UFC 4 Patch Notes (3.0)

Hello EA SPORTS UFC fans!

The newest patch (3.0) for EA SPORTS UFC 4 is here! This is the first content heavy patch and we have some major updates to the game including new fighters, vanity, menu options, and gameplay changes. As always, the full patch notes can be found at the bottom of this article.

Fan favorites Calvin Kattar and Pedro Munhoz make their official entrance to the digital octagon. Kattar, the sixth ranked featherweight, will have a 4 star rating thanks to his elite boxing skills. Munoz, the sixth ranked bantamweight, boasts a 4.5 star rating due to his well rounded skill set. Additionally, we've added existing fighters to new weight classes, most notably Jon Jones to the heavyweight division. 

Venue select will now be an option when inviting a friend to an online match. This will allow you to play in the arena of your choosing including the Kumite and the Backyard arenas. The main menu has been changed to include a new category "Learn" that will house the newly updated practice mode, training manual, and tutorials. The practice mode HUD now includes all new information regarding various types of damage readouts. Additionally, the stamina HUD has been improved to be more visible and call out warning for low stamina.

Gameplay has received a ton of changes and fixes to areas that we have seen lots of community feedback. The last patch made some significant changes to the balance of ground and pound and this patch includes more important fixes relating to GnP defense. Stamina has been one of the largest areas of community feedback and we've included some changes that will help to balance the abundance of stamina. Head damage now causes a small stamina drain and power attributes now have a greater effect on the damage and stamina drain for specific moves. Major changes to stamina can have wide reaching impacts to all areas of gameplay so we will be monitoring the changes and will make additional tuning changes if needed. Additionally, we've given sways and slip counters a significant buff that will allow users to punish strike spammers more effectively.

Clinch spam has been another major area of feedback from the community and in the last patch we made a small update to increase the vulnerability of a fighter attempting a clinch entry. While that change has helped, it was not as impactful as we would have liked and we've made some more adjustments to the clinch in this patch. Most notably we've tuned the clinch entry and exit stamina drain. Escaping the clinch will now have a much smaller stamina drain for the defending fighter - which should discourage those fighters who spam clinch for the purpose of draining stamina. We also tuned striking within the clinch including an unintended issue allowing fighters to land multiple strikes on an opponent as they are escaping the clinch. We will continue to monitor community feedback regarding the clinch for additional tuning needs.

Submissions were tuned to allow a greater penalty for moving too fast on offense or defense. Previously on choke submissions, users were able to flick or spin their bar haphazardly without incurring a major penalty in the form of the maximum size of their bar. The new change has increased the maximum size that a bar can grow by moving too fast. Additionally, we've done some tuning to buff the strength levels of certain submissions that were slightly underpowered and we've decreased the strength level of guillotines from the headlock. These changes should allow submissions to become more nuanced and skill based.

Online world championships received some much-needed updates to matchmaking. We have also removed the ability to see your opponent's gamertag and division points before the match starts to prevent users from dodging opponents. Additionally, we have tuned matchmaking to improve the quality of matches. These changes will allow for much more competitive leaderboards as well as fix some issues with point attrition.

We are still working on many other areas of community feedback and we have more changes planned for future patches. Thank you for your continued support and feedback to help improve EA SPORTS UFC 4!

4.03.00

Major Updates:

• Added 2 new fighters Calvin Kattar and Pedro Munhoz
• Added following fighters to new weight classes:
  • Jon Jones to Heavyweight
  • Omari Akhmedov to Middleweight
  • Frankie Edgar to Bantamweight
  • Alexander Gustafsson to Heavyweight
• Added new items to Create A Fighter which include new hair styles, clothing items, and emotes to choose from
• Added Venue select to Invite A Friend
• Updated Main Menu and created a new category, Learn, which includes Practice, Tutorials and Training Manual
  • Accessibility still remains under Settings
• Added Simplified Controls option to Custom Fight Now Settings. This control scheme simplifies the striking controls to basic inputs and the game chooses what strike to throw next based on the situation.
  • Simplified Controls is a new option inside Custom Fight Now that lets you put up a fight without having to know all striking inputs.
  • You can turn it on individually for each corner. When turned on, use the face buttons to attack and the right trigger to defend. The AI will then choose what moves or actions to perform based on the timing of the button presses and the situation.
  • Each face button corresponds to a type of attack:
    • X (Xbox) - Square (PS) correspond to punches
    • A (Xbox) - X (PS) correspond to kicks
    • Y (Xbox) - Triangle (PS) correspond to clinch
    • B (Xbox) - Circle (PS) correspond to takedown
    • RT (Xbox) - R2 (PS) is used for both blocking high and low and sways, depending on timing

Gameplay Updates

• Added the ability to deny Spear Takedowns
• Persistent Drive added to a few positions
  • The Back Clinch Drives from Back Clinch and Cage Back Clinch.
  • Persistent drives are when the attacker has a chance to make a quick turn, even after a fast denial, before the drive ends in a break.
• Added D’arce Choke to Back Side Postured up position
• Added transition to Side Control from Back Side Postured up
• Added Get Up transition to Back Side Postured Up
• Added dynamic denial windows to flying submissions
• Added additional information to Practice Mode HUD
  • Damage Blocked - Amount of blocked damage
  • Damage Range - % mod due to range landed at
  • Damage Vulnerability - % mod caused by vulnerability
  • Current Stamina Damage - %mod caused by current stamina
  • Max Stamina Damage - % mod caused by max stamina
  • Opponent Stamina Damage - % mod caused by opponent's stamina
• Fixed issue where consecutive knees from Muay Thai clinch would prevent transition to cage clinch.
  • Bug when backing up in thai, the Dom could spam knees to prevent entering the cage position. 
• Fixed issue where some GnP Hooks appeared to land through successful posts. 
• Fixed issue where Stacked Guard Heel Hook and Kneebar were on the same input only allowing one to execute. 
• Fixed an issue with players escaping Takedowns immediately in certain BackClinch scenarios
• Fixed an issue with potential accidental sway inputs after posting
• Fixed an issue where ground strikes were not causing visual damage to fighters
• Fixed an issue where players could instantly get up from Tower takedowns
• Fixed issue with roles being swapped after cage get up from Sprawl
• Fixed issue with bicep control “spam” cancelling opponent’s knees
• Fixed instances of improper defenses being successful against clinch takedowns
• Fixed instances of improper defenses being successful against takedown turns
• Fixed issue with undue priority given to some ground transitions
• Fixed issues with sways during Ground and Pound
• Back Side Dom punches interrupted Sub transitions. These are now disabled during the transition
• Body Side Kick and Spinning Side kick now target opponent’s head if they’re slipping forward
• Head damage now causes a small stamina drain
• Slightly increased damage from Knee on Belly
• Slightly increased permanent damage caused by ground and pound
• Increased the effect of damage attributes
• Removed option to block while leaning back
• Tuned striking during clinch escapes
• Reduced duration of the Half guard posture state
• Removed evasion stamina penalty from attacks evaded by blocking sways
• Slip Counters have been tuned
• Tuned clinch entry and escape stamina
• Tuned the takedown finish and denial stamina costs
• Tuned submissions
• Tuned Stamina cost of Ground and Pound Strikes
• Tuned Pro and Legendary AI choke submission movement speeds to ensure the Legendary AI does not get punished for moving too quickly.

Misc. Updates

• Miscellaneous updates to some UFC fighter appearances/likenesses
  • Cody Garbrandt - Tattoo Update
  • Kevin Lee - Tattoo Update
  • Tim Elliot - Tattoo Update
  • Makwan Amirkhani - Tattoo Update
  • Fabricio Werdum - Tattoo Update
  • Eddie Wineland - Tattoo and Mustache update
  • Jimmie Rivera tattoo update
  • Anthony Smith - Tattoo update
• Fixed various UI issues
• Fixed issues with progression for some of the challenges
• Updated OWC Fighter Select to hide opponent’s name and division 
• Disabled Ground Defence arrows on Legendary difficulty
• Stamina HUD has been updated visually
• Fixed general stability issues