Alright, my response to everyone at once that I worked on for a good hour's time was lost, so I'm feeling pretty somber. I'm going to do the best I can to reiterate my thoughts again.
I want to apologize if I come off as completely asinine to any of you reading this. I'm fully aware that I'm trying to push a controversial concept that some of you don't agree with. I can't necessarily change that, I get it. I just ask that you read into what I am saying with a more open mind than just "It wouldn't work." Remember that the concepts in CAP are to learn, not create a balanced metagame. There will be plenty to learn from the "Frostbite" concept, I assure you.
First off, yes, as the OU metagame currently is, it's impossible to pull of the concept, as "reliable freezing" is a total oxymoron in the current state of the metagame. However, that is
exactly the point of this concept: to remove that label for the Freeze status. Doing this will likely require creating a new move. As much as we'd like to avoid that altogether, it has been done sparingly and when a concept needs it. That one move will be all it takes to open up an entire horizon beneath us. If a move that simply induces a status (which every other status has, may I remind us all) is all it takes for us to
learn about said status in a relevant manner, then will it really ruin anything for us? Is the whole idea of a new move to explore a concept going to hurt us in any way?
Please enlighten me if it can.
Second, we need not worry about Freeze as a status plaguing the metagame like Sleep would without the Sleep Clause. The Freeze Clause, which is an officially recognized clause in the meta, could easily be activated inside of the CAP metagame if we so please. Let me give you this scenario.
Quote:
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Game Freak decides to release a brand new event legendary that specializes in freezing opponents reliably. It finds itself right smack dab in the middle of BW2 OU, where it makes excellent use of its Freeze-status.
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Prior to its introduction, we never really needed the Freeze Clause due to almost non-existent Freeze status ailments. Starting a clause with no actual relevancy to the meta would make no sense. But now that it's there, would you have any doubt that the Smogon Community would activate it? Could you honestly reason why we
wouldn't activate it in a heartbeat?
That being said, if we as the community decide to learn from this concept, there are no consequences to activating the Freeze Clause at the very least during the playtesting due to how it will simulate OU very much like how the actual meta would handle it. It's our CAP metagame. You can nitpick the details of activating such a clause all day if you wanted, but it wouldn't change the fact that activating Freeze Clause would
just make sense in learning about our neglected status ailment. If it's beneficial to learning an age-old mechanic of Pokemon, then we can adjust the server's rules accordingly. The only limit to our actions is how badly we want to explore a concept.
Lastly, let me just list out what we'd be learning about by giving Freeze a place in the metagame:
- The actual mechanics of Freeze itself
- Its comparisons and contrasts to Sleep
- Which Pokemon have a niche in OU with their Ice-typing
- Which Pokemon may drop from OU with their weakness to Freezing
- How the metagame would handle a "new" status ailment, including team selection processes and measures it takes to prevent being affected by it
- The potential of otherwise underused Ice-types
- The effects of an increase in Sunlight and Hail as weather teams and if balance is finally possible in the Weather Wars
- The risk factor to having more than/attempting to shut more than one Pokemon down
- The strength of Freeze as a status compared to Burn, Toxic, and Paralysis
- Prediction and momentum changes in switching into a Freeze-inducing CAP
- The overall pace of the meta
That is a rather decent sized list given that this is only the concept of a preexisting element in the games. Those that support concepts related to giving hardly seen abilities a place in the meta, understand that Freeze not only appeals to the exact same reasoning you have for supporting them, but
predates them by nearly 10 years.
A concept like this is overdue, revolutionary, and an excellent learning experience should we give it a try. To those of you that read all of this, thank you for listening to me. If you disagree still, thank you for at least tolerating my words. If there are still points I'm overlooking as to why this shouldn't be at the very least slated for our CAP5 concept, by all means, please tell me.