Rook seems a bit overpowered

His grab mixup is one problem, if you jump his normal grab still works(resetting the cycle) and his forward A does one hit of damage, if you stand still his blue grab woks and back A deals 1 damage, if you block both grabs would work - you simply cannot beat out his moves when he does this because he will hit on your first frame of vulnerability due to knockdown length.

math incoming As forward A doesn’t knock down I will factor it in to my calculations and assume he picks a random one of the three actions, damage is avoided when his bA is blocked, grab yomi’d or C jumped(1/3 chance), 2 damage and a reset occurs when grab or blue grab hit(4/9 chance) 1 damage occurs when bA hits(2/9). This means off of 1 grab loop there is a 1/3 chance of taking only 2 damage, a 2/9 chance of taking 3, a 4/27 of taking 4, a 8/81 chance of taking 5, a 16/81 chance of taking 6 etc. In short he has only a 55.5% chance of doing LESS than 4 damage off of a throw, 44.4% of 4 or more and a 19.7% chance of winning the round vs most characters(6 health, anyone except midori and rook himself) off of a single throw

This alone would be annoying at the best of times, but rook has a very safe approach, his B has super-armour and is only -4 on block, if you do anything other than a grab on or two damage attack after blocking he can execute his B or C and hit you. it should be noted that his B knockdowns and leads into his throw loop and his super armour is present even after he attacks so it is also safe on whiff. in other words even on miss or whiff his B forces the opponent to pick between two options and get punished if they guess wrong and the punish is his throw loop, on hit it is his throw loop

I could also mention his air moves having very few frames for a lumbering giant or having his jump C give him extra approach time. But the worst thing is that in addition to all this he has the most health of the game, In my opinion either his approach game needs to be seriously nerfed or his throws need to be toned down a bit to prevent the loop from being so easily fatal, I could understand rook being good at one thing, but he is good at everything except projectiles

I’m not really sure how you would want his throws to be toned down. I mean if he’s going to have normals, a command throw and a regular throw then the guessing game is just going to be part of the character, that seems pretty fair to me. Let’s also not forget that half the roster has invincible moves they can do on wakeup (or a counter in DeGrey’s case) so I can’t see any reason to think it’s overpowered.

However, I do think you bring up a better argument against his mobility, but I still wouldn’t say it’s enough to bring him into broken territory. His B does have knockdown and invincibility, sure, but it’s also very predictable and only really useful for getting closer to an opponent. The only nerf to Rook’s mobility I can see myself getting behind is his big splash as I do think it comes out so quickly. Just giving it a few more startup frames or maybe just a bit less priority would probably be fine.

With that being said, here are a few things I can recommend to help you with the Rook matchup:

1.) If you’re knocked down and Rook is right beside you, you should decide your getup option based on his position. If he’s so close he can’t get any nearer to you, then he’s most likely going for a normal throw, so go for the yomi counter. If he’s a bit farther back, but not by much, you should assume he’s going for his command grab, so be sure to jump. If he’s even farther back then he’s most likely going for an attack so you should block.

2.) Don’t be afraid to challenge the super armor when it’s safe to do so. Iirc blue super armor can only absorb a single hit so if you see rook approaching with B or bringing out his command grab as you land, use a multi hit move (assuming your character has one) to counter it.

3.) Don’t listen to the CoD players, camping is good. If you can camp Rook out with projectiles that you can mixup easily (like those of the Stormborne siblings) or moves with good reach (most of Geiger’s attacks) you can do some serious hindrance to Rook’s approach. One good strategy I see often is to throw out a slow moving projectile (like Setsuki’s kunai) and get close enough to Rook to get a follow up once it hits. If he takes a hit, you can do a combo off of that, but if he blocks it you can still get a throw, provided you’re spaced correctly.

Hope this helps.

he does 2 damage per throw for BOTH throws, that means two in a row is 4 damage, or half the round, note that up until actually testing it I thought iframes didn’t stop throws(probably because parry frames don’t), but I dislike having the only reliable way to deal with something to be character specific(besides, degreys super doesn’t stop throws). I am ok with a guessing game in theory, but not when the damage is so high that he can win a large chunk of the game via it and only get punished a small amount in exchange.

His B Armor exists even AFTER he throws the punch, compare this to Degray’s BC which not only has a massive frame negative on block, but his invincibility frames end after the first kick. The problem lies in Rooks RECOVERY FRAMES - NOT THE STARTUP(as I said, he has superarmor even on the frames he should be punished on). It should be noted that Rooks C doesn’t have armor on recovery, so why should his B?

1: When he does his throw he can follow it up with whichever he chooses, so it is a pure guessing game, judging on position isn’t possible when the position is the same and if I was able to watch for him to start moving towards me than that would mean I have the reaction time to react to his blue throw. And if he is really far back he would go for B which is safe on block due to armor and would lead to C or grab, if you block his B and mash out an attack his armor would eat it because it also exists on recovery, why do I have to explain this?

2:"(assumbing your character has one)" sorry, but I do not see why we should assume that I am picking a character that hard counters him, the point is how the move works in general, also Rooks Cdoes not have superarmor on recovery, only his B does, the problem with his C and his throw is that it does 2 damage, leads to a mixup that lasts until you get lucky - in a game where the majority of characters have 6 life and only deal 1 damage with throws.

3:range attacks are his counter, I get it, but he still has too good an approach game for them to be a hard counter, also relying on frame traps works on ALMOST EVERYONE so those are not an indicator of how powerful he is, and he can B through projectiles and hit you, so you aren’t even safe using them.

Dealing with Rook properly has little to do with tactics and is only really possible by countering him with iframes and projectiles, which makes whether you can deal with him character specific, a character should not win a game based off matchup alone and should have weaknesses that can be exploited regardless of character. Sadly most of rooks moves are safe on block and whiff, deal lots of damage and/or create a loop - even his air game is good, which is stupid when you consider that he is an hulking giant, his air B is one of the best air moves in the game and his air A has almost no startup and can crossup.

The loop wouldn’t be so bad if most characters had more health, if he had more moves being unsafe on block and whiff he would have to think twice before using his B and he wouldn’t be able to go from a blocked normal into a throw so reliably and him having a decent air game is just dumb. As I said, he is literally good at everything except projectiles - he has frame traps, mixup, approaching, he has a loop(best loop in the game) and he has arguably one of the best set of air moves in the game, not only is he above average at most things, he is also the best at some stuff, this is overpowered in a game where every other character is only really good at one or two things.

Well, rounds in Fantasy Strike are short by design, so a grappler character being able to get half the round off of a double grab string really isn’t that unreasonable. I mean it’s not like he’s the only character with a guessing game that leads to a big payoff with little risk, Valerie, just for one example, can also kill very quickly if you can never predict how she’s going to end her B string.

As for his B armor, the whole point of it is to give him safe mobility (which is necessary seeing as he needs to get in close to be any use) so I really don’t see an issue with it being safer than his command grab. Same with him having a lot of options to counter your getup. Reading your opponent is a large part of this game, so I don’t see why it would be unreasonable for that to be expected of you. Think of Setsuki, when she has her opponent down she can do any number of things like a direct attack, a ground crossup, an air crossup, two command grabs and projectile pressure. Now the command grabs don’t do 2 points of damage like Rook’s, but the other options can all lead to combos and resets which can do even more damage (especially if she gets a confirm into super) so the guessing game is still present.

I don’t see why you would dismiss the assumption that you would counterpick him at all, either. Some characters are going to have an easier time against some other characters, that’s just a part of fighting games and it’s not like you can’t win against Rook without using multihit moves against his super armor. Besides, how many characters don’t have multi-hit attacks? I’m pretty sure it’s only Grave, Setsuki, and Jaina and they all have counters to super armor as well (though they aren’t necessarily as optimal) Grave can bring out his sword attack, since it has invincibility, Setsuki can do her teleporting thing and Jaina’s level 3 arrow is unblockable by everything except white armor and all that is before we even get into supers which if activated at the correct moment will damage Rook, super armor or not. So once again, it’s just a matter of making the right decisions.

Ditto for what you say about his lariat going through projectiles, you just need to counter it correctly. Grave can use his sword attack, which is invincible on startup and knocks Rook back a lot; Jaina can use her Dragonheart which does the same thing and is even a much better anti-air; Geiger can use his flashkick or his disappearance thing and Setsuki can just fly in the opposite direction. DeGrey, Midori and Valerie don’t even have projectiles so the lariat’s invulnerability isn’t even relevant to them, but again the whole cast has at least one super that can punish the shit out of the move. The lariat isn’t even that safe on block either, so even implying that it’s overpowered is nonsense.

Playing against Rook has everything to do with tactics as I have shown. Your problem only seems to be that you don’t know which tactics to employ, which is quickly fixed. I’ve given you many examples of counters to the moves you accuse of being broken, so I strongly suggest you try those before going further with the whole “overpowered” thing. Hell, I haven’t even mentioned other good exploits against Rook, like his unfavourable anti-air game or his lack of approach options (he really only has two, and both are very reactable as I’ve pointed out above). I’m not saying Rook is the most balanced fighter in the game (as I stated previously, I think his big splash could use some retooling) but there’s a pretty big middle ground between a character on the stronger end of the roster and one that is flat out overpowered.

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Valeries B string only leads to a 1 damage crossup, not 2 damage.

His mobility being almost completely safe is a problem when he has the most powerful close game, it already has a small enough number of frames, it doesn’t need superarmor at the end as well, he also doesn’t really need to read the opponent, literally picking randomly will give him half the game and he has a lot of safe on block so you are often forced to predict his next move as well instead of retaliating, you cannot frame trap him in anything other than a grab. Setsuki however is not only very punishable on whiff but has no superarmor to protect against being beaten out framewise(which makes her vulnerable to frame traps), you are comparing something beatable to a freaking god.

I dismiss the assumption of counterpicks FOR THE SAKE OF BALANCE, under the assumption that I do not know who I will fight and not all characters have tools to specifically counter him - I do not want any matchup to be him winning close to 100% of the time with no place for outplaying him(because that is what rook matchups are like if you don’t counter him), because frametraps don’t work on Rook(for obvious reasons), whiff punishing him is not rewarding enough to discourage his mixup(he does 2 damage, whiff punishing does 2 on average, but he has more health so he wins that game, also you cannot whiff punish his B) - The reason I do not want to assume a character would have a counter to Rook is because more characters could be added in the future and eventually there may be one with none of the tools that would deal with him, that would result in a near 100% matchup.

Also stop comparing characters with less health and with mixups that are less damageing and don’t loop in on themselves, most air crossups may deal 3 damage, but they can be read by where the character starts their jump, all the near unreadable crossups deal 1 damage, rooks grabloop is essentially an unreadable 2 damage crossup that loops in on itself making it the best mixup in the game - even Setsukis teleport only does 1 damage.

The lariat IS safe on block, because it has superarmor at the end, you are looking at the frames instead of the superarmor, he can block or yomi whatever you decide to do in responce to it if the responce occurs after he becomes able to move again(and things he can block he can simply go into his C to superarmor through as you need to hit him in the 2 frames between ending the attack and starting the next) and if he is hit during recovery frames he just shrugs it off and gets frame advantage, needing super to punish a move is unreliable.

The only tactics you have suggested are characters with moves that specifically counter him(when more would be introduced, some would inevitably not have direct counters to his moves, I want them to at least have A CHANCE of beating him if I picked that character) and winning a guessing game that is mathematically in rooks favour - and that is just for his rushdown and grabloop, you didn’t even address that his air game is better than it has any right to be.

Which characters specifically do you think Rook obliterates?

It’s not any of the zoners (Grave, Jaina, or Geiger). @CWheezy (I think) considers DeGrey/Rook to be DeGrey advantaged (as a Rook player). @Leontes, last I heard, considers Valerie/Rook even (as a Val player). That leaves… Setsuki and Midori? vs Midori feels even, but I haven’t heard much said about it one way or the other. I think Setsuki maybe gets beat up by Rook? CWheezy thinks so, at least.

Have you tried playing Rook against people who know what they’re doing? I don’t mean that sarcastically, to be clear.

I certainly think Rook is incredible at relatively low experience levels. Being able to punish unsafe attacks with 2 damage and start your vortex is amazing when people aren’t all that knowledgeable about what’s safe and what isn’t. When people are more experienced, it’s much harder to get in, keep people out, and vortex consistently for big damage.

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Two specific points on moves that aren’t as universally good as you think they are.

His air B (vines/lariat) is absolutely unsafe on block or whiff. It is also beaten, as are most of his air moves, by a lot of basic neutral As.

His ground B is great on hit or block, but you can react to it with neutral jump into whatever your max damage combo is off neutral jump A.

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I definitely would not consider DeGrey vs Rook to be in the former’s advantage. I think I’ve only ever lost a single game to a DeGrey player as Rook, I mean the guy has so many moves that are unsafe on block and his super is rendered almost moot by Rook’s main tools being grabs anyways. I think as long as a Rook player can avoid taking damage from crossups and block the ghost grab they shouldn’t have much trouble at all with DeGrey. He does probably do better in the air though, but I would argue his airgame is the best in the game anyways.

You’re definitely right about zoners though. A smart enough zoner is a nightmare for Rook. They can force him into risky approaches with their projectile game but they can also discourage approaches with their more defense oriented supers. Of particular note is Geiger, who has a moveset practically made for countering grapplers. I would even go as far as saying that Geiger vs. Rook is the most uneven matchup in the entire game.

Midori is a tricky matchup to say for sure. Human Midori gets wrecked by Rook but Dragon Midori wrecks Rook right back. The opponent will spend more time in human form, but dragon form has a much superior damage output. In my opinion it all sort of evens itself out.

As for Val, I think that’s definitely in Rook’s favor. Sure, it takes some skill and luck to be able to completely defend against her strings and mixups, but quite a few of them aren’t safe on block and can be punished with a command grab or a super (which takes 60% of her life, let me remind you)

I’m not quite as sure about Setsuki though. On one hand she has a lot of safe and smart approach options and her command grab can get Rook easily due to his huge hurtbox. On the other hand, she’s easy to punish and a veritable glass cannon. I think it’s in Rook’s favour, personally, but I could definitely see myself being persuaded otherwise.

I do think you hit the nail on the head about the low experience thing. Rook is a great noob killer thanks to his high damage output, but once you get you head around the mechanics a bit more you start to see just how many options you have to beat him out.

The OP is not completely correct:

  • normal throws and C throws leave the opponent at different distances, meaning that the vortex is not as strong in every situation.

  • as someone else pointed out, you didn’t count reversals.

  • Rook actually has fA that does 2 damage, which I see used most of the time instead of bA.

  • Rook also has other options outside of normal, throw or command throw. He can do bAxxC, which thick throws; or once the opponent respects your jA on wakeup, Rook can go for a jA throw or empty jump throw, adding a layer or mixup.

The get to the point though, I agree with the OP. I don’t consider Rook broken, but he is on the stronger side, and his throw loop is obnoxious.

I would personally make it so that both his throws leave the opponent at a distance which goes a little farther than where his C throw leaves him now. I’m fine with him having the complete vortex out of his sA though.

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Rook is slightly lower tier since the zoning game is so strong and he has to work much harder to secure wins
he just seems really strong in the beginning but the more you play the weaker he feels

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@Doombybbr i strongy disagree. Actually all chars seems overpowered until you learn the move zoning and frames. I used to get rekt as Rook by vals and sets.

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why should i count Ireame reversals, projectiles and 2 hit moves, when my point is that there may be a character without them in future and I want rook to be at least beatable in that situation?Theoretical character A will lose to him everytime because all rook would need to do is get close and go for the grabloop, where theoretical character A has no means of stopping rook at any point so loses the round.

Why do you keep missing the fact that the superarmor makes his B safe on block? I actually tested that shit, if you block his B and attack him his armor will eat your move and he will only have a 2 frame period where he doesn’t have armor - this is more than enough to render the -4 on block meaningless. You simply cannot jump into combo him when he whiffs this because the fist hit will be caught by the superarmor of his B, why do have to keep explaining how his B’s superarmor works?

The difference between where throw and C leave the opponent means little, Rooks decision process is the same, rooks fA js actually a worse choice than bA during the mixup because it only lands 1 hit if the person jumps, makeing it unsafe and it pushes people back - which is counterproductive.

Stop stating matchup tactics and expecting me to care about them, matchups ignore my point, this isn’t about if some SPECIFIC character has ways to beat him, it is about if any character can punish him for mistakes, but with half of his moves being relatively safe and the other half being his grabloop.

Rooks air B may be unsafe on block but he cannot be hit during its startup easily, making the correct decision to wait for him to use one of the two moves because jumping in gets you hurt and rushing down gets caught by superarmor if he ground Bs - BUT THIS IS WHAT HE WANTS.

Also @Legion I have been going through his moves frame by frame, so I know how he works, that is WHY I have problems with him, I even gone in to the math of his throwloop for crying out loud. I have not noticed any ligitimate balance problems from the other characters, even val and sets crossup are only good when you do not expect them - rooks throw loop and rushdown are good even when you expect them.

Rooks rushdown is way too good for a character with the most powerful mixup in the game, one of the two needs to be nerfed.

Because it would be obvious to the dev team within about 5 minutes if Rook had a 10-0 match-up against this theoretical character, so it doesn’t bear discussing? It’s like asking “what if there was a character that couldn’t jump or block, Grave would RUIN this character, how can we fix Grave.” If 10 new characters suddenly got added to the cast, I would expect that rebalancing existing characters would probably happen, but it would happen at that time, not before.

I’ll check this tonight. I’m pretty sure I’ve had people punish my ground B on whiff before, but maybe I wasn’t always normal-throwing immediately after.

It isn’t. At C-throw distance you can only C-throw again (for 2), or meaty fA (for 1). Maybe you can bA for 1 as well, but I am 99% sure that the distance is too much to be able to get the follow-up throw, and if they’re jumping it will push them back just like fA, no? C-throw also leaves you too far away, and with too little time to do any of your proper jump ins: if you can get meaty splash (jump fA), it will be too far to cross up. I don’t think you can actually get splash to be meaty, but I’m not certain.

On the other hand, normal throw gives you every single possible mix-up: meaty throw, meaty C, cross-up splash into sweep, non-cross-up splash into sweep, either of those into normal throw, safe jumps, etc.

I’ll put aside the issues with his ground B for now, until after I’ve confirmed whether it can be punished on whiff or not. The two main threats of his vortex off normal throw (another normal throw or C-throw) both have significant risks.

  • Normal throw is beaten by Yomi counter, which gives 1 point of damage, and then also full super meter. Super meter is significant for every character except Setsuki, since she gets full super about every 5 seconds. So in 90% of cases that’s a big deal.
  • C-throw is beaten by jump, and therefore gives nearly the maximum possible damage combo the opposing character is capable of (so minimum 3 damage). That’s pretty freaking risky, imo.
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Also, even assuming literally nothing beats ‘ground B > normal throw’ and Rooks do it constantly, every single character can counter this by blocking the ground B and then letting go of the controller for a free Yomi counter.

Rook’s ground B is -4. If you block it, you can throw it.

Jaina can, on reaction to seeing B, jump back divekick then throw for a 2 dmg combo. The throw works as a combo because Rook isn’t in hitstun or blockstun because of the armor. Maybe other characters can do something similar but I haven’t labbed it.

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What are you talking about? No, really, what is the topic you are trying to discuss? I really shouldn’t have to ask that, but I do because of how all over the place you are. You open by claiming that Rook is overpowered (he isn’t) and now you’re complaining that he may end up being overpowered in the future. Do you see the problem with that? Not only is that a shamelessly obvious goalpost shift, you’re getting upset over your own conjecture. You mean to tell me that I should be worried because eventually there may be a character added to the game that does not have projectiles, or i-frames, or super armor OR multi-hit that can counter the moves you’re complaining about? Really dude? Even though every character in the game has one of those at minimum? Even though one of the two currently planned additional characters is a zoner? Do you see the problem?

Of course, your diatribe about Rook vs the current roster doesn’t exactly hold water either. You have been given multiple counters to the moves that are giving you trouble, so if you’re still getting frustrated my only guess would be that you aren’t choosing your counters correctly. I don’t like saying things like that, because I find it dangerously similar to the reductive “you just don’t like it because you suck at it” argument, but if you’re still claiming that the moves you’re having trouble with are overpowered even after receiving a laundry list of good counters to them which three seperate people contributed to making, then the only conclusion is that you’re salty about getting your butt kicked. It’s not the moves being overpowered, it’s your ability that is lacking.

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This is getting quite fun!

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@Octorockandroll He is overpowered because his design is unheathy, unhealthy in such a way that he limits design space for new characters - the dev team cannot be expected to keep every character in mind for each time they introduce a new one or for them to give the same tools to each one, eventually they will slip up(probably with a rushdown in this case), I want to prevent that before it happens.I was applying his abilities in a vaccuum because talking about direct counters means admitting that there is something wrong with a character.

Choosing a character from the roster specifically to deal with rook would be an admission that rook is overpowered(especially as online doesn’t let you know who you are up against), when character A beats character B I want B to have a CHANCE of winning, not for A to always win. I keep saying that there is no decent way of dealing with rook that doesn’t stem from character specific moves.

Besides I have an example of anfavorable matchup that can have 100% winrate for a good rook - DeGrey, as his only answer to throw loop is his B and all rook needs to do is time his C or bA a bit late to avoid DeGreys iframes for that. Rook can just casually approach DeGrey(no need for using B) or have Degrey come to him as degrey needs to get close to deal damage, rooks rushdown is arguably better than degreys due to safe on block and not haveing a few vulnerable frames, rook is even arguably as good at frametrapping as degrey and evades frametraps.

I do not call a move that can only be dealt with via throws “unsafe” especially as that only means 1 damage punish. Also rook can use ground B> ground C, so he doesn’t need to go for normal throw, making it a bad idea to just let go of the controls. Assuming that Rook either bA, C or Ts during the loop the punish is either 0, 3 or 1 damage, an average of only 1.3, when rook deals 2,2 or 1 and therefore averages 1.6(BEFORE counting the loop) where he has a higher chance of dealing damage than getting punished, also he has more health, therefore he is likely to win the mixup game and assumbing that his move will be beaten by a responce is naive when 2/3 choices lead to rook dealing damage

And rook can do C into normal throw or normal throw into C. it isn’t a problem for him, that is why it is called a loop.

“Having to use moves that act as counters against a character’s moves means that there is something wrong with the character.”

Had a good laugh with that part, but now I’m just done. I could go on all day about how the 100% win rate against DeGrey is pulled completely out of your ass and that having a good matchup alongside plenty of bad matchups never makes a character overpowered or how using a throw after blocking Rook’s ground B will beat out his ground C OR how if you know Rook is going to C after his ground B is blocked that you can just jump and counter, but that would just lead to you jumping to more misinformed conjecture, so I think I’m gonna call it a day. I may check back in every now and again to see you get salty about a character you aren’t able to beat being broken even when literally everyone else says otherwise, but I’m not going to help you improve your gameplay if you’d just rather complain.

TL;DR

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I’m pretty sure DeGrey’s B on wake-up loses to both meaty normal throw and C-throw. And Rook doesn’t beat DeGrey 10-0. I won’t say exactly what the match-up numbers are, because I don’t know for sure, but I guarantee it’s not that skewed.

Honestly, if what you’re saying is true, the best thing you can do is to play Rook online, and post a screenshot of your massive winstreak in this thread. I think you’ll quickly reevaluate your position on him if you try this. But if you do in fact go 50-0 or something, then your argument that Rook is overpowered will be perfectly and irrefutably demonstrated.

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