Warden mixup is not broken | Forums

[nf_Straydog]

Here's the issue.

He shoulder-charges. To avoid this, you must dodge.
Which gets you hit if he guard-breaks. To avoid this, you must stay where you are.
Which gets you hit by the shoulder-charge.
You try to dodge-attack to beat the guard-break, he cancels and parries you. You get hit, anyway.
You try to attack through the shoulder-charge, he cancels and parries you.

You have up to four decisions to make in about half a second. At best, you get a Light attack on him. At worst, you eat a double-Light combo and get sucked back into the Vortex, to try again. It takes very little stamina, is braindead easy to use, and the only smart, 100% effective play is to do a full roll away and lose half your stamina. If you're not in an open field, he's on you with another Vortex before you can even recover. Once you're exhausted, you're stuck playing the guessing game, which you can't even punish if you get right.

The Warden's kit is fine without this, and nobody should have this much power.

Exactly. It's not broken in an strict fighting game sense, it's broken because he's the only one who can do it.

Perhaps you should read the post instead of the title.

[ThePollie]

I did. I also read other posts.

It might be difficult to grasp, but bear with me, that sometimes people post things in response to other people in the thread, and not solely to the OP.

[Hovenberg]

The warden kit is fine without should bash? Dude u drunk..

[ThePollie]

I don't drink or smoke, so that's a reach to say the least.

But I've won plenty of fights without the shoulder-charge, let alone the Vortex. We have a solid top-light and zone-attack for harassment, we can feint heavies to mess with their defense, and our heavies themselves deal a lot of damage. We are one of the only characters capable of Top-heavy damage without a top-heavy, since Crushing Counter hits as hard, without the need to throw someone into a wall.

Admittedly, our side-lights are pretty crap. They're god awful slow and even new players routinely block them and better players parry them easily. But we are hardly lacking in our kit. We might not have a ton of flashy tools, but the basics we have are top notch.

[NiceBoatUS]

Here's the issue.

He can't do a naked shoulder charge. You're free to stuff it. If he starts his so-called "vortex" (it's not even a real vortex, because you're never out of options), you already messed up and gave him frame advantage upon being hit with a very specific attack.

Now, okay, you messed up and he's got frame advantage. Here we go, risk-reward:

You dodge, he charges. You: 0 Him: 0
You don't dodge anticipating the GB, he charges. You: 0 Him: 2
You dodge, he GB's. You: 0 Him: 2

That's pretty bad, right? You're at 0-4. Maybe that's the wrong way to react to the vortex. You should probably always roll away. But that's a massive stamina drain and it's not possible if you're against a wall.

Let's keep digging.
You dodge-attack, he charges. You: 1 Him: 0
You dodge-attack, he GBs. You: 1 Him: 0
You dodge-attack, he parries: You: 0 Him: 2
You roll away to nullify the aforementioned 0-4: You: 0 Him: 0

Hey, dodge attacks are an even game, it's a 2-2! Suddenly he has to make the right guess. He gets a bigger reward, but you have a higher chance for a smaller reward. Who's in whose vortex now?
Champions with dodge attacks: Peacekeeper, Kensei, Orochi, Nobushi, Berserker, Raider, Valkyrie. In fact, PK gets 2 hits on her dodges, so if you try to put her in a vortex you're putting yourself at a 2-4 disadvantage.

If you're against the wall, It's a 2-6 or 4-6 if you're Peacekeeper. That's ugly. But hey, wallsplat situations tend to get ugly against many champions (like Conqueror). You should probably watch your positioning, baby.

But hey, that's not everything, you don't have to dodge in order to attack. 15-frame attacks can stuff the vortex.
You attack, he parries: You: 0 Him: 2
You attack with a zone attack (different direction, can't react in that situatin), he tries to parry and eats it: You: 2 Him: 0
You attack, he tries the bash: You: 2 or 1, but let's be generous for the Warden go with 1 Him: 0
You attack, he tries the grab: You 2 or 1 Him: 0
You nullify the 0-4 by rolling away to avoid the ugly options if you aren't against the wall.

Suddenly it's 4-2 for you. If you attack, you're playing a game in which you have an advantage. In fact, if you have a double tap like Warden or Orochi, it's 6-2 for you. If you've backed yourself into a corner, you're still at a respectable 4-6 or tied at 6-6.

But wait, there's still more. Some characters can start their own "vortex" or offense off a fast light, but I'm not going to factor all that stuff in, because frankly, it'd be too much work. But let's just say that characters like Conqueror or other Warden have far more complicated punishes than a simple +1 or +2. Hell, even a Lawbringer can go light into his own bash, but he sucks 1v1, so let's count him oout.

Basically, 10 out of 12 characters can go even with the vortex in the open. Maybe even 11, because I'm not sure what Shugoki's options are - he has hyper armor, so maybe he can just muscle through it. Would be nice for Shugoki mains to look for some possible tech. What's more, there are some characters (Peacekeeper is an obvious example) that actually benefit from being put in this so-called vortex. Some characters can go even with the vortex when they're put in a corner. The ONLY time vortex is really devastating is when you're out of stamina, but guess what? EVERY bash character can mess you up if you run out of stamina. You have to conserve it just like you have to play around dash attacks whenever you're facing an assassin.

In light of all of this, even calling it a vortex is basically a joke. A farce. It's not a vortex, because it doesn't really loop, doesn't force the defender to stay passive until he guesses right. It's a standard, yomi-based exchange of blows that gives the advantage to the people that know more and can read their opponent better. The reason it's so successful and popular is simple: players aren't familiar with the counters and the nerf-everything crowd simply overhyped it. People who are trying to force Ubi to remove it know nothing about the tech available to them and/or want to see this game devolve into a brainless pokefest.

Warden's offence isn't gamebreaking. It's actually well thought-out, it breaks the monotony of turtling/poke wars/feint fests and as such is very beneficial to the entire game. Not only does it reward game knowledge, it rewards it both ways. It allows for some deeper yomi. It's awesome and I hope other characters get similar tech. And when they do, all the scrublets are going to board yet another nerf train in their never-ending quest to make this game as simple and shallow as possible, because that's what scrublets do: they don't analyze things, they don't look for new tech, they just take everything at eye value and want everything they don't understand removed.

Sad.

[ThePollie]

"Vortex is balanced because it turns combat into a two-way flip of the coin." - Every Warden-main desperate to maintain K/D.

[ZechsMarquizy]

LOL @ at all the noobs who keep using this unknown word called "Vortex" you kids are ****ing ******ed, its called shoulder bash, or mix up, there are already names for things. There is literally nothing in For Honor using the word/name "Vortex" in it. Please stfu, learn to play, get good, stop crying about literally the easiest move to escape from in the game. Damn bads with all there qqing is so annoying, but on top of that **** we have to read this "Vortex" nonsense?

[TCTF_SWAT]

Uhhhhhhh you do you know what the gaming term for vortex is right?

[NiceBoatUS]

"Vortex is balanced because it turns combat into a two-way flip of the coin." - Every Warden-main desperate to maintain K/D.

If it was a "two-way flip of the coin", then the Wardens wouldn't be desperate about it, because it'd pull their K/D towards 1.0.
Anyway, it's not even close to a "flip of the coin". I've listed 11 basic options that develop in a matchup-specific manner. A lot of these options involve the Warden losing his frame advantage by default. If you called something like that a vortex in any other fighting game community, you'd get laughed at.

To be completely honest, your argument has devolved into concern trolling at this point. Your response to a logically sound risk-reward analysis is "hey, it's a Warden main, let's pretend he never said anything and continue with our MMO-style power creep!" FYI, you're wrong. I main assassins and I like the "vortex" (even though calling it a vortex makes me cringe), because Wardens hurt themselves trying to do it, which makes the matchup easier.

And hey, spreading the knowledge is an honorable thing that ultimately serves the entire community. Unlike spreading disinformation and trying to troll the devs into dumbing the game down.

[ThePollie]

Yep. Assassin main, nevermind. We can all go home, nothing to see here.

Just another Cheesekeeper who thinks broken game mechanics is good design. 10/10.