Here is what I want for Generation 6 (it is quite long, so you may disregard is completely):
After having read
this,
this and
this thread, it has come to my attention that the Smogon Community strongly believes in the importance of having an initial banlist for the start of every generation's OU metagame. I am personally opposed to this idea, as I believe that, in the spirit of Smogon's suspect testing process, the OU metagame should be defined as "the balanced metagame from which the least number of Pokémon possible is banned." As a result, I have decided to make this post with the nearing dawn of Generation VI in mind, in the hope of preventing Smogon from making the same mistake that it did at the beginning of Generation V.
There is no such thing as a Pokémon that deserves to be banned from the OU metagame without going through any suspect testing process. While it is easy to see that Pokémon like Arceus, Kyogre and Groudon would be broken if they were each by themselves to be moved directly to the
current OU metagame, who exactly is it to say that the
current OU metagame is what the OU metagame
really should look like? Saying that, for example, "Dialga would completely break the
current OU metagame" and that "the
current OU metagame cannot handle Palkia" would be obvious, yet equally pointless, because Pokémon like support Arceus, Lugia and Ho-Oh do not exist in the
current OU metagame to check them. Who exactly is it to say that the OU metagame must necessarily be the one in which Pokémon like Tornadus-T, Terrakion, Deoxys-D and Politoed are the most viable? Why would there be something inherently wrong with such Pokémon being moved down to UU or BL, while the OU metagame's top threats consist of Pokémon like Kyogre, Groudon and Lugia?
To further help the readers to understand my proposal, I believe that, as already mentioned, the Generation V OU metagame at the very start should have had
absolutely zero Pokémon banned from them. In other words, there should not have been any difference between the initial Generation V OU metagame, and the Übers metagame. After a period of playing and testing in that OU metagame, which looks
exactly like the Übers metagame, people should
then suspect test any Pokémon found to overcentralize the OU metagame, which quite obviously is going to inevitably be Arceus. If that Pokémon being suspect tested gets voted to be banned to Übers,
then there may be a distinction between the OU metagame (in which Arceus in this case is banned) and the Übers metagame (in which Arceus in this case is not banned). Suspecting testing then continues, and if the new OU metagame without Arceus is still found to be overcentralized, by Pokémon such as Kyogre or Groudon,
then they can be suspect tested and/or banned as well. The process of suspect testing continues until the very first instant in which the metagame is found to be completely balanced; in other words, the first instant in which the metagame is not centralized around any particular Pokémon.
As someone who is very experienced in the Übers metagame, I believe that that metagame could have very easily become a completely balanced one after only Arceus is banned from it. If not, then after banning Kyogre, Groudon, and possibly Lugia as well, I cannot fathom how any overcentralization could possibly occur in that metagame at that point. In other words, had there not been an initial banlist at the start of the Generation V OU metagame, then by the end of this metagame, the list of Pokémon banished to the Übers tier could very well have consisted of no more than the following:
Arceus
Kyogre
Groudon
Lugia
Of course, I am not saying that I am definitely correct in this prediction, as theorymonning can only get one so far.
Maybe more Pokémon may need to be banned aside from the four mentioned above, in order to create a balanced metagame. In fact, maybe if there wasn't an initial banlist, then at the very end of all the suspect testing, the list of Pokémon in Übers may even be exactly the same as the one which Smogon has now. We never know, but I strongly believe that it is extremely unfair and against the spirit of suspect testing to ban any Pokémon from OU without at least giving them a chance. Because with the way Smogon's tiers are right now, the line between an "Über-level" Pokémon and an "OU-level Pokémon" is drawn between Thundurus-I/Manaphy (probably the worst "Über-level Pokémon") and Tornadus-T/Terrakion/Deoxys-D/Politoed (which seem to be considered to be the best "OU-level Pokémon"), which is completely and utterly arbitrary. Rather than drawing the line between Übers and OU at this point, I believe that it is much, much more reasonable to draw it between
the Pokémon that cannot ever possibly be balanced in any possible metagame, and
the Pokémon that can actually be balanced in a possible metagame.
Take a look at Pokémon like Blaziken, Excadrill, Thundurus-I and Genesect. Why did we ban them from OU? Because
their OU metagame, in which Pokémon such as Dialga, Palkia, Ho-Oh, Kyurem-W, Giratina, Mewtwo and Darkrai are banned, could not handle such Pokémon. Blaziken, Excadrill, Thundurus-I and Genesect were found to be way too powerful compared to every other Pokémon in the OU metagame, thus overcentralizing it, and therefore banned. But why are such Pokémon not found to to be overcentralizing in the Übers metagame? Because their powers are not anything special compared to most Pokémon in that metagame. So even though Blaziken, Excadrill, Thundurus-I and Genesect proved to be too powerful for the
current OU metagame, if hypothetically Smogon did not start Generation V with an initial banlist at all, it may never have been necessary to even suspect test
any of the four aforementioned Pokémon in OU. In fact, even the earliest of suspect tests such as Swift Swim + Drizzle would more than likely not have been necessary, as such things are far more manageable in an OU metagame containing more powerful Pokémon like those found in the current Übers tier.
Of course, allowing so many cover-legendary Pokémon in OU would change the OU metagame drastically compared to the way it currently is. For example, with Pokémon like Dialga, Palkia and Ho-Oh running around, Pokémon like Dragonite, Tornadus-T, Landorus, Rotom-W, Volcarona, Salamence and Haxorus would most likely not see enough usage to even be OU. But that is fine. Why does it seem that there is an unspoken perceived necessity, or at least, an inclination to maintain the status quo and make sure that such Pokémon remain in OU, as if there is anything inherently wrong with them
not being in OU? Is it just because most people have come to accept them as being among the "iconic" OU Pokémon? If so, then this is hardly a worthy justification in the face of the need to stay within the spirit of suspect testing. The same applies to what I believe to be the unspoken tendency to relegate cover legendary Pokémon to the Übers tier. Of course, such an inclination has already been gone against with the introduction of Kyurem-B to the OU metagame, so I see no reason why anyone would need to further have their decisions regarding suspect testing and initial banlists influenced by this.
Finally, I am aware that some people may attempt to refute everything I have written in this post by pointing out that even in the event that a metagame could be balanced while still containing most of the cover legendary Pokémon, then that balance would merely be a result of "broken Pokémon checking broken Pokémon," something that is undesirable. But to such people, I must say that this argument is invalid. Why are all OU and BL Pokémon banned from UU? Is it not because we can sustain the UU metagame? Since that is the case, why not move all OU and BL Pokémon to Übers then, and make UU the new OU metagame, since the balance that is achieved in the OU metagame is also a result of "broken Pokémon checking broken" from the perspective of the UU metagame? And why are all UU Pokémon banned from even lower tiers? Isn't it because UU Pokémon would be broken in such tiers? Why not move all UU Pokémon to Übers as well, since the UU metagame's balance is achieved through "broken Pokémon checking broken Pokémon" from the perspective of the lowest tiers? Depending on where one draws the line between "broken" and "not broken,"
absolutely any and every metagame could be seen as one in which balance is achieved only because "broken Pokémon check broken Pokémon," so it is not an argument to refute the idea that there should not be an initial banlist.
I hope that by making this post, I am able to bring to light why it is a bad idea to begin any generation's OU metagame with an initial banlist, and therefore prevent such from occurring again in the approaching Generation VI OU metagame.
I know that it is a bit early to be discussing about banlists. I just want to know what others think of this proposal.
