who's Potemkin?
@@bofi1280 a grappler from the guilty gear series.
@@dragonfire634 Thanks.
@@bofi1280 This big guy: ruclips.net/video/hzd-TtC4HoA/видео.html
Being hard = being weak sure buddy
Really interestingly, near the end of Smash Wii U's competitive lifespan, almost every top player picked up a secondary grappler in either DK or Bowser. The general thought behind it was that the prime meta threats in Cloud and Bayonetta, both more or less rushdown characters, won neutral with about the same degree of consistency whether it was against a grappler, zoner, or rushdown character. DK and Bowser allowed you to take games from Cloud an Bayo in 6 total interactions rather than the 20 another top tier would require.
What a garbage ass game that was. Thank God for Ultimate.
I know, Bowser in both 4 and Ultimate is also kind of a stasised, meta-proof consistent pick, because he has really good defensive burst options, and always has a resting chance of just killing someone in a couple interactions, even if he's getting his spiky ass handed to him.
Less in Ultimate, Bowser with Rage in 4 was silly.
In Ultimate, he couples that with a pretty neat rushdown/grappler(esque) hybrid thing. Ultimate Bowser is FAST, and surprisingly difficult to zone out.
Bayonetta could kill either in one interaction lol. Cloud struggled more, but even then it was a winning matchup simply because he could just not interact.
@@Thorognahbayo's side and upb both ignored the weight value of the character they hit, so superheavies objectively faired better into bayo combos than a character like jiggs.
Smash isn't a fighting game
The main problem with grapplers is the same thing that make pixies too good... Devs overestimate the value of health bars and single hit damage.
Grapplers often effectively lose access to lots of game mechanics to compensate for their high hp... While pixies are given more and more tools to compensate for their low health... but then, the health bar barely makes a difference.
What devs for any game have to keep in mind is that what make a character powerful is how many (effective) options they have. Not how high are their raw numbers.
I'm with you on that one. Damage numbers are more easily adjusted, getting a character's options right on the first run of implementation often determines where they'll end up tier-wise.
Balancing based on life is always a terrible idea. See: Phoenix, Akuma, Seth, Vergil etc etc
yeah you're right but Grapplers sometimes makes extreme damage but the problem is that they have to get close to you and they are slow and hard to play
Yup. And when they do get in, they often have the hardest to execute moves (360 motions/buffering anyone?). Way too much work for too little payoff. Meanwhile most rushdown/pixie characters can do more damage with simple BNB combos and its widely considered fine gameplay. Zoners also get hurt because they are given low health, slow moves, and limited options for the benefits of range (which is fine but often a bit over tuned).
I am also a bit dubious about the claims of a high-tiered grappler being inherently unfun. I'm not sure why fighting a grappler is inherently more frustrating than any number of rushdown characters who can 50/50/vortex you at will. Characters like Broly, Potemkin, Clark etc... show you can have fun and effective grapplers that don't destroy popularity/the meta all that much.
I think your premise about the overvaluing of single hits and HP bars hits close to the real reason. Its a fighting game 'truism' that people have repeated forever that just really isn't true (outside of a rare few like Potemkin who actually hits like a truck).
They also tend to focus on mistakes of the opponent, if they are really good then it’s extremely hard to get anything going
So the first grappler character that comes to mind that’s generally really strong is King from Tekken. I don’t think he’s ever been top tier, but I’m fairly certain he’s ranged from mid to high in every game he’s been in. That said, it’s rarely his grab game that makes him so good. He’s also insanely fun to play/watch.
In Tekken 1 he had a +90 something on block mid poke for some reason but aside from that he's definitely never been top tier
I have very limited tekken experience, so bear with me:
I'm assuming wavedashing and kbds are your preferred way of moving. Do characters have different dash startups/distances/qualities and does that translate to character categories?
asked differently, is king less mobile than other - specifically non-grappler - characters?
Tekken also doesn't really have projectiles, they still have zoners in a way with some attacks having big hitboxes but in general grapplers are better in Tekken just cause they don't have to deal with projectiles as much. Then even in 7 which added a lot of projectile characters you can still use the z axis to sidestep them much easier than in a 2D fighter
@@ddublu If I remember correctly KBD’s are universal except on characters that have a back sway like Paul or Bryan (they can still KBD but it’s harder). Wave Dashing is exclusive to characters that have special steps like the Mishimas and Bruce. I don’t think King can Wave Dash, but he has other mobility tools like this neat little spin jump. As for dash startup, I actually have no idea.
@@GodOfOrphans Yeah, the only characters that had projectiles throughout the series were the Devil characters. At high level though, even those lasers were useless because of side stepping, like you said, and cause slow startup.
I think it's important to note that for old school fighters, zoners were by far and away the strongest archetypes. SF2 was always dominated by Guile, Dhalsim, and Sagat and it wasn't until later games like Dark Stalkers and everything that came after where mobility started to matter more and rush down characters could start showing their strength. As for a game with a strong grappler, how could you have forgotten Jupiter from Sailor Moon S?
I think a lot of the reason zoners are a little poorer now is because devs remember how strong they used to be in games like SF2. Like, Balrog has several re-dizzy combos in Champion Edition, but he ranks at the very bottom in most tier lists for the game because it is so easy for most characters to keep him from ever getting close enough to unleash his fury. Just updating his Turn Punch to allow it to go through projectiles in Hyper Fighting made a lot of difference in how usable he was against zoners. Still considered low-tier, though, even in HF.
@@gargervon8697 Yeah way weaker fireballs now compared to say SF2 World Warrior
"how could you have forgotten Jupiter from Sailor Moon S?"
The forbidden game
Very interesting, loaded question. A strong deciding factor is the game that the characters are in and the mechanics that govern those characters. Let’s look at Injustice2, a game notorious for strong zoning because of the chip damage, lack of fast movement, the pushback on projectiles, and the large screen size. Zoning was the meta of that game whether it’s strong zoning or strong counter zoning, every top tier could zone or could get around zoning. Then you look at MKX where there’s a run button, everybody does 30-40% damage for one bar, and everybody has 50/50 mix, the rush down characters are the dominating archetype in that game. It just really depends on the game and mechanics
Indeed, it's all about the game and the mechanics, and the characters will get stronger accordingly.
He said all of that though. He mentioned that Nether Realm games typically have stronger zoners, and he specifically mentioned the Injustice series.
His point is that in most games zoners aren't great. We can look at the zoner characters in SF2 (pick your favorite version) and they're very strong. Then 3 came out and they became irrelevant due to the parry mechanic. MVC has only had one decent zoner in their entire lineup and that's Megaman from MVC2. But that was more cheese (jump backwards and spam heavy punch) than anything else. Even in MKX, the two best (and frankly only viable) characters were a zoner and a rush down. Even in a Nether Realm game where they like to have strong zoners, the other broken character is rush down. Even the exceptions have broken rush down characters.
TLDR; other than a few outliers, zoners have become weak, grapplers have almost always been weak, and rush down is the strongest. That's the new normal for fighting games.
@@fumoffu_l Not only you didn't add anything new, but you only gave wrong information. In MKX, all types of the 4 types of archetypes (Zoning, Rushdown, Balanced and Grapplers) are viable, it's just that Rushdown is the most accessible one, but all 4 of them had at least some chars with Variations for that archetypes that were viable. Also in MVC games there were other strong Zoners besides Megaman, there were Magneto (outside of MVC2), Morrigan (MVC3), Sentinel, Dr. Doom and more. Having Zoning chars not strong is only in the last few years. Yes there are more and more games that purposefully make Rushdown chars the strongest, but it's only really in recent years that this trend is going on, and just like you said SF3 had way back in the late 90's. At the end of the day, it's all about the game and the mechanics, and the characters will get stronger accordingly.
@@RoyArkon I mean I wouldn’t count doom , magneto and sentinel good for their zoning. With doom and sentinel they have amazing assist games. Doom also has great air play and sentinel has a bunch of armor . Magneto will just bash you from the air. They have good zoning but its not what makes them top tier.
@@egekazkayas8968 Magneto and Doom are both well-rounded characters, they both can play Zoning and Rushdown (again, aside from MVC2 as in this game Magneto is indeed not a Zoner) and Sentinel is 100% Zoner, pretty much his entire moveset are projectiles that cover the screen from so many different angles.
My observation is that grapplers as an archetype are not designed for both players to have fun at all points of the match. It's a very different type of grind than other characters but it can be exhilarating to make the right reads and kill your opponent in a few hits. Ironically, grapplers are probably the most realistic archetype in terms of how people fight (think brazilian ju jitsu)
When grapplers are done right they are my favorite archetype bar none. I love the feeling of out thinking my opponent or commiting to a risky move and having it pay off. when you're losing your losing pretty badly but winning makes it worth it. As someone who does actually fight and do some martial arts I wish more game would make grappling accurate to how it is irl. Grapplers aren't big slow heavy guys. They're big fast heavy guys. Grappling is fast not slow.
@@azechase6597 exactly, and instead of ridiculous damage there could be a trade off for unique movement options and better oki. I love ramon for this in KOF but he is still bottom tier somehow...
Figuring out how to do well with a grappler is incredibly rewarding, for sure. I almost always have a secret-best character and they're almost always grapplers where I've figured out something degenerate. You have to keep them in your pocket most of the time lest you anger your friends though...
Just like in real MMA everyone hates grapplers lol
@@azechase6597 There are a few "fast" grapplers that focus on using grabs for resets rather than pure damage (Android 16 and Kouma from Melty come to mind)
I think Street Fighter 5 has a good variety of characters :
-Dhalsim is an excellent zoner
-Ken and Luke are excellent Shotos
-Alex and G are very good Grapplers
-Cammy and Rashid excellent rushdown
-Karin and Kolin good neutral characters
R mika is amazing too
@@theworldlywarrior Mika used to be very good yes. But she ate a LOT of nerfs. And she's not that good anymore unfortunately.
@@TheOxiongarden oof, i left at the right time then. She had a great mixture of pokes and grapples.
I main a character in Killer Instinct called Kan-Ra, who falls into the - I guess - unique category of a "trappler". He plays like - and has the damage output of - a zoner, he can attack like a grappler, he has the respective weaknesses of these two archetypes, but makes up for it via his trap setup game. The opponent can't just run into him and unga-bunga if he has used his distance to make setups. He's such an interesting character because of this.
Everything is fast in Vampire Savior (well, besides Victor and Anakaris) but I really feel like Fish is a trap character mixed with a rush down (possibly the first "trap" archetype ever?)... his dash is good and he has a lot of offensive tools. It's just that he shines when he gets the opponent in a corner and starts throwing out bubbles to trap them. He's the closest thing to a zoner in this game and really interesting.
@ytm23akNess isn't really a trapper. You can bait attacks, but that's with everyone. Ness is a zoner, with next to no grappling. Snake is a trapper, possibly "trappler" since his grabs are a much bigger part of his combo game than Ness.
"Grapplers aren't fun for others to play against"...
I've heard this argument before, like Catalyst on event hubs said in one of their podcasts "grapplers should NEVER be top tier." when talking about the end of Street fighter 5 going into street fighter 6. But i disagree...
I'll predicate this statement by saying that I do not like to play as grapplers, but I know plenty of people that do. But I think the aforementioned statement is a pretty poor excuse to have grapplers nerfed. Just because their play style doesn't conform to how you want to play the game doesn't mean that they shouldn't be able to take advantage their toolkits. As long as they're balanced, and not unbeatable, there's no reason there shouldn't be variety. Those people that don't like fighting against grapplers have to put in the time to learn how to play around them. I feel it's important to have matchup knowledge and experience against all archetypes.
I see the same argument for '2D characters' in Tekken 7...
I agree. Besides, holding down back while the opponent's pixie goes crazy on you isn't fun either.
@@GM_Lemmy 100% this weird fgc philosophy that there is one specific honest and fun way to play the game, wether it be rushdown or neutral based shoto (it really just depends on the game) is kind of annoying. It's honestly just majority consensus, people just don't like losing, which makes sense, but that's an individual battle and not one indicative of game design. The majority of a playerbase gravitates towards shoto and rushdown characters, and because of that, their interpretation of what is and isn't fun eventually becomes the accepted one. But in reality, the grappler is having just as little fun when they're holding down back all game, and the zoner isn't enjoying your full screen burst options whenever they try to get their fireball pressure going. People who complain are going to complain, there just happens to be a larger sample size of complainers in the playerbases for more standard archetypes.
@@jackredfield5993 I have to say I have more fun being zoner out as a rushdown character than rushed down as a zoner.
I find space control more interesting part of the game than mix ups. Mix ups and combos get glorified as the most important part of fighting games but we are all different
The problem is that "playing around them" basically means playing like a zoner - don't let them get close to you so they can't threaten you with their grab. Which, unless you're playing a zoner already, might not be a play style you enjoy. In which case, makes sense that fighting them would be something you don't enjoy doing, regardless of their power level competitively, no?
zoners are an interesting case. I'd say that in a vacuum, zoners are the strongest archetype, but in the context of basically every modern game they're pretty weak. If nothing else, I don't think the others mentioned needed mechanics added to deal with them specifically.
I wish more grapplers were like Shermie or Ramon (in theory).
Well all modern games unless made by neverrealm.
He picked frieza, worst example imo , bcs dbzfighters are almost FULL of rushdowns , I think zoners are pretty strong , also because this archetype is famous with being salt-inducing , people can't deal with them when they're not skilled enough 💀
@@yurin4402 "Why're you so bad at video games?"
What does "in a vacuum" even mean in this context? It sounds like you're saying "if you take away everything that isn't a zoner, then zoner is the strongest"
@@fumoffu_l “in a vacuum” referred to game mechanics. I thought that was made clear based on the rest of my comment.
I really enjoyed this video. I like when you tackle these topics across the entire fighting game genre. To be honest I don't know how much of that you can really do. Logistically I think you're gonna have to go into specific games a lot more. But I enjoyed this.
From my experience, I’d say that zoners and rushdown characters have the potential to be the most powerful depending on the game. Grapplers are definitely on the lower end. Shotos/balance types are usually high tier/mid because their arsenal just lets them deal with all the other archetypes and rarely have almost impossible to win match-ups like a grappler vs a zoner.
Then you have the absolutely borderline broken characters like Swiftmaster who have every tool to win a match, ridiculous damage off any hit, and the pros of their respective archetype, in this case: speed, mix-up, and setplay (rushdown). If they had given him a command throw then that would have just been adding insult to injury.
Nice vid! Some other archtypes that i think are worth discussion are characters who have a gameplan around using armored moves such as Vaseraga from GBVS and also 'puppet' characters you see mostly in anime fighters like Zato and Zappa etc.
You can argue that these characters fall into the catagories you've listed, but i think their gameplan is different enough for them to merit a seperate discussion.
Puppet Fighters are weird in meta, as small changes can make them either very strong or very weak.
Zappa was not as powerfull in AC untill later revisions added stuff like the sword that he can pressure with fullscreen (including an overhead) and the dog. Zato in Xrd SIGN started out very strong, but by the end of Xrd Rev 2 (the final revision for Xrd), Zato was almost near the bottom, beat by Potemkin. I think what was changed among other stuff was how his drill attack, Invite Hell, worked. DEB went into more detail on her video on Arcsys balance.
Allthough, from my research, they're more often really good.
Zoning is puppet. Puppet is zoning.
@@thefrankiepalmeri you’re telling me Zato is a zoner?
puppet is more like 'playstyle' rather than 'archetype'. for example, dhalsim/axl is a zoner with long limbs. launcher is a zoner with projectiles. zato is a zoner with his puppets. whenever the character is able to put pressure while maintaining distance, they are what we call zoners.
@@mohdnazri7126 just wanted to mention that all puppet characters arent zoners, Devo in Jojo Hftf for example is only made more vulnerable when his puppet is out but if you can get your puppet behind the enemy your combos triple in damage output
I wish the "brawler" archetype was more well represented in fighting games. Close range, trouble getting in, but with short combo strings that do really good damage. Someone that plays like a grappler but uses short strings instead of throws.
What would be your favourite brawler?
I think this is also called "footsies" archetype as well. Rekka characters usually fit here as well.
@@hoodedstreetmonk352 third strike alex. I know he was low tier, but his move set, aesthetics, and mind game were the most fun I've ever had with a fighter. Psyching out your opponent by swapping between weak, fast grapples and really strong 3 hit strings always made him feel so much more violent than the rest of the cast.
Sounds like Maxima
3S Alex?
A pretty interesting video (series), I think, would be a deep dive into less common archetypes. Not so much how strong they are, but _what_ they are, what makes them cool and interesting, maybe showing some iconic examples.
Some guy started one called archetype archive but it’s not that good imo.
I think “level up” characters (susanoo, Zappa, ss4gogeta, etc…) in fighting games usually end up being very polarizing, the strongest or the weakest.
Personally though I’m a big fan of the resource management characters! They can also be pretty polarizing in terms of balance. Some of my mains are Jack-o, Umbrella, and Rachel alucard.
I think Adult Gohan is a better example of a "level up" character from FighterZ than Gogeta 4 is.
I’m pretty sure they’re called “Snowball” characters as opposed to “level up”
@@rah8693 I was about to come here and say that as well.
Amy from soul calibur is a perfect level up character
I detest fighting Potkemin from GG. But he's a great grappler because he has a counter for everything. I play Cerebella in Skullgirls, she is like a rush down mix, and has plenty of options to get past even projectiles.
If it makes you feel better, most of the high level pro Pot players just don't even bother competing in big tournaments because he also has some of the worst matchups in strive lol. Hell even other Pot mains like myself don't like the Pot mirror
@@AstralTaurus I love the Pot mirror for being absolute chaos. I don't think the better Pot wins with any consistency unless the gap is enormous but damn if it ain't always an absolutely silly spectacle. That said, you're dead-on about high level play, and while he was generally in a okay spot for most of season 1 (only Goldlewis proved functionally insurmountable), season 2 seems to have only made Pot even worse while making some of his worst MUs *worse for him.* He now has a bit most silliness in areas he was already doing okay, but Goldlewis got massive buffs for example while Potemkin lost his only reversal (even if it was a pretty bad one), all while they pushed Potemkin even further in terms of execution demands.
I was out here throwing karas all over the place already, but now they want me to 236236S, hold for no more than 11 frames, RC, and then 632146K~P just for a half decent reversal to get out of pressure? Is it hilarious when you do it perfectly? Absolutely. Does it put the fear of god in your opponent when you just facetank through their oki and grab them for a Buster instead? Absolutely. Is it also literally 16 inputs in less than a quarter of a second and if you mess up your super timing you die, if you RC too early, you die and it takes your meter, you RC too late and it takes your meter and you fire into the sky at best resetting to neutral but maybe just dying instead, or you mess up your kara or the buster input and you randomly Megafist (50/50 on dying) or whiff the Buster and then definitely die? *Yep.*
I feel like giving complex characters complex inputs is fair (Zato) since you just have the logistical issue of cramming all those things onto the controller, but I'm guessing a huge problem with grapplers in most games is just that they, for some reason, often have extremely taxing and unintuitive inputs. Tager in BB for example has 720 inputs on his regular grabs, part of his basic gameplan, and you can either roll those in to your play and do them more or less at will or you aren't allowed to play Tager, to say nothing of having to often understand underlying buffer mechanics so you can work around the limitations (buffering it while landing from a jump, etc) to do these things in the first place which is often extremely unintuitive. To say nothing of his 1080 input Astral Heat. There are a lot of weird old, misguided, design decisions that have stuck with us for way too long.
@@TheVenerableMrKrieg god 360s/720s still scare me so much and i've been playing potemkin for a few years now and can honestly say just mastering the potbuster input took so much time (i'm also stupit).
@@AstralTaurus Good thing potbuster isnt a 360 eh? :)
@@paatwo those were 2 semi related thoughts put awkwardly together i already told you i was stupit ;-;
-i find 360s hard
-i still mess up the potbuster input on occasssion despite practicing it for a few years
-inb4 "git gud"
There is the unmentioned fifth general character archetype that is debatably on par with rushdown, the Midrange character. The ones that have big buttons, usually a fast walk speed, focus less on mixups and more on good conversions. Often they differ from shotos in that the major tools that the Shoto has are ones that the midrange character doesn't get, at least not so easily. They usually don't have projectiles, or if they do they're rather weak and often piddle out without some sort of resource investment. They usually don't have DPs so getting strong anti-air options and reversals isn't quite as common for them. Instead of a Tatsu, a tool they use for getting in usually only moves them forward a little bit and is intended to be used after landing a whiff punish or it might be something like a command dash.
Characters like Karin, Strive Ramlethal, Chun-Li, Hitman, possibly Nova in MVC3... In any case, it's a character archetype that not many people talk about because it's hard to pin down exactly what it is but something that you can tell it's characters who can't be classed as "Shoto, Zoner, Grappler, or Rushdown" since they don't actually have the right characteristics to fit into any of them. Yet it's a character type you can probably think of at least one character in any fighting game to fit inside. It also tends to be extremely powerful, dependent on what sort of mechanics a game has.
IMO midrange characters are better in a game where there is more player expression, because the midrange character is a total mystery at the beginning of a match since they can play in so many different ways.
You described Scorpion, Kung Lao, Johnny Cage and Fujin in MK11
I think Claw from Super Turbo is where this started. Everyone talks about the wall dives (which are busted, don't get me wrong) but to have a character with a fast walk speed and the 2nd longest normals in the game is a DEADLY combo. I honestly think if his wall dive was removed completely he would still be a top tier character. There are some matchups he might not want to go into the air much against, and in those his speed and range makes him amazing at footsies (let alone most of what he can do is safe on block).
The irony of this list is that as a grappler I'd much rather fight rush down characters than zoners or shotos. Like rush down characters are often top tier, but it's the one archetype that a grappler can actually hang with pretty decently.
I've always had the easiest time with shotos, followed a close second by projectile zoners, once I learned to zone. Rushdown, I'm 50/50 with, because the designs of that particular style vary REALLY widely in my experience.
*Also, Launcher main. Yeah, life's rough, but when they fail to stop my momentum from building, I am a wall of explosive death that is salt-inducing at the very least.
What i hate is the grappler issues of them losing a lot of the other characters main tools/functions is almost exclusively 2d fighters meanwhile in 3d games like tekken they don't cut off a characters leg just because you want to play a grappler.
That's why they're good in KOF. They are just like everything else but don't block
Before I watch the video, we all know the pecking order is rushdown/mixup, shotos, zoners, and lastly grapplers.
I agree
Season 1 R.Mika would like a word with you
Good video but you forgot about the footsies archetype. Someone like Karin from street fighter 5 obviously isn't a grappler, she has no full screen play so she isn't a zoner, she is definitely more offensive then defense so she isn't a shoto and she doesn't really want to get upp in your face so she isn't a rush down character. She is however really strong in the mid range, that's where she want to be, so she's a footsies character
I wouldnt really call her a footsie archetype, she's more or less rush down and a mix of a grappler.
I have never heard of a “footsie” archetype lol. I do get what you mean tho, Vanguard in DNF Duel dominates mid screen with his giant normals. Not quite a zoner but definitely not rushdown either.
Sounds like a Karin main’s reasoning
Thats a zoner.... a zoner is someone who wants to keep you in a specific range...full screen zoners are called keep aways.
@@stolensentience facts lol
Another reason for pixies being the strongest archetype is that they tend to have good matchup spreads. They have the easiest getting in the zoner thanks to their movement, but the same movement advantage allows them to run away from/ run circles around the grappler allowing for easy whiffpunishes. Even against shoto/midrange characters the high speed of pixies allows them to compete in footsies despite usually having worse normals in terms of range
Cyberbots is one of the few games where a grappler(Vise) is the best character in the game,but it's a really balanced game.
S1 Android 16 made me so happy as a grappler enjoyer. Bless these dunks
I consider grapplers to be like Megaman boss characters. Gimmicky and punishing, but once you learn how to beat them, they simply cannot win without their opponents making a mistake, and there is usually one character that exploits the grappler’s weaknesses exceptionally well, usually zoners. Strong against newbies or early in a game’s lifespan.
Similarly, zoners generally are annoying to fight, but once you understand how to get in they have few tools to turn the fight back around. They’re like late-game megaman bosses that require patience and have no particular weakness, but you can win against them once you get the pattern. There are exceptions of course, but I digress. Strong against newbies as well, but also annoying to face at all stages of a game’s lifespan.
Stoto characters are like X in the megaman games, safe and easy to play with a basic tool for everything. Characters like akuma and evil ryu count as super-stoto imo, and are like X with his armor upgrades, but some weakness to balance it, that is unlike anything x would have.
Rushdown characters are usually the Zero in the megaman x games, dangerous to use at first, but once you know how to beat the grapplers and zoners that give x a bit of trouble, it’s the most efficient type of character you can play, and usually only slightly struggles against strong shoto characters and over-tuned characters of any given archetype, which everyone would struggle against.
TLDR: fighting games are just megaman games without stages to run through, except totally different.
Unorthodox, and surprisingly extremely great comparison
Aren’t all megaman bosses zoners?
@Ben Thompson
Not within the context I provided, but I get what you’re saying.
Totally Love the Megaman Analogy. It's how I learned to play fighting games as well (atleast the arcade mode) I treated them as boss fights in Megaman. I got the idea when I realized Magma Dragoon is a Shoto
I feel like grapplers usually feel weak because of their speed. There aren't really any fast grapplers. And with 2D games, they have trouble getting close to their opponent. especially one's with fireballs. 3D games like Tekken and VF feel a bit different with grapplers though. However their best moves are usually really hard to execute.
Dragon Ball FIghterZ has fast grapplers like Android 16 and Broly because everyone in that game is just speedy as hell but it’s compensated by grabs not doing the same amount of damage proportionally in slower fighters like Street Fighter.
I hope you mean DBS Broly.
one other type that everyone always forgot is the "turtle". tbh, i didnt know whether it is an archetype or just playstyle. Turtle characters are more comfortable defending, their win condition revolve around reacting rather than initiating like for example counter punch, dodge and whiff punish moves, anti-airs or just straight up armored moves.
You're more or less describing a traditional zoner. However, some zoners can be played aggressively. Some characters have some zoning tools, but then combine with mixup or rush down options like Ramlethal from GG Strive.
@@Mykulveli traditional zoner tend to pressure you from distance, poking you away which means they have to INITIATE. turtle characters want you to attack them first and REACT to your moves. one example that i can think of is, if you can imagine guile (probably the OG turtle) squatting all the time charging while waiting for you, thats a turtle character.
A pretty under rated example of a turtle is UI Goku from DBFZ. Everyone knows he is good but no one says why. Its because he has all the defensive gimicks that no other character has.
He can walk thorugh ki blasts. He can hop through beam attacks. He can insta teleport behind you if you time it with a normal. He can even insta counter specials with a parry. In a game where every character could be considered a rush down nightmare, its refreshing to see this kind of change up in design.
Like Elena from sf4? She was a menace lol
In KOF 98 Goro Daimon is the strongest character by far, you should see more of him, he is the true boss.
The game is pretty niche but while we're on the topic of role reversals, most zoners in Under-Night In-birth exe: late [CL-R] are top tier characters if not just a strong pick. Vatista and Yuzuriha are s tier characters with some really unique hybrid archetypes.
Vatista not only is a charge character through and through (as well as negative edge) with no motion inputs whatsoever but she's also a zoner/trap character. Forward and backward charge inputs are projectiles, down and up charge inputs are a invuln flash kick and an overhead dive move respectively, and negative edge places down up to 3 traps according to the button held that you can detonate with any of your attacks including projectiles. Coupled with pretty big normals, a levitate, and not being able to get counter hit, she's pretty ridiculous in the right hands. Yuzuriha on the other hand is a zoner/stance character with unreactable projectiles, multiple teleports, counters, and a dodge (both aerial and grounded). The teleports are backwards dp inputs and you can chain them together to mix the opponent up, her grab can chain into combos, and her stance (while making your walk speed mega slow) allows you to do small teleports for minor repositioning, dodge attacks, and do a flurry of projectiles.
I've played this game pretty religiously for a couple years and the match up between these 2 is never the same. It really just depends on the player.
This guy: Zoners are bad
Sagat in SFII in high difficulty: Allow me to introduce myself
The thing about grapplers is that even if they are top. Most games only have one or two at most so unless they are absolutely dominant the meta would never revolve around them.
Here’s an idea for a video. How about which characters you think represent the ideal of each archetype better, also maybe add which one you think it’s the strongest and your favorite.
Asuka and JP watched this video and took it personally
Season 2 JP is on the line. He's sobbing uncontrollably.
Well, this depends a lot of the gamer, for example in skullgirls Beowulf, that Is a grappler, is pretty broker as far as i remember.
I'm always either a shoto or rush down. I have to be someone that is cool and fun to watch fight. And while a projectile or two in the kit is always good for an opening or a mixup, at the end of the day I just gotta put the feet on you.
How could you have forgotten the puppet-rushdown-footsies-zoner hybrid?
I don’t mind that grapplers aren’t top tier, it’s that they almost never have tools to deal with projectiles. Try fighting Happy Chaos or Axl in Strive as Potemkin. Literally no fun.
I really wish there were breakdowns for archetypes in fighting games. I feel like it would lead to a better understanding of the game in general. I'm curious what all the archetypes in MvC2 are, for example.
Top tier grappler: Goro Daimon in KoF 98. There's a small group of viable chacaracters, and he's one of them.
so ur telling me my 3x pot buster isnt a combo?
Thanks for the breakdown. I’m trying to get back into fighting games again and videos like these really help out a lot.
Now that I’m 40 I tend to really want to learn grapplers but settle in most games for rushdowns.
Do you play on controller or arcade stick? I always like asking what older players use to play fighting games and why
What games do you jam on?
@@markmessi9020 Normally I play with a controller but I found a pre owed Xbox fight stick today for the series. Now I can learn with fighting games on Xbox and arcade. I am very excited for this late stage journey.
@@pleaseshutup7053 the Capcom fighting collection especially darkstalkers got me back playing hard again. I’ve always played fighting games but dropped out quickly. The collection has me installing everything I own again.
The other would be Muktiverse and I picked up Melty Blood Type Lyle lumina on a recent sale but I’m still learning that one.
Thanks everyone!
It’s cool for the hobby to be fun again.
@@djmajesticeclectic I assume this will be more than a hobby for you and I can expect to see you at Evo?
I truly don’t know the reason for most grapplers jumping away after doing the command grab. I feel like getting rid of that would put most grapplers at mid tier.
Likely the devs want to avoid looping grabs and creating a mixup vortex.
@@leithaziz2716 I was about to put that, but then I remembered that’s just rushdown characters, so why is it an issue for grapplers?
@@GohTheGreat There are usually mechanics to make mixups less effective, even if they can still be looped. FD in Guilty Gear pushes the opponent way and mixup attacks usually scale a lot, so they don't do too much damage (unless it's MVC). With Grapplers, they sometimes just make grabs do as much damage as a combo, but give no Oki to make things less "intoxicating".
@@leithaziz2716 right, and in a lot of fighting games a command grab throw loop is a true 50-50 if they don't have an invicible reversal, much more potent than your typical combo reset
@@jackredfield5993 typically there's a few frames if grab invul or, in blazblue's case, they just let u tech the command grab if they do it on blockstun (or a few frames after) and the window for it is way bigger.
This probably doesnt apply to old games tho
hearing you saying zoners are bad reminds me of the nightmare that is peacock from skullgirls
To name a few exceptions to this topic:
- Thunder (KI2013) he is grappler, and also one of the best characters in the game. He does have great mixups, a DP, a half screen cmd grab and a dash that can pass through a bunch of stuff like a teleport, kinda. He can also destroy projectiles and has pretty good normals. Once he's in you're done, if you don't know the match up.
- Nu13 (Blazblue CT) She's a zoner and THE best character in that game, she had mad damage and combo potential, and she could combo you even at full screen distances, and that's like just the tip of the iceberg. She was nerfed so hard that ArcSys actually deleted her from the next game.
Depends. Do projectiles have collision which franchise etc. I love Grapplers in Injustice games the opponent gets mad having to just watch a grapplers animation play out with no escape I loved Grodd but I’m a NRS fanboy Zoners can be toxic af some chars have amazing zoning with good combos that just resend u full screen. THEN the midmatch animations can reset ur position taking u from up close to far and ur having to get back in all over again.
JM with amazing video topics, AS USUAL.
Funny enough, Z Broly is a grappler that has one of the best zoning tools in the game. Zoners would be great if chip kills were a thing again. The top zoners in FGs force you to play their game since, if you don't, you simply perish.
bring back chip kills, man, I'm tryna play fighting games, not blocking games
😂 you ain't lying. Can't stand this no chip kill shit. So many characters would've been badass in SFV if only chip kill for specials were there.
In the smash bro's series, there is a character archetype between Zoners and rushdown/shotos. They are swordies. They have disjointed hitboxes and play a midrange game. They try to control your approaches and take advantage of their disjointed hitboxes to protect themselves until they get an opening. In smash, they are often very good.
Unless you're playing an NRS game the zoners will not be top tier.
puppet characters tend to be really strong in most games.
I’m sobbing as grappler main.
I already know they’re gonna be low.
called it 😔
My only counter argument for grapplers is the fact that R.Mika is a character that exists who is nuts
The S Tier characters tend to dominate metas in games, so they might be the best archetype
Android 16 was a demon in dbzf launch, a grappler s tier is just god level
Strive beta was funny because Potemkin was almost universally agreed top 3 at minimum, along with Sol, the other top tier, having his wild throw damage to 35%. Grappling was amazing in the beta
Grapplers are usually bad due to polarizing matchups. Zoners often destroy them in neutral
I always like grappler characters more
Abigail in SFV was somewhat viable grappler until they nerfed him. If you think of the pure heavy grapplers, they are usually rough but the lighter grapplers like Abel and R.Mika they are alright. I think ppls just have always preffered rush down. I remember I'd get called certain names for playing Sim in SF4. He was pretty strong in the early iterations. I think a game where there are high tier versions of the architypes may be difficult but now that would be a fighting game.
I always find it so funny that grapplers are without a doubt some of the most consistently bad archetypes (usually mid/bottom tier) and yet EVERYONE hates them lol
Even grappler players hate grapplers. And themselves usually.
Almost like they break the core systems of the game or something
@@stolensentience depends on the game but in general it's kinda the opposite. Grapplers seem scary at low levels till you play against solid intermediate+ players who know the proper OS to get out of throw set ups. Unless you're talking about DBFZ Broly
@@AstralTaurus I just mean how you aren’t allowed to play up close whatsoever. You just play keep away because all the up close interactions mean nothing. And don’t get me started on the teleporting into their arms nonsense.
@@stolensentience that's not really "game breaking". Actually most grapplers have pretty slow normals and lack defensive options like reversals so it's not so bad. And they kinda need big grab ranges otherwise the grab becomes kinda useless
Zoners are hands down the strongest. To be honest they're never bad up close. Cable, Sentinel, Iron Man, etc. in MVC 2. Cetrion is damn near impossible to beat in Mortal Kombat. Sucks to face Robocop players as well. Sonic fox made a living off Erron Black.
NRs zoning is built different but not the norm
Nerf Scrimblo Bimblo
I think one of the more universal things across fighting games that makes grapplers weaker by default is the risk reward aspect and how inconsistent they are by design. Most other types of characters can run their mixup or vortex (especially in tag fighters) and the reward of guessing correctly against them either means you dont get hit and you still have to block, or you just escape the situation and reset to neutral, however, against a grappler if you guess correctly you are typically rewarded with a punish.
Day 16 of asking you to play DotoDoya in DnF Duel
Fun fact: Scrimblo Bimblo has been featured in 3 different franchises, and is still banned from competitive play.
I definitely feel like Zoners are routinely worse than Grapplers now. There's the odd good or even top tier Grappler in some games, but NO game nowadays is gonna let you have a top tier Zoner, you have to go back like 20 years to find one. Not to mention that there's a lot more hybrid grapplers nowadays like Sol Badguy and R Mika showing up who are grapplers but don't have the limited movement of a regular grappler. My vote for top tier archetype is definitely puppet characters because they almost NEVER let puppet characters be bad bc they know the effort they have to put in is more. The only exception is like Rev2.1 Zato (who was top tier for basically all of the prior game) and Enchantress from DNF
Dhalsim, Poison, Menat? SFV has a lot of strong zoners. That's a game in the past 20 years.
happy chaos in GGST is an example of a modern top-tier zoner
@@IntermissionVA Yeaahh Zonners are better even if you compare them with grapplers with mobility like Rainbow Mika, Laura in SFV and Clark in KOF
Cetrion?
@@nnnp634 NRS games are bad they dont count
Top tiers are almost always hybrids. In the examples you gave, zbroly(zoner/grappler), swift master(rushdown/zoner).
For new games at least yes
The reason why so many people don't like to play grapplers is because of the basic nature of fighting. Our hands weren't design for striking in mind, but for grasping. There's a reason why most modern Martial Arts had evolved into some sort of grappling hussle: it's safer to throw an opponent down in the floor than it is to K.O. them.
Of course it's gonna be frustraiting when the archetypical martial arts' fantasy of knocking down opponents, with basic punches and kicks, gets a rude awakening by the more efficient grappling. This also aplies to fighting games.
Sorry this comment just makes me laugh, calling grappling in FGs “less fantasy and more realistic” is funny when you got most grapplers like zangief and potemkin throwing you like a ragdoll 500m in the air flipping 7 times and shit, makes no sense comparing it to real life fighting 💀
Isn't beowulf from Skullgirls an obnoxiously good grappler? I don't play the game, but i remember hearing that he's basically a shoto, but half his combo tools are different variations of grabbing and swinging around enemies, giving him absurd damage output.
What I DO know however, is that in BBCF, the meta is dominated by a rushdown that just gets ultra armor for basically free (Izanami) and a Zoner with obnoxious normal and special zoning capabilities (Nine). Although, meta doesn't have much importance in BBCF since most people play characters for their unique play style (thanks to the drive and overdrive systems, that basically forces every character to have an unique gimmick, even the shotos)
Some other chatacters I can think are Stance or maybe rekkas, Stance are like really technichal but someone who plays them can be amazing and rekkas kinda relay on frame traps, delaying moves, different chains of moves, all of these usually creates Mixup opportunities.
that kinda reveal my main issue with fighting game. Despite having a lot of different mechanics in action in a fighting game (footsies, mix up, combo, knowledges checks, frame data) in the end... it's always end up being all about combo. (not that the other mechanic don't matter, but being good at combo over being good in any other domain don't compare)
From my experience not necessarily, you can make do with a simple combo, as long as you can perform a basic b&b combo, that can carry you through a match. Not knowing some of those other things could potentially actually hold you back more. Depending on the game of course
You're definitely right about grapplers, but i do thinks its interesting to look at the exceptions.
In general, grapplers are big slow guys who does huge damage when they get in, but because of how good they are when they get in, the rest of their kit isnt really allowed to be good to compensate. The example I am familliar with is r mika in sfv (at least pre-season 4 before nerfs and powercreep kinda left her in the dust). She was definitely a grallper with her command grab which gave her oki, her crouch grab for oki, fast jump back punish and good damage.
However, despite being a grappler, her neutral was actually good? Like her buttons were all pretty solid and she was pretty fast for a grappler. Her mid svreen confirms weren't the best, but hit confirm stand strong into ex peach gets her a knockdown at baciallt no risk, she was really cool. Because of this, her oki command grab (i think that was the kick one) while definitely giving her oki didnt do a ton of damage (~120 iirc) but because she had no trouble getting in a situation to use it, she was really good.
I think its kinda interesting that an example of a good grappler is one whose main mixup tool isnt even her best source of damage, which i think reveals a fundamental flaw in the design of grapplers, where having them be so focused on landing their big commmand grab forces their kit to be gutted elsewhere to the point where the goal it to get in once or twice and make a couple reads to win, which leads to inconsistent gameplay, which generallt is bad at a higher level. Whereas the grappler where their cmd grab is a mixup tool and not the wincon is way healthier and viable.
I was never into grapplers in fighting games until Injustice 2. Not only is Swamp Thing one of my all time favorite comic characters (read the Alan Moore run of Saga of the Swamp Thing. Trust me), but he's so fun to play in Injustice! He quickly became my main.
IRL fighting: Grappling is king
In fighting games: Guess I'm C tier
Not a surprise bc it isn't a major one, but no one in the comment section mentions Mouri from BASARA X who is the beyond strongest shoto & zoner
Cool video! I think it’s very tough to discern these things, especially because characters change in “goodness” from low level to high level play. For instance it’s easy to stomp your fellow scrubs as Potemkin, but going against high level players puts Pot at a disadvantage. Would love to see more examples, in-depth analysis of other, less common archetypes!
Maybe the King of Fighters is the only game that take the grapplers seriously. Daimon is ridiculous, he can take any shoto down anytime
There’s an archetype I think exists that I call Footsie girls. Some examples of these are chun li, rose, ssj4 goku, strive may and umvc3 wesker. These are characters whose main tool is long reaching footsie normals and fast walkspeed. Usually really good low mediums. This is a really solid archetype
There ARE still those instances where grapplers are broken or at least super viable picks like Jason in MKX, King in Tekken, etc. Potemkin I would have mentioned before but he’s falling off a bit now, though everyone in Strive is viable practically so I wouldn’t say he sucks.
The broad stroke video archetype. Great way to flex your fighting game knowledge and appeal to wide audience.
Great video. Thanks
Peacock from skull girls is the hellish abomination known as a rushdown zoner... She can dominate a match pretty quickly
Something to take note about grapplers is that they excel depending on the meta of the game... Take dbzf for example, almost all of the cast have some sort of gap closer like teleportation or super dash so grapplers there excel... While on the mvc2 example theres a lot of pushback on hits so they dont excel there... And also depending on the game, like in tekken where everyone has some sort of combo/air juggle, the grapplers like the kings or marduk have options on whether they grapple or not.
KoF have lot of strong grapplers. Strong, fast, with combos grapplers like Goro, Yashiro, Ramon, Clark, Hinako, Shermie...
The funny thing I noticed is that the Rushdown archetype revolves around speed, the Zoner archetype around attack and the Grappler type around defense.
I totally agree with this ranking. I think the zoner archetype is sometimes the strongest in fighting games for specific reasons. It's because movement options in fighting games generally weren't that good or special for rushdowns before even if they're faster than usual until recently.
The problem is though that when a rushdown reaches you, he could beat the shit out of the zoner if hey wouldn't have any sort of fast close range option to escape. To me that's because rushdown is naturally the strongest archetype in fighting games from a design perspective. It's the same for rushdowns when they get zoned by multiple projectiles from the other side of the screen but I think it's a bit easier to go through a barrage of projectiles to hit your opponent than it is to escape from a close range interaction if you don't have any get out of me option or a decently fast move. That's why they have it but they end up being very strong in fighting games sometimes with close and long range options. Grappler is obviously the weakest one and they're the rarest of the three. Their only tool is super armor. I think grapplers could be stronger and more interesting if they had access to a better combo game and would be a bit faster. Some grapplers already are like that but they aren't many.
I agree zoners can be boring sometimes but fighting games as a all would just be so much more boring if it was just rushdowns.
Shotos, rushdown, and whatever Guile is (Turtle? Charge zoner with some rushdown)
Also Chun Li's archetype is usually excellent although her moveset changes a bit game to game. Sometime's she has more anti-air options, and sometimes she has stronger rushdown and fireball options.
KOF98 Daimon is a monster.
Oh shit, JM, you know my homie Scrimblobimblo too?
I tend to play 'midrange space control as embodied by a staff'... The biggest trends I've seen are underplayed and underrated!
"Grapplers don't let me play the game".
-Rushdown players
Shotos are the strongest in this category, think about this:
- Shotos covers certain ranges shooting fireballs and best counter/comeback. Just watch out for good grapplers and rushdowns, other than this not nearly troublesome
- Some zoners are typically slow at times and SOME are just not made to counter, nor escape corners/make comebacks.
- Grapplers are strong, but only in close range. Trouble in longer distance range.
- Rushdowns are there, but typically weak if exposed (either read opponent wrong or combo wrong)
I just want to say that you have motivated me on wanting to do fighting games you and dotodoya are definitely the best fgc content creator and most versatile
In One Must Fall 2097 Gargoyle is a grappler who is Top Tier. Its free on PC and a pretty good fighter from the 90’s and made by Epic.
Great game but broken as hell in single player mode once you level up, easy infinites galore. Me and my buddy played the hell outta this in the mid 90's.
@@ultimateman55 I wish I could make it into an arcade game tbh. Its a good fighter.
In the Skullgirls meta, while Ms Fortune, a rushdown character, is currently considered the strongest character, Peacock and Robo-Fortune are among the top 5 highest perceived strength characters, and they are both zoners. Cerebella is also a very good character as a grappler, but she isn't used as much as the aforementioned. In saying that, Skullgirls is a pretty well-balanced game, any team variation of any character is viable, but the most dominant strategies use Ms Fortune, Robo-Fortune, or Peacock (and Annie who's a rushdown-shoto hybrid)
Peacock is from hell.
Should you have a separate category for turtle/punishment characters?
In UNICLR, Vatista and Yuzu are easily top 3, and both are zoners. Vatista being arguably the best character in the game.
The other character in that top 3 is Seth, who is a rushdown. The cast is pretty diverse, however, and everyone is viable.
Seth? A zoner?
@@dc7981 I misstyped lol
Here's my argument, these tier archetypes often shift around depending on the game that is being played, and perhaps even the match up depending on certain games, here's some examples:
A: Grapplers in Injustice 2 (I am using this game as an example because its the most prevalent), first of all they barely exist, and secondly they have to deal, with an Zoners BS, and cant get in to do damage at all, and that sucks (For I am an grappler player) Or another example, GG STRIVE, Potemkin VS Axl Low, and that MU speaks for itself, but in other games and other match ups, an grappler can just DUMP on an rushdown player, because they can eat the damage/chip damage that they throw out, hug them, and shatter their spines into an fine dust, as JM mentioned, Clark, in KOFXV
B: Shotos can also shift around, because in some games they dont even exist, and if they do, they're the most HONEST SHOTO AS AN SHOTO CAN BE, take Ryo and Robert Garcia for an example, Meh fire ball, Decent DP, and an flying kick, but they shine in being NOT an "shoto" but their tools that are NOT shoto like
While I agree that rushdown is an stronger archetype than most due to their aggressiveness and the "If I press a button I'm going to get hit by this wack ass mix up" there can be cases where they're not as strong, take Injustice 2 (again) as an example, where the Zoning was SO STRONG, and SO PREVALENT throughout the most of the game's lifetimes, that rushdowns barely got an chance to shine
Kof really has some of the best grapplers in the opinion
Some have said that _all_ the characters in Melee are grapplers, because grabs are so strong in that game, lots of characters get really good combos off of it including ones that go into a re-grab and loop. (They're not infinites because of the percent knockback scaling, but sometimes are zero-to-death so I guess might as well be infinites). In particular Marth has a really strong chain grab combo on Fox/Falco, and a great grab game in general, and is probably top 3 or 4 on the tier list
You pretty much pointed out why I get frustrated with a lot of games these days. Devs are so worried about people being annoyed with fighting against certain techniques, that they make them barely viable (grappling and zoning). With all the fighting games that have come out over the past 25 years, my two favorites are easily MvC2 and early SF4, why? Because in MvC2, you can play keep away viably, and with SF4, as a Gief main, I could compete so long as it wasn't Seth or Sagat. Devs need to toughen up and just let multiple playstyles rock. "Oh no, people are going to get annoyed with being thrown", mean while I'm playing Galaga against a Ryu spamming hadoken. Just balance the games. Your example of Frieza was perfect, I SO wanted to main him, but then I got DESTROYED as his launcher was garbage early on, and people could just dash through my projectile vomit, in a game where chip isn't really a thing anyways.
Big thing that prevents me from even trying DBZF is that the game is rush down neutral, followed by a giant combo. Maybe I'm just getting old, but I really miss the days of winning neutral not meaning the other person can put the control down and make a sandwich before the combo is over. SF and Skull Girls are the only fighters I can tolerate that are modern, because they either don't have insanely long combos, or in Skull Girls case, a mechanic that literally ends combos if they go on for too long, resetting neutral. I love watching DBZF, but I'll never enjoy getting hit with a jab and then watching my life bar slowly drop to 20% if not lose my character all together with a tod.