Disaster Area
formerly Piexplode
I think that's the point of the paragraph's, in lieu of what MS said
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Ubers suspect testing aftermath
- Thread starter chaos
- Start date
The issue here was the mixed message between having a vote and reviewing those votes. The vote itself sends the message that the process is democratic and objective while the reality is the opposite. It's not an issue of one way being better than another, it was that one was dressed as its opposite. It was a very poor way to compromise between the fact Ubers, historically, doesn't do suspect tests when deciding a ban with the fact that Ubers is now doing a suspect test. (exception being the bw clause suspect tests which were used to advertise the metagame rather than make a decision over a problematic element in it)
Keep in mind that I'm oversimplifying things here and that this trainwreck wasn't the operation of the holy ghost. That's why, as fireburn and jibaku have stated, Ubers philosophy is going to be fully analyzed before another decision regarding the metagame is made. This will take some time.
Keep in mind that I'm oversimplifying things here and that this trainwreck wasn't the operation of the holy ghost. That's why, as fireburn and jibaku have stated, Ubers philosophy is going to be fully analyzed before another decision regarding the metagame is made. This will take some time.
Crestfall
levitate, levitate, levitate, levitate
If it deters those players, then I'd say they just aren't dedicated enough to see through reqs for a tier they apparently care for. Obviously real life is an obstructing factor, but this suspect was open a loooong time. And why should we concerned about making it "a pain to vote"? We are talking about BANNING something from the tier known for freedom. The 'ultimate ban' so to speak. In fact I'd say making reqs difficult is only good for us, every vote carries heavy weight. For God's sake it would make gothi unusable, mgar banned (after a no vote), and wobuffet (well w/e). It's not some small matter!
If the "relevant players" and those who "actually play Ubers" cared as much as everyone claims, they'd make higher reqs if needed. Not accusing you Minority, but with all the whining about "half these voters don't even main ubers as a tier" I'd be glad to see higher reqs.
However given the posts by Ubers leaders and chaos, it's unlikely we'll even have another community voted suspect. In which case discussing reqs is irrelevant :(
Hi guys.
Let me start by saying that I deeply apologize for how everything went down. My motives with this Suspect Test were not corrupt or selfish, I assure you, but it certainly looked like that on the surface. I understand many of you were outraged over the voting results, and I'm sorry if I caused you any undue stress. I want to clarify our intentions with how this was handled, although I fully agree that the test was not managed as well as it could have been, and perhaps should not have happened in the first place.
The purpose of instituting a paragraph system was to help people try and understand what was really being tested. The Suspect Test format for OU and lower tiers is generally geared towards asking the question "Is X broken?" However, we don't care about that in Ubers; here, everything is broken. What we were asking was the question "Is X uncompetitive?", which is very much different. However, a lot of people don't necessarily get the difference right away when looking at the subject matter initially. So in an effort to help people understand, we implemented a paragraph system to judge votes. Our intention was to get you to really think about the suspect beyond "X is bad because it beats Y and Z" or "X is okay because you can revenge kill it with Choice Scarf Y." and understand the question that was really being asked.
However, things didn't work out that way and many people accused me and the other Ubers moderators of being biased or corrupt. This is partially because that the paragraphs were judged by myself, Melee Mewtwo and Jibaku, the former two of which were vocally pro-ban. We did our best to be as just as could, and collectively we felt that we had been fair - but the way the numbers fell made it seem like we had rigged the vote from a surface viewpoint, and a huge public outcry boiled over. On top of other multiple other issues (the concept of suspect testing in Ubers itself, poor transparency, untimely transitions of tiering leadership, potential subjectivity in the judging criteria), the Suspect Test itself was pretty flawed from a procedural standpoint. As a result, people got angry, called it unfair and unjust, and chaos ended up squashing the Suspect Test results as a result of of the huge wave of complaints from the Smogon community.
You were all well within your rights to question things. Looking back, I would have done the same if I were in your position. I am truly sorry if I have negatively impacted your trust in myself, the Ubers leadership, or even Smogon itself as a result of this test. As the Ubers tiering leader, I take full responsibility for this backlash. Please understand that I have only been recently appointed to Ubers tiering leader and am still learning the ins and outs. I hope not to overstep any boundaries in the future and I promise that such a debacle will not happen again.
So, then, where do we go from here?
For starters, Shadow Tag will remain unbanned. chaos has overturned the decision and that is how it shall remain. Even if he offered to reinstate the voting results, I do not believe it would be the right thing to do, given the immense backlash and procedural errors on my part. I would rather take the time first to work out a clear direction for our tiering policy before proceeding with any more major tiering decisions.
One thing I can tell you now: Suspect Tests in Ubers have been abolished. I think most everyone agrees that this was a bad idea - a failed experiment, if you will. No one seemed to really enjoy it, the idea of holding Suspect Test in Ubers of this nature remains questionable, and this test was a public disaster that dragged on much longer that it probably should have. That being said, we will still have a system of some sort to handle future policy concerns. What that will be, I do not yet know. I plan on having a nice long chat with resident wiseman Jibaku and other leaders in the community to iron out a clear and explicit tiering policy for Ubers so that everyone will have a crystal clear idea of what is considered acceptable. Ubers obviously isn't a ban-free metagame (we have clauses, Moody is banned, Swagger is banned, etc.), but a concrete philosophy will help us make sure we don't potentially overstep our bounds in the future.
It is my hope that we can approach ORAS with a clear conscience and enthusiasm for what lies ahead. Above all, I hope that this Suspect Test did not tarnish anyone's interest in the Ubers metagame. It is an interesting metagame with a great community, despite what recent events might suggest. We tried something new with this Suspect Test, it didn't work out, and we're going to make sure we make things right for everyone. The one good thing that came out of all this is that we now have a prime opportunity to closely analyze Ubers tiering policy and figure out what direction it should really take. This will take some time, but I believe we can produce something great.
Thank you all for your understanding. Once again, I apologize for my mistakes and I will do what I can to serve the community better in the future.
Let me start by saying that I deeply apologize for how everything went down. My motives with this Suspect Test were not corrupt or selfish, I assure you, but it certainly looked like that on the surface. I understand many of you were outraged over the voting results, and I'm sorry if I caused you any undue stress. I want to clarify our intentions with how this was handled, although I fully agree that the test was not managed as well as it could have been, and perhaps should not have happened in the first place.
The purpose of instituting a paragraph system was to help people try and understand what was really being tested. The Suspect Test format for OU and lower tiers is generally geared towards asking the question "Is X broken?" However, we don't care about that in Ubers; here, everything is broken. What we were asking was the question "Is X uncompetitive?", which is very much different. However, a lot of people don't necessarily get the difference right away when looking at the subject matter initially. So in an effort to help people understand, we implemented a paragraph system to judge votes. Our intention was to get you to really think about the suspect beyond "X is bad because it beats Y and Z" or "X is okay because you can revenge kill it with Choice Scarf Y." and understand the question that was really being asked.
However, things didn't work out that way and many people accused me and the other Ubers moderators of being biased or corrupt. This is partially because that the paragraphs were judged by myself, Melee Mewtwo and Jibaku, the former two of which were vocally pro-ban. We did our best to be as just as could, and collectively we felt that we had been fair - but the way the numbers fell made it seem like we had rigged the vote from a surface viewpoint, and a huge public outcry boiled over. On top of other multiple other issues (the concept of suspect testing in Ubers itself, poor transparency, untimely transitions of tiering leadership, potential subjectivity in the judging criteria), the Suspect Test itself was pretty flawed from a procedural standpoint. As a result, people got angry, called it unfair and unjust, and chaos ended up squashing the Suspect Test results as a result of of the huge wave of complaints from the Smogon community.
You were all well within your rights to question things. Looking back, I would have done the same if I were in your position. I am truly sorry if I have negatively impacted your trust in myself, the Ubers leadership, or even Smogon itself as a result of this test. As the Ubers tiering leader, I take full responsibility for this backlash. Please understand that I have only been recently appointed to Ubers tiering leader and am still learning the ins and outs. I hope not to overstep any boundaries in the future and I promise that such a debacle will not happen again.
So, then, where do we go from here?
For starters, Shadow Tag will remain unbanned. chaos has overturned the decision and that is how it shall remain. Even if he offered to reinstate the voting results, I do not believe it would be the right thing to do, given the immense backlash and procedural errors on my part. I would rather take the time first to work out a clear direction for our tiering policy before proceeding with any more major tiering decisions.
One thing I can tell you now: Suspect Tests in Ubers have been abolished. I think most everyone agrees that this was a bad idea - a failed experiment, if you will. No one seemed to really enjoy it, the idea of holding Suspect Test in Ubers of this nature remains questionable, and this test was a public disaster that dragged on much longer that it probably should have. That being said, we will still have a system of some sort to handle future policy concerns. What that will be, I do not yet know. I plan on having a nice long chat with resident wiseman Jibaku and other leaders in the community to iron out a clear and explicit tiering policy for Ubers so that everyone will have a crystal clear idea of what is considered acceptable. Ubers obviously isn't a ban-free metagame (we have clauses, Moody is banned, Swagger is banned, etc.), but a concrete philosophy will help us make sure we don't potentially overstep our bounds in the future.
It is my hope that we can approach ORAS with a clear conscience and enthusiasm for what lies ahead. Above all, I hope that this Suspect Test did not tarnish anyone's interest in the Ubers metagame. It is an interesting metagame with a great community, despite what recent events might suggest. We tried something new with this Suspect Test, it didn't work out, and we're going to make sure we make things right for everyone. The one good thing that came out of all this is that we now have a prime opportunity to closely analyze Ubers tiering policy and figure out what direction it should really take. This will take some time, but I believe we can produce something great.
Thank you all for your understanding. Once again, I apologize for my mistakes and I will do what I can to serve the community better in the future.
Crestfall, you're proposing that only people who can play for 5 hours a day to ladder should be able to vote? I'm sure there are SPL-tier players who simply don't have that time to ladder who are more qualified to vote than say, me, who could probably get reqs due to the amount of free time I have that could theoretically dedicate to grinding Ubers.
edit: oh gosh the ninja
edit: oh gosh the ninja
I totally agree with you mate and I believe those who are still "paragraphs help keep out bad player" should take a look at his post. We already have ladder req which is an objective criteria for voting we dont need a subjective criteria. Those we take the time to get req are dedicated to the voting and people this dedicated must know the tier well or is willing to learn it. Even tho the ladder is not really competitive, new players cannot neccessarily get reqs easily or if they do, then they are already sorta expose to the tier IMO.
Crestfall
levitate, levitate, levitate, levitate
The vote was open a long time. You could play for an hour a day for the entire suspect and make reqs.
The problem isn't just that higher reqs make voting more painful for everyone and deter the players that should vote, it's also a fact that you can be good at laddering and "bad" at Ubers. There were relevant Ubers players that did not participate in the vote because laddering to get reqs is so painful and such a large commitment of time; making the reqs higher increase both of these factors. As for the thought that having higher reqs will make sure "bad" players don't get to vote it won't, the reason being that ladder play is inherently different from tour play. There is only a bit of correlation between tour success and ladder success, for example there are players such as myself that are irrelevant in official Smogon tours, but can get reqs faster with a higher GXE than known tour players such as Aim. Even players with common sense and a good ladder team can get in the top 20 when they have never played an Ubers game in their life.
The issue of how things should happen in the future is now irrelevant to an extent since we won't have another Ubers suspect test anytime soon, however I just want to point out the solution was not as simple as having higher reqs and no paragraph required.
The issue of how things should happen in the future is now irrelevant to an extent since we won't have another Ubers suspect test anytime soon, however I just want to point out the solution was not as simple as having higher reqs and no paragraph required.
What you say might be right but consider that Ladder reqs are the only objective mean of determining a player's criteria. In economic, we call this the Contest System, whereas the paragraphs reviewing are Majority Vote on the surface but a Command System in the interior.
I do think that we should move on from this and stop the blaming and complaining about emotional distress, we are strong people. To be honest, I don't think there is a reason to keep this thread open.
okay I just saw this and honestly I don't completely understand what actually happened LOL
but seriously, don't hate on Fireburn. Perhaps he made a mistake, and even if he did, that gives us no right to bash him for this one possible error he made; he has contributed countless other good things to this tier that has shaped what Ubers has become. same thing goes for MM2 if anyone is hating on him as well :^)
On another hand, I'm kind of glad this actually happened. From the beginning of the Gengarite suspect test, I was against the whole "suspect testing" thing but after people argued back and forth, my viewpoint was eventually changed so that I voted to ban Shadow Tag. Even so, I still couldn't deny that I still didn't like the idea of Suspect testing in Ubers.
Anyways, this will probably be a good turning point for this tier and I look forward to OR/AS Ubers [[[[:
but seriously, don't hate on Fireburn. Perhaps he made a mistake, and even if he did, that gives us no right to bash him for this one possible error he made; he has contributed countless other good things to this tier that has shaped what Ubers has become. same thing goes for MM2 if anyone is hating on him as well :^)
On another hand, I'm kind of glad this actually happened. From the beginning of the Gengarite suspect test, I was against the whole "suspect testing" thing but after people argued back and forth, my viewpoint was eventually changed so that I voted to ban Shadow Tag. Even so, I still couldn't deny that I still didn't like the idea of Suspect testing in Ubers.
Anyways, this will probably be a good turning point for this tier and I look forward to OR/AS Ubers [[[[:
Thugly Duckling
I play TCG now
I just hate the mods' reasoning of "Pokemon X was not banned; so lets retest Pokemon X, and test Pokemon Y, and Z to see if it gets banned this time." The tier leaders have my upmost respect but I really feel the entire suspect was biased because 1) the two most active mods in the suspect test (Fireburn and Melee Mewtwo) are pro-ban, and 2) anti-ban voters and reasoning were more scrutinized than pro-ban voters and reasoning. I think the idea of abolishing bans in the Uber tier is foolish because we never now what the hell is in the future after ORAS or even in ORAS; but nonetheless, I am just glad this whole thing is over. XY was a dark metagame - I just hope ORAS redeems Gen VI.
I don't think they said the Uber tier is abolishing bans, just suspect tests. Future bans will be taken care of in a different manner.
I think people in this thread need to learn the distinction between "vote-rigging" and "bias" before accusing tier leaders of vote rigging. Vote rigging implies a conscious and premeditated effort to tilt a vote. I can't intelligently see what the paragraph readers had in their minds, but I don't think anyone has any evidence to suggest that they were consciously removing votes that didn't serve what they wanted. Now was there bias? Of course there was. I trust Fireburn/MM2/Jibaku enough to know that thy wouldn't consciously rig the vote, it was actually apparent in the Gengarite suspect test that they didn't have malicious intent (for those unaware, it was basically Fireburn/MM2 that effectively read all of the paragraphs). However, just because we can't say that they rigged the vote mean they didn't have clear biases. I don't care how ethically the vote was carried out, when you have someone as vocal as Melee as a paragraph reader, you're going to have a conflict of interest, no matter how you put it, and I think that's what made this Suspect test so controversial. No matter how impartial they try to be, when someone has that strong of an opinion, biases will cloud their judgement. These processes are unconscious. Now, I'm not blaming any of the paragraph readers for it, because this is a systemic problem that allowed them to be paragraph readers in the first place.
tl;dr: Stop blaming Fireburn/MM2/Jibaku/Chaos for how this suspect test turned out, reasons:
1) The problem was a systemic one, which we are now committed to fixing, so stop singling out people and piling blame on them
2) More seriously, stop accusing the paragraph readers of vote rigging. You have no evidence to back that up so stfu
tl;dr: Stop blaming Fireburn/MM2/Jibaku/Chaos for how this suspect test turned out, reasons:
1) The problem was a systemic one, which we are now committed to fixing, so stop singling out people and piling blame on them
2) More seriously, stop accusing the paragraph readers of vote rigging. You have no evidence to back that up so stfu
Can everyone just stop fucking portray XY Ubers as a dark metagame just because you don't like the Shadow Tag suspect. I seriously fail to see how 'dark' the suspect tsst is tbh. I also don't see the problem of requiring paragraphs and reject them since apparently many people don't know what they are talking about and lacks understanding of the focus of the suspect (ie. see the PO STag suspect thread which is filled with trash posts from people who don't even know about the metagame). Why the fuck is people given right to vote when they don't actually know the Ubers metagame? That's like giving British citizens the right to vote in American policies. I always see posts in the suspect thread that makes absolutely no sense no matter from the pro-ban or anti-ban side. Of course there are much more of these people in the anti-ban side since a lot of them are clueless people that blindly follows the 'no ban in Ubers logic' which is already told to be not true. I don't really see a problem of rejecting that much of anti-ban posts since it is much more easier to blindly join the anti-ban side due to hate of banning a pokemon in Ubers. I'm not saying that the anti-ban side is wrong since the whole matter is incredibly subjective and there's no clear cut of right or wrong in this subject. However, people arguing without knowing the metagame and the Ubers tiering policy is simply unacceptable.
The reqs being that easy also allows numerous clueless people to get votes too. After reading Fireburn's recent rmt I spent a minute to make a trash team with Magic Coat lefties Ekiller/Specs Zekrom/AV Ho-oh/AV Excadrill/Scarf Giratina/Physically based mixed SR Dialga and managed to get to #3 of the suspect ladder with 88 GXE in a single day. That makes me doubt the quality of voters when all they need is win a bit of matches in this garbage ladder. People that have no experiemce in Ubers can simply beat some bs Ash teams and get reqs.
The situation right now is appointing the tier leaders to make decisions on the tier but eventually 'fix' their decisions. Why appoint someone as the CEO when the owner of the company don't believe in their decisions? I guess that my post will most likely be deleted and I may probably be a 'banned deucer' afterall but at least I want to fight for the freedom to express my opinions towards the tiering policy. I always love the Ubers metagame and have cared enough about it to learn about and play in Ubers of every single generation. I have noticed how the discovery of STag abusers negatively affect the metagame (I know that's subjective and arguable but I'm just voicing out my thoughts) and want to do a thing about it. I hope that the final decision about STag are made my someone who actually cares about and is willing to spend time to learn about Ubers.
Thanks for watching this emotional trash post. Feel free to hate, rebutt and curse me.
The reqs being that easy also allows numerous clueless people to get votes too. After reading Fireburn's recent rmt I spent a minute to make a trash team with Magic Coat lefties Ekiller/Specs Zekrom/AV Ho-oh/AV Excadrill/Scarf Giratina/Physically based mixed SR Dialga and managed to get to #3 of the suspect ladder with 88 GXE in a single day. That makes me doubt the quality of voters when all they need is win a bit of matches in this garbage ladder. People that have no experiemce in Ubers can simply beat some bs Ash teams and get reqs.
The situation right now is appointing the tier leaders to make decisions on the tier but eventually 'fix' their decisions. Why appoint someone as the CEO when the owner of the company don't believe in their decisions? I guess that my post will most likely be deleted and I may probably be a 'banned deucer' afterall but at least I want to fight for the freedom to express my opinions towards the tiering policy. I always love the Ubers metagame and have cared enough about it to learn about and play in Ubers of every single generation. I have noticed how the discovery of STag abusers negatively affect the metagame (I know that's subjective and arguable but I'm just voicing out my thoughts) and want to do a thing about it. I hope that the final decision about STag are made my someone who actually cares about and is willing to spend time to learn about Ubers.
Thanks for watching this emotional trash post. Feel free to hate, rebutt and curse me.
Guys enough. Everything that needed to be said has been said. We are moving into a brand new format in under 2 days. The shadow tag suspect test was carried out and there were some mistakes. In all honesty i can't see anything that is differenr from before. Shadow tag is still aeound and everyone is in the same poisition as before.
So yeah peace.
So yeah peace.
is this thread peaceful yet? yes? ok. will this suspect be counted for the tiering contributor badge? i'm not badge hungry, it's just common sense to be unsure of it when the said suspect had its result reversed and all.
jk you're a nice guy and i hope your Ubers reign is long and glorious(after hugenis slayed retires)
Now can we stop blasting the para readers pls. You're not helping, and w/e questions you have are irrelevant in the face of the fact that Suspect Tests in Ubers have been abolished. So w/e you have to say about how the suspects should be held amounts to nothing, and rather than find flaws in this suspect, let's just forget it to be a mistake, and move to the bright future.
quoting Dumbledore
jk you're a nice guy and i hope your Ubers reign is long and glorious(after hugen
Now can we stop blasting the para readers pls. You're not helping, and w/e questions you have are irrelevant in the face of the fact that Suspect Tests in Ubers have been abolished. So w/e you have to say about how the suspects should be held amounts to nothing, and rather than find flaws in this suspect, let's just forget it to be a mistake, and move to the bright future.
quoting Dumbledore
Everyone makes mistakes, but, the Ubers higher-ups being more powerful, their mistakes will be larger, but that's no bias to hand them a noose. Let's just laugh about this(or you could get brainwashed), pass evasion boosts to your MegaRay :]
while I agree with some of this (the "laddering" part having little correlation with actual tier knowledge), I have heard the tour argument a bunch of times. Sorry but from my understanding the tours are only for dunno 8-12 players? If you really feel we should all jack to those players and practice what they preach, that's cool but I don't think it's valid to make decisions based on such a small playerbase. A solution would be to just ban what these ppl think on the tour itself as oppose to compromise hundreds of players (both "serious" or "old schoolers" and "casual" or "newbies") with a ban decision that affects the tier.
Remember that there are several OU or UU good players that occasionally play Ubers. They could just copy/paste a decent team and do very good against ppl spamming Psychic with LO Lugia.
On a side note, while the suspect test was probably not very well executed I would be vary wary to leave further banning decisions in the hands of maybe 3-4 ppl considering what just happened. Without accusing or anything, bias does exist and positions are taken. Before the test started we all knew who was pro and anti ban. How would that be considered/factored in in a future "council will decide" form of action?
If you're trying to balance at the most competitve level then you should only take into account the most competitive players, as otherwise strategies that are only good (not necessarily banworthy) at the competitive level (Gothitelle for example) are not considered, and stuff that's good (not necessarily banworthy) on the ladder (GeoXern) are. In reality, every solid tour team can deal with GeoXern, so why should GeoXern be considered? Gothitelle is good but nonexistent on the ladder, why should people with very little experience with it make decisions about it?
As I said take a look at basically every competitive video game at the moment, esp Dota. Balancing is never made by the average player, the game devs consult with pro players before making their decisions.
I don't necessarily agree that Smogon should make tour metas, but that's what they decided so I can't really do anything about it.
As I said take a look at basically every competitive video game at the moment, esp Dota. Balancing is never made by the average player, the game devs consult with pro players before making their decisions.
I don't necessarily agree that Smogon should make tour metas, but that's what they decided so I can't really do anything about it.
I never said or implied that only known tour players are qualified to vote, merely that the idea of raising the reqs to vote won't fix the core issue they claim it will.
this whole sentence is wrong. Every fighting game ever created has never been patched/balanced to fix/hear any imbalance or whatever you guys call "uncompetitive" issue. Have you played Tekken 4? Or SF2/3? Or any MK game created? Because I never heard people banning Vega/Claw or Yun/Chun Li. You sound like someone that would probably ban fireballs/projectiles in SF2. Recent updates or newer versions such as Third Strike OE or USSF4 are further proof of this.
As a dota player I can only attest for maybe some Dota 2 feedback from players and only because a context issue atm. Dota 1 nerfs/changes/balancing was never done with consultation of the/any community.
that doesn't change the fact that balancing isn't made by the average player? if there are no balance changes period then it's not relevant
You sound like someone that would probably ban fireballs/projectiles in SF2.
how is this relevant? I don't play SF2 nor would I be good
if dota 2 balance was determined by average players then invis would be nerfed into oblivion and batrider would never have been changed. Icefrog does in fact talk to pros before each patch
You sound like someone that would probably ban fireballs/projectiles in SF2.
how is this relevant? I don't play SF2 nor would I be good
if dota 2 balance was determined by average players then invis would be nerfed into oblivion and batrider would never have been changed. Icefrog does in fact talk to pros before each patch
thats really not a relevant comparison as the skill cap in dota 2 is incredibly higher than the skill cap in pokemon
in pokemon any average player can build a team with xerneas and mega-gengar and 6-0 problems if their luck is right, even if problems has superior game knowledge and prediction skill.
in dota 2 no average player would ever be able to beat a pro in a 1v1 regardless of luck. while in pokemon you can reach a point where it is almost impossible to improve due to limitations of the game, in dota 2 that point does not exist, even for pros.
that being said, what you said about balance is also wrong. icefrog balances the game around the pro scene AND the public scene. spirit breaker nerfs/buffs, huskar ghost scepter nerf, are just a few random examples off the top of my head without thinking very hard.
in pokemon any average player can build a team with xerneas and mega-gengar and 6-0 problems if their luck is right, even if problems has superior game knowledge and prediction skill.
in dota 2 no average player would ever be able to beat a pro in a 1v1 regardless of luck. while in pokemon you can reach a point where it is almost impossible to improve due to limitations of the game, in dota 2 that point does not exist, even for pros.
that being said, what you said about balance is also wrong. icefrog balances the game around the pro scene AND the public scene. spirit breaker nerfs/buffs, huskar ghost scepter nerf, are just a few random examples off the top of my head without thinking very hard.
I think outright claiming that Jibaku, Melee Mewtwo and Fireburn were out to rig the results of the votes goes too far. I don't think they did, in fact I think they acted in what they felt was in the best interests of the tier (i.e. their intentions were pure). The problem was that they're human and humans aren't perfect. When we have a bias towards something it becomes easy to show that bias by doing things that we don't feel is biased. When something is objective, e.g. "did user Majickary vote for ban or no ban", I am sure Jibaku Melee Mewtwo and Fireburn were all unanimous. They didn't secretly change my vote (which was no ban) because they were biased towards ban. On the other hand the question "is user Majicakry's paragraph good enough" is a subjective one. Example: if a pro-ban paragraph basically argued that STag is uncompetitive because it removes the fundamental ability to switch (a valid reason by the council's standards) AND because it leads to certain Pokemon / playstyles being unviable (not a valid reason by the council's standards), does one accept the paragraph or not? This is where a bias may manifest. The council may have the purest of intentions but when 2/3 of the council is vociferously pro-ban a bias is inescapable.
I think blaming Hugendugen for the suspect tests is also inappropriate. The guy was tasked with deciding on one of the most major decisions of Ubers history. When you have people with the pedigree of Fireburn arguing in favour of banning, even the most experienced Ubers player would be inclined to listen and not outright dismiss the idea. And then to come to a decision of this magnitude alone? It makes sense to get the community's opinion.
That's why I say Go Team Fireburn. The entire episode was not good, but it's not because he, Melee Mewtwo and Jibaku were treacherous underhand people setting out to fulfill their hidden agenda of getting STag banned. No. This is not their fault, it's human nature's fault. Someone has to make such mistakes before future can be averted. Go Team Fireburn!
I think blaming Hugendugen for the suspect tests is also inappropriate. The guy was tasked with deciding on one of the most major decisions of Ubers history. When you have people with the pedigree of Fireburn arguing in favour of banning, even the most experienced Ubers player would be inclined to listen and not outright dismiss the idea. And then to come to a decision of this magnitude alone? It makes sense to get the community's opinion.
That's why I say Go Team Fireburn. The entire episode was not good, but it's not because he, Melee Mewtwo and Jibaku were treacherous underhand people setting out to fulfill their hidden agenda of getting STag banned. No. This is not their fault, it's human nature's fault. Someone has to make such mistakes before future can be averted. Go Team Fireburn!
Given the importance of this topic not just to the Ubers tier but to Smogon as a whole, I would like to take some time to weigh in on the matter.
First off, I would like to commend the people in charge of the suspect test, especially the ones in charge of judging the paragraphs. Anyone, and I mean anyone, can screw up the execution of an important public event like a suspect test, but it takes a great deal of moral character and courage to publicly admit personal responsibility for such a high profile screwup in the manner that the Uber TLs did. I want these kinds of people running our tiers, ones who are willing to admit when they are wrong and then make serious efforts to fix those errors, and the willingness of the Uber TLs to do just that far outweighs the magnitude of the mistakes they made during this test. That's not to trivialize the magnitude of the mistakes made, but to emphasize how important this level of honesty and sincerity is to me.
In case it's not abundantly clear, I think we should continue to show the Uber TLs our full support moving forward.
I will admit, I actually thought that the paragraph idea was a great idea when I first read about it, and was hoping that it would produce the results that Fireburn and the other TLs were hoping for. Shadow Tag, like many other uncompetetive elements in pokemon, is not something that one can just throw onto a team willy-nilly and expect it to perform as if it were a broken sweeper. It's power is much more subtle and is not always apparent even to successful ladderers. I have little doubt that a half decent HO player could've easily made a perfectly fine ubers HO team and obtain reqs without losing a single mon to mega gengar or any other trapper, not having a clue as to why they're being suspected in the first place. This isn't just a problem with shadow tag, but with every suspect worthy thing that isn't horribly overused on the ladder. Just look at Deo-S in OU, who was suspected but failed to get banned when Genesect and Mega Luca were dominating the meta but got banned much later when Deosharp became popular. Even in the face of this failure, I applaud the ubers tiering council for being willing to take these risks in order to improve the ubers metagame as well as the suspect process as a whole.
That all being said, I do in fact believe that abolishing the possibility of suspects in Ubers is a tad hasty. Judging from the posts made by the Uber TLs on this topic, there currently is or very soon will be a very heated debate on how to make future tiering decisions. Wouldn't it make more sense to keep suspect tests on the table until after the TLs have had this discussion? As Fireburn admitted in his excellent post on the subject, the Shadow Tag suspect was handled quite poorly. It lasted too long, the people in charge of reading the paragraphs and counting votes were personally involved in the suspect debates and heavily invested in its results, and the voting process could have been more transparent and better explained. However, I do not see how a single poorly handled suspect implies a problem with the suspect process as a whole or the very idea of suspect testing. From my understanding (and please call me out on this if I'm wrong), there were 2 suspect tests in ubers during Gen 5 for evasion and OHKO moves, both of which were executed much more cleanly then the most recent Shadow Tag suspect. Given that there has already been two successful suspect tests, I think that it would be wise to not immediately ditch the entire process but instead carefully examine why this one went so poorly and take steps to fix the process in any future suspects.
If we do decide to ever suspect something in Ubers again, I would like to propose a suggestion. It seems pretty obvious that the paragraph requirement is not the best way to determine whether or not any given player is knowledgeable of the suspect. The process is subjective and is vulnerable to bias from even the most well intentioned judges. Furthermore, our tier leaders are first and foremost battlers, not essay writers, and it stands to reason that we should not assume that they have skills that belong to a language arts teacher. Lastly, as stated earlier, it's pretty easy to C/P a well written anti/pro ban argument from the suspect thread, which circumvents the process far too easily for my liking.
Therefore, I propose the following: In future suspects of uncompetitive or underused elements of the metagame, players will be required to submit a reasonably high level replay of a team taking advantage of the abilities of the suspect in question to show that they understand what's going on.
I feel that it will be much easier to make objective (or at least less subjective) criteria to judge replays then it is to judge paragraphs. I also think that the TLs will have a much easier time judging them because they are already skilled battlers who are plenty familiar with analyzing replays at all levels.
Once again, trying different methods to make a healthier metagame is paramount for the growth of the community. I applaud these attempts even when they end in failure because we still learn from them. Do not take options off the table before you are absolutely certain that they are terrible ideas.
*edit*
Oh yeah, and Go Team Fireburn! Go Team Ubers!
First off, I would like to commend the people in charge of the suspect test, especially the ones in charge of judging the paragraphs. Anyone, and I mean anyone, can screw up the execution of an important public event like a suspect test, but it takes a great deal of moral character and courage to publicly admit personal responsibility for such a high profile screwup in the manner that the Uber TLs did. I want these kinds of people running our tiers, ones who are willing to admit when they are wrong and then make serious efforts to fix those errors, and the willingness of the Uber TLs to do just that far outweighs the magnitude of the mistakes they made during this test. That's not to trivialize the magnitude of the mistakes made, but to emphasize how important this level of honesty and sincerity is to me.
In case it's not abundantly clear, I think we should continue to show the Uber TLs our full support moving forward.
I will admit, I actually thought that the paragraph idea was a great idea when I first read about it, and was hoping that it would produce the results that Fireburn and the other TLs were hoping for. Shadow Tag, like many other uncompetetive elements in pokemon, is not something that one can just throw onto a team willy-nilly and expect it to perform as if it were a broken sweeper. It's power is much more subtle and is not always apparent even to successful ladderers. I have little doubt that a half decent HO player could've easily made a perfectly fine ubers HO team and obtain reqs without losing a single mon to mega gengar or any other trapper, not having a clue as to why they're being suspected in the first place. This isn't just a problem with shadow tag, but with every suspect worthy thing that isn't horribly overused on the ladder. Just look at Deo-S in OU, who was suspected but failed to get banned when Genesect and Mega Luca were dominating the meta but got banned much later when Deosharp became popular. Even in the face of this failure, I applaud the ubers tiering council for being willing to take these risks in order to improve the ubers metagame as well as the suspect process as a whole.
That all being said, I do in fact believe that abolishing the possibility of suspects in Ubers is a tad hasty. Judging from the posts made by the Uber TLs on this topic, there currently is or very soon will be a very heated debate on how to make future tiering decisions. Wouldn't it make more sense to keep suspect tests on the table until after the TLs have had this discussion? As Fireburn admitted in his excellent post on the subject, the Shadow Tag suspect was handled quite poorly. It lasted too long, the people in charge of reading the paragraphs and counting votes were personally involved in the suspect debates and heavily invested in its results, and the voting process could have been more transparent and better explained. However, I do not see how a single poorly handled suspect implies a problem with the suspect process as a whole or the very idea of suspect testing. From my understanding (and please call me out on this if I'm wrong), there were 2 suspect tests in ubers during Gen 5 for evasion and OHKO moves, both of which were executed much more cleanly then the most recent Shadow Tag suspect. Given that there has already been two successful suspect tests, I think that it would be wise to not immediately ditch the entire process but instead carefully examine why this one went so poorly and take steps to fix the process in any future suspects.
If we do decide to ever suspect something in Ubers again, I would like to propose a suggestion. It seems pretty obvious that the paragraph requirement is not the best way to determine whether or not any given player is knowledgeable of the suspect. The process is subjective and is vulnerable to bias from even the most well intentioned judges. Furthermore, our tier leaders are first and foremost battlers, not essay writers, and it stands to reason that we should not assume that they have skills that belong to a language arts teacher. Lastly, as stated earlier, it's pretty easy to C/P a well written anti/pro ban argument from the suspect thread, which circumvents the process far too easily for my liking.
Therefore, I propose the following: In future suspects of uncompetitive or underused elements of the metagame, players will be required to submit a reasonably high level replay of a team taking advantage of the abilities of the suspect in question to show that they understand what's going on.
I feel that it will be much easier to make objective (or at least less subjective) criteria to judge replays then it is to judge paragraphs. I also think that the TLs will have a much easier time judging them because they are already skilled battlers who are plenty familiar with analyzing replays at all levels.
Once again, trying different methods to make a healthier metagame is paramount for the growth of the community. I applaud these attempts even when they end in failure because we still learn from them. Do not take options off the table before you are absolutely certain that they are terrible ideas.
*edit*
Oh yeah, and Go Team Fireburn! Go Team Ubers!