July 2016 – Page 63

Last March, one of the biggest changes to Quan Chi in Mortal Kombat X’s XL update was the massive reduction of the hit advantage on his Trance. This advantage was reduced from being +80 to merely +46, with increased combo damage scaling after a Ground Burst, with the Meter Burn version going from +14 to -1 on Block, unless Quan leaves a Delayable Gap between the Hits that can be Armored or Backdashed out of, in addition to increased Damage Scaling on all of Summoner’s Bat attacks, with his faithful Neterrealm Demon Spawn Puggles, which is the defining Trait of the Variation.

Widely hated and feared throughout the NRS Community for his glass cannon nature and touch of death playstyle, he was considered to be an S+ Tier character, by both Team YOMI and top United Kingdom players like PND’s Ketchup and Mustard. However, YOMI|REO recently noted that Summoner has fallen to merely an A Tier, below his sorcerer variation, which now resides in A+ after its massive redesign in XL.

In summation, all of these changes were explicitly done to make Quan, particularly Summoner, a more Meter-dependent character, as now Trance would only give him enough Hit Advantage to Summon the Bat with his 1-Frame Demon Spawn Special, but would leave him unable to run his 1-Frame “Hard-To-Blockable” Overhead-Low Setups that would previously lead into upwards of 70-80% Meterless damage and leave the opponent in a Hard Knockdown state for another guaranteed Bat Call, allowing the Oni Sorcerer to have arguably the greatest Offensive game of the entire cast. Previously, he was forced to spend a Bar on Deep Trance, which remained +86 on Hit, to guaranteed his Vortex, that would ultimately do less damage, due to the increased Scaling on Ground Bursts and Puggles, until now.

Last week, top Quan Chi enthusiast and “The Quan Father,” Shujinkydink, posted a video about some new Technology for Quan known as, “The Tile Vortex,” named after the EU player who first discovered this Setup, allows Summoner to regain a Meterless Vortex off of regular Trance, by calling the Bat, then Launching the opponent as high as you can, before Tranceing them in Mid-Air, similar to how Quan would Recapture his adversaries in Mortal Kombat 9 to optimize his Meter Building in the previous title. If the Trances hits them out of the air, after you’ve launched them up as high as possible, Quan can use the extra Frames of them coming down to the ground, to assume the Restand, Forward-walking Trance animation, will allow him to get a Demon Spawn out, after confirming either a F4/Krescent Kick or a Standing 4/Demon Kick, before normally going into the Reset situation of your choice. The version displayed in Dink’s first video is the Setup that The Tile has dubbed, “The Easy Version,” but there is an “optimal version” that requires a bit more execution. However, Dink did manage to find a Midscreen Setup that, while lacking in overall Damage, will provide Quan a good source of Meterless damage to close out Rounds when needed, in addition to overcoming his new Scaling issues. This is performed by hitting a Neutral Jump Punch, into a Standing 1/Quick Backhand to manipulate the Gravity, then doing a Trance into Demon Spawn before using a D1/Low Chop to Jail them, which will always leave the Sorcerer at +2 on Hit, but the option should still be respected due to the uncommon nature of this particular Setup.

Next, Dink shows how practical this Setup can be in “real match” situations by using it in online against a Hellfire Scorpion player.

Finally, here a series of videos from The Tile himself, showing off both the “Easy” and the “optimized” versions of this Setup, as well as some other Variations of it, involving a Midscreen Meterless Setup, a version utilizing the MB Ground Burst, in addition to one off of a Corner Low Starter, as well as some Fullscreen 50/50s and Risk-free ways to punish an opponent’s Armor attempts, just for good measure.