Metagame Metagame Discussion Thread

[Kingler]

re: ZF - I believe Berks already touched on this but no, it does NOT matter whether croagunk or meowth or purrloin would be broken with z conversion; what matters is what is in the meta and not random hypotheticals that are only tangentially related. "Policy" advocates basing tiering decisions off the current metagame with the intention of removing a broken/unhealthy/uncompetitive/what have you element from the tier.

I don't know why people are comparing random past situations that differ from the suspect and are pretending like they are exactly the same (Levi's post is a good read in regards to this) when they really aren't.

Also various people I've talked to on discord and PS still believe this is a complex ban...? I guess i should expand, a complex ban involves a ban on a combination of item/move/pkmn; simply banning conversion is not banning a combination. Yes, you're doing the exact same thing that banning Normalium Z + Conversion or Porygon + Conversion would do, but that just makes this an effective simple ban. You don't define a ban "simple" or "complex" in terms of the problem you're addressing, you do it in terms of the actual statement of the ban. I'm really not sure what the confusion is here exactly so if someone could explain that'd be cool.

I'm not sure what precedent we are worried about setting but OU is likely to do their own thing anyway; having a unified framework for dealing with Z-moves is great, but these are case-by-case regardless so there's really no issue with going ahead on this.

re: doka - No move is "broken" by itself; I really don't see how anything "by itself" becomes broken, because you don't have moves without a Pokemon to run it on. This ties in with the "hypotheticals" point I'm referring to; these are pretty irrelevant to actual policy discussion and don't bear any real meaning. This isn't a "silly way of nerfing it" so much as... removing a broken element from the metagame? Again I'd redirect to Levi's post which I've linked above because it does a pretty good job of addressing these arguments.

Unrelated but I really wish people would stop treating this as some sort of convoluted favoritism when there's clearly an argument to be had here; I don't mind having the debate, although my opinion hasn't really changed from reading the posts so far.

 

[Brambane]

Policy is more important than people's feelings about a particular mon. Drifloon is my favorite mon, but even though it was deemed broken and banned, I wouldn't advocate for some silly way of nerfing it just to preserve it and keep it in the meta. Adhering to precedents and policy keeps bans from being confusing to new users, maintains the formality of the tier, and prevents LC from becoming a laughingstock like what ensued after the PU suspect of Dynamic Punch. While Conversion isn't that complex in nature, in this scenario it is complex because it's an indirect way of nerfing Porygon. Conversion by itself is not broken, but rather it's broken on Porygon with Normalium Z. Unless a move or ability is inherently uncompetitive, like Swagger or Moody, the simplest course of action is to just ban the broken mon, not the broken part of it.

I agree policy is more important that personal feelings, but I think Porygon is an interesting case in that there is a solution that not only removes the broken aspect of the Pokemon, but also does not negatively impact any other Pokemon in the tier and is not inordinately complex. Drifloon lacked these traits; banning Unburden would affect Treecko/Purrloin, banning Berry Juice would affect numerous other mons, banning Unburden + Berry Juice only on Drifloon is ridiculously complex, etc. This solution may not work for other suspect Z-moves in the future, but that is why we should view things by a case-by-case basis. I don't see banning a move like Conversion being difficult to understand for new users, or changing the formality (which I would argue is influenced by a tier's policy process, not the actual decisions being made,) and I tend not concern myself with Little Cup as a laughingstock because the fact that it even has a place on Smogon and an active, contributing community of players is proof enough of its legitimacy, regardless of the opinions of other players. I agree that Conversion by itself is not broken, but I don't think Porygon by itself is broken either. In this case, I would rather ban Conversion (or Normalium Z + Conversion, both results are the same) to preserve a non-broken element of the game, Porygon, while eliminating what is imbalanced.

 

[Fresher Than You]

Wouldn't banning Pory and banning Conversion essentially create the same effect?

Banning Pory is simple. Banning conversion is simple. Banning pory wouldn't create any (foreseeable/not hypothetical) collateral. Banning conversion wouldn't create any (foreseeable/not hypothetical) collateral. And I doubt doing either will create any significantly bad precedence (besides maybe some people getting salty but the Metagame should be put first ahead of what people like). There aren't any substantial negatives to banning Conversion versus banning Pory as a whole. Banning Conversion meets all the requirements to fixing the problem just as much as banning Pory. And it's not like it even particularly go against tiering philosophy/guidelines either. Is there any specific reason to ban the mon as opposed to banning the move?

I also don't think we should necessarily compare a specific move to a specific ability or item. They're different gameplay mechanics and should be treated via a case by case basis. Just because one suspect led to the banning of a pokemon, that doesn't mean every mon with a somewhat similar situation must adhere to the same treatment thereafter because it's simpler (which it isn't anyway, as I just said). Besides, if we banned Unburden it would have collateral on other Pokemon. Treecko, which isn't great anyway, but it exists and it's viability would be heavily affected and is thus collateral. Conversion has virtually no foreseeable collateral on any Pokemon besides Porygon. Nothing else is affected by the banning of the move outside hypothetical.

Tl:dr Banning Porygon isn't simpler or less negative than banning Conversion, and we should treat stuff case by case.

Oh also Cutiefly. I'm actually promoting the opposite for this one and banning the entire Pokemon. Primarily because banning Baton Pass would create more collateral than is really needed at this stage. Torchic's only real reason for living right now is being able to BP, same for Venipede. Eliminating not at all broken niches and strategies for the sake of one Pokemon getting nerfed seems a little strange.

 

[tcr]

Merritt I think I've addressed the second half of your post regarding porygon (fourth paragraph onwards) in my post, so i'll just respond to the first three:

what precedent has been set in this regard? there have been few cases regarding this, but if you're referring to our basic tiering philosophy of preferring pokemon bans to item/move ones, as well as simple bans to complex ones, this should be taken into account. however, there's a reason each suspect is assessed individually: it's because sometimes the same course of action might not be optimal for every given case.

king's shield on aegislash is fundamentally different because aegislash has various qualities that push it over the line. it was a new addition to the metagame and king's shield-less aegislash had not been established as a balanced threat in the tier prior. also, it was determined that even if KS-less aegislash weren't broken, it wasn't healthy for the metagame or a good addition to it; aegislash isn't the only pokemon in the tier that learns king's shield anyway (king's shield smeargle isn't broken, so it would be far less appropriate to just ban king's shield). as for speed boost blaziken... it isn't the only pokemon that gets speed boost. the same pattern exists in all your examples where there is far less of an apparent, proven correlation and you would have to complex ban if you wanted to nerf that specific pokemon. porygon does not present any of these issues.

like i said, banning conversion is synonymous to banning porygon when it comes to nerfing porzgon: we banned eevium z, basically the same logic applies though you could argue that it's a slightly less "clean" ban. if your argument is that conversion, a bad move in its own right, should not be broken, i could just as easily argue that conversion and z-conversion are essentially the same move except the latter is enabled by a z-crystal. i don't think conversion's competitive uses would be missed anyway, and that is pretty negligible collateral.

EDIT- I've seen repeated references to this being a "complex" ban when it isn't. What is being proposed is a simple ban on Conversion in LC.

This post is inherently false. Aegislash did not have various qualities that pushed it over the line. Its Blade form was balanced through its extremely poor defenses, as well as its extremely poor speed. Its Shield form was balanced through its inability to recover reliably and its extremely low attack. The reason Aegislash was banned was because King's Shield would inherently turn any turn where it was able to be used into a 50/50, with no real counterplay. Either you predict wrong and eat a super strong Iron Head / Shadow Ball / Whatever move, or you predict right and possibly kill it. There was no way to accurately risk / reward that scenario, it was essentially the "swagger" argument of forcing 50/50s.

Moves and Abilities don't get banned. Unless theres something I've missed, this has been accurate throughout most tiers and most generations. The exceptions have been when either are deemed uncompetitive in a traditional sense, instead of being deemed "broken." An example is Swagger. Swagger is not "broken" it strictly goes against the spirit of the game by turning what is otherwise a fairly complicated strategy game into a series of coinflips. Moody was banned bc it has a chance to break Evasion clause. Double Team falls under Evasion Clause. Sheer Cold falls under OHKO Clause (which is, again, rolling the dice to get a lucky break). The only thing even remotely close is Banning Scald, and the argument there was not that it was "too powerful" but that simply spamming it for a lucky status effect can fall under uncompetitive strategies. The other exception to this rule of not banning moves / abilities is to complex ban, however no one wants that because it just creates confusion to newer players learning the tier.

Eeveeium Z was banned because it was basically treated as a Megastone, there is precedent for banning unique items that can only be used by one Pokemon. If Eevee had been using Normalium Z instead of a unique z gem, then I'm sure many many people would have advocated for an Eevee ban.

How exactly would you deal with Meditite? Would it be unbanned in favor of Pure Power ban? Its the only line that gets Pure Power in the tier. Or does that not fit your definition of what an ideal metagame is? There is no difference between the two. The issue here is the need for consistency. It doesn't really matter whether x or y pokemon gets banned as long as the philosophy behind such is consistent. The problem with that is, when you aren't consistent, you are essentially favoring certain Pokemon over others. This is a huge problem because then it just goes against the spirit of what a metagame should be, as people are just manipulating whatever bans they want in order to create their version of ideal, instead of doing the neutral thing and just keeping it super simple and letting the meta fall however it should.

In short, if you decide that Conversion should be banned then you are freeing Porygon for no other reason than preserving the current metagame. That is "the least amount of collateral argument." It is not bad for the metagame to change, it just something different. What is bad is preserving the same metagame for no other reason than because you can. Former policy already details what should be done in this scenario. Regardless of whether something is unique to a Pokemon, the banning element should be what is broken. Pure Power on something super trash like Caterpie would not be broken in any way. Pure Power on Meditite is broken. Thus Meditite is banned. Conversion Z is not broken on something like Munchlax. Conversion Z is broken on Porygon. The problem is not Conversion as a move, as neither its Z part nor its regular part are broken, the problem is when it is gifted to certain Pokemon, and those certain Pokemon should be banned. If you ban Converison Z, then you might as well ban everything else that gives +1 to all stats, as that is the main "broken part." If you don't think that Z Trick or Treat or Z Forest's Curse are broken then Z Conversion is not broken. Neither is it uncompetitive (its a boosting move). The only issue I see here is a group of the playerbase that has grown comfortable in such a stagnant metagame and wishes to preserve it regardless of everyone else or regardless of whatever a metagame is supposed to do, and this is completely wrong.

 

[Berks]

This post is inherently false. Aegislash did not have various qualities that pushed it over the line. Its Blade form was balanced through its extremely poor defenses, as well as its extremely poor speed. Its Shield form was balanced through its inability to recover reliably and its extremely low attack. The reason Aegislash was banned was because King's Shield would inherently turn any turn where it was able to be used into a 50/50, with no real counterplay. Either you predict wrong and eat a super strong Iron Head / Shadow Ball / Whatever move, or you predict right and possibly kill it. There was no way to accurately risk / reward that scenario, it was essentially the "swagger" argument of forcing 50/50s.

Moves and Abilities don't get banned. Unless theres something I've missed, this has been accurate throughout most tiers and most generations. The exceptions have been when either are deemed uncompetitive in a traditional sense, instead of being deemed "broken." An example is Swagger. Swagger is not "broken" it strictly goes against the spirit of the game by turning what is otherwise a fairly complicated strategy game into a series of coinflips. Moody was banned bc it has a chance to break Evasion clause. Double Team falls under Evasion Clause. Sheer Cold falls under OHKO Clause (which is, again, rolling the dice to get a lucky break). The only thing even remotely close is Banning Scald, and the argument there was not that it was "too powerful" but that simply spamming it for a lucky status effect can fall under uncompetitive strategies. The other exception to this rule of not banning moves / abilities is to complex ban, however no one wants that because it just creates confusion to newer players learning the tier.

Eeveeium Z was banned because it was basically treated as a Megastone, there is precedent for banning unique items that can only be used by one Pokemon. If Eevee had been using Normalium Z instead of a unique z gem, then I'm sure many many people would have advocated for an Eevee ban.

How exactly would you deal with Meditite? Would it be unbanned in favor of Pure Power ban? Its the only line that gets Pure Power in the tier. Or does that not fit your definition of what an ideal metagame is? There is no difference between the two. The issue here is the need for consistency. It doesn't really matter whether x or y pokemon gets banned as long as the philosophy behind such is consistent. The problem with that is, when you aren't consistent, you are essentially favoring certain Pokemon over others. This is a huge problem because then it just goes against the spirit of what a metagame should be, as people are just manipulating whatever bans they want in order to create their version of ideal, instead of doing the neutral thing and just keeping it super simple and letting the meta fall however it should.

In short, if you decide that Conversion should be banned then you are freeing Porygon for no other reason than preserving the current metagame. That is "the least amount of collateral argument." It is not bad for the metagame to change, it just something different. What is bad is preserving the same metagame for no other reason than because you can. Former policy already details what should be done in this scenario. Regardless of whether something is unique to a Pokemon, the banning element should be what is broken. Pure Power on something super trash like Caterpie would not be broken in any way. Pure Power on Meditite is broken. Thus Meditite is banned. Conversion Z is not broken on something like Munchlax. Conversion Z is broken on Porygon. The problem is not Conversion as a move, as neither its Z part nor its regular part are broken, the problem is when it is gifted to certain Pokemon, and those certain Pokemon should be banned. If you ban Converison Z, then you might as well ban everything else that gives +1 to all stats, as that is the main "broken part." If you don't think that Z Trick or Treat or Z Forest's Curse are broken then Z Conversion is not broken. Neither is it uncompetitive (its a boosting move). The only issue I see here is a group of the playerbase that has grown comfortable in such a stagnant metagame and wishes to preserve it regardless of everyone else or regardless of whatever a metagame is supposed to do, and this is completely wrong.

Y'know, you're actually right. I completely forgot about Meditite! While personally I feel that we ought to ban Pure Power and reintroduce Meditite, that may not be our best option going forward. Regardless, this should come down to consistency: either we ban Conversion and Pure Power, keeping Porygon and reintroducing Meditite, or we follow what has been our banning philosophy and ban Porygon. Though under my own ideas about banning I would advocate banning the ability and the move, our collective banning philosophy has been to remove the Pokemon up to this point; it should probably stay this way for the sake of the playerbase at large!

e: just to be clear, this is not satire! I literally forgot about Meditite and I think abilities and moves at least should be banned in the same way. I would honestly be for a Pure Power ban for the reasons I outlined in other posts I made here and in Policy Review, but that's just my philosophy!!

 

[TheTraininator]

Y'know, you're actually right. I completely forgot about Meditite! While personally I feel that we ought to ban Pure Power and reintroduce Meditite, that may not be our best option going forward. Regardless, this should come down to consistency: either we ban Conversion and Pure Power, keeping Porygon and reintroducing Meditite, or we follow what has been our banning philosophy and ban Porygon. Though under my own ideas about banning I would advocate banning the ability and the move, our collective banning philosophy has been to remove the Pokemon up to this point; it should probably stay this way for the sake of the playerbase at large!

e: just to be clear, this is not satire! I literally forgot about Meditite and I think abilities and moves at least should be banned in the same way. I would honestly be for a Pure Power ban for the reasons I outlined in other posts I made here and in Policy Review, but that's just my philosophy!!

Keep in mind that while Pure Power is restricted to Meditite, Huge Power, which is essentially the same ability, is not, and has proven to be balanced on both Bunnelby and Azurill. No other Pokemon in Little Cup can boost all 5 stats and change to a type of its choosing simultaneously other than Porygon.

 

[Get Hype]

The solution to the cutiefly discussion is simple, implement the baton pass clause. The main arguments against it is that it is overly complicated, to which i counter with that the majority of players already know of these rules and are familiar with them due to it being a rule in every other tier. The point of not having complicated bans is so that everyone is on he same page as to what is legal or not which is a non issue for how common this rule is in competitive battling and that any new people to battling would encounter this rule in another tier because very few players play only 1 tier. BP clause would ban broken part of cutiefly in quiver passing while allowing other BP strategies as legal. Torchic would still be able to pass speed to slower wall breakers just as it did before or receive a nasty plot boost and sweep. BP clause would also allow for mienfoo swords dance to carvanha sets to remain viable. Cutiefly is a very viable pokemon without the ability to baton pass a quiver dance and it would be a shame to have it banned when there are measures in place in every other tier that would allow it stay while fixing the issue with the pokemon. There is more precedent for this solution than for the ban baton pass proposal and it would limit collateral damage far more than the banning BP proposal.

As for porygon, the use of conversion would be formidable on many pokemon in the tier. Some have compared conversion to trick or treat and other z moves which boost all stats but that is not a fair comparison due to the very nature of the base move conversion. Conversion allows porygon to change its type thus allowing the pokemon in question to adapt to the meta game and its potential checks and counters by changing the type it chooses. Porygon has shown how strong it can be with electric typing but it could adapt to pokemon who check it by changing its conversion type based on what the meta is running at the time. Some notable types that it could become are psychic (resist and hit fighting types beat normal pory), ghost (again get a fighting immunity), and bug (resist ground which is used to hit porygon electric and resist fighting). This characteristic of conversion would surely come into play as porygon is run more and more and the meta adapts to stop it. The conversion base move is a powerful tool that can be used by not only porygon but by many balanced viable pokemon in the tier. The type change that conversion offers can cause misplays and allow for sweeps if a player guesses wrong for which type a player chooses to evolve their pokemon.

Some have mentioned that meowth receives happy hour and isnt broken with it which is a poor argument because meowth wold be exponentially better with conversion. Conversion would allow meowth to change to any type it wanted (hidden power) while setting up which could cover the biggest flaw with that set being meowths lack of bulk. Meowth would then have a base 90 move in any type it wanted (technician boosted hidden power) at +1 of all stats. Although we cannot test this, the possibilities are endless for a pokemon like meowth with conversion whereas the threat from happy hour is minimal because you dont have to guess when attacking it and you know that your checks can beat it. I hope this scenario illustrates the difference between conversion and the other +1 z moves which is why the move conversion should be banned and not just porygon.

The use of conversion in every real scenario is broken and theoretically many other pokemon would be broken if given the same tool in conversion that porygon was given. The ability to be any type and boost all of your stats is the real source of many of the issues in this scenario. Another argument posed against banning of conversion is that other pokemon can raise all of their stats by 1 and aren't broken which is a poor argument because OU did ban shadow tag because there were extremely powerful abusers of it despite the fact that not every pokemon with it was broken (wobuffet, prevos of gothitelle). The fact that they banned an ability that made the pokemon broken and not the pokemon gives precedent to do what is clearly best for the meta and only banning only the broken move and not porygon itself. If the non shadow tag gothitelle and wobuffet were worth not banning with shadow tag then surely a viable pokemon in lc like porygon is worth keeping.

 

[mad0ka]

This is just a nitpick, but an important detail: Hidden Power cannot be used as a base type for Conversion. One of the reasons Z-Conversion is so good on Porygon is because of its large movepool, allowing it to become a lot of different types. Meowth is a good example of a mon that Z-Conversion would actually not be broken on, I believe. It has versatility, but it has no recovery, no high natural defense, and not nearly as much SpAtk as Porygon does.

Also, the reason Shadow Tag was banned in OU and not Gothitelle was because it was argued that the ability Shadow Tag in and of itself was uncompetitive, which is a justified reasoning for banning an ability. Furthermore, the anti-Porygon ban group has been insisting that abilities and moves are completely different, so that Pure Power Meditite and gen5 Speed Boost Carvanha cannot be compared to Porygon (which I do not understand at all, but I digress), so you can't have it both ways and compare OU Shadow Tag ban to Porygon.

 

[Celestavian]

I'll take that a step further and say that there are actually a lot of Pokemon on which Z-Conversion is not broken, leading me to believe that Porygon is the problem, not Z-Conversion. Eevee's boost was a no-brainer: +2 to all stats is broken on pretty much anything with stats that aren't total ass. But +1 to all stats, despite how crazy that seems, is not that big a deal. Pumpkaboo is not running over the metagame in the same way Porygon is now, even though it shares some (not all!) of the traits that make Porygon broken. Porygon's access to Download, recovery, high Special Attack, BoltBeam coverage, and natural Evioliteless bulk roughly equal to Eviolite Drilbur are what make it the perfect abuser of Conversion.

I'm going to do a bit of theorymonning here. Now, back in the good old days of gen 5 when I rallied for a Speed Boost ban, one of the arguments I hated the most was "what if Magikarp got Speed Boost?" because Magikarp is not now and never will be relevant. Back then I hated it because Magikarp did not get Speed Boost, and since Speed Boost was only on broken mons like Carvanha and Yanma, but I lacked perspective on exactly why we banned things. We ban things because they are broken, not because they are broken on everything they are available on. So when I look here at a theoretical situation where other Pokemon besides Porygon get Conversion, a lot of people will say that it doesn't matter since only Porygon gets Conversion and likely that will always be the case. That's not the point. Conversion being broken on Porygon, even if Porygon was broken before, is not evidence that Conversion broke Porygon. Saying that "Conversion is broken on everything that gets it!" presumes that Conversion is the broken element. Now I will argue otherwise by putting it on other Pokemon and theorize about what would happen.

I'll start with Mienfoo, the top dog of LC for the past 2 generations. As a preface, Mienfoo would certainly be broken with Z-Conversion as it gets Baton Pass, but that is because of Z-Conversion + Baton Pass, and not Z-Conversion itself, so I will assume that Mienfoo runs an attacking set with it like Porygon does. Firstly, Mienfoo is frail, even with the boost from Z-Conversion, with minimally invested defenses putting it on the level of Porygon's pre-boost defenses after using Z-Conversion. This gives it far fewer set-up opportunities than Porygon has, in addition to making it easier to wear down or OHKO if you can survive a hit. Mienfoo would likely not convert to a different type, as having STAB on Fighting is really good and best for sweeping. What Fighting STAB would it use? High Jump Kick is supremely powerful at +1, but with a 10% chance each turn to stop your own sweep, it seems like Drain Punch would be a more consistent option that also provides recovery. From there, Knock Off is mandatory for Ghosts, and of course Conversion takes up a slot. From there, Mienfoo is hard-pressed to stop its checks. It's coverage against Spritzee and Snubbull is Poison Jab, but that KOes neither, while they both hit it with a strong Fairy-type move (Snubbull OHKOes, Spritzee does not, making it an inferior choice). There's also Foonguss and Mareanie, neither of which Mienfoo can hit super effective and stop its sweep easily. Depending on the set, Grimer-Alola can also take even a High Jump Kick from full HP and then either Haze or Clear Smog to stop its sweep. Croagunk also resists everything Mienfoo has, and Ponyta's random burns can be a real pain even though High Jump Kick can sometimes get the KO. Mienfoo would be a pretty powerful threat after boosting, and even beforehand it doesn't need to boost in order to hit hard and fast, but I don't think it would be broken with Z-Conversion.

So what about something bulkier who still has power, like Vullaby? It has very similar bulk to Porygon, giving it a lot more set up opportunities, and it even has Roost to recover HP after boosting, just like Porygon. However, Vullaby has a big problem: Conversion robs it of its typing, essentially forcing it to choose between a STAB Knock Off or STAB Brave Bird. Pure Flying would probably be the best choice here, as it gives it a stronger STAB move and better defensive typing. Pure Dark makes it susceptible to Scarf Fighting-types and makes Vullaby walled by Spritzee and Snubbull. Even without STAB, Knock Off still hits hard with pseudo-STAB from the Z-Conversion boost, and helps against the Electric-, Rock-, and Steel-types that can absorb Brave Birds. Outside of Dark/Flying though, Vullaby has almost no coverage. It gets Rock Smash for Pawniard, but Pawniard wouldn't really be the best check to Vullaby anyway since it can't Knock Off its Z-Conversion defense boosts or flinch it with Iron Head. It's also not the most powerful wither with a +1 boost, with only a base 55 Attack. There is no way Vullaby would go Special with this set since it already has Nasty Plot + Weak Armor. Thus, anything that resists Flying or has huge defense is a big check to Vullaby. Onix, Omanyte, Shellder, Tirtouga, Dwebble, and Magnemite are all examples of this. There's also opportunity cost: You can't run Nasty Plot + Weak Armor or Z-Mirror Move Vullaby if you run this set, and honestly, I think both of those sets are better than this one. Vullaby night still end up broken with Z-Conversion, but that would only be because it has so many other good sets that Z-Conversion is the straw that breaks Vullaby's back.

These two Pokemon were chosen because they represent the two main problems with Z-Conversion: A +1 boost to all stats is not as insane as it seems, and Conversion's base effect can be a big detriment for dual-type Pokemon. I'll go through a quick list of the other good Pokemon and say why Z-Conversion would or would not be broken for them:

Pawniard: It loses either STAB Knock Off or STAB Iron Head, while still being crushed by Fighting-types. Ironically, choosing pure Dark makes Pawniard weak to Spritzee, a Pokemon that regular Eviolite Pawniard is used to beat. Terrible coverage that loses to anything resisting Dark.

Diglett: Already fast enough, no use for the defenses, and it wastes a turn setting up in which time it gets pummeled. Still too weak even after the boost to hurt things like Mudbray or Foongus. It can choose a Pokemon to set up on with Arena Trap, but that's basically its only boon.

Magnemite: Loses SturdyJuice and one of its types. Where pure Electric Porygon is good, pure Electric Magnemite sucks, as its Steel typing is a big help for it. It lacks Ice Beam for the famed BoltBeam coverage, and HP Ice is bad, while Flash Cannon is no replacement.

Abra: Same as Diglett: Frail, fast enough, no use for defenses.

Cutiefly: With Quiver Dance, Z-Conversion is not needed at all. The only thing it's missing out on is the Defense boost, which it gets anyway from the Eviolite it gets to carry since it doesn't need a Z-Crystal.

Foongus: Weak and slow, even with the boosts. Loses one of its types and Regenerator since switching is not an option once you have set up.

Mudbray: This one could be good, but it lacks recovery and would be pretty frail on the set-up turn.

The list doesn't really need to be bigger than that, as every other Pokemon would be a repetition of one of the above reasons. No recovery, bad coverage, loses one of its types, frail, not powerful enough after the boost, already has a better boosting move that lets it have Eviolite, etc., all the way down the viability list. Porygon is the only Pokemon in the metagame that has none of those problems. It has recover and BoltBeam for a great moveset alongside Conversion. It has a type it's happy to get rid of and replace with pure Electric. It has Download, which is a passive boost to its Special Attack (most of the time!) that gives it the power it needs to sweep after boosting. It has fantastic bulk before and after boosting, and coupled with its Normal typing before boosting, you are never going to hit it super effectively before it boosts, so you're very unlikely to OHKO it. This is what leads me to believe that Porygon is the problem. I believe that the only reason we are even considering banning Conversion is our attachment to Porygon from BW and ORAS and the fact that the extenuating circumstances surrounding the exclusivity of Conversion allow us to take leeway with established policy. Porygon has been borderline for 2 generations, but now it's finally broken.

 

[Kingler]

i really didn't wanna post again because i pretty much laid out my thoughts across my posts but since someone replied to me...

tcr everything you have said has been addressed prior so idk why you're quoting my post. what makes my post "inherently false"? the fact that i posted it? that's really the only way to interpret that word unless it was just some tacked on adverb to make your argument look fancier so... yeah. you seem far too intent to frame this as some conspiracy to keep porygon in the metagame and haven't really understood the point i was trying to put across.

Also Celestavian again, why does that matter? Why does it matter that vullaby might be broken with Z-Conversion when it does not learn that move? Why does it matter that Meowth might not? These are hypotheticals to determine whether Z-Conversion would be broken on everything that learned it IF everything learned it, but they do not, so why are we putting forth these situations? Everyone seems to love mentioning precedent but there is no "precedent" for basing our metagame off an alternate reality of that metagame.

ye i'm done posting for this suspect

 

[Celestavian]

Kingler12345 Becuase everyone seems to have it in their heads that because Porygon is the only one to learn Conversion that we have free reign to just ban Conversion. If anything, it seems like the opposite. The fact that Conversion only exists on Porygon means we cannot ban it because it may not be broken. We do not have a large enough sample size to outright say "Conversion is broken" just becasue Porygon is broken with it, unless it's ridiculously overpowered like Eevee's boost was, which it is not. The reason we ban things is to get rid of broken stuff. So when you say "ban Conversion", you say that Conversion is broken. I had the same position as you during the Speed Boost debacle of Gen 5, that being "why does it matter what hypothetical Speed Boost Pokemon do, only x Pokemon have it!" I'll explain why that's flawed rather simply: You're missing the point of the hypothetical situations. You want to ban Conversion either because you believe that Conversion is broken, or because you want to save Porygon. The latter is a naive, unsupportable position, so I'll ignore that. To prove Conversion is not broken, or at least to inject doubt that it is, I present hypothetical situations where other good Pokemon learn it. By my theorymonning, I come to the conclusion that they will likely not be broken by Conversion. The whole point is to see if the move itself is broken or not, because on the Pokemon that do have it, it poses a problem. However, I am saying the problem lies more with Porygon than it does Conversion, thus it should be banned.

 

[zf]

Also Celestavian again, why does that matter? Why does it matter that vullaby might be broken with Z-Conversion when it does not learn that move? Why does it matter that Meowth might not? These are hypotheticals to determine whether Z-Conversion would be broken on everything that learned it IF everything learned it, but they do not, so why are we putting forth these situations? Everyone seems to love mentioning precedent but there is no "precedent" for basing our metagame off an alternate reality of that metagame.

Because Z-Conversion is a move, that's why it matters. There's a reason every single person arguing for a Porygon ban mentions these hypothetical tangents about other pokemon with Z-Conversion; simply put, the reason any metagame bans a move is because there is something broken about the move that's independent of the user. OHKO moves give any mon a 30% chance to kill something, and therefore are banned. Dragon Rage / Sonicboom OHKO a fair portion of the LC metagame after hazards and are banned; you could give the worst pokemon in LC these moves and they would still be broken. When these hypothetical situations are brought up, they're being used to show that Z-Conversion isn't broken like the aforementioned examples. If you were to use it on a random LC pokemon, it wouldn't magically become broken like it would if it got Dragon Rage / Sonicboom and it wouldn't introduce a large luck component like if it got Sheer Cold / Minimize. Therefore, Z-Conversion, being a move and not a mon, is not broken and should not be banned.

The opposing argument is that only Porygon gets Conversion, so a Conversion ban has no collateral damage, which is true. However, it fails to address the fact that a Conversion ban separates a move that isn't broken (as shown above) from a pokemon that is broken in conjunction with the move. These types of bans are things we do not do on Smogon because it sets a precedent for complex bans that cannot be allowed to occur. If the OU council deemed Keldeo broken, partially due to its use of Secret Sword, they would not ban Secret Sword (despite it being unique to Keldeo) because it separates something (a move) that isn't broken from a broken mon and bans it, rather than banning the actual problem (Keldeo, which happens to use Secret Sword on all its broken sets). Once a ban like this occurs, there would be precedent to separate moves / abilities from broken pokemon (I'm sure Blaziken without Speed Boost / Greninja without Protean / Reshiram without Blue Flare won't be broken in OU!).

tl;dr:
1) Banning Conversion is banning something that isn't broken
2) Banning Conversion sets a terrible precedent to save a mon people like using

 

[TheTraininator]

I'd like to point out that it doesn't really seem fair to say that a move has to be hypothetically broken on every single Pokemon that would use it for it to be broken because given any single move in the game, I could always name one Pokemon who could get it and have it not be broken on. Would Cosmog be broken with Z-Conversion? No, but Cosmog also only has Splash and Teleport, so it's not like it could do anything with those boosts. Heck, Cosmog would not be broken with Extreme Evoboost either, so we should probably just ban Eevee instead of just the Z-Crystal because clearly Eevee is the aspect that makes it broken, right? And yes, I know that Eevee is the only Pokemon capable of running Eevium Z, but Porygon is still the only Pokemon who can run Conversion too, so in practice it amounts to the same thing: these two Pokemon are the only ones capable of running this exclusive Z-Move. I honestly don't see any reason why banning a move/ability on all Pokemon if it is proven to be broken on literally every single Pokemon that gets it sets a bad precedent. If, in the future, something else gets Conversion in the tier other than Porygon, then maybe it might be worth looking at suspecting Porygon, but for now I feel like banning Conversion is certainly an option not to be dismissed, if not the preferable course of action.

Oh, and for the people who mentioned how OU banned Aegislash and Power Construct and didn't ban King's Shield and Thousand Arrows, you conveniently left out Smeargle, who can run both of these moves and not be broken, and both of the other Zygarde formes in the case of Thousand Arrows. Smeargle does not exist in Little Cup, meaning it is far easier to ban moves in Little Cup than any tier in which Smeargle is legal, if that makes sense.

 

[Rowan]

If we're gonna ban Conversion, then go ahead and ban Quiver Dance instead of Cutiefly as well.
Cutiefly definitely wouldn't be broken without quiver dance, and it's the only pokemon that gets it.
If you're banning Conversion but not Quiver Dance then I really don't understand.

 

[Get Hype]

Another issue is that conversion has the possibility to introduce a noncompetitive aspect to the meta by forcing anyone who runs a pokemon with less 14 speed to play the guessing game with the set up. Porygon itself has multiple viable types it can change into while setting up which could lead to the potential for having to guess which type it will change to. Although there is a similar concept in OU with the multiple Mega Zard forms, this is even worse because instead of only having to deal with 2 possibilities that share a type, with porygon you could face at least 5 viable types (normal, ghost, psychic, bug, electric) each with unique resists and coverage to sweep. Many pokemon may not share get 5 viable types like porygon but in general it is fair to say that most viable pokemon in the meta could have 3-4 good options.

Celestavian You selected many pokemon who obviously wouldnt benefit from the type change that conversion offers or are too slow or frail to abuse those boosts. In addition the proposed sets for the conversion sets only consider them changing to there stabs which may be sub optimal. For instance Pawniard may be able to become a tricky pokemon to face with conversion because it could change its type to beat its counters. One set that comes to mind is the potential for a ghost set with shadow claw. Shadow claw and brick break combine to give pawniard perfect coverage which would allow it to carry a third move such as substitute or sucker punch to get past sucker punch users. Another possibility is psycho cut conversion giving it psychic stab and the fighting resist to turn the tables on its potential counters. Another interesting set could be dragon pawniard with dual chop which gets perfect coverage with steel and fighting coverage moves. Dragon would serve the niche of being able to set up on fire, water (unless scald burn, rip), or electric types which usually hit it for neutral or supereffective damage.

Finally I would like to address the claim that mudbray would be "frail on the set up turn" mudbray could run 24/14/12 defenses with 20 attack and 14 speed, porygon runs 23/14/14 defenses with the same speed and 18 spatk. Mudbray has great 2 move coverage in earthquake rock slide and stamina helps it deal with chip damage from priority. Although it lacks proygons recover it too would be too good for the meta with this move as well. Note that since mudbray is ground it still only 1hp to stealth rock whereas pory loses 2 which further suggests that mudbray should not have anymore trouble setting up than porygon does. Another option for mudbray could be to run heavy slam in its final move slot and turn into a steel type which would give it many more resists than it currently has.

 

[Rowan]

yeah you say that porygon can change to like 5 viable typse, but is anyone actually using anything other than electric and normal?

 

[Get Hype]

Its only 2 weeks into the meta, people have been struggling to find answers to it other than munchlax with whirlwind and scarfers that hit it super effectively. If this threat were to be left in the meta most teams would adapt and start bringing either mons that pory has a hard time setting up on or one of the few porygon checks in the meta game. Once people commonly start team building for the anti electric sets the people running pory just change the conversion and many of the checks other than munchlax become are no longer checks. If the meta were able to settle with porygon Z in it, there is a far better chance to see greater prominence of the other forms or every team running munchlax to check all forms of porygon.

For example scarf drilbur or scarf mienfoo now have the potential to revenge porygon if it takes set up damage, once the prominence of these checks rises on teams porygon users will change there tactics to make there sweeper more effective and use porygon bug to resist both pokemons stabs rendering to former checks null. The meta may adapt to favor porygon ghost as well or porgon psychic depending on which checks are most prominent and what tanks pory will need to break. This leads to a meta where each of the porygon forms are used in varying amounts and if you may have to run 2-3 porygon checks if you dont want to have a munchlax on your team so you can be prepared to beat any porygon form. The players abusing porygon can be just as clever as the people finding ways to stop it and will also adapt to the metagame is the point. After 2 weeks of this gen it is too early to think that all of the scenarios that could occur in a meta with a pokemon as complex as porygon with conversion have occured creating a stagnant meta game and the fact that the abusers of porygon with conversion havent had to adapt yet shows just how hard porygon is to beat in general that checks are hard to find and develop. Just because it hasnt been required that the porygon sweepers adapt in the first 2 weeks of the generation doesnt mean it wouldnt happen if left it were left in the meta game. It is for this reason that conversion should be banned is because the conversion part prevents the development of sets to better deal with porygon making it so that porygon is too diverse of a pokemon so that 1 team slot can be used to check all forms without requiring the meta to run the same pokemon in said slot.

On another note the argument that many other pokemon would not be broken with conversion being the reason as to why porygon is broken and not the move is not a good argument to make because there have been things to have gotten banned that were only truly broken on a select few pokemon. Although swagger is noncompetitive the biggest reason it was banned was due to the abuse of it with prankster users such as klefki and sableye who abuse swagger and foul play. A few abusers of this strategy got the move banned despite swagger being completely balanced on 90% of the pokemon who have access to it. They didnt ban confuse ray or flatter both of which also turned the game into a series of coin tosses, so it wasnt purely for confusion is noncompetitive. It was done because there were pokemon who could take advantage of the moves niche mechanic of raising the attack to fire off powerful foulplay attacks while the opponent struggled with confusion. The fact that there are pokemon who can take advantage of conversion in this way to change type while boosting is what makes it broken despite it only working as a boosting for other pokemon. If swagger were just a confusion move that raised attack it would not be banned, it was banned because was gifted to pokemon who could take advantage of it just as porygon was gifted with conversion Z. I realize this isnt a straight comparison because swag play is obviously more noncompetitive than conversion but the point about having multiple pokemon who could theoretically take advantage of this is still a valid reason to consider that conversion may be the real problem here.

 

[Camden]

The LC council has voted, and Porygon is banned from Little Cup. The council had already unanimously decided that there was an issue with the Pokemon but were initially unsure of how to handle it. After some lengthy discussion, the majority of the council had decided that banning the Pokemon itself was the proper approach because banning Conversion would set an unhealthy precedent for future votes. In addition, numerous council numbers agreed that while Z-Conversion was the factor that made Porygon as powerful as it was, it was its combination of bulk, movepool, and power that allowed it to abuse the move to its fullest potential. Thank you to everyone on the council for your participation, as well as everyone in this thread, in the PS room, and on Discord for your contributions to the discussion.

 

[blarajan]

and with that I no longer have any interest in s/m lc

 

[Tenmei_Lightpaw]

and with that I no longer have any interest in s/m lc

Thanks for letting us know! We enjoyed your stay here and hope you find peace in your next adventure!

 

[Berks]

So at what point will we move away from council voting into actual suspects?

 

[Adeleine]

porygone

Thrilled with the precedent the lc council is establishing here, could save a lot of future trouble/anguish assuming it becomes standard

 

[Avant Heim]

okay,it's official,i'm never going to play this meta's LC

 

[Rowan]

I'd like to thank the LC council for making what I believe is the right choice. I honestly think things would have got messy when it came to discussing Cutiefly, since imo there really is no difference in banning Conversion and banning Quiver Dance, and if Conversion were to go, then I honestly think Quiver Dance would have had to be suspected rather than Cutiefly.

For those saying 'omg I'm so done with LC now' I personally think it's a silly response. Pokemon is a naturally evolving game, and it has always been that way, and now it's just going to evolve without Porygon. I don't see the point in rage quitting before you've even tried the new metagame because a decision hasn't gone your way.
I'm sure just as many people would have done the same thing if the council banned Conversion instead of Porygon, at the end of the day you can never please everyone.

As for the Cutiefly discussion, I have changed my mind since saying Baton Pass needs looking at. I believe the best thing to do is ban Cutiefly. If Baton Pass becomes a problem without Cutiefly, then we can possibly look at suspecting Baton Pass in some form, and then retesting Cutiefly, but since we don't know what Baton Pass is like without Cutiefly, then Cutiefly should go to begin with.

 

[v]

[last scene from the planet of the apes]