CAP 11 - Final Product
 

It appears I made an error in not posting this sooner. Less work for me as I'd rather do it now than scramble tomorrow morning. I suppose it's time for a big round-up post. I'm terrible at speeches.

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The easiest way to descibe this CAP project is "roller coaster." Every element of Voodoom's process underwent immense scrutiny. Even from the Concept Assessment stage people were engaging in fierce arguments about how CAP 11 should continue. I have been around the CAP project since it's beginning, and this project only proves to me that no matter how contentious it gets in the middle, we can focus together to make a coherent end product. I'm not sure if Voodoom is going to be a "Perfect Mate" for Togekiss, or if they'll be a threatening offensive core together. What I do know is that in retrospect, a lot of the things we think are contrived when we start discussing them can still be adjusted for later. Our community is that creative and our process that flexible, and it only got that way because every day for the last two and a half years, dedicated CAP contributors have put their nose to the grindstone to analyze flaws and improve the system instead of just discarding it after "failure."

By all rights Fuzznip should be making this post, I'm just doing cleanup. Early in the process I, along with a lot of regulars in #cap, had a lot of doubts and second guesses about Fuzznip's choices. Nonetheless he guided us in the manner that a strong TL should have. That's exactly why we put that model in place, because sometimes you have to be hardnosed and do things the way they ought to be done, not according to the wishes of your peers. Fuzznip deserves all of the applause here. TL's do an amazing amount of work and have to excercise their best judgement at every stage. Sometimes this means following the process to the letter even if it won't be popular.

As for my part, I am always fascinated by the preferences people express during every part of the process. If you can't tell, preferential polls are my personal favorite despite their difficulty to count. I like them because I think they are the most just way to balance the competitive and the feedback function. Every CAP we always seem to pick up a few stellar new users who come out of the blue with excellent contribution quality. I'm one of the grayest CAP graybeards around and I am always pleased when somebody new gets a shot at the top. Having a process that gives good feedback, especially to new contributors is extremely important to me. There is always room for improvement, something that bears out both during the project and when we analyze our policies themselves.

The introduction of the new stats and movepool limits was a smashing sucess in my estimation. It kept the movepool sizes in check without sacrificing flavor elements and still lead to several variations depending on what the submitter's felt was important. Aside from a few flaws in the OP that are from more outdated processes, I forsee that method for doing movepools lasting in perpetuity. I look forward to seeing how our contributors apply it to the next project, now that they've had some experience with it. This is almost as monumental a shift if CAP Policy as the strong TL model, and I think the process is much better for it.

Playtesting will be coming up soon, and I'm sure you're all eager to start using Voodoom and see if it and Togekiss operate well in tandem. I've got a few set ideas in mind already, but I'll leave it to the battling experts to do the heavy lifting. My advice for any future TL's is that RAGE is to be avoided unless absolutely neccesary. The TL is supposed to have a strong and clear vision and occasionally excercise stubbornness over process elements. Their mind should still be open and they should have faith that the community can band together and make it work, no matter how many misteps are racking up in your head. Don't be paralyzed by frustration, keep your mind agile and think of new ways to work around "mistakes." You will rarely be dissapointed if you view each stumble as an opporunity instead of a defeat.

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All my rambling aside, here is the final product:


http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/3821/cap11.png

Typing: Fighting / Dark
Stat Spread: 90 HP / 85 Atk / 80 Def / 105 SpA / 80 SpD / 110 Spe
Abilities: Volt Absorb / Lightningrod
Name: Voodoom
Movepool:


Misc:

Pokemon Stage: Stage 1 (Evolves from Voodoll)

Dex: Height: 6'6"

This is a rough approximation of DougJustDoug's height, as he is the inspiring artist (and Concept Contributor). Voodoom also has the build of a fairly tall Pokemon, and this puts it at a little more than Blaziken height. I'm also doing a little play on "The Beast's Number." Also, Voodoom curses the metric system.

Weight: 166.6 lbs.

Competitively, this makes Grass Knot/Low Kick 80 Base Power on Voodoom. Otherwise it's a believeable Height/Weight ratio for a Fighting type with a decent level of both bulk and speed. And again, a play on "The Beast's Number." Dark flavored CAP, mmmmm.

Was this the fastest CAP ever made?

Very cool Cap! It's it's bigger than a Charizard yet it's only a doll lol.

Well, we started July 5th and today is August 22nd (the poll will close the 23rd), so it took 7 weeks from start to finish. I think the fastest a CAP was ever completed was somewhere around 6 weeks, but otherwise this CAP's process flowed pretty smoothly. 7 weeks is about normal for the current process.

seemed to go pretty quickly to me, but, then again, it seems like forever ago when we were considering a Rock/Electric type to be togekiss's mate rather than a dark/fighting.

I had followed this CAP from it's Topic Leader Nominations, and though there are parts I didn't agree with, (and still don't), I am looking forward to the inaugural battle.

It was weird participating in all of the various stages of the CAP process (on CAP 10 I just voted on art and sprites), and there were a lot of strong opinions flying around, but in the end I'd like to look at this project and say that it turned out all right. No one person's opinion is necessarily the most "correct" or the most "beautiful", though as a wiki editor I'm well aware of the shortcomings of relying on popular opinion to decide on the quality of various options. I eagerly await the playtesting phase, though unfortunately I may not be able to playtest that much :( I have four teams planned to test different hypotheses.

This was my first time participating in CAP and I must say that I enjoyed it greatly (even though many things didn't go the way I would have liked), and I look forward to playtesting and participating in future CAP projects.

This was also my first time participating in CAP. It was a good experience, with the friendly (to a degree) debates, and I enjoyed it very much.

I've been lurking for a long time on the CAP Forums, and this CAP has been one of the better ones. Good leadership, no major fuck-ups, and an overall solid final product. No mega gigantic movepool, either!

Though the previous few CAPs were (in my opinion)...ehhh...this one looks like one of the better CAPs we've had and I'm ready for the next one!

I've fallen in love with the CAP process so much that I could care less about the real metagame. I look forward to participating in the future, hopefully with a better insight.

I am really excited to see Voodoom on shoddy. Everyone did excellent work.

Honestly I was skeptical at first, but Voodoom turned out to be pretty awesome. Good job you guys.

Was a really fun CAP, really liked the intense disscusions during most of the rounds. I think the only thing that I didn't like about the project was that the working name. Calling it "Dollmon" or something equally imporbable to stick around would've just seemed better, as the name poll proved that everyone had already accepted the name.

Nothing against the name itself of course :D Doug's creation was so amazing that he pretty much won two polls at once xD One of the coolest Pokemon designs IMO.

DOLPHIN all the way

In all seriousness, this was one of my favorite CAPs that we've ever made, and one of the only ones I really tried to participate in as much as I could.

Good job team.

I'm eagerly awaiting the testing process so we can see if this CAP really works the way it was intended to. As of right now, I'm still heavily skeptical and will be until I can get some hands-on experience.

Cannot wait until the suspect testing period so we can investigate how effective our Voodoom and Togekiss play out together and what disturbances may flow into thier path.

Nice job guys!

Yes, well done, lads and ladettes.

Should be good fun testing this thing out.

Not that it really matters too much but I thought I'd mention that, unless I'm mistaken, all pokemon heights conform to certain amounts representing .1 meter intervals (0.1, 0.2, 2.3 etc). In the 6ft range all pokemon are either 6'03'', 6'07'' or 6'11 with no pokemon in between.
So in terms of pokemon flavour 6'06'' is actually invalid. Not particularly inportant but if we want it to fit into the standards of the games...
http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wi...by_height#6_ft
Flavour pedant awaaaaay!

I have only one honest complaint about this CAP.

Polling. The worst offender in this was the Type polls - if you lived outside of the US and weren't a complete loser like me and went on at ungodly hours, you didn't get a chance to vote. There's also the fact that the Dex submissions were cut down to a ridiculously small amount of options, with no proper reasoning for why they weren't allowed. (Sore loser here, but eh.)

Otherwise I love this CAP, and I hope I can eventually get Shoddy Battle to work so I can use it!

reserving judgement until playtesting

The polls are open for at least 24 hours so I don't see what the problem is? You should be able to vote no matter what time zone you're in.

Congratulations on another fine CAP creation guys! It's been fun and interesting to follow this from beginning to end.

lol felt like that sometimes fo me too. like the poll was over before I knew it began. But being busy in life will get that for you.


I also agree about the dex submissions. Flare's was the only one which made it into polling which I didn't think was just bad.

Eh, i'll agree with this. I'm a UK guy, and if I ever got to vote in the typing polls, it was because I was awake stupidly early.

But ohwell. All in all, another cool CAP. looking forward to see if some of the more controversial removals of moves will work out well.

Although I disagree with the size of 6'6, when it seems more like... Maybe 2 or 3 feet.

Despite this, I think this was a pretty fun CAP to make.
Can't wait to playtest it! :3

Just to put in my two cents I think CAP is a great thing this site supports and I would love to have a CAPmon as my brainchild LOL but seriously this is an awesome thing that the Smogonites run here. There's my two cents so don't spend it on drugs you crazy kids!