Judging an opponent based on their character choice

#1

Do you ever find yourself making assumptions of a player’s skill level or fighting style based on the character they chose, before you even start fighting? Obviously it’s never a true indication of what to expect from them, but I always get a certain feeling when I see someone pick certain characters, and sometimes I’m even right. For example:

Ryu = New to the game.
Ken = Flowcharter. Free DP punishes.
Yun = Complete noob who picked him just because he’s top tier.
Yang = See above.
Fei Long = Someone who is actually good, but also a tier whore.
Blanka = Turtle. Most likely going to play Blanka in the most lame way possible.
Evil Ryu = Free as hell. Picked him because he’s “dark”.
Oni = See above.
Akuma = About to kick my ass.
El Feurte = Troll. Is going to taunt and do random running just to be annoying.
Dan = See above, except he’s actually an amazing player.
Adon = Random Jaguar Tooth all day.
Makoto = Random Hayate all day.

#2

Not sure how much support you are going to get here but I sort of agree with you. I think in general those observations tend to be accurate, at least in my experience!

#3

Sakura = Free win

#4

Low tier = probably has a SRK account

#5

Wait! What about C. Viper?!

#6

The only thing you should ever assume about an opponent is that they are potentially better than you. That way you play your best and show that you are better. Assuming shit based off the character they use is just dumb and asking to get mentally fucked once you realize how good they are with said character.

#7

Sakura = I’m about to be bodied

#8

Yes, I do. A lot.

Fei Long: Can’t win with anyone else, so he picked Fei
Yun: Wants to win, will get salty if he doesn’t
Yang: Really good.
Viper: Oh no I’m gonna have a crazy girl flying all over the screen and electrocuting me in a couple seconds. Can I just resign?
Blanka: Sadistic maniac who wants me to rage.
Makoto: Pro
Ryu: Some beast who trains for 5+ hours daily and has completely mastered the character
Ken: He’s gonna shoryuken me to death, with an occasional full-screen Kara grab.
Adon: Excessively egotistic
Guile: jumps off a cliff Gonna get turtled hard.
Bison: Uhh… I, um, can’t press any buttons or I get scissor kicks to the face. He’s just gonna spam that all day, and cross me up a ton on wakeup.
Sakura: Oh, you landed a hit? Keep comboing, imma go make myself a sandwich.
E.Honda: I imagine this is what hell is like. Honda just keeps deciding whether or not he wants to cross me up on wakeup this time. Let’s see if I guess correct!

Before you ask, yes, I am terrible at SSF4. I don’t even play it anymore, but discussing it is still interesting to me.

Edit - Read OP’s character thoughts. Ouch, I’m an Oni main. So that’s what people think about us. :rofl: I can assure you I did not pick Oni because he was dark. I just liked the character.

#9

I somewhat agree.
Black Gi Ken w/ Hair: "Why did you pick that horrid color? I assume you’re just gonna do fierce DP all day right?"
Makoto: "Breath of fresh air! I’m gonna get bodied or he’s a free win. "
Viper: "God damn it :("
Blanka: "Shenanigans >:("
Yun: "Not sure if he’s ass or good. :wtf:"
Yang: "2 slashes FADC Grab"
Gen: "Why haven’t I learned the match up!!!:shake:"
Guile: "I’m gonna die"
Adon: "He’s trolling"
Bison: "HK all day"
Chun Li: “Hazanshu lk lk lk lk lk lk lk lk lk EX legs” >:(
Zangief: "He’s testing the waters… maybe."
Evil Ryu: "Why? :rofl:"
Oni: "EX cross up slash all day"
Ryu: "This nigga is serious! :D"
Dudley: "Ducking grab or MGB xx DP followed afterwords"
El Fuerte: See Gen
Honda: "Cross up butt splash! :eek:"
Guy: See Gen
Cody: "Saw Momochi play during Season’s Beatings, or is legit"
Cammy: "TK can of sprite does not phase you"
Hakan: "I’m gonna get bodied! See Gen"
T.Hawk: Churn Butter
Juri: "Dive kick isn’t an instant win, idiot"
Balrog: "See Ryu"
Dan: "He must be bored"
Sakura: Resets up the ass
Akuma: See Sakura
Gouken: I know you bust your ass w/ this character. Sorry Bro :frowning:
Seth: Mixups up the ass
Abel: Roll, ROLL!!!
Rose: Crouch MP :bluu:
Ibuki: Kunai cross up, Vortex
Fei Long: Oh, he knows
Dhalsim: Yoga sniper!
Dee Jay: Alright! Black Guile! Don’t Jump! Wonder if he knows EX MGU dash Ultra?
Sagat: Tick Throw
Rufus: One of the few who hasn’t switched.
Vega: Counterhits up the ass. :shake:

#10

No matter which character they pick, I always assume that my opponent is retarded.

#11

Juri: “Dive kick isn’t an instant win, idiot” :smiley: :smiley: :frowning: This is funny to read. But apparently I’m also legit :slight_smile:

#12

I don’t really assume much but when I see a Ryu or Ken, it’s “must not be very creative”.

#13

It’s just my experience w/ other Juri’s. It’s always a mirror match too for some reason. The other guy does DK’s and I’m sitting there waiting for it then I punish. It’s one of the weirdest matches for me.

#14

Do you ever judge the poster just by the name of their thread?

#15

No, I judge a poster by how much they whine about their character even though they’re consistently high tier. :wink:

#16

Blanka - a baller.
Gen, Juri, Gouken, Fuerte, Sakura, T-Hawk, Dee Jay, Hakan - Street Fighter hipster.

#17

It’s funny because I’m probably the Akuma player that whined less in this whole forum in the last year.
Of course I’m not happy, but hey, nerfs are nerfs even if the character is still good, can’t be happy about them.

#18

Why not? If they benefit the game as a whole, making it more balanced, you should be VERY happy about them.

#19

Honestly, I don’t give a shit about balance. 3s is unbalanced yet it’s a great game, MvC2 is totally unbalanced yet incredibly funny and so is MvC3. Vanilla SF4 was quite unbalanced yet it was the funniest of the series.

When all characters just become a shadow of their former selves the game becomes boring, even if it’s more “balanced” and if it has 50 playable characters. “balance” is only good for scrubs, competitive players won’t care about it and just pick the stronger characters, unless the situation is REALLY bad (like ST Akuma bad)

#20

Yeah SC:BW would totally have been as successful if it was utterly imbalanced and everyone would be forced to play Zerg.
Does everybody play Yun? No. Why not? Are the competitive players all scrubs? A roster of 50 characters isn’t of much use if you can only pick the Top5.
Why does a game become boring if the Top Tiers are nerfed to be ‘shadows of their former selves’? Imagine it wasn’t a patch but a totally new game, would it be boring then because there’s no OP characters?

And no, I’m not saying SF has a lot of problems balancewise (It really doesn’t). But I don’t see why Nerfs would always be a bad thing. The more balanced a game is, the bigger it’s roster becomes (Imagine a Top32 with 32 different characters!), the more diversity in playstyles is useable, the more difficult it becomes, … etc

Yeah, Games can be a lot of fun even if they aren’t balanced. Doesn’t change the fact that they will most likely be more fun if they are (note that these thoughts always force the diversity aspect and skill ceiling to stay intact. A game with only 1 character to choose from will be perfectly balanced but that’s not what I’m talking about. RPS is also perfectly balanced but has a skill ceiling of pretty much 0 so that doesn’t really count either.)