TS4 Matchups

[djarvik]

Taken out from Exhibition thread.

I played djarvik's Monfil's today. Lol, those were some nice enjoyable matches. Especially my all rounder vs his monfil's. I like the way that match went. Your monfil's is really fast. It's was hard for my all rounder to hit through him. Reach swing expert just made it tougher. Lol, at times I was like "what the...he got that back". Your monfil's and puttu puttuu's soderling are very similar. The problem my all rounder has is that he isn't an offensive baseliner so he has trouble hitting through them. I like those matches thoough, they remind me somewhat of federer vs nadal. I usually have to bring my S+++ game if I want to keep up with good really fast defensive baseliners.
I enjoy my new all rounder now, he plays more like how I wanted. How was his offense djarvik? My brother told me that even though I have 64pw he strikes the ball very hard. I try to play him like how federer plays in real life, if it wasn't obvious already lol.
Also what did you think of my s&v/defensive baseliner hybrid? lol, something told me you were like "wait so he can rally with me and volley very well too o_O?" hahaha. It's hard to play him though with that 54pw. In the games current state it's makes it difficult.

I am quite proud how my Monfils came out, he is looking good and the strokes fit and the play style as well. He may not be the "winning setup" but so far I enjoy every match I played with this style.

Puttu's setup was the inspiration behind it yeah...

I can't remember the exact stats of your players, but the last one was rather good. I really dont think the power matters that much unless you cross that 80 mark, then you start feeling the ball getting really heavy. I think your second guy had Inside out master right? ...that is a very useful skill, it makes you hit way harder than your power rating may indicate, as long as you do hit inside out. Both players were rather good in their own respect.


To further expand on your thought mine as well, been discussing this with Anil some time ago):

The counters as I see it now are:

Top Spin Invasion - Instant rocket
I have not lost yet to a TSI guy with my instant rocket. Granted, the matches are close, but that is a good think. The key is to hug the baseline and go up the line. Basically, you need to cut down the time from TSI, because once they fully power up their top spins - you are in trouble. Instant rocket will power your shots faster then your opponent, combined with standing close to the baseline, you should be able to gain control rather fast.

Monster Defense - Smell of Blood
Monster defense kicks in every time the user is behind in the game. Smell of blood on the game point, both break point and your game point. So it is a natural counter and works like a charm.

Problem is, that we need a setup to truly counter TSI/MD and that is Instant Rocket + Smell of Blood. Since such a setup doesn't exists TSI/MD dominates. You can only partially stop it.

I have tons of thoughts and ideas on Skills like above. If you interested guys, I can make a separate thread about it. Don't want to turn this thread into discussion of these.

[Hawkeye Miihawk]

My all rounder's stats
fh 80
bh 69
srv 70
vol 53
pw 64
sta 74
spe 70
rf 65
Poisoned slices, smell of blood

Hybrid
fh 72
bh 62
srv 71
vol 75
pw 52
sta 73
spe 70
rf 70
Topspin invasion, inside out master

I like my hybrid a lot. Once he gets the advantage in a rally, he can end points very quickly at net. I can also s&v, but not too much cause he isn't a true s&ver. Although at times I forget that and go into s&v mode.

Instant rocket - topspin/slice invasion (can also beat reach swings expert but is tough)
Yes, this is 100% correct. In the beginning, when my def baseliner had 83spe 95sta slice invasion and reach swings expert, instant rocket characters gave me a lot of trouble. I was really fast, and if not for reach swings expert I would have lost a ton of those matches. Slice invasion didn't do much cause they reached full power so easily, and could end the point before I had the chance to capitalize on slice invasion. My current def baseliner has topspin invasion, and instant rocket guys still give me trouble. lol you can never get topspin invasion powered up cause you're too busy running.

Monster defense - smell of blood
Correct. When I switched coaches for my all rounder, I was like "uhhh smell of blood? I guess that's the useless skill for this coach". I thought poisoned slices would be the better one, lol was I wrong. All of a sudden I find that I'm holding serve and breaking serve a lot easier. I knew what the skill did, but I didn't think it made your shots that good . It completely nullified monster defense. Yes they get a bonus when I have game point, but the kind of shots you hit at game point with smell of blood are 10 times greater than the kind of shots they hit with monster defense. Your angle, precision, and power increase 10 folds. It doesn't matter what skill you have, when I have game point and we get into a rally 98% of the time I will win it. Unless you s&v. This is perfect for monster defense, which is a comeback skill.

Semi-volley king - deep shots
This skill was tailor made for people who like to hit deep baseline shots during rallies. Be it with topspin/slice invasion, instant rocket, etc or just regular deep shots. I ran into someone with this skill a while back. I was using my all rounder who had shot counter/return serve counter back then. I used my usual "hit deep topspin shots to baseline" strategy. To my surprise he handled them so well and just kept smacking the ball left and right. He refused to move back beyond the baseline, taking the ball on the rise every time. I though his timing was godly cause everything was coming back to me with so much pace at what seemed like perfectly timed shots. He had the coach Roman Neuwith (Semi volley king/shot counter). I was like "how is he able to get so much pace, precision, and angle when the ball is practically landing at his feet?". It wasn't until right before I lost that I realised what semi volley king was smh.


Lol, I'll stop right there so this thread doesn't turn into something else, but I think you should create a thread like that djarvik. It'll help the community, and some people might be willing to try out new styles if they know what beats what. Right now people aren't experimenting because of Pei Jing Quah. TI/MD is still king. If a coach had a combination of 2 of these skills, instant rocket - smell of blood - fatality, then Pei Jing Quah would be 2nd best. Unfortunately a coach like that doesn't exist. Yes, my new all rounder is better against TI/MD characters, as their MD is useless when I have game point. The problem is he still has to deal with TI/MD during non game point moments, and the path to getting that break point is still very tough. As you said, those skills separately only stop it partially, but still not enough. Quite sad really, cause TS4, despite it's many flaws, can be a lot of fun when people branch out.

[tigerofintegrity]

I have tons of thoughts and ideas on Skills like above. If you interested guys, I can make a separate thread about it. Don't want to turn this thread into discussion of these.

Please do create a thread for this. Would love a discussion on this. I think it'd be both interesting and beneficial for ITST. Players may think twice about just folding in to the TI/MD trend. Plus I can tell people why I think my current setup is killer.

[Mack2300]

This thread is very useful I switched traits on one of my players earlier to instant rocket/monster defense and I managed to beat many TI Invasion/monster defence players. I guess my player using monster defense kind of cancelled out theirs a bit so it was more of an even playing field. And it does appear that you just have to try and blast your way through them by going down the lines, and not give them time to charge up their topspin as djarvik said. Now I'm sure an ITST TI Invasion/monster defense would more than likely beat me easily but at least we are figuring out how to counter this set-up now, even if it isn't a particularly enjoyable way of playing.

[Crotatsuya]

The problem with Quah is, that it not only has TI/MD as specials, but also the best and most useful distribution of skill points in the game. Its the only coach where you have the perfect balance of power and vh/bh. i have tried many different setups, but eiter the angles were not good enough or the power was lacking.

Personally I'd still use her without TI/MD just for the skill points.
i'm really curious if 2k will balance this out, since out of a gamers perspective that likes to be as competitive as it gets, there are very few reasonable options for coaches, since the skill point distribution of most coaches in this game is just not as good.

Let me show you a few examples.

The oh so hated Pei Jing Quah with my own setup:

0/10/10

vh: 83 +15
bh: 83 +15
srv: 68 +7
vol: 39
pow: 75 +7
sta:86
spe: 66
ref: 50

skills: Topspin Invasion / Monster Defence

As you can see you have good to great stats in nearly every category that counts plus 2 very good special skills that complement the baseline game. You can blame noone for using this, because the game simply doesn't provide many good alternatives. On the other hand you still have to be able to use it, I have seen many bad players with this setup, so it is not the setup alone that wins the matches. In the hands of a good player on the other hand it is quite lethal.

Another setup that I find quite useful as a baseliner is this:

Jon Samala

0/1/19

vh: 81 +13
bh: 83 +5
srv: 49 +5
vol: 40
pow: 67 +13
sta: 93 +9
spe: 83
ref: 50

special skills: Instant Rocket / Monster Defence

This is the first real alternative for baseline play I found, although it is lacking a bit in the power department, and the Topspin Invasion will be missed if you fail to hit the ball with perfect timing when it counts.
Instant Rocket kind of helps you getting enough power to hit that ball for winner, although fast players will give you a hard time. With 83 in speed however you are quite speedy yourself which is always a plus for a baseliner.
Tell me what you think. I wanted to test it thoroughly with my female character but the servers are still down.

Ok, 2 down 2 to go..

Nr 3 is a build which i like to call "The Wall", since its perfect for defensive baseliners:

Jorge Barrero

0/3/17

vh: 80 +5
bh:70 +5
srv: 51
vol: 40
pow: 61
sta: 95 +12
spe: 89 +13
ref: 59 +10

special skills: Slice invasion / Reach Swings Expert

There is another coach called Snezlana Slavina who also hast Reach Swings Expert and grants +10 to vh and bh and +15 to speed and reflex, if you want to pass on Slice invasion that might be the better choice, but since you will be slicing al lot du to the defesive playstyle I'd rather take this one. A well timed slice all the way to the baseline is always a good way to win some time and to get the opponents to struggle with their timing, forcing errors. Thta however depends also on their skill, so against a very good player you will always have a hard time as defensive baseliner.

The last good baseline setup i found is this one:

Drew Welch

0/2/18

vh: 86 +15
bh 86 +15
srv: 58 +10
vol: 40
pow: 63 +5
sta: 88 +5
spe: 79
ref: 50

special skills: Drop Shot Artist / Smell of Blood

I think this is the only coach that really rivals Pei Jing Quah in terms of skill point distribution, since it complements the baseline play well.
Although lacking a bit in the power department you have excellent ground strokes and very good speed. Also Smell of Blood can be very useful when it counts, as heard above.
If you don't mind the lack of power this might be another really good choice for baseline players.

I hope this was kind of helpful fore some of you that are still struggling to find a good baseline setup that rivals the TI/MD players. Even though I personally think, that the first one is still a little overpowered (there is a reason everyone is using this after all), the other 3 are also very good setups and can beat those players if played right.

thank you and good night.

cheers

Cro

(typos and errors concerning grammar may be overlooked, I am german after all. )

[Crotatsuya]

Guess I was a little out of topic with this one, If there is another thread that may find the above useful you might move it there...

[venom400]

The problem with Quah is, that it not only has TI/MD as specials, but also the best and most useful distribution of skill points in the game. Its the only coach where you have the perfect balance of power and vh/bh. i have tried many different setups, but eiter the angles were not good enough or the power was lacking.

Personally I'd still use her without TI/MD just for the skill points.
i'm really curious if 2k will balance this out, since out of a gamers perspective that likes to be as competitive as it gets, there are very few reasonable options for coaches, since the skill point distribution of most coaches in this game is just not as good.

Let me show you a few examples.

The oh so hated Pei Jing Quah with my own setup:

0/10/10

vh: 83 +15
bh: 83 +15
srv: 68 +7
vol: 39
pow: 75 +7
sta:86
spe: 66
ref: 50

skills: Topspin Invasion / Monster Defence

As you can see you have good to great stats in nearly every category that counts plus 2 very good special skills that complement the baseline game. You can blame noone for using this, because the game simply doesn't provide many good alternatives. On the other hand you still have to be able to use it, I have seen many bad players with this setup, so it is not the setup alone that wins the matches. In the hands of a good player on the other hand it is quite lethal.

Another setup that I find quite useful as a baseliner is this:

Jon Samala

0/1/19

vh: 81 +13
bh: 83 +5
srv: 49 +5
vol: 40
pow: 67 +13
sta: 93 +9
spe: 83
ref: 50

special skills: Instant Rocket / Monster Defence

This is the first real alternative for baseline play I found, although it is lacking a bit in the power department, and the Topspin Invasion will be missed if you fail to hit the ball with perfect timing when it counts.
Instant Rocket kind of helps you getting enough power to hit that ball for winner, although fast players will give you a hard time. With 83 in speed however you are quite speedy yourself which is always a plus for a baseliner.
Tell me what you think. I wanted to test it thoroughly with my female character but the servers are still down.

Ok, 2 down 2 to go..

Nr 3 is a build which i like to call "The Wall", since its perfect for defensive baseliners:

Jorge Barrero

0/3/17

vh: 80 +5
bh:70 +5
srv: 51
vol: 40
pow: 61
sta: 95 +12
spe: 89 +13
ref: 59 +10

special skills: Slice invasion / Reach Swings Expert

There is another coach called Snezlana Slavina who also hast Reach Swings Expert and grants +10 to vh and bh and +15 to speed and reflex, if you want to pass on Slice invasion that might be the better choice, but since you will be slicing al lot du to the defesive playstyle I'd rather take this one. A well timed slice all the way to the baseline is always a good way to win some time and to get the opponents to struggle with their timing, forcing errors. Thta however depends also on their skill, so against a very good player you will always have a hard time as defensive baseliner.

The last good baseline setup i found is this one:

Drew Welch

0/2/18

vh: 86 +15
bh 86 +15
srv: 58
vol: 40
pow: 63 +5
sta: 88 +5
spe: 79
ref: 50

special skills: Drop Shot Artist / Smell of Blood

I think this is the only coach that really rivals Pei Jing Quah in terms of skill point distribution, since it complements the baseline play well.
Although lacking a bit in the power department you have excellent ground strokes and very good speed. Also Smell of Blood can be very useful when it counts, as heard above.
If you don't mind the lack of power this might be another really good choice for baseline players.

I hope this was kind of helpful fore some of you that are still struggling to find a good baseline setup that rivals the TI/MD players. Even though I personally think, that the first one is still a little overpowered (there is a reason everyone is using this after all), the other 3 are also very good setups and can beat those players if played right.

thank you and good night.

cheers

Cro

(typos and errors concerning grammar may be overlooked, I am german after all. )

I guess you dont get it , there shouldnt be a perfect couch , there should be weakness and strenngths to every spec , why do you have to have a perfect forehand and backhand in a tennis game , in tennis you should always have a week side , it kills and simplifies the game but not allowing you to attack a weak side .

[Sherlock 117]

Very good post Cro. Very interesting stuff. I think I will start practicing a few of these against TI/MD players to see if it can be made to work.

[Crotatsuya]

@ Venom400

What you say is true in real life, but if you look at things from a gamers perspective as well, you must take some points into account:

-if you want to be competitive, you take the best possible setup you can get (that suits your style obviously). As long as there are balancing issues, you will not voluntarily handicap yourself by choosing something worse than what most of the other gamers ars using unless you are a complete virtuoso that can win anyway.

-since this is a game with gameplay mechanics you have to take what the game offers you and use it to the most of you abilities. This is a good game with many shortcomings nonetheless, but you have to take it as it is.

-> So the question is this:

Will you use what the game has to offer and probably be among the best while using unrealistic skills and angles?
Or will you voluntarily neglect the best possible setup and handycap yourself and probably have a more realistic experience? And congratulate yourself if you are among the best anyway?

I'd really like to do the second, but for that to make sense everyone here would have to do the same, because as long as most of the people use Pei Jing Quah it is completely ok for me. Everyone has the option to use her as coach and these matches are usually very exiting and a good GAMING experience albeit unrealistic.
From a simulation aspect i completely agree, that it doesn't make sense.

So either you ban Pei Jing Quah for the tournaments on this site, or you'll have to accept that people are using her...

[venom400]

@ Venom400

What you say is true in real life, but if you look at things from a gamers perspective as well, you must take some points into account:

-if you want to be competitive, you take the best possible setup you can get (that suits your style obviously). As long as there are balancing issues, you will not voluntarily handicap yourself by choosing something worse than what most of the other gamers ars using unless you are a complete virtuoso that can win anyway.

-since this is a game with gameplay mechanics you have to take what the game offers you and use it to the most of you abilities. This is a good game with many shortcomings nonetheless, but you have to take it as it is.

-> So the question is this:

Will you use what the game has to offer and probably be among the best while using unrealistic skills and angles?
Or will you voluntarily neglect the best possible setup and handycap yourself and probably have a more realistic experience? And congratulate yourself if you are among the best anyway?

I'd really like to do the second, but for that to make sense everyone here would have to do the same, because as long as most of the people use Pei Jing Quah it is completely ok for me. Everyone has the option to use her as coach and these matches are usually very exiting and a good GAMING experience albeit unrealistic.
From a simulation aspect i completely agree, that it doesn't make sense.

So either you ban Pei Jing Quah for the tournaments on this site, or you'll have to accept that people are using her...

I agree with what you said , but in due of balance any play style should beat another granted both people are the same skill level .

The fact that you have to be 30% better than your oponent to beat someone with jing quah is not balanced , I have not have any problems being competetive against anyone using any other couch , including the isntant rocket ones and MD with something else combination , I beat 1 MD TI with my all arounder because the guy was absoulutely horrible , and even then it took every single once of my skill to beat him , any time I go against someone with my skill level or higher I'm toast when they use this couch .

This site is famous for bringing balancing rules to otherwise unbalanced games , banning this couch should be the first step until this couch gets balanced , this couch is bugged and her skills are not only amazing but are apparently more powerfull than they appear.

[Crotatsuya]

God, I'd love to sit on a couch with skills that good.

(coach is what you mean, no offense, reading couch makes it kinda funny to imagine. )

I'm curious to what will happen though.

There is one thing I found out nonetheless:

If you use the last setup I wrote down, and use drop shots a lot to get the opponent to the net, you can easily pass the ball around them to score. Drop Shot Artist helps a lot with this.
I'm quite sure if you'd practice stop balls for a while to get the perfect feeling for them, this might be the best weapon against TI/MD players, since they are vulnerable at the net and not the fastest players around and the ball to hit close to the net is not always easy to play...

I tried it against the computer on expert using

90 vh
90 bh
50 srv
40 vol
55 pow (which is very slow)
90 sta
85 spe
50 ref

the computer is completely helpless against this, all you have to do is to get the next ball after the stop and you're good to score.

Try it out.

[tigerofintegrity]

The fact that you have to be 30% better than your oponent to beat someone with jing quah is not balanced

But tennis isn't all balanced. Federer has to play 30% better than Nadal to have a chance to beat him these days. You can't say Federer ever had less skill than Nadal but he always struggled to beat Nadal even if they did play at the same level. It's as much about what this thread is about, matchups.

I think people are spending too much time whining about TI/MD and not enough time trying to figure out what works against it. Crotatsuya has highlighted some excellent builds that I've already tried before and they are all competitive and viable against TI/MD as well as other builds. Using my current build, I feel I am actually stronger than TI/MD and am confident of beating them when I play one. It's really not as invincible as everyone is making it out to be. I find learning to perfect time your shots and read the game is far more important to being competitive.

Go experiment with other competitive builds, find one you like and feel works well against whatever style you normally have trouble against, play with it a lot until you perfect it and you'll find that you can easily compete with the TI/MD guys.

[tigerofintegrity]

God, I'd love to sit on a couch with skills that good.

(coach is what you mean, no offense, reading couch makes it kinda funny to imagine. )

I'm curious to what will happen though.

There is one thing I found out nonetheless:

If you use the last setup I wrote down, and use drop shots a lot to get the opponent to the net, you can easily pass the ball around them to score. Drop Shot Artist helps a lot with this.
I'm quite sure if you'd practice stop balls for a while to get the perfect feeling for them, this might be the best weapon against TI/MD players, since they are vulnerable at the net and not the fastest players around and the ball to hit close to the net is not always easy to play...

I tried it against the computer on expert using

90 vh
90 bh
50 srv
40 vol
55 pow (which is very slow)
90 sta
85 spe
50 ref

the computer is completely helpless against this, all you have to do is to get the next ball after the stop and you're good to score.

Try it out.

I used to use this setup (and seemed to be about the only one who did) before they released that balancing patch that toned down drop shot artist. It was very, very effective against TI/MD users because they don't have the best of speed. However, after the update, it's not as effective and this build struggles to finish points against them with a less effective drop shot. It's still a great build, pretty competitive and will compete well with TI/MD players but be prepared to work really hard for it and good luck when you come up against a good power player.

[djarvik]

I dont think we should be "upgrading" players to compete with overpowered setups, I think we should be "downgrading" the powerful ones.

I am with Venom here, [players need to have weaknesses that are exposable. For example, strokes. Having both strokes over 80 is just bad if you ask me. Makes the already pong like game even more pong. Takes a way a fundamental strategy in the tennis, a strategy that works in EVERY match played in tennis, the strategy of exploiting a weaker side of your opponent.

[venom400]

The fact that you have to be 30% better than your oponent to beat someone with jing quah is not balanced

But tennis isn't all balanced. Federer has to play 30% better than Nadal to have a chance to beat him these days. You can't say Federer ever had less skill than Nadal but he always struggled to beat Nadal even if they did play at the same level. It's as much about what this thread is about, matchups.

I think people are spending too much time whining about TI/MD and not enough time trying to figure out what works against it. Crotatsuya has highlighted some excellent builds that I've already tried before and they are all competitive and viable against TI/MD as well as other builds. Using my current build, I feel I am actually stronger than TI/MD and am confident of beating them when I play one. It's really not as invincible as everyone is making it out to be. I find learning to perfect time your shots and read the game is far more important to being competitive.

Go experiment with other competitive builds, find one you like and feel works well against whatever style you normally have trouble against, play with it a lot until you perfect it and you'll find that you can easily compete with the TI/MD guys.

But even Nadal has a weak side ...

And Nadal does have weakness , his weakness is that he doesn't have flat shots , having him run forever for all the balls.

It sounds like you defend this set up because you play with it , but wouldn't you want this game to have more than one set up that worked ? and no there aren't many other set ups that can beat this one , and if there is they need to be tuned down .

Look at a great game publisher , Bizzard entretainment these guys balance the game so almost any class is good at arenas and at doing whatever they have to do to win , the advantages over one class over the other are there , but are so small that they can be worked around if the player behind the weaker class knows what he is doing , perfect balanced games make for long lasting games.