I attempted a full tier list. It's only an attempt; I don't honestly believe I know all 62 characters in the game well enough to be certain. There are placements here that I feel strongly about and some that I really don't. The only one that's in order is the broken tier. Feel free to rip it apart.

broken tier

Moloch
Blaze
Onaga

top tier

Scorpion
Sub Zero
Sareena
Noob
Shinnok
Tanya
Kenshi
Drahmin
Mavado
Kung Lao
Quan Chi


upper tier

Johnny Cage
Chameleon
Dairou
Ermac
Li Mei
Bo Rai Cho
Goro
Sheeva
Kabal
Mokap

upper mid tier

Sektor
Smoke
Jax
Stryker
Mileena
Jade
Kitana
Hsu Hao
Hotaru
Shao Kahn
Raiden

mid tier

Havik
Liu Kang
Fujin
Sonya
Ashrah
Baraka
Motaro
Nightwolf
Frost
Jarek

lower mid tier

Taven
Reiko
Kintaro
Reptile
Rain
Darrius
Meat
Kira
Kobra

low tier

Shujinko
Sindel
Kai
Cyrax
Daegon
Kano
Shang Tsung
Nitara

Hmm. Top Tiers seem right for the most part. Dairou and Kabal should be a little higher I think. Nightwolf should be lower. Cyrax and Nitara should be higher. I don't think there's an offical full list yet, although I'd like to see the high level players come up with one before they leave MKA.

I think Nitara is better then Cyrax personally, Cyrax should be near the bottom.

I guess

The BANNED Tier

Moloch
Blaze
Onaga

Top Tier

Scorpion
Sub Zero
Sareena
Noob
Shinnok
Tanya
Kenshi
Drahmin
Mavado
Kung Lao
Quan Chi


Upper Tier

Smoke
Chameleon
Dairou
Ermac
Li Mei
Bo Rai Cho
Raiden
Kabal
Mokap
Hotaru

upper mid tier

Sektor
Fujin
Jhonny Cage
Stryker
Mileena
Jade
Kitana
Reptile
Frost
Jarek

Low Tier

Shujinko
Sindel
Kai
Cyrax
Daegon
Kano
Shang Tsung
Nitara

everything else cant decide

I said only the broken tier was in order. Nitara is definitely better than Cyrax. Everyone is better than Cyrax; he's absolutely the worst character in the game. I put Kabal as upper so he can't go much higher. Darrius I'm definitely reconsidering. I think Nightwolf is where he belongs. He's pretty solid.

you xbox folks really shouldnt be putting up tier lists. its funny really.

cyrax B+4 and b+3 is all you need to win w/ him and its better then what 30 other characters have.,

Dont use his specials and dont use his first stance. just B+4 and B+3 and play mind games real simple.

Good job with the tier list! There are only a couple that I disagree with or question. I'm not an top, top player like some of you, but I do play a lot with kitana, sonya, li mei, jade and frost and I have played (and lost to!) a lot of great players.

I think the top tier is spot on. Upper Tier is a bit perplexing to me. I am curious about the placement of Li Mei. I personally think that she is way too high. As I said, I play with her a lot, and I find her to be one of my tougher characters to win with. Her weapon is quite nice and she has great juggling potential, but her best juggling move (f,d +3) is really, really slow and can easily be parried. It's really tough to pull of her best combos online. I also don't think Lui He Ba Fa is that great a stance. Characters like Smoke (probably Kitana, Jade and Raiden as well) pose a much greater challenge in my mind. (So does Frost for that matter) I would be interested in hearing your reasons.

Lastly, I think Kira is probably too low. She can be a very tricky opponent and Yuan Yang is a really nice fighting style, IMO. It has good range and is unconventional. Also, her kiss special doesn't reduce damage.

Just my two cents. Great job on the list though!

Hey, I'm not a top player myself. The top tier looks good since it's the same as what is listed in the first post of this huge topic. Other than that, there are plenty of characters I placed with only a very rudimentary knowledge of how they play, so I'm open to criticism. I especially had difficulty analyzing characters that I don't really know how to play and that no one else has really bothered to analyze either. Sheeva is one example. Kuatan has a great low kick and a safe mid popup, and she's strong on juggles. She has one of those teleport stomping moves, so she can eat projectile happy characters alive. Shokan Blades sucks though and has no mids.

Li Mei is great, but I'll admit to some bias since she's one of my favorite characters. (Still, Liu Kang is one of my favorite characters, and it disappoints me that he's just not that great.) She's another character that nobody ever seems to bother analyzing, but I know her movelist pretty much cold.

Li Mei's weapon is definitely the better of her stances. If you're unfamiliar with it, it has the same moves as Sareena's Demon Fang. d+1 is a good, safe, quick tracking low. 2 is a safe, high priority mid, that gives a free throw, and so is 1,1,2 (hits high, mid, mid). 2, b+3 is high priority, hits mid, does 23% damage, and is amazingly safe -- only thing you need to worry about is getting parried. This move is pretty much the base of her game and you can go pretty far just 50/50ing it with d+1 or her throw (just 16%, looks badass though).

Carnival Spin is great so long as you don't spam it. If you spam it all the time you're just asking to be punished. If you land one you should be able to do 50% with very little effort, or you'll force your opponent to use a breaker. Carnival Spin, 3,3 (LHBF), Flying Flurry is a very easy 47%, 54% if the enemy is in weapon. Carnival Spin will also break crouching blocks, whereas Reiko's Flip Kick can be blocked standing or crouching. Flying Flurry and Heel Kick are mostly just for using in juggles. Nova Blast is a crappy projectile that you can use to catch people on wakeup.

Lui He Ba Fa isn't as good as Kunlun Dao but it still has a saving grace or two. Mainly, Hammer Palm (b+1), is a safe mid popup that does 13 damage. The damage scales down more than on Carnival Spin, but you can still get a very easy 35-40% every time. (I believe b+1, 3,3, Flying Flurry is 37%.) d+4 and b+3 are the lows to use in Lui He Ba Fa.

What cripples Li Mei is her lack of any sort of long range game. Carnival Spin actually has surprising range, but it's a mid range move. Li Mei's projectile is about as bad as Kabal's and she doesn't have a teleport.

I don't know quite as much about Frost, Kitana, Jade, Smoke or Raiden, but I can say for sure that Frost is nowhere near Li Mei. I know it's not the only thing to consider when determining tiers, but I'm counting mids a lot in my analyses. This isn't like Soul Calibur or Virtua Fighter where every character has 500 mids, some safe, some not. Li Mei is a character with plenty of mids, some of them great, safe, and powerful. Frost is a character with two mids, neither of them good, both unsafe, and one of them very weak. Frost is hurting without Yuan Yang, and it's pretty much her specials that are her saving grace.

The others are a bit more debatable. None of those characters can juggle like Li Mei. Kitana has juggles that are as strong, but very difficult to pull off by comparison. Kitana has one of the best projectiles in the game though. It's very fast, and I think it's the only mid-hitting projectile in the game. Fans are pretty safe but has no mids. u+4 in Ba Gua is great but I don't know much about it other than that. Jade certainly has plenty of mids but I think she isn't as powerful or as safe as Li Mei. Smoke and Raiden I know even less about, other than that Staff and Judo both have no mids. (However, I think I recall Nan Chuan and Mi Tzu having good mids.)

Thanks for the write up Radical. It's nice to see someone have an interest in the same characters as me.

I don't disagree with anything that you've written. I think we just focus on different elements. Just about everything Li Mei does can be parried easily and God forbid her weapon get stolen by Quan. (same for Jade as well) But you are right about her abundance of mid attacks. I also have a much more difficult time getting Li Mei's juggles to go off online (even more so than Kitana) Perhaps I just need to play with her more, but Carnival Spin, 3, 3 works fine, but the Flying Furry is hard to time online. (Probably more an issue of my skill, than her ability)

As for Frost, your analysis of her is very accurate. Tong Bei is just a horirble style (both for range, damage and lack of mids) and her weapon isn't that terrific either. My only response is that if you use her specials well enough, that really doesnt become an issue. Any person I would normally catch with a mid, i can get with Ice Puddle. Ground Freeze is a great tool when you sidestep someone who is mid combo, or to catch characters in the middle of a special (Mavado, Havik, Baraka) or to keep them at bay. (Same with Ice Puddle, but you have to accept the damage reduction)

As for Kitana, I would make a stronger argument for her. She is very fast in BOTH of her stances. U+4 and B+4 are great in Ba Gua to keep your opponent guessing. You can usually catch people blocking incorrectly for B+1. 1 is fast (also stuns I believe) and 1,2,2,3 (4) is a very fast , easy 31% for KiKitana that requires no juggling. She also has tons of high damaging combos (but again like Li Mei, they are hard to pull off online). In Steel Fans, B+2 is a fast, pop up attack that leads to many nice juggles and 2,2,2,F+2 (B+4) is a very, very fast combo with good range.

Also, I think you have to mention her Fan Lift. It is a great, great tool for catching your opponents and start a number of juggles. It is good against characters attacking from the air (Kung, Fujin, Mileena) and has good range. If you keep your distance and sidestep/backstep well, you can catch characters mid combo (especiall Quan Chi and his sword combos) Also, characters trying to attack you with low hits, can also be caught in her lift. Lastly, her fans cannot be stolen by Mr. Chi.


Jade is a lot more unsafe than Li Mei, but she has easy, high damaging combos and better specials and definitely better range on her attacks. I won't push this one too hard because I am not an expert Jade player and I agree she is quite unsafe.

And like you, I don't know much about Smoke and Raiden, but I have played a lot of really, really good Smokes and that is why I mentioned him.

I would love to see you play as Li Mei though, and pick up a few pointers

Dude, the xbox vs. PS2 rivalry is old news man lol.Only a few from each side can crossover.

But I assure you xbox has it's share of elites that majority of ps2 people would get killed by since PS2 has more players, that also means more scrubs sadly then Xbox does.One guy I would like to play though is Dave, haven't seen versatile post in a while so I'm assuming he doens't play that much or isn't around as much.

But for the hell of it ha, ha, xbox is better online and the better system overall ha, ha, ha PS2 supports cheats online=lame.And the fact that you can't block KAK is just dumb, you have to admit that.

But on Cyrax, Cyrax seriously sucks though overall, you're right B+4 and B+3 are good to mix up but can a.be parried easily b.most of the time a cyrax player will whore the sword =predicatable and c.nobody uses him....for good reason man lol.He sucks when compared to the rest of the cast in this game.And those two things alone aren't nearly enough to save Cyrax against most of the other characters unless there's lag involved which makes them even more safe.I've seen it happen numerous times.

It's not like I've heard of any insane Cyrax players from PS2 in MK:A that post here, there's one player on xbox.That says it all dude lol.

Kai might give him comp for worst character though in some areas.....

rapidshare

your arugument can be said about scorpion also.

a ~ canbe parried easily
b ~ Sword predicatable

thats just dumb, its whether or not he has moves that are effective in winning.
b+4 and b+3 are.

wheni say play mind games that doesnt mean whore out the b+4 and get yourself killed. bait out a parry, watch them see their moving patterns. know when to do b+4 it catches people off guard once you know when they'll let go of block for a few secs to move. B+3 is pretty safe and gets them to duck more to set up the b+4.

trust me hes no high or upper tier, hes a weak MID tier however.

having the tools to win in this game doesnt take much.

even shang has a few things, i use him alot hes one of my main 8, but im not stupid enough to say hes better then any other character in this game.

its the player using the character at his highest level.

most folks dont use characters right. i LOL when i see folks use Cyraxs special moves. i do from time to time drop a bomb out, but i know its a major risk and the reward isnt much. ill only do it if i have a major advantage over my foe at that point.




ALSO

i know you guys have good players on the xbox (your one of them), i been there and i may return in jan, most likely feb.

but when i see you guys say funny stuff i gotta whip out my cock and smack you guys w/ it.

Just didn't have the time to edit the post, it's done now.

Subzero2 - You talk to much.

Kano is crap, just like you.


I added Motaro to the low tiers. The dude sucks.

lol, you and the cock jokes dude.

Anyway, well cyrax a weak mid tier?ehhh, I gotta disagree with that man lol.He's a low tier in my book personally.If not at the bottom, then close to it lol.I haven't seen anyone pick cyrax or kai in like a few months lol.

I mean like I said, as far as the xbox is concerned there's only guy that uses him well.Pighut and he lags at times so that combination=killer cyrax.

Actually, there's a bit of a difference though concerning scorpion and cyrax.

You see yeah they both have swords that can you can parry, however everyone knows that scorpions sword owns cyrax's by far, Scorp shoves his sword down cyrax's throat if you get my drift lol.

Scorp's like a million times more safe also, but online lag at times can help cyrax I admit.

One thing I want you to know is that a lot of the xbox players that comment in this thread with the exception of alex and myself aren't high level players, just casual ones so not all xbox players are ignorant.

Obviously like you said, you've played me and alex so you know we know how the game works.

Granted, we might not write as deep essays as you and malone would but I know how the drill works.

One game I've always played my whole life is MK hehe.

Let me know man when you come to the xbox dude.

Do you still use Sindel?

Who's the top ps2 players anyway?Like the top ten out of curiosity.

Does Shinnok really deserve to be top tier?

kool, sorry if i came off like an asshole.

i so agree w/ the motaro statement. he may even be the worst. a boss that can be thrown wtf is that O_o stupid. hes slow etc weak!!

Dairou

Mi Zong -

f+1 - Mid, juggles.

d+1 - Quick low poke.

b+3 - Unpaaryble fast low sweep.

b+4 - Mid, juggles.

Atum Dao -

d+1 - Quick low, nice range.

b+2 - Mid, juggles, unsafe. Best to use only as a punisher.

b+3 - It's not Kung Lao's version but still good.

Special Moves -

f,b,d+1 - Dairou TS has been rightfully gotten major balancing and now it's quite slow.

Most people will jump it on reaction. Don't spam it.

d,b+2 - Great projectile.

d,u+3 - One of the better telepors in the game. Fast, aviodes projectiles. 50/50 from up close.

Throw - Not the best throw but launches far giving time for some TS / fireball mix ups.

Just a few corrections and add-ons...

-b+4 is actually high.Nonetheless,it's one of safest moves in the game.

-u+4 is the mid juggle starter.Very poor range but 100% safe even off-line.It's great against jumpers;very good anti-air move.Best followed up with wep. 1,1,f+3 since it launches rather low on the ground.If you catch them jumping with u+4,then you can go for aerial damage.

Dairou's wep. stance is rather useless aside from 1,1,f+3 and maybe b+3.I think b+3,unlike King Lao's version,may be unparriable but less safer.I need to re-test and confirm it,though.

The TS Drop cannot be reacted to (see below).Here are all the TS Drop variations and their speed (all credit goes to my man Check for finding this)...

f,b,d+1 - slowest

f,b,d/b,d+1 - faster

f,b,d/b,d+1~1~1~1 (i.e. keep mashing "1";other buttons seem to work as well) - the fastest.Looks even faster when done in weapon stance.

f,b,D/B (hold),N,1 - delayed/crouching TS Drop (like in MK:D)

Dairou's Teleport still gives a free throw up close;otherwise,they can jump away or duck (sometimes it's lag-depedant online).Dairou's Teleport has priority over all Teleports in MK:A except Rain's.

Dairou's Fireball,like most projectiles in MK:A,tracks better when you side step and then perform it.

Scorpion- i understand why hes top tier
Sub Zero - why is he????
Sareena - understand SHES AMAZIN even past the projectile
Noob - dont really understand 2,4 is unsafe and its the base of his game
Shinnok - dont really understand?? because of his hand move??
Tanya - understandable
Kenshi - y?
Drahmin - understand
Mavado -understand
Kung Lao -understand
Quan Chi -understand

A great Sub player can you explain why hes top tier to all of us who dont understand.
Same with NOOB
Same with SHINNOK
Same with KENSHI

Whats with wrong with BO??? If he was Top tier before why wouldnt he be now??? Konqrr said the Tier list for deception wasnt made with glitches.
So why is it all of a sudden Sub and kenshi are so good but Bo and Dairou arent as good???? Dairous dam TS got toned down SO!!!! its still useable and abusable and BO got even better.

And every move noob does is unsafe? it seems the only way noob can be used is if your opponent makes a punisable mistake, rare against good players. SO what makes him like top 3??? DUDE MOTARO low tier???? I USED to think he was BUT not anymore 1. d+4 great low unparryable damge is like 12 AND SAFE 2. 2,2 Great Mid to mix up with the D+4 SAFE 3. b,f+1 i think is a great charge fast 16 damage good to throw around really is usefull 4. HIS projectile mood is awseome you DUCK dodgin almost all projectiles and you can either shoot a projectile, charge or not do anything. AND you can shoot projectiles with him pretty fast. 5. His combos have nice areas to stop at creating pretty decent mixups. etc so is he really low tier??? dont really know

Sub-Zero - I'll try to get Versa to explain it but I feel Sub is top tier both off-line and online

Noob - you're right.I don't really think he's top tier either but you need to know that 2,4's recovery will differ online due to the inconsistant lag.Some players may abuse 2,4 and get away with it while others get consistantly punished.That's why I've been telling this community over and over and over again...ONLINE TIERS ARE POINTLESS!!! Base them off-line.If you can't then don't bother.

Regardless,Noob is a high risk/high reward character because all his launchers are horrible on block;however,he can get up to 45% of damage online and 55%+ off-line.

Shinnok - no top-tier but probably high-mid tier.His d+3 (first stance I think) is different from other characters' lows.It recovers much quicker and even gives a free throw in some instances.Otherwise,he's very unsafe but has a high reward because of AC's like most characters in MK:A.

Kenshi - I've already said why he's very good - wep. u+2 is safe online and leads to consistant 45%+ of damage.He's still a good turtler and has average low attacks.Top tier?Probably.High-mid tier?Definitely.

Motaro - you're right.He's no low tier.d+3 is a great low.2,2 is a nice mid.The shoulder ram is also great but very un-safe even online.I think he lacks a juggle starter with range to punish people when ducking.He doesn't really have anything,and what he does have is very,very unsafe.

BRC - high-mid to mid tier.You need to play BRC in MK:D before you make foolish statements about how he's better in MK:A.BRC in MK:A lacks damage (he's one of the few characters with no AC's according to Check).In MK:D you could easily do 60%+ after a Puke Puddle.What will you do in MK:A?All his glitches that have made him broken and God tier are gone.This isn't even an argument.It's common sense.

And when Konqrr said that MK:D's tier list wasn't based on glitches,he probably meant it wasn't based on infinite combos.Everything else that was in the game was used.

And here's my other post on the other forum about online tiers...

Before all of you read this it's very,very,very important to know that punishing moves off-line actually matters and it's very crucial.It determines what characters can abuse and what they can't abuse.With that said...

Anyway,as for the tier list,I think you can pretty much forget about creating an online tier list since the amount of stuff you can do online is very limited and inconsistant thanks to the lag.And seriously,how many people play MK:A competitively off-line,and of those,how many people have the ability to come up with a reasonable tier list?Probably very,very few,if any.

But let's take a look at what would be important in determining an off-line tier list (at least in my view):

Move safety - I know it feels good spamming those safe mid-pop ups online but off-line every move has a fixed recovery.However,remember that in MK:A (also probably in MK:D and MK:DA) sometimes you can jump or backdash before you can even block.This allows some characters to escape guaranteed damage when other certain characters don't have the moves needed to catch and punish them during these movements.But overall and theoretically speaking,characters with safe moves,especially juggle starters (Dairou's Mi Zong b+4,for example) have a huge advantage to characters whose juggle starters leave them heavily open.This of course all leads to your basic risk/reward ratio,and which characters can spam their moves because of their safety and which can't because of their un-safety.

For example,Noob in his first stance has 2,4, which leads into very good damage (since he also has AC's).However, 2,4, isn't nowhere near as safe as it is online.It's punishable by almost everyone off-line with a medium-ranged juggle starter.How would this affect his rank on an off-line tier list?

Aerial Cancels - MK:A's finest glitch that works inconsistantly online depending on your and your opponent's connection.During off-line game play AC's work 100% of the time and are the easiest way to do very high damage.Every character who has some type of AC can easily do at least 45%-50% of damage.

However,some characters like Sub-Zero don't have any AC's.He might be limited from his high risk juggle starter to only 35%-40% of damage.Does that mean that he does,in fact,rank lower/a lot lower?

etc.

But this is all theoretical bull shit that raises nothing but questions.So,until people start playing this off-line,which is probably highly unlikely,I don't think this game will ever have a true and consistant tier list.

I stopped reading this lame thread a while back cause it was all noob flamers, but I am glad that people are starting to get the picture. Yes sub-zero is not top tier. Top 3?? I missed that one, I cant believe anyone thinks hes top 3.



And I agree with the general theme that a tier list is impossible to come up with because A) There are just too many characters to sort it out for a while, and B) Tier lists come from REAL fighting games from the arcades, where there is no lag. I agree that unless everyone stops playing online we will never knopw truely, because lag is just such a wildcard factor. There are many strats that favor lag, and many awesome ones that cant be done.


Well if the creator of this thread is not going to make any changes to his tier list why dont we close this thread and post somewhere else? I like radicals tier list much better than the one here.

Back in the day tier list were either high or low, none of this top-left-right polka-dotted tier or yellow-black-two-steps-down-from-top tiers and crap. I would personally like to keep the categories MUCH more simple.

I still think that this "Broken/Banned" tier group is just stupid, the bottom line is, they are the most powerful characters in the game... i.e. Top Tier. Just write them in, are they cheap? Hell yah, but then again, those who hold the top tier position always are.

subby is high because his 1st stance 3 and his throw.

3 is a safe mid attack that leads into a free throw.

same exact thing for kenshi 3 safe mid attack that leads into a free throw. on top of that you can get free hits after 3 besides a free throw. like 33,cs up+2 combo.

IMO

the tiers look like this

1 ~ Sareena
2 ~ Scorpion
3 ~ Quan Chi
4 ~ Dairou
5 ~ Subby
6 ~ Noob
7 ~ Tanya
8 ~ Drahmin
9 ~ Kabal
10 ~ Kenshi

LOL, the funny part about this whole thing is that everyone's list are different, from elite players to average ones....

This list is going to take forever before it's final, then even so there will be some people that will in general disagree with some character placed spots.

Kabal 9th huh?Interesting, I thought he was great from the beginning along with Movado.Although, why they took away Kabal's Free throw after 4 only to give it Movado puzzles me a bit.

I actually counter Movado's online with Kabal and he works like a gem.

danab dude i understand why all the characters are top tiers now and i disagree with you.

Shinnok is defintly Top from how i seen him used.

My opinion on the list is this
1. Sareena
2. Scorpion
3. Noob
4. Sub Zero
I think these 4 chars are amazin! My opinion.
No order after
Drahmin
Shinnok
Quan Chi
Mavodo
Tanya
Kenshi
kabal
Kung Lao
Dairou

I think we should have a top 13 now because there is so many characters.
If i was to take away 3 it would be

Dairou-
His TS has been toned down (major part of his game)
His Damage with TS + 1,1,f+3 Toned down
Overall Damage is toned down.
Simplest projectile stops him from juggling you after TS Drop.
Id say hes Upper Mid dont get me wrong he still has great turtling tools but if the person doesnt just jump around like an idiot and jumps the TS Drop on reflex you render The big part of his game Useless. the projectile andfucking teleporting is only good when you play someone whos scared to try to jump the TS Drop. Even M2Dave said TS Drop can be jumped on reflex.

Kabal
Because he lost all his free grabs that also lead to 40 dam easy.
LLost his 40-75 damage juggles
I think he has no mids that lead to a juggle besides the high - mid
Lost mid that lead to a free spin thing
I thought this was like his main game ??? So what does he have now?

3rd guy ??? cant really decide
Probablyyyyyyyy kenshi ONLY because i dont know anything about his potential AT ALL!




Any idea till the next MORTAL KOMBAT comes OUT???

Shinnok is a top tier character when b+1 is 100% safe or when b+1, b+4, Hand special is completely unbreakable or both.In other words,he's a top tier character when there is a lot of lag involved.Shinnok is simply another high risk/high reward character like most characters in MK:A.b+1 into AC's for a lot of damage.However,get your b+1 blocked and eat as much damage.

Dairou's TS Drop cannot be reacted to.Please read my post above.Dairou has one of the safest stances in MK:A.He can deal a lot of damage,too.It's just that online makes his AC's extremely hard to do.

TS Drop, (first stance) jump, 1,1,2,CS, 1,1,4,CS, land and switch into wep. 1,1,f+3

This does 35%+ of damage.

Kabal has the tools to win.The Flash is still the best punisher in the game.He's strictly a turtle and 50/50 mix up character now since he lost his damaging combos.Online he's top 10.Off-line he wouldn't be because wep. u+2 and 4 are not safe (especially not the latter).