Tier List Discussion

[solidshark]

Tier lists seem to be very important, especially when you get to higher levels of play. I'm curious what everyone thinks about the concept.

My opinion is that a tier list will help me determine which character I might be seeing a lot, or which ones might give me the hardest time, but I take them with the smallest grain of salt possible. To me any tier list is really subjective; even when collectively established, that list won't tell me who I'll play with best, while experience will. I'd know most players treat tierlists more like guidelines rather than rules, and I know tourney players will take the seemingly strongest fighters to win more than just for fun, but on all levels of play no present tier list might inspire more creativity among character or team (depending on the game) choices. I find it funny how I always pick characters who are mid-tier range from anybody's list, when I usually pick my characters based on their movesets, appearances, personality, etc, and try to make it work from there.

[omegaryuji]

Generally, I don't lean on tier lists when picking characters, for exactly what you said about who is the best not necessarily being who you'll play the best.  As long as the characters I play can compete against anyone, I don't care where they are on tier lists.

While not having tier lists might stop people from flocking so quickly to XIII's Raiden or HnK's Toki or CS2's Makoto (or whatever other examples you can think of), hiding the lists isn't going to stop people from seeing that some characters have a clear competitive advantage over most of the cast.  I think tier lists are interesting for discussion and as a starting point to exploring the potential of other characters (from the point of what lower tier characters can do to combat whatever makes the high tier characters better), but beyond that, I don't give them much attention.

[baccano1932]

In my own opinion tier lists are just general guidlines that can help inform you as to who generally has an advantage over who and what you should be looking out for the most. As for character selection I generally choose based on movelists and play style opposed to how high they rank, the exception to this being if there is a clearcut divide been the high tier and low tier charcters in which case I usually just end up dropping the game altoghther

[Dark Geese]

A

In my own opinion tier lists are just general guidlines that can help inform you as to who generally has an advantage over who and what you should be looking out for the most. As for character selection I generally choose based on movelists and play style opposed to how high they rank, the exception to this being if there is a clearcut divide been the high tier and low tier charcters in which case I usually just end up dropping the game altoghther

Agreed, tier lists are just guidelines...and these guidelines differ in different regions/countries.

It's not to say one Tier List is right and the other isn't, there is not one true "right Tier List",  it's again based on area, level of skill/amount of time spent into given characters, tournament results, potential of characters etc.

[jinxhand]

In my own opinion tier lists are just general guidlines that can help inform you as to who generally has an advantage over who and what you should be looking out for the most. As for character selection I generally choose based on movelists and play style opposed to how high they rank, the exception to this being if there is a clearcut divide been the high tier and low tier charcters in which case I usually just end up dropping the game altoghther

Agreed, tier lists are just guidelines...and these guidelines differ in different regions/countries.

It's not to say one Tier List is right and the other isn't, there is not one true "right Tier List",  it's again based on area, level of skill/amount of time spent into given characters, tournament results, potential of characters etc.

I agree that they vary for region, but at the same time I feel that just on match-ups and what a character can/can't do within the game system, there should be one maint "tier list" that only deviates when new things are found out for a specific character. For instance, Vanessa might have been top tier in France for example, only because of what the "players" of that region can do with her, whereas in America she's probably beyond garbage tier for example. However, just within the actual game's fighting system, she's stronger than low tier, because of what she can do in Max Mode in terms of BC combos and the mixups/oki that come with them. So in essence I feel that region tiers should be in their own league, and then there should be a "system" tier list (I can't think of a better way of naming it) but this is the tier list that shows what a character can do "minus the player" per sé...

It's like having a armory with a nodachi, katana, naginata, a morning star, a Zulu fighting stick, a European broadsword, a Chinese broadsword, a rapier, heavy iron bracelets, butterfly swords, a harisen, and an assortment of other weapons, and putting them in a list from strongest to weakest. Sure, realistically (or perhaps scientifically[?]) a katana should be top because it is light which allows easy movement, has range, is very sharp, can both stab and slice, and also has better defensive options. However, that doesn't mean that anyone willing to invest time in mastering the iron bracelets cannot defeat a master of the katana. In fact, you might very well find regions of the world where "Masters of Stick Fighting Styles" (South Africa, Philippines, Viet Nam, Indonesia, India, Ethiopia, Nigeria) is the strongest style in those areas vs other forms of weapon-based martial arts... I hope this isn't too far out there to understand.

As mentioned in another post, I feel the only real thing that DOA4 had to offer outside of a pretty good (but quirky) online lobby were region-based tier listings. It's already a fact that ninjas are top and everyone else kinda trickles down with I think Bass being bottom tier (any DOA players, please shed some light on this, I haven't played in months), but in throughout the world, they aren't always the "strongest", even though the scene itself had eventually developed a standard tier list. DOA4 does have a strength tier list, but they also go the extra mile and make a popularity tier list, that both change all of the time...

Either way, I simply pick who I want and have fun... For the longest I didn't know Billy was top in 02, nor that Big was high tier (previously top) in NGBC. I just picked who I thought fit a style that I liked to use, which evolves over time, so I picked up other characters, regardless of tiers.

[LouisCipher]

I'd agree that Tiers vary by region, but I think they're more dependent on the balance of the game. Like Wolverine in MVC3, he just needs to get in once and instantly kill a character and possibly kill the 2nd or severely damage them. In that case it's definitely the character that's op and not the player. To use another example you can look at Kuroda using Q and he can have you think that Q is one of the best characters in 3S .

I main 3S but I disagree with the common tier list and think that Yun is better than Chun. I use Alex and do pretty well against Chun in general, with Yun I get rocked. The difference between the two is huge and I feel if I'm fighting a Chun I'm playing that player, and not so much the character. Against Yun I feel like I'm playing the character and have to overcome everything Yun is capable of doing and that's a lot.

[ZeWickedOreo]

In my opinion... There shouldn't really be a need to come up with a tier list.. It's a game.. Shouldn't it be played for entertainment and enjoyment? Knowing the tierlist people would only come up with a mindset of replacing their old characters with the ones that come up on top...
NOT HATING OKAAAY! Just my opinion