DOA5U The Official Tier List with Discussion Thread

XZero264

FSD | Nichol
Premium Donor
Japanese players place more emphasis on their tiers via whiff punishment where American tiers tend to be more based around how well you can stay in when you get in. That's why NA sees Hayate as mid and Japanese see him as top. They prefer the footsie game and NA prefers "no-fucks-given-I'm-coming-for-you"
 

KasumiLover

xX_APO_Prince_Xx
Premium Donor
Japanese players place more emphasis on their tiers via whiff punishment where American tiers tend to be more based around how well you can stay in when you get in. That's why NA sees Hayate as mid and Japanese see him as top. They prefer the footsie game and NA prefers "no-fucks-given-I'm-coming-for-you"
If that's true, then I'm definitely pro Japanese tier list, they're more focused on defensive play which I love.
 

KasumiLover

xX_APO_Prince_Xx
Premium Donor
If Ein won a major he wouldn't be considered top tier, unless the person who won that major, consistently won other majors or frequently placed in top 8 or if a wide selection of people made it top 32 with him cause then people would have to re-evaluate how he stacks up against other characters in reality instead of theoretically knowing that this character is threat in tournament situations. I'm not trying to glorify tier lists as the end all be all of this game they definitely need to be updated constantly for the most accurate view of them, but logically they stand testament to what a character is capable of in a variety of match-ups in a variety of different circumstances and anyone who uses the tourny results in conjunction with their knowledge of the game get the most accurate of view what to expect when going to a tournament therefore allowing that person to practice for that situation. Calibur has trained alot with Vader in Alpha so I'm sure they discussed the potential she has generally and specifically in situations. The fact he made it so far with her shows that I'm must train against Alpha and study her frames because of the threat she brings in knocking me out of tournament if I were to go far or up against Calibur or any other alpha for that matter. I have yet to see a Brad or Bass consistently place top 8 in tournament so therefore I'm not going to practice to study those characters as much because the results do not show that they are a threat to be recognized despite them being great characters. Brad being top 3 in crouch cancel and reverse crouch cancel speed and having a wide variety of mix-up and good input delay due to his stance not to mention guaranteed combos off a reverse grab and a grab that gets an opponent to a wall for a possible critical burst set up or guaranteed combo and a reverse low punch reset for a guaranteed set up after a critical burst, easy timing power launchers that do great damage and a solid combo game with much choice for a player to go for combo damage or combo advantage. Bass an intense pressure character who has easy timing unholdables, multiple guard break mix ups, a 4 frame neutral grab, a guaranteed set up off his grab turn around, frame perfect half circle grab set-ups, a forward grab that can put an opponent in to a wall for no wake up kicks, easy interruptions off mid wake up kicks and low wake up kicks, low punches that instantaneously put him in a crouching state up to avoid any highs in a string, great range, very fast side to side movement for free stepping, superb tech chasing, advanced mid counters with moves that send an opponent to the ground for an easy possibility of making a high damage counter read off a wake up kick and then being put in a situation to best utilize his range and maintain indirect pressure, great wall pressure and damage a moveset that gives a player a choice to either keep up close or attempt wall pressure, a heavy weight that reduces overall damage my opponent can do, easy power launchers, and lots of tracking moves.
Even if Ein won several majors, the truth still is that he's a bad character, you can win with a low tier character all day but unless their tools and versatility is up to par, than they're still bad. I'm not exactly threatened by the fact that Eliot won a tournament, I still deem him the same way I felt before. Same for high tiers, Christie has lost quite a few times, but she's still at the same tier standing because of her speed, tools, FA, delay, and pressure she brings to the table.
 

NightAntilli

Well-Known Member
Japanese players place more emphasis on their tiers via whiff punishment where American tiers tend to be more based around how well you can stay in when you get in. That's why NA sees Hayate as mid and Japanese see him as top. They prefer the footsie game and NA prefers "no-fucks-given-I'm-coming-for-you"
If the emphasis of how a certain culture plays (or sees how plays should occur) influences a tier list, how objective can it really be?

Disclaimer: I'm not implying anything. Simply asking some obvious questions.
 

Rikuto

P-P-P-P-P-P-POWER!
DOA is largely matchup based anyway. Eliot sucks against most of the cast, but he won against arguably the best Leifang in Japan just recently. And Leifang is a monster.

Why? Because he has the tools needed to perfectly counter that matchup. His launch throw is extremely punishing to a sabaki based defense. His range is extreme while Leifang's is minimal. The very concept of tiers is flawed in this regard because they do not help in every given situation. They aren't useless persay, but they are a guideline more than a law.

Matchup charts are far, far more practical.
 
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XxNoriakixX

Well-Known Member
Is there a new tier list in japan or america ? I am curious to see how it changed besides the fact that they finally realized that leifang is better than being placed at b+ behind characters like hitomi.. and i think i am the only one who thinks that ayane is not top-tier
 

KING JAIMY

Well-Known Member
I know it may be a little bit early to discuss but where do you guys think Mai would end up in the tier list? From what I've observed, she is a very strong character. She has insane speed with a 9i jab and 11i 6P with delayable follow-ups. She has a lot of good lows with great range and just great range in general. She is relatively safe compared to a lot of speedy characters, such as Kasumi, Christie and Phase and has mostly semi-safe move (-6 / -7) which can only be taken care of with neutral throws. Her pushback is amazing with 236K and all variants. This lets her set up her wall combos with which deal an absurd amount of damage. Mai also has plenty of crushes and one of her crushes - 8H+K - even gives her +2 Frame advantage on block. Her stun game is really good, she has a lot of non-staggerable moves and her launchers can give decent damage even at a low stun threshold. Her throws are good, nothing special about them. She seems to lack in the area of tracking - which is maybe why she is relatively safe for her speed - and holds.

I think Mai has so much potential, she could end up being A+ or S tier.
 

XZero264

FSD | Nichol
Premium Donor
I'm thinking she will end up around mid tier.
She may be an i9/i11 character but everything else about her has the speed of an i10/i11 character and she lacks the strings from those i9/i11 optoins that other characters have (except 6PK strings which don't stun on Normal hit). Her NH damage is kinda weak so she may be designed to be a Counter Hit character and that's where her damage starts to get respectable but she still needs to put in a lot of work to get high damage. What she lacks that most other top tier have are good crushes and mixup, right now the best ones are her 2K, 2P, 2P+K for high crushes and her jumping strikes for lows (Jump P+K right now does crush mid wakeups but that is very telegraphed). Her throw damage is better than some i9s but still fairly low. The most she has is in her special cancels but all but one are mid and all her strikes that can cancel are incredibly unsafe so you have to cancel to make them less unsafe. Her long range options aside from 6K and 3K are all fairly slow, her punches that aren't 66P are very short but still not incredibly fast.
When she gets a strike in she can be scary but using those strikes is an incredibly high risk for her.
In the end I think she will be mid or upper mid but not A or higher. At an early glance she just doesn't really have anything that makes her that good. In 6 months we might find something but right now it's very hard to tell.
 

Crext

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
I know it may be a little bit early to discuss but where do you guys think Mai would end up in the tier list? From what I've observed, she is a very strong character. She has insane speed with a 9i jab and 11i 6P with delayable follow-ups. She has a lot of good lows with great range and just great range in general. She is relatively safe compared to a lot of speedy characters, such as Kasumi, Christie and Phase and has mostly semi-safe move (-6 / -7) which can only be taken care of with neutral throws. Her pushback is amazing with 236K and all variants. This lets her set up her wall combos with which deal an absurd amount of damage. Mai also has plenty of crushes and one of her crushes - 8H+K - even gives her +2 Frame advantage on block. Her stun game is really good, she has a lot of non-staggerable moves and her launchers can give decent damage even at a low stun threshold. Her throws are good, nothing special about them. She seems to lack in the area of tracking - which is maybe why she is relatively safe for her speed - and holds.

I think Mai has so much potential, she could end up being A+ or S tier.

I'd say it is never too early for these things. The list hasn't been updated since DoA5 Ultimate's days. I remember that people were complaining that it was too early back then also, to make a list after launch and add the characters as they popped up, yet much (most) of that data is actually unchanged because most people get the theorycraft quick and the estimates off those are usually not that bad. Anyways, this might be a disagreement of approaches which I'd have to respect. You see, the host (Mr. Wah) actually hi-jacked my post with the original text and everything, and simply put his name on it (I was the one who made that first post in this thread), which I was initially happy about because I thought it meant it would get constantly updated without me having to put in the effort anymore. Instead it seems to have buried to a complete halt, where no new characters have been added afterwards. Maybe one doesn't know how to operate the excel to add them, maybe one is stuck at the PS3 without the newest characters or maybe one want this space to be more of a casual conversation arena and live on with a retro spirit of not making tier lists until 5 years after release.

Personally, in our days of DLC, I think that is a bit of an strange approach. Whatever the reason I for one would be embarrassed if the community do not have all the characters included in our tier lists once DoA6 gets announced, which probably isn't unlikely to happen within a year (and the actual game coming later). DoA5 launched 4 years ago, so an opportunity to gather everyone on the new consoles I'd see as a welcoming addition (instead of the rather fractures community at the moment where everyone is split between 6 consoles effectively (PS3, PS4, PSV, X360, X1 and PC). This rings especially true now that we got these "semi-next gen" consoles rolling out, and they could make use of that extra power if they'd so want.

Anyways, enough ranting. I somewhat predict Mai might be very good against certain types of characters who lacks the footsies, and overall a decent pick. I must admit I haven't dug in on the frame data of cancels for throws, and string baiting scenarios (in order to take advantage of increased reaction time for the opponent). This is something that have made characters like Hitomi decent enough, and if Mai can adopt similar mind games, she might be a character that easily get people on the guard (unlike Hitomi which must be either in or out at times (pray for parry)) and work her magic from there. She'd then always have the tools available to have the odds in her favor and grind down the opponent on chip damage (by either making people open their blocks for counter hits, or get the throws). As such she'll probably have long (and boring) games, but if this theorcraft is valid, she'll probably be a very good character for people who are patient and/or understand their opponent. This can make her very good at the high tier ends of the scale, and so-so if two more mediocres play each other. I'll be looking forward to see what the pros can do with her, as she may be one devil of a pocket pick. Anyways, there is a lot of ifs here, and further work in the lab must be done in order to see if this is a possibility.
 
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synce

Well-Known Member
I knew Honoka had some stubby limbs but wow. Try doing 46P against Mila. It'll whiff half the time, at point blank range. At first I thought maybe it's Mila's hitbox but Tina's 46P connects just fine against her. Nice balance
 

UncleKitchener

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Well, she sure is a tiny kid and this isn't a 2D game, so you can't expect too much from her. You have some running moves and such, but I don't suppose they're always the best choices against a whole lot of characters in this game and most have good keepaway options.

Still pretty good up close.
 

NightAntilli

Well-Known Member
She's in this odd place where she's a pressure character but has difficulty putting pressure on anyone that's not in direct close range. Ultimately you have to use her walk speed and evasion to focus on counter hitting, rather than opening someone up. Honoka has great tools with great damage though. I don't think she's unbalanced.
 

CookingMama

Active Member
I knew Honoka had some stubby limbs but wow. Try doing 46P against Mila. It'll whiff half the time, at point blank range. At first I thought maybe it's Mila's hitbox but Tina's 46P connects just fine against her. Nice balance

This must be a glitch. Leon had something similar with his shoulder bash but with Hayate.
 

GreatDarkHero

This is frame advantage
Premium Donor
Anyone have a good idea if where Mai may place on the tier list? I imagine that she would be at least A-, based on the standards shown in the OP. The problem is that her (and Naotora) are rather... new. They had periodically shown up in a few tournaments, however.
 

DestructionBomb

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Pretty hard to say when skill gap is involved and players putting text that's more of a feel approach. Think Bladez can pull it off I suppose regarding Mai.
 
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The Spine

Well-Known Member
This entire game is pretty feel-based in my eyes. Also, no need to worry about Naotora, we can just put her in the garbage.
 
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