Llodra nerf by VMoe & Elias : real facts vs biaised beliefs.

[C4iLL]

1) Let's sum-up what Elias & Vmoe said in their previous answers :

- They have the subjective feeling that, with Llodra, you simply have to press a button to catch the ball at the net and that this requires no real ability as it is automatic with the jump bonus.
- They have then the feeling that playing SV with him is easy, unrealistic and unbalanced.
- They logically think this character must be changed.

2) Against these subjective feelings, and as an objective person, I bring real facts to the debate :

- Among the 200 members of ITST, C4iLL is the only member to regularly use Llodra.
- With this "overpowered character", he lost its 3 matchs at the Barclays Masters against potentially less good players than some non-participants like Cerji, Florian, Voja, AlexJasmins and so on.
- He won 0 tournament in 2012 despite 29 suscriptions.
- He lost a final against a "Harrison", a tier 3 character.
- He's only ranked 8th despite a huge amount of tournaments played.
- His ratio win / losses is negative (29W, 31 Losses)
- In exhibitions, he recently lost a huge amount of sets against Florian, Cerji, Felipe, Clog, Otlichno and other guys (all the .dmo can be provided).

1.10 ITST results vs the top players --> 13 matchs, 9 losses, 4 victories = 70% of losses !

C4iLL vs Spencarlos (Fed) = 7-6, 4-6, 6-3
C4iLL vs Michael D (Fed) = 2-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Spencercarlos (Fed) = 4-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Cilic) = 4-6, 6-4, 6-1
C4iLL vs MichaelD (Fed) = 6-7, 3-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Harison) = 6-3, 3-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Spencercarlos (Fed) = 3-6, 6-7
C4iLL vs Robbin (Murray) = 6-2, 6-4
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Nadal) = 7-6, 7-6
C4iLL vs Voja (Nadal) = 0-6, 6-3, 3-6
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Nadal) = 5-7, 7-6, 1-6
C4iLL vs Ugadalou (Murray) = 6-7, 7-6, 3-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Nadal) = 4-6, 4-6

+ very close matches vs lower ranked players.

C4iLL vs El Croato = 6-3, 6-7, 7-6
C4iLL vs Vlad (Djokovic) = 6-3, 4-6, 6-7 (defeat at first round of a M1000... And I was not qualified for Barclays yet !)
C4iLL vs El Croato = 6-3, 5-7, 6-4

Before 1.10 vs the top players --> 10 matchs, 9 losses, 1 victory = 90% of losses !

C4iLL vs Ugadalou (Youzhny) = 7-6, 3-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Elias (Monfils) = 4-6, 6-7
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Tsonga) = 4-6, 4-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Otlichno (Federer) = 7-6, 2-6, 6, 5-7
C4iLL vs Fox (Federer) = 6-7, 1-6
C4iLL vs Polca (Soderling) = 6-7, 6-7
C4iLL vs Robbin (Berdych) = 3-6, 7-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Elias (Djokovic) = 4-6, 6-4, 2-6, 6-4, 7-6
C4iLL vs Fox (Federer) = 6-7, 6-4, 2-6, 3-6

Very important thing to notice : just a few weeks after the very FIRST victory I finally got against a top player (Elias, responsible of the mod) after 5 months on the tour, Llodra has been dramastically decreased in stats !!
1 very close victory in 5 sets and boom --> NERF for Llodra : far less power in wings, less speed, less stamina, less service... What a beautiful example of neutrality and fairplay...

The defeat in 4 sets vs Fox just after the Elias match showed that Llodra was not overpowered at all, but Mister Elias didn't care and could not accept he was't able to find the good tactic to destroy me (normal, he played like 15 sets in a few days, he was mentally exhausted, you can watch the US Open draw).

After this defeat, he was so frustrated that he even spammed on the chat that he will nerf Llodra : Eliomelma, IBullet VMoe and surely other guys were present and can witness this fact.

3) Questions

- What is the most important thing to balance a competition : subjective feelings, frustration or... real facts ?

- How do you explain nobody plays with Llodra ?
We are all H-omo Economicus, we all take rational decisions ! As everybody wants to win and some people here even create Excel files to scientificly pick their characters, why the hell nobody uses Llodra ?
If he would be so easy to use and guarantees easy victories, everybody should take him no ? We all take rational decisions like that !
Fox sticked with Fed for instance ! Voja, VMoe and Kyuuji recently took Nadal !
Saying Llodra is tier1 is not only a bad faith opinion : it's indirectly saying the community is blind and stupid for not having exploit that successful opportunity.

- How do you explain the unique Llodra user hasn't won any tournament until now whereas this character is overpowered ? How do you explain the unique Llodra's user got 70% of defeat vs the top players in 1.10 and 90% before 1.10 ? Just these statistics prove he's far from being tier 1.

- As someone has been able to beat the OVERPOWERED Llodra with Harison, don't we have a REAL ISSUE with Harison ?! Lopez, Wawrinka and recently Almargo in Cerji's hands reached some finals as well, don't they deserve a nerf as well ?? This is irony off course...

- Apparently, 78% of losses vs the top players with a SV is not enough for Elias and Vmoe (23 matchs, 18 defeats).
You want to put this percentage to how much ? 100% ? To reach what goal ? Realism ?!

4) The spirit of ITST Mod...

- Let's definitely clear one thing : the goal behind the mod is not realism. If that would be the case, Federer, Djokovic and Murray would be a lot stronger than they are now in the roster, because only them reach the last rounds of masters1000 / gran slams in real life.
- If you'd make them as they really are in real life : EVERYBODY would only pick one of these 3 guys, because everybody wants to win (rational economical decision).
- What would then be the point to offer more than 30 players in these conditions ? Completely useless as we would only use 3 players. It's mechanical.
- And by the way : a lot of players are completely underpowered regarding the reality. Isner with 74 in FH power when Del Potro has 90 and so on...

So please, be fair and admit that realism was only used at beginning to define trends about every players of the roster. And then, find another excuse than realism to explain that Llodra must be decreased or changed update after update.

Because in fact, the unique objective of the mod was always to find a consensus between these global trends (Fed has a good FH, Nadal is a great runner, Llodra a good SV) and 3 or 4 things :
- diversity of styles
- balance
- fun
- fairplay

The spirit always was to make 4 great characters (Murray Fed etc) for most people and give strenghts to specialized characters like Del Potro, Berdych, Llodra, Tsonga, Raonic and so on, to allow people who like challenges to be able to disturbe the tier 1.

At the end of the season, what is the learning of this strategy ?
The results of the most important tournaments show that Djokovic, Nadal and Federer are BY FAR the best characters of the roster. Goal reachy congratulations !

Other guys like Berdych, Wawrinka, Lopez, Del Potro, Davydenko, Tsonga, were around trying to disturbe the hierarchy. Even if they had good results, they are far from having the results of the top4.

The goal was then reached with 4 characters above all and the other part of the roster, able to get chances if they are extremely well used.

Among this list Llodra is here, getting some semi finals in some tournaments. He was able to compete, but in long term, he won nothing and the hierarchy was totally respected.

Now If he's in among the top15 players in terms of results, it's really not because the character is an amazing combinaison : it's because the guy behind practices a lot with this player, like 6 months in a row and has developed a very special knowledge of the SV style in Tennis Elbow and in other tennis game he plays. A real expertise nobody apparently has with this player.

Because, don't forget the guy behind this Llodra was the best SV of the TS4 Xbox tour during almost 2 years, able to be part of the top 10 whereas nobody was successfull with the SV style in this game.
By playing more than 1 thousand match on TS4 and TE as a SV he has developped anticipation, positioning and feeling at the net, that nobody may have around.

Despite this know-how, he is still always behind the very best players of the tours he participated and he TOTALLY accepts that. He doesn't ask for more. He just wants fairplay and objective management of the mod he plays.

5) Which is the tier of Llodra ? And what "Tier" Means ?

I'm sorry for you VMoe, but you should learn how tier are determined. They are not defined by feelings or by beliefs of some people in their coners, but by two concrete things : results of a character in competition and statistics of the character.

In terms of statistics, he's not tier 1, he's not tier 3, he's tier 4 with Isner. Here's the proof :

35th out of 36 players in stamina.
25th out of 36 players in speed.

36th out of 36 players in FH Power
36th out of 36 players in FH Consistency
34th out of 36 players in FH Precision.

35th out of 36 players in BH Power
34th out of 36 players in BH Power
32th out of 36 players in BH Consistency

This is the result of the 1.10 nerf done after US Open. Only a people of bad faith can think he's tier 1.

So yes, Llodra is the best in volley skills and net presence but it's not sufficient at all to compensate these huge weaknesses as the competition results show.

In terms of results indeed, with several semi finals and quarters but 0 title, he's at max tier 2 in my hand (not on the hands of everybody...). Because tier 1 is composed by characters who regularly reachs finals and titles : which is far from being the case of Llodra.

With 70% of losses vs top players using tier 1 characters like Nadal Fed Djokovic + defeats and close results against average characters like Harison, Cilic, any neutral people will indeed admit Llodra is something between tier 2 and 3

The best proof : several average ITST members who are often beat by other baseliners (like Ugadalou, Vlad, El Croato...) beat my Llodra with their tier 1 character.

If Llodra would be tier 1, I would logically beat them easily as other baseliners usually do. It's pure logic. And indeed, the rare times I picked a baseliner in exhibitions against them, I always won.

6) The examples of VMoe to show how Llodra is overpowered :

To say Llodra is overpowered, VMoe, winner of the Barclays Finals, brang two pathethic examples :

- he has beat Eliomelma (using Nadal) by staying on the baseline with Llodra.
- he has also beat Elias (using Djokovic) in the same conditions.

No offense but :
- Last result of Eliomelma with Nadal ? 0-6, 0-6 vs Michael D at Bercy Paris. Same Michael D who has not won Bercy and ITST Open.
- Last results of Eliomelma globally ? 3 defeats at Barclays Masters in the easiest group and a lot of defeats in 1.10.
- Last results of Elias ? After 4 months of inactivity since his US Open --> elimination from the easiest group of the Barclays Master.
- Last results of VMoe with tier2-3 characters like Wawrinka and Harison ? 2 titles against people using Federer, Murray etc.

So this is a big joke. Your statement with Llodra is completely irrelevant and can't be used to change the Llodra stat.
Unfortunately for you, it even shows how you take biaised decision without any method and consistency, and this withdraw your whole legitimacy to touch the mod in my opinion.
I really hope for you, you don't do that kind of simplification in your real professional life because it's not glorious.

If you want a real test, be methodic and objective : organize real exhibitions with a lot of people like Florian, Voja, AlexJasmins, Cerji, Fox Kyuuji and so on. The real top level : not with 2 inactive guys who are far from your level.

7) Conclusion

Troughout all this long message, I have proven VMoe & Elias have a pre-conceived idea about Llodra, which is based on feelings, not on facts. Managing a mod like that requires objectiveness and no bias.
And on this story it's obvious they didn't work with this in mind.

Until here I only presented facts, no subjective feelings to argue. I could have calculated a lot of other things to show how Nadal Federer Djokovic and other characters of the tier 2 are far better than Llodra but I think I've done enough.

I've just shown in objective terms that the whole community doesn't think Llodra is overpowered and doesn't trust his ability to win tournaments. I've shown that it's impossible to dominate the tour with him and he's then balanced.

And now I will expose my very own subjective opinion of Llodra regarding my 7-8 months practice with him.

For me, it requires a lot more anticipation, concentration and skills to play with him than with a baseliner.
It took me 6 months to be competitive with Llodra. If it was only about only pushing a button, everybody could do it, and nobody would ask me advices to increase their net skills (Fox, Clog Indiantonike, Elio and a lot of people often ask me how to play well at the net)

Thinking that volleying is just about pushing a button is completely disconnected from reality.
You always have to choose a side before your opponent shot to catch the ball well. And you must have extremely good reflex to do it in a way that will be efficient. In fact it's all about reflex and anticipation.
Because you not only have to catch the ball : you have to hit a fast shot, and to put it in on the best side of the court, if possible, on the lines. It's a lot about risk managing then.

It's also a lot about positioning, closing the angles, and avoid lobs. If you are too far from the net, you will be passed with a short accel... If you are too close, lobs.

With the short accel everybody now use, you always have to anticipate and think where your opponent hit his passing.

You are also always in pressure on your service because of the balls in the legs which make you do a FH instead of a volley.
You have to deal more with lag than baseliners because of the huge difference it creates in sensibility at the net.
I recently lost 6-0 vs Felipe , partly because of that : a lot of my volleys went out.

You have to serve a solid second serve because if you serve a spin serve, it's a free winner for your opponent now. Taking such risk make you do double faults and that is then even harder to win matches because of that.

You have to come to the net at the good moment on return services because if not, you will be always passed whatever the jump bonus is.
You have to manage your stamina, to build points etc... And so on, it's infinite the things you have to manage.

For all these reasons, instead of trying to constantly nerf Llodra, you should just be impressed by the results I get with him. If I had won US Open, what would you have done ? Erasing him from the roster ? Be objective a bit, and admit it's not the character who determinates the results, it's the player behind.

People have won tournaments and reached finals with Berdych, Almagro, Ferrer, Wawrinka, Berdych Soderling, and nobody said they were overpowered. If they won, it's not because of the character, it's because the guy behind is great.

And trust me : if I would have practiced with a real tier 1 character, my results would have been far better (especially at Shanghai-Bercy-WTF).
Regarding all I said about the results and the ability of the majority of players to deal with the Llodra volley, there's obviously no need to touch Llodra.
By changing things in the way you want, you will only make the baseliner life easier whereas results show they don't need help at all. It's more Llodra who needs help regarding the fact nobody takes him.

[Elias]

The defeat in 4 sets vs Fox just after the Elias match showed that Llodra was not overpowered at all, but Mister Elias didn't care and could not accept he was just less good on this day (he played 15 sets in a few days, you can watch the US Open draw).

After this defeat, he was so frustrated that he even spammed on the chat that he will nerf Llodra : Eliomelma, IBullet VMoe and surely other guys were present and can witness this fact.

To be honest i've stopped to read there.

It's pretty sad if you think one second that could be serious We were in the chat in good company and familiar people, and that was obviously joking, tickleing you a bit for fun. If you want to know the reality of things, Vmoe suggested *before* the US Open already that he thought there was a balance issue with Llodra, wich i wasn't convinced of (after we considerably boosted his wings, serve in previous versions, also changing his motions to make him better), i was mostly the one who intended to boost Llodra from the start, and from different people opinions, i've been gone too far with it. This defeat, against you wasn't especially a frustration, more relieving that anything else after playing all this long matches, as you said. I really don't care losing to anyone (and even if the match up may be unbalanced), i'm playing mostly for fun here (sometimes i've been doing so much testing that i've been bored and demotivated to sign up tournaments, so you can tell how much i care for my rankings, and i wouldn't either give you a point away in a 5th set tie break if i was that concerned by the result, and as a sidenote : i wouldn't ever beg for it either), i think you are the one a bit too much concerned by your greatness. Young and arrogant, that's finaly what you seems to be, sadly. Not the kind of person we may joke again with in the future, you may take it personal and hire a lawyer later on, pity..

For the rest, i think we never said it doesn't need any skill to handle Llodra the way you did, volleys aren't only tied to the jump of course but also directional skills, that's obvious; though, pushing an opponent in corners, opening a side of the court, with better wings, along with a lower jump, enforcing to close a defined net area, will definitely be considered much better, skill wise. You're good at what you're doing. Though a jump that wide wich is automated on a push, has no place in a sim, control wise, you may have a different opinion, obviously, but it's ours. Llodra shouldn't jump that much far compared to some good varied's like Lopez or Fish. We plenty understand it may be frustrating, being used to a gameplay for a long time. Though i'm pretty sure we won't ever see Voja crying for ages if Nadal is revamped, after all, he can probably win with different chars around without much issues.

We have the option to revamp him another way, so we will. It's been discussed some time ago before US Open, and i can tell you i'm definitely not alone working on balance, there is a 4 people team, and we'll probably include more balance testers in the future.

Balance is pretty sensitive, you have a weak char that you want to improve, you introduce different ameliorations, stat wise, and sometimes you end with an unbalanced char, it's not novelty. Llodra is not especially overpowered, but his conception is wrong, or too much axagerrated (too strong in one area, too weak in the other), our opinion is that we have to find some more acceptable setup, in the middle.

Albeit, i have to add that 77% speed with 1.0f doesnt lead to less reach than 80% in 1.0e. -3% for Llodra, as for other chars, is mainly a quick fix trying to get back the overall reach we had in 1.0e (and it's probably not enough yet). Llodra didn't got a 0 or -1 modifier like some other T2's, because we didn't wanted to take any risks with him, as we project to revamp him.

The jump was never touched though, since the start, but we've come to the conclusion it's the main exagerated trait wich prevents us to balance the char properly. After some private talks about it, even Manutoo suggested that volleyer+92 net presence may be too large, and that leaded us to some reflexion on how to revamp him.

This new feat in build 95 was introduced for a reason, imo :

- Gameplay : Player Style jump bonus now slightly depends of the Net Presence ; ie: to get the full jump bonus, you need to have 100% Net Presence

It allows to tweak the jump better than it was possible before.

There ain't anything personal in all our balance works, so please don't bring the discussion on such a low territory, C4iLL, that's pretty poor and mindless. You deserve better for yourself. And we deserve better as well. It's definitely not amateurism that leaded ITST tour to the success we can observe today.

[costiiforzaa]

So here am I after 1 month without joining the forum or playing TE and what I see: one of my very good friend from the ITST community wrote so great reply! I really didn't know what is going on before reading his reply and for sure I'm on his side. I don't think it is serious by Elias to write this words:

Though i'm pretty sure we won't ever see Voja crying for ages if Nadal is gimped, after all, he can probably win with different chars around without much issues.

It is one for player that played with years with Nadal's gamestyle which is totally a baseline to play with others baseliners and for one player that played 6 months and training very hard to improve his volley skills to the maximum to play with other baseliners (there is no other server like Llodra but there are other defenders and baseliners like Nadal)

[L Sanchez MD]

Just one thing: Llodra should be among the absolute worst baseliners in the roster. He's one of the worst baseliners in the top 100 of the sport.
Losing to Harrison doesn't mean the roster is wrong - Llodra has lost to many worse players than Harrison in real life. A couple months ago, he lost in the 2nd round of a Challenger to Maxime Authom, ranked 178.
The week before that, he lost to Kenny De Schepper, ranked 202.
The week before that, he lost to Edouard Roger-Vasselin, ranked 117.
In August, he lost to Guccione, ranked 587.

Llodra got bagelled by both Federer and Murray this year.

OK, the roster isn't 100% realistic, but Llodra is (or should be) one of the weakest / least consistent baseliners in the game. He's ranked 53, so he's probably only included in this roster of ~30 to have some variety of style.

[C4iLL]

Elias : when will you stop thinking your opinion is universal... ?

Your opinion with Vmoe and Manutoo is that the Llodra jump is unbalanced.
My opinion is that the jump is totally balanced and we are a lot to think that.
Who are right ?

The man who looses every day against the top players with Llodra ?
Or people who know nothing about Llodra and SV in competition like you Elias and Manutoo ?

You see, even on this opposition of subjective opinions, my opinion could count more than yours because I'm the guy who practices Llodra for a year. I'm the guy who is constantly passed by great players. I'm the man who comes the more to the net on the tour...

But honestly, I don't think it's constructive to oppose Subjective Opinions vs Subjective Opinions.
It's better to oppose FACTS vs FACTS.

And the facts are the following :

Llodra vs top players in 2012 = 23 matchs, 18 defeats, 5 victories --> 70% defeat in 1.10, 90% before.
Llodra = 0 tournament won.

There's no reason to make him even less good by reducing his jump. End of story, end of the fuss.

ps : I brang only facts on my initial topic. After his elimination at US Open, the creator of the mod said he will nerf the character who has just beat him. The future has shown Llodra was indeed nerfed.
I didn't do any interpretation about that : I just brang that as a fact. I let other people interprete that.

ps 2 : just stop reading my whole topic because of that, make you appear even less objective and professional.

[VMoe86]

- He's only ranked 8th despite a huge amount of tournaments played.

Translation: "I have no clue how rankings work."

- His ratio win / losses is negative (29W, 31 Losses)

And is positive after Cincinnati.

1.10 ITST results vs the top players --> 13 matchs, 9 losses, 4 victories = 70% of losses !

C4iLL vs Spencarlos (Fed) = 7-6, 4-6, 6-3
C4iLL vs Michael D (Fed) = 2-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Spencercarlos (Fed) = 4-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Cilic) = 4-6, 6-4, 6-1
C4iLL vs MichaelD (Fed) = 6-7, 3-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Harison) = 6-3, 3-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Spencercarlos (Fed) = 3-6, 6-7
C4iLL vs Robbin (Murray) = 6-2, 6-4
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Nadal) = 7-6, 7-6
C4iLL vs Voja (Nadal) = 0-6, 6-3, 3-6
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Nadal) = 5-7, 7-6, 1-6
C4iLL vs Ugadalou (Murray) = 6-7, 7-6, 3-6
C4iLL vs VMoe (Nadal) = 4-6, 4-6

+ very close matches vs lower ranked players.

C4iLL vs El Croato = 6-3, 6-7, 7-6
C4iLL vs Vlad (Djokovic) = 6-3, 4-6, 6-7 (defeat at first round of a M1000... And I was not qualified for Barclays yet !)
C4iLL vs El Croato = 6-3, 5-7, 6-4

More interesting is total sets played and sets won or sets lost. Just looking at the matches against top players (and including one set you played against spencercarlos and won 7-6; then spencercarlos could not continue playing), it is 13 sets won out of 33, in percentages 39.4%.

Before 1.10 vs the top players --> 10 matchs, 9 losses, 1 victory = 90% of losses !

C4iLL vs Ugadalou (Youzhny) = 7-6, 3-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Elias (Monfils) = 4-6, 6-7
C4iLL vs Kyuuji (Tsonga) = 4-6, 4-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Otlichno (Federer) = 7-6, 2-6, 6, 5-7
C4iLL vs Fox (Federer) = 6-7, 1-6
C4iLL vs Polca (Soderling) = 6-7, 6-7
C4iLL vs Robbin (Berdych) = 3-6, 7-6, 4-6
C4iLL vs Elias (Djokovic) = 4-6, 6-4, 2-6, 6-4, 7-6
C4iLL vs Fox (Federer) = 6-7, 6-4, 2-6, 3-6

7 out 28 sets, which is exactly 25%.

NERF for Llodra : far less power in wings, less speed, less stamina, less service...

He got his old stats back on wings, 1% less speed. Even with that, your sets winning percentage increased. And at least the two times you lost to me you said afterwards you did not play your best (I'm pretty sure this was the case in every loss ), in contrast to you claiming now that you played at "max level". So, at maximum level you could have won some of your three setters you lost.

Because, don't forget the guy behind this Llodra was the best SV of the TS4 Xbox tour during almost 2 years, able to be part of the top 10 whereas nobody was successfull with the SV style in this game.
By playing more than 1 thousand match on TS4 and TE as a SV he has developped anticipation, positioning and feeling at the net, that nobody may have around.

Translation: "I'm the best S&V on the world in tennis games!".

In terms of statistics, he's not tier 1, he's not tier 3, he's tier 4 with Isner. Here's the proof :

35th out of 36 players in stamina.
25th out of 36 players in speed.

36th out of 36 players in FH Power
36th out of 36 players in FH Consistency
34th out of 36 players in FH Precision.

35th out of 36 players in BH Power
34th out of 36 players in BH Power
32th out of 36 players in BH Consistency

This is a proof, but only of your incompetence regarding stats in TE:

Power is relative to spin and with 24 spin Llodra is on ninth/tenth place regarding spin. This gives him 83 mph groundstroke speed off a neutral ball, both on forehand and backhand. As a comparison: Federer has 85 mph groundstroke speed off neutral ball on forehand, 81 mph on backhand.

EDIT: What I forgot to say, Precision is relative to Power, so what only counter is Precision minus Power. On FH side, there are 16 characters who have a higher value in Precision minus Power. On BH side there are 22 characters with a higher value in Precision minus Power. As a note: Now in 1.11, regarding Nadal, there are 25 players with better Precision minus Power on FH side, and 31 characters with better Precision minus Power on BH side.

Stamina is also relative to speed, from the Documentation:

the more you Speed is above your Stamina, the quicker you lose energy

There are 20 characters in the roster for which Speed minus Stamina is larger or equal to that value of Llodra. Stamina directly affects how tiring accelerations are.

To say Llodra is overpowered, VMoe, winner of the Barclays Finals, brang two pathethic examples :

- he has beat Eliomelma (using Nadal) by staying on the baseline with Llodra.
- he has also beat Elias (using Djokovic) in the same conditions.

I did not say when this was and Elias, playing his best, is on TWM-Fox level. This was close to the end of US Open, by the way. With Elio it was not even testing, just a coincidence we met.

If you want a real test, be methodic and objective : organize real exhibitions with a lot of people like Florian, Voja, AlexJasmins, Cerji, Fox Kyuuji and so on. The real top level : not with 2 inactive guys who are far from your level.

These guys can all play against each other and provide feedback, everyone would appreciate that. Keep in mind that some of those names write insightful comments (also on TE in-game chat or TE Forum Chat) like "I cannot do shit with Djokovic anymore!" or insult other players or simply do not comment at all.

Final (and not so serious) comment: If you think that Jump Bonus is irrelevant, we can make Llodra a Defender (he then has no Jump Bonus) with the same stats he has in 1.10.

[Elias]

Llodra is not nerfed in 1.11. He just got a -3% speed like several other characters in the roster, as a quick reach adjustement to 1.0f.

Our opinion is that Llodra had too much baseline reach and defense possible, considering his net abilities, that's why the -3% speed, along with other chars, it's not dedicated to Llodra only, it was the least we could do about it, knowing this wouldn't even lower his overall reach compared to 1.0e, it's just a reach calbibration from 1.0e to 1.0f. Thus Llodra was not especially part of the tier2 chars we wanted to be closer, speed wise to the fastest chars. Pretty simple. You may have considered him nerfed if we had reduced other stats, his wings or any other one, wich is not even the case, it's not a nerf, but more a speed adjustement. Some T2's where a bit improved though, regarding the speed gap.

Sure, we can also consider to keep a very large jump, but then we'll have to adjust his baseline abilities accordingly (about reach, wings are weak enough.. i'd rather seeing him with a bit less reach, but a bit more power). Or we may consider a lower jump (still a good one obviously) and better baseline abilities, not especially reach wise, but that can be power wise, to allow better approaches opportunities. There is different options. My personal perference/view, would be the second one, but that's just me, i''m not making any balance choice alone, Vmoe, Djarvik, Robbin, Slicer have also their analysis and will surely end up with an acceptable solution. There is probably different acceptable solutions, and obviously we'll end with only one. Probably not the universal one, wich does not exists, you may like it, or not, you may also do very well with it, or not.

About the "facts", it's not Llodra losing to the top players. It's C4iLL losing to the top players, sorry, we can't consider yourself as the unique incarnation of a game character. What would have happened if you played another character, who knows or can appreciate it. It's a bit irrelevant. To quote Vmoe : 'What matters is the potential of a char in certain hands."

Everyone is entiled to his opinions. Nobody has a universal one. Even among the ITST organisation team, we have often different opinions wich usually leads to constructive discussions before taking a definitive decision, hopefully. There barely ain't any perfect solution in the gaming balance area, even in mainstream huge productions like World of Warcraft wich are led by big companies, there's very often balance issues between different character classes, complaints and flaming. Professional doesn't always means perfect either. And you're right, we're not doing this for a living, we're just doing this over our free time, and until now, i think we can tell we did pretty good, however it won't ever be perfect. And yes, it will also reflect the vision of a management team, not an universal one.

Now it seems you stick to argue about our integrity, biased issues, that's pretty low submarine hits, imo. And not opening to any constructive sharing being that much agressive and unrespectful. Therefore that'll be my last answer about it, definitely not worth more of my time.

To be honest we would probably have considered to invite you to some testing sessions during the Llodra revamping intent, to have your impressions, as it's been done in the past, consulting some players who are using a single character. But considering your behaviour, i guess this won't happen.

[djarvik]

Just an observation, C4ill, all your alleged "facts" are based on the assumption that you are the best SV player out there. That might be, but you are also the only one out there. So you are too tiny of a sample size to represent the category to even consider it a "fact". It is irrelevant if you are right or wrong, it is relevant that you simply don't conclude anything, rather take personal observation and "feelings" after YOUR results and attempt to factorize them by virtue of putting forth an erroneous statement of you being the best "possible" style representation.

If you think we are bias and are out there to some how hurt you, then I would say you give yourself too much credit. Your name, record, achievements have not come up in the conversation when balance was discussed. Delusion of grandeur much?

I have no problem with you giving constructive feedback, "feeling", desires for the player you use and for yourself personally, but this needs to be done in civilized or even fun/caricature way (which I know you are capable of). What you doing, is "throwing out the baby with the bath water". You are unhappy about a change and the first thing that pops into your mind "conspiracy!" - "they out to get me!", and you immediately go on offensive and attack the integrity of the organization and people who spend COUNTLESS of hours creating this environment and testing players rigorously, yes, even Llodra being tested.

To that, I say - poor show.

[C4iLL]

This is my last message on this topic, so I advice you to read it carefully.

I'm sorry to state none of you guys have understood what the debate is about. In my initial topic, I've written like 4 or 5 questions you still haven't answered. You prefered to focus the attention on superficial things that are completely out of the subject. It's your argumentation choice, I won't comment it, but that doesn't bring anything to the real debate.

Because the debate is neither about my person nor about Llodra's technique, it's about his power in the roster and on the tour.

Is Llodra so overpowered that he needs a third decrease in stats in a row ? Is Llodra raising an issue to the tour ?
Is there on the forum, a guy who ever complained in a report after being defeated, saying "Llodra is overpowered in CaiLL's hands" as people recently did with Nadal regarding Voja's and VMoe results ?

The answer is definitely and objectively NO. No because :

1) Everybody knows he's one of the hardest character to play with on the roster.
People take the best characters. If he would be overpowered, everybody would have taken him, it's simple, mechanical and rational.

Everybody knows the learning curve is indeed extremely slow with this character and that the ratio "hours practiced / level reached" is laughable in comparaison with what other characters like Fed or Nadal offer (great level in a few hours).
It's why more than 50% of people took Federer and not even 1% took Llodra troughout the year.

So stop dreaming : people took Federer-Djokovic and so on because it increase their chance to win. And not Llodra because he lowers your chances.
If Llodra would have been more used, okay, a debate could have been opened as we MIGHT had a problem. But it's really not the case. People choices are more significant that what 2 guys think on their corners with their own feelings.

2) Llodra's results against the top players using the tier 1 show only one thing : he is weak.
Even in the hand of a guy who trained with him during 6-7 months, Llodra is enable to regularly beat the top players. Fortunately I'm objective and fairplay, so I don't ask for any increase in stats.
But statistically speaking I could have asked it : 0 title earned despite hundre hours of practice, Llodra is definitely not a good deal.

3) I could go further on statistics if you want too. Despite my huge practice of volleying, I've noticed that against people like Kyuuji, Fox, Voja or Florian I win less than 50% of my net points.
If the jump would have been as overpowered as you subjectively think, a guy who has practied 6 months in a row with this style would always got between 80 and 90% of his net points, not 45-50%.
This is the reason why nobody ever complained : in game, everybody know they can pass me when they want if they play well whatever the jump bonus is. And this percentage is a statistic proof.

And even when this percentage is better (65% against Ugadalou), that has not a big impact on the match because it's far from being sufficient to win. I lost a lot of matches with a percentage like that.

And to definitely kill the debate with realism : Llodra vs Ferrer, semi finals of Bercy 2012 = more than 50% of points won at the net for Llodra. And he lost. I let you imagine what his percentage may be when he wins against less good players.
Source : http://www.tennis.com/news/2012/11/berc ... OFrvBzsAoQ, last sentence of the text;

Now anybody can obviously see Llodra and his jump are far from being overpowered, I've nothing more to add to this topic. I let people state this obvious fact and make their own opinion about how the staff treats this case.