As I complained about on another topic His tier placement is based on what options other characters have, and right now his main trouble match ups are still Kasumi and Jann Lee. I'm fine with those being his trouble match ups as that's really just expected. What I'm not fine with is taking away his main tool for pressure. A tool that doesn't guarantee anything and does no damage. It's one of the main reasons he was so bad in DOA4 and they've gone and returned him to damn near close to that status.
Just because people saw me on stream beating up someone who hadn't really played the game that well on one of Bass' best stages doesn't mean that he's god tier. Keep in mind that I did not win that tournament and lost my first set to a Kasumi player and second loss to a Jann Lee.
Bass' pick-up grants him a front facing frame advantage that's +11. His fastest attack period is i12 but it's a high that doesn't string or juggle, and his fastest mid is i14. Compare that to Kasumi's i9 high string combo and i11 mids and you can see he's not supposed to win on speed of attacks. Hell, half of his strings can be guarded mid string even if he attacks (3KP on cb i'm looking at you) or even held on reaction. His stats show this that 'attacks' are a 1/5. So he has a tool that does no damage, pushes the opponent far enough away that the fastest attack with enough range he can do is i16 meaning the opponent has 5 frames of movement available to them. The throw was granting him a way to fight fast speed characters. It was following his stats and allowed him pressure while still allowing the opponent a way out.
Seriously, I can't tell you how stupid this nerf is and how pissed off I am.
Meanwhile, Hayabusa gets to KEEP his AIR attacking 3H+K // PP4PK which not only gives +9 on guard break, can't be interrupted with anything but a mid kick hold, gives him a knockdown mix-up, but is also a visibly linear AIR attack that TRACKS.
Yeah. Balance. pft.: