SSF2T HD Remix, Part 11: The T.Hawk Chronicles
This article is reprinted with permission from Capcom Unity.
T.Hawk has been one of the hardest characters to balance (along with Fei Long and Honda). On the one hand, he has an extremely damaging command throw, a great Dragon Punch-type move, and an aerial dive. These moves could conspire to make him terrifying, so I understand why the original SF2 developers were so careful to keep him check. Hit the jump to get the full story…
Now that we have the benefit of 14 years of SSF2T history to look at, we know that they kept him a little too much in check (he’s considered a bottom tier character), but their decisions at the time are certainly understandable.
The thing that makes him especially hard to balance now is his all-or-nothing game plan. The “nothing” part happens when you spend the entire round trying to get in on your opponent and never do. I’d like to explain the “all” part for the uninitiated though. His devastating sequence is:
Safe jump jab -> low jab -> button-up command throw -> repeat.
That’s a lot of jargon, so let’s sort it out. I covered the concept of safe jumps in the advanced section of my SSF2T tutorial videos. The idea is that you jump at your knocked-down opponent as he gets up. You time your jump so that you land just a couple frames after the opponent is completely standing up. If the opponent chooses to do a reversal attack (such as Ryu’s Dragon Punch or Guile’s Flash Kick) then it actually won’t hit you. Those reversal attacks have a few frames at the beginning where you can’t hit them, but they can’t hit you either. So your jumping jab will pass through the opponent, then you’ll land (and block), then their reversal attack will start to hit—but you’ll be safe. Yes it’s hard to time this, but experts can do it.
If the opponent tries to do a reversal attack in this situation, you’ll just land, block it, and then be able to retaliate with a command throw. If the opponent decides to block, then your jab will touch him, forcing him to block. If blocks the jumping jab, he will be forced to block your subsequent ducking jab. At this point, you can perform the 360 on the joystick, then release a punch button. In Street Fighter, releasing a button (as opposed to pressing it) does count for doing a special move, but it does not cause you to do a normal move. So after the opponent blocks your low jab, if he does a move that makes him unthrowable (such as a Dragon Punch), then your throw will fail. In ST, T.Hawk does not have a throw whiff animation, so usually if you miss a throw, you get a normal punch instead. But if you tried to do the command throw by releasing a punch button (rather than pressing it) you don’t even get a punch if you fail to throw—you just get nothing, and you can block.
So after the opponent blocks your low jab, he will either get thrown or you will safely block his reversal attack (and then throw him anyway). At this point, you can safe jump jab to repeat the entire sequence if you are in the corner.
The bottom line is that although this loop is very difficult to execute properly, if you land it and you can execute it, you basically win. It also means there is a “perfect T.Hawk algorithm” once you get in the right situation. No real strategy is involved, it’s just a very difficult test of your ability to execute precisely. You could say that T.Hawk “needs” something this powerful, because even with it, he’s still bottom tier. But when we buff him up, it’s probably a bad idea to let him keep this. Because getting in is easier now (safe Hawk Dive), the reward should not be so great, and more importantly, the strategy should not be completely replaced by a dexterity test once you do get in.
Now check out my current change log for T.Hawk, starting AFTER the last T.Hawk article:
• Hawk Dive no longer knocks down. The reward for hitting was simply too great, allowing for crossup splash (fierce), stand short, command throw.
• Hawk Dive now falls slower after hit/block so that on block, T.Hawk does not recover before the opponent anymore.
• Hawk Dive now falls even slower after hit/block to prevent Hawk Dive -> low short or forward combo that was possible at a very certain height/distance. Difficult to perform, but too powerful.
• After command throw and super, T.Hawk now bounces farther away, and falls slower during the bounce. This prevents safe jump jab in the corner after a command throw, but still barely allows walk up low jab after a command throw (remember, the victim can hit your low jab with a reversal, but not the safe jump jab).
• Hawk Dive damage reduced.
• Hawk Dive startup time increased 4 frames.
• Alternate Hawk Dive added. New dive has incredibly fast startup, knocks down on hit, but is unsafe on block against many characters. Purpose is to allow T.Hawk to deal block damage to defensive characters such as Guile and also to give him back his knockdown dive if he’s willing to do the unsafe version.
• Both hits of low roundhouse given the ability to deal block damage (mostly to help vs. Honda).
• Change reverted: block damage removed on low roundhouse.
• Change reverted: Alternate Hawk Dive removed, the ultra fast startup wasn’t quite game-breaking in tests, but I can imagine it would be once released into the wild.
• Change reverted: Hawk Dive’s startup time reduced 4 frames, now matching original game.
• Change reverted: Hawk Dive’s damage set back to original game’s, entirely because block damage turns out to be linked to hit damage. Reducing the damage in an earlier change had the unintended effect of reducing the block damage also, so change reverted because he needs a way to deal some blocked damage.
• Throw whiff added when T.Hawk attempts the command throw, but fails to connect. Acts similarly to Zangief’s whiff throw.
As you can see, that was a lot of experimenting, and it didn’t all go well. You might argue that T.Hawk is even worse now than the original game because the deadly throw loop has been removed (can’t safe jump jab after a command throw and also addition of throw whiff prevents completely safe attempts at the command throw). But the flipside is that T.Hawk doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing anymore. He can mostly get in with the new dive, so getting in doesn’t need to lead to instant checkmate. He does have trouble against defensive characters like Guile and Honda, but I’ve managed to find at least some effective strategies in those matches, so hopefully he won’t be too bad off there. In other matches, he’s more well-rounded. His gameplay is more “interactive” now and less based on perfectly executing a throw loop, so this makes fighting him more fun. And when all is said and done, I hope players will find him more effective than he was in ST, just not game-breakingly so.
Although it took more tries with T.Hawk than any other character, I think he finally settled down into a reasonably balanced state (though maybe there is still another chapter left in his book...). Every time T.Hawk wins a match by a lot or loses a match by a lot, I already know people will lean over to me and say “you think that’s reasonably balanced, eh?” Time will tell!
–Sirlin
April 30th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Which existing animation is used for his new throw whiff? I’m just curious since you said you couldn’t add new frames of animation.
April 30th, 2008 at 11:32 am
High-risk/High-reward characters are usually fine, if inconsistent. What made ST FeiLong and T.Hawk so bad was that they were EXTREMELY high-risk/high-reward. Extreme to the point that only a few brave souls dared gamble on that low chance to get in close for a ride on that near-100% damage wave.
Even with all the tweaks that have hopefully dropped those R/R ratios down to reasonable levels, life bars at KO are a hard way to eyeball balance with these guys (even over multiple matches) because they still have some of that inherent inconsistency from their old selves in their closets.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:12 am
I’m confused about what the changes to the dive are. You mention:
Change reverted: Alternate Hawk Dive removed, the ultra fast startup wasn’t quite game-breaking in tests, but I can imagine it would be once released into the wild.
So it sounds like he doesn’t have an alternate dive anymore. But then you say:
He can mostly get in with the new dive, so getting in doesn’t need to lead to instant checkmate.
So does he have a new dive or not? If so, what are its properties?
May 1st, 2008 at 2:31 am
The “alternate dive” was added and removed. So forget about that. The main dive is safe on block, allowing him to throw it out very often and end up fairly close on hit or block. It has same stats in every way to ST dive except that it falls down at the end rather than bouncing away. (Same startup, same flight speed, same damage, same block damage, same hitbox). The bounce-off change to straight-down fall does make it a “new dive” though.
May 1st, 2008 at 3:56 am
Is it me or is the whole balancing situation being overanalyzed? I mean there is never going to be a perfect balance so that all of the characters are all exactly identical. I applaud your efforts to make the game as fair as it can be, but by trying to be so meticulous about it don’t you, to some affect, go back to where you started? If you say that it is possible to execute this highly intricate combo with T. Hawk would that not apply with other fighters? I mean many things could be possible, but they are not very probable. I doubt anyone could pull that T. Hawk “combo” off with any consistency. That would be identical to saying someone going through a game like God of War without getting hit once. It is very possible, but it is not very probable. All that being said, I do really appreciate your work in getting it right, but I believe that sometimes less is more.
May 1st, 2008 at 4:04 am
Thank you for the clarification on the dive. One more question. In your article, you mention that the dive no longer knocks down. But in your reply, you say that it has the same stats as ST except for the falling down rather than boucing away.
Does the “new dive” knock down or not?
May 1st, 2008 at 4:19 am
Garen: You clearly have never played a fighting game at tournament level… I’m not saying that’s inherently a bad thing, but trust us when we say that not only is it possible for people to pull off those difficult combos consistently, it happens quite often. You’re forgetting the biggest fighting game tournaments in the world can have $10,000+ prizes for the winner. People could win god of war without taking damage, but few people do, because there’s no point… fighting games there is a very strong incentive, and it’s not like either task is especially challenging, it’s just some memorization and timing.
There are a handful of T.Hawk players in Japan, considered the best in the world, who can perfectly perform the combo Sirlin mentioned, and have proven that by winning a number of tournaments using T.Hawk, despite him ostensibly being a bottom tier character.
People have been playing ST for a very long time, and have amassed a great deal of skill, and learned just about everything there is to know about the game. It’s those people that Sirlin is rebalancing for, and using the very knowledge they compiled to base the changes on should (hopefully) lead to those changes having the exact effects on actual gameplay that Sirlin stated as well.
May 1st, 2008 at 4:22 am
I was wondering the same about the knockdown.
As for all this analysis: I’m glad it’s done! I have no idea when the next “patch” for Super Turbo will come, but if it takes another fourteen years, we better get it right!
May 1st, 2008 at 7:38 am
My brain would hurt after trying to balance out one of the lowest tiered characters in the game. However, you have managed to start him with a clean slate.
I have an odd suggestion…why not be let the Cyclone be “softenable”. Not nessessarily flub the damage it does, but just have it so that the oppenent can get out of the knock down and land on his feet. That would prevent the endless loops but still alow him to capitalize on a knockdown advantage.
I’m not sure how hard that would be to program though.
And now a bit of fun…make his DP “Raising Hawk” move faster, go through fireballs and cancallable into a Hawk Dive at it’s peek. *evil grin*
May 1st, 2008 at 8:12 am
Julien, yeah I should have mentioned in my last post that it does not knock down (though that is the first bullet point in the list in the original post). It did knock down in an earlier version but the ability to knock down into crossup splash (not just walk up, low jab like in ST, but crossup splash!) was just too strong. Sorry. My ideal solution was to let him have his old dive from ST in addition to the new one so you can knock down if you are willing to be unsafe on blocked dive, but we just don’t have the resources to implement that now, unfortunately.
Many have made the argument that if T.hawk has a whiff on his spd, then perhaps he should not have a far-bounce on the spd that prevents safe jump jab. I admit this is a decent argument. T.hawk rests on the edge of a knife, simultaneously not that good and too good. I don’t even know anymore. He seems to be the only character who has repeatedly oscillated in power over development. Every other character has converged to some stable state.
Garen, I don’t know how to say this politely, but you’re a little out of your element here. What Claytus told you is 100% correct.
May 1st, 2008 at 10:13 am
Sirlin, you never answered PoisonDagger’s question on the throw whiff animation. This isn’t really a gameplay question, so I can see why you missed it. But still, since no new frames were to be added in ST, how did you get a T.Hawk whiff animation in the game? Or is there some hidden animation frames in the assets that were never used in the original?
May 1st, 2008 at 3:30 pm
The wiff animation on his SPD seems nice. It should prevent him from abuse safe negative edge SPD. The far bounce back after SPD is also a good idea.
At first I thought it was a little much giving him both, but then i realised that without it hawk should still be able to do his infinate versus characters without a reversal (dhalsim and bison).
I also want to know how you managed to get an animation to the wiff.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:07 pm
I can’t believe you experimented with having a normal do block damage. I understand the reasoning, but that’s definitely “out of the box” thinking. It’s ironic that the character whose normals would logically do a ton of block damage (Vega claw) would be horribly overpowered if that were the case.
(I’m not calling for increased realism in a game where people throw fireballs, stretch limbs, and have twenty foot verticals, I just think it’s funny to watch people repeatedly block a metal claw with their bare flesh… those gotta be some thick callouses =)
The whiff on the SPD sounds good. Does it last exactly as long as Zangief’s?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
The SF2 series has a long and proud history of adding new moves based on existing animations — particularily in HF, but definitely in other games as well. I’m sure it was possible to cobble together a convincing throw whiff animation from frames that were already present.
Garen: I’m not trying to beat up on you, since other people have already addressed your comment, but assuming that players will never be skilled enough to use or abuse a particular gameplay feature is one of the worst mistakes a designer of a competitive game can make. In an old article, Sirlin wrote about a bug in CvS2 called roll cancelling that’s worth a read. ( http://www.sirlin.net/archive/playing-to-win-part-2-mailbag/ )
P.S. nice name ;D
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:01 am
Wow I did not realize so many people had so much time to execute such intricate and precise maneuvers. I guess I grossly underestimated the amount of time that people spend to find methods of exploiting a game. That being said I just want to reiterate that Sirlin is doing a great job. I guess my brain hurt from reading all of those complex adjustments that I did not understand what was being done. I am a long time player of this series and started playing it on the Sega Genesis in the form of Street Fighter II: Champion Edition. I am looking forward to the release of this game so that I can weigh my skills against others.
P.S. Is there actually going to be prizes given away in the online matches?
May 2nd, 2008 at 5:52 am
I know you’re going to implement a timer for character selection. Could you also consider losses for ranked disconnects and blind/double blind character selection? It’s really not fun playing “let’s both keep switching to your current selected character’s worst match up until one of us gives up” that happens in ranked SF2:HF matches on xboxlive.
May 3rd, 2008 at 1:06 am
So, what does this whiff animation look like? Is it about as long as Zangief’s? Shorter?
Also, I’m sure I was supposed to infer this, but just for the sake of checking: There’s a whiff animation on his super, too, yeah?
June 5th, 2008 at 2:48 am
Well since you don’t like other gamers opinions Mr. Sirlin, I’ll give you mine:
Do what you said and let him fall slower allowing the player to get to his feet before T Hawk can get closer.
This removes the loop all together. So how does he win. Give him OTHER options to get the throw in.
It’s safe to say that all T Hawk Players rely on his 360 loop for the kill. Give them more options to get the 360 throw, other than that silly loop.
Give him a “fake” Hawk Dive. It doesn’t hit but it lands him next to the opponent. Let him cancel into 360 throw from certain moves. Things like that.
Then again..I’m not a ranked World Player, so I guess that means my opinion isn’t respected.
June 5th, 2008 at 10:15 pm
I like this discussion on suggested changes and questioning the purpose of those changes - but we need to stop seeing the “Sirlin doesn’t care about lil’ ole’ me!” attitude on these posts.
June 11th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
Blanka’s Vertical Roll has always hit on the first frame, and hence the safe jump jab was never guaranteed against Blanka.
What’s special about that tick is that it *is* uncounterable if executed perfectly. Cannot be countered. Either you miss the reversal attempt and you get hit then thrown, or you reverse, but the move is blocked and you get thrown anyway. Even if Zangief can SPD out of it (I’m not sure if you can), very few characters have command throws. I don’t think that the ranges on non-command throws are larger than the command throws - that’s kind of why they’re command throws. So most characters are out of luck.
Sirlin’s solution is elegant. I don’t see why your proposed solution is necessary.
June 12th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
Are we going to see more of these articles? I really, really dig them and have been anxiously awaiting reading about the rest of the cast changes!
June 14th, 2008 at 2:36 am
Odd. i somehow got caught by the anti spam???
My proposal leaves the whiff in if a tick attempt is failed, for exactly that reason. But unless game balance actually requires it, it doesnt’ make sense for a button up command throw to whiff. And during the tick attempt is the only time it’s actually required to whiff. My rule is simple. If the other player is unthrowable due to lock stun, or becoming unthrowable with a reversal, whiff, otherwise do nothing for the button-up, like every other button-up in the game except for the original SPD.
By the way, There is an even simpler solution. remove the abilty to do the button-up command throw, which will force an attack to come out when the throw fails.