Some ponderings.

[The Original Red]

I have no doubt that I’m completely unfamiliar to virtually everyone reading this (at least under this handle) and this heavily opinionated article will as such not be backed by reputation. I’ve dabbled in online play for all generations of Pokémon; starting with PBS, then the GSBot and NetBattle, ShoddyBattle and Pokémon Online after. I went through dozens of handles and nick names and left the game for long intervals, only to come back because of how addicting and fun it can be. I’m ultimately just a fan of the series, still playing the actual games and having obsessive bouts of competitive play. You could also consider me somewhat of a Smogon lurker; being more of a player than a theorist I rarely felt the need to express myself. Something changed.

I thought the third generation was perfect, as it struck the right balance for me between offense and defense and putting a team together carefully could prepare you for everything. I felt in control and was really disappointed with how Nintendo handled the fourth gen, as Choice Scarf took the micro-management out of the speed stat and there were several threats that you couldn’t really prepare for because of how versatile they could be. While I didn’t agree with banning Garchomp and later Salamence at the time, I could see where people were coming from. I just felt that the generation was fundamentally flawed and that you’d need to ban a hell of a lot more for team diversity. That’s another topic altogether though, but it illustrates how I came into this gen… sceptical.

It seems with generation 5 that they tried to fix the issues of gen 4’s overcentralizing aspects by making everything overcentralizing. Many of the Dream World abilities are very over the top and weather teams completely dominate the current metagame. Smogon will have to make a conscious choice: will we/they proactively shape the metagame or only remove what is completely broken? The latter probably has the theoretical high ground, as it keeps the game closer to what the developers intended, but I think Smogon has already chosen for playing God to at least a certain extent. As far as I can tell there are systems and voting procedures in place to ban aspects of the game beyond the obvious uber legendaries and for the very first time I really feel that the metagame needs that kind reshaping.

The biggest problem with this is that most people are already completely clueless as to how and why certain choices came about. Example: From what I gather Moody is banned as an ability, but Blaziken has been banned altogether, presumably because of Speed Boost being broken (or just because it’s unavailable?). This seems inconsistent to me, but it is likely that I am missing the full facts because I just can’t find them. This lack of transparency is a huge problem for competitive players who don’t frequent Smogon (there are very man of them, I assure you) and this is neither beneficial to their understanding of the rules, nor Smogon’s image. It seems easy to fix by having a prominent article on bans on the main page that is being updated for as long as it takes, the metagames have always pretty much stabilized at some point.

As for what I feel deserves consideration in the near future… a complete ban on permanent weather abilities. In the time that I’ve been playing online I’ve seldomly ran into teams that didn’t carry Politoed, Ninetales, Hippowdon or Tyranitar. I’d add Abomasnow, but Hail teams are still relatively rare and not nearly as effective as their counterparts, IMO. Anyway, I feel the metagame is focused on weather to the point where it’s unhealthy, even if it’s not broken or unbeatable (at the very least you can push in your own “Imakeweatherbyexisting” critter). Drizzle + Swift Swim is already banned and Pokémon like Excadrill and Garchomp would be a lot less dominant without Sandstream backing them. It would also diversify the metagame, because if you reason under the assumption that a weather producer is pretty much a given, the options for other team members become limited. Of course, competitive play has always drawn from a subset of what is available, but a blanket ban on permanent weather is easy to enforce and deserves to be considered IMO. Moves like Rain Dance and Sunny Day would still be allowed under such conditions.

Another consideration to make would be removing DW abilities from the regular OU metagame, perhaps giving it its own metagame. I am not saying I necessarily support this, but it’s something to think about if Smogon really wants to shape and better the metagame. I guess my main point with this writing is that I want to get some responses and dialogue going and perhaps someone who is more ingrained into Smogon’s publishings can at least address the point regarding transparency.


inb4coolstorybro


P.S.: I really hope this is the right place for this. I’m sorry if it’s not.

:justin:<<<this face is funny

 

[Benlisted]

This would've been better in the suspect thread probably, not as a new thread.

That said, if you truly care a lot about the metagame, you can follow smogon to see why things take place - transparency is reasonable if you actively look for the stuff you care about. A week or two ago there were literally 10+ pages of discussion on how Blaziken was simply uncounterable outside of Slowbro, which many people seem to ignore or be unaware of when talking about the issue. Blaziken was not simply banned with no or inconsistent reasoning, and nor was Moody, but the reasoning behind each is now somewhat buried, which admittedly is problematic to those looking on from an outside perspective after events occurred. I'd take your idea for a sticky thread or similar detailing some of the discussion on a ban to the suggestion box forum, as it would solve the issue people like you who do not religiously read the huge suspect threads (understandably) have when things are banned.

 

[min min]

Blaziken:
high attack+powerful base powered moves+speed boost+swords dance+option for versatile moves=2hko all except Slowbro.

 

[breh]

Moody is an inherently broken ability, while Speed Boost is not. While a complex ban would definitely have been more suitable, the argument is that complex bans lead to a slippery slope of "how much do we have to neuter Kyogre to make it usable in OU" - type issues.

 

[Sajak]

Moody was banned because all Pokemon that had it were considered broken with the ability.

Blaziken was banned because it's best set is a Speed Boost set, and as others have pointed out, is uncounterable aside from Slowbro (or CB Aqua Jet Azumarill, but that's aside the point as something has to die to let it come in anyway). Speed Boost was available last gen on both Ninjask and Yanmega, and neither made a significant splash on the metagame (Yanmega wasn't even OU), so clearly Speed Boost wasn't the problem, it was just the pairing of it with Blaziken.

 

[cantab]

I though Moody was banned not because it was broken in terms of power, but because it's excessively luck-based, and arguably breaks the spirit of evasion clause.

 

[Thorhammer]

There is nowhere close to sufficient cause to make such a drastic ban.

Consider the ramifications: Tyranitar, Hippowdon, and Abomasnow would be kicked out of OU (and potentially UU, for Abomasnow) and into Ubers. Hippopotas and Snover would be kicked out of lower tiers and into Ubers. Venusaur and other weather-dependent Pokemon would fall right out of OU.

And for what? None of these Pokemon were deemed broken or otherwise harmful to the metagame. The ones that were, have already been taken care of, along with plenty of others that are not harmful in the slightest, which is right now being disputed because so many people are dissatisfied with how it was handled. You think this will satisfy more than a handful of people?

 

[The Original Red]

This would've been better in the suspect thread probably, not as a new thread.

That said, if you truly care a lot about the metagame, you can follow smogon to see why things take place - transparency is reasonable if you actively look for the stuff you care about. A week or two ago there were literally 10+ pages of discussion on how Blaziken was simply uncounterable outside of Slowbro, which many people seem to ignore or be unaware of when talking about the issue. Blaziken was not simply banned with no or inconsistent reasoning, and nor was Moody, but the reasoning behind each is now somewhat buried, which admittedly is problematic to those looking on from an outside perspective after events occurred. I'd take your idea for a sticky thread or similar detailing some of the discussion on a ban to the suggestion box forum, as it would solve the issue people like you who do not religiously read the huge suspect threads (understandably) have when things are banned.

I've taken note of what you said about the suggestion box and this topic perhaps being better off within an existing topic, but I got kind of lost, I suppose. If a moderator feels it needs to be closed, I wouldn't be offended.

What I meant by seeming inconsistency is that Moody is banned as an ability, not its potential users. Why not ban Speed Boost on Blaziken, rather than Blaziken altogether? I understand and agree to its brokenness, but it seems like a waste to completely remove an otherwise fine Pokémon for the sake of its DW ability. I guess the underlying idea is that something has to be always banned rather than get into complexities of not having certain abilities on certain Pokémon, but maybe exceptions can be made for at least DW abilities? Similar to how you can use Bibarel as long as it doesn't have Moody, you could also have Blaziken as long as it doesn't have Speed Boost and the same logic applies to the weather users. The slippery slope argument someone made about Kyogre seems unrealistic considering his stats rather than his ability got him banned originally and I currently don't see which other Pokemon and ability combination are broken while each on its own isn't per se.

You don't need to ban the Pokémon for their ability considering they can have other abilities, but it's not even relevant to the weather ability bans, as they would actually be similar to the ban on Moody... considering no Pokémon would be allowed to have them (unlike Speed Boost). It wouldn't change anything other than admittedly nerf the auto-weather users and the Pokémon which only excel under weather. Dramatic tier shifts would only happen as a result of some sort of dogma that states you can never detach abilities from Pokémon, but the Moody precedent already seems to negate that. So Pokémon like Ninetales and Politoed would probably go back in UU with their original set of abilities, while Tyranitar is probably still good even without auto-sandstorm.

 

[TorchicBlaziken]

Have we ever actually had a slippery slope? I've only heard hearsay. People said that DSw ban would lead to a slippery slope, but I don't see it.

 

[Sajak]

What I meant by seeming inconsistency is that Moody is banned as an ability, not its potential users. Why not ban Speed Boost on Blaziken, rather than Blaziken altogether? I understand and agree to its brokenness, but it seems like a waste to completely remove an otherwise fine Pokémon for the sake of its DW ability. I guess the underlying idea is that something has to be always banned rather than get into complexities of not having certain abilities on certain Pokémon, but maybe exceptions can be made for at least DW abilities? Similar to how you can use Bibarel as long as it doesn't have Moody, you could also have Blaziken as long as it doesn't have Speed Boost and the same logic applies to the weather users. The slippery slope argument someone made about Kyogre seems unrealistic considering his stats rather than his ability got him banned originally and I currently don't see which other Pokemon and ability combination are broken while each on its own isn't per se.

You don't need to ban the Pokémon for their ability considering they can have other abilities, but it's not even relevant to the weather ability bans, as they would actually be similar to the ban on Moody... considering no Pokémon would be allowed to have them (unlike Speed Boost). It wouldn't change anything other than admittedly nerf the auto-weather users and the Pokémon which only excel under weather. Dramatic tier shifts would only happen as a result of some sort of dogma that states you can never detach abilities from Pokémon, but the Moody precedent already seems to negate that. So Pokémon like Ninetales and Politoed would probably go back in UU with their original set of abilities, while Tyranitar is probably still good even without auto-sandstorm.

You don't ban Pokemon + a specific ability because Pokemon are considered based on their best available set, and in the case of Blaziken, it's best set uses Speed Boost.

In the case of Moody, the ability itself breaks any Pokemon that has it, so it should be banned, and not the Pokemon.

 

[Thorhammer]

Have we ever actually had a slippery slope? I've only heard hearsay. People said that DSw ban would lead to a slippery slope, but I don't see it.

Seems more like a sticky slope right now. Lots of ideas start to fall down it, but they get stuck and won't go anywhere without a good reason. Which seems perfectly fine, if you ask me.

 

[Benlisted]

@Theoriginalred: Like the above posters have said, in all but the case of the Drizzle+SwSw ban, which was only done to save the entire playstyle of rain from extinction, we as of yet do not ban broken elements in combination with each other. This would simply make the entire tiering process incredibly complex, as every pokemon only strong via an ability of even single move would be tested and claused appropriately if we followed that precedent. Imo, this is the main reason why Blaziken was not claused in this manner, as it would set the scene for Magic Guard+Reuniclus etc bans, which would quickly spiral into huge complexity.

 

[cantab]

I don't think it would add any particular complexity to consider some Pokemon with their different abilities separately. Indeed, in many cases there's hardly any extra testing requirement. Blaze Blaziken is inarguably not broken. Speed Boost Blaziken has been deemed to be broken.

You don't ban Pokemon + a specific ability because Pokemon are considered based on their best available set, and in the case of Blaziken, it's best set uses Speed Boost

That idea was all well and good in Gen 4, when it came to things like Salamence that would be darn powerful whether or not it had Outrage. But the impact of Speed Boost on Blaziken is huge; I think the only precedent, in terms of a Pokemon so strongly dependent on its Ability, is Wobb, and he didn't have a second ability so the issue was moot. Similarly, there's probably only one Pokemon that strongly depends on a single move, Darkrai, but frankly he'd be strong in OU even without Dark Void. Blaziken is different; without Speed Boost, he's arguably outclassed by Infernape and would quite possibly be UU.

On concerns that we'd start seeing dozens of Ability Pokemon bans, bear in mind that first the Pokemon in general needs to be deemed Uber. Only then can the question be asked "is it Uber mainly because of its Ability?" And frankly that can be postponed, if suspect testing wants to move on. And I don't think there'll be too many Pokemon that might realistically get such bans. Blaziken of course. Reuniclus maybe. Swift Swim Kingdra and co - perhaps banning that is preferable to the Drizzle-SwSw ban. Sand Veil/Snow Cloakers, but on hax basis more than brokenness.

 

[Sajak]

That idea was all well and good in Gen 4, when it came to things like Salamence that would be darn powerful whether or not it had Outrage. But the impact of Speed Boost on Blaziken is huge; I think the only precedent, in terms of a Pokemon so strongly dependent on its Ability, is Wobb, and he didn't have a second ability so the issue was moot. Similarly, there's probably only one Pokemon that strongly depends on a single move, Darkrai, but frankly he'd be strong in OU even without Dark Void. Blaziken is different; without Speed Boost, he's arguably outclassed by Infernape and would quite possibly be UU.

Dugtrio with Arena Trap is not banned, which, while not exactly the same as Shadow Tag, does go some way to disprove the Wobbuffet argument. Even then, Shadow Tag in itself is not inherently broken. I could give Shadow Tag to a large number of Pokemon and those Pokemon would not be considered Uber, meaning that Shadow Tag is not broken, and it is the combination of the ability with the Pokemon that is broken, and considering that Pokemon are viewed in their entirety, the Pokemon, and not the combination of the Pokemon and the ability, would be banned.

I agree on Darkrai, but I have a suspicion that he would be sent to Ubers with or without dark Void, but that's just theory.

 

[zyrefredric]

There is nowhere close to sufficient cause to make such a drastic ban.

Consider the ramifications: Tyranitar, Hippowdon, and Abomasnow would be kicked out of OU (and potentially UU, for Abomasnow) and into Ubers. Hippopotas and Snover would be kicked out of lower tiers and into Ubers. Venusaur and other weather-dependent Pokemon would fall right out of OU.

The way I understand it, Unnerve Tyranitar, Sand Force Hippowdon, Soundproof Abomasnow, Water Absorb / Damp Politoed and Flash Fire Ninetales are still allowed in standard play.

I wasn't around during the low level Kyogre/Groudon test, but I've heard (prove me if I'm wrong) that the test only proved that Drizzle/Drought are inherently broken? If that's true, then I really don't understand why Politoed and Ninetales get to do away with it.

For me, if an ability is inherently broken, that means that even if it is given to a "worthless" pokemon, it breaks that pokemon. Moody fits this description, so I'm happy that it's been banned.

I would support a weather ban, if only there is an equivalent item that makes Sandstorm and Hail last for 8 turns instead of 5. But there's none, so I am yet unsure where I stand on this issue. Of course, smooth rock and icy rock. Just shows how accustomed I was with DPPt where only Damp and Heat Rock are the only the ones that see usage. Well then, I don't really mind playing a weatherless metagame, where weather needs to be set up like Trick Room, Gravity, etc. But as it is, I think it would be best to try out Drizzle+SwSwKingdra.

 

[Shining Kestral]

I would support a weather ban, if only there is an equivalent item that makes Sandstorm and Hail last for 8 turns instead of 5. But there's none, so I am yet unsure where I stand on this issue.

Smooth Rock and Icy Rock say hi.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

The level 1 Kyogre/Groudon test was in Advance (even before Emerald, I guess) and I don't think it was even documented, while the level ~65 Kyogre/Groudon 5-8 turn weather test was in CaP during D/P in an altered metagame with a much smaller playerbase.


Please people, don't bring those tests up in B/W.

 

[Thorhammer]

The way I understand it, Unnerve Tyranitar, Sand Force Hippowdon, Soundproof Abomasnow, Water Absorb / Damp Politoed and Flash Fire Ninetales are still allowed in standard play.

I wasn't around during the low level Kyogre/Groudon test, but I've heard (prove me if I'm wrong) that the test only proved that Drizzle/Drought are inherently broken? If that's true, then I really don't understand why Politoed and Ninetales get to do away with it.

For me, if an ability is inherently broken, that means that even if it is given to a "worthless" pokemon, it breaks that pokemon. Moody fits this description, so I'm happy that it's been banned.

I would support a weather ban, if only there is an equivalent item that makes Sandstorm and Hail last for 8 turns instead of 5. But there's none, so I am yet unsure where I stand on this issue. Of course, smooth rock and icy rock. Just shows how accustomed I was with DPPt where only Damp and Heat Rock are the only the ones that see usage. Well then, I don't really mind playing a weatherless metagame, where weather needs to be set up like Trick Room, Gravity, etc. But as it is, I think it would be best to try out Drizzle+SwSwKingdra.

Unnerve Tyranitar, Soundproof Abomasnow, and Sand Force Hippowdon do not exist at present. Until their DW abilities are released, if ever, this would result in a soft-ban of them.

As for Ninetales and Politoed, I never said that they would be banned, just useless in OU.

 

[Lou Cypher]

Unnerve Tyranitar, Soundproof Abomasnow, and Sand Force Hippowdon do not exist at present. Until their DW abilities are released, if ever, this would result in a soft-ban of them.

As for Ninetales and Politoed, I never said that they would be banned, just useless in OU.

How would that really be a big problem tho? Especially Tyranitar is just so much better then his weather counterparts, and Sand is a lot more influential on the game then Rain and Sun seem to be.

 

[Thorhammer]

How would that really be a big problem tho? Especially Tyranitar is just so much better then his weather counterparts, and Sand is a lot more influential on the game then Rain and Sun seem to be.

Losing OU-viable Pokemon for no good reason is always a big problem.

 

[The Original Red]

Yet you would rather ban Blaziken altogether than just his ability.

 

[Sajak]

Yet you would rather ban Blaziken altogether than just his ability.

Speed Boost is not inherently broken.

 

[TheMaskedNitpicker]

Losing OU-viable Pokemon for no good reason is always a big problem.

What? Why? If by losing Tyranitar, a bunch of other Pokemon become viable, why is that a big problem? Please explain yourself.

 

[cantab]

Dugtrio with Arena Trap is not banned, which, while not exactly the same as Shadow Tag, does go some way to disprove the Wobbuffet argument. Even then, Shadow Tag in itself is not inherently broken.

Almost no ability can possibly be "inherently broken", since almost all abilities can only be of benefit if the Pokemon they're on can be effective. But for some Pokemon, their ability is a fairly minor part of their power. For some, it's more significant. And for a handful, it's one of the biggest factors; the Pokemon would be lacklustre, even outclassed, without it.

considering that Pokemon are viewed in their entirety, the Pokemon, and not the combination of the Pokemon and the ability, would be banned.

This is essentially the dogma that I'm challenging. What tangible benefits does it bring? "Simplicity", but really, banning a Pokemon with a specific ability is hardly complicated. Meanwhile, the drawback is reducing diversity, potentially in UU as well as and more so than OU.

 

[reachzero]

Welcome to the club! Your experience of 5th Generation closely resembles that of many of us. I think we all have issues both with the metagame and with the current system--I feel that one of the worst changes from the 4th Gen tiering system to this one is the loss of paragraphs. When voters needed to write paragraphs, you could always publish them to explain the exact reasons for banning any particular Suspect. Smogon's entire tiering process is very democratic; the administration neither chooses the Suspects nor votes on them.

As for your comments about weather, I feel that we are playing in a metagame with an incredible number of imbalanced Pokemon. I think banning, at the absolute minimum, Drizzle, Drought, Landorus, Excadrill and Garchomp would give us a far better and more enjoyable metagame than we currently have. Unfortunately for you and I, tiering decisions don't necessarily work that way, and that best we can do is qualify to vote, and do our part to shape the metagame as much as we can.