Ok, so this will be my second trip to Indianapolis (Gencon), last year I attended and played UFS after starting the game only a month prior. It goes without saying I intend to do much better this year (didn’t do to badly last year either all things considered).

Today is a day off, but I find myself at the office anyways, and for the better part of the day. I had hoped to get some PD done that I have been shirking for the better part of half a year… But as I finish chewing on some olives I find my mind wandering and thought it would be best to articulate my thoughts on the UFS meta prior to putting a nail in my two competitive decks (teams and singles). As the song says “I wish I had you to talk to”, unfortunately not everything played, little more everything thought, is posted up on the forums. Find this my attempt at cultivating some discussion, results are one thing, but rationale is what makes decks work – so here you have it!

Speaking of results, many of my ‘recently played’ inferences come from the results of recent tourneys: I’m taking Socal, Calgary, East Coast Championship, and the Great Lakes regionals. I’d like to add team Canadian Nationals and the Manitoba one to that list but I don’t have details as of this article, lest re: the former the fact that Mike ran Olexa and Andre was using Bishamon (2 characters that are also represented by the regional data), and the latter that Hilde was top 2 pre cut (also represented by the regional data). Taking these 4 regional’s we have the following:

Symbols (main, does not account for multi – ‘W = win’)

Earth w/ 7, WIN
Order w/6, WIN
Death w/5, WIN (split with Chaos, i.e. Victor)
Air w/4, WIN
Good w/4
All w/2
Fire, Evil, Water, Void w/1

Characters

Recurring- Sagat, Raphael, Dan, Tira, Zi Mei, Felicia
High Swiss/Final placing (that aren’t recurring)- Hilde, Talbain, Olexa, Alex, Bishamon, Guy <apologies for missing any>
Ostensibly missing- Akuma? Probably the reason we have seen Earth do well, along with the lack of Spinta in many of the decklists, is the lack of Akuma from play. We won’t ‘not’ see him at worlds. Interestingly enough his 3 symbols all have 1 top 8 only/respectively…

What’s changed, or rather what’s missing?

The big question is which of the banned cards could have got away with thinking they were ‘Irreplaceable’. My opinion - From most ‘irreplaceable to least (most replaceable)’

1. Olcadon’s – Honestly, this card being gone is what has seen the Earth symbol make a recent surge, namely it’s strong defensive cards get to stay in play and generally more ready (Blinding Rage, although strong, wasn’t enough of an answer)... Olcadon’s was irreplaceable for a lot of symbols. To my knowledge there are now fewer ways to deal with problem foundations (add to this Chester’s gone and it is difficult to say the least).
2. Forethought – Some people will hate me for this. But nothing is ‘as viable’ at slowing down build. Play this first turn with two other foundations and you basically said to the opponent you can now play 2/3 foundations instead of 4/5. Another reason Earth (a symbol with jack for hack) is able to play now is the banning of this card.
3. Chester’s- Can’t replace this, closest to it is vast negation, which only a few symbols have access to… See Death, Death can replace Chester’s, a fairly limited statement, also no life gain.
4. Bitter Rivals- Nothing was so offensive/defensive and had the most ‘use’ in competitive play under the Evil symbol. Saikyo Ryo stands to replace it in some decks… But not much else changes zones as well and as repetitively with little cost and along with the look at hand backing.
5. Rejection- This card is difficult to replace for the symbols it ran on, there isn’t a lot of early damage redux for these symbols. The easy way to replace this is with thoughtful playing, better blocks, more quick-control etc. But I can tell some decks are struggling to survive with sub-20 life against certain characters.
6. Feline Spike – There aren’t that many early kill cards that go beyond character specific abilities now. Feline could be run by any of these three symbols with ‘gain two momentum items’ and kill turn 2/3 easy. Of course, Felicia still poses this threat… The card’s damage is arguably replaceable by Menuett Dance, but the text on Spike is not replaceable in any way shape or form.
7. Lord of the Makai – Oddly enough this card is replaceable, but not efficiently, without some brainstorming. Obviously there is a lot that gains momentum, and there are more than a few recursive items in the game, they can all and have all replaced LotM, but none do it as well. The loss of 6+7 is what has seen the strength of some agro decks take a dive, taking a few extra turns before kill, etc.
8. Tiger Fury – the One Hit Kill took a bit of a hit with the bannings. There are still High Plasma and Sardine Special that bring single attacks to seemingly infinite damage; both of them require a much higher cost than Tiger Fury. Whereas Tiger Fury was dependant on foundations, Plasma needs ‘committed foundations’, meaning a miss-hit is easily countered for a win, and Sardine needs opponents with foundations, which means more answers in play (especially w/o Olc).

The ones not on the list are all irreplaceable (yes I think the kick from Hanzo can’t easily be replaced with something else, +1 difficulty on a low damage attack is a lot).

Symbols (a ‘forest for the trees’ look at the refined meta post banning)

From the results we have 5 symbols that stand out from the others at the moment, I don’t dare rank them, nor would I say they stand alone:

Order – Good – Earth – Air – Death

Most people start their deck decision at character, but it goes without saying that a strong character is nothing without support from a synergistic symbol. On the flip side, some symbols are more prevalent because they are found on characters with strong abilities.

Before US nats there was a very solid breakdown of the top 3 symbols posted by Matt, those being Air, Evil, and Order. Not surprisingly, 6/8 of the top 8 decks used those symbols at the nationals, and I’d argue that the other 2/8, being All decks, were just ones that were able to take some of the better cards those 3 symbols ran (Chesters/BRT/Bitter Rivals/Lord of the Makai, etc.) hmmm, 3/4 of those cards are gone now. All is a very different symbol. But are Air, Evil, and Order changed as well, or is what All didn’t steal from them still enough to keep them on top? And what of Death? A symbol that didn’t lose a single card*, and a symbol that gained two foundation cards from reprints…

I am in agreement that Evil is having problems lately… I don’t deny that it still has cards that are some of the strongest in the game; it just has fewer of them. I would expect to see Evil splashed with Order/Death/Chaos/Fire/Earth/Good if anything. But I highly doubt you will see a stand alone Evil deck do anything amazing. Evil still has some of the best pick of characters though, Ibuki/Zi Mei/Akuma/Olexa etc.

Air and Order are still top of the heap and for good reason. I think we will see more than a few of Felicia/Tira/Olexa, and any 7hs+ order is probably pretty viable. It comes down to which Order character has the best ability, or stats? Order’s always been a fairly complete symbol, and an ability-less character like Gill could still be run quite viably. Ability wise we have Guy/Frogase for momentum, Rock for draw/fake hs, Mina goes without saying…

Good/Earth, I always see them as similar symbols but they aren’t really. Good offers more protection from abilities (lotus/destiny), whereas Earth offers more protection from damage (cutting edge/battle prowess). Earth also has Inhuman Perception, a card that noticeably shares 3 symbols with the power 5. Other cards that you can be sure you will see because they share multiple symbols with the power 5 are: Amy’s Assistance, Holding Ground, Tag Along, and of course - Cursed Blood.

And then there is Death. A symbol that is greatly misunderstood at the moment seeing as how it’s coming out of a period of dormancy. One of the more interesting losses Death has suffered is *Dead for 1000 Years and its reversed ruling. I’ve always seen Death as a symbol that needs to have more answers out than the opponent has problems, and with Cursed Blood back it can manage to do this. Martial Arts Champion also goes a long way to ensuring this as well, because draw heavy -> build decks are stumped by it. Death is the new Evil, and you can probably expect most veteran players that are in love with Evil’s chess game to head to Death to steer the steady course to victory. Death also has a lot of one turn kill attacks with the release of SCIV – namely Menuett, Vibrato, Knight Breaker, and Launcher. Expect Tira/Zi Mei/Blanka/Donovan and Victor to rock Death, but I’d also look out for Gill, Fio, and maybe Morrigan…

Thoughts so far? I’ll pencil more of mine time permitting (specifically a technique discussion). But I’m interested in what people are thinking re: symbols and the different results we have seen post banning(s) as of after this weekend (can’t see much happening next weekend tourney wise – correct me if I’m wrong)…

- dut

I think you're spot-on in most of the analysis. Death has taken a lot of Evil 's thunder, and since a lot of the stronger cards in the pool have both of the symbols, I'm not surprised it's usurped Evil 's place on the UFS Power 5.

I'm gonna take your analysis a bit further and examine all the symbols, which are in ALPHABETICAL order in their tier (if they're in the same tier, I feel they're too close to make a definitive statement as to which is the order):

Tier 1:

Air - The classic 'glass cannon' symbol lost some muscle with the recent bans/erratas, but that's a good thing, because it was a bit too awesome. Its strengths are its up-tempo momentum generation abilities, its absolutely blistering attack line up (with the likes of Dragon's Flame , Feline Spike , Ira-Spinta , and Jaguar Thousand all making rounds here), and abundance of aggressively inclined characters, this symbol can hit hard and fast.

Standout Characters: Adon:: (7 HS, 19 HP), Andrew Olexa*, Felicia::, Mignon*, Terry***

Death - ...And now, we go from talking about symbols that got burned by the SOTG's to a symbol who got buffed by them. With most of Evil 's defenses getting a taste of the banhammer, Death now stands at the top of the control symbol heap, with a reinvigorated attack lineup ( Ichi no Tachi --> Midnight Launcher --> Knight Breaker , anyone?), the most comprehensive tech arsenal of any symbol out there, and a stable of strong characters, Death has come from the ashes as a powerful contender.

Standout Characters: Blanka:: (7 HS, 20 HP), Donovan*** (7 HS, 20 HP), Night Terror* (6 HS, 27 HP), Yang** (7 HS, 19 HP), Zi Mei* (7 HS, 20 HP)

Earth - I admit being biased in favor of this symbol, but no one can deny it's one of the top symbols right now. Earth has always been well versed in the arts of boosting and reducing damage, but now has found itself bolstered by the additions of card drawing, abilities speed boosting/hand damage, and some nifty tech cards (including Inhuman Perception and Torn Hero ), it has been able to bound its way up the rankings. And I haven't even talked about the possibility of full turtle mill and Hanzo*** loops (he can still do them here). The characters here run the gamut from speedy T2-3 artists ( Leona** , with her 8 HS/14 Vitality stats), to full-fledged mega-tanks ( Hugo* 's daunting 40 Vitality) to most things in between, so it's actually a pretty diverse symbol.

Standout Characters: Astaroth* (6 HS, 28 HP), Hanzo*** (7 HS, 18 HP), Hugo* (4 HS, 40 HP), Leona** (8 HS, 14 HP), Yi Shan* (6 HS, 29 HP)

Good - As a longtime Good player, I honestly believe the SOTG's finally placed it on the upper echelon of UFS. Though most decks lost a kill condition as the feared Feline Spike was basically turned into a Felicia Only attack, two major thorns in its side ( Rejection and Bitter Rivals ) also went the way of the dodo, leaving Good decks with much more room to operate, and finally allowing for guilt-free running of Reversals . With a solid attack lineup (the likes of Dragon's Flame , Ichi no Tachi , Mark of the Beast , and Shadow Blade come to mind), a defensive tech lineup second to none ( Holding Ground , Healer , Memories of a Nightmare , Red Lotus , Torn Hero , the list just goes on and on), and a fresh stable of beats-oriented characters, Good looks the best it has in years.

Standout Characters: Elena** (7 HS, 20 HP), Felicia:: (6 HS, 27 HP), Gen* (7 HS, 24 HP --> them stats should be illegal), Hilde* (sorry Marco, but it's true) (7 HS, 18 HP), Nagase*** (7 HS, 22 HP)

Order - It's been nerfed, to be sure (it lost Forethought , Lord of the Makai and by extension the Defender loop), but that's because it was run-away-laughing good. Though it can be argued that it lacks a consistent kill button now (and with stuff like Kuzuryu Reppa and Lunar Slash running around and solid pumps such as Personal Style on board for them, consider me a skeptic on that front), Order packs a sick amount of card drawing (though not as much as All ), combined with a powerful array of tech cards (which All lacks). It won't be as dominant as it has been recently, but by no means diminished.

Standout Characters: Astrid (OMG no dots!) (6 HS, 27 HP), Donovan*** (7 HS, 20 HP), Guy** (7 HS, 20 HP), Nagase*** (7 HS, 22 HP), Seong Mi-na*** (5 HS, 34 HP)

Tier 2:

All - This is one of the symbols that took the most damage from the June-July SOTG's, with Bitter Rivals , Chester's Backing , and Lord of the Makai all getting the axe, dramatically changing the symbol's playstyle from grey-wars behemoth to (IMHO) an aggressive symbol that uses superior card drawing and vitality gain abilities to stand and bang with the opposition. The attack line-up varies depending on your concept, but there are a few stand-outs that most decks will be carrying ( Kuzuryu Reppa and Ryu's Shin Shoryuke n are the most prominent ones), but you'll find a lot of solid moves here. Hand size is also less of a concern here, since this symbol packs plenty of card drawing to make up for any initial disadvantage you may have. The one thing it has to beware about is that it has absolutely no answer to Martial Arts Champion , and that can throw a pretty nasty wrench in its plans.

Standout Characters: Alex*** (6 HS, 28 HP), Balrog:: (6 HS, 30 HP), Hugo* (4 HP, 40 HP), Sakura:: (6 HS, 27 HP), Zangief::. (6 HS, 32 HP)

Chaos - Another symbol that took a big hit from the SOTG's ( Lord of the Makai was the Defender loop enabler, after all, and Forethought was just plain nasty), this symbol is in a bit of a weird place right now. Right now, it's hasn't got as many pieces for or as consistent a momentum strategy as Air (and some of the best cards it has for these purposes have Air as well), and its control check shenanigans aren't as powerful as Evil 's, but it has both, and it has something both these symbols somewhat lack in straightforward speed boosts and defensive abilities. True to its name, this is a grab-bag symbol, and you can play it in one of many ways.

Standout Characters: Andrew Olexa* (7 HS, 19 HP), Blanka:: (7 HS, 20 HP), Fio* (7 HS, 19 HP), Guy** (7 HS, 20 HP), Zhao Daiyu** (6 HS, 25 HP)

Evil - Behold the fallen giant. With most of the SOTG smackdown being directed at it ( Bitter Rivals , Chester's Backing , and the infamous Rejection have all bit the dust now), this perennial top-tier symbol has been forced to yield ground to hungry contenders in Death and Void . Still, Evil carries the most powerful attack lineup of all the "control" symbols (think Death , but add a devastating second option to Ichi no Tachi in Reverse Flayer ), and still reigns supreme in control check hacking shenanigans with Blood Runs True , and should thus not be taken lightly. Look for Evil to turn more aggressive as a means to compensate for its lost grey war potential.

Standout Characters: Akuma::: (7 HS, 20 HP), Andrew Olexa* (7 HS, 19 HP), Zi Mei* (7 HS, 20 HP)

Fire - Here we have a symbol that was always in the mix, but may be put over the top by the recent bannings. Sure, Bitter Rivals (one of the very few defensive pieces the symbol has ever had) is gone, but so is its hated enemy Rejection (which prompted most decks I saw to carry the bulky No Memories around), so Fire and its well-rounded buffing offense is much more free to operate. Set 12 has brought even more powerful attack lineups to Fire 's always impressive arsenal, as well as a handful of control-hating tech, so look for this symbol to make its presence felt.

Standout Characters: Akuma::: (7 HS, 20 HP), Alex*** (6 HS, 28 HP), Astaroth (6 HS, 28 HP), Leona** (8 HS, 14 HP), Yang** (7 HS, 19 HP)

Void - Though some folks are skeptical about this symbol being fully deserving of this tier rating, I can say with a strong degree of confidence that this symbol is every bit as strong as Evil . Although the attack lineup isn't as mighty as the dreaded pitchfork's, it has superior defensive/negating abilities and generally has an easier time making its attacks connect, thanks to discard/speed boosting being more prevalent here than in Evil . Add some Throw -based awesomeness, and you have a very solid symbol, indeed.

Standout Characters: Akuma::: (7 HS, 20 HP), Dhalsim:: (6 HS, 28 HP), Ken:::. (6 HS, 26 HP), Rashotep** (6 HS, 27 HP), Sakura:: (6 HS, 27 HP)

Tier 3:

Life - And here we are at the basement of unfulfilled potential. Life took two solid shots to the jaw when Forethought and Rejection both went down, and its general lack of answers to problems such as characters (name me ONE CARD that can nerf characters, just ONE, and I'll take it back), and Responses, combined with its general lack of kill condition power (a combination of a lack of strong attacks with lack of damage-oriented buffing), and you see why Life is down here, especially when the other "aggro" symbols ( Air , Chaos , Earth , Fire , and debatably Good and/or Evil , since they're hybrids) have all answered most or all of these issues.

Standout Characters: Alex*** (6 HS, 28 HP), Ivy* (6 HS, 26 HP), Leona** (8 HS, 14 HP), Yang** (7 HS, 19 HP), Yi Shan* (6 HS, 29 HP)

Water - This symbol wasn't the first on folks' minds when the SOTG's came down, but it lost a good bit of defense in Chester's Backing and Rejection . Although Bitter Rivals ' departure has officially made it safe to play a Reversal -based deck, Water has glaring defensive issues (no answer to getting committed out) and offensive shortcomings (a dearth of damage and speed bonuses, combined with no alternative to force attacks through, such as discard or throws), combined with a general lack of characters that are most at home in the symbol as problems to attend to.

Standout Characters: Donovan*** (7 HS, 20 HP), Felicia:: (6 HS, 27 HP), Sakura:: (6 HS, 27 HP), Seong Mi-Na*** (5 HS, 34 HP), Ukyo:: (7 HS, 20 HP)

*pant, pant, pant* Finally done. Comments?

Work your sexy body for Indiana, yeah. It wants you bad.

life in my personal opinion is NOT as horrible as it is made out to be, my Ivy7 deck is off of life and to this day has only lost ONE game out of 40 though thats like comparing apples to oranges with that character, Lu Chen2 and Tira6 are BOTH good characters that are very good off of all 3 symbols though which is gonna get play at the highest level of the 3 characters... Tira and she's probably gonna get played off of Death unfortunately... if i could only scrounge enough money together to go back home to Indianapolis and teach people a lesson in [Life] i would show people that Life is not has horrible as people have percieved it to be...

Water... meh It lost Rejection and took a hit with Spike, still a playable resource though it's one major trick got nerfed with the recient bannings.

Fire and Good are almost one in the same with beats decks, Leona, Astaroth, Nightmare, Cassy & Sagat all great Fire decks. Then you got Good beats with Hilde and Talim, and also have Good Mill thanks to Kyo4.

Earth and Death... hmm why do i see this being Señor Duckworth's Bishamon Mill deck.

thats all i can think right now... wow i need to get my playgroup back up and running and get a job...

N.J.

Homme Chapeau said:

Yikes! That's not at all the type of image said song title should conjure.

On topic though, it is interesting to see people place life and water at the bottom. Life is kind of a no brainer, but water still has a lot of viable cards if you ask me.

- dut

dutpotd said:

I disagree with you there.... Life still has alot going for it. Gorgeous Team, Battle Prowess, Calming the Mind, Revnants Calling, Tough Outer Shell and Torn Hero are the basis for a very solid foundation lineup that is very anti meta. Lifes problem, like it has always been (minus CSS), is that the symbol has a hard time killing. SUre it has Heel Snipe which is a plus but with few ways to damage pump and not really any finsiher attacks Life struggles. Not to mention it has some awesome characters in Ibuki and Alex. Regardless I still have a soft spot for it in being one of my favorite symbols.

I think water is the worst symbol right now.... yes it has some of the same foundations as Life in Calming, Gorgeous, Battle Prowess and it has other nice pieces in The Bigger and Program Malfunction but it has absolutley no answers to commital (which is so important in todays meta) and its attack lineup is just as bad as Lifes.

I think Earth, Good, Death and Order on the top tier I dont think there is really room to argue against that... Im not too sold on Air being there. yes air has inhuman and spinta which gives it merit but it lost soooo much with the bannings that its hard for me to think of it still has top tier.

Fire is still nice because there is few answers to its damage pump and it has spinta.

All lost so much.... being an avid All player for all of block three its hard to find replacements for the power cards that it lost. It still has some nice options in plenty of draw and discard but it has no lil to no defense with Chesters and Bitter gone. No answers to commital and spinta whatsoever makes it a bad meta choice. All has to outbuild the opponent to stand the chance, if it cant it falls on it face.

Void is an interesting option.... IMO it still lacks a lil something (especially character wise) but i think its well on its way to becoming special.

Chaos without Forethought, Lotm and Defender Loop lost alot. Im not impressed with it at all on paper however I cant say how well it does cuz i havnt even seen a chaos deck played in quite some time.

Evil lost obviously lost alot but it still has quite a bit.... it has one of the best attack lineups out there, it has cutting edge and BRT so thats nothing to sneeze at. It definately needs a boost with Tekken

This meta is different on one had I like the fact that foundations stay on the field and in most cases get to use there abilities... however on the other there are just sooooo many easy E's right now (damage reduct and life gain mostly) that its still a pain in the but to kill. Healer, Amys and Battle Prowess are some of the best cards in this format because they deter attacking so much and the meta which for the most part needs 2-3-4 attacks per turn in order to kill

Void is grossly underestimated. Definitely mid tier; it can kill, it can draw, it can Throw, and has a pretty great list of characters and enough control to make it matter.

I'm with Marco on this one; Heel Snipe + Akuma::: is downright nasty (what is this Red Lotus of which you speak?), and that runs off of Void . Rashotep and R. Mika have brought more muscle to the symbol, and Dhalsim , Ken , and Sogetsu 's support offers card drawing. No Memories and The Evil Doer Destroyer flip the bird to Enhances, so if anything, I feel Void is every bit as good Evil right now (sure, it doesn't have the destructive line-up, but it's packing more defense and control).

MarcoPulleaux said:

I agree that Void is a capable symbol. I am actually in the process of building a Void deck for Worlds, one that branches off of some of my prior Void builds (pre-ban). Void hasn't lost a lot, but it hasn't gained what it needs.

Namely, I don't believe Void can kill early enough to fit my style. Void can kill, I agree with Marco here, but it can't kill before turn 4-5+. It gains momentum slowly... And it doesn't have any 'damaging attacks' that don't require big setup/late game scenarios...

Ehhh, I guess it is a different type of defensive symbol, defensive w/o damge redux. I find the techs that Void fosters are:

discard

draw

anti-draw

negation

readying

Note that I don't find Void has many defensive enhances, rather it has a lot of defensive responses. Find a way to turn off responses and Void gets bitten hard... The same goes for Death, but Death has more form negation and the ability to strike sooner than Void... So.... Void sees a lot less play.

Most importantly, Void has big problems with control hack... (short of MAC for BRT now) and Void isn't on Tag Along, not surprisingly Void's recursion ability is suspect...

For the same reason that Life (alabeit an o-k on paper symbol) doesn't see play, you will not see Void in play more often than not. A good symbol is not the better symbol, and at most competitions (barring a spectacular character) the better symbols will be played more and have a greater deal of sucess.

- dut