How would a 600BST restriction effect the metagame?

[Brawley]

What's with Dragonite?

It has no counters, because after a DD it 2hkos everything in OU :p.
Also how is Dragonite too slow to sweep after a dd everything is outspeed up to and icluding scarf cross, I don't really like the idea, because if those pokemon were banned we might see more stall:

- Garchomp
- Metagross
- Tyranitar
- Salamence
- Dragonite
- Celebi
- Jirachi
- Shaymin
- Heatran
- Cresselia
- Deoxys-E (Shoddy)

The bolded ones have no counters fyi, but I think we should do a tourney without them, and as Aldaron says banning and unbanning are way different.

 

[dynamo]

hahaha banning/restricting BST 600's how do you guys come up with this shit

They run the metagame, so what? this is competitive pokemon, they are the strongest pokemon that aren't overpowered (uber), it's natural that they are the most used and usually most effective. Seriously, they have counters (although Garchomp has very few, and apart from Cress they depend on set being used).

Is that really an even playing field?

yes actually, want to know why? Because you create your own team, if it can't handle with the BST 600 threats, then you have yourself to blame.

conclusion: this is competitive battling. You have to use the best to be/beat the best. Don't like it? Don't play competitive then.

 

[Raikou]

It has no counters, because after a DD it 2hkos everything in OU :p.

Highlighted the difference between Dragonite and Garchomp. The relatively slow Dragonite must take a turn of setup to 2hko everything. Garchomp just needs a CB to 2hko everything, no setup. 1 turn of setup means your opponent is doing something to stop you, like switching in a counter or hitting you with an ice move before you attack.

 

[Gemerl]

I honestly dislike all of those pokemon, but I don't think banning/restricting them is right. They each have their own feasible counters (Barring perhaps Garchomp... that's debateable) to take them out. They're not as bad as some people make them out to be.

 

[kamikaen]

On some other sites, I've seen a proposal of an "ubers limit", which lets you, say, have two ubers on your OU team. The problem with that is how you'd still have to cover every single uber, in that case. So, let's say the UU tier has let in one OU per team. That means that UUs, if they attempt to cover everything (which is unwise, blah, blah), then will have to cover every single OU. So you'll still have to counter all of the Garchomps, etc., and still see them (and the best of them will likely be chosen for the couple you let in per team, not solving any problems).

If people are going to ban OUs (which I prefer to unbanning ubers), then a new metagame should be created.

 

[Bourbon]

With all the complaining, I'm starting to think maybe we SHOULD try and start a new tier, Kamikean. Try and make a middle tier, maybe? Start with a select few "average" or "middle of the road" pokemon, and add stuff in from there.

With all the debating and whining about banning base 600s, maybe we should make them all uber for a while and see how we adapt. It seems we've all gotten tired of the OU monotony all at once. I certainly am tired of Garchomp and Specsmence myself, I hate seeing them. If they were gone, other pokemon would take their places. I'm sure that Uxie, Kingdra, Flygon and Porygon2 usage would skyrocket ^_^

EDIT: I passed you in posts, dude :P

 

[biaj]

if you know how to counter them right there easy to destroy i can usually 1hko all of them i use non of them but i destroy most teams on shoddy ive faced a team that ran all of them and it took out 2 of my pokes

- Garchomp flamethrower
- Metagross flamethrower
- Tyranitar close combat
- Salamence hp ice
- Dragonite hp ice
- Celebi flamethrower
- Jirachi flamethrower
- Shaymin flame thrower
- Heatran close combat
- Cresselia night slash/pursuit
- Deoxys-E (Shoddy) night slash/pursuit from weaville
hp ice infernape and weaville can take them all out look at that all weak to weaville or spec nape i 1hko them all with expert belt equiped

 

[Dark Android]

I think that banning Pokémon just because their BST is 600+ is just retarded. Those guys listed may have high stats, but they aren't over-centralizing the metagame. If you ban them, then other Pokémon will take their place. Those Pokémon will then start to be so good that another thread like this will pop up complaining about those Pokémon being over-centralized, which results in more bannings, and so on. This vicious cycle will gradually spell the end of competitive Pokémon battling as we know it.

Restricting them is also unneccesary as far as competitive battling goes. Competitive Pokémon battling is a sport which was meant to be a skill-based game, with a simple tier system. People should be allowed to choose whatever they want on their teams. Sure, a restriction will get players to use a wide range of BST's, but for the most part, if people want to use all 600 BST, by all means, let them.

 

[IggyBot]

Banning based on stat total is simply stupid. Would you argue that something like Jirachi or Shaymin are more powerful than say, Raikou, Azelf, Blissey, Infernape, Swampert, ect? While they do have a base stat advantage, another huge part of pokemon is stat distribution and movepool. I want to say more, but Aldaron said it all.

 

[Deck Knight]

I think that banning Pokémon just because their BST is 600+ is just retarded. Those guys listed may have high stats, but they aren't over-centralizing the metagame. If you ban them, then other Pokémon will take their place. Those Pokémon will then start to be so good that another thread like this will pop up complaining about those Pokémon being over-centralized, which results in more bannings, and so on. This vicious cycle will gradually spell the end of competitive Pokémon battling as we know it.

Restricting them is also unneccesary as far as competitive battling goes. Competitive Pokémon battling is a sport which was meant to be a skill-based game, with a simple tier system. People should be allowed to choose whatever they want on their teams. Sure, a restriction will get players to use a wide range of BST's, but for the most part, if people want to use all 600 BST, by all means, let them.

Actually, no.

Banning the base 600's has little impact on making other things more broken.

Sandstream will still be provided by Hippowdon, so that strategy remains viable.

Much as we will all miss Metagross and Jirachi, Bronzong is still around, and Steelix and Forry could provide Steel STAB for those who really want it.

Cresselia gone? Hi Uxie and Mesprit, were ya been? Regi's still fulfill walling needs.

Celebi and Shaymin? Sad to see you go. Good thing we still have Blissey, Miltank, Vileplume, and Meganium.

Heatran. Well, you don't really have any comparisons, but there's still plenty of awesome fire types around.

Chompy and Mence gone? Good riddance. Flygon and Altaria make a comeback.

About the only thing removing the base 600s will do is decrease the number of uncounterable sweepers. Every strategy that was viable before them will remain, although you won't be seeing boosted Outrage anymore. You still have the Trios to troll around with, and its hardly as if all the heavy hitters have been removed. There are literally a dozen pokemon with 130+ Base attack, even after removing Chompy, Groos, and Mence.

Cresselia, Celebi, and Jirachi were decent defensively no doubt, but with the biggest hitters in OU gone, the inferior walls should suffice. None of the base 600s counter Heracross as well as Gliscor and Weezing do, and none of them are particularly lethal to Gyarados.

It would certainly be a different metagame, but by no means an inferior or less balanced one.

 

[Invective]

I think that banning Pokémon just because their BST is 600+ is just retarded. Those guys listed may have high stats, but they aren't over-centralizing the metagame. If you ban them, then other Pokémon will take their place. Those Pokémon will then start to be so good that another thread like this will pop up complaining about those Pokémon being over-centralized, which results in more bannings, and so on. This vicious cycle will gradually spell the end of competitive Pokémon battling as we know it.

Restricting them is also unneccesary as far as competitive battling goes. Competitive Pokémon battling is a sport which was meant to be a skill-based game, with a simple tier system. People should be allowed to choose whatever they want on their teams. Sure, a restriction will get players to use a wide range of BST's, but for the most part, if people want to use all 600 BST, by all means, let them.

my thoughts exactly. if you ban the current strongest pokemon, then the ones lower than them will not have as much competition, and would thus take their place. then they would become "too powerful" and someone would say that we should ban them, resulting in an endless cycle of banning.

 

[Bogmire]

The only 600 BST on that list that really is overpowering is Garchomp, the others are strong but have something that keeps them in check. Celebi and Tyranitar are tough but they have 5 and 7 weaknesses respectively, including a x4 one, Dragonite and Metagross are too slow to sweep without setup, etc. You have to look at them individually.

(Please don't say an ice weak keeps Garchomp in check when it takes a lot of EV investment to even 1hko, standard Raikou can't even do it with HP ice).

tyranitar has 6 weaknesses actually. I only think banning garchomp would be good (I assume everyone's seen the thread about it)

 

[Brawley]

if you know how to counter them right there easy to destroy i can usually 1hko all of them i use non of them but i destroy most teams on shoddy ive faced a team that ran all of them and it took out 2 of my pokes

- Garchomp flamethrower
- Metagross flamethrower
- Tyranitar close combat
- Salamence hp ice
- Dragonite hp ice
- Celebi flamethrower
- Jirachi flamethrower
- Shaymin flame thrower
- Heatran close combat
- Cresselia night slash/pursuit
- Deoxys-E (Shoddy) night slash/pursuit from weaville
hp ice infernape and weaville can take them all out look at that all weak to weaville or spec nape i 1hko them all with expert belt equiped

Garchomp/Dragonite/Metagross/Heatran/Salamence/Tyranitar used strong move! Bye Counters ;_;

Also having shaymin above Heracross is just wrong >:(

 

[Sovereign]

Did anyone else pick up that he put flamethrower for garchomp? =\

 

[majesty]

If you are going to be specific, then be specific. Excluding Regigigas and Slaking is like saying "Let's study something but only publish data in a set that supports our hypothesis, rather than disproving it". They really do need to take part in this, at least in the basis and consideration of the idea that 600 base pokemon are truely gamebreaking.

600 base does not a great pokemon make, unfortunately. For example, how many Dragonites do you see on shoddy or wifi compared with Blissey or Skarmory? How many of those dragonites are so game breaking that people build teams around it just to counter it? Comparing Garchomp and Dragonite in the same pool like that based soley on stats (and not even considering stat allocation) is a little bit out there.

In closing I'd like to add that movepool can play alot into this as well. If you have a pokemon with 400 base attack but only special attacks, it really won't do much of anything with that bloated attack.

 

[DrCrashMD]

I think this would be acceptable - if not restricting altogether, but making it another separate clause, such as Freeze or Sleep. If the two players consent to activate the No +600 clause, then Shoddy/Competitor could prevent teams with any of the said +600 stats Pokemon.

Otherwise, an all-out ban is just out of the question.

 

[jrrrrrrr]

If I was to think of something to compare this to, it would be:

If you cut off the world's largest dick that belonged to someone, there would be another dick that would take the title of being the biggest dick.

This is the greatest analogy I have ever heard. *hi5*

But seriously, most of the top OU pokemon in terms of usage do not have 600 BST. 600 is a pointless number to make a cutoff at, and restricting the game due to stat total would be stupid. The shoddybattle stats page proves this. A high stat total doesnt make a pokemon better than another, and doesnt always mean it will win, even with a type advantage. The 600 BST cutoff is a completely arbitrary number, and cutting the metagame off at that point would eliminate a large portion of the strategy of the game and make it significantly less fun. What fun is it if there are no pokemon that my opponent could possibly have that could beat me? What would the point of playing be if pokemon with advantageous stats were disallowed? There would be no thinking involved whatsoever. If your team cant counter these things, it is not a problem with the 600 BST pokemon, but most likely because your team is weak to some of the most common attacking types. The most OU (read: the best) pokemon are not used for their sheer stat total, but by their advantageous STAB and movepools that allow them to take advantage of it. Countering these pokemon isnt a matter of "I need x amount of walls on my team", but instead "I need something that can come into a Dragon-type attack and live".

Pokemon isn't always a game of numbers. Like Aldaron said, if your team was built with winning in mind, you take things like typing and move power into account, not the combined stat total of the pokemon. Even more evidence of this is the fact that we don't compare teams by adding their stats. On the RMT forums, you don't see things like "This team has >3600 BST, so it is the best". If this were true, there would be a "best possible team" in pokemon, which anyone that has played will tell you is impossible to have. Even if it is possible, the determination of the "best team" would not involve addition of stat totals.

Doing this would effect the metagame by making a whole bunch of people not want to play anymore.

EDIT: Not to mention, the fact that you wanted to ignore Slaking and Regigigas is evidence as to how arbitrary this cutoff would be. I want to play Pokemon. Not "some of the Pokemon". Removing the Ubers makes the standard game more fun, because it eliminates the need to use 6 out of ~20 usable pokemon in Ubers. Removing 600 BST makes the game less fun and would be the equivalent of saying "Lets disallow use of moves with over 100 BP because Close Combat/Megahorn/Draco Meteor are too strong"

 

[obi]

I always find it amusing after the match when I glance at my opponents team and think "Wow, he used Tyranitar, Garchomp, Celebi AND Heatran?"

Then they are either a bad team builder or those were the best Pokemon for their team. If it's the first, you should be able to win if you aren't a bad team builder. If it's the second, that's called playing competitively. You're not going to convince me that Shaymin is more powerful / causes more centralization than Gengar or Togekiss.

 

[Lee]

Seriously, at what point did this become "BAN ALL 600BST's?" I'm pretty sure I suggested "2 600BST's per team."

Still, it's interesting to see how the masses feel on this. I don't know if it's because we've grown accustomed to having our faces Outraged off, or because we enjoy being kept on our toes (main reason for me selecting option number 2!), but it seems we're quite content with things as they are.

 

[obi]

It's an arbitrary banning. You ban things for specific reasons (overcentralizing, too much luck, etc.). You are using their stat total as an indirect measure of something people would support banning. This is nonsensical, because we can actually directly measure those things that "Base 600 stats" indirectly measures.

 

[Jiggy-Ninja]

I believe that such an idea has been proposed in the past, but was overlooked. I'm not looking for this to be implemented, but I'd like to hear some opinions on it.

Did anyone see that?

 

[Brawley]

Snip Snip

This may be because a lot of "counters" for Dragonite are the same for Garchomp.

 

[kingofgames]

Actually, This was already done. Banning 600 BST. It was called Latios and Latias.

But Banning them would not make much of a difference. IT would actually make some Pokemon shine, and no longer in the shadows of their former counterparts.

This is a bad example, but:

Infernape, if he was not introduced, and Blaziken was the way he was, Choice Scarf + Mix moveset = Unpredictable.

Garchomp would be replaced with Flygon
Salamence / Dragonite with Alteria
Cresselia with Uxie

But pointing out a restriction just changes your gameplay strategy.
Its not different from playing in the Battle Tower, or in Pokemon Stadium 1 (Couldnt use Mewtwo from rentals)

 

[jrrrrrrr]

Seriously, at what point did this become "BAN ALL 600BST's?" I'm pretty sure I suggested "2 600BST's per team."

Still, it's interesting to see how the masses feel on this. I don't know if it's because we've grown accustomed to having our faces Outraged off, or because we enjoy being kept on our toes (main reason for me selecting option number 2!), but it seems we're quite content with things as they are.

The arguments against restricting them and banning them outright are very similar. Just as you said, most of the fun in pokemon comes from being kept on your toes, which a restriction of pokemon based on stats alone hinders.

 

[Evil Hamster]

I'm all for restrictions being put up. Not solely based on Base stats though.

Blissey, Heracross, Wobbuffet for example are all really, really common pokes that don't have such insane stats, but thanks to other variables such as movepool and good stat distribution, they are, in some cases, more annoying/dangerous than those with massive stats.

Personally, I'd like to see a few of the more common OU's temporarily restricted for testing purposes. Based on usage, not BST. I would make a list, but I'm lazy.

*Note, not banned. Restricted.*