Last action of a match

[Its_A_Random]

This thread will be moderated to keep discussion focused.​

Well then, if anyone has read my proposal in feedback, & done a bit of snooping around, you might have found one thing: The way the last action of a battle has been reffed has been inconsistent across different referees & different role-plays. As I outlined here, there is currently no official way to deal with the last action of a match as far as Toxic, Sandstorm, & other forms of residual damage is concerned. I also outlined my preferences in said proposal, & do not expect me to change my views.

Clearly, the way to solve this issue is tertiary in nature: Either we do nothing & keep the inconsistency flowing, we decide we should follow the cartridge, or we follow the so-called "in-anime" precedence to deal with this. The purpose of this discussion is to objectively determine which way is better, & make it easier for the council when it comes to voting.

Discussion should focus on the following questions:

• In-game vs. In-anime; What should we follow? Which one is better?
• Is there another possible way not thought of that could handle with this final action can-of-worms?
• Are there any other issues with the last action of a round that could be raised?

Keep it civil folks. Otherwise, time to get rid of this shitty inconsistency that has been dogging ASB for some time.

 

[ZhengTann]

"Oh, this match is going to be close! KS's Nidoking is charging up for an incredible Fire attack, but wait! Glacier's Mamoswine is faster!"

"Truffles charges forward and slammed into Nidoking, and the behemoth is down! Glacier's Mamoswine is the- oh no, it looks like that Toxic attack from before has finally taken its effect! Glacier's Truffles is down as well!"

"Well, it looks like this match is a draw, folks. What a game, what a game!"

Okay the real deal here

First of all, I'd like to point out that ASB is an abbreviation for Anime-Style Battling. So I am all for in-anime logic here - any action would play out to completion in a battle. Unfortunately, "in-anime logic" is the only reason I can think of to back my choice, just as "in-catridge inertia" is the only reason I can think of for supporters of in-game option. If anyone has a differing opinion, I am happy to stand corrected.

Basically, this is what I hope it would happen:
[box]If a mon is KO'ed, all Post Action effects are still carried out - Poison/Burn/other status damage, counter lowering for stage boosters and non-damaging moves' effects, etc. etc. Should this results in the opponent (last mon standing) being KO'ed as well, then the match would count as a tie. [/box]
If you hate ties (of course, assuming that you actually count your W/L/T ratios), first I'd like to say that ties aren't that scary. Both sides still get their respective KOCs, so it's not like coming to a draw nets you less than a win - though it does give your about-to-lose opponent one extra KOC, which brings extra happiness all around. In RPs, there has already been codifications as to what happens in a tie - IIRC zar said that ties count as wins for Raiders, whilst I know for sure that they count as losses for challengers in Halls.

As for potential referees complaining that counting all that stuff is the straw that breaks the camel's back, when all you want is the UC you get from finishing the reffing - well, if it's your responsibility to have a clean reffing format, unbiased RNG rolls, you'd do it, because it's the right thing to do, no? Saying "I'm too lazy to count residual damage after the KO" sounds uncomfortably close to "I'm too lazy to correct my calculations", which is not an attitude a referee should be taking. But then, could be just me.

Of course, I'm saying this with the presumption that "In-anime" means counting residual damage, while "In-game" means not. Again, if anyone's opinions differ with me, I'm happy to stand corrected and reassess my stance on the matter.

I'd also like to highlight a question here:

In the past, it has been commonly assumed that when a mon is moving second is left with 0.5 HP or EN by attacks, it is still able to carry out its orders from that action before being counted as KO'ed is the Post Action phase of the round.

Can we actually clarify this and put it somewhere in writing so that newer referees won't be confused? Or was it already in black and white and I have't spotted it?

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

This is a problem?

I'd always thought it was fairly given that sandstorm damage etcetera took its toll on the last action of the winning Pokemon's move.

Regarding results, zt highlighted the two clear cut cases. In regular matches it obviously counts as a tie and that's fine. In other role plays you didn't win so you don't get winning spoils. I tied the bronze pike once and did not advance for example.

This is a problem?

Edit: after reading your post if you want to remove weather and poison and whatnot from activating then I don't see a problem with that. Just clarify what residual damage will happen and what won't, I.e Life Orb recoil will still activate on the last action of a match in every situation that the last attack was a damaging attack.

 

[Stratos]

I think it's pretty simple, here.... and i completely disagree with Texas.

when you knock out your opponent's last Pokemon: you win. Doesn't matter if your own faints AFTER that. The only things that should result in a tie are two pokemon fainting on the same move: that is, a self-KO (due to HP or EN) while you KO your opponent. It doesn't even make flavor sense for residual damage to cause a tie, since it occurs a decent amount of time after your pokemon moves (if you're faster).

 

[Its_A_Random]

Perhaps I did not make myself clear enough. Just because something is not a problem, it does not mean that is it not an issue. This is probably one of those threads. Referees are supposed to be impartial figures that basically oversee a match. But the main issue is that "your mileage may vary". Referees are expected to be as unbiased as possible, & hence, are expected to follow the rulebook as closely as possible. If we have one referee reffing said scenario in feedback to end in a draw, & another reffing to give a win to the attacker, then, well... Of course there is going to be confusion amongst refs over what to do. Yeah we could have just asked Deck to fiat something, but in all honesty, I would rather this got public exposure & be dealt with democratically.

That said, to all you supporting applying residual damage: Sure, a draw is fine, but because of the increased chances of draws, how are we going to deal with draws in the Gym League—which could just be codified by the committee, lol—or even an (un)official tournament in cases where the host does not turn the Self-KO Clause on? Do we coin-flip the winner & cause bias? Do we replay the match & drag the tournament? Do we call a sudden death scenario?

Then again, the divided opinions in feedback & in this thread have basically, obviously warranted this discussion, & that is why we are here.

 

[Objection]

Yeah we could have just asked Deck to fiat something, but in all honesty, I would rather this got public exposure & be dealt with democratically.

I believe I asked Deck about this a while ago, and he said that the action was to be completed with all residual damage after the winning mon's move. I will try to find when this happened, if indeed it did.

 

[Elevator Music]

That said, to all you supporting applying residual damage: Sure, a draw is fine, but because of the increased chances of draws, how are we going to deal with draws in the Gym League—which could just be codified by the committee, lol—or even an (un)official tournament in cases where the host does not turn the Self-KO Clause on? Do we coin-flip the winner & cause bias? Do we replay the match & drag the tournament? Do we call a sudden death scenario?

I think this is a really good point, and a reason to avoid a word of god ruling (unless this is addressed somehow). Honestly I prefer the action completing as a whole, but these cases are probably the most important ones so they definitely need to be taken into account.

 

[EspyOwner]

Just here to point out that ties are an issue in tournaments, and following ingame w/ a Self-KO clause allows for ties to be a non-issue.

 

[Flamestrike]

Ties are the biggest issue for me as well; I don't mind either system, but the in-game system combined with a Self-KO clause all but eliminates the possibility (there's still the possibility of both Pokemon dying to residual in the same round but I think even that can be dealt with by end-of-round priority + the fact that the faster Pokemon loses health first in-game iirc). If a similar easy and fool-proof way to break or prevent ties in big matches could be suggested for the anime system, then I'd be willing to support it.

 

[ZhengTann]

That said, to all you supporting applying residual damage: Sure, a draw is fine, but because of the increased chances of draws, how are we going to deal with draws in the Gym League—which could just be codified by the committee, lol—or even an (un)official tournament in cases where the host does not turn the Self-KO Clause on? Do we coin-flip the winner & cause bias? Do we replay the match & drag the tournament? Do we call a sudden death scenario?

I'm of the opinion that the solution can be found in the phrases I've highlighted. If in RPs, a tie is codified, then a simple way would be to codify Gym ties as victories to the Leader - the Challenger could do better still to win the badge. In tournaments, Flame has outlined a good solution there - if we were to count residual damage, things will not have gone differently, if at all.

• Contigency 1: Your last mon KO'ed your last opponent through non-self KO moves, then fainted due to residual - in an official tournament, it could be counted as a win, since technically you are still the last battler standing. Pwne stated this.
• Contingency 2: Both last mons fainted due to residual damage post-action - well, in this case, I guess we'd had to concede to ingame precedence. Like Flame said, faster mon loses health to residual and thus is KO'ed first, so the slower mon is the winner.
• Coningency 3: Self-KO clause is turned on by default. If you had no choice but to hope for a tie via Explosion, then you probably would've lost anyway, no? If we really want to do in-anime logic here, you'd have to blow yourself up before the blast wave hits your foe...

If really pressed, perhaps I could provide one more minor reason in support of counting residual damage after the victory KO - the lose-but-tie user gets one extra KOC. Both camps could probably say something about this, but I'm of the opinion that the tie-but-loser could at least get a mite bit happier with that one KOC - small consolation, but is his/her due. All that stall strategy did pay out, after all - just not the ultimate reward a match can give: a victory.

.. Okay come to think of it, the difference between both sides of the argument really comes down to that one KOC, doesn't it? After all, how ties are resolved can simply be codified by the respective RP/Gym League/Tournament committee...

 

[Stratos]

I'm of the opinion that the solution can be found in the phrases I've highlighted. If in RPs, a tie is codified, then a simple way would be to codify Gym ties as victories to the Leader - the Challenger could do better still to win the badge.

new strategy for my (with luck) gym: all grass-types have aftermath.

I dont see a reason to force every match/etc to codify ties when the game has already given us a fool-proof way to resolve every tie, and one that is far more balanced to boot. If a facility wants to specify differently, let them, but the game's tie conditions are the fairest and most skill-reliant way of solving a tie, as opposed to a blanket fiat that allows for some pretty silly bullshit.

 

[zarator]

For raids, I made tie wins for the challenger mainly for two reasons.
1) It follows WoW standard - if a boss dies but so do the entire raid, generally one person just resurrects with a Soul Stone or an Ankh and then they loot the dead boss. Either way, it's a win for the raid.
2) Raids are already very merciless in that they don't give any reward if you lose. I didn't want to make them even more cruel.

However, as Pwnemon pointed out, such a system doesn't work for other stuff, like Gym matches. If a tie counted as a win for the Gym Leader, I could just abuse Destiny Bond and Explosion to earn a lot of victories (ex: in my last match with DF44, I could've just used either move on Cyclohm to secure a tie). Self-KO clause as it is in-game seems the fairest option.

 

[ZhengTann]

... Wow. Okay, as much as I don't believe that the current Gym Leaders will abuse it, I'll retract what I said about Gym ties counting as wins for the Leader (please don't let me know that you actually would go to such lengths just to deny the challenger a fair badge...). But I definitely concur that Self-KO clause activated by default is the fairest option, and the 3 contingencies I outlined above should have solved any circumstances leading to all-out KOs in matches, thus removing headaches about ties.

So, going back to the my last paragraph:

.. Okay come to think of it, the difference between both sides of the argument really comes down to that one KOC, doesn't it? After all, how ties are resolved can simply be codified by the respective RP/Gym League/Tournament committee...

I think the last sentence still stands, somewhat shakily I guess, due to inconsistency between different RPs, but that is beside the point. I'd like to direct attention to the first sentence, if I may, and humbly ask for feedback.

 

[Its_A_Random]

48 Hour Warning. This discussion has almost run its course. Options in slate will be:
[BOX]How should the last action of a match be reffed?
Depends on the referee/role-play
End reffing as soon as one side has no Pokémon left following an attack/residual effect
After all end of action effects are applied

How should draws be resolved?
The same way as before
Add a Self-KO Clause[/BOX]
In the first slate, the first option means no change, second option follows in-game precedence, final option follows the so called "in-anime" precedence. The second slate I probably missed a lot of shit, but that is where you lot come in.

Finally, I just want to reiterate that not everyone plays matches for counters, some people will play to win, as is the competitive nature of Smogon as a whole. If one side has all of their Pokémon fainted, then the other side should be able to win, & not be bsed out of it. At the same time, if we do add a self-ko clause, then apart from trying to earn an extra counter in matches—which is a poor excuse to do such—then declaring a match at the very end of an action is fairly redundant.

 

[Dogfish44]

"Finally, I just want to reiterate that not everyone plays matches for counters, some people will play to win, as is the competitive nature of Smogon as a whole. If one side has all of their Pokémon fainted, then the other side should be able to win, & not be bsed out of it."

So if I make plays to end a match in a draw from a losing position, I'm now BSing the other person out of a win? That.... doesn't seem right.

I'm assumming by a "Clause" we're talking "Switch = KO" and "Switch = OK", not "This must always happen like X"? Since the former is fine, the latter... less so, personally.

 

[Stratos]

the slate is divided up like this, since IAR defined it poorly:

the first half of the vote concerns KOC. Do you
A) not give a flying fuck
B) want a pokemon to not get KOC if their opponent is set to faint that action but doesn't (ie if they win with 1 hp left and toxic'd)
C) want a pokemon to get said KOC

The second part of the vote concerns who actually WINS a match. Do you:
A) basically just up to ref discretion
B) always determine winning by in-game standards, so there are no draws. RPs are not affected by this, though. [Self-KO clause being that the trainer who KOes his own pokemon (due to recoil or EN KO) loses; after that we have effect order: LO recoil, arena effects, leftovers, status]

to address dogfish's question: read zara's latest post to see what IAR is talking about when he says "bsing out of a win." by "clause" we mean 'always active except in RPs.'

...frankly i'm surprised to see opposition from df or anybody, i thought in-game precedent was pretty obviously the best way to handle end-of-game events.

 

[Dogfish44]

In that case, don't call it a Clause, call it a rule, or let it be an actual clause. I can understand tie-resolving issues in gym matches and tourney matches, but I'd rather it not be forced upon every match. Make it a third option if you must =\

As for the end of an action, I'm partial to all effects occurring, even if we end up deciding it doesn't apply to the winner or loser of the match. This is a deviation from in-game, but it represents what would be realistic - and it shouldn't be an issue if it will end with the same result anyway, and I don't think there's any issue with a few more KOC floating around the system.

 

[Its_A_Random]

We are done. As per dogfish's concerns, I am updating the slate to...
[BOX]How should the last action of a match be reffed?
Depends on the referee/role-play
End reffing as soon as one side has no Pokémon left following an attack/residual effect
After all end of action effects are applied

How should draws be resolved?
The same way as before
Enforce a Self-KO Clause in all matches
Enforce a Self-KO Clause in all Gym & Tournament matches[/BOX]