To take an extreme example, hypothetically, would you prefer to face an opponent with 5 Pokemon, or an opponent with 5 ordinary Pokemon and a Pokemon with only Splash as lead? For some teams, the Pokemon with Splash is still a hindrance but, particularly for any team that can get a setup sweeper in against it, the latter team is often worse off than the former despite having 6 Pokemon instead of 5. If CAP 19 was intended to be fainted by a Pokemon that, for example, relies on EdgeQuake two attack coverage, and CAP is immune to/takes little damage from Earthquake, Grudge can be used to leave the opponent with mono-Ground coverage. Anything else that doesn't care about Ground attacks is then free to setup as it pleases. I agree that losing PP on a move that isn't relevant to the match would be a bad thing, but the key would be designing CAP such that the move used to KO it would still be relevant when it is KO'd.
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CAP 19 CAP 19 - Part 1 - Closed Concept Assessment
- Thread starter paintseagull
- Start date
- Status
It seems to me that the difference between Grudge and Destiny Bond is at the core of this concept. They are exactly the same kind of punishing move that's used to neutralize a dangerous pokemon, but the difference is that one of them faints the target, and one of them cripples the target. So the question is, is there ever a situation where it makes more competitive sense to leave the enemy alive than to faint them given the opportunity? Because if there isn't, then this concept is hopeless out of the gate, since the entire idea is to discourage the opponent from fainting you.
I think these situatations do exist, but as was said previously, they typically come up late-game, when you're looking to stall out a dangerous field effect or something similar. Is it possible to create a pokemon that actively generates these scenarios as a gameplan, even if the opponent knows what you're trying to do?
What are the benefits of leaving an enemy pokemon alive when you have the chance to faint them? Is gaining control over a pokemon (for example, Tricking Blissey a Choice Scarf) ever better than fainting them outright?
I think these situatations do exist, but as was said previously, they typically come up late-game, when you're looking to stall out a dangerous field effect or something similar. Is it possible to create a pokemon that actively generates these scenarios as a gameplan, even if the opponent knows what you're trying to do?
What are the benefits of leaving an enemy pokemon alive when you have the chance to faint them? Is gaining control over a pokemon (for example, Tricking Blissey a Choice Scarf) ever better than fainting them outright?
Okay, this is going in a direction that I don't want it to go in. Please stop talking about individual moves like Grudge, Destiny Bond and Trick. As I just said in my last post, these are individual moves that I do not believe are good for an entire concept direction, so please save discussion about these moves for later stages (namely movepool). Keep further discussion based on the topics I've brought up.
All these arguments against status are assuming that we'd just toxic quagsire and call it a day. The entire point of status it is to use the momentum gained from fainting along with the crippling effect of burns/paralysis to give nearly any set-up sweeper the change to set-up. If I hear "A cleric will just use heal bell" one more time, then I'm going to murder a baby kitten with a spoon.
This is why I think non-weather moves such as tailwind and trick room should be our focus - they don't suffer the same issue that weather does in the sense that there's so many abusers out there.
I guess my issue is (and I'm not saying this to say I'll keep discussing these moves), there isn't much else to discuss as per your previous post, DarkSlay. As ginganinja pointed out, having a "standard lure" fundamentally doesn't work, given lures won't lure things if the opponent knows the primary goal is to lure (there has got to be a better synonym here). There isn't too much else to say on the subject as far as I can imagine.
That leaves the only viable issue you want discussion on at field effects, which, well, aren't exactly a new phenomenon to tie in with fainting. Pre-Gen V, using Explosion on weather setters was pretty common, and certain Dual Screeners like Uxie and Cresselia have been known to set up and sacrifice themselves with Memento or Lunar Dance. This CAP would be exploring nothing new by entering that territory unless we delve into newer effects, like Terrains (which you've rightfully said we should put aside).
I know you've said you don't have anything against discussing weather, but I get the impression that most other folks here certainly do. People didn't vote on a CAP that explores how weather works in Gen VI. Weather has been examined to hell and back, and this CAP has potential far beyond digging up that horse, let alone beating it.
Finally (and again, not planning on actually reigniting move discussion without any go-ahead), I think the reason it's turned to moves is because they're so directly vital to how this CAP will proceed from the beginning. Heck, the very first question is "How can a Pokemon leave a long-lasting effect on the rest of the battle with just its moves?"
That leaves the only viable issue you want discussion on at field effects, which, well, aren't exactly a new phenomenon to tie in with fainting. Pre-Gen V, using Explosion on weather setters was pretty common, and certain Dual Screeners like Uxie and Cresselia have been known to set up and sacrifice themselves with Memento or Lunar Dance. This CAP would be exploring nothing new by entering that territory unless we delve into newer effects, like Terrains (which you've rightfully said we should put aside).
I know you've said you don't have anything against discussing weather, but I get the impression that most other folks here certainly do. People didn't vote on a CAP that explores how weather works in Gen VI. Weather has been examined to hell and back, and this CAP has potential far beyond digging up that horse, let alone beating it.
Finally (and again, not planning on actually reigniting move discussion without any go-ahead), I think the reason it's turned to moves is because they're so directly vital to how this CAP will proceed from the beginning. Heck, the very first question is "How can a Pokemon leave a long-lasting effect on the rest of the battle with just its moves?"
I know that people have been implicitly disagreeing with this already, but to make it explicit: Base Speed said that being fainted is never better than being alive. That's not really true. There's a cost to being alive. An easy example is a burned physical attacker. With its main means of threatening the other team neutered, all it can do usually is sit there. It's not even good death fodder because good death fodder at least compels the opponent to appreciate fainting it due to any lingering threat it poses.
This gets into a concept from chess that I think is extremely relevant to the fainting dynamic. Zugzwang is the state of being put into a disadvantage simply because you have to use your turn. You're trying to KO something that's weak against Electric as quickly as possible, but *whoops*, your Electric attack is Volt Switch so you have to switch out. People who've played enough drawn-out games have an intuitive awareness of zugzwang, except here we're talking about having an out in choosing not to KO the other Pokemon immediately. Sometimes, to keep on going with the "faint the other guy" mentality is an obvious mistake (at least in hindsight!), so it's easy to make such a mistake if you're not paying attention. For example, you're a defensive team trying to stop a last mon sweeper, and the way to do that is to use living Pokemon on the opposing team to phaze.
I'm not all too certain of how best to represent this concept in a Pokemon. Endgame zugzwang-like situations can be achieved with just about any Pokemon. I threw the field effect setter idea out there just to try to keep the ball rolling, but I guess the idea behind it would be to help create such situations outside of the endgame.
This gets into a concept from chess that I think is extremely relevant to the fainting dynamic. Zugzwang is the state of being put into a disadvantage simply because you have to use your turn. You're trying to KO something that's weak against Electric as quickly as possible, but *whoops*, your Electric attack is Volt Switch so you have to switch out. People who've played enough drawn-out games have an intuitive awareness of zugzwang, except here we're talking about having an out in choosing not to KO the other Pokemon immediately. Sometimes, to keep on going with the "faint the other guy" mentality is an obvious mistake (at least in hindsight!), so it's easy to make such a mistake if you're not paying attention. For example, you're a defensive team trying to stop a last mon sweeper, and the way to do that is to use living Pokemon on the opposing team to phaze.
I'm not all too certain of how best to represent this concept in a Pokemon. Endgame zugzwang-like situations can be achieved with just about any Pokemon. I threw the field effect setter idea out there just to try to keep the ball rolling, but I guess the idea behind it would be to help create such situations outside of the endgame.
In terms of what can be discussed, it's rather important to get an idea of what we want CAP 19 to do throughout a match. If its only role is to eventually be KO'd, unless that KO sets up a sweeper who single-handedly sweeps most of the time, the opportunity cost is going to be too high and nobody is going to use it. However, if it is too useful throughout the match, there'll be no incentive to allow it to be KO'd. I personally think that we need to give CAP 19 some early game utility (this may involve laying hazards, or potentially involve keeping hazards off the field in a counter-lead style role, or perhaps even scouting, just to name a few examples - all three, in their own way, make their presence felt throughout the match), but ensure that it is not as good in the mid game as it is early. Any utility it has later on in the match should be relatively minimal - if it has decent bulk, it may find some use walling certain threats, but it should not constitute a key component of mid game planning. If we can achieve this, such that CAP 19 has already somewhat justified its place on the team in the early game but become redundant by the later game, then we have created a Pokemon that does not carry a cost to sacrifice to the KO. At that point, heading into the late game, CAP 19 can then be designed to engineer a match situation where, by allowing itself to be KO'd, it facilitates a dangerous setup sweeper to get in and do its job.
Even for those who disagree on the exact role CAP 19 should play, we need to plot out what CAP 19 should be doing at any given stage in the match. Doing so allows us to identify how it becomes better for us to have CAP 19 KO'd, and when in the match CAP 19 should be KO'd. Part of exploring the concept of fainting is identifying the difference between losing a Pokemon early in the game, during the mid game, or late game. If we're going to design a CAP that is intended to faint, we need to be able to specify when it should faint, and what it should be doing in the team prior to that point that a) justifies its inclusion in the team while b) not being so useful as to discourage fainting it.
Even for those who disagree on the exact role CAP 19 should play, we need to plot out what CAP 19 should be doing at any given stage in the match. Doing so allows us to identify how it becomes better for us to have CAP 19 KO'd, and when in the match CAP 19 should be KO'd. Part of exploring the concept of fainting is identifying the difference between losing a Pokemon early in the game, during the mid game, or late game. If we're going to design a CAP that is intended to faint, we need to be able to specify when it should faint, and what it should be doing in the team prior to that point that a) justifies its inclusion in the team while b) not being so useful as to discourage fainting it.
*affectsI think we should redefine what we mean by leaving your 'presence' on the battlefield, whether that's before or after death. Right now, We're treating presence as something only tangible that directly comes from the use of a move.
For example, if you send out latios, and are prepared to use Draco-Meteor the next turn with close to no retaliation, you have high presence. Something on their team is going to have to take a hard hit, no matter what they do.
Basically, a high presence comes from the ability to greatly punish the enemy's mistakes with little to no ability to retaliate.
Make sense? I hope so. Now let's talk about the concept. Right now, it could be said that there are two different criteria for the concept. One is maintaining presence after death. There's really easy ways to do this. Weather, Hazards, anything like this has a lasting effect on the battle, even after death. On the same note, defog and rapid spin leave a similar effect on the battlefield, although it's much more defensively oriented.
Secondly, there's maintaining presence while alive, but discouraging death. That is to say, changing your opponent's thinking from "I better kill CAP!" to "If I kill CAP bad things happen!" This is where moves like Destiny Bond come in. They directly discourage the killing of your Pokemon, but can produce just as much threat as a solid Draco-Meteor. Discouraging death is NOT LIMITED TO EFFECTS THAT ONLY OCCUR WHEN YOU FAINT. Ferrothorn is a good example of this. If you poke it, it pokes back. if you poke it too much, you die. If you don't die, then you get hurt super bad before you can kill it. Honestly, Aftermath is like a shitty version of Iron Barbs. Other abilities do this to an extent, as well.
I made this pretty chart to explain where normal "roles" fit in.
We want the top right. That is all.
Wow, I was about to post something along these lines, but it seems you've done it in a simpler fashion and tone.
What I want to discuss involves what aspects a Pokémon can have without fainting but switching out. Basically I want to address the Assessment segment by examining things in the battle that don't necessarily involve fainting a Pokémon, but rather what effects they leave in the battle by still being alive. Which of these aspects can we translate from an absent Pokémon to a fainted Pokémon (i.e. we work towards making it so fainting the CAP causes a certain condition to occur)?
The obvious aspect is hazards; your supportive lead can set up hazards, and if not removed, can switch out. Your opponent may resort to defogging or spinning them away, but they must consider that your support source is still alive.
Many people have vouched for preventing our CAP from being a suicide setter, and because there may not be a lot to learn from making it so, that proposal will be picked up my city's public refuse tomorrow morning.
The next option that we can examine is status. If you were incapable of removing a status setter, the job of your cleric may be nil. Sometimes you need to stop the leak before you can fix the boat.
In terms of making CAP19 like this we could make it that factor that keeps weakening your team and stay active after death (Ignus brought up some good stuff). How we do this
But what other aspect of the battle enables an absent Pokémon's presence to be felt?
I want to add to many peoples' lists of effects that a sacrificial Pokémon can have.
So, yeah, there are hazards, status and weather, which are all very viable ways of promoting active after death consequences.
Perhaps one of the more devastating things a Pokémon can do to switch out is to pass boosts to teammates.
Passing boosts is almost like leaving a will containing a fortune, but in battles Baton Pass does not faint the user. Baton Pass is purely for example and not what I am requesting the community to follow, I just think it's an option that can help us learn about what a fainted/absent Pokémon leaves once off the battlefield.
I would really like to see what the community thinks of this (possibly viable or horribly incompetent?).
I was just looking through the thread and only saw posts on blatantly obvious and increasingly redundant aspects that can gear us towards an unfun project ("hey look, another person mentioned Destiny Bond/hazards"). These are things that are felt after fainting a Pokémon, but it seems like they don't really guide us to look at this project to make this a unique Pokémon, not some OU version of Froslass and
The biggest issue here, and the elephant in the room, is that the situations you are describing are all undesirable things for our Pokemon and desirable things for our opponent. Burned attacker as an example: We do not want to make an attacker that is neutered while burned, if for no reason other than it is impossible to force an opponent to burn the Pokemon. We need to find a way to swing this concept around from passive to active.
We want to figure out how to shift this topic away from "what do we want to happen to CAP?" to "what do we want CAP to make happen?" If status is out, we can't burn foes to put them in that state. If we make an attacker that *would* be neutered by burn, it would still need to be a competent enough attacker to warrant burning it in the first place instead of just KOing it. Usually that means bulk.
My issue with this concept the whole time has been its combination of vagueness and passivity. So far we are struggling to find a core idea and being distracted by side issues because we're wrapping our head around this by assuming this concept applies to a defensive element of teambuilding. We should perhaps be looking outside that box into the kind of conditions we force externally.
We want to figure out how to shift this topic away from "what do we want to happen to CAP?" to "what do we want CAP to make happen?" If status is out, we can't burn foes to put them in that state. If we make an attacker that *would* be neutered by burn, it would still need to be a competent enough attacker to warrant burning it in the first place instead of just KOing it. Usually that means bulk.
My issue with this concept the whole time has been its combination of vagueness and passivity. So far we are struggling to find a core idea and being distracted by side issues because we're wrapping our head around this by assuming this concept applies to a defensive element of teambuilding. We should perhaps be looking outside that box into the kind of conditions we force externally.
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Pretty cool discussion here guys, I just have a few points I want to make.
Firstly, I've been seeing a lot of avocation for playing the role of something that gets KO'd after doing some job to give a set up sweeper an opportunity to come in safely and set up. It's a pretty cool idea and it was one I had agreed with for a while until I thought about it some more. My main gripe with this is: doesn't every Pokemon already do this in some way or another? I mean, sacking a mon to let your sweeper come in safely is nothing new. In fact, that's really a pretty basic tactic for any team that has a set up sweeper, which is most teams. While it's perfectly fine to elaborate on an already common strategy, I have to point out that one doesn't build a team planning to sack a Pokemon. The "death fodder" Pokemon isn't really a product of planning, it's a product of the situation. The Pokemon on your team you are willing to sacrifice are going to be different every match.
Say I have a Keldeo on my team and in team preview I see 4 water resists and a Talonflame. In that particular game I wont really mind letting Keldeo faint to give one of my other Pokemon a free turn because it was dead weight anyway, but in other games he might be my win condition and I need to keep him alive at all costs. The same thing can happen in the middle of a battle too. Say my Scarf Terrakion gets burned somehow, during my teambuilding phase Terrakion was my revenge killer but now that I'm in the middle of a battle and it got burned he's my death fodder. I'm not the smartest or best Pokemon player around but basically the point I am trying to make is why would you go into a battle looking to get one of your Pokemon KO'd? Sure, shit happens and often the best way to salvage a situation is letting your weakest link go, but I don't think anyone builds a team planning to use a Pokemon only as a sacrifice. I mean, that might work occasionally but most of the time doing that is just going to put you in a 5-6 situation. Anyone would rather have six live Pokemon if they could help it.
And even if you can get that strategy to work well (a big if imo), why would you give such power over said strategy to your opponent? They get to choose whether they KO you or not. Even if your strategy works really well they could just switch out or something. You have zero control over your own strategy if you go into battle relying on your opponent to make the decision to KO you. Ok, yeah, that was the concept- to discourage you opponent from KOing CAP. BUT, you can't really take advantage of that. If CAP staying alive was something that you could take advantage of then your opponent wouldn't be discouraged from KOing it in the first place. And if CAP fainting is something you could take advantage of then your opponent can just choose not to KO it. Basically, by relying on one of your own Pokemon fainting you are handing a lot of power to your opponent, and that is really unreliable.
And before someone brings up self KO moves here- they are all exceptionally awful except for memento (which is merely awful in a non-outstanding way). Explosion- best outcome is a double KO for a double blind switch in. Final gambit-same deal. Grudge-no. Destiny bond- only as a surprise.
Ok. That was a lot of negativity but it just had to be said. On a more constructive note, I think we should focus on the "makes it's presence felt after it has fainted" aspect of the concept, because that seems pretty doable. I think something along the lines of an "extremely passive" Pokemon like Deck Knight brought up earlier would be the optimal way to go.
Also, I don't think that this has been brought up yet, but what about a "sniper" Pokemon? By that I mean something that takes out a really key Pokemon in your opponent's team like their spinner/defogger or their revenge killer or maybe a wall or something. If CAP takes out a Pokemon that is especially vital to your opponent then it's presence in the match remains regardless of whether it gets KO'd soon after. Kind of like what Mega-Gengar used to do. His role before he was banned was to take out the most important Pokemon on your opponent's team, letting your other Pokemon come in and control the match. By no means am I advocating something as OP as Mega-Gengar, but his role on a team was a very interesting one nonetheless. After he got rid of that "important Pokemon" on your opponent's team, be it their physical wall, revenge killer, etc. , it didn't really matter if he got KO'd or not. He had done his job and probably won you the match, his presence in the battle lasting far beyond his death.
tl;dr
- Sacrificial mons are sacrificial because they are otherwise useless, it's almost always better to have a useful live Pokemon.
- Relying on your opponent to KO your Pokemon puts a lot of power in your opponent's hand.
- It's going to be far more viable to focus on the "lasting presence" aspect of the concept than the "discourage the opponent from KOing you" aspect.
- A "sniper" could easily make it's presence last after death and not be as boring as a para-shuffler or suicide hazard lead.
Firstly, I've been seeing a lot of avocation for playing the role of something that gets KO'd after doing some job to give a set up sweeper an opportunity to come in safely and set up. It's a pretty cool idea and it was one I had agreed with for a while until I thought about it some more. My main gripe with this is: doesn't every Pokemon already do this in some way or another? I mean, sacking a mon to let your sweeper come in safely is nothing new. In fact, that's really a pretty basic tactic for any team that has a set up sweeper, which is most teams. While it's perfectly fine to elaborate on an already common strategy, I have to point out that one doesn't build a team planning to sack a Pokemon. The "death fodder" Pokemon isn't really a product of planning, it's a product of the situation. The Pokemon on your team you are willing to sacrifice are going to be different every match.
Say I have a Keldeo on my team and in team preview I see 4 water resists and a Talonflame. In that particular game I wont really mind letting Keldeo faint to give one of my other Pokemon a free turn because it was dead weight anyway, but in other games he might be my win condition and I need to keep him alive at all costs. The same thing can happen in the middle of a battle too. Say my Scarf Terrakion gets burned somehow, during my teambuilding phase Terrakion was my revenge killer but now that I'm in the middle of a battle and it got burned he's my death fodder. I'm not the smartest or best Pokemon player around but basically the point I am trying to make is why would you go into a battle looking to get one of your Pokemon KO'd? Sure, shit happens and often the best way to salvage a situation is letting your weakest link go, but I don't think anyone builds a team planning to use a Pokemon only as a sacrifice. I mean, that might work occasionally but most of the time doing that is just going to put you in a 5-6 situation. Anyone would rather have six live Pokemon if they could help it.
And even if you can get that strategy to work well (a big if imo), why would you give such power over said strategy to your opponent? They get to choose whether they KO you or not. Even if your strategy works really well they could just switch out or something. You have zero control over your own strategy if you go into battle relying on your opponent to make the decision to KO you. Ok, yeah, that was the concept- to discourage you opponent from KOing CAP. BUT, you can't really take advantage of that. If CAP staying alive was something that you could take advantage of then your opponent wouldn't be discouraged from KOing it in the first place. And if CAP fainting is something you could take advantage of then your opponent can just choose not to KO it. Basically, by relying on one of your own Pokemon fainting you are handing a lot of power to your opponent, and that is really unreliable.
And before someone brings up self KO moves here- they are all exceptionally awful except for memento (which is merely awful in a non-outstanding way). Explosion- best outcome is a double KO for a double blind switch in. Final gambit-same deal. Grudge-no. Destiny bond- only as a surprise.
Ok. That was a lot of negativity but it just had to be said. On a more constructive note, I think we should focus on the "makes it's presence felt after it has fainted" aspect of the concept, because that seems pretty doable. I think something along the lines of an "extremely passive" Pokemon like Deck Knight brought up earlier would be the optimal way to go.
Also, I don't think that this has been brought up yet, but what about a "sniper" Pokemon? By that I mean something that takes out a really key Pokemon in your opponent's team like their spinner/defogger or their revenge killer or maybe a wall or something. If CAP takes out a Pokemon that is especially vital to your opponent then it's presence in the match remains regardless of whether it gets KO'd soon after. Kind of like what Mega-Gengar used to do. His role before he was banned was to take out the most important Pokemon on your opponent's team, letting your other Pokemon come in and control the match. By no means am I advocating something as OP as Mega-Gengar, but his role on a team was a very interesting one nonetheless. After he got rid of that "important Pokemon" on your opponent's team, be it their physical wall, revenge killer, etc. , it didn't really matter if he got KO'd or not. He had done his job and probably won you the match, his presence in the battle lasting far beyond his death.
tl;dr
- Sacrificial mons are sacrificial because they are otherwise useless, it's almost always better to have a useful live Pokemon.
- Relying on your opponent to KO your Pokemon puts a lot of power in your opponent's hand.
- It's going to be far more viable to focus on the "lasting presence" aspect of the concept than the "discourage the opponent from KOing you" aspect.
- A "sniper" could easily make it's presence last after death and not be as boring as a para-shuffler or suicide hazard lead.
I think Tsaeb XIII does a good job expressing how CAP 19 would need to function. Since I think the whole grudge concept has been played out, I'm going to address some other things which I'm surprised have been mostly ignored.
Healing Wish, Final Gambet, and Memento are all moves which faint your current pokemon to make what could potentially be a big play in return. Now I'm not saying that this poke should even have those moves, but I think it's worth looking at what those moves do and how they effect the battle overall:
- What is the difference between tangible results of fainting (hazards, raw damage, etc.) and theoretical results of fainting (team opportunities, loss of momentum, added stress, etc.)? Which of these are most important when discussing CAP 19's goals?
Healing Wish and Memento on the other hand fall into the latter category and are much more more interesting. First of all, any time you faint actually generates a lot of momentum for your team, because you get to choose what your best matchup is against your current opponent. This is even more true when healing wish comes into play because you then get to not only send in whatever poke will do best, but that poke becomes into perfect condition once more. This has duel functionality, as it not only gives you a safe "switch" into any poke for a large momentum boost, and also adds a lot of stress on your opponent as they can no longer consider how crippled your team is for sweeping because you can simply restore one of your pokes to full health at any point, and they don't even know which one you'll choose for certain. Memento is a similar concept but with a different objective. The move singular purpose is to instantly provide a massive opportunity for your team as you get a safe switch in against a heavily crippled poke guaranteed. The "free turn" this generates can change an entire match if used at the right time, which is what I think this CAP concept is all about.
- How important are the other five Pokemon when it comes to losing a Pokemon? Should CAP 19 accomplish its goal as an individual entity, or as a member of its team?
- Is it more about the opponent being hindered by a Pokemon fainting directly, or is it more about your team benefiting from your Pokemon fainting? Can it be both? How?
Final Gambit can be an example of how a fainting Pokemon can hinder your opponents team.
And Memento can be an example of both simultaneously, as it's simply a move that creates an opportunity. One that slows down your opponent and gives your team time to push forward.
- How is it possible to discourage the opponent from fainting a Pokemon? Can this be a constant result from a Pokemon fainting, or is it situational depending on what players (re: Pokemon) are involved?
- With these questions being discussed, what is the best overall avenue for us to pursue, as a community, CAP 19?
In conclusion, CAP 19 has some huge potential to be one of the most powerful momentum tools in the game, though it will likely carry a lot of risk with it. This entire post also leaves a pretty big unanswered question that I think should be addressed as well: What is CAP 19 doing while it's not being KO'd?
This CAP concept is quite interesting to me. I like it a lot, but I have no idea how it would be done, so I'm just gonna kinda write a lot and see if that helps at all.
So, our concept is:
A Pokemon that dissuades your opponent from fainting it, or can even leave it's presence on the field felt even after it faints.
It's much easier to talk about the part after the comma, so I'll start with that.
Between status, hazards, weather, or hole-punching, it's easy to have the effects of a Pokemon felt. Deo-S was popular for dual screens, being almost guaranteed barring priority, just like with hazards. Deo-D was the same. Even after they fainted, their effects could be felt, given the fact that another member of their team could set up much easier, or gain crucial OHKOs.
In a slightly different vein, a parashuffler could wreak havoc on a team. If it's successful, you could have at least half your team paralyzed, and if you don't have a member to remove status, you're really hurting. When that parashuffler faints, you're really feeling it.
The thing with these examples is, you want to KO these Pokemon as fast as possible, to stop them from doing more damage to your team. To me, the crucial part of the concept is to make your opponent to not want this CAP to faint. It's a simple idea, but quite difficult in practice. Aftermath is one thing that may dissuade your opponent from fainting you, but it's only 25% of your health, and only on a contact move. Against more than half of Pokemon, Aftermath is useless. On those it does affect, that 25% probably won't save you. Being 6-5 with one Pokemon at, say, 50% is way better than still being at 6-6.
Moves such as Grudge or Destiny Bond (I see that we should avoid discussion, but I have to mention them too. Sorry) also do this, but they take a turn to do, plus only last for one attack. They are also very niche, and creating a Pokemon around these moves would be poor indeed. We want this Pokemon to useful while alive, not just spamming one move repeatedly. This CAP isn't about making the match 5-5.
So how do we make this Pokemon fainting advantageous to the user? I have no idea, short of creating a new move or ability, but I have no idea what the protocol for that is, so that's all I'll say about that.
Somebody earlier in the thread mentioned that a fainted Pokemon is a pretty big deal: you get a free switch-in to try to stop whatever just fainted your last Pokemon. That's why revenge killers are a thing. Sometimes, you purposely faint a Pokemon to safely bring in another to set up and try to end the game there! That's a big deal. Memento and Healing Wish are great in assisting a set up for a sweep. Memento to bring in a Pokemon to set up on their otherwise counter, forcing the opponent to switch twice to let that previously Mementoed Pokemon do its job. Healing Wish fully restores a sweeper, allowing it to set up while fully healthy. While useful, and certainly in line with part two of our concept, it doesn't make your opponent not want to KO it; quite the opposite! It wants to KO that Pokemon so it can't KO itself.
tl;dr: I've said everything everyone else has said. I tried.
So, our concept is:
A Pokemon that dissuades your opponent from fainting it, or can even leave it's presence on the field felt even after it faints.
It's much easier to talk about the part after the comma, so I'll start with that.
Between status, hazards, weather, or hole-punching, it's easy to have the effects of a Pokemon felt. Deo-S was popular for dual screens, being almost guaranteed barring priority, just like with hazards. Deo-D was the same. Even after they fainted, their effects could be felt, given the fact that another member of their team could set up much easier, or gain crucial OHKOs.
In a slightly different vein, a parashuffler could wreak havoc on a team. If it's successful, you could have at least half your team paralyzed, and if you don't have a member to remove status, you're really hurting. When that parashuffler faints, you're really feeling it.
The thing with these examples is, you want to KO these Pokemon as fast as possible, to stop them from doing more damage to your team. To me, the crucial part of the concept is to make your opponent to not want this CAP to faint. It's a simple idea, but quite difficult in practice. Aftermath is one thing that may dissuade your opponent from fainting you, but it's only 25% of your health, and only on a contact move. Against more than half of Pokemon, Aftermath is useless. On those it does affect, that 25% probably won't save you. Being 6-5 with one Pokemon at, say, 50% is way better than still being at 6-6.
Moves such as Grudge or Destiny Bond (I see that we should avoid discussion, but I have to mention them too. Sorry) also do this, but they take a turn to do, plus only last for one attack. They are also very niche, and creating a Pokemon around these moves would be poor indeed. We want this Pokemon to useful while alive, not just spamming one move repeatedly. This CAP isn't about making the match 5-5.
So how do we make this Pokemon fainting advantageous to the user? I have no idea, short of creating a new move or ability, but I have no idea what the protocol for that is, so that's all I'll say about that.
Somebody earlier in the thread mentioned that a fainted Pokemon is a pretty big deal: you get a free switch-in to try to stop whatever just fainted your last Pokemon. That's why revenge killers are a thing. Sometimes, you purposely faint a Pokemon to safely bring in another to set up and try to end the game there! That's a big deal. Memento and Healing Wish are great in assisting a set up for a sweep. Memento to bring in a Pokemon to set up on their otherwise counter, forcing the opponent to switch twice to let that previously Mementoed Pokemon do its job. Healing Wish fully restores a sweeper, allowing it to set up while fully healthy. While useful, and certainly in line with part two of our concept, it doesn't make your opponent not want to KO it; quite the opposite! It wants to KO that Pokemon so it can't KO itself.
tl;dr: I've said everything everyone else has said. I tried.
I think this CAP would be best suited to be a support Pokemon. Your opponent would really have to ask if it's worth KOing it, if it's better dead or alive to you, and to them.
I think at this point it would be wise to bring back up the example of Mega-Banette. Banette is actually able to set-up its own sweep based on its ability to cripple the opponent's Pokemon and get in with its impressive 160 ATK stat. It just so happens that the effects of M-Banette last long after it dies, and Banette can punish the opponent for trying to kill it. It also fills all the roles people seem to want it to fill.
"I want a Pokemon that's strictly here to set up field effects!" Luckily for you, my friend, Banette has Trick Room, Sunny Day, and Rain Dance. If you want it to be particularly good at setting one of the above up, just give it the typing to take advantage of it when Typing discussion comes up. Heck, with the right typing, you could justify giving it Sand or Hail or even a Tailwind if that suits your fancy.
"I want a Pokemon that has Destiny Bond/Grudge/Memento/Healing Wish/whatever I think is the best suicide move!" Good news for you, since it's your Cap, you can take Destiny Bond or Grudge (It has both) out of the movepool and switch it with whatever suicide move you want. Banette has already set a groundwork for what a movepool would look like for this idealized Pokemon, you just need to fill in the blanks. Heck, if you really wanted, it has Curse as well, so Ghost typing would put the opponent into a position where they had to switch and kill Banette simultaneously.
"I want something that debuffs the opponent before my Pokemon comes in
"I want a good suicide lead!" Banette has a suicide lead set.
"I want a good mid-game wall that can either set hazards or statuses!" Banette can wall mid-game through a combination of Will-O-Wisp and a significant enough investment in Special Defense. If you wanted to make it a hazard setter, Stealth Rocks and a good defensive typing can let you forgo the need for heavy physical investment, since Talonflame, Charizard, and a good number of other physically inclined Pokemon won't be happy about having to take a huge chunk of damage on the switch-in.
"I want a Pokemon that lets itself die in order to give the next Pokemon an opportunity to set up!" Great, Banette has Disable, Knock Off, Will-O-Wisp, and a plethora of other moves that leave the Pokemon in front incapable of stopping something like Charizard-X from Dragon Dancing to its hearts content.
"I want a Pokemon that can lure in a Pokemon that won't like to be in against the next Pokemon!" That's pretty much how the interaction between Banette and Coballion works in RU. Banette brings in a Dark Pokemon for Coballion to set up all over once Banette kicks the bucket.
I really do feel like building a better Banette would let us satisfy the most people while also helping us answer the questions we set out in the beginning. Even if there are parts of Mega-Banette we don't want to be on the CAP, we don't have to keep them. It is a community created Pokemon after all, it doesn't have to have moves the community disagrees with. I just think that we'd be better off starting out with this as a baseline, I feel we'll get much further with this question and have much less bickering in the process.
Do we want to encourage the opponent to KO CAP19, do we want to discourage the opponent to KO CAP19, or do we want to have the option to KO CAP19 ourselves to bring benefit to our team? These are the three things that I keep seeing pop up in this discussion, and I don't think that they are entirely exclusive in the way they operate.
If we want to leave lasting effects on the field that our team can benefit from but that CAP19 cannot use but can only get on the field, then we have two routes that I can see. Either we encourage the opponent to KO CAP19 after these field affects are produced, or we KO ourselves with the use of a sacrificial move. However, what's the point of KOing ourselves after setting up when pivot moves exist? If the problem is that we want to get CAP19 off the field as fast as possible to allow our teammates to abuse the timer that is on the field effects, wouldn't having a switching move be more beneficial to this role than just trying to off ourselves? If we're talking purely about getting ourselves off the field quickly, as we're considering sacrificial moves, the primary difference between sacrificial moves and pivot moves is how much we want to cripple the opponent before going out. Essentially, for a sacrificial move to work we need to both create an advantage for our team and create a disadvantage for the opponent's team at the same time. And I don't mean some sort of "well, putting the opponent at a disadvantage is our advantage" type of deal. We could have a hazard/field setter that pivots out and achieves a team benefit without the heavy cost of losing a Pokemon. That, of course, doesn't do anything for the concept of fainting but it is so much more appealing of an option than just having a hazard/field setter set up and then die. Alternatively, we could use only a sacrificial move and hurt or cripple the opponent, but there are also methods of accomplishing this without being forced to sacrifice your Pokemon. What I'm trying to get at here is that you can damage/cripple the opponent without fainting, and you can leave hazards or field effects without fainting as well. There are Pokemon already made that can fulfill one of these roles individually without being doomed to fainting in the process. Therefore, I think that if we actually want a functional suicidal Pokemon, it has to be able to perform both roles before/while fainting, otherwise it will likely be outclassed.
Beyond that, there's the circular problem of how much incentive do we want to give the opponent to KO CAP19 or to not KO CAP19. If we want to create scenarios where the CAP fainting will actually harm the opponent, will the opponent actually KO the CAPmon? But, at the same time, if we need CAP19 to be fainted to fulfill its full purpose to the user's team, how do we gain back some incentive to the opponent to actually KO us? One way to avoid this dilemma is to put the power to KO ourselves within our grasp, rather than leaving it purely to the opponent. But even then, the opponent could potentially have some control. Some suicide moves are entirely reliant on the opponent's action (destiny bond, grudge), and others can be blocked/minimized by the opponent's actions (switching negates memento, certain opposing Pokemon can laugh at explosion/final gambit). Of the suicidal moves, Healing Wish (and consequently it's likely off-limits legendary counterpart, Lunar Dance) is the only real option that I think the user has true control over. The user decides when it happens, and to which teammate it will affect. However, this creates a direct benefit to your team and only an indirect disadvantage to the opponent. And how is a dedicated Healing Wish user any more viable than a dedicated Cleric/Wish passer?
Rather than looking at all of the attributes individually (setting up field effects for your team's benefit, crippling the opponent, and trying to gain benefits dependent on who controls CAP19's fainting process), I think the collective attributes of stacking these effects might be the best way to go. We need to set up our team to succeed, hurt the opponent, and have fainting methods that provide fairly tangible effects whether or not it was the opponent solely responsible for CAP19 fainting or if it was the user's active choice via the use of a suicidal move. We also want to give the opponent some sort of incentive to KO us so that our efforts don't reach fruition or benefit our team (repeatedly), while at the same time giving some sort of negative side effect that hurts the opponent in the event that we do faint, thus giving some sort of incentive to not KO us... But I don't think we should give the opponent 100% full incentive to NOT KO us, otherwise achieving some of our "team set up" might not be as successful. We should dissuade them from trying to KO CAP19 in some situations, but we shouldn't try to give them enough incentive to never KO us or to let themselves set up all day.
If we want to leave lasting effects on the field that our team can benefit from but that CAP19 cannot use but can only get on the field, then we have two routes that I can see. Either we encourage the opponent to KO CAP19 after these field affects are produced, or we KO ourselves with the use of a sacrificial move. However, what's the point of KOing ourselves after setting up when pivot moves exist? If the problem is that we want to get CAP19 off the field as fast as possible to allow our teammates to abuse the timer that is on the field effects, wouldn't having a switching move be more beneficial to this role than just trying to off ourselves? If we're talking purely about getting ourselves off the field quickly, as we're considering sacrificial moves, the primary difference between sacrificial moves and pivot moves is how much we want to cripple the opponent before going out. Essentially, for a sacrificial move to work we need to both create an advantage for our team and create a disadvantage for the opponent's team at the same time. And I don't mean some sort of "well, putting the opponent at a disadvantage is our advantage" type of deal. We could have a hazard/field setter that pivots out and achieves a team benefit without the heavy cost of losing a Pokemon. That, of course, doesn't do anything for the concept of fainting but it is so much more appealing of an option than just having a hazard/field setter set up and then die. Alternatively, we could use only a sacrificial move and hurt or cripple the opponent, but there are also methods of accomplishing this without being forced to sacrifice your Pokemon. What I'm trying to get at here is that you can damage/cripple the opponent without fainting, and you can leave hazards or field effects without fainting as well. There are Pokemon already made that can fulfill one of these roles individually without being doomed to fainting in the process. Therefore, I think that if we actually want a functional suicidal Pokemon, it has to be able to perform both roles before/while fainting, otherwise it will likely be outclassed.
Beyond that, there's the circular problem of how much incentive do we want to give the opponent to KO CAP19 or to not KO CAP19. If we want to create scenarios where the CAP fainting will actually harm the opponent, will the opponent actually KO the CAPmon? But, at the same time, if we need CAP19 to be fainted to fulfill its full purpose to the user's team, how do we gain back some incentive to the opponent to actually KO us? One way to avoid this dilemma is to put the power to KO ourselves within our grasp, rather than leaving it purely to the opponent. But even then, the opponent could potentially have some control. Some suicide moves are entirely reliant on the opponent's action (destiny bond, grudge), and others can be blocked/minimized by the opponent's actions (switching negates memento, certain opposing Pokemon can laugh at explosion/final gambit). Of the suicidal moves, Healing Wish (and consequently it's likely off-limits legendary counterpart, Lunar Dance) is the only real option that I think the user has true control over. The user decides when it happens, and to which teammate it will affect. However, this creates a direct benefit to your team and only an indirect disadvantage to the opponent. And how is a dedicated Healing Wish user any more viable than a dedicated Cleric/Wish passer?
Rather than looking at all of the attributes individually (setting up field effects for your team's benefit, crippling the opponent, and trying to gain benefits dependent on who controls CAP19's fainting process), I think the collective attributes of stacking these effects might be the best way to go. We need to set up our team to succeed, hurt the opponent, and have fainting methods that provide fairly tangible effects whether or not it was the opponent solely responsible for CAP19 fainting or if it was the user's active choice via the use of a suicidal move. We also want to give the opponent some sort of incentive to KO us so that our efforts don't reach fruition or benefit our team (repeatedly), while at the same time giving some sort of negative side effect that hurts the opponent in the event that we do faint, thus giving some sort of incentive to not KO us... But I don't think we should give the opponent 100% full incentive to NOT KO us, otherwise achieving some of our "team set up" might not be as successful. We should dissuade them from trying to KO CAP19 in some situations, but we shouldn't try to give them enough incentive to never KO us or to let themselves set up all day.
Ignus
Copying deli meat to hard drive
I want to take an opportunity to talk about 'discouraging fainting'. It's basically half the concept. Actually, it's literally half the concept. And it's not a very simple subject. So, let's talk about fainting. It's been said before, but this is what happens when something faints.
So how do you take advantage of it? That's easy. There's literally one thing you can take advantage of. The free switch in. So we need to focus the majority of our efforts on making this free switch in MORE USEFUL then the advantage of being alive. There will still be a way to be useful if you're alive, but it has to be much more straightforward to handle and deal with by the opponent.
Ok. So what happens when you're alive? What advantage do you have?
Okay. It's pretty obvious what the trade off is. Simply put, the advantage that comes from fainting is the ability to have another pokemon freely do it's job. If the pokemon that comes in after the faint is a hazard spreader, it can set up. If the pokemon is a sweeper, it can sweep. One free switch can be worth quite a bit based on the situation. However, if you're alive, then you are farther away from losing. Pretty simple.
This brings us to the next point. DarkSlay, I'm basically just going to mention you like 300 times (or just twice) in this post. Sorry. In his starting post, it was brought up that the fewer choices there are in a situation, the more obvious the outcome is for both players. If I realize that killing my opponent's pokemon will allow for them to bring in something that will end the game, I probably won't. However, if I have 2 or 3 different options that circumvent defeat before it becomes an inevitability, then I'm more likely to make the decision to faint my opponent's pokemon. So, we need to make it obvious to both us and our opponent what is going to happen in each situation.
Basically, we need to limit our opponents choices to this:
Okay, so what do we do to make people be so terrified of killing CAP that we get to take advantage of the situation? Let's look at what we can do if CAP DOES die.
Oh. That's pretty simple. We just pair CAP with something that takes a big advantage of a free turn. Okay, so what is really scary with a free turn, and is so blatantly obvious to the opponent that they'd be terrified to even give it an advantage early in the game?
Ever been 6-0'd by turn 7 or 8? What did it? There's our answer. A super fast, super terrifying setup sweeper. Something that can not only take advantage of the free turn, but that can potentially end the game with it.
As such, I propose we pair CAP 19 with a setup sweeper. The best way to discourage fainting isn't by using moves that take advantage of fainting- they're all bad. The best way is to scare your opponent shitless with the feral animal sitting right behind it, waiting to consume you for your greedy actions.
Now, a response to a previous post because I'm 78% sure it was directed towards me:
Okay. I guess that concludes this post. It's two in the morning. I'm going to sleep.
- You lose a tool. If you lose your sweeper, it's like losing a hammer. A support, your nails. This will always be bad.
- You get a free switch in.
So how do you take advantage of it? That's easy. There's literally one thing you can take advantage of. The free switch in. So we need to focus the majority of our efforts on making this free switch in MORE USEFUL then the advantage of being alive. There will still be a way to be useful if you're alive, but it has to be much more straightforward to handle and deal with by the opponent.
Ok. So what happens when you're alive? What advantage do you have?
- You can use a move.
- You can use a different move.
- You can switch in later and therefore use moves later.
Okay. It's pretty obvious what the trade off is. Simply put, the advantage that comes from fainting is the ability to have another pokemon freely do it's job. If the pokemon that comes in after the faint is a hazard spreader, it can set up. If the pokemon is a sweeper, it can sweep. One free switch can be worth quite a bit based on the situation. However, if you're alive, then you are farther away from losing. Pretty simple.
This brings us to the next point. DarkSlay, I'm basically just going to mention you like 300 times (or just twice) in this post. Sorry. In his starting post, it was brought up that the fewer choices there are in a situation, the more obvious the outcome is for both players. If I realize that killing my opponent's pokemon will allow for them to bring in something that will end the game, I probably won't. However, if I have 2 or 3 different options that circumvent defeat before it becomes an inevitability, then I'm more likely to make the decision to faint my opponent's pokemon. So, we need to make it obvious to both us and our opponent what is going to happen in each situation.
Basically, we need to limit our opponents choices to this:
- Not killing CAP and having something generally considered shitty happen to them
- Killing CAP and having something EVEN SHITTIER happen to them
Okay, so what do we do to make people be so terrified of killing CAP that we get to take advantage of the situation? Let's look at what we can do if CAP DOES die.
- Get a free switch in
Oh. That's pretty simple. We just pair CAP with something that takes a big advantage of a free turn. Okay, so what is really scary with a free turn, and is so blatantly obvious to the opponent that they'd be terrified to even give it an advantage early in the game?
Ever been 6-0'd by turn 7 or 8? What did it? There's our answer. A super fast, super terrifying setup sweeper. Something that can not only take advantage of the free turn, but that can potentially end the game with it.
As such, I propose we pair CAP 19 with a setup sweeper. The best way to discourage fainting isn't by using moves that take advantage of fainting- they're all bad. The best way is to scare your opponent shitless with the feral animal sitting right behind it, waiting to consume you for your greedy actions.
Now, a response to a previous post because I'm 78% sure it was directed towards me:
I agree. There's a pretty obvious difference between the two. The idea behind using Ferrothorn as an example is that attacking over and over again in order to kill it can potentially cost MORE then the kill was worth. If I poke the shrub so much that I die the next turn, and then have to lose two pokemon because I just crippled my way to handle a different pokemon on their team, was the ACT of eventually fainting Ferrothorn worth it? Attacking is only means to an end of fainting the target.
Okay. I guess that concludes this post. It's two in the morning. I'm going to sleep.
The thing is, it takes two turns to set-up and pivot, and one to set-up and get KOd. That's what the prime focus is if we base it around a field effect.
But it takes two turns to set-up and to use a suicide move. And there's no guarantee that the opponent will KO you the same turn you set up... especially since so much of the concept seems to at least in part try to discourage the opponent from KOing you. To this end I think setting up a field effect and pivoting away is vastly superior and doesn't show anything too great about setting up and expecting the opponent to make you faint. As a result, if fainting is necessary I think CAP19 should try to accomplish multiple benefits to your team/deficits to the opponent's team before it is ultimately stricken from its existence in the battle.FireArrow said:
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Base Speed
What a load of BS!
It seems to me that right now, we have some vague idea of what we want to do, but little idea how to do it. I'm going to attempt a summary of what we, as a community, want, based on frequently stated opinions, highly liked posts and well reasoned arguments. Then, I'm going to explain how weather ticks fits all the criteria we've set ourselves.
Weather haters, sharpen your pitchforks...
What Do We Want?
Simply slapping a weather ability onto CAP19 won't cut it, and we'll have to use all the stages of the build to refine it into what we want (that's a good thing by the way, this CAP would be pretty dull otherwise). As an overall strategy, it is hands-down the best option we have.
#TeamWeather
Weather haters, sharpen your pitchforks...
What Do We Want?
- A Pokemon that can leave a lasting effect on the field after death
- A Pokemon that your opponent may not want to faint in some situations
- To make use of the free switch fainting creates, through synergy with another Pokemon
- To actively create these situations, rather than wait for our opponent to put us in them (so can you guys quit justifying your opinions with examples of burnt or paralysed Pokemon please?)
- To not be like Deoxys S or Deoxys D
- To not base CAP19 around Destiny Bond and Grudge. We might still get them, but it's not the focus of the concept. As per DarkSlay's request, I will say no more on the matter
- Hazards provide no incentive not to faint the opposing Pokemon. And if we don't want to be like Deoxys, then they should at least not be the focus of CAP19, if not avoided entirely
- On its own, status provides little reason not to faint the opposing Pokemon. In theory, a Mon immune to CAP19's status could in take advantage of it, but it's extremely situational. Status shouldn't be our focus, but it shouldn't be ruled out just yet
- Weather is a field effect that lasts after death and Deoxys isn't a weather inducer. I know I'm stating the blindingly obvious, but it's a point in favour of weather: it's ticking the boxes
- Weather oozes synergy with Pokemon that like free switches. Kabutops instantly springs to mind, but he's far from the only one
- Weather can create situations where you don't want to faint your opponent's Pokemon. Read Jas' example if you haven't already:
- While still somewhat situational (this concept is always going to rely on situational scenarios, get over it) weather is much more active in creating the situations we're looking for, rather than waiting for our opponent to put us into them
Simply slapping a weather ability onto CAP19 won't cut it, and we'll have to use all the stages of the build to refine it into what we want (that's a good thing by the way, this CAP would be pretty dull otherwise). As an overall strategy, it is hands-down the best option we have.
#TeamWeather
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The problem with weather based situations is that, while almost anything we go with in this concept will be situational, weather is one of the lowest probability conditions for which KOing your opponent's weather starter is a bad idea. It is much, MUCH more likely that killing the weather starter is a good play.
The only sort of situations where you can reliably say you don't want to kill the opponent's weather starter is when it is so totally neutered that giving it free turns can't harm you. For example: A burned Tyranitar, with Excadrill waiting in the wings, and you lack a good Excadrill counter if Sand is up. Let's say this is late game and all that is left is this burned Tyranitar and Excadrill. You have a somewhat weakened Specs Keldeo out, and a Heatran in the back. Sure if you kill the Tyranitar this turn Excadrill will sweep you. Obviously you don't want to kill Tyranitar right away. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't attack it. If you use HP Flying to try to stall turns, Excadrill will come in the next turn and sweep you regardless. If you switch to Heatran to avoid having to lock yourself into a resisted move with Keldeo, you have to deal with the fact your opponent might predict this rather obvious play (or the HP Flying) and just go straight to Excadrill on the double switch.
In short, even when you get these sorts of scenarios, it's still rarely a clean cut I should/shouldn't attack the opponent's weather starter. It just becomes a prediction game. And these are rare. For the most part, the first thing you should aim to do with any weather starters your opponent has is kill them.
If we're going on situational factors, which we kind of have to, since bog-standard sacrificial moves are really boring for this concept, the only acceptable path is to aid the set up of a teammate by drawing in Pokemon that it can set up on. This is not going to be an easy path to take, since we'll have to be REALLY careful in picking what we want to/can set up on. But it's the only reasonable path I see to take with this concept.
The only sort of situations where you can reliably say you don't want to kill the opponent's weather starter is when it is so totally neutered that giving it free turns can't harm you. For example: A burned Tyranitar, with Excadrill waiting in the wings, and you lack a good Excadrill counter if Sand is up. Let's say this is late game and all that is left is this burned Tyranitar and Excadrill. You have a somewhat weakened Specs Keldeo out, and a Heatran in the back. Sure if you kill the Tyranitar this turn Excadrill will sweep you. Obviously you don't want to kill Tyranitar right away. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't attack it. If you use HP Flying to try to stall turns, Excadrill will come in the next turn and sweep you regardless. If you switch to Heatran to avoid having to lock yourself into a resisted move with Keldeo, you have to deal with the fact your opponent might predict this rather obvious play (or the HP Flying) and just go straight to Excadrill on the double switch.
In short, even when you get these sorts of scenarios, it's still rarely a clean cut I should/shouldn't attack the opponent's weather starter. It just becomes a prediction game. And these are rare. For the most part, the first thing you should aim to do with any weather starters your opponent has is kill them.
If we're going on situational factors, which we kind of have to, since bog-standard sacrificial moves are really boring for this concept, the only acceptable path is to aid the set up of a teammate by drawing in Pokemon that it can set up on. This is not going to be an easy path to take, since we'll have to be REALLY careful in picking what we want to/can set up on. But it's the only reasonable path I see to take with this concept.
I'm not a fan of using weather for this concept. Much more often than not you want to knock out the opponent's weather starter. It's true that late-game you might want to leave your opponent's weather starter in so their weather sweeper has fewer turns to sweep or so some of your Pokemon can take less Sand damage, but much more often than not taking out an opponent's weather starter is a huge advantage. If you take out an opponent's Tyranitar early, then their Excadrill is significantly less useful for the rest of the game. While weather, by definition, leaves an effect after the weather starter faints it's not really worth dedicating a whole CAP to. Good players know when to attack the weather starter and when to stall out the weather. While it could be a cool mindgame to have a weather starter that can be almost as dangerous as the sweeper, I do not believe something that's almost always better to KO really fulfills this concept.
Continuing the Mega Charizard X example I made in my previous post, let's say M-Zard X can set up against Scizor and Rotom-W (there are obviously more examples of Pokemon M-Zard X can set up on, but this is for the sake of argument) but can't set up on Landorus or Garchomp (again, for the sake of argument). We could create a Pokemon that works especially well against Landorus and Garchomp while losing to Manectric and Rotom-W. When a player feels that they can sweep or do significant damage to the opponent's team with Mega Charizard X, they might let Scizor or Rotom-W KO CAP19 to let M-Zard set up. CAP19, hopefully, would have spent its time in battle beating up on the opponent's Charizard X counters before giving Zard the free switch. Making the ultimate "death fodder" mon isn't worth it, but a Pokemon that can serve as death fodder after knocking out your sweeper's counters makes it even more of a headache for the opponent to deal with.
I think this sells the "create a Pokemon that helps another Pokemon set up" idea short. If we're building a Pokemon that can work as a sacrifice, we need it to defeat a lot of Pokemon and only lose to the Pokemon that our sweeper can set up on. The Pokemon on a team that are worth sacrificing does change every match, but if we create a Pokemon that almost only loses to the Pokemon a sweeper sets up on and usually defeats everything else, then we're not just building a "death fodder" mon. We're building a powerhouse that can serve as death fodder when it's time for your sweeper to clean up.Clankenator007 said:
Continuing the Mega Charizard X example I made in my previous post, let's say M-Zard X can set up against Scizor and Rotom-W (there are obviously more examples of Pokemon M-Zard X can set up on, but this is for the sake of argument) but can't set up on Landorus or Garchomp (again, for the sake of argument). We could create a Pokemon that works especially well against Landorus and Garchomp while losing to Manectric and Rotom-W. When a player feels that they can sweep or do significant damage to the opponent's team with Mega Charizard X, they might let Scizor or Rotom-W KO CAP19 to let M-Zard set up. CAP19, hopefully, would have spent its time in battle beating up on the opponent's Charizard X counters before giving Zard the free switch. Making the ultimate "death fodder" mon isn't worth it, but a Pokemon that can serve as death fodder after knocking out your sweeper's counters makes it even more of a headache for the opponent to deal with.
The current weather setters are rarely supported by a sweeper in my experience, and all of them have tools in order to utilise the weather by themselves, making them a self-sufficient threat. This is especially the case for weather setting pokemon that survive and maintain a spot in OU. Look at Charizard-Y it sets weather and gets a strong boost in its STABs and access to solarbeam.
Tyranitar and Hippowdon both get their defenses bolstered and their EQs are empowered in the sand. Even though sand rush Excadrill is viable, it is less used due to the fact that perma-weather no longer exists.
Politoed, while no longer in OU, can still dish out plenty of damage with specs hydro pump.
Most of the weather setting pokemon have been relegated from OU because weather is a less viable mechanic (and Ninetales is simply outclassed), we don't want that happening to CAP19, what I mean by that is we want it to impact the OU metagame. Anyhow, the fact still remains that they have been formidable threats in their own rights and they carry the correct tools to gain benefit in the weather they set, even irregardless of their teammates.
So let's apply this to CAP19:
In order for it to be an effective OU pokemon it would need self-sufficiency as far as the weather concerns probably backed up by a sweeper after it is fainted permitting the weather is still in play. To maximise the potential of the weather in the OU metagame the setter is an efficient beast; read that as a threat, so it would not deter any pokemon from fainting as soon as possible.
That's my stance on the weather issue, although I can see where the support is coming from, I just think in the grand scheme of things for CAP19 to survive well in OU as a weather setter it's going to need to carry enough offensive pressure.
Back to basics, a few little thoughts I had earlier on about the concept as a whole:
Perhaps a better way of phrasing the concept is to encourage our opponent to be very careful as to how and when they eliminate CAP19. As Deck Knight said we would prefer to create an effective pokemon, in order to achieve this CAP needs to put pressure on the opponent in some form; whether it's offense, support or both, but the key is forcing the opponent to play carefully in order for themselves to come out on top. A pure relentless assault into CAP should leave their team in tatters, yet few strategically utilised turns should enable them to best CAP.
Not all of these need to be implemented into CAP19 but they would certainly help achieve the concept;
-When CAP faints our opponent should suffer a huge loss of momentum, more so than they would do if any other pokemon fainted. (personally, I think this point is paramount)
-When CAP faints our opponent may be directly affected by it, such as with Aftermath
-When CAP faints some field effects may be in play, be it weather, trick room, gravity, electric terrain and so on.
The suicide moves are being thrown around a lot and we need to steer clear of them, especially ones where the opponent can't prevent it from happening. The point of the concept is to dissuade the opponent from fainting CAP, this cannot be achieved through using sacrificial moves. We may as well be doing a different concept if we pursue this line of thought.
Finally, I don't support us creating a specific core for CAP19 like we did for Volkraken, however if we were to say CAP19 should be easily paired with a set-up sweeper for example, that would be far more acceptable in my eyes.
The team members should be an integral part of this pokemon, especially to gain that huge momentum after death, if we designate a specific pokemon to that slot then teams can easily counter it - with the element of surprise CAP19 would be a far more interesting pokemon to play around.
Tyranitar and Hippowdon both get their defenses bolstered and their EQs are empowered in the sand. Even though sand rush Excadrill is viable, it is less used due to the fact that perma-weather no longer exists.
Politoed, while no longer in OU, can still dish out plenty of damage with specs hydro pump.
Most of the weather setting pokemon have been relegated from OU because weather is a less viable mechanic (and Ninetales is simply outclassed), we don't want that happening to CAP19, what I mean by that is we want it to impact the OU metagame. Anyhow, the fact still remains that they have been formidable threats in their own rights and they carry the correct tools to gain benefit in the weather they set, even irregardless of their teammates.
So let's apply this to CAP19:
In order for it to be an effective OU pokemon it would need self-sufficiency as far as the weather concerns probably backed up by a sweeper after it is fainted permitting the weather is still in play. To maximise the potential of the weather in the OU metagame the setter is an efficient beast; read that as a threat, so it would not deter any pokemon from fainting as soon as possible.
That's my stance on the weather issue, although I can see where the support is coming from, I just think in the grand scheme of things for CAP19 to survive well in OU as a weather setter it's going to need to carry enough offensive pressure.
Back to basics, a few little thoughts I had earlier on about the concept as a whole:
Perhaps a better way of phrasing the concept is to encourage our opponent to be very careful as to how and when they eliminate CAP19. As Deck Knight said we would prefer to create an effective pokemon, in order to achieve this CAP needs to put pressure on the opponent in some form; whether it's offense, support or both, but the key is forcing the opponent to play carefully in order for themselves to come out on top. A pure relentless assault into CAP should leave their team in tatters, yet few strategically utilised turns should enable them to best CAP.
Not all of these need to be implemented into CAP19 but they would certainly help achieve the concept;
-When CAP faints our opponent should suffer a huge loss of momentum, more so than they would do if any other pokemon fainted. (personally, I think this point is paramount)
-When CAP faints our opponent may be directly affected by it, such as with Aftermath
-When CAP faints some field effects may be in play, be it weather, trick room, gravity, electric terrain and so on.
The suicide moves are being thrown around a lot and we need to steer clear of them, especially ones where the opponent can't prevent it from happening. The point of the concept is to dissuade the opponent from fainting CAP, this cannot be achieved through using sacrificial moves. We may as well be doing a different concept if we pursue this line of thought.
Finally, I don't support us creating a specific core for CAP19 like we did for Volkraken, however if we were to say CAP19 should be easily paired with a set-up sweeper for example, that would be far more acceptable in my eyes.
The team members should be an integral part of this pokemon, especially to gain that huge momentum after death, if we designate a specific pokemon to that slot then teams can easily counter it - with the element of surprise CAP19 would be a far more interesting pokemon to play around.
This is where I want to stress the passing boost suggestion.
If we grant CAP19 the ability to boost, the opponent will want to kill CAP19 because it may severely damage their team if they don't. In the metagame, fainting a set up sweeper means you've lost your boosts and your sweeper.
But how do we get it so that they know that if they do kill it, something really bad happens to them?
It is in the rest of this post that I find my answer to making CAP19's consequences fit the above two criteria.
Ok, so CAP19 is boosting in the more offensive stats. The opponent must kill it or CAP19 can land damaging blows (nothing has been made definite, so anything can happen). Opponent commands their player to knock CAP19 out as it makes a last attempt to boost, and CAP19 faints.
Luckily, we have a free switch, and CAP19 has left its presence on the field, but how? Weren't its boosts lost?
What if we can make it so that CAP is the set up and the proposed partner is the sweeper? If we can engineer CAP so that it leaves its boosts to the incoming teammate when it faints, gives the partner the free switch in, and allows for that partner to punish our opponent we are:
- Discouraging our opponent from fainting CAP
- Leaving our opponent no choice but to faint CAP
- Leaving CAP's presence on the field when it faints
- Oh, and also guaranteeing safety to teammates
Something very interesting we could do is give it the three pledges (water pledge, fire pledge, and grass pledge). When combined status like things happen to the field to give you boosts or the opponent troubles, the affects are also irremovable unlike status and hazards. Based upon this concept and can leave a very nasty effect on the battle if these get setup. It will also be the only pokemon in singles that can set all these moves up. It can learn hazards too, and also status moves, but the three pledges would be very interesting.
For the dissuades fainting piece, we could make use of the ability arena trap or shadow tag, we give the pokemon status or hazard moves then so it can setup without worry, but make it weak enough attack wise so that they do not want to KO it.
- Status