ITST Mod 1.18 - What do you need to get started!

[djarvik]

BTW - as much as the "Fed-Army" won, they lost even more!!! It would be interesting to see a win/loss record for each character! Anyone up for some spreadsheet fun?

[C4iLL]

If the characters are supposed to be more or less like in the real life then it should be really really difficult to win a tournament with Llodra or Stepanek, isn't it ?

You are right and it was indeed already extremely difficult ! Why make things even more impossible ?
I had to play at an unbelievable level to reach "only" 1 final with this character, final I lost against a Harrisson in an ATP500... By the way the real Llodra would have beat Harisson ! Where's the realism then ?

The rest of my season ? Semi finals and quarters despite a 6-7 months practice with the same character ! That's not incredible at all...
And I didn't get these results because Llodra is overpowered, but only because I practiced and for I am generally a good player in tennis games (top10 on Top Spin 4 reg tour and top 5 on Simulation tour when these tours were played a lot).

I reached the full potential of this SV player and I have won nothing : it's then exactly as in real life and I didn't ask to increase him. I just ask to let Llodra as he was because he was totally balanced. That's all.

In 1.09, Llodra had 81 in speed.
1.10 = 80.
1.11 = 77 whereas Gasquet and Wawrinka keep their 80 speed...

Same thing with stamina : Llodra had the worst stamina of the roster, and now he has only 69. It's the guy who need the most stamina to always approach the net, and you give him less and less stamina update after update. This is completely insane !
It was totally stupid to give -5 stamina to everybody : regarding their own very specific styles, some characters should be excluded by global increase / decrease.

[djarvik]

Lets be clear about it, the agenda is to create a realistic roster of current ATP players, replicating current state of the ATP tour. Yes, we do want to make sure that the stat gap is not extremely large, but we do want the gap to be there.

It seems to me you are driven by a personal agenda, you using Llodra. It is understandable, but you need to put it into a context, the context of ALL players being affected, Llodra was not singled out. So now you compete against the players who are slower as well. The speed overall was affected.

Sure, we left a few players untouched, but these are the few....majority were adjusted. The reason is because we wanted to give these players a bit of an edge. Llodra with 93 net presence 83 FH 88 BH volleys AND being SV - has a TREMENDOUS advantage in that department over all of the other players. He has a decent serve as well.

I am not expert, but when I play with Llodra against AI on Master 10 - I am able to get to 6-4 or so. When I use a baseliner - I fail miserably, barely 1-2 games, and even in these games I score a good amount of winners at the net, with baseliner.

At the risk of pissing you off, I am just gonna say it, I think you do not play SV. I mean you are GREAT at what you do, obviously, no denying that, but from my point of view - you are not playing the classical SV game, rather half of it, a hybrid. You do well on your serve, but when it comes to a return game, you switch to a "defender" mode. You are not attempting ship-n-charge, you are not being aggressive and taking the returns early, you are not risking enough. You prefer to play rather far back and chase the balls down. Maybe that is why that speed change affecting you more then it should? SV players were never fast moving side to side, but they were/are great at being aggressive and controlling the paint, the inside of the court.

Anyway, I have very limited experience playing you, but this is what I gather after it. Maybe I am completely wrong here...if I am, by all means tell me and call me an idiot and I will shut up.

[Florian]

I have to say I agree with Caill about Llodra. It's not like i care about Llodra getting lowered, but if we talk about his 2012 BNP Paribas level, he's better than those stats. On the other hand, comparing his whole 2012 season to those new stats, i think it's pretty realistic ^^
Concerning Tsonga, i enjoy playing with him a lot, his serve is now a big weapon as it should be, his net presence should be probably bigger, but if the goal of the new roaster with the new stamina was to give an advantage to the players who prefer to end the points at the net, how can you possibly deal with that plan when spinners with a better stamina will just prevent you to reach the net close enough so that any approach doesn't look like it's desperate ?

[C4iLL]

I am not expert, but when I play with Llodra against AI on Master 10 - I am able to get to 6-4 or so. When I use a baseliner - I fail miserably, barely 1-2 games, and even in these games I score a good amount of winners at the net, with baseliner.

This is extremely stupid. The AI is absolutely not configured at all to answer to the issues raised by a SV player on this mod. It's why you can earn more points with a SV configuration. Against a human who try everything, it's totally different.

At the risk of pissing you off, I am just gonna say it, I think you do not play SV. I mean you are GREAT at what you do, obviously, no denying that, but from my point of view - you are not playing the classical SV game, rather half of it, a hybrid. You do well on your serve, but when it comes to a return game, you switch to a "defender" mode. You are not attempting ship-n-charge, you are not being aggressive and taking the returns early, you are not risking enough. You prefer to play rather far back and chase the balls down. Maybe that is why that speed change affecting you more then it should? SV players were never fast moving side to side, but they were/are great at being aggressive and controlling the paint, the inside of the court.

This is a bit outside the subject : the only thing that must be taken in account is the result.
Is Llodra overpowered ? Is Llodra taken by half of the members, winning 10 tournaments during a season ? No.

So why touching him ? The equity was there. Instead of constantly thinking about the future of Llodra in the update, think about Nadal which raise a BIG issue since 1.10 on the community and a lot of complains.

This player was used in a way that completely killed the interest of the game by Voja. Apparently, it's far from being solved regarding what Florian says.

Llodra and C4iLL, on the contrary never brang any trouble to the tour, everybody were always happy to play them, to beat them or to loose against them (look at reports from Spencercarlos, El Croato, and so on about matches they lost against me).

And just look my record : he's negative.
Vmoe record since he uses the 1.10 Nadal ? Only 1 loss in like 30 matches with Nadal.

I'm sorry but you don't balance a roster with feelings (as the one you described in your answer) but with FACTS.
And the fact is I never won a tournament, I lost 3 matches on the groupstage of the masters by playing at the best level I could and my record is negative.

On the other side, half of a draw take Federer, Nadal completely dominated the tour in 1.10. These are the issues to solve. Not Llodra. It's just simple management...

[Martan]

As I agree with you C4iLL in most things, giving -5 stamina to all is not stupid. I'd say it's genius feature, there will be less long rallies with accelerate shots. I played only a few matches with 1.11 so far but I have seen more slices in these matches than in whole last year It's surely great move

Anyway about Llodra, he is only true S&V player. As you guys said, ITST is not really about realism but about balance and I think Llodra should be favoured. Give him a decent serve and a bit more speed points. Cause is anyone want play S&V there is no other opinion that Llodra (you can try it with Stepanek but you will not last it the whole match) and don't forget S&V is the best tennis tactic ever to watch, **** off defenders, S&V rocks

[VMoe86]

Since djarvik and Elias are okay with it, here a response to C4iLL:

There is a big mistake on the update : nobody uses Llodra because he's weak but once again he has been dramatically lowered... Once too often !

First of all, Llodra is not weak. He has 69 FH Power, 71 BH Power at 24 Spin. Compare that to Davydenko who has 72 Power on both wings, also at 24 Spin. He has both FH and BH Precision at 70, which gives as good accuracy (i.e. aiming for the lines) as Nadal had in 1.10. Keep in mind: Accuracy = Precision - Power, that's how TE works. His consistency stats are good enough to hit short accels of BH side, only from FH side you are more limited. So, Llodra's wings are very solid.

What is also important for baseline game is speed and height of a character. The height affects reach and with 190cm Llodra is taller than quite a few guys, taller than any T1.

In addition to this very solid baseline abilities, Llodra has Really Big Jump Bonus at the net, very good volley stats: All you have to do at the net is to hold a button and if the opponent does not hit the line then the Volleyer will get to the ball, without having to move there manually, the Jump Bonus does that for you.

What people forget: 1.0f made it easier to move forward, so approaching the net had become easier.

In summary: It was possible to play exclusively from the baseline with Llodra and beat a good Djokovic (in this case Elias). No, not talking about US Open, but about personal tests with Elias. And it was also possible to beat eliomelma using Nadal playing from the baseline. As a total character, combining baseline and volleying abilities, also that serve, he was Tier 1 in the same way Simon was Tier 1 when he was still a Counter. Instead of making Llodra a Varied, we tried keeping him a Volleyer, but this has to come at the cost of his baseline abilities, especially defensive abilities.

At the Barclays Masters, the best Llodra user lost his 3 matches by playing at its max level.

So, no one is even capable of playing better with Llodra than you did? This sounds so humble.

It was already very hard to approach the net during exchange and to keep your serve because of its low stamina and speed , it will now be nearly impossible vs the top 20 !

See above: In 1.0f, compared to 1.0e, it is noticeably easier to move forward, so even with lowered speed it will be possible if it was in 1.0e. And stamina and speed are tied with each other regarding running, i.e. -3% speed and -4% stamina is almost the same for stamina regarding running, only when using accelerations it should be a bit more noticeable.

This is a bit outside the subject : the only thing that must be taken in account is the result.
Is Llodra overpowered ? Is Llodra taken by half of the members, winning 10 tournaments during a season ? No.

What matters is the potential of a char in certain hands.

This player was used in a way that completely killed the interest of the game by Voja.

The way you play would make the real Llodra cry.

Llodra and C4iLL, on the contrary never brang any trouble to the tour, everybody were always happy to play them, to beat them or to loose against them (look at reports from Spencercarlos, El Croato, and so on about matches they lost against me).

I can tell you: There are people who don't enjoy playing against you or Llodra.

Vmoe record since he uses the 1.10 Nadal ? Only 1 loss in like 30 matches with Nadal.

My record was positive before 1.10 was even released and that was switching characters every tournament. And I have played only 12 matches with Nadal, a 11-1 record. Both Shanghai and WTF I could have won with any of the other Tier 1. In addition, I have not lost a match with Harrison or Wawrinka. And spencercarlos had Voja on the ropes in Paris. There is also kyuuji, who used Nadal and look what he did: Did not even reach a final. And for 1.11 Nadal's wings have been lowered noticeably, both in power and accuracy.

On the other side, half of a draw take Federer, Nadal completely dominated the tour in 1.10. These are the issues to solve. Not Llodra. It's just simple management...

If you only take a look at the big tournaments, yes, Nadal won the last three big tournaments (Shanghai, Paris, WTF). Also to keep in mind: I won 4 of the last 5 tournaments by using three different characters. Except for Voja and myself, no one even made it far with Nadal in other tournaments once 1.10 was released. Then, take a look at Challenger and Futures: Only one Nadal has won there, I believe it was tdbchess in a Futures tournament (in a three-setter against iBullet91; could have gone either way). In general, few Nadals appeared in Futures/Challengers, more del Potro/Berdych type players have come up lately.

To conclude all this: There will be a 1.12 before Australian Open 2013, which will be more refined. 1.11 was more about animations and reducing speed in general for most characters (and keeping them where it was necessary).

@ Woowhat: Since in the latest TE build serve speed was lowered by 5 km/h we had to increase serve stats accordingly to have the old average serve speed.

[Florian]

@ VMoe : Don't you really think that the combination of Nadal's spin so big and reaching most of the time the opponent's baseline on either fh or bh + the fact that most players can't attack higher than 135km/h (except Delpo because he's very tall) make the whole game unbalanced ?
Wouldn't you agree that when in real tennis some players bash the hell out of Rafa, his spin gets lower and lower or his shots become shorter and shorter so that eventually Fed, Nole or big hitters come inside the court to finish him off ?
So how are we supposed to do that when in TE the only thing a good player with Nadal in his hands has to do is running left and right and wait that the opponent gets tired or starts to mishit because Rafa's spin and defence won't get shorter or less spinny ? Please if you have a clue let me know, or better, play Voja, Alexjasmins or those kind of good level guys and try to apply that method...

In that case i think only Llodra would be an annoyer for Rafa...

Thanks for the answer.

[VMoe86]

@Florian: Regarding Nadal, I have made the experience of playing against Voja (when I was Nadal or when I was Federer). The goal against Nadal should be to take time off him, so that he cannot hit with as much spin, eventually he should leave a short ball and then you step in -- I agree here.

In TE this is difficult to achieve, as you can stand far behind and still hit reasonably deep. So, once someone uses Nadal and camps further behind (I think I'm the only Nadal user who played close to the baseline), it is very difficult (if not impossible) to win the point if your opponent does not make a positioning/timing mistake. I think the problem is not the high net clearance of the shots, it's rather the combination of spin and depth and spinny shots should not be as deep as they are. In which way depth of shots will be adjusted we'll see, there are still some experiments/thoughts going on (lowering counter stat further, lowering consistency of wings, as this affects depth). Defenders have some depth bonus on Top Spin shots, I believe, so there you go.

[Ugadalou]

From my first impression I found some animations to be too exaggerated, to the point that the players look like caricatures of their real selves.
Not only on the newly added anims, but from previous versions too.Most noticable for me: Almagro's new BH, Cilic's new FH, Gasquet FH & BH, Youzhny BH (this one not particularly exaggerated rather but it's rather poor).I'm also skeptic about the new forehand slice but I feel I still need time to process it more.Looks good on the FH drop shot but I get the overall feeling it's too club player-like...

However, I have to say there have been some great additions as well!Djokovic's new fh looks great and the same goes for the much more athletic smash anims (awesome) and the much improved volleys (the swing motion was too big on the previous version) .

One concern I have from my first few matches using the new patch is the drop shot.I like the general direction of lowered speed and stamina stats but that contradicts the already existing issue.Maybe lowering the drop shot stats along with the other 2 is inevitable as they are even more effective now and just as easy to execute as they used to.

[AlexJasmins]

@Florian: I think that's more of a personal issue you have with Nadal . I have beaten Nadal and like Vmoe said you need to take time from Nadal and open angles. I've beaten MANY, MANY "Nadal's" on this game with a DelPotro and Raonic, no one's unbeatable and if you use the right player and make a good game I'm sure you'll make it.

Congrats guys and Good Luck everyone for 2013. All the best


Best Regards

TheBombarder

[Florian]

@Florian: I think that's more of a personal issue you have with Nadal . I have beaten Nadal and like Vmoe said you need to take time from Nadal and open angles. I've beaten MANY, MANY "Nadal's" on this game with a DelPotro and Raonic, no one's unbeatable and if you use the right player and make a good game I'm sure you'll make it.

Congrats guys and Good Luck everyone for 2013. All the best


Best Regards

TheBombarder

Lol, you are confirming my comment without even noticing it The only reason you ve defeated some Nadal is as you mentionned when you played some huge fh guy (delpo's the biggest fh of the roaster), but in the mean time you're saying that Djokovic and Federer aren't able to "take time from Nadal" ? I guess that's not easy when your average groundstrokes are 135km/h...so tell me what's missing in the game so that Nadal has a chance to get dominated on most surfaces (starting from IH like that beautiful 6-3 6-0 from Federer at the Barclay's 2011) ?

[inseedious]

There is a big mistake on the update : nobody uses Llodra because he's weak but once again he has been dramatically lowered... Once too often !

3 points less in speed and -5 in stamina... Whereas it's not the case of every character in the roster : Gasquet, Wawrinka keep their speed for instance !

This raises a serious question : why not definitely erasing this character of the roster ? How can you then be competitive with him now ?

At the Barclays Masters, the best Llodra user lost his 3 matches by playing at its max level. As Llodra is FAR from dominating the tour (no one ever won a tournament with him), what's the point to always lower this player ?

It was already very hard to approach the net during exchange and to keep your serve because of its low stamina and speed , it will now be nearly impossible vs the top 20 !

That kind of strategy is more dangerous for the tour than you think : it will incent people to give up special character like that to only go for Nadal and Federer.
It's not only stupid : it kills the diversity of the tour and that won't motivate people to join it at all.

The fact that i'm only one to regularly use a SV on the tour shows that there is an issue to solve. And constantly lowering the only interesting player of that style is an extremely strange way to deal with this issue !!

A logical proposition : instead of continously lowering the stamina and speed of a character EVERYBODY thinks unplayable except me, you should make him more attractive, by increasing this stats. Like 82 in speed and a more normal stamina. More people will then begin to use him.

I'd like to play some matches vs your Llodra, because maybe I understand what's the problem with SV playstyle. The big problem of SV is that it works only if used as a surprise. If I know that you're gonna do SV, I'll return a low and short ball that often makes your volleying impossible or at least inefficient. This is the problem of many "non arcade" tennis games (even Top Spin had this issue), the volley physics is not the best, because Llodra in real tennis is able to do good volleys even on short and low balls. I think it's due to the game, I don't think it's a stat issue, even if I think Llodra didn't need a nerf. Volleys are actually overpowered from some points of view, but not from SV one.

[Lucian86]

I'm also skeptic about the new forehand slice but I feel I still need time to process it more.Looks good on the FH drop shot but I get the overall feeling it's too club player-like...

It's more training session shot like...indeed, that's where I've copied it from, a Federer forehand slice in a training session against Gasquet; I thought it looked good...very elegant shot from Roger...afterwards I saw that was looking good also for the drop-shots

It's not looking that good for a defensive slice forehand...it's difficult though to make it look good here; we definitely need a separate animation here. It can be done but it will look bad after for a forehand slice approach shot

[C4iLL]

VMoe & Elias :

We need objective people to determinate the statistics of such a mod, used for playing fair competitions.
The tour can be potentially played by more than 200 people and we can't take amateur decisions on "feelings", clichés or personal antagonism. WE must take decisions on FACTS in the interest of the Tour and its members.

Even if your answer looks like the God Truth, it is in fact the biggest bullshit one can perhaps read on any forum ever.

I'm sorry to do that, but I will have to prove it by building a very detailed argumentation that show you took an unjustified measure only based on something like an obsession with Llodra and my results.
A mirage, a pre conceived idea based on frustration and maybe other things.

This will unfortunately bring questions about your integrity and neutrality. In life we can't indeed be Judge and Party as you both are in this story.

You could have been intelligent and recognize this was a mistake : end of the fuss. You didn't, I'm sorry for you : we had good relations before but this is finish with such an odious answer.

I advice you now to prepare better arguments if you want to defend yourself, because what I'm about to set-up will completely destroy all the ridiculous things you said in your previous publication.

On my side, I have indeed real facts : demos, tournaments results & other stuff (who repeat 3 or 4 times "I will nerf Llodra" on the TE Chat after his defeat at US Open ?! Elias, responsible of ITST Mod) and I will bring a very constructive text that ANY IMPARTIAL people will recognize true. I could also ask some members to give their advice on the subject.

In these conditions, the whole process of stats change will be modified : you won't be two anymore to manage such a sensitive subject because you have made a real fault here.