How to proceed (policy review nominations and more)

We have a substantial disagreement about whether to start Gen 5 play and testing with no ban list (and deciding a ban list through a relatively fast democratic process), or starting Gen 5 play and testing with a predetermined ban list that wasn't based on testing.

I think everybody is in substantial agreement that this should be resolved in a democratic way. The public straw poll has already given us some evidence on this, but it wasn't billed as being the final decision. The people who support a ban list will be developing their concrete ban list of choice in this thread (and elsewhere as they see fit). Then we can have a vote on whether to begin play and testing with that ban list, or with no ban list (as discussed in this thread and this thread).

The voting pool will be badgeholders and policy review members for a start. However, the policy review membership list is a bit oudated. There are various members who could be added, including a bunch of relatively new users from Uncharted Territory.

I'll start off by giving the list of current list of people with access to this forum.

Badgeholders (216): *Hen*, Aeolus, Aeroblacktyl, Alaka, Aldaron, alex, Altmer, Amazing Ampharos, Antique Roadshow, aragornbird, Arseus, Articuno64, Atlas, Atticus, august, AvatarST, Bass, bearzly, Bloo, Blue Kirby, Boa1891, BobDoily, bojangles, Bologo, Brain, Buffalo_Wings, bugmaniacbob, Bugsy23, CactuarJoe, Caelum, Caladbolg~, capefeather, Carl, Cartoons!, Cathy, chaos, CheesiePoofs, cholena, ChouToshio, Chris is me, cloud, Colonel M, cookie, CyzirVisheen, Darkmalice, DawnBringer, Deck Knight, Diesel, diinbong, Ditto, DM, Doomsday, DougJustDoug, Dr. Reid, Draco Zephyr, Dracoyoshi8, Dubulous, Earthworm, Elevator Music, Eo Ut Mortus, Erazor, eric the espeon, evan, Expert Evan, Fabbles, Fig, Fireburn, Firestorm, Fish, Fishin, FlareBlitz, Flashstorm1, franky, G80, Gen. Empoleon, Giffca89, gk, Glen, gmax, GoldenKnight, goofball, Gouki, Great Sage, GreenPikachu, Haunter, Havak, havoc, HellaHellaStyle, Heysup, Hipmonlee, Huntofthelion, husk, Huy, icepick, IggyBot, IronBullet93, Itsuki, JabbaTheGriffin, Jackal, jc104, Jibaku, Jimbo, Joel, jumpluff, Jumpman16, Jungle Boy, junior, Justin8649, kd24, Kevin Garrett, Kinneas, KoA, Komodo, Kongler, Kumar, Lady Bug, Lee, Legacy Raider, Loki, Lorak, M Dragon, macle, maddog, makiri, Malfunction, Maniaclyrasist, Max, McGrue, Mekkah, MetaNite, mingot, Misty, monkfish, mtr, MythTrainerInfinity, Nachos, noobster, Nosferalto, obi, OmegaDonut, omni, panamaxis, Persistence, Peterko, Philip7086, Pidgeot500, Pirika, Plus, RBG, reachzero, remlabmez, Reverb, reyscarface, RicepigeonKKM, Rising_Dusk, Rocket Grunt, Rory, Roy, ryubahamut, Sage Abdul, Sanders, Sapientia, Sarenji, Scofield, Serv, Setsuna, Seven Deadly Sins, Shinxe, Shiv, shrang, SilentEcho, skarm, SMOGON AWARDS, Snorlaxe, Sonuis, SoT, Stallion, Steelicks, stellar, Super, supermarth64, Surgo, Swaggersaurus, Synre, tab, Tangerine, TAY, Taylor, Team Rocket Elite, tennisace, The Smog, TheMaskedNitpicker, TheMutant, Theorymon, TIP, ToF, Toothache, TTS, twash, Umbreon Dan, Vader, vashta, Vineon, Vo0, whistle, Wichu, Wild Eep, Wyverii, X-Act, Xia, yamipoli, Yilx, Zak91, zfs, Zracknel, Zystral

Policy Review members who are not badgeholders (19): Ancien Regime, Blame Game, cantab, Cynthia, Foreys, imperfectluck, Kou, lati0s, Lemmiwinks MkII, Mario With Lasers, Paltheos, QibingZero, Syberia, the_artic_one, Tleilax, TVboyCanti, Ulevo, Veedrock, Yagami Light



What we want to do is flesh out the second group with a whole bunch of new people to participate in this debate and ultimately vote on the final issue. The standard for joining Policy Review is reasonable intelligence in something related to competitive pokemon. Most people nominated should be added. A longer list of reasonably intelligent people is a good thing so that each individual vote matters less, and it's more of a group decision.

To nominate new people to add to the Policy Review list, post in this thread with a brief explanation of why they should be added. Maybe link to a relevant post, if appropriate. Include the person's full and unabridged user name to make this easier for me.

Nominations can come from known good users (e.g. tournament players, etc.) who are not on the list, or from new users in Uncharted Territory who look promising, or elsewhere.

Note: The list of badgeholders who are automatically allowed to vote is fixed at the list in this post. If somebody becomes a badgeholder after the posting of this post, they still have to be nominated for policy review in this topic.

After the nominations stop coming in, I will close the thread and open a new one where you can post your list of objections to nominations. Unless more than six people post to oppose a nomination, the person will be added.

In Policy Review, a user needs to have a vast tournament experience to draw on, which is why I am nominating the following.

Nominating locopoke as a voter. As a prominent tournament player, locopoke knows his pokemon very well and knows both Ubers and OU extremely well. There are very few non badged users that can match what he has done in competitive pokemon, which is why I fully support him for being able to vote.

If more explanation is needed / wanted, then please ask. I believe that being good in tournaments should be a good of reason as any for something like this. This has absolutely nothing to do with locopoke getting a badge. There is no power to abuse here; there are no maturity issues when it comes to a vote. This is strictly about who is qualified, and I think locopoke is clearly fit for the job.

Also nominating Stone_Cold, who has also done extremely well in the tournament scene in the past year and should not be overlooked. His participation in SPL, WCoP, my Kind of a Big Deal Tournament, and the Smogon Tour should suffice for his credentials. He has beaten many top notch players over this span, such as ipl and DL in my tournament, and should be considered among them.

A user who I think goes under the radar too much is Mizuno. He is a class act and an excellent battler. Although he just came back fairly recently, he has been with Smogon for a long time and has performed well recently and in the past in OU and UU.

For obvious reasons, I am also throwing the names of Krack, DarkLucario, and Eternal (Arin) into the mix. It is pretty obvious from their fantastic Smogon Tour records why they should be included into this vote and discussion.

Also nominating hanke. He is a solid member of the Koalas and has accomplished a great deal on the tournament scene since his Smogon Tournament win.

Lastly, I want to bring something up: the nomination of old tier players. These are extremely good players and I feel they can all bring something to the table, that is if they would decide to vote! As they all participated in SPL, they have shown they still care for competitive pokemon.

The list: GigaPunch, FM, JMC, Sk, dbolt, Floppy, Lesm46, spies, gotei(13) hyornimaru, Umby, Pirotechnix, Slobroking, and VIL. While I don't like putting them all together, I feel this is the easiest way. I encourage anyone who agrees or disagrees with any or all of this list to post. Personally, I will vouch for GigaPunch, dbolt, Pirotechnix, Slobroking and Floppy as users that could definitely contribute. The rest I only know from their excellent competitive histories.

I guess with the nominations here I should stick to what I know best, so glancing at the UU channel, nominating bad ass, Bluewind, uragg, and Folgorio. The UU player:badgeholder ratio is surprisingly low and I was actually somewhat surprised to be informed recently that none of them were actually badgeholders. They're all pretty good players, active in the community, and fairly likely to actually vote. They also all play "standard" as well, so as to be more directly effected by the decision, but it'll "effect" everyone, anyway.



Incidentally if any of the other big UU playing non-badgeholders read this and think they should and want to be nominated, PM me. Doesn't necessarily mean I'll do it, but there's a few who I think would be good voters that I didn't mention because they're neither IRC users or people I know read this forum. It'll be a fun test this way.




Also nominating a teammate of Folgorio and mine in the SPL and a long time friend of mine: Mr. E. I know he's not many people's favorite user, and I kind of wanted to choke him myself during much of the SPL, but he's an extremely strong player at basically every generation of Pokemon, is a theory-smart player, and has more experience than almost anyone here. He'll be an asset to the vote and the forum.

The_Chaser - member of SPL finalist team (individual 6-3 and was the player who played the most number of different tiers/generations), WCoP 4 winning team, currently 9th in Smogon Tour X, played in Superstars II.

undisputed - currently 3-0 in Superstars II, was very intelligent and respectful when I tutored him (unfortunately I can't take credit for his OU success -- that was Phil, who also had similar experiences with him as a tutee).

Folgorio - member of SPL winning team, currently a finalist in the Good OU tournament.

bad ass - played in SPL on TDCE (individual 5-2 record), played in Superstars II, consistently participates in tiering discussions in the UU megathread.

edit: err sorry for double nominating a few of these it took a while to look up tournament records and stuff.

Eet - was an active participant in four of the suspect stages (3-2, 3-3, 3-4 and 3-5). He is definitely an intelligent and knowledgable guy and in terms of recent tournaments he is currently in round 4 of team trials (and playing OU).

I want to nominate:I have interacted with these users many times over the past months, and although I never agree entirely with all of them, I feel that they have sufficient competitive know-how and an attitude conducive of a good user to merit access to PR for purposes of the vote.

firecape is someone I've known since his becoming very active and I get to say that I had the pleasure of working with him from the get-go. He is a very active player, talks seriously about competitive Pokemon in many IRC channels I frequent, and is a sensible and level-headed person who definitely deserves access to this vote. He also plays Ubers religiously and is very good at it to boot, which gives us a good and balanced palette for discussion and voting from multiple ends of the spectrum.

drcossack is someone I've only really met recently, but from my interactions with him that are by no means limited, I feel that he has the competitive Pokemon understanding from placing well in many #stark cups and other things to vote sensibly and intelligently. His recent posting has been a bit sketchy and when I brought him in up #insidescoop, he was met with a lot of vocal opposition. However, despite this, I think he meets whatever requirements we have for Pokemon knowledge and will take this seriously enough to not be an issue. I'm not sure how this nomination will go over, but I feel like he is good enough to deserve at least being considered.

DJXO9 is someone who has hosted a score of tournaments, plays regularly, and interacts seriously with content reviewing of analyses in C&C. From working with him on GP, I've felt that his competitive Pokemon understanding is pretty dead-on and that he deserves very much to be included in any competitive tiering vote we have. I'd definitely like to see him be able to vote and discuss this tiering stuff.

Krack - Tour Finalist, great record in all 3 DPP tiers, overall awesome player with a lot of experience in tiering, being chosen for the Salamence council as well as partaking on other Suspect tests.

hanke - Reigning Champion of the Smogon Tournament, great OU player, as shown by his Frontier and World Cup records.

DarkLucario - Tour Winner, has shown great skill on the game.

Delta 2777, ENZ0, Eternal, legendary_07, _Rewer_, _Flygon_, B-Lulz, Blue_Tornado, Light-Kun, Scimjara, Heist, Mechazawa, Pride, 6A9 Ace Matador, Deep Thought, snorlax, undisputed, Ashley Young, apologies, DaPlayaFlow, Flamewheeler - Have been on SPL, World Cup and also the current Superstars Tourney, they have proved their worth as great DPP players. They also have had success on Smogon Tour by getting very far in single tours / winning a tour / getting to finals. These are some of the best DPP players.

PurpleWeezing, Mien., eaglesrock, Kinneas, nagai, TheFourthChaser, RT. - Players that have been on big tourneys and have also made a name for themselves in big competitions and normal tourneys on Smogon. PW is a succesful tour player as is eaglesrock, while mien. and Kinneas have played in World Cups, nagai too, but he has been on the Champion team twice in a row, and RT. is a great UU and OU player and suspect tester that is really underrated but very smart.

tito, Iconic, Megan_Fox, -Mind- - OU and Ubers excellent players. They know both aspecs of the "broken side" of Pokemon while also being great Tourney players. All of them have been in World Cup and they have been on the Superstars tourney too.

Mizuno, FM, Mosh, GigaPunch - Have been here since waaaay back, they know how tiering has evolved and are also good tournament and ladder players.

Stathakis, Limitless - Have had badges in Pokemon related activities. In the case of Limitless and Stathakis they have been playing on tourneys since a good while ago with good success.


Also a little note on Stone Cold since it seems there has been a bit of controversy about him, even though he may "look like a complete troll" hes very damn intelligent and is also a great player who knows the inners of this game.

Oh and another one, like Synre said, if anyone feels like he/she should be added feel free to PM me and ill consider it!

cap server patriotism

these are all of the unbadged cap moderators. i want to be inclusive since people still have a chance to oppose if they really don't like one of these. but really, if doug trusts them enough to let them moderate his server, what harm could they do in pr?


cyberzero was topic leader of cap8 and one of the oldest cap server drivers. he disappeared for a bit but recently made a dramatic return!

bobtheball4 is a great battler and longtime cap participant. "playtesting expert"!

zari, kassidy and frizy are three users i've known for over a year now and i've really grown to love them all. they don't post a whole lot, but they're all active pretty much every day, so if they had something to say, they could chip in.

magmortified is a very proficient battler who won the cap8 playtest. he also ran cap7. i'm only a little bit dubious with regards to his recent activity, but i think he might post more if he had pr access.


respect

On the topic of UU players that are being nominated, I'd like to nominate Thund91. He's an excellent and innovative UU player who is also a member of the UU QC team, and has written quite a few analyses as well.

Toaster is a great user with a plethora of DPPtHGSS experience in all tiers, especially ubers. I feel that with his extensive knowledge of the Ubers metagame and little bias (save Manaphy, who hasn't even been mentioned) that he would be an asset to discussion and voting. He is the embodiment of a good, though not exceptional, Smogoner, to whom this decision matters the most.

I would like to nominate Iconic, Megan_Fox, and Ice-eyes. All three are extremely active Ubers players and know the 4th generation metagame very well. Both Iconic and Megan_Fox have had good showing in tournaments, and all 3 contribute extensively to Ubers discussion on IRC. They've also had experience in an Arceus metagame where all Pokémon are truly allowed.

EDIT: Sorry about the repeated nominations >.<

Nominating Jiggy who I've talked to on other boards and IRC since a bit after I joined Smogon. Doesn't post as much on our boards, but knows the game very well and fits the "relatively intelligent" profile as well. He's the one who wrote the EV Training with the VS Seeker guide which everyone spread early last generation. Has import copies of the game which he's going through now.

The PR forum description says that access here is granted to users who make intelligent, respectful posts in Stark Mountain (and now UT) and I think the following meet that criteria at least.

blasphemy1 - One of the more consistent posters in Stark over the past year or so and has contributed to discussion in the UT forum more than most. Obviously is passionate about the game and has a good understanding of it.

Little Green Yoda - Been a member for over 5 years and has never once recieved an infraction/warning. Consistently shows a good understanding of both the metagame and in-game which is quite rare nowadays.

I would like to nominate Apologies, hanke, Krack and DarkLucario. They all showed their skills in important tournaments (spl, st, tour or world cup) and are quite good in normal tournament and the ladder and so I think they're intelligent to be added, even though they are a bit quiet on the forums

I am nominating Duskie. He has been a fantastic battler since DP was released and has seem the game develop, and he is generally a smart guy.

Sixonesix has been quite active with VGC and Black & White. Intelligent user with a wealth of knowledge that we've been able to count on when something is required.

iss, askaninjask, and Kannon are helpful and reasonably intelligent users who I've known for some time in the LC community. There are several others, but from what I see most of the non badged ones have been nominated already.

Eevee (the creator of Veekun) is someone who is worth considering for PR access, he very easily qualifies as intelligent and though most of his work focuses on the dex and he is not interested in this vote, his input on other issues which could come up in PR may be very helpful. I'm not sure if this is a more general invitation to invite people who it would be good to have in PR, or focused specifically on this vote. If it's the latter then ignore this nom.

coyotte508 is the guy behind Pokemon Online and an intelligent individual. He is leading research on his on forum and reporting it here as well. Has a good understanding of BW as he has to for his projects. Considering our policies may indirectly affect him, I think being able to voice his concerns is important for him and valuable for us.

Go here to object.