Direction

This patch will be less focussed than v1, adding a lot of fun new stuff (not necessarily buffs), counterbalancing the previous patches that mostly removed or nerfed things. These changes intend to give characters a larger variety of tactics to use in battle, but with strong consideration to ensure that characters maintain their distinct identities.

It will also have the following systemic reworks that were cut from v1 to avoid bloating it too much:

Punishment will be more broadly balanced within the character. That is, some characters will still have much better or worse punishment than others, but a character’s i14 punisher should be better than their i12, etc. In general, this means i10 standing and i11 while standing punishers nerfed, and i13 and i14 punishers buffed. This should encourage more precise punishment and make the difference between -10 and -14 more significant.
Combos will be more broadly balanced within the character. That is, some characters will still have much better or worse combos than others, but they should all have a wide variety of combos to choose from with a reasonable tradeoff between difficulty, consistency, okizeme, and damage. Focus currently is more so on wall combos, but combos in general may have some attention too.

Changes

(Prospective changes for next patch. Very incomplete.)

(✓ is stuff that’s been implemented so far in dev build.)

Dragunov

1,3,2 block frames (-12 → -13)
1,3,2 cancel detection end (18 → 27)
- Makes it more usable as a wall combo
1,3,2 damage (7,14,20 → 7,14,24)

Lidia

✓ f+2,4 hit effect (+5 → knockdown)
✓ b+3,4 hit effect (+0 → +2s)
- Makes b+3,4,1+2 combo from 1st hit
✓ b+3,4,1+2 recovery (r30 → r35)
- Changes block frames (-10 → -15)
- Also affects b+3,4:1+2
✓ b+3,4,1+2 damage (16,16,19 → 16,16,17)
- b+3,4:1+2 not affected
✓ b+3,4,1+2 pushback on hit in juggle increased
✓ b+3,4:1+2 new hit effect in juggle, more distance but less height
✓ CFT.4 damage (7 → 10), clean hit removed
✓ CFT.4 stagger removed
✓ CFT.4 blockstun (19f → 21f)
- Changes block frames (-23 → -6)
- Up to i14 will punish before Lidia can block
✓ CFT.4 transitions to TAW on hit and block
CFT.4,4 blockstun (21f → 24f)
CFT.4.4 recovery (r34 → r32)
- Changes block frames (-14 → -9)
- Changes hit frames (+5d → +7d)
✓ CFT.4,4 startup (i38~39 → i35~36)
- Trades with i14 punishers after 1st hit is blocked
✓ CFT.1+2 transitions to TAW on hit and block
CFO.b new move, can block after 8 frames
✓ CFO.n,f input changed to CFO.F
✓ CFO.n,b input changed to CFO.b,b
CFT.b new move, can block after 8 frames
✓ CFT.n,f input changed to CFT.F
✓ CFT.n,b input changed to CFT.b,b
✓ TAW.F new move, transitions to HAE
TAW.b new move, can block after 8 frames
TAW.b,b new move, same as CFO.b,b
✓ HAE.F new move, transitions to TAW
HAE.b new move, can block after 8 frames
✓ OTG.d+2 ground hit effect (spike → nothing)
✓ OTG.d+2 recovery on hit (r45 → r31)
- Changes hit frames (-7c → +7c)
✓ OTG.d+2 startup (i23~24 → i18~19)

Master Raven

uf+3+4,4,2 damage (17,9,21 → 17,13,15)
- Changes wall combo damage (20 → 18)
- No change to normal hit damage

Noctis

Due to a happy little accident, the uf+1 knockdown previously intended to only combo under rare circumstances (via db+1,1+2) actually still guarantees a combo, but it’s a fairly tight ws2,2 pickup. Since it’s a pretty cool combo, it’s staying in and instead the move is being balanced similarly to Jin’s m4.

✓ uf+1 blockstun (24f → 20f) and recovery (41f → 43f)
- Changes block frames (-4 → -10)
✓ uf+1 pushback on block reduced slightly
- Safe on block at mid range in most matchups, unsafe up close
✓ uf+1 CH knockdown speed altered such that ws2,2 is a 3 frame link.