Gen 6 np: XY Ubers Gengarite Suspect Test - In The Shadows [READ POST #71]

[Disaster Area]

It's not like we've never had issues with trapping before (there was actually a stigma about using wobbuffet, as well as farceus, in DPP OU, as I've heard from theorymon - could someone explain how farceus and wobb are great pokemon in DPP Ubers and permitted on the ubers ladder, yet are not actually used? What'd be the difference between that and all the players agreeing not to use geomancy or shadow tag or baton pass?) - gothitelle was around in gen 5 with shadow tag, but it wasn't used in ubers much because of the lack of things to trap. The introduction of defog's mechanics change has allowed it to destroy hazard removers (e.g. water/grass/poison arceus), klefki (say hello to a geoxern sweep), palkia (when something goes down unless it gets critted before CM boosts are set up or double crits later on - it's worth noting palkia became a lot less offensive than in BW, where permanent rain also made it a lot less likely that gothitelle would be capable of trapping it), as a few examples as to why it's become more popular. Mega-Gengar adds to the list in the same way of pokemon you can't really use (fairy arceus, sylveon, defensive xerneas, clefable, chansey, etc.) without it being trappable and removable and introducing a fundamental weakness to the team. Gengar however gets destiny bond and taunt, allowing it to virtually guarantee removing one pokemon - the one turn of mega evolution perhaps makes it less threatening versus hyper-offensive teams (it is still usually capable of taking something down with it though) but it is still incredible. I don't know how people can see something that lets you remove 1 pokemon, virtually of your choice, off of the opponent's team, is not uncompetitive. Maybe we could hold a tournament in a different tier where one player brings a team of 5 and the other brings a team of 6, and then the person with the team of 5 gets to remove one pokemon from the team of 6. Assuming they're roughly equal in level, who would you think would win? Admittedly it's a bit far from its origins, but the point still stands that removing 1 pokemon of choice from the opponent's team with very little opportunity cost is kind of something massive..

 

[TFL]

It's not like we've never had issues with trapping before (there was actually a stigma about using wobbuffet, as well as farceus, in DPP OU, as I've heard from theorymon - could someone explain how farceus and wobb are great pokemon in DPP Ubers and permitted on the ubers ladder, yet are not actually used? What'd be the difference between that and all the players agreeing not to use geomancy or shadow tag or baton pass?)

Yeh, it's the same as that really. Before gen. 5, there was pretty much an unspoken gentlemen's agreement not to use the what were known to be 'cheap' strategies. And doing so was to be frowned upon.

 

[Ed]

I posted my reasoning and vote yesterday. Will I be notified when it gets approved?

Shadow Tag should be suspected as a whole.

 

[absdaddy]

Yeh, it's the same as that really. Before gen. 5, there was pretty much an unspoken gentlemen's agreement not to use the what were known to be 'cheap' strategies. And doing so was to be frowned upon.

Since when? Only thing i remember being frowned upon(ubers) was Mewpass, wobb was completely fine.

 

[faint]

I posted my reasoning and vote yesterday. Will I be notified when it gets approved?

Shadow Tag should be suspected as a whole.

It is being tested as a whole.... right after this test is finished.

It's not like we've never had issues with trapping before (there was actually a stigma about using wobbuffet, as well as farceus, in DPP OU, as I've heard from theorymon - could someone explain how farceus and wobb are great pokemon in DPP Ubers and permitted on the ubers ladder, yet are not actually used?

I'm not familiar with any stigma associated with players using Wobbuffet in DPP. It was always used to aid setup mons and likely dropped in usage when heavy offense became really common. Arceus wasn't used in DPP because it wasn't allowed due to Shoddy restrictions with the 100 EV's per stat. Once we moved to PO it was possible to use him as Farceus, but nobody liked him and gen 5 was launching like 4 months later so we just said fuck it and now he's never used.

 

[Ed]

It is being tested as a whole.... right after this test is finished.

That's right, I forgot. It's been a while since the last time I was reading this thread :/. Thanks :]

 

[Disaster Area]

I'm not familiar with any stigma associated with players using Wobbuffet in DPP. It was always used to aid setup mons and likely dropped in usage when heavy offense became really common. Arceus wasn't used in DPP because it wasn't allowed due to Shoddy restrictions with the 100 EV's per stat. Once we moved to PO it was possible to use him as Farceus, but nobody liked him and gen 5 was launching like 4 months later so we just said fuck it and now he's never used.

Fair enough I just went off of what I remember theorymon telling me; still, farceus must be a fairly usable pokemon within DPP Ubers, and probably would affect the metagame.. I was aware of the shoddy battle restrictions, still it's a bit peculiar to allow a fairly strong pokemon into a metagame (much as it clearly had limits) and for no-one to use it. Anyway I think this is getting a bit far away from the point, but it does seem that there's some unsaid agreement not to use certain pokemon (in this instance, farceus) and I find it's kinda odd lol ... also with people saying about 'shadow tag wasn't an issue in previous gens' - apart from the fact that it was (in ADV OU but not ubers - see wobbuffet AND wynaut's ban) - some clauses have gone in and out of effect relative to the tier and generation, e.g. there's no swagger clause pre-gen 6 in spite of its existance for a few generations, freeze clause is not used outside of generation 1 (and is only sometimes used in gen 1), so you can't use that as a valid arguement; the environment of the tier affects the clauses within it. UU and below in XY have banned Shadow Tag also, if that is of any note. Point is, bans being discussed currently, and bans relating to any other tier, these are not related.

 

[MMII]

Yo, if you guys could stop posting your votes itt that would be cool. Part of the reason we have private votes is so that people don't feel pressured to vote one way or another after seeing the votes of other users. Reposting paragraphs kinda treads on that thin line between discusssion of the suspect and potential peer pressure.

 

[hyw]

I don't understand why this isn't stressed enough. Whether you like it or not you are going to encounter 50/50's. They are part of the game.

Yanked the tongue out of pro-bans then chopped it off with a chainsaw. xD Though, when I post such material, nope, it's invalid -> deleted. Anyway, I don't think people have enough of a fundamental understanding of the core mechanics of the game to understand that this game is a gamble and that banning Mega Gengar will 1. decrease diversity due to BANNING an entire Pokémon, and 2. we will end up banning a Pokémon for no good reason. I STILL have not been presented with even one scenario in which Mega Gengar uncompetitively beats the opponent, given that the opposing team is not Mega Gengar weak.


I took out the off-topic bits since it was minor and the rest of the post had merit. I hope you don't mind fireburn. ~MM2

 

[Yuy]

Late claiming but it's my first suspect I've ever gotten reqs for. Sorry for being late. Can I still vote or am I out? Thanks guys.

 

[TheTabKey]

Late claiming but it's my first suspect I've ever gotten reqs for. Sorry for being late. Can I still vote or am I out? Thanks guys.

Wrong thread: http://www.smogon.com/forums/thread...firmation-thread.3513156/page-11#post-5691428
And yes, you're late.

 

[Yuy]

Wrong thread: http://www.smogon.com/forums/thread...firmation-thread.3513156/page-11#post-5691428
And yes, you're late.

Cool, thanks.

 

[hyw]

It just clicked. I understand now the argument of the pro-bans, finally (I think). It's that, unlike Ekiller and Xerneas, Mega Gengar has no counters and is able to feed on a proportion of the metagame without struggle. So, while you can run Skaromory for Ekiller and Aegislash for Xerneas, using such logic, Mega Gengar, while not uncounterable right off the bat, HAS THE POTENTIAL TO BECOME UNCOUNTERABLE due to its ability to eliminate the pivotal ability for players to opt for a switch-out. As Pokémon players we are constantly supplied with the choice to switch so that no single Pokémon becomes complete deadweight in the face of a higher predator...but only if you exclude the existence of trapping abilities. Thus, as a result, there's really no way of COUNTERING MEGA GENGAR IN A SEQUENTIAL MANNER.

Is this the meat of the gist, pro-bans?

 

[shrang]

It's not like we've never had issues with trapping before (there was actually a stigma about using wobbuffet, as well as farceus, in DPP OU, as I've heard from theorymon - could someone explain how farceus and wobb are great pokemon in DPP Ubers and permitted on the ubers ladder, yet are not actually used? What'd be the difference between that and all the players agreeing not to use geomancy or shadow tag or baton pass?) - gothitelle was around in gen 5 with shadow tag, but it wasn't used in ubers much because of the lack of things to trap. The introduction of defog's mechanics change has allowed it to destroy hazard removers (e.g. water/grass/poison arceus), klefki (say hello to a geoxern sweep), palkia (when something goes down unless it gets critted before CM boosts are set up or double crits later on - it's worth noting palkia became a lot less offensive than in BW, where permanent rain also made it a lot less likely that gothitelle would be capable of trapping it), as a few examples as to why it's become more popular. Mega-Gengar adds to the list in the same way of pokemon you can't really use (fairy arceus, sylveon, defensive xerneas, clefable, chansey, etc.) without it being trappable and removable and introducing a fundamental weakness to the team. Gengar however gets destiny bond and taunt, allowing it to virtually guarantee removing one pokemon - the one turn of mega evolution perhaps makes it less threatening versus hyper-offensive teams (it is still usually capable of taking something down with it though) but it is still incredible. I don't know how people can see something that lets you remove 1 pokemon, virtually of your choice, off of the opponent's team, is not uncompetitive. Maybe we could hold a tournament in a different tier where one player brings a team of 5 and the other brings a team of 6, and then the person with the team of 5 gets to remove one pokemon from the team of 6. Assuming they're roughly equal in level, who would you think would win? Admittedly it's a bit far from its origins, but the point still stands that removing 1 pokemon of choice from the opponent's team with very little opportunity cost is kind of something massive..

- Stigma - Farceus was not used because Shoddy couldn't implement the mechanic. On Wobbuffet, functionally speaking, stigma played little to no part in how it was used. There may have been some agreement at some point that Wobb was bad for the metagame, but at least when I started playing Pokemon, people were using Wobbuffet, not extremely commonly, but common enough that it was a legit threat, and from what I could tell, no one gave a damn (3/11 teams in the RMT archive had Wobbuffet in it).
- Removing 1 Pokemon at will - doesn't Wobbuffet do the same thing? Like I said, gen 4 Wobbuffet was arguably better at trapping things because unlike Gengar/Goth now, you didn't know it was coming because there was no team preview (Gengar also has the added disadvantage of having to Mega evolve). It was able to remove pretty much every Scarfer and probably still come back to Encore things for a sweep later (It took like 35% from ScarfPalk's Spacial Rend, could even tank a Scarf Water Spout from Kyogre if you really needed to) or if you had Custap (not Shoddy), you could Destiny Bond something else later. A typical offensive team could pretty much follow the formula: send in sweeper A, get as far you could, get revenged by a Scarfer, send in Wobb to remove that Scarfer, and then send in sweeper B to clean up. Obviously, it wasn't as simple as that, but a lot of games followed that model. Everything you mentioned in the bottom 2/3 of your post was pretty much applicable to Wobbuffet, yet, no-one cared. Why do we care now? Why SHOULD we care now?

 

[MMII]

i'm just dropping in before I drop off to sleep to say that you shouldnt talk about tag in past metas. shit is so different and it's just utterly irrelevent to things now. it's fun stuff to talk about, imo, but not in this thread.

 

[hyw]

But Wobbuffet is still relevant, isn't it? And just because the metagame "changed" to fit the opportunities of play-styles supplied by new Pokémons, items, etc, it doesn't mean that we should stop aiming to achieve team-building perfection as opposed to outright banning a problematic Pokémon.

[22:03:10] HybridGundam: shrang that's perfect.
[22:03:14] HybridGundam: See I'm having
[22:03:26] HybridGundam: a lot of trouble viewing things from the pro-ban perspective
[22:03:44] HybridGundam: but assuming that Mega Gengar = 1 Pokémon picked off of the opponent's team
[22:04:22] HybridGundam: (despite hardships like fragility coupled with the necessity of one turn to Mega Evolve, etc.)
[22:04:29] HybridGundam: then Wobbuffet is no different
[22:05:10] HybridGundam: just like Mega Gengar can't come in and pick off Scarf Zekrom
[22:05:23] HybridGundam: Wobbuffet can't pick off Giratina-O
[22:05:29] HybridGundam: so basically
[22:05:59] HybridGundam: Mega Gengar and Wobbuffet are the same Pokémon, just with different facades of their stats being usable
[22:06:22] @shrang: ye
[22:06:34] HybridGundam: while Mega Gengar is in fact inferior to Wobbuffet in this Shadow Tag-killing area as it requires a turn to Mega Evolve from regular Gengar.
[22:06:46] HybridGundam: Why don't people think this way.
[22:06:53] HybridGundam: *sigh
[22:06:56] HybridGundam: :'(
[22:07:03] HybridGundam: I argued this is my second post
[22:07:24] HybridGundam: but Fireburn deleted it lol
[22:07:26] HybridGundam: or MM2 I forget.
[22:08:18] @shrang: melee undeleted one of your posts and editted out off-topic bits

Here's a conversation I had with shrang (albeit he didn't say too much xD) that illustrates my outlook on this matter and shrang seems to agreee for the most part too.

 

[shrang]

Actually, it's not irrelevant if the actual themes are similar. That's like saying a preceding case in case law is irrelevant just because the superficial facts are different. The concept is the same here. Shadow Tag removing threats is a theme in BOTH gen 4 AND gen 6, and that is what we are discussing, NOT the fact that different metagames are different.

 

[Asmodean]

Even though it may be possible that Mega-Gengar takes out a pokemon at will (and even that is not guaranteed), the metagame is such that this does not translate to an auto-win. Sure, you might lose an important check or counter, but you also have the option to make plays that would prevent such a check from being trapped. This option may not exist after you are trapped, but that is what makes the game interesting and keeps you on your toes, pressuring both players to make plays that either enable or prevent trapping. This, I feel makes the game even more 'competitive,' contrary to pro-ban arguments.
(PS: Do I get updates if and when my vote is accepted?)

 

[MMII]

Except unlike previous cases in court, Wobb was never seriously considered for a ban in the same manner gar/tag is being now so there's no actual official decision to be referencing as precedent. What you are doing by bringing up wobb in DPP is comparable to the little kid pointing out something his brother did in response to chastisement. It's just a red herring and distracting from the actual discussion. There's a large number of reasons that could be proposed and argued as to why Wobb wasn't a problem then, but is one now. The issue I have with this sort of discussion is that answering why Wobb in DPP wasn't banned is not going to answer whether Gar/tag should be now.

 

[Engdrew]

Can we stop using immaterial metaphors to try to explain ourselves? This is like the fifth time this thread I've seen someone focus more so on the misuse of the metaphor rather than the point it's trying to make regardless of how well it exemplifies the argument. We're not all literature majors.

And yes, I agree - stop posting your paragraphs. It defeats the purpose of blind votes.

 

[Minority]

Can we stop using immaterial metaphors to try to explain ourselves? This is like the fifth time this thread I've seen someone focus more so on the misuse of the metaphor rather than the point it's trying to make regardless of how well it exemplifies the argument. We're not all literature majors.

Argument stems from examples, and examples are comparisons i.e. metaphors, similes, etc. The purpose of majoring in literature is not to waste precious time and money memorizing menial definitions and learning to communicate in some needlessly complicated form, rather its primary purpose is to master the ability to analyze and formulate argument in a variety of ways. Telling someone not to use examples in an argument is telling someone not to argue, however, hypothetical examples in any form, metaphor or not, are perhaps the worst kind of examples to use since they are not real or specific. Argument over the validity of an example, and argument over the validity of a metaphor used as an example are the same thing. Basically you're telling someone not to argue because you are to ignorant to understand the argument.

Argument does need to be more structured however, and many posts are just (not relevant body text) + (unsupported conclusion).

 

[asterat]

Is Gengarite an uncompetitive element of the metagame that needs to be removed to preserve the competitive integrity of Ubers, within the current paradigm of Ubers?

I'm aware my opinion on this holds almost no weight (Gengarite will most definitely be banned by a vast majority) but I personally think that Gengarite is not an item that should be removed to preserve the competitive intergrity of ubers. Personally, I don't see Gengarite as being the first or even worst offender of Shadow Tag in ubers. In generation four, there was no team preview. If something was trapped by Wobbuffet and it was essential so check a certain threat, it's game over. You can't really see Wobbuffet coming and playing like your opponent has a Wobbuffet will be disadvantageous whenever they don't. What makes this worse is that one doesn't know whether or not they need certain pokemon to secure a win. It's a blindsided battle where Wobbuffet can sneak up at any time, and steal a win. Now, admittedly Wobbuffet is nowhere as useful as Gengar. It could only trap choice users with extreme certainty, and has an extremely limited movepool. Gengar has an awesome speed tier and strong special attack stat. This introduces a concept of "picking off" slower threats by coming in and killing them with the move of choice. If the threat is serious and cannot be killed, Gengar can use destiny bond and take the foe with him. Despite all of this Gengar is debatably easier to work around. It doesn't start out in its dangerous form, meaning it has a turn of vulnerability before it becomes truly dangerous. The first time Gengar comes in, the active pokemon on the other side can flee. Gengar can attack this turn, meaning he is not complete set up bait, but his primary function is not active yet. In addition, XY has team preview. Playing around Gengar, to me, is as much as skill as using Gengar effectively is. In addition to Wobbuffet existing before, Gothitelle is maybe even worse than Gengar is because it sets up. It honestly seems to me that what makes Gengar so common is that it's easy to use and effective, meaning it finds its way onto a lot of teams.

Also, 50/50s are a part of the game and that argument is pretty invalid. Assuming every threat can not be perfectly accounted for, bringing a version of the team that fares better against different mons is a 50/50 betting on what the opponent will bring. The idea of a metagame where all teams can check each other and matches are decided by who can play perfectly longer is a nice thought, but somewhat unrealistic in a metagame as hazardous as XY Ubers.

 

[nmitchell890]

I think the reason that Mega Gengar is too much is the fact that it has the ability to almost guarantee to checkmate two pokemon per game. It will trap and KO a pokemon, then take out the opponents Pursuit user with Destiny Bond. If the opponent lacks a Pursuit user, it will switch out and checkmate another pokemon later. It can even help its teammates set up if it switches into a defensive pokemon and uses Taunt. Gothitelle and Wobbuffet don't come close to Mega Gengar. I vote to ban Gengarite, not Shadow Tag.

 

[Engdrew]

Argument stems from examples, and examples are comparisons i.e. metaphors, similes, etc. The purpose of majoring in literature is not to waste precious time and money memorizing menial definitions and learning to communicate in some needlessly complicated form, rather its primary purpose is to master the ability to analyze and formulate argument in a variety of ways. Telling someone not to use examples in an argument is telling someone not to argue, however, hypothetical examples in any form, metaphor or not, are perhaps the worst kind of examples to use since they are not real or specific. Argument over the validity of an example, and argument over the validity of a metaphor used as an example are the same thing. Basically you're telling someone not to argue because you are to ignorant to understand the argument.

Argument does need to be more structured however, and many posts are just (not relevant body text) + (unsupported conclusion).

My point was more along the lines of people using shitty metaphors rather than the actual usage of metaphors itself. I agree with what you're trying to say, but you totally missed my point.

 

[Slimmer]

So Mega Gengar will be banned or not? When is this suspect supposed to get done?