JAA closure (Bryant Park Tourney Tree) + pairing theory

I have to be honest, I really don't see a point to this thread, but it doesn't surprise me that it got posted. Exactly why are we here half a year after the fact trying to justify our board's poor performance at the finals? If I were on the outside looking at this, I would be laughing at this pitiful attempt to explain our loss by formulating this absurd conspiracy theory. However, sitting where I am, I can only shake my head.

Yeah, that's great. A bunch of Smogoners had tough breaks early or was pitted against each other in round 1. If that was the case, the surviving members should have cruised to the final four with minimal resistance. Shotwell was identified as the top non-Smogon competitor? What is the basis for that, just because we knew who he was? Well, he didn't fare too well himself. Part of our failure was arrogance. We thought since we are Smogon, we are the best competitive Pokémon players there are, and we need to worry about each other, not the competition. See where that got us?

Being confident is empowering to a degree. Being painfully overconfident, however, is a huge weakness. And we are more than guilty of the latter. I will say right now that we are not the top competitive Pokémon battlers out there. I will try to explain why, as I see it.

We have a good, strong community with a lot of great battlers. It is possible that we could be the best group of battlers around, but we are currently not. It's not that we lack skill or knowledge by any means, but we do lack diversity. There is one thing we are great at. If you click open a Netbattle team builder, and under version find a little tab called "Mod: Smogon University," you will find what we excel at.

We are the best at a metagame that we have created, and that nobody else cares about. We ban moves. We tier Pokémon. We omit entire play types, which for the most part we deem irrelevant, but when it comes time to need to know them, such as the double battle setup for JAA, we find we aren't quite up to snuff.

All this is fine, if all you care about is beating each other and random newbies senseless on Netbattle or Competitor. Sure, Netbattle was the only way to battle over distance before, and even then it attracted barely a fraction of the entire Pokémon playing population. Imagine now, with Wifi capabilities, how many people will be interested in playing an unofficial bots the like of Competitor? Sure, the immediate members of our community will like it, but outside of that, will anyone? And if we stay on the same track we are in clausing, banning, and limiting the game of Pokémon, will it even be of benefit to Smogon's bigger goals, or will it further contribute to our biased way of thought?

We didn't lose to bad luck in pairings or elaborate conspiracy theories, we lost to our shortsighted metagame and arrogance. We may be the best in the world at our own metagame, but what difference does that make if we're the only ones who play it. Until we start playing a more all-inclusive Pokémon game, we're likely to see the same type of struggles in any future national events.

I dunno, I don't want to be an ass but to me that post makes it seem like you want to allow DT, "hax"(and I use that term tentatively) items, and ubers into the metagame. This, at least in my opinion, detracts from the fun of the game because people will rely on luck even more. Also, I think smogon did pretty well, considering that 3 out of the final four had smogon accounts. We also had only 1 first round lost to a non-internet player, iirc. Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

Well, it is whatever you want to make of it. If we're content doing our own thing and being master of our own metagame, then by all means, let's keep doing what we're doing as far as clausing the game. However, if we want to take Smogon to a more involved direction, as some of that admins have expressed interest in doing, then we should consider taking a more active role in that more all-inclusive game that Nintendo advocates.

We were able to control the flow of Netbattle because it was a program with a relatively small user base, and Smogon controlled the largest server that was run on it. As such, the metagame conformed to what we wanted it to be. That will not be the case with Wifi in general. Sure, we can limit ourselves to just battling other Smogoners or closely related communities, but what good does that do for Smogon as far as growth? I can say now, however, we will not be able to dictate the tone of Wifi as a whole. Smogon is such a tiny fraction of the huge group of players that their new system has produced.

Also, I must comment on your quip about three of the four finalists having Smogon accounts. Those people are not Smogoners, at all. I would even have a hard time counting Jeps as one. They registered because we were playing an active role in the tournament, they used the site to get information on competitors, and they left when it was all over. They are by no means what I would consider to be members of this community.

Fish said:

Well, it is whatever you want to make of it. If we're content doing our own thing and being master of our own metagame, then by all means, let's keep doing what we're doing as far as clausing the game. However, if we want to take Smogon to a more involved direction, as some of that admins have expressed interest in doing, then we should consider taking a more active role in that more all-inclusive game that Nintendo advocates.

We were able to control the flow of Netbattle because it was a program with a relatively small user base, and Smogon controlled the largest server that was run on it. As such, the metagame conformed to what we wanted it to be. That will not be the case with Wifi in general. Sure, we can limit ourselves to just battling other Smogoners or closely related communities, but what good does that do for Smogon as far as growth? I can say now, however, we will not be able to dictate the tone of Wifi as a whole. Smogon is such a tiny fraction of the huge group of players that their new system has produced.

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I sorta agree with this, and at the same time I don't. Go to GameFAQs and post a topic that says "Why is Double Team/OHKOS/Wobby banned?" and you'll get a laundry list of reasons why you shouldn't/can't use them(even from people who clearly don't understand why). So I think it's possible the restrictions established over NetBattle might carry over into this generation, since a lot of new players are probably going to get linked to Smogon/other Netbattle server forums at some point and pick up their perception and biases of the metagame through stuff posted here/there.

However, I admit that using GameFAQs to judge any sort of popular opinion is hideously shaky ground.

What's your point though?

A tournament like JAA isn't going to conform itself to the Smogon metagame just because of a meaningless tier system and kids online being used to playing with restrictions.

Dear Alysanne, I'm quite sure you didn't understand a single word of what Fish was trying to say. Please, read it well enough before you throw out weird shit like that.

This has nothing to do with JAA putting up tournaments with Smogon metagame restrictions.

I completely disagree with you Fish. 2vs2 has more luck involved than any other metagame. I knew absolutely nothing about the regular Advance metagame when I was playing 2vs2. When we look back at the strategies we used, they were very good and on paper would have as god of a shot to win as whatever anybody else used. I hate to bring up luck, but winning 2vs2 Ubers is pretty much a 50/50 shot if you both have solid teams. It is all about making the right guess at the right time. Whoever makes the right guess wins. And in the finals, missing 2 or 3 hydro pumps in a row leads to a loss. To say we are stuck in one metagame and cannot compete in any other is just plain ignorant. With our knowledge of pokemon, we can easily compete in any metagame that is thrown out there. It is just as simple as that. I made a bad guess and lost. That is all there is to it. It was 50/50. I keep rayquaza in and i lose. I switch it out and I win. I don't even care that I lost. I could have won the whole thing just as easily. I played bad. I lost. There is nothing more to be said about it. Did I lose because other people were more knowledgeable and skilled in the metagame? Fuck no.

EDIT: And to address the MAIN point of this thread.

This thing is like a year over now. To continue to complain about whatever happened is ridiculous. Nintendo obviously read our forums and saw that a couple of our users were sharking and it gave us a reputation as a community that sharks (even though only a minority of our users were guilty of this.) Then to make a thread calling over half of the competition "useless cannon fodder." Followed up a year later with conspiracy theories on pairings. This is NOT a way to get anybody to like us. I hope other people see this post and realize that not ALL of Smogon feels this way. I am an admin here and I am fine with how everything went. I did not go into the competition thinking any of the participants were "useless cannon fodder" They obviously won their regionals and deserved to be there. As far as the pairings conspiracy, I could not care less about what happened. I lost in R1. Maybe I wold have made it a little farther, but since I lost, I obviously deserved to lose sometime in the tournament. It wasn't my day to win. This is really starting to go overboard. When are we going to chill out so that other people will RESPECT us for our battling skills. I'd rather be respected and skilled than to be hated and skilled because we make idiots of ourselves when every big competition comes up.

Fish I do agree that it is silly to go back and analyze what happened and make "excuses" for it. I don't find it a failure at all personally because out of the odds of even making it to the finals we did pretty well. Where I disagree is the sentiment that we were "overly cocky" and lost because this wasn't our style of play and that we're closeminded. Well maybe we are closeminded sometimes but that's not the reason we lost. We lost because it does happen. Sometimes it's not in the cards and as Justin said it's a very hard style of play to properly predict. We had plenty of strategies formulated to do well in 2v2. That was obvious with how many people made it to NY. As for the cockiness, the people that win believe they are going to win. You've got to have the killer instinct and competitive mindset that says "I can do this I'm going to win" in whatever you're competing in. Part of being the best is believing it and having that confidence.

The bottom line is though that it didn't work out this time but we'll sure is hell be back to try again when given the chance.

Justin8649 said:

I completely disagree with you Fish. 2vs2 has more luck involved than any other metagame. I knew absolutely nothing about the regular Advance metagame when I was playing 2vs2. I hate to bring up luck, but winning 2vs2 Ubers is pretty much a 50/50 shot if you both have solid teams. It is all about making the right guess at the right time. Whoever makes the right guess wins. And in the finals, missing 2 or 3 hydro pumps in a row leads to a loss.

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2v2 doesn't have any more luck than any other play style. Luck is a constant factor across the game in general. You can try to take out the luck, as we do in our metagame choices, but the percentages and chances for any luck based elements remain constant. A more accurate statment would have been to say that because the JAA format only gave four Pokemon per team, instances of poor luck would have more of an impact on the outcome of the battle. Also, I don't see how the Mewtwo/Kyogre bit is relevant to the luck dynamic of 2v2. As far as I know, at that point they were head to head, so those bits of "bad luck" would have occurred in a 1v1 environment just the same.

When we look back at the strategies we used, they were very good and on paper would have as god of a shot to win as whatever anybody else used. To say we are stuck in one metagame and cannot compete in any other is just plain ignorant. With our knowledge of pokemon, we can easily compete in any metagame that is thrown out there. It is just as simple as that.

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I never said we cannot compete in other metagames. I said we are masters of our own metagame, but not of the others. We can certainly compete, but we are not the best at it. And I think the part you said about how our strategies looked good on paper kind of prooves my point. Yeah, they were good, sound strategies in theory, but did we get a chance to extensively test them in practice? No. It didn't help that our more innovative members got banned for cheating (Obi, BLJ) and one of the more experienced Ubers players was Canadian (skarm).

EDIT: And to address the MAIN point of this thread.

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I guess you don't completely disagree with me after all!

Lexay said:

Dear Alysanne, I'm quite sure you didn't understand a single word of what Fish was trying to say. Please, read it well enough before you throw out weird shit like that.

This has nothing to do with JAA putting up tournaments with Smogon metagame restrictions.

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What made you think I was directing it at Fish? I was talking to Chozo.

Why are you even posting this fish? Let people play how they wanna play..

And if they lose, let them whine.. Everyone gets upset about losses sometimes.

Have a nice day.

I personally hope that Smogon's metagame becomes all inclusive where "anything goes", but I guess that's too much to hope for.

I love fish.

Anyways, JAA is over so lets just all get to breeding and making some sweet Pokémon for the next tournament. Dwelling in the past and keeping our own metagame will only hinder us in the competitive aspect for future events.

I agree with justin's point about the main point of this thread completely. That's really what this is all about.

i wasn't all busted up about losing either. that trip was top 2 of all trips i've ever had. the competition was fun but actually took the backseat to the enormus fun had with all my friends. i also look forward to seeing how wifi changes gameplay.

Hipno said:

Why are you even posting this fish? Let people play how they wanna play..

And if they lose, let them whine.. Everyone gets upset about losses sometimes.

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For those not paying attention, a recent vote in Uncharted Territory showed more people were interested in giving DT and Wobbuffet (not sure about the results for OHKO) a try in the new metagame than were against it.

I'm not telling anyone how to play, I was offering an alternative to this conspiracy "why me" theory as to why Smogon lost. Its safe to bet people had not considered our metagame choices in this regard. If I was telling people how to play, I would say the Smogon Tour should be something like 1 week RBY OU, 1 week GSC OU, 1 week ADV OU, 1 week ADV Ubers, and 1 week ADV 2v2 so people would experience more broad scenarios in the current game instead of focusing entirely on our modded metagames.

ahahaha I just thought it was pretty funny how Fish's unrelated attempts to
promote the game into becoming even more of a lottery/coinflip actually
managed to find its way into this thread