Espio872 Wrote:
Noob's use has sky rocketed since his buff, I have fought more of him and more Cyrax than ever, since Kung Lao is no longer the beasting cheese factory, it's a shame...
Even without the overhead, it's not like Noob's keep away was poor or lacking.
You could never consistently jump in on him, his shadow upknee has always hit you if you're crouching, standing, or jumping at him, it all works out the same way.
His shadow charge has always had pushback, meaning you're going to have to from time to time jump over it to get in on him or be chip damage to death trying to slowly work your way in to get at him.
The shoulder charge hitting overhead, while it already has pushback and is fairly quick makes his keep away game easily the hardest to get around in the game, if you ask me.
Even before the buff, if someone gave me the choice to fight Kabal, Cyrax, Kung Lao, Kitana, or Raiden, I would choose all of them over Noob Saibot, mid tier or not, his zoning in my view trumps Sindel's, Shang Tsung's Stryker's, Jade's and pretty much everyone else's in my opinion with ease.
I use Noob from time to time, he's not that horrible up close(not at all if you ask me), he has respectable and easy combos(3,3,3,) and 2,1,2 into an easy teleport for example) It's also extremely easy to combo into his X0-ray, in addition to his mix ups, I honestly don't consider most characters bad up close, Noob's certainly not the worst, maybe Jade, but not Noob.
I must say, fighting Noob with the online lag can be really frustrating. The block stun in his attacks seem to last longer and his recovery seems to be faster making it much more difficult to get in. Once you're in he can use his best string which is 2, 1 and push you back. His f+3, 3, 3 isn't really that effective up close because of the startup time but when used correctly can cause a great pushback.
In top of that now that his shadow charge is an overhead he can use b+1, 2, 1, 4, charge or slide for a great mindfuck.
He is not that effective offline though.
Noob's zoning game is good but he is overshadowed big time by Kabal with his instant air fireballs and saw blade at high level. Because Noob is much user friendly you don't see many zoning Kabals online. Kitana and Mileena are better at zoning too. Reason is instant air fireballs don't have recovery, and Kabal's fireballs don't even have startup time. Also if he catch you in the air with one fireball, then he can follow up with a nomad dash and combo, same with Kitana. Noob doesn't have air fireballs and can't combo off a shadow so he only has his mixup zoning game in favor.
Also unlike Kabal, Kitana or Mileena, Noob can't effectively get in and his normals are far worse than those 3.
