-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
np: UU - Rain Drops Keep Falling on my Head
- Thread starter JabbaTheGriffin
- Start date
- Status
I just want to say that I very much liked it how the voting went much quicker this time. I think it's good to get into the habit of being more effiecient at this, if generation 5 could be starting in a years time.
And this means Venusaur will probably be number one in March. :)
Yeah, and I was also expecting the title to be something about ducks, rather than rain, although I can't think of anything witty myself.
And this means Venusaur will probably be number one in March. :)
Yeah, and I was also expecting the title to be something about ducks, rather than rain, although I can't think of anything witty myself.
Ah shame Froslass survived again...thought I'd seen the last of it this meta... oh well.
I expect that Venu usage to climb up again thanks to Cress's banishment.
And Moltres retains its place to terrorize us all forever more...
I expect that Venu usage to climb up again thanks to Cress's banishment.
And Moltres retains its place to terrorize us all forever more...
I, for one, thought the title was perfect... especially since the song contains the lyrics "sleeping on the job," fellow voters!
EDIT: Also "I'm not going to stop the rain by complaining." This is almost stupidly perfect.
Eager to play in a Cress-less ladder since she was the only one of these suspects who really disrupted what I like to do this period, though I don't think I'm going to completely retire my rain team... the rain sweepers are all so goofy looking, they have a certain charm, don't you think? Any team that can use Miror B's dancing buddy and the RBY fossils is good by me.
The 4 week thing seems to be pretty unanimously accepted and I think it'll be particularly great if shit like Hippo ever DOES drop down, since we didn't gain much momentum trying to get an accelerated suspect removal process through Policy Review. I'd rather quicken the pace this process works at if we can regardless, it always feels like we're trying to play catch-up to me. The faster we only have to really worry about OU drop-downs the more adjusted people will become to the metagame, and the easier it will be to keep content on the site up to date.
I've always been kinda sketchy on the rating thing...
What I would really like to do is do something like this:
Normal Paragraph Voters: 1650/50
EZ TRACK SUPERVOTERS #1: 1800/40
I still think the current line is way too low, and while that jump is pretty small I think it is enough to allow for slightly easier grading on the paragraphs, if that is so desired by the userbase.
I really like having a second bar for the same reason - if players are so good that we just have to have their input, then having a bar like that out of reach of all but the best players seems reasonable to me. I think anyone putting up that kind of rating (shut up about 5k I swear to god I see you thinking it) deserves the vote and thus it's fine if they aren't as thorough as the rest. It doesn't take away anyone else's right to vote, it's simply a reward for the best players.
While I think more people would have hit that bar if we'd had it available for people to go after, for the record last period, only the following accounts would have hit it: Silent Verse, Slowking (and Jak3 was only 1 deviation off so maybe reach and Jabba would have had a heart and gave it to him). More hit the rating, but it was an awfully exclusive group that hit both, since most ratings that high are basically right at 50 deviation, which isn't a good enough sample for this, IMO. Something to think about...
EDIT: Also "I'm not going to stop the rain by complaining." This is almost stupidly perfect.
Eager to play in a Cress-less ladder since she was the only one of these suspects who really disrupted what I like to do this period, though I don't think I'm going to completely retire my rain team... the rain sweepers are all so goofy looking, they have a certain charm, don't you think? Any team that can use Miror B's dancing buddy and the RBY fossils is good by me.
I'm really just posting to try and get other people commenting on it since you know my opinion already, but...JabbatheDrunk said:
The 4 week thing seems to be pretty unanimously accepted and I think it'll be particularly great if shit like Hippo ever DOES drop down, since we didn't gain much momentum trying to get an accelerated suspect removal process through Policy Review. I'd rather quicken the pace this process works at if we can regardless, it always feels like we're trying to play catch-up to me. The faster we only have to really worry about OU drop-downs the more adjusted people will become to the metagame, and the easier it will be to keep content on the site up to date.
I've always been kinda sketchy on the rating thing...
What I would really like to do is do something like this:
Normal Paragraph Voters: 1650/50
EZ TRACK SUPERVOTERS #1: 1800/40
I still think the current line is way too low, and while that jump is pretty small I think it is enough to allow for slightly easier grading on the paragraphs, if that is so desired by the userbase.
I really like having a second bar for the same reason - if players are so good that we just have to have their input, then having a bar like that out of reach of all but the best players seems reasonable to me. I think anyone putting up that kind of rating (shut up about 5k I swear to god I see you thinking it) deserves the vote and thus it's fine if they aren't as thorough as the rest. It doesn't take away anyone else's right to vote, it's simply a reward for the best players.
While I think more people would have hit that bar if we'd had it available for people to go after, for the record last period, only the following accounts would have hit it: Silent Verse, Slowking (and Jak3 was only 1 deviation off so maybe reach and Jabba would have had a heart and gave it to him). More hit the rating, but it was an awfully exclusive group that hit both, since most ratings that high are basically right at 50 deviation, which isn't a good enough sample for this, IMO. Something to think about...
I agree 100%. It's always been my wish that we get numerous intelligent and good players voting.
The current "only paragraphs" system fails in "numerous" and unfortunately weeds out a lot of the good players. I feel like those two aspects itself introduce a higher "potential error" issue than the maybe 1 or 2 players who might achieve the higher bar and have "dumb reasons" for voting as some of my peers like to put it.
Lower, easier to reach bar for people who wish to express their intelligence and knowledge of the metagame through paragraphs. Higher bar + small tiny little explanation (jabba wanted this as an additional check against "idiots" who manage to qualify) to both increase the number of voters (and thereby increase credibility and reduce the potential error) and hopefully get more good players tuning in on a subject as significant as...the metagame.
Let's do this.
EDIT: Regarding increasing the lower bar...if we have a higher bar I hesitate to do this only for one reason. We are already giving the good players a chance to "auto qualify," so that isn't an issue anymore. My issue becomes that a lot of people tend to experiment with various sets in a new metagame, and their account rating gets killed. Now we could just ask them to "make an alt" but I'm not sure if we should be encouraging alts :X
The current "only paragraphs" system fails in "numerous" and unfortunately weeds out a lot of the good players. I feel like those two aspects itself introduce a higher "potential error" issue than the maybe 1 or 2 players who might achieve the higher bar and have "dumb reasons" for voting as some of my peers like to put it.
Lower, easier to reach bar for people who wish to express their intelligence and knowledge of the metagame through paragraphs. Higher bar + small tiny little explanation (jabba wanted this as an additional check against "idiots" who manage to qualify) to both increase the number of voters (and thereby increase credibility and reduce the potential error) and hopefully get more good players tuning in on a subject as significant as...the metagame.
Let's do this.
EDIT: Regarding increasing the lower bar...if we have a higher bar I hesitate to do this only for one reason. We are already giving the good players a chance to "auto qualify," so that isn't an issue anymore. My issue becomes that a lot of people tend to experiment with various sets in a new metagame, and their account rating gets killed. Now we could just ask them to "make an alt" but I'm not sure if we should be encouraging alts :X
I wish Raikou was BL again. Oh, well. At least I have Dugtrio to take care of it.
Strangely, I had no problems with the other suspects (except super-ultra-heavy-offense rain from the Damp Rock).
Strangely, I had no problems with the other suspects (except super-ultra-heavy-offense rain from the Damp Rock).
Ok, I change my mind....I'm actually really liking the metagame. I know the changes haven't been made, but I've seen a total of 1 P-z and a few raikou...that's it! My new team is actually killing pretty much everything. Maybe I'm liking it because I haven't been getting haxed out the ass, but I stand by it...
Speaking of "numerous"... I've mentioned before it doesn't bother me that we only have like 6-12 people voting on most items, but I wonder if we shouldn't knock down that bar I mentioned as the "higher end" to be a little more inclusive now that I think about it more. I don't want to budge on the deviation - I'd rather lower it than raise, it frankly, since we need people who are playing a large sample of games and playing the consistently for the free pass to make sense - but maybe dropping the rating to 1775 or 1750 to be more inclusive of the "best" players? I'm not exactly sure what we should aim for there.
I suppose that's true. I think I got a little spooked by how many people were trying to toe the line at the end of the last period, since I question people struggling to get what was an awfully generous deadline last period... but if they struggle to hit it and have a "good enough" explanation I guess we're fine either way, you're probably right.aldaron said:
50 deviation isn't "the same" at different ratings since getting 1650/50 is much much easier than getting 1800/50 even when you ignore the difficulty of achieving the rating i.e. you can probably get an account to like 1800/70 or something then lose a moderately high amount of your battles and end up with something like 1650/50 or so. I haven't done the math at all or considered the actual formula for how these are calculated in the context of this post but that seems to be how it works. 50 sounds good enough or maybe 45 but 40 seems a bit low (it is a CRE of 1640 for reference).
some other things to think about
- I played way too much Pokemon this round but on separate accounts which meant I barely made the quals on one account. not that using separate accounts is necessary, but if the bar for deviation is set very low it would be harder for people that do use more than one account to qualify.
- out of 85 qualifiers for 1600/55 in the Yanmega metagame, there were 3 accounts that made 1800/40 (Dekzeh, Legacy Raider, and Bluewind) [lol Dekzeh made 1900/40 too], 0 additional accounts that made 1800/45, 1 additional account that made 1800/50 (Eo), and 4 more accounts that made 1800/55 (Krack, Aldaron, CTI, and replay).
- out of 104 qualifiers for 1600/55 in the Gallade/Honchkrow metagame, there were 0 accounts that made 1800/40, 1 account that made 1800/45 (xianglongfa), 3 more accounts that made 1800/50 (IPL, Chii, and IronBullet), and 2 more accounts with 1800/55 (Huntofthelion and "Spirit Tracks").
I think this implies that a decent portion of the voters aim for the 55 deviation requirement, but that doesn't shed any light on how difficult it would be to aim for a 40 deviation.
if we drop the rating requirement down to 1750 it gives about three times as many qualified voters (approximating) so maybe if 50 deviation isn't "okay" with 1800, a 1750 rating requirement with a 45 or maybe even 40 deviation requirement could work.
this post is pretty wishy washy but then again so are rating qualifications afaik
some other things to think about
- I played way too much Pokemon this round but on separate accounts which meant I barely made the quals on one account. not that using separate accounts is necessary, but if the bar for deviation is set very low it would be harder for people that do use more than one account to qualify.
- out of 85 qualifiers for 1600/55 in the Yanmega metagame, there were 3 accounts that made 1800/40 (Dekzeh, Legacy Raider, and Bluewind) [lol Dekzeh made 1900/40 too], 0 additional accounts that made 1800/45, 1 additional account that made 1800/50 (Eo), and 4 more accounts that made 1800/55 (Krack, Aldaron, CTI, and replay).
- out of 104 qualifiers for 1600/55 in the Gallade/Honchkrow metagame, there were 0 accounts that made 1800/40, 1 account that made 1800/45 (xianglongfa), 3 more accounts that made 1800/50 (IPL, Chii, and IronBullet), and 2 more accounts with 1800/55 (Huntofthelion and "Spirit Tracks").
I think this implies that a decent portion of the voters aim for the 55 deviation requirement, but that doesn't shed any light on how difficult it would be to aim for a 40 deviation.
if we drop the rating requirement down to 1750 it gives about three times as many qualified voters (approximating) so maybe if 50 deviation isn't "okay" with 1800, a 1750 rating requirement with a 45 or maybe even 40 deviation requirement could work.
this post is pretty wishy washy but then again so are rating qualifications afaik
Agreeing with everything that has been proposed with regards to changes in the testing process.
As for the metagame, I can certainly see Froslass realizing her full potential this round. Her two best 'recipients' have been kept UU, while her Spikes now have an almost full range of effectiveness on the elite defensive side of the metagame.
Speaking of Dugtrio, I can certainly see it getting more use now that it is a bit less of a liability. This would in turn have an interesting effect on Raikou, who loses a potential counter but will arguably have something more serious to worry about in return. I can also see other cool Pokemon like mixed Sceptile and several forms of Blaziken regain plenty of popularity. What shouldn't be overlooked is just how many Pokemon and sets Cresselia rendered much less viable with her presence in the metagame.
As for the metagame, I can certainly see Froslass realizing her full potential this round. Her two best 'recipients' have been kept UU, while her Spikes now have an almost full range of effectiveness on the elite defensive side of the metagame.
Speaking of Dugtrio, I can certainly see it getting more use now that it is a bit less of a liability. This would in turn have an interesting effect on Raikou, who loses a potential counter but will arguably have something more serious to worry about in return. I can also see other cool Pokemon like mixed Sceptile and several forms of Blaziken regain plenty of popularity. What shouldn't be overlooked is just how many Pokemon and sets Cresselia rendered much less viable with her presence in the metagame.
I think that's a good thing, though. I think there's a big difference in what we want and what we'd get from, say, requiring 1800/50 and getting people who power alts on the last few days vs. required 1750/40 and getting more people who played a lot throughout the period to keep that deviation down. It's still "doable" in one night, but I think it'd be a lot harder with the lower deviation because you'd have to be just absurdly consistent.
I had that in mind when I made my posts here ;) I think that's a strength rather than a weakness of making changes, alt use messes with ratings as it is since players gain/lose more points than they should relative to the actual skill of their opponent. The system we're using isn't designed for people to be using alts, less abuse of the system is a good thing.whistle said:
Quoting this again so more people see it but I don't really have much to say about it since the stats are what I'd expect them to be. I think we all have a pretty good grasp over how "hard" the bar would be to hit at each point (although it having not been a bar before is a huge variable), to me it is just a matter of how exclusive we want to be in regards to the easy vote. I don't think this feature does what it is intended to do if it is too easy to hit - it should probably be a bar that ends up being exclusive to the top 10/20/30/whatever we think is appropriate.whistle said:
This should also make the leaderboard more competitive, since hitting any of these bars would require CREs that are competitive with the best on the ladder most periods, which is a nice effect for the competitiveness of the ladder.
EDIT: Also thanks for doing that research, it's nice to know it fell where I thought it would for the most part and it's interesting to have the frame of reference. Nice that you went through the effort of doing that!
40 deviation at an 1800+ rating is pretty darn hard because of the amount of games you have to play, though if you really want the best possibly players its obviously the best choice. I think the most reasonable setup would be 1800+ at a less than 55 deviation. This is quite achievable by the good players and wouldn't burden them by playing soooo much so that they hit a deviation like 40. I would even be fine with 50, though 55 works best IMO.
If you look at the stage of UU voting for Honch, Crobat, and Shaymin, there were quite a few people that hit 1800 and 55:
B IS FOR BOOBS | 1,803.28 | 34.14 |
GANNA WIN | 1,863.74 | 53.79 |
KRAWK | 1,804.91 | 54.75 |
PANAMAXIS | 1,850.40 | 36.64 |
RT-UU | 1,835.68 | 46.02 |
TAY | 1,890.99 | 51.43 |
There were also 2 or 3 people that were above 1775, so I'm sure they could hit 1800 without much difficulty. Comes down to how 'selective' you want this upper range to be. I think a good 'bare minimum' in terms of deviation is 45. Between 45 and 55 is good, keeps the pool somewhat selective and also would require a good amount of skill to obtain.
If you look at the stage of UU voting for Honch, Crobat, and Shaymin, there were quite a few people that hit 1800 and 55:
B IS FOR BOOBS | 1,803.28 | 34.14 |
GANNA WIN | 1,863.74 | 53.79 |
KRAWK | 1,804.91 | 54.75 |
PANAMAXIS | 1,850.40 | 36.64 |
RT-UU | 1,835.68 | 46.02 |
TAY | 1,890.99 | 51.43 |
There were also 2 or 3 people that were above 1775, so I'm sure they could hit 1800 without much difficulty. Comes down to how 'selective' you want this upper range to be. I think a good 'bare minimum' in terms of deviation is 45. Between 45 and 55 is good, keeps the pool somewhat selective and also would require a good amount of skill to obtain.
Well, glad to see cress and p-z in BL, because even for a person like me who hardly plays UU knows how fucking incredibly bulky cresila was in the UU enviroment, and it was very hard to run a stall team with p-z around to spoil you're fun. Good to see them gone! Hopefully i can get better at UU and start making good teams. But, one question, will UU Stall be even more easier to work with now that p-z and cress is gone?
Tbh, stall was a bitch even with Cress and PZ, but at least they made it more manageable. I plan to abuse Rhyperior to the fullest and run right through stall teams anyway. With Cress out of the way, I've also been meaning to try out UU's former premier special walls, Hypno and Grumpig to see if they can function as suitable substitutes for Chansey. I've been using her for a while and her lack of offensive prowess has been nagging at me.
Stall seems like it would be just as effective as pre-Cresselia and PorygonZ UU. Before Cress and Porygon were dropped, we had stall breakers like Blaziken and Rhyperior, and we still have Moltres + Spikes, all of which will be very common in this metagame just as they were before (with Cress gone, Blaziken will have a bit more fun). However, since then we have lost both Honchkrow and Gallade. It seems like stall always gets quite a few benefits every time the voting process comes around.
Because I forgot to say it before the last thread closed,
I'M TIRED OF THESE MOTHER$@%# DUCKS IN THIS MOTHER#%@# TIER!
I do like P-Z, despite my vote, but it was just a bit too powerful and versatile. Overall, I'm very happy with the results, excepting Damp Rock, which will continue to be annoying. Time to find a new Sunny Day setter that can take a hit from a rain sweeper and turn the tide in my favor. Registeel and Uxie look promising at the moment.
I'M TIRED OF THESE MOTHER$@%# DUCKS IN THIS MOTHER#%@# TIER!
I do like P-Z, despite my vote, but it was just a bit too powerful and versatile. Overall, I'm very happy with the results, excepting Damp Rock, which will continue to be annoying. Time to find a new Sunny Day setter that can take a hit from a rain sweeper and turn the tide in my favor. Registeel and Uxie look promising at the moment.
Sunny Day is probably one of the best matchups against Rain, IMO. It's a pity Cresselia left, because it is a GREAT Sun summoner, but there are plenty of good Pokemon who can set up the sun anyway. The reason why Sunny Day is more likely to win against Rain Dance is simply because a Sunny Day team is more likely to survive in the Rain than vice versa. Think about it. Sunny Day teams have 2 types of users, Grass and Fire. Grass resists the main STAB of Rain Dance abusers, giving you a better chance of reclaiming the weather for yourself. Rain Dance abusers aren't going to take Sun very well, because firstly, their main STABs are ruined (50% cut), no more Swift Swim and they are weak against the Pokemon who now have doubled Speed (Chlorophyll abusers).
Sunny Day is also a great option because unlike Rain, it is a more balanced team (Grass + Fire is kind good synergy), meaning if it doesn't have it's way, it's not going to just curl over and die like a Rain team is going to be. It also has more options to play in than the Rain. Hell, you can even run a QuickStall Jumpluff in the Sun with some success.
Sunny Day is also a great option because unlike Rain, it is a more balanced team (Grass + Fire is kind good synergy), meaning if it doesn't have it's way, it's not going to just curl over and die like a Rain team is going to be. It also has more options to play in than the Rain. Hell, you can even run a QuickStall Jumpluff in the Sun with some success.
Was I the only person (apart from reachzero) who was disappointed when P-Z got a supermajority?
I would loved to have tested P-Z in a metagame without Cresselia, but... meh.
Anyway, new metagame looks like it's going to be very interesting, since people are going to be prepared for Rain dance from the beginning of the test, Raikou is STILL UU(wtf), Froslass has free reign over the tier, and Moltres is just Moltres.
YEAH!!!!
I would loved to have tested P-Z in a metagame without Cresselia, but... meh.
Anyway, new metagame looks like it's going to be very interesting, since people are going to be prepared for Rain dance from the beginning of the test, Raikou is STILL UU(wtf), Froslass has free reign over the tier, and Moltres is just Moltres.
YEAH!!!!
I'm just sad that with Porygonz gone, the team I used to use doesn't seem to be salvagable anymore ... it's just one of a kind. Nonetheless, I can't say I would've voted Porygonz UU if I could vote. If I weren't using a UU Pokemon than Porygonz getting the banstick is just fair. Besides, what's happened has happened, and if I can't find a replacement I'll just start using completely different teams.
@the rating discussion, I still think my original idea is good. Basically have just one bound. Players above the bound can vote without paragraphs (or just the bare minimum), while players under it can still vote, but must write good paragraphs. This would encourage all the good players to vote, as well as allow any player who didn't meet the rating requirement for whatever reason but still know what they're talking about to vote.
Finally wondering what the metagame would be like if ALL the BL Pokemon dropped to UU at the same time. Cresselia and Porygonz would get to duke it out with other heavy hitters like Staraptor and Yanmega! The power level would instantly go up, but would it wind up undesirable?
@the rating discussion, I still think my original idea is good. Basically have just one bound. Players above the bound can vote without paragraphs (or just the bare minimum), while players under it can still vote, but must write good paragraphs. This would encourage all the good players to vote, as well as allow any player who didn't meet the rating requirement for whatever reason but still know what they're talking about to vote.
Finally wondering what the metagame would be like if ALL the BL Pokemon dropped to UU at the same time. Cresselia and Porygonz would get to duke it out with other heavy hitters like Staraptor and Yanmega! The power level would instantly go up, but would it wind up undesirable?
- Status