Just a quick thing, this weekend gone england held what will prob be our last regional of the season with the new banned list.

The top 4 was:

Victor - Defender loop with reanimated

John Herr - turns me on combo deck

Akuma - yes that one again

Chun Li - No spike Multi with spinta

Victor vs chun Li - chun Li wins 2-0

John Herr Vs Akuma - Akuma Wins 2-0

final

Chun li vs Akuma - chun Li wins 2-1 after first blood

So hows that for the new list eh

New list looks very much like Old List.

u could be right however i may have to check again lol, tis true though there was a lot of diversity there out of 27 people i think there were only 2 doubles so that bodes well

You had a first blood result in the finals match. I thought finals were always supposed to be played out with no time limit?

unfortunalty the community center we was using for the event was due to shut (hence the top 4 cut) however we decided before the first blood game 3 that we would split the prizes and the winner of first blood would walk away with wood and the sol cal 4 incramental and 2nd would get the shadow war. so not too bothered really

Tuesday said:

Ummm gogo Victor? Kinda similar though!

Interesting topic name. Are you indicating a change to either of the prominent character cards (Akuma/Chun-li)? Or are you indicating they will win more this year, and perhaps at worlds?

The latter is a duh, the former is... yet to be seen. I know for a fact Chun-li creates major blips on anyones radar of - omg that's powerful - but Akuma is a bit more subtle, in that his game break doesn't occur until he is ready and supported by all of Evil's mechanics.

I'm presuming Akuma's R:, although powerful, is more manageable than Chun-li's, granted repeatable answers exist to it (anti-hack) and punishing answers (willful/autopass). His E:, especially backed by Evil's wall (I'm especially referring to Revanant's here), and if needed Snipe, is his true trump card.

- dut

Basically i just thought i'd post our results that are post bans. Its just quite funny that the us nats pre bans gave us the same results as our biggest regional to date post bans.

More to the point do people see this as whats still to come or is this just a last gasp from these 2 characters??

Tuesday said:

Oh, ok. I gots ya.

Definately of still whats to come. They are the 2 best character abilities flat out (well maybe Mina competes but her handsize puts her overall character rating slightly below these two). Similarly, Herr competes, but his ability doesn't add anything breaking as far as offense goes. What he does is break some of the luck out of the game. Chun-li and Akuma are without a doubt, stand out character abilities / stats / access to strong symbols.

I can't see how the bans impact either of them more than anyone else. Everyone loses out with Olcadon's, it is debatable to what degree who wins the most, but of those that do they are still weaker symbols/characters. 4 symbols lose with Chester's, but anyone who says Chun-li or Akuma rely on Chester's is straight up silly. Makai doesn't hurt Akuma at all... Chun-li can still deal boatloads of damage without free momentum, and arguably she is the best to gain momentum, seeing as how she can usually attack on the opponent's turn with them having 2 cards in pool and reluctant to block, short of having a harder time building later that turn...

The thing about Chun-li is her early game headstart, she basically starts play with a Valerias/New Low in play, if her ability read - playable after the third turn of the game, or - only playable twice per game she would be a bit more balanced...

Ehhhhhh, I know that unless a new character is released that is better (see Tekken) or a very strong counter tech to one of these two characters is discovered, that anyone wanting to honestly 'win' Worlds this year, and not simply top 8, will have to play as either Akuma or Chun-li.

Of the characters that are absolutely ruined from US Nats (or will have the hardest time repeating with a similar deck), they are Alex, Zangief, and Gill (duh - arrow ban, but good/death base and spike might still be reasonable).

I think Ibuki is still good as gold (but not as strong as Kum or Li, and Hanzo with kick is always going to be a threat (as it is sometimes luck based as to what answers you draw vs. what offense he draws).

Just my thoughts.

- dut

ps. there are answers to chun-li, but it isn't so much stopping her ability that is the problem, it is stopping it without losing half of your staging area in the process to a committal war vs. inhuman/perfect sense among other things. A committed staging area early to pay the cost to stop her is costly, and then late game, it is still costly now that you are committed for your and the Chun-lis turn to follow which is when it attacks.

Mark,

Admittedly my Akuma deck was inspired by yours and what I saw you do in Canada. However, my deck list was quite different from yours in many ways. I ran quite a few different cards that you didn't include and I dropped a lot of cards you did run (Superior Witch, Amy's, Soul Wave, to name a few). The number of copies I ran of each card varied quite a bit as well. I ran 4 of a lot of the cards you choose to only run 3 of. I'd love to talk to you more about decklist, card choices, etc if you have the time. My AIM screen name is LoadingPlsWait or you can contact me via email at [email protected]

I plan to run Akuma again at Worlds this year and will be testing a few different builds post bannings.

Paul

P.S. As far as the topic is concerned I have no doubt that Chun Li will continue to dominate post bannings. She is broken and in the hands of a good player has the edge on every other deck out there. It will continue to be an up hill battle for all those who face her until she rotates or is banned.

Also, while I agree with many that the concept behind Chun Li was well thought out, in practice she is far too strong. This is evidenced by tournament results (She won both Canadian Nationals and US Nationals) and the overall number of Chun Li's that get cut each tournament due to diversity.

As far as Akuma is concerned he is very strong, but there are many decks that can beat him. He's been around a lot longer than Chun Li and has not accomplished nearly as much. Personally speaking I am hopeful Akuma continues to do well because I know that I will be playing him =).

Last, very few teams ran Akuma at US Nationals which says something about what people think about him. For most teams, including our own, the top 3 decks were Chun Li, Hanzo, and Gill Spiral arrow lock.

Post Bannings I see the strongest decks being (In no order other than Chun Li on top):

Chun Li
Hanzo Kick
Akuma
Jon Herr
Donovan
Alex
Seong Mina - Really just Jeremy Ray if he continues to play her.
Ibuki
A death deck will tear stuff up too. Maybe Zi Mei or even 8HS Gill Death now that spiral arrow is gone. This requires more research.
Last look for Good to be really annoying. Probably not win, but be really annoying.

Edit - Also I forgot to add, the most important thing isn't the deck, the character, or the symbol, but rather the person playing it. We are likely to see most of the same people in the finals and top 8 as we usually do. Jon Herr tops at everything everytime so it's almost like a top 7 or top 15 for everyone else.

PaulBittner said:

Paul - I agree wholeheartedly with your entire post (heh, I even got some of the changes right by watching your games played with Akuma) but most importantly with the Edit.

Herr is, without a doubt, a very very intelligent player, if not the most intelligent player the game has right now. Opinion of course, but any competitive deck in his hands will top 8, his mindset demands it. He does have some equals and that cannot be denied, and all of these are also likely to top, which begs the comment, characters aside - players do make all the difference between consistent and inconsistent sucess.

I daresay what would be if Herr decided to run Chun-li. Now that would be a heated diversity fight!!!

Here's wishing you consistent finishes with Akuma who, you are right, is beatable and not broken - just damaged - in comparison to Ms. Li.

- dut

Edit - too bad you had to leave Saturday night, what would have been fun is to play against your version of Akuma with mine (from teams the day before). At the very least we would have learned a bit about taking a very sucessful deck (to Tuesday's credit) and adding our own flare or changes based on our understanding of the meta and personal playstyle.

Just wondering who was playing the chun li that won?

What does the new akuma list look like? is it pretty much the same stuff as the one that won french nats?

I'm really trying to build a competitive akuma deck off of buying singles, in-order to get into the game. I'm an akuma player since SF-Alpha so it seems fitting, and he's good in UFS....honestly half the reason I'm playing

I would really appreciate a post-ban list, if anyone is willing to help me out.

I'm sure anything people are brewing up off the same game-plan will be plenty good for my purposes, once I play it a bit, I can find things to tailor it to my style, but starting with a strong deck goes a long way to getting somewhere in a game...and decklists/resources seem so scarce for this game.

My aim is Arcanis777

Email is [email protected]

if anyone can toss me a list post ban, I'd appreaciate it. thanks.

PaulBittner said:

Fei Long's Forward Kick got banned

quarzark said:

Judging from the date the original post was made, the "post bannings" they were refering to would have been for Chester's, Owlface and LotM. Chunners and co. didn't get banned til July's SotG.