Hey, everyone. Hope you enjoyed the dev stream we had at the Killer Instinct World Cup earlier today. It is an awesome feeling to be able to gather everyone in a room (or this case the hugely awesome Tobin Center) and talk about KI. Even better – we brought a couple of consoles down to let you try 3.7 and Shin Hisako. Sitting behind @swordsman09 right now on the show floor. This has nothing to do with anything, but he’s wearing awesome shoes.

Ok, enough delays.

We’re still working on getting the video edition of the Patch Notes, but for now, let’s give you the plain text version.

3.7

Shadow Lords

4 new Story Missions for Tusk

Kilgore added to Mimic pool

Increased chances for getting Dossiers

Bug Fixes

Fixed the crash that occurred if you had more than 32 friends in Shadow Lords leaderboards

Fixed an issue that allowed Aria to cancel her instinct mode while wearing the Mask of the Ancients (Instinct Always On)

Fixed a bug where the Crimson Vampire Bat and Crimson Ram were dealing 15% damage instead of 115% damage.

Overall System Changes:

Fixed a bug where it was possible to trigger a timed lockout on the opponent during a shadow linker when they correctly timed a break attempt.

Fixed a bug where Shadow Enders could become counter breakable if the opponent recovered from a previous hit.

Jago:

Jago is a powerful character who doesn’t really struggle at any range or with any matchup. He has the game’s most powerful set of defensive tools, and he has a very potent offense, as well. The team wanted to maintain his defensive specialty, but slightly weaken his up close offense, and also make it more difficult for Jago to close in on his opponents. We still fully expect Jago to be a top 5 character after the changes below. They may seem dramatic, but we feel it is for the best for the overall game.

Light Windkick is now -4 on block (was -2).

Medium Windkick is now -6 on block (was -3)

Heavy Windkick is now -11 on block (was -7) [Jago already has Laser Sword if he wants to maintain frame advantage close to his opponent. Making Windkick punishable is a big change for Jago, and it will require that Jago players approach opponents more thoughtfully than just throwing out medium or heavy windkicks.]

Double Roundhouse is now +2 on block (was +3) [This move is still extremely good, but if you choose not to cancel it, Jago gets away with ever so slightly less after.]

Neck Cutter now hits on frame 22 (was 19) and has a slight range reduction [This move is a primary reason why Jago’s offense is so scary. Not only is it incredibly difficult to react to, but the range is spectacular and Jago can simple cancel it into other things. While a lot of that will still be true, the speed and range reductions will make it a bit less scary, and because Windkicks are now punishable on block, Jago players will have to either get closer and cancel into laser sword or hit confirm another way.]

Endokuken damage reduced by 20% [This will lower Jago’s life swing during instinct and his 1-chance damage a little.]

Big Endokuken damage reduced by 20%

Shadow Windkick is now -1 on block (was +1) [This probably won’t matter much because Jago still has the threat of his Tiger’s Fury DP, but he may have to use it more often in this situation now]

Fixed a bug causing instinct endokukens to not fan cinder’s flames. [Jago already gives Cinder a hard time, but this fix should help a lot if your strategy as Cinder was to burnout punches]

Fixed a bug where Jago’s combo breaker would become vulnerable during the landing portion of its recovery.

Glacius:

Ice Lance is now -4 (was -8) [Because of Shatter becoming a true projectile in S3, Glacius was left with nothing to cancel Lance into in some matchups that wasn’t punishable. His only choice was to use Cold Shoulder, also punishable, and move to an uncomfortable range. This change will allow Glacius to use Lance as a poke without canceling it in nearly every matchup and will make his zoning much more potent.]

Crouching HK is now -5 (was -11)

Standing HP is now -4 (was -7)

Standing HK is now -5 (was -8) [In reviewing Glacius frame data, compared to his playstyle, his close range moves were simply far more negative than they needed to be. These changes will help a Glacius who wants to use these great normals without canceling them more often.]

Heavy Puddle Punch inflicts 2 less frames of blockstun (-20, was -18) so that canceling it into Shadow Hail behaves like the LT and MED versions. [This is no longer a true blockstring on standing opponents. Anyone with the meter to blow through a projectile will be able to punish this from now on. Glacius gained better keepaway thanks to the Lance change above, so this change makes his true reversal carry more risk, even when canceled into Shadow Hail.]

Fixed a bug causing the 5th hit of Shadow Cold Shoulder (Opener Version) to do less damage than intended. [The change from last patch that tried to even these damage values out is now actually working as intended.]

Thunder:

Fixed an issue preventing Thunder from canceling into an Ultra off a max distance Ankle Slicer

Fixing a bug that caused Thunder to scoot forward when attempting a manual after a Shadow Call of Earth.

Orchid:

Adjusted Flik Flak so that in juggles you cannot use this move back to back without inserting manuals between. [Juggles here should feel more like Sabrewulf’s paths now and deal a bit less damage overall, as the player will need to use manuals instead of just repeated specials.]

Lowered Opener Ichi Ni San damage by 5%

Raised Opener FlikFlak damage by 10%

Raised Opener Slide Kick damage by 25% [Players were correct in pointing out that our change last time didn’t quite go far enough. With this change, you’ll definitely see better damage when opening with more risky specials than Ichi Ni San.]

Fixed a bug where Gargos would not fall out of Orchid’s air throw properly.

Spinal:

The startup of Shadow Boneshaker is now projectile immune. [For some reason, he was not projectile immune right away, forcing players to use the Skull version of Heavy Boneshaker for 1 st frame projectile invulnerability.]

frame projectile invulnerability.] Shadow Boneshaker now loses its projectile invulnerability after its active frames have ended. [This move used to be projectile immune until it was completely over, meaning that if you tried to punish with a projectile it would go right through. A common case here was a shadow counter from Kilgore.]

Added the missing hitboxes to the startup of the linker version of Shadow Boneshaker.

Fixed a bug where j.MK would cause a ground bounce against opponents performing attacks that cause wall bounces.

Fulgore:

Can no longer pip cancel Eye lasers into Plasma Bolts [Upon review, we felt that this ability simply made his zoning too strong, and that when used with his new instinct, lead to unwanted high damage 1 chance break combos.]

Fixed a bug causing Fulgore’s spin speed to max out when activating instinct despite us trying to remove that last patch. [The last patch said this would happen, but it didn’t, and it’s still causing Fulgore to get more meter than we expected internally.]

Fixed a bug where Fulgore’s combo breaker would become vulnerable during the landing portion of its recovery.

Fixed a bug where it was not possible to Shadow Counter with LK+MP.

Fixed a bug where the Punishment message would not show up during the Air Shadow Eye Laser’s landing sequence.

Fixed a bug where the time out win animation would finish too early.

TJ Combo:

Fixed a bug where Powerline could be instinct canceled before hit.

Fixed a bug where TJ Combo would slide larger opponents across the stage during his Ultra combo activation.

Maya:

Adjusted Tumble Kick so that in juggles you cannot use this move back to back without inserting manuals between. [Juggles here should feel more like Sabrewulf’s paths now and deal a bit less damage overall, as the player will need to use manuals instead of just repeated specials.]

Reduced opener Tumble Kick damage by 10% [This will make some of the difficult to break juggles deal a little less damage.]

Reduced Double Dagger damage by 33% [Unblockables will lead off with less damage up front]

Reduced damage dealt by Mantis in combos by 50% [Because Maya is the only character who can cash out juggles using a meterless move, Mantis will always remain very useful in her many different juggle paths. We feel this reduction in damage is necessary to keep the advantage a bit more in check, since Maya is turning out to be very strong.]

Significantly increased the damage dealt by the Dagger Assault Ender upfront, so that it deals just slightly less than the Exchange/Launcher ender. [Our final tweak to Dagger Assault should help Maya players not give up all the up-front ender damage when trying to explore the possibilities behind the various setups Dagger Assault allows. This ender still does less damage than others, but it will lessen the blow if your mixups do not succeed.]

Fixed a bug where the Punishment message would not show up during the Leap Kick Special landing sequence.

Fixed a bug where Maya’s throw would cause Gargos Minions to go flying.

Kan Ra:

Decreased the amount of PD inflicted to himself from Sandsplosion by 50% (from 20 points to 10 points) [To be honest, we overlooked this when making the PD changes in 3.6. With PD healing slower, it was important to decrease the PD Kan-Ra puts on himself when using Sandsplosion.]

Fixed a bug causing heavy manuals to not be possible off his heavy linkers. [We aren’t sure how long this was around, but this will greatly increase his combo options.]

Reduced pushback on Swarm linkers. [This is so that more of his manuals will reach]

Fixed a bug where Kan-Ra would become stuck in a single pose during Whirl if going over a sand trap while already cursed by another Kan-Ra.

Fixed a bug where Kan-Ra could not special cancel normals while a Shadow Sand Trap attack is also hitting.

Fixed a bug where you could juggle after Clutch into medium Spike without a Swarm around by increasing the air pushback of standing and crouching kicks.

Fixed a bug where you could not combo backwards Clutch into Sand Spike against some characters.

Riptor:

All Shoulder Charge enders are now 0 on hit midscreen (was +16 on lv1, and -13 on lv2-4) [You can no longer combo off of the Lv1 version midscreen, and the Lv2 and up version are no longer punishable on hit midscreen.]

Fixed a bug causing Riptor to bounce off thin air during Talon Rake if her opponent was in blockstun from Mortars or Carpet.

Fixed a bug where you could whiff a sweep with Riptor to prevent quick rises.

Fixed a bug where Riptor would be launched very high if thrown out of a certain frame of her Tail Flip by Arbiter’s Prophet’s Bane.

Fixed a bug where Riptor could perform auto doubles while whiffing jumping normals when Flame Mortars are hitting.

Now showing the Recapture property for Special Tail Flip in training mode.

Hisako:

Fixed a bug causing Possession’s animation to slow down while cursed by Kan-Ra.

Now showing the Recapture and Stagger attack properties for Shadow Air OnRyoZan in training mode.

Aria:

Fixed an input priority issue making her ultra not come out if you try a Shadow Linker Explosive Arc into ultra.

Fixed a bug where a combo only using the Shadow Explosive Arc Linker would make an ender occurring after it breakable.

Fixed a bug causing heavy Crescendo to not cause a hard knockdown on trades

Shadow Jago:

Fixed a bug where Shadow Jago’s combo breaker would become vulnerable during the landing portion of its recovery.

Arbiter:

Fixed a bug where auto doubles wouldn’t come out after medium or heavy Overhead Slash.

Fixed a bug where Arbiter’s back throw could be blocked if a character was thrown out of super freeze.

Mira:

Fixed a bug causing Heavy Reaping Linker to consume less health if you held LP to trigger it than it did if you held MP. Both versions deal as much damage to Mira as the MP version now.

Gargos:

Change the frame on which Gargos can cancel his dash early into a special move from Frame 18 to Frame 24 [This was an oversight by the team. All characters can cancel their dashes into special moves on the last few frames, but Gargos was able to do it much earlier than desired. Dash into Command Throw will be ever so slightly slower now, but still plenty fast enough to catch people who aren’t ready for it..]

Decreased opener Izuna Drop damage by 28%

Removed the hard knockdown from opener Izuna Drop [Gargos can get both high damage and a minion from his neutral command grab, and we feel the power of a minion makes this a bit too common of an occurrence. The places where Gargos can still get a minion are numerous, including his launcher ender, hard knockdown ender, forward or back throws, sweep, and in many situations by canceling blocked Portal Punches during zoning. Depending on the meter situation and your opponent’s character, safe minion summons may still be possible after neutral command grab as well.]

Fixed a bug where Gargos’ Air Madness Grabs would whiff if the opponent was attacking.

Fixed a bug where the player could not Stoneskin Explode during a hit if a minion was picked up.

Fixed a bug where the Minions could get stuck if Gargos is hit during his instinct and Explodes.

Fixed a bug where the throwee’s reaction animation would be flipped during the Air Madness grab.

General RAAM:

Reduced the cost of Kryll Attack Cancel from 1 meter to a half meter. You’ll notice that when you have at least half a meter, just a few Kryll will appear around RAAM’s legs to let you know you have enough meter to perform a Kryll Attack Cancel. [Upon review, RAAM’s Kryll cancels give him similar freedom to other offensive characters, but at a very high cost. Reducing the cost will help him with some problem matchups, without pushing him too far ahead in ones that he already wins.]

Eyedol:

Shoulder Ender is now 0 on block midscreen (Was -13, -8, -13, and -13) [These are no longer punishable on hit midscreen]

Fixed a bug where the standing proxy guard boxes were not as tall as the idle boxes making the character rapidly transition back and forth between the guarding to walking back animation.

Added missing collision on Eyedol head switch animations to prevent opponents from passing through.

Fixed a bug where Eyedol would use the jump properties of whatever body he was in when instinct activates instead of the Warrior settings.

Fixed a bug causing an animation pop at the end of Warrior’s forward throw

Kilgore:

PD output reduced by ~60% [Kilgore was dealing far more one-change damage than we anticipated with single combos. These are still very worth doing and hit hard, but much less hard.]

Increased self damage when performing dodge in Overheat from 5 points to 24 points (so it deals the same damage to Kilgore as it does to his opponent) (note this is not effected by scaling, so at lower health values, Kilgore takes the full 24 pts but the opponent takes a bit less) [This move was incredibly abusive and annoying. This change hurts Kilgore so much that he’ll have to be really smart about when he chooses to throw away large chunks of health doing it.]

Fixed a bug causing Shadow Chaingun Dash to not fire exploding bullets in Instinct. [This is a pretty important part of his intended method of refreshing burns during a normal combo path and leads to monstrous damage.]

Fixing a bug that caused the 16 second Overheat mode to decrease in duration when firing chainguns

Reducing overheat time to 12 seconds [And because it is no longer modified in duration by any of your actions, it should be much easier to know when to expect it to end with a little practice.]

Made Sweep count as an opener so combos performed off of OTG hits become breakable as expected.

Fixed a bug where it was possible to not get Kilgore’s heavy linkers when holding the button for light and medium linkers.

Fixed an issue causing the chainguns to not spin during instinct.

Fixed a bug where Level 3 Metal Ball ender could cause opponents to fall out early.

Fixed a bug where the missiles could not be destroyed by projectile destroy boxes.

Fixed a bug where the forward HP command normal would cause a ground bounce when hitting a wall bounced opponent.

Fixed a bug where the Exploding Bullets would apply potential damage to Spinal if he absorbs them with Power Devour.

Reduced the chance that the standing HP bullets would whiff standing opponents.

Fixed a bug where the Level 1 Missile Pod ender was not using the correct animation.

Fixed a bug where players would get an ender instead of Shadow Chain Gun Dash Linker when inputting QCF+MP+HP from Shadow Chain Gun Dash linker or openers.

Fixed a bug where it was possible to Shadow Counter with 40% Shadow Meter.

Fixed a bug where players could not perform Shadow Counters with LK+MP.

Fixed a bug where Autodoubles would not come out after the training dummy performed Metal Ball after landing more than a certain distance from the opponent.

Made it possible to break the Shadow Metal Ball in opener/ender combos.

Fixed a bug where it was possible to get Heavy Auto Doubles blocked after performing an Overheated Heavy Chain Gun Dash.

Fixed a bug causing the throw to cause the opponent to blow out and spin in the air.

Fixed a bug that let you counter breaker on Shadow DP.

Fixed a bug where the medium and heavy Metal Ball specials would not land when expected while cursed by Kan-Ra.

Fixed a bug where a linker could be performed after a Shadow Linker Chain Gun Dash.

Missiles now auto destroy if not active during a match, preventing them from hitting between rounds

Fixed a bug where heavy autodoubles could drop when cursed by Kan-Ra following a Shadow Metal Ball ender.

Fixed a bug in Combo Breaker training where the Medium Metal Ball opener would come out when Heavy was expected.

Fixed a bug where the time out win animation would finish too early.

Fixed a bug where Kilgore would not end combos with the Shadow Uppercut in Combo Breaker Training.

Fixed a bug where the projectiles during the Ultra could cause the opponent to be blown out.

Removed the Shadow Metal Ball Ender from combo breaker training since it wasn’t possible to combo into it from an opener, becoming breakable.

That’s all we have for now. Make sure to swing by the forums to let us know what you think!

FIGHT ON!

Discuss: https://forums.ultra-combo.com/t/3-7-patch-notes/19445