Freeze Clause

[magic9mushroom]

(Okay, there's enough argument about this that it needs its own thread as opposed to clamouring for a quickfix as SOME PEOPLE have done.)

Freeze Clause should not be used in simulators attempting to simulate RBY cartridge play. It is a perversion of in-game mechanics to suit whiners.

Sleep Clause can be implemented on cartridge; you make a rule that you can't use sleep moves if you've slept something (mechanical sleep clause does allow the player to waste a turn using it and failing, which is not a good thing in my book; however, wasting turns is a terrible idea in almost all circumstances and thus it's not very relevant). But all three moves that inflict freeze do it as a secondary effect, so that rule doesn't work very well. In any case, we should not be allowing the moves to do damage and then negating the freeze by fiat; this is literally no different from declaring arbitrarily that Thunderbolt is banned from inflicting paralysis, or that Pokemon are banned from getting critical hits. It is a modification of game mechanics, which is unfaithful to the game it is attempting to simulate. Bans are faithful because they restrict player choices rather than changing the way the game works; this is not.

If you want to implement Freeze Clause in a Stadium-simulation metagame, I'm all for it. Not in cartridge play. If it's frozen in cartridge, it should be frozen in sim. This is why they are called simulators. And why we don't houserule any of RBY's myriad other oddities.

I am not putting a poll on this thread. I don't care how many whiners there are, only how many counterarguments there are.

 

[Disaster Area]

I think, like Joim's enabled a tradeback option, a freeze clause option on/off would be fair.

I'm curious to think that the adjustment in mechanics recently might lead to a change in the way people play which could then lead to less likelihood of dumb freeze situations.. it's all rather complex.

I personally feel that having it off under most circumstances is fine (i.e. on ladder), friendly matches to be agreed upon by the players, and for the tournament to have the capacity to set their own rules. In short, freeze clause-free ladder sounds totally fine, whilst in a tournament setting the hosts should be allowed to dictate the ruling on that if needs be.

 

[bwburke94]

So if we simulate cartridge it's off, while if we simulate Stadium it's on. (Gen I freeze is broken enough that we absolutely need a freeze clause under Stadium mechanics.)

 

[Jorgen]

I think the biggest counterexample to "carts should be emulated perfectly always according only to what is possible" is the whole acid rain thing in DPP. Realistically, this is super-common to trigger (use Pursuit to KO a retreating Pokemon when Sand is up), and it results in all weather conditions being active for the rest of the match. This wreaks havoc on games and kinda renders them unplayable, so mechanics were (reasonably) changed for DPP and HGSS such that Acid Rain would not trigger.

Granted, that's an extreme case, certainly more extreme than the sort of thing the lack of Freeze Clause would do to RBY. But it's not unprecedented and it can actually be a good idea to tweak mechanics in extenuating circumstances, therefore providing a counterexample to the "it can't be implemented in-cart, therefore it should never see a simulator" argument. The main question is, therefore, not whether Freeze Clause is possible to implement outside of a simulator, but rather whether multiple Freezes are bad enough to warrant a simulator clause. It's unfair to paint Freeze clause as arbitrary, because Freezes are way more consequential than Thunderbolt paralyses, and it was implemented in another instance of RBY (Stadium), and also in Nintendo-sponsored tournaments (albeit, those that were played on Stadium). There's clearly reason for it, it's just whether that reason is good enough.

 

[lilyhollow]

In my opinion the response to the Acid Rain example is: "we made the incorrect decision with Acid Rain." In fact, one of the reasons I (and many others) were in favor of implementing Acid Rain was that it would avoid situations like the current Freeze Clause question.

 

[magic9mushroom]

I think the biggest counterexample to "carts should be emulated perfectly always according only to what is possible" is the whole acid rain thing in DPP. Realistically, this is super-common to trigger (use Pursuit to KO a retreating Pokemon when Sand is up), and it results in all weather conditions being active for the rest of the match. This wreaks havoc on games and kinda renders them unplayable, so mechanics were (reasonably) changed for DPP and HGSS such that Acid Rain would not trigger.

Granted, that's an extreme case, certainly more extreme than the sort of thing the lack of Freeze Clause would do to RBY. But it's not unprecedented and it can actually be a good idea to tweak mechanics in extenuating circumstances, therefore providing a counterexample to the "it can't be implemented in-cart, therefore it should never see a simulator" argument.

Your counterexample would only work if I played DPP and agreed with Acid Rain being claused out. I don't play DPP, so I can't legitimately agree or disagree with it.

The main question is, therefore, not whether Freeze Clause is possible to implement outside of a simulator, but rather whether multiple Freezes are bad enough to warrant a simulator clause. It's unfair to paint Freeze clause as arbitrary, because Freezes are way more consequential than Thunderbolt paralyses, and it was implemented in another instance of RBY (Stadium), and also in Nintendo-sponsored tournaments (albeit, those that were played on Stadium). There's clearly reason for it, it's just whether that reason is good enough.

If multiple freezes are really so terrible that they degenerate the game into a luckfest (the only case where it even comes close would be the Jynx/Cloyster/Lapras/Articuno/Dewgong/Gengar team I've seen a couple of times, and even then bringing your own Ice nullifies a lot of the luck factor; it CAN be countered with viable teams without relying heavily on luck), then the faithful solution would not be to declare "that didn't happen" when you get frozen twice but to ban the moves' use entirely (or, I guess, allow them on sets but ban them from use when there's an opposing frozen mon). That, we could have a poll over. But I don't think there will be much support for the idea.

 

[Jorgen]

Yeah maybe it does only work if you play DPP and agree with it. It's the most extreme example to date though, so I'm kind of using receptiveness to it as a proxy for whether this idea of perfect fidelity being the only acceptable implementation is theorem or axiom. If the latter, there's not much discussion to be had.

 

[Disaster Area]

I personally feel now is the time to question whether we should implement acid rain in DPP B]

 

[Joim]

I think Acid Rain should've been implemented on DPP at the time. I might just go ahead and implement it when I'm done with gens 1-3 since it's an old gen now.
Personally, I think that Freeze Clause should NOT be implemented on Gen 1 format for the same reasons magic9mushroom states. However, it's obvious I'd like a Gen 1 (Stadium) format to be added which changes the mechanics and allows for the freeze clause (and the other mechanics modifications).

 

[kokoloko]

regarding acid rain - if you wanna get every dpp player to hate you, that's a great idea.

pls don't do it. i'd rather avoid another pixels incident

 

[Joim]

We can clause it and make it available through challenger :P (I mean, implement != force it on the meta, just have it available).

 

[CrapAtRBY]

Well Acid Rain can actually cause a literally gamebreaking side effect with Cherrim and Castform, not that they are relevant pokes.

 

[Disaster Area]

Ban them when acid raid is in effect? I mean, we should be emulating link battles, right? ... Philosophical battles are fun B] and y'all went too soft after banning garchomp anyway y/n

 

[Vinc2612]

Let's remove the cancel button, it doesn't exist on the cartridge... Because that is the main counterargument.

It's not the first time we don't emulate the cartdridge exactly. I don't understand why it suddently becomes so important. I understand the will of changing RBY's mechanics regarding paralysis because it does not affect the competitiveness of the tier (at least we can't see right now if it will unbalance the metagame). Freeze clause does by adding a 10% of OHKO for every ice beam.

I'm also against acid rain in dpp, but that's more personal than objective

 

[Joim]

Remember that we are talking about Gen 1 freeze clause here, the pros and cons of removing it. Using another mechanic or option that is not relevant to this one just because they share something (not being available on cartridge play) is a fallacious argument. The precedent on modding the game to suit our needs exists, right, but this is a discussion in which we can decide whether to keep the precedent or to make a new precedent and choose to follow the cartridge mechanics more accurately. One must argue whether it's the good or bad option depending on the change itself, not on other past or future changes.

Furthermore, each modding we do on the simulator has to have a reason to be on its own, you can't just start modding the game because "we already did it". When do we stop, then? Where do we draw the line? Modding the game should be as limited as possible. On a personal note, I understand in the whole percentage vs pixels fight the point for the percentage mod, as that is merely a screen display limitation rather than an intended game mechanic. Proof of this is using double the pixels on Stadium health bars, so Game Freak does not intend to give less information on purpose on their handheld device games, it's just a technology limitation that does not exist on a computer. We can go ahead and ignore that, since it's not an intended mechanic.

That isn't the same with freeze clause, though. We are hereby modding the game to suit our needs instead of playing it as intended (mechanically, a mod is not a rule). Do we want to mod the game to limit that 10% chance of freeze on certain Pokémon? That's the question to answer, and the answer shall not be "it's been done before" or "it has always been that way". The correct answer is "Yes/No, because [insert well thought reasoning here]".

 

[Joim]

Banning Swagger in XY (a different generation and metagame, btw), is a ban, a rule. Freeze Clause is a mod (game modding). If you want your argument to make sense, you should mention the ban of freezing moves or the ban of freezing moves after a freeze. That would be a rule and thus a good comparison.

Btw, freeze clause is not used in any other generation on Smogon if you want to use clauses on other generations as an example. So once again not a good example mentioning other gens as a case in favour of Freeze Clause.

 

[kokoloko]

i commented here already but i guess i should be on-topic now.

from what i understand, the urgency to get RBY into a playable state was due to SPL, and as far as i'm aware no RBY SPL player wants freeze clause gone. removing it would just make them play on PO, which is kinda counterproductive.

makes no sense imo.

the "correctness" of having it implemented vs not having it implemented is irrelevant imo because both sides have valid arguments. you guys busted your ass getting RBY to a playable state on PS, idk why you're willing to let that go to waste.

and apparently gamfreak added freeze clause to stadium anyway so there's that.

 

[Jorgen]

It's less an issue of what should be done immediately and more an issue of what ought be done in a perfect world where politics and timetables don't dictate what's feasible. Obviously there's a lot of pushback against the removal of Freeze Clause to preclude immediate action, but it's good to discuss it so that cooler heads can prevail at some point. And given the recent flurry of new RBY happenings, I'd say it's a good time to revive an old, but important, topic like this.

I can sympathize with the no-clause crowd (generally the simulator programmers fall into this boat), as it's a pretty intuitive notion that nothing technically impossible in-cart should be enforced in standard simulator play. It's just that, in practice, it's not a great axiom, as there's extreme examples (e.g., Acid Rain) that would make this too hard a stance to take, or impose too complicated a constraint to be feasible in the simulator. Thus, it isn't sufficient to say "isn't possible in cart" when making a decision on something like Freeze Clause, and a discussion of the competitive merit of such a change is warranted.

Now that I've had time to think about it, I'll plant my foot in the sand and revise my earlier pro-Clause stance to an anti-Clause stance. I'll argue from the perspective that mechanics should be faithful to the cart in all situations except when the uncompetitive nature of the unaltered metagame is more repugnant than a proposed tweak in the mechanics. It wouldn't really be that big a deal if Freeze Clause were to be eliminated from RBY. Multi-freeze is not even the most likely sort of luck that could completely ruin a game. A Tauros crit clause should probably be imposed before a Freeze clause is, but such a clause seems absurd, suggesting that removing multi-crit luck does not provide enough competitive merit to overcome the repugnance of tweaking mechanics. If this crit clause is absurd, then Freeze Clause, which deals with an even less likely game-breaking event, is also absurd, for the same reason. Thus, Freeze Clause does not provide enough competitive merit to overcome the repugnance of the mechanic tweak it imposes, and therefore shouldn't be part of the standard RBY ruleset.

In later gens it's different, because Freezes can be waited out through perpetual switching the same way Sleep could be, and therefore the simulator is just streamlining something you could do in-cart. But in RBY, this is not an option, so even if it's competitively more necessary in RBY than in any other generation, it has to be so much more necessary that it makes it worth the imposed mechanic tweak. Multiple freezes aren't so huge a problem in RBY to make preventing them worth the repugnance of an impossible clause.

 

[Golden Gyarados]

I believe Freeze Clause SHOULD be implemented, and here's why:

When GameFreak first made Pokemon Red and Green, they had NO IDEA it would ultimately turn into what it is today, or what it would become even shortly thereafter. Link Cable was a cute gimmick. Trading was novel and the basis for the "idea" of Pokemon at all, and the ability to battle your buddies was an added bonus. When battling others took off the way it did, Nintendo created some "tournament-style" rules. Stadium itself is really just a tournament outlet for Pokemon battling. It gave you a bunch of rules for tours that later got adopted to the cart (like Pika cup and such, with Pokemon Yellow) and it introduced Clauses. Clauses exist in Stadium not because Stadium has different game mechanics, but because Stadium is for tournament-style play.

So, when we play RBY on simulators, we want RBY cart mechanics. That's cool. Focus Energy doesn't work right. Hyper Beam doesn't recharge. Sleep lasts longer. That's great. If we wanted those mechanics changed, we'd play the Stadium metagame. But Stadium Clauses weren't really game mechanics, they were competitive/tournament mechanics. It's clear that when Nintendo realized Pokemon battling was competitive and could be done at a tournament-level of play, they thought Clauses were a good idea. When we play Pokemon on simulators, we're playing at a high, competitive, tournament level of play. That right there is justification enough for us to adopt the Clauses (sleep, freeze) from Pokemon Stadium MECHANICALLY into the simulators - because the SPIRIT of the Clauses is to support competitive/tournament play, and that's how we play here, even if we use the carts for the GAME mechanics.

Game mechanics and tournament mechanics are different things to me. So I see absolutely zero philosophical conflict in playing with cartridge mechanics for the Pokemon and moves and such but adopting tournament-style mechanics through clauses.

 

[Jellicent]

Now that I've had time to think about it, I'll plant my foot in the sand and revise my earlier pro-Clause stance to an anti-Clause stance. I'll argue from the perspective that mechanics should be faithful to the cart in all situations except when the uncompetitive nature of the unaltered metagame is more repugnant than a proposed tweak in the mechanics. It wouldn't really be that big a deal if Freeze Clause were to be eliminated from RBY. Multi-freeze is not even the most likely sort of luck that could completely ruin a game. A Tauros crit clause should probably be imposed before a Freeze clause is, but such a clause seems absurd, suggesting that removing multi-crit luck does not provide enough competitive merit to overcome the repugnance of tweaking mechanics. If this crit clause is absurd, then Freeze Clause, which deals with an even less likely game-breaking event, is also absurd, for the same reason. Thus, Freeze Clause does not provide enough competitive merit to overcome the repugnance of the mechanic tweak it imposes, and therefore shouldn't be part of the standard RBY ruleset.

In later gens it's different, because Freezes can be waited out through perpetual switching the same way Sleep could be, and therefore the simulator is just streamlining something you could do in-cart. But in RBY, this is not an option, so even if it's competitively more necessary in RBY than in any other generation, it has to be so much more necessary that it makes it worth the imposed mechanic tweak. Multiple freezes aren't so huge a problem in RBY to make preventing them worth the repugnance of an impossible clause.

I'm in the anti-clause camp as well, but I don't like these arguments.

Comparing freeze and crits is a bit off. It's possible for a Pokemon to survive a crit and proceed to clean up a weakened team. A frozen Pokemon is just fucked. Freezes are more game-breaking, but they're also much less likely (especially two of them.)

The switching back and forth in later gens is also not really true, since entry hazards exist and any stat gains or drops would be lost in this scenario (as well as multi-turn moves like screens, weather, TR, etc.) Also, apparently freeze clause is only used in RBY atm.

That said, I agree that now's a great time to discuss the clause, since things haven't shaken up this much in RBY since proper Wrap mechanics. We might as well use this time to properly look at our stance on the metagame, as things will be changing regardless (and in much more drastic ways.)

i commented here already but i guess i should be on-topic now.

from what i understand, the urgency to get RBY into a playable state was due to SPL, and as far as i'm aware no RBY SPL player wants freeze clause gone. removing it would just make them play on PO, which is kinda counterproductive.

makes no sense imo.

the "correctness" of having it implemented vs not having it implemented is irrelevant imo because both sides have valid arguments. you guys busted your ass getting RBY to a playable state on PS, idk why you're willing to let that go to waste.

and apparently gamfreak added freeze clause to stadium anyway so there's that.

Which simulator would be used isn't really the debate, as any rule that could be decided (if a decision even comes from this discussion) would be affecting the rules of the metagame and therefore how it's played in SPL regardless of sim. What you're suggesting would be akin to UU making a ban, but the SPL players agreeing that the ban is stupid and playing on OU so they could still use the desired Pokemon. This is an open discussion anyway so they're free to leave their thoughts here.

Let's remove the cancel button, it doesn't exist on the cartridge... Because that is the main counterargument.

It's not the first time we don't emulate the cartdridge exactly. I don't understand why it suddently becomes so important. I understand the will of changing RBY's mechanics regarding paralysis because it does not affect the competitiveness of the tier (at least we can't see right now if it will unbalance the metagame). Freeze clause does by adding a 10% of OHKO for every ice beam.

I'm also against acid rain in dpp, but that's more personal than objective

The fact that the simulator has made adjustments to actual game mechanics isn't an argument for continuing to do so. Any time we choose to not directly follow the mechanics of the actual games, we need a good reason for doing it. Cancel button and acid rain are separate discussions from this clause.

 

[Vinc2612]

No, cancel button and acid rain are directly connected to the discussion. It just shows that we don't have to follow the cartridge 100% of the time. We already took that liberty in the past.

My point (since it seems like you tried to dodge it) is that removing the freeze clause goes against the competitivity that we are looking for. You just add another luck factor, one of the biggest that exist in the game all generations altogether (freeze in RBY being the closest thing to an OHKO)

 

[Joim]

Cancel button does not change the game mechanics or rules at all. It's akin to having a battle log.

Acid Rain is a longer discussion, as it's a specific battle link bug that doesn't even happen in all the versions of the 4th generation games. It's easier to ignore this since it adds nothing and the game can be played on cartridge without it.

 

[Jorgen]

Ah, I forgot about hazards for some reason. Yeah, that makes freeze clause a bit trickier to implement (if even possible), although the fact that it's only standard in RBY sorta makes it moot.

I'd say multi-crit is comparable to multi-freeze. Instead of effectively killing Pokemon, it actually kills Pokemon most of the time. And one thing I didn't fully consider is that going for Freezes has considerably less risk associated with it than fishing for crits (Chansey tanks hits when it fails, whereas Tauros gets crippled), but on the other hand, you can play to prevent Freezes (switch in para'd Recover user, use Rest Jynx), whereas you can't really play to stop crits from messing you up. So even there, the lower risk of Ice spam in this comparison gets cancelled out by the inability to counter crits whatsoever.

Also re: acid rain (sorry for bringing this up again), if you play on DP carts to avoid it, you need to also implement 70% Hypnosis and other quirks I might not know about.

 

[Saria]

Which simulator would be used isn't really the debate, as any rule that could be decided (if a decision even comes from this discussion) would be affecting the rules of the metagame and therefore how it's played in SPL regardless of sim. What you're suggesting would be akin to UU making a ban, but the SPL players agreeing that the ban is stupid and playing on OU so they could still use the desired Pokemon. This is an open discussion anyway so they're free to leave their thoughts here.

Is not uncommon to see people say "Let's play without X Pokemon because it is broken and it'll probably get banned" in tournaments. The argument is akin to that, the big differences are that Freeze Clause has been considered standard for like 10 years, that pretty much all players who actually play RBY competitively regularly are against removing it and that every single big tournament in the past decade with RBY had Freeze Clause.

PS: Your example doesn't happen because no one wants to deal with bullshit in official tournaments (like trash managers trying to get an undeserved default win). Easier to "ban" a Pokemon than to use a banned Pokemon.

?_?

 

[Disaster Area]

Okay this post is going to be not totally relevant to the thread, but being ICBB I can't post a separate thread; it is relevant enough though I feel to post it. I'm just going to look at clauses here mainly. I'm going to quote large chunks of page 57-60 from the Book of Actaeon is working on. Any extra comments by me are underlined.

Competitive Pokémon was first conceptualized by Nintendo, and participants physically attended the tournaments (Nintendo Cups) with their game cartridges and an in-game prepared team. Besides the game mechanics, there were few rules, because Nintendo expected the game to be quite balanced already. However, it quickly became apparent that certain strategies were unfair in many situations. Therefore, extra clauses have been added to competitive matches, e.g. having to use different Pokémon (i.e. Species Clause). Also, evasion-enhancing and OHKO-moves like Double Team were banned from use most of the time (OHKO Clause, Evasion Clause).

-----

Reasons for use of Sleep Clause

• If there would be no Sleep Clause, fast sleep inducing Pokémon like Gengar (using Hypnosis) can put a whole team to sleep if they don't miss, or easily defeat Pokémon that decide to stay in and await their sleeping turns. This cannot be helped except by waiting until Gengar misses, or coincidentally having a fast Pokémon that can beat Gengar in one hit with some luck, like Dugtrio or Alakazam. But not only Gengar is dangerous; slower Pokémon like Exeggutor or Parasect are way too influential if Sleep Clause is disabled;
• Without Sleep Clause many teams would consist of Pokémon that have sleeping moves, preferably fast ones. As a consequence, in many turns it will be decided by a speed tie whoever sleeps the opponent, and the outcome of the game would be based on luck for the most part. Additionally, the whole game would depend on the duration of the sleep status, which is random again.

---

While Sleep Clause is far more important and neccessary than Freeze Clause, some important reasons to agree on the Freeze Clause as
well are the following:

•  If Freeze Clause is not activated and one player is lucky with Ice-type moves, he or she might freeze a substantial part of the opponent's team (and completely disable these Pokémon) as a mere consequence of the random number generator. While there is only a one-in-ten chance of freezing the opponent, it turns out that sometimes many freezes do occur in matches, especially if many Ice-type moves are used throughout the match.
• All competitive players agree (sic) that matches should not be decided by 'spamming' Ice-type moves in the hope for a freeze, completely relying on probability in the process.

One might wonder why we do not disallow freezes in general; if only one Pokémon is frozen, it can be game-breaking as well. That is indeed a fact, but the possibility to freeze one Pokémon adds to the aspect of strategy in RBY as well. A classic example is given by the Chansey freeze war. If two Chansey with Ice Beam in their moveset battle one another and no Chansey has a status ailment yet, an idea is to try and freeze the opposing Chansey (they cannot make each other faint in a realistic different way). This is risky for both players, as it is completely random whoever gets the freeze first. However, if one player has another frozen Pokémon on the team already, Freeze Clause is activated and his/her Chansey will eventually inict the freeze on the other Chansey. As the opposing player should know this, he/she will switch to another Pokémon. Another idea to win the freeze war, of course, is trying to get your own Chansey inicted with a different status condition such as BRN, PSN or PAR, so that it is 'protected' from FRZ in the future.

---

Despite the reasons given above, it might still be argued that Freeze Clause should ban freezes from happening altogether; I am very certain that it would add to the game's balance. But on the other hand, probability-based mechancis like the FRZ status and critical hits define RBY; it is a game full of luck and an important task of a competitive player is to try and abuse this factor; one has to create as many opportunites as possible to get an advantage! Finally, it would be a waste to just throw away a part of the game mechanics; we are playing Pokémon after all and without freezes, it would not be the same game anymore.

---

While they should appear to be unfair already by definition, we enlist the main reasons they are banned:

•  The event of OHKO-ing an opponent at full health has so much impact on the game that it is terribly annoying if it is completely determined by (a small) chance. A Pokémon like Dugtrio can, for example, OHKO Exeggutor with Fissure, while it would nearly always lose without Fissure. If Dugtrio misses until Exeggutor finishes Dugtrio, it will have done nothing to Exeggutor but if it hits once, it's over for Exeggutor and there is no way any player can influence the probabilities in this process.
  
•  OHKO moves cannot be played around by 'smart switching'; the only Pokémon able to safely switch in on a OHKO move are Pokémon that are immune to it. In the case of Fissure, this leaves only the (partial) Flying-types and for Guillotine and Horn Drill a Ghost-type Pokémon is needed. But having either on your team just for this reason would be extremely limiting if it is just to be able to avoid the effects of a OHKO move. Furthermore, some Pokémon (e.g. Rhydon) can learn both Fissure and Horn Drill (via TMs) so it would still be a gamble on which move it will be using.

On Pokemon Perfect we held an event not too long ago permitting OHKO moves, and we didn't find them to be as stupid as is theoretically made out, however it's a small sample size; a re-test might be interesting, although as it stands it is probably wiser to implement this clause than not to.

The book discusses also Self-KO clause and PP restriction; no commentary here about when they were introduced, so I feel there's nothing to say in this post about them. Then there is a discussion on Partial-Trapping moves, with some Pros and Cons. What I'll note here is that it was never an official Nintendo rule, and a large part of its ban in previous years was due to it not being implemented properly. As is stands, Standard RBY currently permits Partial-Trapping moves.

Dig and Fly mechanics are mentioned next. Due to a major glitch, it's worth noting that on PO (and almost definitely also PS, although I've not tested), has not got the bug encoded into the metagame. Furthermore, Fly/Dig aren't popular moves (the rare Fly/Toxic Zapdos is hardly worth a mention), but the bug does not actually cause any errors in the game. If the game were implemented properly, then this glitch would be added too; I'll discuss this again later when discussing Competitive Pokémon's philosophy.

It is worth noting that Freeze Clause was included in the original Japanese Pokemon Stadium game (and then again, Item Clause is in some forms of VGC..).

A bit of summary over the generations then (to the best of my knowledge):

Hide

RBY

• Sleep, Freeze, Self-KO, and Species clauses introduced in Pokemon Stadium. (note the lack of Evasion/OHKO clauses - sourced from Bulbapedia)
• Some early official tournaments banned Mew and Mewtwo, others may have listed a certain list of permissible Pokémon.
  
• Dig/Fly glitch not implemented in simulators [if it were, they'd probably be made illegal]
  
• At times, clauses relating to PP, Self-KO, and Partial Trapping have been included, but none are currently used in standard play [PP is always maximised]
• Pre-Statusing is possible but (to my knowedge) illegal in any official setting, and is impossible currently to do on the simulator (probably should be coded eventually, but I'd say its priority is probably lower than tag battling (2v2/4 player battles))

GSC

• Little Cup in Stadium 2 is the first official scenario where there is any ban on moves (Dragon Rage and Sonicboom being non-permissible). Note that Item Clause exists here too, as well as in Prime Cup, Event Clause.
• Snorlax, in retrospect from a later-generation perspective, appears 'broken' enough that it would deserve banning, but at the time, and despite any retrospective challenges, it remains unbanned [I'm not commenting on what's correct or not, but it has been brought up many times].

ADV

• Pomeg glitch affects LC, some permit it, others do not. LC was probably not played much at the time, but this glitch is relevant all the way up until the current generation.
• Soul Dew and the Enigma Berry are the first items to be banned from any competitive formats available in this generation.
• Wobbufet and Wynaut are banned, the first ban of Pokémon ever that are not 'legendary' (or 'pseudo'-legendary). An important point.

DPP

• Acid Rain glitch not implemented; could be implemented if Cherrim/Castform are banned [this feature could be claused] - Which games is this true in? This suggests that it's only in DPP (In the box listing the glitches, note how it says: Acid Rain glitch (Diamond/Pearl/Platinum)) Whilst here makes it less clear; it appears to me that most versions of the game battling eachother would result in this scenario - presumably, this ought to be implemented if we're attempting to properly simulate link battles as the format from which we gain mechanics from. Here is in agreement with the second source. Also see the comment on Jorgen's post in this thread (thread post number #24).
  
• Garchomp. This Pokémon was mandatory on your team when it was permitted in OU; in fact, it shaped exactly how you built it, everything else was created around it. I guess, the difference between it and Snorlax was not how centralising and mandatory they are, or how unpredictable they are (with Lovely Kiss added, Snorlax is more in my opinion), I think it more shows how players had adapted, they did 'git gud', and then, well.. this was a turning point. It was considered uncompetitive and overpowered. Here, players think more about why we clause and ban stuff - it's a simulator, so unobtainability is less relevant.. now it comes down to power. Lati@s are relevant here too.

BW

• Nintendo's VGC bans Sky Drop due to a Double-battle related glitch (whilst in 2012, Dark Void was banned too - this was more relevant to avoiding discouraging weaker players from the format, and was a little less relevant at the very highest level of play)
• Smogon's Ubers does a retesting of all clauses apart from Species Clause - notably, evasion was unbanned, which carried through into generation 6.
• Moody is banned (from Ubers too).
• Notably, complex bans and large question marks over its weather-dominated OU from BW1 and 2.

ORAS

• Probably the most key things to note are the suspect tests and situations in Ubers. Gengarite, Shadow Tag, Anything Goes (except Funbro !_!).. Swagger is banned, and Baton Pass nerfed multiple times (Baton Pass/Evasion Pass/Geomancy were all considered possibly warranting discussion of ban in ubers, but due to the delays dragging on with the suspect tests, whether these would ever have been considered for a test is highly uncertain.) The purpose of Ubers has changed much since its original days from the first generation.
• Kokoloko's philosophy as leader of the UU tier being to remove stuff that is potentially broken has created a very balanced metagame, in a fashoin lower in bureaucracy but perhaps higher in controversy. Very meritorious of mention here.
• Sleep Clause removed in Gen 6 Doubles.

All

• The way damage is reported is reported in %'s, rather than by HP bar, differing to what's within the game.
• The simulator also includes a cancel button not used in the game, as well as operating the timer differently to its usage in official Nintendo Tournments.

Sources include Actaeon's book, as well as http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Rule_variants

What is Smogon's philosophy? An answer can be found here

Smogon attempts to avoid bans as much as possible—only when it becomes very apparent that a Pokémon is far too powerful to be in line with a balanced metagame is it banished permanently from the standard arena.

This relates more to discussions that aren't directly relevant to the thread, and since this isn't in an exclusive thread I'm starting up, I won't discuss the relevance of this to stuff like Garchomp, Shadow Tag, Wobbuffet, Snorlax, Gen 6 UU, etc.

However, do not expect Smogon to be accepting of new metagames on a more general basis—it is the simplicity and effectiveness of the current metagame, more than anything, that justifies the main ruleset.

Simplicity is self-explanatory: Fewer bans, of which fewer will be complex.
Effectiveness isn't self-explanatory: Effective at what? I personally think that's lacking in sense, but anyhow.

Some summary (I might have gotten a name or two incorrect here though)

Hide

Smogon Clauses that Modify Mechanics:
Sleep Clause [Nintendo too]
Freeze Clause [Nintendo too]

Smogon clauses that limit what can be brought:
Endless Battle Clause
OHKO Clause
Evasion Clause
Swagger Clause
Moody Clause
Soul Dew Clause [Nintendo too]
Sky Drop Clause [Nintendo too]
Shadow Tag Clause

Smogon clauses that aren't classed above:
Self-KO Clause [Nintendo too]
HP Percentage Clause

All clauses listed as Nintendo too were used by Nintendo before Smogon, in spite of how this is presented.

Clauses that Nintendo have used that Smogon doesn't:
Event Clause (I am including stuff like Enigma Berry's ban in some tournaments under this too, even if that may have not been the official title of what was not permitted)
Item Clause
Using less than 6 Pokemon in a match - Picking from the Pokemon that you bring - Nintendo only
Dark Void ban - Nintendo and Smogon

Other Notable Unclassified Rules:
PP Restrictions
Partial Trapping Clause
No pre-statusing (never made explicit in simulator play, no evidence of being made explicit in Official play either, as far as I can gather)
No Dragon Rage/Sonicboom in Litte Cup (Nintendo and Smogon both use)
Baton Pass nerf (what's it called, is it a clause in OU??)
Knock Off/Berry Juice Bans (not sure if either have been implemented, but both have been taken very seriously in the LC community, as far as I'm aware)

Things that one or both of Nintendo or Smogon implement but implement differently:
Timer - Smogon uses optional timers, PO uses it decided before the match, and VGC and some other Nintendo competition have their own variations on time limiting as well.
Cancelling - Simulators only allow this, but both allow you it; not matched by the cartridge or Nintendo competitions however.

Unimplemented Glitches/Features:
Fly/Dig Glitch [Gen 1] - Not game-breaking but uncompetitive. If the simulator were made to emulate cart mechanics as properly as possible, the correct course of action would be to implement it, but then probably ban Dig/Fly (after a test of them)
Partial Trapping - there's still an element or two of this that's not properly implemented, but it would involve redesigning the simulator format. Nothing competitive-related relevant in this section to mention however.
Acid Rain Glitch [Gen 4 in Link Battles with certain cartridges] - Worth a note is if we're emulating cart mechanics properly, then if we were to try and negate the existance of this glitch, then that would involve contending with Choice Band U-Turn/Pursuit glitches as mentioned here, which would affect competitive play also. If Acid Rain were implemented, then for matches were (assuming the option to play without it even exists) it is mechanically implemented, a Castform/Cherrim ban would have to be implemented (as they would break the game). The alternative of course is not permitting Acid Rain, but it really depends on where you're drawing the line with implementing cartridge mechanics, and avoiding things that break the game.

So.. how does Freeze Clause fit in all that? It's pretty clear that the purpose of the simulator, of Smogon, and of rules of competitive battling... are not very clear cut or centralised. I feel that both the arguements for and against Freeze Clause are justifiable, especially within this grander context; as it stands though with the Dig/Fly glitch not even being implemented (if it were claused to have the feature disabled or having bringing the move being banned as a clause, then this is obviously contrary) I feel that Freeze Clause is perfectly fine, since currently we're actually neglecting the accurate cartridge mechanics anyway, and we're using a competitive ruling Nintendo originally had given us in a game designed to support the series, and the impacts of removing the clause would arguably be uncompetitive, there's enough in my mind to accept having freeze clause as standard in RBY OU is a sensible decision as a community.