Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

[Serengeti1]

The striking is great conceptually. The execution is lacking in some areas though.

-Super sonic speed combo spam.
-Stamina system. Guys are throwing way too many punches a round.
-Straight punches having stopping power at close range.
-Floaty movement. The movement is better than UFC 2 but could do with tightening up a bit.
-Chin depletion stat has too much control over who wins fights at a high level.
-Too many rocks. (in the right direction but it's over the top). I think this is mainly because once a fighter has been rocked or dropped once or twice.... It happens over and over. This isn't realistic... plenty of fighters get dropped or rocked but carry on fighting as normal. Conor drops everyone a lot. It's the type of power and timing he has. There's way more examples of fighters getting hurt or dropped and then continuing fighting as normal.
-Inability to catch kicks in a jab-roundhouse combination.
-Head movement could be more responsive/smooth to deal with the rapid fire punches. Also a shame that you can only duck and not just slightly slip to the left/right (this will probably have to wait until another UFC game tho).

So here's martial mind...

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Go to 11:20. Everyone respects this guys ability so I'll use him for evidence that it's not that I'm just bad. I've beaten plenty guys in the top 100 on UFC 2 and have fought some of them on 3 and won too.

The stopping power of those straights is too much at that range. They come out so quick and they stop MM from throwing. The head movement is also just not good enough to deal with them. Before everyone says it's just Diaz.... he said the same thing when he was Kevin Lee playing a McGregor. He blamed it on the characters head movement stat but that isn't the problem. Pettis has a head movement stat of 90. That should be plenty high enough to deal with this stuff. It just doesn't feel responsive enough currently and the 1-2 punch spam is too fast and has too much stopping power up close. If one punch lands.... it messes up the head movement and you just get tagged repeatedly.

[Nugget7211]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

The main problem with the head movement is the return to center axis. Diaz's 1-2 and McGregor's 1-2 are so fast that if I'm moving I'll have returned to the center line and get hit by the next 1-2 and if I'm standing still and try to throw off a slip, their punches are faster and knock me out of my strike. I should be able to walk forward ducking, or leaning back or doing whatever, give it massive grapple disadvantage because of the weight distribution (except ducking, because that'd probably help with defending shot takedowns)

I don't think this is a massive problem with other fighters however, it's just the unique diaz jab/straight and celtic cross are too fast (the celtic cross is actually too slow as a lead though imo, it's slower than a regular straight). Tune the speed on unique punches and adjust stopping power with range. A flicking, pocket jab is nowhere near as disorienting as an fully extended jab and that should be reflected.

Also, I have a theory that the multiple rocks are people being too aggressive and not good at block breaking yet. I rarely get more than 2-3 rocks before I manage to finish a guy, especially if he backs straight up blocking. People also need to learn that you aren't fully recovered after you come out of the rocked state, it takes a few seconds after that. The amount of times people throw hard at me immediately after getting their legs back only to be rocked or KO'd by the counter is honestly ridiculous. Agree with everything else though

[LittleEvil]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

I concur. I've had plenty of fights where well timed head movement still does nothing for me against someone whos good at the 1-2-1-2 combo. Sure it works well against someone who throws just a single strike or keeps the combo down to a two piece. But those 4 punch combos seem to overpower proper head movement

[Serengeti1]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

Also, I have a theory that the multiple rocks are people being too aggressive and not good at block breaking yet. I rarely get more than 2-3 rocks before I manage to finish a guy, especially if he backs straight up blocking. People also need to learn that you aren't fully recovered after you come out of the rocked state, it takes a few seconds after that. The amount of times people throw hard at me immediately after getting their legs back only to be rocked or KO'd by the counter is honestly ridiculous. Agree with everything else though

The rocks is actually the only thing I'm not so sure about. But I'm pretty confident that even when people learn to play better it'll still be a little much. I've rocked/knocked guys down a ton before I actually get the finish the fight knockdown or a clean knockout. It just gets kinda silly at a certain point. Joe Rogan shouting "ohhhh" every 5 seconds as well lol.

[Nugget7211]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

The rocks is actually the only thing I'm not so sure about. But I'm pretty confident that even when people learn to play better it'll still be a little much. I've rocked/knocked guys down a ton before I actually get the finish the fight knockdown or a clean knockout. It just gets kinda silly at a certain point. Joe Rogan shouting "ohhhh" every 5 seconds as well lol.

Oh, don't get me wrong, ever getting to 12 rocks or whatever is kinda dumb. I'm just not sure if I'm ready to blame the game just yet. If in like, April/May (2-3 months post launch) it's still like this, then yeah, they should probably tweak some ****. Reactionary nerfs/buffs is rarely a good thing

[WarMMA]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

The rocks is actually the only thing I'm not so sure about. But I'm pretty confident that even when people learn to play better it'll still be a little much. I've rocked/knocked guys down a ton before I actually get the finish the fight knockdown or a clean knockout. It just gets kinda silly at a certain point. Joe Rogan shouting "ohhhh" every 5 seconds as well lol.

I get what you are saying about the rocks. I love how realistic the damage system is and I really don't want that to change. That being said, I feel it's really the constant knockdowns more than anything. There are too many active and alert knockdowns that are happening. I feel there needs to be a threshold with that, where there will only be so many active and alert knockdowns that happen to a fighter in a round. After that threshold is passed, if he gets knockdown again, they will all be regular knockdowns where the opponent can go for the finish.

[iverson91]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

-Straight punches having stopping power at close range.

I agree with this, I thought distance was gonna matter and landing punches at the right range. But it seems to have no effect.

[tissues250]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

-Super sonic speed combo spam.
-Stamina system. Guys are throwing way too many punches a round.
-Head movement could be more responsive/smooth to deal with the rapid fire punches.

I completely agreed these.

[GameplayDevUFC]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

The striking is great conceptually. The execution is lacking in some areas though.

-Super sonic speed combo spam.
-Stamina system. Guys are throwing way too many punches a round.
-Straight punches having stopping power at close range.
-Floaty movement. The movement is better than UFC 2 but could do with tightening up a bit.
-Chin depletion stat has too much control over who wins fights at a high level.
-Too many rocks. (in the right direction but it's over the top). I think this is mainly because once a fighter has been rocked or dropped once or twice.... It happens over and over. This isn't realistic... plenty of fighters get dropped or rocked but carry on fighting as normal. Conor drops everyone a lot. It's the type of power and timing he has. There's way more examples of fighters getting hurt or dropped and then continuing fighting as normal.
-Inability to catch kicks in a jab-roundhouse combination.
-Head movement could be more responsive/smooth to deal with the rapid fire punches. Also a shame that you can only duck and not just slightly slip to the left/right (this will probably have to wait until another UFC game tho).

So here's martial mind...

<div style="position:relative;height:0;padding-bottom:56.21%"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mSkhCSu7uxU?ecver=2" style="position:absolute;width:100%;height:100%;le ft:0" width="641" height="360" frameborder="0" gesture="media" allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

Go to 11:20. Everyone respects this guys ability so I'll use him for evidence that it's not that I'm just bad. I've beaten plenty guys in the top 100 on UFC 2 and have fought some of them on 3 and won too.

The stopping power of those straights is too much at that range. They come out so quick and they stop MM from throwing. The head movement is also just not good enough to deal with them. Before everyone says it's just Diaz.... he said the same thing when he was Kevin Lee playing a McGregor. He blamed it on the characters head movement stat but that isn't the problem. Pettis has a head movement stat of 90. That should be plenty high enough to deal with this stuff. It just doesn't feel responsive enough currently and the 1-2 punch spam is too fast and has too much stopping power up close. If one punch lands.... it messes up the head movement and you just get tagged repeatedly.

The head movement stat actually changes the number of evasive frames by quite a bit. But the beta has exposed some frame tuning issues around some of the new combos (which went in very close to the beta build) where a few of them broke some thresholds that we didn't strongly enforce.

The GC's found that if you eat Diaz's 1 you cannot block the 2, which is not intended. His 1-2 is 8 frames in the beta, and there were about 10 other combos that were 10 frames, the next lowest was 12.

So now there will be a hard lower limit at 12, and all the head movement frames will be tuned around that.

Although that won't change the visual perception of the combo speed, I think it will help a lot with the feeling they are OP.

As for stamina, I'm convinced it's the perks that Diaz has that are OP.

Again, perks went in late and are kind of an add on to what I think is a pretty balanced stamina system.

I just think they unbalance it.

Need to verify, but I don't think the baseline is bad at all.

I like the idea of the jammed up straights losing their special stopping power abilities. I don't know that it's a necessary change, but I think it would be a good change.

As for combo speed, I think a progressive slowing based on stamina would be a great addition to the game. We were limited on what we could do initially because the raw combo mocap didn't leave a lot of room, but we have other options now that might be able to help here.

Just have to be careful here to not break the balance of the game, because I really do think it's well balanced right now. The combo speed at low stamina I see more as an authenticity issue as opposed to a balance issue (in my mind at least).

As for the rocks, I don't agree. I think the frequency is fine, especially when people play smart.

The chin controls more the severity of the knock downs, and considerably less the frequency of health events.

It's a severity progression that limits how many KD's you'll see in a round more than anything.

[Dave_S]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

His 1-2 is 8 frames in the beta, and there were about 10 other combos that were 10 frames, the next lowest was 12.
an authenticity issue as opposed to a balance issue (in my mind at least).

So other people don't have to think about numbers, I think that's 2/15, 1/6, and 1/5 of a second.

[Serengeti1]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

The head movement stat actually changes the number of evasive frames by quite a bit. But the beta has exposed some frame tuning issues around some of the new combos (which went in very close to the beta build) where a few of them broke some thresholds that we didn't strongly enforce.

The GC's found that if you eat Diaz's 1 you cannot block the 2, which is not intended. His 1-2 is 8 frames in the beta, and there were about 10 other combos that were 10 frames, the next lowest was 12.

So now there will be a hard lower limit at 12, and all the head movement frames will be tuned around that.

Although that won't change the visual perception of the combo speed, I think it will help a lot with the feeling they are OP.

As for stamina, I'm convinced it's the perks that Diaz has that are OP.

Again, perks went in late and are kind of an add on to what I think is a pretty balanced stamina system.

I just think they unbalance it.

Need to verify, but I don't think the baseline is bad at all.

I like the idea of the jammed up straights losing their special stopping power abilities. I don't know that it's a necessary change, but I think it would be a good change.

As for combo speed, I think a progressive slowing based on stamina would be a great addition to the game. We were limited on what we could do initially because the raw combo mocap didn't leave a lot of room, but we have other options now that might be able to help here.

Just have to be careful here to not break the balance of the game, because I really do think it's well balanced right now. The combo speed at low stamina I see more as an authenticity issue as opposed to a balance issue (in my mind at least).

As for the rocks, I don't agree. I think the frequency is fine, especially when people play smart.

The chin controls more the severity of the knock downs, and considerably less the frequency of health events.

It's a severity progression that limits how many KD's you'll see in a round more than anything.

First of all.... Thanks for this really in depth response.

The framing issues on combos being tuned sounds really good. It definitely seems like it's not just Diaz that has 1-2 combos too fast. Conor is another one that is over the top.... and I'm sure when the full game releases and there are other fighters with really fast hands... They'll be too fast too. It's a complex issue though because you can tune it in a bunch of different ways.

I like that you like the idea of jammed up straights not having stopping power. I personally think it's pretty necessary for a more sim experience. It's just irritating.

The combo speed slowing down due to stamina would be amazing too. That would yet again bring the realism to a new level. It would also greatly encourage stamina management which would lead to more realistic fights with less strikes being thrown.

I believe there are often currently too many knockdowns before a stoppage a lot of the time. I like the damage system MUCH better overall but yeah... It hurts immersion a bit. This isn't game breaking or anything though and it's not at the top of my list of complaints.

I also strongly believe that you'll change your views on the stamina once you read this thread - https://forums.operationsports.com/f...ufc-3-a-6.html

There's a screenshot of Khabib throwing 200 strikes on that page and still having tons of stamina in the second round. 200 strikes a round is absurd and the statistics in that thread show that.

[ZombieRommel]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

I do think the chin mechanic can cause mistakes to snowball a bit. You can play around it, but I think if you do a really good job of shelling up and avoiding damage for a protracted period after a health event (say a full 2 minutes or so) then your chin should replenish a fair amount. Against someone good, if they rock you once and pressure you, they can smack you down easier and easier and you aren't really given, in my mind, a fair chance to gather your bearings and get back to a baseline of safety. If the match is 50/50 between you and your opponent, you suddenly have to play about 60% better than them to not repeatedly get walloped down after a KD.

I like the system a LOT more than what was in UFC2 but I feel like it could use some tweaking to better reward players who regroup and play well defensively after a knockdown -- instead of still leaving them on death's doorstep, ever-ready to get blown up by one good strike again for the rest of the match.

In regard to stamina, I would be in favor of shifting some emphasis off body strikes and onto whiffing. Right now, you have to punish your opponent for being stupid when they should be punishing themselves by whiffing in the first place. You have to make up the slack that the whiff drain doesn't do by itself. I personally would like to see that shift by about 20%. As in 20% less drain from body strikes, 20% more drain from whiffing. Hell maybe even 20% less from strikes but 30% more from whiffing.

Right now players (especially when using Diaz) can barrage the air from 2-3 feet away to impose a kind of hurtbox forcefield and make it dangerous to approach them, which is TOTALLY whack. You should gas from punching the air non-stop, I don't care who you are.

And I tend to agree this is not just a Diaz issue, although he is the most egregious example of the frame tuning and stamina issues. I think it affects everyone, just not to the same extent. But for example, Barboza flurrying with 1-2's can also make it basically impossible to slip unless you backdash away from him and reset. He too can throw a bazillion strikes without gassing unless you go to his body. Etc..

[Dave_S]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

My main issue might be switch stats.

[fballturkey]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

I’ve found that the “too many rocks” problem is actually worse when two guys are fighting smart/defensively. This goes back to something that I think needs tuned.

It feels like you cannot knock someone out unless they’re in a vulnerability window. I have flush head kicks nail guys that are low on head health, and if they’re not leaning or throwing a punch they either walk through it or maybe get rocked. Same with hooks or overhands. They just don’t have stopping power on their own.

On the flip side, in vulnerability windows pretty much anything can KO somebody.

It’s a bigger gap between the two than it should be. Vulnerability windows feel just a little too powerful, but the bigger move that needs to happen is for single regular strikes to hit harder.

Back to the constant rocks problem, I just finished a fight against a pretty good guy using Diaz and I was Barboza. We had a nice war going but it got ridiculous in the 2nd when, in half the round, we each got rocked 3 times, alternating. I rocked him, he got away, he rocked me, I got away, etc. Neither of us were giving the other one KO opportunities (leans into kicks, ducks into uppers, etc) so it just went on like that.

What needs to happen is before it gets to that point somebody falls down and gets in an actual ground position. There are way too many of the knockdowns where you end up feet on hips and way too few where you end up in their guard or side control or something else. It would’ve felt far more natural if one of us would’ve been knocked down by one of the hard shots that landed and then we at least can go to the floor if the aggressor wants.

Edit: Oh yeah, and my #1 suggestion is to make both high and low blocks check leg kicks. Nothing prevents you from keeping your hands up and checking a kick.

[Nugget7211]

Re: Main Issues With Stand Up In UFC 3. Let's Talk About Punch Speed/Head Movement.

I’ve found that the “too many rocks” problem is actually worse when two guys are fighting smart/defensively. This goes back to something that I think needs tuned.

It feels like you cannot knock someone out unless they’re in a vulnerability window. I have flush head kicks nail guys that are low on head health, and if they’re not leaning or throwing a punch they either walk through it or maybe get rocked. Same with hooks or overhands. They just don’t have stopping power on their own.

On the flip side, in vulnerability windows pretty much anything can KO somebody.

It’s a bigger gap between the two than it should be. Vulnerability windows feel just a little too powerful, but the bigger move that needs to happen is for single regular strikes to hit harder.

Back to the constant rocks problem, I just finished a fight against a pretty good guy using Diaz and I was Barboza. We had a nice war going but it got ridiculous in the 2nd when, in half the round, we each got rocked 3 times, alternating. I rocked him, he got away, he rocked me, I got away, etc. Neither of us were giving the other one KO opportunities (leans into kicks, ducks into uppers, etc) so it just went on like that.

What needs to happen is before it gets to that point somebody falls down and gets in an actual ground position. There are way too many of the knockdowns where you end up feet on hips and way too few where you end up in their guard or side control or something else. It would’ve felt far more natural if one of us would’ve been knocked down by one of the hard shots that landed and then we at least can go to the floor if the aggressor wants.

Edit: Oh yeah, and my #1 suggestion is to make both high and low blocks check leg kicks. Nothing prevents you from keeping your hands up and checking a kick.

I agree with a lot of this although it's very rare for me and feels like a latency thing, but you effectively asked at the end to make leg kicks totally useless against anyone not completely incompetent. My personal favourite low kick set up, 2-3b-back low kick, already doesn't work because there's no timing requirement on checks, you just have to hold low block and the kick is checked so any sort of body dutchie variant (which is something Aldo used a lot in his best leg kicking performances) is just totally useless as is, and the change you watched would take away every single low kick setup and even make it next to impossible to land naked kicks.