Heavies should have slower grabs#275

I think the universal grab speed in Rivals 2 causes issues in both balancing and gameplay diversity, specifically when it comes to heavies.

Something one might notice is that most heavies in Rivals 2 are secretly grapplers. Kragg, Galvan, and Loxodont look like a brawler, a trapper, and a swordie, but they are really all just trying to get grabs while walling people out with big moves.

All three rely on this one tool so much because they all have relatively slow frame data to compensate for all the advantages of being a heavy. Their grabs poke out like a sore thumb: they’re some of their fastest moves, they’re bigger than most other characters’ grabs, and, well, they’re grabs, so they ignore shield and CC. This lets these heavies punish and scrap with characters they’d otherwise have no business competing with.

I’m fine with the universal 4-frame jumpsquat – it’s good for the gamefeel. Any mobility buffs this gives to heavies can be offset by tuning their movement stats, and any frame data buffs can be offset by slowing down their attacks. However, this should include grabs. Universally fast grabs give heavies a loophole in their core design that predisposes them all to playing more or less the same way.

I think adding one or two frames of startup to some heavies’ standing and dashgrabs would go a massive way in pushing them into more diverse gameplay styles – and it would make them a lot less frustrating to fight in scramble situations, where they would have slightly slower aggressive options.

Everyone tries to get grabs, not just the heavies. Olympia, Zetter or Ranno thrive on grabs just as much as Kragg, if not more. While heavies grab box is indeed bigger, so is their hurtbox.
Galvan, Etalus, Lox and Kragg are very different archetypes that just so happen to share the property of being heavy. Each of them poses entirely different categories of issues, and I don’t think a universal “make their grab slower” is a good blanket solution to any of them.

@Marthin Barbefleurie You aren’t quite getting my point I think. Everyone tries to get grabs, but most heavies’ grabs are one of their fastest attacks, if not their fastest outright in some situations. This means they all look for grabs more belligerently and they shape their gameplans around grab a lot more.

I don’t want a blanket solution either. I do think that reducing grab speed for all the heavies would force them to rely more on their individual strengths, but some should probably be allowed to have faster grabs than others. Slowing down the grabs would also allow the devs to safely buff some of their underused tools, or it would reduce the toxicity of some of their strongest tools without the need to directly nerf them, just by nature of giving them less easy access to those tools via grab combos.

I do get your point, but still do not think adding a frame or two to their grab startup would bring meaningful changes to their gameplan, nor that this change is actually granted. Their slow attacks and greater range (that is, if you’re not Clairen, Fors, Slade, Fleet or whoever) means that their opponent needs to adapt their plan to take that range into account, just as much as heavies need to be aware of their own shortcomings in these matchups which is the whole point of fighting games. If anything, it forces people to rely less on shield against them and use different tools, which is a good thing in itself.

@Marthin Barbefleurie Yeah, heavies are built around slowness in exchange for range, power, and survivability, and I don’t want to change that. I just want to bring their grabs more in line with this philosophy, because their grabs being as fast as they are warps their playstyles. Galvan is the poster child for this – he is advertised as being setplay-esque but until you hit like 50% all he wants is a grab combo. It might not seem like much but 1-2 frames on a move as important as grab matters a lot at top-level play.

As a Lox main, I gotta veto this for a simple reason. Half the cast can run circles around me, weave in and out of my effective range, forcing me to play catch with them. If you take away one of my defensive tools, you might as well just tell me to lay down and die.
Besides that, it’s also on the attacker to properly space their attacks outside of grab ranges, which is far easier now due to the grab range nerfs, or simply land behind the opponents. In Lox’s case, if you land behind him, you’re pretty much safe since he lack any good oos moves that hit behind.

@Whiskey Titan Grab is not a defensive tool though, it’s an aggressive one, and Loxodont does not need a specifically frame 7 grab when his jab 1, ftilt 1, and retreating fair exist. Loxodont decides whether his opponent gets to interact with him because at no point does the game say for certain that you can punish Loxodont for taking any of these actions, even if you’re Maypul or Zetter. Spacing attacks around his grab is useless because it puts you in jab combo range, the worst possible spot to be against Lox. Getting any closer is not worth doing due to the grab and how long he can CC for, so you have to actually cross him up as you say to get value. Even then, floorhug turns you to face the attacker, so thanks to jab 2 beating anyone who tries to shieldgrab jab 1, floorhug jab works anytime floorhug grab would anyway.

@Whiskey Titan Not to pile on too bad, but short hop bair exists and Lox does a great job deterring people from getting behind him by camping at the edge and using different boulder and tilt timings.