bored, so i decided just to edit the t5:dr tier ranking before i make a fresh post later tonight; keep in mind koreans set their machine so that the lifebars are higher, so some characters may be ranked lower than played elsewhere(ie nina won't do as much damage during her oki):

A Class:
Asuka, Baek, Bryan, Devil Jin, Dragunov, Feng, Jack5, Jin, Law, Marduk, Paul, Raven

A-/B+ Class:
Kazuya, King, Nina

B Class:
Armor King, Bruce, Christie/Eddy, Ganryu, Heihachi, Hwoarang, Julia, Lee, Lili, Xiaoyu

B-/C+ Class:
Anna, Kuma, Lei, Wang, Yoshi

C Class:
Roger, Steve

when you actually line all the characters up by rank things look fairly interesting; this game is actually pretty balanced. though dr's still a game with some random wins due to high damage combos and the crush system, ultimately skill plays more of a deal than the player.

i'm still surprised that steve is ranked so low(NiN, the korean tk5 2005 champion who uses steve as his main character, is playing tremendously using him). steve can't possibly be that low. maybe not in the A class, but definitely not that bad.

i'm taking a look at the up-most bracket and looking kinda confused that jin, asuka and baek are there. and how is the 1st time paul up there? weird; i don't think they've addressed his linear attacking problems, and he still seems like a high risk/high reward character. i can't comment on dragunov, lili or aking though, cause i haven't really seen them in action. but the korean dr champion, Na Rak Hof uses paul as his main character.

so i'm guessing why there's so many in the top tier is b/c this game's become a lot less abusive, sorta like virtua fighter 4:final tuned... to a lesser degree. so just because a character has problems doesn't mean they fall b/c of them. still weird though seeing the top tier bracket.

i'll make this quick, cause i'm just taking a break...

tomorrow's my most hellish day in a long time.

tis a sad thing when US loses to both its neighbors.

and yay, warriors FINALLY beat someone! although, beating the twolves is seriously nothing to sneeze about.

*the following's a cut and paste off of shoryuken.com regarding tekken 5:dr tiers*

"Anyway here is a better list from Tekkencentral owner with top players experience, altough Vers. B arrives(changes will be minimal).

From Duk2000

Aking - B
Lili - B
Dragunov - A

Marduk - A
Lei - B~C
Anna - B~C
Law - A
Nina - A~B
Baek - A
Hwoarang - B
Steve - C
Roger - C
King - A~B
Kazuya - A~B
Kuma - B~C
Raven - A
Xiaoyu - B
Bruce - B
Asuka - A
Jin - A
Wang - B~C
Feng - A
Lee - B
Ganryu - B
Christie/Eddy - B
Julia - B
Mokujin - S++++
Paul - A
Yoshi - B~C
Heihachi - B
Jack5 - A
Bryan - A
Devil Jin - A

My ranks so far after 2 weeks of hardcore playing.
Seems like very well balanced so far. (korean setting is +2 energy which is
about 123% in ps2 version)
Don't know why Namco is releaseing Ver. B already... maybe it has
some bugs??"
(end quote)

from what i hear, jack-5's supposed to be the best char in the game. that's crazy. meh; i'll always be an ewgf-ing jin player first and foremost, so i'm gonna keep dj as my main. might wanna start learning hwoarang though.

hate to say it, but kings are starting to look REALLY good as of late.

bonzi and artest are both players that get it done on the boards and D, and it's starting to really make the kings better in 2 aspects of the game they've never really been before.

now, sacto's just gotta pray ron's honeymoon season doesn't crash on them in the next, oh, i dunno, 10 years, heh.

fyi, i never realized how good breaded fish fillets topped with chunky salsa and pickled jalapenos mixed in the salsa could taste.

maybe it's cause i never had frozen breaded fish fillets for a LOOOONG time.

but i seriously like the kick that the salsa and jalapenos bring.

i found this article about gmail to be interesting

considering how many ppl use gmail now(i have an account, but haven't really used it yet)

i'm not quite yet completely sold on the ideas that the article has. but it wouldn't be too bad of an idea to save any important messages on your gmail account to a single mht file(click save as and bring up single file) and delete any important messages you have saved on your gmail account if you're going to keep those messages past 180 days.

it is so hard for me to say "blessed be the name of the LORD" right now, as Job did in chapter 1.

how he even managed to do so, and not blame God for all his problems as seen in chapter 2, i will never know.

i'm not saying i'm in a position where i want to curse God; i just find it so hard to say "everything's great" right now. because, isn't that what saying "blessed be the name of the LORD" basically is?

the bible is quite strange sometimes; when something bad happens to us, that is our own fault to blame. when something good happens to us, it is all of God's doing.

we know that God has his purpose with all of us, to prosper us and not to harm us, as stated in Jeremiah 29; and if he sees we're not going with his plan, he pushes us the other way, even when he knows it'll just crush us emotionally inside, knowing the best for us. BUT IT'S JUST SO HARD TO SEE WHAT HE'S TRYING TO DO.

i think i know why sometimes we feel like it would be easier to follow God back then. the way the educational system and modern-day society works, is like a long, logical chain.

elementary school -> jr high -> high school -> college -> grad school -> career -> marriage -> some more career -> kids -> death

and when something goes wrong part of the way in that supposed chain, like bad grades in college, or impending bad grades in college, that chain appears to collapse. life's over. we're done.

10 years are but a second in the eyes of the LORD. but to us, it seems like eternity, especially if you feel helpless.

i guess the reason why i'm writing all this down, is because i believe in fate. i've read enough of the bible to get this sense that God really has known everything that will happen before this world will end. to somehow believe that we have free will to do what we want and that God's just occasionally stepping in or stepping back is wrong. look at it this way; God predicted what will happen to the world when it comes to an end in specific detail in Revelations. to suggest free will is more prevalent means that these people that are talked about can just try to not do what is said and it won't come to pass. to suggest that God can only predict the end times and not everything that will occur in between now and then is rubbish; it was only not written down because there was no need to.

that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to DO things. animals try to do stuff too. but it is more God than us.

what God wants us to do though, is not get caught up in the things of this world. it can feel extremely hard in tough times. but we need to see that God intends to do something useful with our lives, and never intends to give us more than we can handle. it is by the realization of this assurance in Jeremiah 29 that we can say with firmality, "blessed be the name of the LORD."

the more time i spend with my bible verse scrapbook project, the more i see the truth behind Proverbs 30:5(a verse which states that all of God's words are pure)

you see, you can say, i like this verse. but the verses behind that verse and after it give it that much richer meaning. and often times i'm staring at a photocopied page of my bible trying to pick out the exact verse i wanted to cut and paste out, only to realize how many more i should've done... if i kept this up, i would end up just photocopying the entire bible.