Balance 240 vs 300 life

TRI Mike

Well-Known Member
Everyone knows that DOA5U saw yet another increase to the default life bar for every character. With 300 life, the vast majority of strings, combos and other things now deal less damage and fights tend to be much longer. DOA5U also saw a slight damage buff for holds and throws in general but I feel strikes are too weak now to the point where sometimes, they don't matter as much.

For example my character, Tina, has quite possibly the best throw repertoire in the game and her HCT J.O.Cyclone deals 132 damage. In previous games it dealt 120 which was exactly 50% life (with 240 settings) but now though the damage itself is increased, the percentage of the bar taken away from the opponent is actually less. I also used to fight with her using small combos, launching immediately after stunning or whiff punishing or going for faster-but-weaker throws to punish unsafe things and damage blocking foes. All of this was excellent in 240 life because with Tina, everything hurts. But now with 300 life, everything is going to shit for me.

Now I feel I just can't damage my opponent enough which unconsciously leads me to try either a CB combo or a HCT J.O.Cyclone all the time to damage a lot but favoring those options fail sometimes and ends up in me losing fights I probably shouldn't have lost. This is also happening to me with my other characters like Gen Fu, Helena and ESPECIALLY Rig and Leifang (Their damage output in 300 life just sucks balls).

So why should we stay with 300 life¿ I honestly believe the game is not favoring from it. With 240, everything matters, small combos, wall splats, ground throws, offensive holds by themselves, using or not a wake-up kick, etc. The game simply feels faster with 240 and makes everyone play better and more carefully. Hell, even spacing, sidestepping and turtling correctly is more important.

I know this is very subjective and that a lot of you will not agree with me but I want to leave the discussion open and probably reach an agreement.
 

AkaShocka

Well-Known Member
Yea, Tina is kinda effected by the life bar now. But it's not all that bad IMO, well to Tina at least. On HiC she can deal with half life and damn near half like with her combos after CB. Against lightweights on HiC her :6::P::P::6::K: and her :426::T: and she has a combo that works on all weights: :6::P::P::6::K: air throw. On HiC doesn't that do half life? Or just about?
Even without HiC it still does a pretty decent amount of damage. But outside of those combos she really doesn't have a lot of combos that handle a lot of damage. Her J.O. Cyclone on HiC doesn't even do half life at the lab stage, yea that's a problem. That was a very good throw. But it's still pretty useful.
 

MrMoon360

Well-Known Member
I was not happy with the buff to health. See post here.
1367c0af-64f9-42e2-be33-d640069d430a_zps1dc4ea35.jpg


And you make good points that I think are merited and not just subjective.
I now see Team NINJA as forcing their new PL gimmick on players. Even though they can and may avoid using them entirely, the harm to other damage outputs is done.
There are definitely mixed feelings about forcetechs being removed, also. I was in favor of them remaining.
 

Brute

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
I encounter the same exact problem you do with Tina with Ryu's Izuna. In DOA5 vanilla, it was 75 NH damage to 117 HiC damage. Now in Ultimate, it's buffed to 80 NH and 120 HiC. But, because of the health increase, even on HiC Izunas are less threatening than they have been in any DOA game to date. Think about it. 117->120= +13 damage. The new health added +30 health. That means that even after two HiC izunas, you still haven't made up for the added health bar. Izunas were more threatening with 270 health, even when they only dealt 75 damage. In regard to previous games, with 240 health, an 80->120 damage izuna was right where it should be. Two HiC Izunas; you're out. "Oh, but in the Lost World stage they're so powerful!" Yeah, they are. 160 damage on HiC. But need I remind you what it looked like getting HiC Izuna'd off Lorelei or Lost World in DOA3? Shit was scary. Your life bar was just destroyed.

So they turned him from a striker with good throws into a grappler and thought "grapplers shouldn't have good strikes, so let's nerf those to shit." What they didn't realize is that in doing so, they took away all his perks, since now his throws are less intimidating than they ever have been as well thanks to the life bar setting. That's just nerfs across the board. In place, he now gets gimmicks and shenanigans like silly free teleports and some teleport attacks, both of which are absolutely blown out of the water by Hayate's similar capabilities with teleport cancels and wind-dash shenanigans.

Now don't get me wrong, I understand in the past Ryu has been a little ridiculous and toning him back is not something I'm necessarily opposed to, and I wouldn't have too many issues with him if his Izunas were terribly threatening and as a result they felt he was a grappler-based character. But he has shitter mix-ups than most grapplers, worst OHs than most grapplers, the least intimidating Izunas since their inception and in place he gets gimmicks.

TL;DR: Tone down the fuckin' life bar already.

edit: And before some jack-off comes in to claim I'm asking for buffs or whining that my character is too weak, just fuck off. Not in the mood for your bullshit when you don't even understand that that's not what I'm talking about.
 

StrikerSashi

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
Did you know Kokoro's 3 part 12f throw on HiCH can land three times and still leave someone alive? This gaaaame. They buff health and don't buff Kokoro's throws. Used to be that she has great throw damage for a striker. Not anymore.
 

Tones

Well-Known Member
Premium Donor
260 health for balance imo.

First best 2 out of 3 rounds for tournaments until top 8 is reached to ensure tournaments don't run overtime.

As above otherwise straight 240 health.
 

Tenryuga

Well-Known Member
I vouch for one of these two things: Return health to 270 or leave health at 300 and buff strike damage. Strike damage is poor for some characters and in the transition to 5U those characters actually got thier strike damage nerfed in addition to the health bar being increased. For the sake of triangle system balance I want strike damage buffed. Some throws could use a damage buff too like Kokoros 214T and Ein's 33T. I have no idea why Ein's 33T is doing less damage than Hitomi's given how many options she has over him. Kasumi's throws can stay where they are at.
 

Tenryuga

Well-Known Member
The buff to throws also makes punishment very lovely with health at 270. A 6T is 53 points on average from a striker. That is roughly 20% of the health bar gone because you decided to be risky or stupid. I like it.
 

TRI Mike

Well-Known Member
I'm not having a problem if Leon's got death combos with 240. His opponent probably has a shit ton of ways to escape before AND DURING it so it should be a price for Leon to land the entire thing. I also noticed how some multipart throws like Koko's or Fangs aren't any strong at all. I just don't feel there's enough incentive to use Tina's fast throws or launch without playing the stun game because chances are the damage will be extremely shitty.

Another example I give is Fang's Unshu OH, it guarantees a faint stun and a launcher for a quick 3PP6PP juggle which only lands 56 damage if I'm not mistaken. With 300 Life you have to do that SIX times to kill. That means the combo (or the Unshu grab for that matter) is simply not scary, people won't try to avoid it (opening up more options for Fang) because 56 damage is too little.

I think this issue is more important that we think. I seriously believe we have to play in 240.
 

Tenryuga

Well-Known Member
240 is way too small IMO. I wouldn mind it but that doesn't give a good amount of time for people to adapt to each others playstyles. With health that small the game basically becomes use your most fastest and most damaging setups for a majority of the cast and doesn't encourage much strategic play outside of making sure you don't get hit. It would reduce the level of skill required to achieve victory IMO.

At the same time you don't want health to be so high that people feel like they can take risks without being punished hard. I say 270 Health. Either that or buff strike damage and some throws and leave it at 300. I'm leaning more toward 270.
 

TRI Mike

Well-Known Member
If you want to adapt to a playstyle, play 2 out of 3 sets or 3 out of 5 sets. It's better, it wouldn't affect the life bar and we already do it anyway.
 
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Tenryuga

Well-Known Member
We should test things out and see how it goes for 240 health. I know a few players want the health setting to return to that and I'd like to try it out as well.
 

d3v

Well-Known Member
If you want to adapt to a playstyle, play 2 out of 3 sets or 3 out of 5 sets. It's better, it wouldn't affect the life bar and we already do it anyway.
3 out of 5 sets is standard for most games nowadays anyway.
 
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