Removing the forward guard and making it cost stamina ruins the main positives of the skill, it does need the lower cd and it would be nice to have it connect better from other skills but adding another gappy cc instead isn't the move. Ninja is the king of gappy cc, it needs the frontal more than the other proposed changes, especially succession which only has 1 other reliable frontal skill (that also gets farmed by hit stun/stutter)