I’ve had my fare share of fraudulent Yomi Counters e.g. I let go of a direction to do a neutral move, but the opponent grabs me in the brief moment I wasn’t pressing anything.
I’m not sure how feasible it would be, or if there are potential balance issues, but having to do nothing for the first 2 or 3 frames of a grab could potentially reduce the possibility of accidental undeserved Yomi Counters.
I have made a comment previously on Yomi Counters activating on the frame that the grab lands. However, there are some gameplay considerations to take into account. One specifically is fuzzy guarding. Currently, it is very possible to fuzzy guard against a throw and then another option that the opponent would have because you are able to delay your inputs for the required number of frames for the startup of a certain attack. This delay will guarantee a Yomi Counter against a throw that would have come out sooner. If we only require an extra frame or two of no input, then it would make fuzzy guarding more difficult. If we require more than those extra frames, then fuzzy guarding may become non-existent.
As it is, I like fuzzy guarding options because it opens up more layers of depth. So, I think I am against my previous comment (which I made before I actually started to play and realized that fuzzy guarding against throws was possible and is very fun).
Edit: Just realized something, a possible solution would be to have directional throws require extra frames of no input to Yomi Counter… but this may confuse new players unnecessarily. So, my first feeling is against this solution. Although it would be even more incentive to leave neutral for throwing thus reducing accidental Yomi Counters beyond the one frame advantage now.
Shouldn’t this game be philosophically opposed to fuzzy guarding anyway, as that’s essentially an option select?
But you could counter this fuzzy guard by just delaying the throw so that it would land around the same frame as the attack would?
I don’t see a problem with it to be honest. In a normal fighting game if you’re doing, say, a charge motion your opponent can hit you while you’re holding back and you’ll block. I don’t see much difference between that and this.
That’s the beauty of the situation. Now, you are entering a new layer of strategy because the defending player will usually have more options at their disposal if they know the attacking player has to respect the fuzzy guard.
Edit: Forgot to reply to @inkstud
I don’t consider it to be an option select. I think an option select is where you give some input, then based on how the game processes the input, you can have multiple different outputs based on the current situation. For example, in Virtua Fighter, you could evade, throw escape, and then guard all in the time it takes for your character to sidestep (even inputting multiple throw escapes). Based on the situation, you would either escape a throw, side-step and guard a straight attack, or just sidestep and end up in the guard animation. All that depends on which three of these outcomes happen is what actions the opponent takes. The game automatically chooses between which of the three outcomes would apply. The important point here is that the options that the opponent takes could all land in the exact same frame. You would still be able to guard against all of those options doing this.
In the case of fuzzy guarding, you are defending against two (or more) options, but you cannot defending against each of those options in the same frame. That’s the important difference. To defeat a fuzzy guard, you can always delay one of your options so that both options land in the same frame. That’s why it’s a “fuzzy” guard. The fuzziness is the delay between the two options the opponent can take.
