Apparently, we can't punish defender's sps or heavy anymore

As per the title, 8/10 times i say if we try to do such in bgs specially either we get parried ( parry I understand due to mastery active) but reflexes / recovery timing is something else lately...or they throw sp right away even when they are still down by attacker sp. the recover window of ai is getting small day by day & apparently, more try to punish them( defenders after their sps or heavies), there recovery time is way too fast to even punish at all & instead they punish back for dashing in to do counter intercept. At times they do light intercepts.
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DISCLAIMER: posting this after discussing with fellow mates if not the majority. Just want to see if there are others as well who feel recovery/ reflexes of defenders is really fast to even go for punishing them anymore.

Comments

WinterFields

My problem is that this issue isn't consistent. Sometimes I can punish heavies and specials just like I've been doing for years, while other times the AI recovers far faster than it should and ends up punishing my punishing them

shield311

Isn't that bad for me but a very small group of defenders seem to always parry me when I punish them, like i've been parried over 4 times in a single BG fight and obviously end up losing it
I don't remember specifics but scorpion is one of those who parry me alot. Could be coincidence but it has happened just yesterday and is regular whenever I fight a scorpion defender. and nick fury sometimes

HungaryHippo

They have likely tuned up the AI. Where before the buffer between actions (reading your input then reacting) was a reasonable time, it's now probably set to the few milliseconds it takes to calculate the right response.

Doctor_Doom94

Example: you dash in to punish them( after their sp usage) they light intercept you right away to 5 hit combo to a sp on your face.
Lost few fights due to that in bgs as well as in aw

PT_99

The fact that Doom sp2 has recovery animation after using that high impact special,

Yet onslaught sp1 has NO recovery animation is biggest blunder by Kabam.

You can punish Doom sp2 very easily but I dare you to try punishing onslaught sp1 10 times and in those you will fail 8 times, bruh? Why is dexing his special so unrewarding, like, "you dex special? Lol better just stand there and let him come at you so you can intercept." It's stupid.

WHY CAN HE THROW 5 PROJECTILES OUT OF HIS BUM BUT RECOVER IMMEDIATELY.

xLunatiXx

The fact that Doom sp2 has recovery animation after using that high impact special,

Yet onslaught sp1 has NO recovery animation is biggest blunder by Kabam.

You can punish Doom sp2 very easily but I dare you to try punishing onslaught sp1 10 times and in those you will fail 8 times, bruh? Why is dexing his special so unrewarding, like, "you dex special? Lol better just stand there and let him come at you so you can intercept." It's stupid.

WHY CAN HE THROW 5 PROJECTILES OUT OF HIS BUM BUT RECOVER IMMEDIATELY.

You can guarantee punish his special by dashing in before his last shot, dex it and punish. With that said, I agree with the overall experience

Vanitelia

I get parried the most by Shocker. I stopped trying to punish his sp1.

Chuck_Finley

My problem is that this issue isn't consistent. Sometimes I can punish heavies and specials just like I've been doing for years, while other times the AI recovers far faster than it should and ends up punishing my punishing them

This is the most frustrating thing of all. It’s all over the place even when you fight the same defender. You do it once, you get the opening. Next time? Good bye health bar.

Totally random. Which takes the skill out of the competition

Deacon

artificial intelligence lads. it's not Kabam. the AI is evolving itself. beware.

kikiFurieux

artificial intelligence lads. it's not Kabam. the AI is evolving itself. beware.

well, good luck with the AI fighting against itself in matches when no real people will play the game anymore because of all the BS going on

Buckeyesha

I have this same problem, but even worse for me now is my striker gets blocked 80% of the time now. It does not matter who the defender is and no matter at what point I throw my striker, it gets blocked. When this happens you have no choice but to get punished because you cannot recover quick enough. Very seldom I'm able to at least hurry up and block the punishment

DONZALOOG1234

You can guarantee punish his special by dashing in before his last shot, dex it and punish. With that said, I agree with the overall experience

I've failed every time I tried

Bugmat78

The fact that Doom sp2 has recovery animation after using that high impact special,

Yet onslaught sp1 has NO recovery animation is biggest blunder by Kabam.

You can punish Doom sp2 very easily but I dare you to try punishing onslaught sp1 10 times and in those you will fail 8 times, bruh? Why is dexing his special so unrewarding, like, "you dex special? Lol better just stand there and let him come at you so you can intercept." It's stupid.

WHY CAN HE THROW 5 PROJECTILES OUT OF HIS BUM BUT RECOVER IMMEDIATELY.
You can guarantee punish his special by dashing in before his last shot, dex it and punish. With that said, I agree with the overall experience

Correct but...all specials should be punishable once you fully dex them, like the good old days of...I dunno early 2023! This need to dash in halfway is ridiculous imo.

What's worse is when the AI can punish you after you knock them down, they recover faster from being knocked down than you from putting them on the floor. The game literally freezes your controls to allow the recovery frames of the AI. Imagine knocking a defender down, and immediately trying to dash back and somehow they are back up and clipping your dash before it 's done? Ridiculous "physics. It's tiresome to keep having to play through just ****.

BullDOSR

This nonsense has been ruining gameplay for quite a while now. It’s incredibly annoying that there is no longer a punishment window like what we had for several years. 90% of the time I get intercepted if I attempt to punish anything now, and like others commented the defenders reflexes/timing is very broken. It’s ridiculous to see the enemy launching a wake up special when their body is still half way between getting up and on the ground. What’s worse is that we as players can’t do any of these things ourselves. We are forced to wait before we can trigger specials no matter how fast or how many times you smash the button. No immediate wake up specials for us, and If we miss a special or a heavy we are also forced to wait out a delayed punishment window before we can actively reengage. The ai should not be allowed to play in ways that we cannot, that’s just plain unfair.

Vegeta9001

I punished a Maestro heavy in BG yesterday, my entire fist went through his face, point blanks, against the wall, he then blocked the last frame of my attack to "parry" me

BigBlueOx

Sadly it’s clear they just don’t care about this issue or that it’s slowly killing the game.

PT_99

This nonsense has been ruining gameplay for quite a while now. It’s incredibly annoying that there is no longer a punishment window like what we had for several years. 90% of the time I get intercepted if I attempt to punish anything now, and like others commented the defenders reflexes/timing is very broken. It’s ridiculous to see the enemy launching a wake up special when their body is still half way between getting up and on the ground. What’s worse is that we as players can’t do any of these things ourselves. We are forced to wait before we can trigger specials no matter how fast or how many times you smash the button. No immediate wake up specials for us, and If we miss a special or a heavy we are also forced to wait out a delayed punishment window before we can actively reengage. The ai should not be allowed to play in ways that we cannot, that’s just plain unfair.

Fact that our characters MUST complete delay animation if we miss heavy or special attack but AI gets to skip it altogether is pure defination of broken.

Pinkerton

Friends, my teammates and I have been complaining for over a year about this kind of AI on steroids that we frequently encounter in BGs. Punishing one-hit heavies when the AI has a special ready is nowadays a gamble, as you risk never being quick enough.

Additionally, the AI has recently:

Learnt to do sidesteps
Become much more efficient at intercepting (light and special intercepts, anyone?)
Been able to wait for your heavy to automatically launch before punishing you
Been likely to reparry your two-hit medium into block
Been able to evade specials

That's a lot to deal with.
The big problem is that all this behavior is random. Sure, one could argue it's random for everyone, but when luck prevails over skill, it takes the fun out of the game, in my opinion.

Savage123456789

When you finish a combo against domino, sometimes she reacts so fast, she counters right away, and you can’t do anything about it

xLunatiXx

The fact that Doom sp2 has recovery animation after using that high impact special,

Yet onslaught sp1 has NO recovery animation is biggest blunder by Kabam.

You can punish Doom sp2 very easily but I dare you to try punishing onslaught sp1 10 times and in those you will fail 8 times, bruh? Why is dexing his special so unrewarding, like, "you dex special? Lol better just stand there and let him come at you so you can intercept." It's stupid.

WHY CAN HE THROW 5 PROJECTILES OUT OF HIS BUM BUT RECOVER IMMEDIATELY.
You can guarantee punish his special by dashing in before his last shot, dex it and punish. With that said, I agree with the overall experience
Correct but...all specials should be punishable once you fully dex them, like the good old days of...I dunno early 2023! This need to dash in halfway is ridiculous imo.

What's worse is when the AI can punish you after you knock them down, they recover faster from being knocked down than you from putting them on the floor. The game literally freezes your controls to allow the recovery frames of the AI. Imagine knocking a defender down, and immediately trying to dash back and somehow they are back up and clipping your dash before it 's done? Ridiculous "physics. It's tiresome to keep having to play through just ****.

You can't safely dex and punish void sp1. You can if you apply the same tactic I explained vs Onslaught sp1, dex, dash in, dex the projectile.
Void is 2018...

BasNL

Here, according to me, this is another example how the AI can react while they are using their special.

https://youtu.be/gJOxVMf1IWA?si=BfEvkmeVXu5YJtMv

Super_Cretu90

It has happened to me to use a heavy on the defender, knock it down, but, somehow, the defender activated a special attack from the ground. It has happened many times.

In other cases, the defender would use a heavy and, right before finishing the heavy, it would launch SP1 or SP2.

I have also experienced defenders that can finish a 5 hit combo, launch and SP1-SP2, finish another 5 hit combo right after the SP and kill me. Hahaha!

I like a challenging A.I. but it is too much. Way too much!

Diablord

This is an issue, I faced too. not to bring up another old topic, but the issue of AI reparrying double mediums, is way too annoying.

PT_99

This is starting to happen again, after defender gets knocked down by special attack, the defender rises up + dashes in at the SAME TIME.
Like defender will rise up 30% and skips 70% of get up animation and somehow also decides to dash into

Killswitch01

I've noticed Champs like Bishop especially wait for you to punish. If I attempt it, they parry. If I hold block after their specials, they stay completely still (no blocking or anything). I tested it out twice and it was the same for both

Another thing I noticed, if I try to special intercept or striker intercept, it's the moment I press the buttons they trigger their own specials... I mean wth??? And then I'm left wide open to damage😂💔

SecondSkriller

I just got parried while punishing Mephisto’s sp1. They should increase recovery timers on all specials, this issue has been present for quite a while in battlegrounds specifically.

LONERANGER_141

AI in general is acting quite shady. Search mcoc ai frame skipping. I have had multiple experiences where ai supposedly launches sp attck while stunned.

Avenger_A1

The defenders are reparrying randomly and quite frequently in the current alliance war showcase. And this is happening both mid combo as well as on medium or light hits on defenders' block. We're supposed to hit block to gain prowess, but if we do we get parried and knocked out. This is so bizarre.

I hear a fix was supposed to be released for the reparry issue, but looks like it's gotten worse.

Emomike

AI is skipping frames and has been. Kabam has failed to address the issue for at least a year now. It seems to get a little worse or maybe different every update

NONYABIZZ

Been saying this about the new defenders heavy and special attacks since 2023. I notice this alot because I personally use cheeilth, someone who relies on heavy and special punishing. Shocker recovers way too fast from his specials, champs with one hit heavy attacks are almost unpunishable now for some reason eg Jessica Jones. Like someone said earlier Onslaught has almost no recovery. Bullseye has no recovery time in his special and heavy animations especially in war and BG. You would be able to be full screen and dex and still have time to punish a projectile. You can't even punish bullseyes heavy WITH A MEDIUM ATTACK when mid screen. Shocker will immediately parry you after that sp1 if you try to rush in. In the newer champions, I think it's kabam that has stopped giving these champions recovery time in their special and heavy animations. You can barely punish NEW CHAMPIONS one hit heavy attacks eg dust etc.
I can barely punish juggernauts heavy attack with a heavy attack when I'm using cheeilth or tigra in ROL because he can escape his heavy animation and punish my heavy with a special attack during the time he's supposed to be recovering.