Sand Veil in DPP

[McMeghan]

Hello... it's me... ♫

I feel like we could talk about Sand Veil in DPP.

In BW, we decided to ban Sand Veil under the Evasion Clause because of its unhealthy effects on the metagame, mainly when used on Gliscor (Acrobat set), as Garchomp was already banned at the time. It's interesting to note that Sand Veil was arguably a big part of what made Garchomp broken in BW1 to the point of being banned.

Based on the Tiering Policy Framework, I'd say that Sand Veil fits the uncompetitive criteria.

C.) This can be probability management issues; think OHKOs, SwagPlay, Evasion, or Moody, all of which turn the battle from emphasizing battling skill to emphasizing the result of the RNG more often than not.

We already have an evasion clause preventing us from using moves such as Double Team. Under that premise, I don't plan to explain exactly why abusing Evasion is uncompetitive, since we already acknowledge it. What I'd like to point is why Sand Veil should be banned under the Evasion Clause in DPP.

What separates Sand Veil from items like Brightpowder and make it truely uncompetitive?

The biggest argument for me is that there is very little opportunity cost in using Sand Veil. Its biggest (and pretty much only) abuser is Gliscor, and its most common sets have little business using Hyper Cutter (which is only useful against Gyarados and the very rare Hitmontop). You don't lose out on an item (unlike Brightpowder or other "hax" items), you don't lose out on a move, you have everything to gain from using Sand Veil and banking on its effects, which leads me to my next point.

The only oppotunity cost in trying to abuse Sand Veil is using Gliscor and a Sand Streamer. Based on the Smogon Tour 20 stats, Tyranitar is the most used Pokemon in DPP. You will encounter it in one battle out of two. Hippowdon sees less usage but is still a very relevant Pokemon in OU, and Gliscor falls in the same category. According to the DPP Viability Rankings, Tyranitar is S-Rank, Hippowdon A rank and Gliscor A+. While it is arguable that these ranks are subjective, what is certain is that using these Pokemons isn't gimmicky at all. They're all solid and reliable, which is a big trait separating Sand Veil from all the other hax reliant gimmicks.

Fact is, you can't play around Sand Veil. Your only possible strategy is using a Hail setter or another weather starter, and that is only if you manage to win the "weather war". Sand Veil abuse is so good that it's been one of the premier strategy used in the tier in the past year. babidi1998 is one of the site"s most renowned DPP player, and for anyone who's been following his games, it is known that he's been having great results out of Gliscor abuse teams (such as winning the DPP Cup).

Another thing to point out is that Sand Veil is equally destructive against all playstyle, making it all the more reliant. Against Defensive teams, it's a totally reasonnable strategy to play the odds and aiming for misses on the long run, as it is shown in this World Cup game between Marshall.Law and Go10. In this game, a Sub Roost Gliscor manages to solo its way through an Ice Fang Hippowdon, a Rotom-A and more importantly: a Calm Mind Ice Beam Clefable. You may think that Sand Veil is only a big factor against Defensive teams, as eventually missing moves is the prize to cost from running Pokemons with low damages output that draw out the battle, but then you also see games like this. Of course, I'm using quite the caricatural replays to show what is Sand Veil capable of, but they display how Sand Veil turns the table for someone who has arguably played worse throughout the entire battle.

To sum it up, I'd say that I think Sand Veil is banworthy in DPP because it plays a big part in the metagame due to:

• Being abusable by consistent and reliable Pokemons (Tyranitar, Gliscor, Hippowdon).
• Affecting everything that has to deal with it (every moves is at risks, outside of the irrelevant Shock Wave [which doesn't even hit Gliscor] and Aerial Ace). I feel like it can creates undesirable games described in the Framework that I quoted earlier: "all of which turn the battle from emphasizing battling skill to emphasizing the result of the RNG more often than not".
• The lack of reasonnable counterplay (Abomasnow, a B-ranked Pokemon, with <2% usage, that needs support to properly work and that doesn't even invalidate Sand Veil abuse as it has to win the weather war first; Kingdra sees more usage but doesn't always carry Rain Dance and it's not a cold stop either).

This is obviously open to discussion!

I'd appreciate if we can reach a conclusion on the matter before SPL starts.

Maybe we should keep the semantics for later (Sand Veil ban? Snow Cloak ban? Gliscor ban?), I don't know about that. Anyway, if we ever decide to ultimately vote on something, we'll probably hold a similar vote in the manner of the BW Weather Boost one, but if you have better ideas, feel free to propose them too (maybe by PM to me and the other TDs so we don't clutter the thread with that).

 

[Genesis7]

I am so for a Sand Veil ban, it just promotes luck and creates situations that don't award the better player or the better plays. I think a really good example of something like this is Husk vs. TV-Rocka in WCOP http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-74205 where you can see that late game TV-Rocka continues on his early game bluff of non sub Breloom by repeatedly Seed Bombing the Gliscor (a matchup he would of won regardless of whether or not he had Substitute) and then he finally reveals the sub on Gliscor's EQ. This play puts TV-Rocka in a position where he not only gains momentum and the lead but, necessarily wins the game UNLESS he misses because of Sand Veil. And of course, TV-Rocka does which nearly loses him the game and puts husk in the driver's seat once again. This is just one example and this isn't even a team that goes out of its way to abuse Sand Veil unlike the teams we always see during early ST being used for "easy wins".

Gliscor obviously gets nerfed by this ban, but it is still a useful mon. I really can't see any downside to this ban other than the lowered viability of some pokemon.

 

[Alfalfa]

There are two important points that need to be brought up. First of all, does banning Sand Veil apply to DPP OU? I realize that most people do not play any other DPP metagame except for OU, but it is still highly important to consider whether or not we want to blanket ban Sand Veil across DPP in general from OU down, because there are Pokemon that only possess the ability Sand Veil that aren't Garchomp. Just for a general note, since this is not technically about Sand Veil but still considerably important to this discussion: if we choose to ban Snow Cloak as well, keep in mind that Froslass would be banned from DPP OU, which does not seem like a practical cause for me because Snow Cloak-abusing Froslass sets require a fair amount of support in order to even abuse Snow Cloak effectively.

 

[Oglemi]

To those worried about sandslash and cacturne, we can easily have this apply only to ou or complex ban Sand veil on gliscor, both of which would accomplish the same desired effects as banning sand veil as a whole.

Either way, as far as past gen concerns go, I feel like this is a ban that should have happened ages ago, filing it under our evasion clause. So I have no issue with this going through regardless of implementation.

 

[Andy Snype]

I'd rather do a complex ban for Gliscor/Gligar since those are the mons capable of consistently abusing it. I have no issue with using that as a basis for complex bans because of the battles brought up in this thread, there's only three replays where SV has successfully influenced the game, which out of the hundreds of thousands of possible battles in DPP (maybe a million, considering the past 8 or so years that it's been out) and if there are only three battles brought up for the successful cases of Sand Veil, I'm more likely to inclined that the quantity of "successful" replays presented so far only occurs because this is the noticeable set where Sand Veil has a successful influence rather than not having an influence in the game at all, despite having a presence. I'll get to as to why Gligar ilater in the post.

Personally, I am fundamentally opposed for 100% accuracy moves to have the chance to consistently miss for the guarantee of skill in a turn-based game, and with the distribution of DPP considered, there's only three "usable" mons that could be used in OU that only have Sand Veil: Sandslash, Gabite, and Cacturne. Sandslash only provides a ground-type spin, which doesn't match up against any of the spinblockers in DPP and is pretty much outclassed by the others. Gabite's advantage in competitive OU is that it serves as another physical Dragon that also has Ground STAB. This mostly matters for teams in DPP that want to use another physical Dragon in addition to Flygon. Gabite's Electric immunity and Rock resist give it a reason to be used instead of Kingdra. CB Gabite isn't great, but not terrible either (2HKOs SDef Hippo and 252/208 +Def Rotom-A). Cacturne's got an interesting niche with its typing and STAB SuckerSeed, but even using Cacturne itself is high-risk and you'd need to build a special team around it for it to work well (with about as much support as I would expect for a Rhyperior-based team). I can't speak too much about its actual efficiency because I haven't tested with it extensively, but there is potential for a team to be built involving it.

I don't think that banning any of these Pokemon is worth it through a Sand Veil ban because in the case of Gabite and Cacturne, there is creativity in teambuilding that could be made involving them and none of the evidence currently shows that Sand Veil is having a deterimental effect involving these mons. Taking directly from the Tiering Philosophy for Skill:

4.) Creativity - ability to come up with unique strategies or sets to swing momentum in your favor
a.) This means being able to surprise the opponent with a unique set or strategy without losing on general utility (too much)
b.) Doesn't just mean creating new sets, but also being able to use existing sets in a creative manner

Gabite's potential is pretty much worth keeping for Creativity and Cacturne's potential is still to be explored and its role in a 6-man team could exist, unless someone else that has used it would like to speak about its efficacy.

Though having Sand Veil helps Gabite, Cacturne, and Sandslash, I do not think Sand Veil pushes either of them into consistently missing what should be really accurate moves nor do I feel that those swings are going to necessarily be enough to win. Though there is potential for Substitute abuse, I really only see that working for Cacturne, and even then, I think Cacturne needs the help from Sand Veil to actually be good. Though Gabite could run Substitute with LO and SD, it's likely missing out on coverage and likely needs turns that it wouldn't necessarily have. Sandslash is just bad in DPP and doesn't have Natural Cure to stop Toxic Spikes anyway if it needs to come in to Spin nor does it have recovery. If it's running Sub however for SD, it's only got one other move for coverage and pretty much needs LO.

As far as Duggy, it's useless without Arena Trap and I couldn't really care less. Include it in the Compex Ban if you want, as I know I've had one match turned the tables because the PO Default ability was Sand Veil in an ADV match with someone.

If SV is banned for Gliscor, Gligar could be run as well and fulfill most of the same roles as Gliscor does, but with less bulk and less Offense. Just because Gligar is outclassed by Gliscor doesn't mean that it won't be used, especially if we put an artificial restriction on just Gliscor. Gligar's got the moveset tools and potential as well for a similar policy to be applied. Between Substitute and Roost, the odds of most non-100% moves to hit twice against a Sand Veiled mon is less than 50% (.85 * .8)^2 = .46. If we want to ban Sand Veil for the frustrations we see in Gliscor, I wouldn't be surprised if there are similar frustrations for Gligar based off of the upsets that have happened with Gliscor, so that's why I propose a Sand Veil for Gliscor + Gligar Ban.


tl;dr Ban Sand Veil for Gliscor/Gligar, not a full Sand Veil ban because that kills some DPP creativity with the other SV-only mons.

 

[M Dragon]

• Being abusable by consistent and reliable Pokemons (Tyranitar, Gliscor, Hippowdon).

How do TTar and Hippo abuse Sand Veil exactly? You can argue that sand set uppers are common (a bit more than 50% of the teams had at least 1 of them in WCop). I dont get this point tbh.

• Affecting everything that has to deal with it (every moves is at risks, outside of the irrelevant Shock Wave [which doesn't even hit Gliscor] and Aerial Ace). I feel like it can creates undesirable games described in the Framework that I quoted earlier: "all of which turn the battle from emphasizing battling skill to emphasizing the result of the RNG more often than not".

This is what made BW SV Chomp and BW Acro Gliscor broken. A miss giving them a free SD could make them sweep all the other team easily. Could DPP SubSD Gliscor be on the same boat? Probably

• The lack of reasonnable counterplay (Abomasnow, a B-ranked Pokemon, with <2% usage, that needs support to properly work and that doesn't even invalidate Sand Veil abuse as it has to win the weather war first; Kingdra sees more usage but doesn't always carry Rain Dance and it's not a cold stop either).

Not really, there are also mons like Zong and Gyara that wall it (it can still luck with Ice Fang, but chances are very low). Also there are mons with no counterplay at all, such as nape.


Note that this does not mean Im against a SV ban, but of all those 3 reasons in the OP, the only one that is relevant is the second,

I disagree with Sand Veil being uncompetitive though

About probably management:

A.) This means we have to accept that moves have secondary effects, that moves can miss, that moves can critical hit, and that managing all these potential probability points is a part of skill.
B.) This does NOT mean that we will accept every probability factor introduced to the game. Evasion, OHKO, and Moody all affected the outcome "too much" and we removed them.
C.) "Too much" is if a particular factor has the more skilled player at a disadvantage a considerable amount of the time against a less skilled player, regardless of what he does. In relation to the latter part, "too much" also refers to factors that nearly completely take a game out of the player's hands and turn the PRIMARY point of the game to wait for the RNG.
1.) OHKO moves are an example of the "too much" portion. With a 30% success rate, the other player will be put in an immediate disadvantage by the OHKO move user a considerable amount of the time no matter what he does.
2.) Moody and SwagPlay are examples of the "taking the game out of a player's hands". Both turn the PRIMARY point of the game waiting to see what the RNG spits out.

Sand Veil obv doesnt fit criteria 2 at all, and its not comparable to criteria 1 (30% chance of removing a mon vs 20% of giving a free turn to Gliscor, which is bad, but its impact is not "that big" when compared with other banned luck elements in DPP such as OHKO moves or Double Team or even with BW Chomp and BW Acro Gliscor, both of then much greater threats than DP Gliscor, capable of sweeping teams easily only with a miss (20%), something Gliscor cant really do in DPP unless its late game)
However Sand Veil is definitely an unhealthy element in the game.


Also I agree with Steven Snype, I would rather ban Gliscor + SV than SV, because the collateral damage (one of the reasons I believe that actual BW is terrible)

 

[Conflict]

Yo!

As you all know im one of the most ban-averse people on this side and even I have come around to the fact that SV (honestly mainly SD-Gliscor) is fucking bonkers and in no way, shape or form rewarding skill. Ive lost way too many battles to either Heist, tama, Fakes or whoever abusing this strat.

SV on Britscor is just a mere annoyance but on SD-Glis it is potentially game-ending and there are no countermeasures. Ive lost to SubSD-Glis with max hp Cune, Milotic, Starmie, Gyara, even Bronzong and those are pretty much the best counters one can find.

Honestly do me a favour and ban it somehow. Either ban Glis+SV or uh SD+SV idc. But id rather not see every 3rd DPP-battle be decided by SV-misses like ive witnessed lately.

Ban. Thx.

 

[Bughouse]

Imo, don't carve out exceptions for Gligar or Cacturne etc by only applying it to OU. It's an equally stupid strategy in lower tiers with Hippopotas too.

 

[Stratos]

Imo, don't carve out exceptions for Gligar or Cacturne etc by only applying it to OU. It's an equally stupid strategy in lower tiers with Hippopotas too.

except theres no dream world in gen iv, so banning sand veil would literally send these mons to ubers

edit: not gligar, the ones in question are cacturne and sandslash

 

[Mazinger]

Banning Sand Veil is cool but I oppose extending it to lower tiers because doing do would compromise Stronger, which is unacceptable.

 

[Bughouse]

except theres no dream world in gen iv, so banning sand veil would literally send these mons to ubers

edit: not gligar, the ones in question are cacturne and sandslash

Fine, do it as a complex ban of Sand Veil mons + Sand Stream Hippopotas in low tiers.

 

[Alfalfa]

Fine, do it as a complex ban of Sand Veil mons + Sand Stream Hippopotas in low tiers.

To be honest, these Pokemon in question, Cacturne, Sandslash, and Gabite, are not anywhere near as dominant in those lower tiers as Gliscor is in OU with Sand Veil up. Most of mons still possess counterplay against them even with Sand Veil activated, so a complex ban to affect them really is not as necessary as it is in OU.

 

[Bughouse]

I'm aware that both the cases I'm presenting here were losses for the Sand Veil Gligar players, but it's just evidence that good players DO bring this haxy shit to battles in DPP NU (not so much to UU). And there's no reason it shouldn't also be eliminated if DPP OU is getting improved.

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4uu-61234
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4uu-50994

There's also http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4uu-58715 (Gligar doesn't appear bc Regirock already won the game, but it's the same team as one above - this one actually gets used a good bit and is obnoxious as fuck with Cacturne and Gligar)

 

[Vinc2612]

There are four ways of handling that:

1/ Gliscor Ban
2/ Sand Veil Ban
3/ Complex Ban (either Gliscor + Sand Veil, or Sand Stream + Sand Veil, or a combinaison of both)
4/ Do nothing

1/ I don't like the first option more than anyone else, but it would be only logical if we think that Gliscor is the only Pokémon that can abuse Sand Veil (since Sandslash/Cacturne has no reliable recovery and Gligar is too weak to abuse free turns).

2/ That would be the easy option to get rid of SV abusing in OU, without changing anything to the tier (read: keeping Gliscor). It feels like it's unfair to Gabite/Cacturne/Sandslash though, all of them would be banned because we give a preferential treatment to Gliscor in order to keep it. It's still an option if we don't want to go to the complex ban thing I guess.

3/ My personal favourite. I don't really want to lose all Gliscor now, since it could have a bigger impact than expected. The complex ban only removes what we want to remove. I also have a preference on the Gliscor + Sand Veil complex ban (since it would still be easy to abuse your opponent sandstorm), but if the lower tier players want to remove the whole combo, that's fine as well.

4/ If you don't think Gliscor is a problem. I could understand. Well, maybe not, but I'll act as if I could.

 

[Aberforth]

If the only pokemon that can abuse it is Gliscor, why not just ban Gliscor? If Sand Veil is banned entirely, Sandshrew, Cacnea and Gible are sent to ubers, which feels counter-intuitive (although not necessarily wrong, given that Wynut was in there in ADV). And if you are complex banning Sand Veil on Gliscor, you are doing exactly what is often brought up as not being done in the newer tiers by not banning Protean/Speed Boost on Greninja/Blaziken.

In other words, either entirely ban Sand Veil cause its uncompetitive cause of the evasion boost, or only ban Gliscor. Complex banning Sand Veil on Gliscor would be hypocritical and would, rightfully, give a significant amount more legitimacy to the voices calling for banning Speed boost on Blaziken and Protean on Greninja.

E: Bughouse, I was referring to complex banning Sand Veil specifically on Gliscor.

 

[Bughouse]

I'm afraid a complex ban of Gliscor + TTar/Hippo in OU won't solve a ton anyway, since they're such common mons.

I mean, just look at the replay gif in the OP. Which team brought the sand again?

 

[panamaxis]

I agree with Bughouse RE complex ban of SV + sand only minimising the problem and not solving it. Banning gliscor itself (instead of either some sort of complex ban or SV ban) is just idiotic, for what are hopefully obvious reasons.

If this is a big enough issue, just do what Oglemi suggested and ban sand veil as a whole but have it only apply to OU so it doesn't mess up lower tiers. If it's not, do nothing.

It feels like it's unfair to Gabite/Cacturne/Sandslash though, all of them would be banned because we give a preferential treatment to Gliscor in order to keep it. It's still an option if we don't want to go to the complex ban thing I guess.

The ability itself is what is uncompetitive, not Gliscor, so I don't see it as giving preferential treatment to Gliscor but removing uncompetitiveness generally because Sand Veil <anything> is arguably uncompetitive. Yes, Gliscor is better than them all (usually), but they are all equally 'uncompetitive', and that's what McMeghan says we're banning based on. So I see no issue with banning these guys from OU if we consider sand veil uncompetitive.

I don't have strong feelings on this, but I just know that if we do a complex ban of SV + sand we're just going to end up revisiting this thread in another six months to a year when an important DPP battle is lost because player X brought sand veil gliscor and player Y brought ttar, and then gliscor did the same old shenanigans and influenced the outcome of the game.

 

[Vinc2612]

Gliscor is the only one that is "too much". Sand Veil Gligar and Sandslash are about as uncompetitive as any BrightPowder holder. You will need more than 20% of dodging to make Sandslash better than Donphan/Claydol (which says a lot about Sandslash's viability) or Gligar better than Hyper Cutter Gliscor. They are just totally outclassed. That's why we can take it as "only Gliscor" and not "Sand Veil as a whole".

Also the complex ban everyone is talking about is Sand Veil + Gliscor, not Sand Veil + Sand Stream.

 

[Jibaku]

Sand Veil + Gliscor is as messy as Speed Boost + Blaziken, Sand Rush + Excadrill, and Protean + Greninja. I feel like that wouldn't be the best approach, and it would open up a can of worms for other suspects. Unfortunately, there are a lot of issues with most of the other approaches (i.e banning sand veil would send Cacturne Sandshrew Sandslash Gible Gabite into Ubers which is just silly, or it'd extend to Snow Cloak and stuff like Glaceon or Froslass would get banned).

What if, instead, we banned Sand Veil under the circumstance that the Pokemon has access to other abilities. It's a little messy, but it's probably less messy than Sand Veil + Gliscor. I'm trying to think of a way where we can tackle the problem without screwing over some Pokemon's tier placement.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

You can justify a SV+Gliscor complex ban without opening up the external can of worms if, and only if, you explicitly state that such complex bans are used only in the instance of uncompetitive abilities, and not for claims of brokenness. Otherwise you do get people wondering why don't we unban Blaze Blaziken.

 

[Isa]

Is Sand Veil an uncompetitive ability?
Yes, according to our BW ruleset, Sand Veil is inherently uncompetitive. The counterplay against sand + Sand Veil abuse is very limited (use Rain Dance or Abomasnow, or Swift-like moves...), and unlike in BW there's no Drizzle (or Drought) to cancel it out.

So, my instinct is to ban Sand Veil.

What'd be the negative effects of flat out banning Sand Veil?
Since some Pokémon only carry Sand Veil as an ability, there's collateral damage in the simplest ban. While Cacturne, Gabite and Sandslash are far from popular nor particularly strong choices in DPP OU (Cacturne was used three times total across Smogon Tour 18/19/20 and lost all games, Gabite was used once in a won game in Smogon Tour 18 and none since, Sandslash hasn't been used), they carry some amounts of viability in DPP UU and NU. Since Sand Veil isn't uncompetitive in a vacuum, only with Sand Stream support from either player (which is limited to Hippopotas), I could get behind a Sand Veil ban in OU that breaks transitivity and allows Sand Veil in lower tiers. I could also get behind a more precise ban that only targets Sand Veil users with more than one ability - the end result is more or less the same.

I do not believe in a complex ban of Gliscor + Sand Veil. Sand Veil is inherently uncompetitive and a ban should be targeted directly at the ability rather than aimed at one abuser. Sand Stream + Sand Veil is more satisfactory for the lower tiers (if the issue is there), but is not satisfactory for the OU climate where you could easily pack a Gliscor without packing Tyranitar or Hippowdon.

 

[-Tsunami-]

Sand Veil should just be banned in its entirety. There's honestly no way to justify a complex ban of Gliscor + Sand Veil, as has been pointed out in this thread; if the ability is uncompetitive, then it should just be banned. I don't see any other way of looking at this issue, honestly. The collateral damage pointed out shouldn't even be an issue, since the overwhelming majority of the community seems to agree that the ability is uncompetitive. Doing this may inherently mess up the tiering placement of some Pokemon, but that is a consequence that needs to be accepted. We can't ban Gliscor for obvious reasons, and a complex ban is simply unjustifiable. I see no way that you can reasonably say that banning Gliscor + Sand Veil is different than banning Blaziken + Speed Boost. If you try to argue that Sand Veil is an uncompetitive ability, then why is it allowed in the first place?

Going off of this, the only option is just to ban the ability as a whole, unless for some reason you don't feel that Sand Veil is uncompetitive. Would this mess up some Pokemon's tiering placement and send some obscure Pokemon into Ubers? Yes. This is a necessary "evil", however. The main tier that Sand Veil is affecting is DPP OU, and we should do whatever can be done to remedy this. If the ban affects tiers and Pokemon below OU, then that is completely and utterly irrelevant. This has always been the case in Smogon's tiering system, so why should this be any different? I can remember a key example from a couple of years ago, where myself and the rest of the RU council voted to keep Gothitelle in the tier. This decision ended up being completely useless because the UU Council ended up banning it a day later because it was broken in their tier. Now, this Gliscor example is a little bit different, but the same logic should still apply. Sure, it sucks that you can't use Gabite or Sandslash or any of these other Pokemon in lower tiers, but there is simply no other way to get rid of the demon that is Sand Veil in OU, unless you just want to ban Gliscor I suppose.

 

[Saria]

Sand Veil ban wouldn't necessarily "send" anything to Ubers. Ban Sand Veil in OU, break transitivity in UU and NU to allow Cacturne, Gabite and Sandslash. But if breaking transitivity is a big issue, just ban it in all tiers and. DPP UU and NU are dead tiers and have no official tournament representation, so we should just focus on making DPP OU better, because, unlike those two, it is a really popular tier with more tournament representation than most ORAS tiers.

 

[trc]

sand veil cacturne in dpp nu is just as annoying in some cases

the ability fundamentally is anti-competition by nature and still exhibits these aspects on the other pokemon it is legal on

I dont think banning simply gliscor, sv + gliscor, or doing nothing are viable solutions at all, so a blanket sand veil ban seems the most logical decision.

 

[Laurel]

This post may seem counter intuitive but I need to disagree with trc on blanket banning sand veil, and instead banning gliscor + sand veil together. Specifically make it so only Hyper Cutter Gliscor can be used to avoid the argument Panamaxis brought up.

Personally, I'm a proponent of banning Sand Veil Gliscor in OU. I think this replay is a really good example of why it should be banned: http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen4ou-69658 it is me vs IronBullet in WCoP Round 1.

He likely expected me to be running Toxic Gliscor and then I was able to punish him by getting a Swords Dance behind a Substitute. From that point on (turn 19) I needed one move to miss of 3 (Shadow Ball, Shadow Ball, Bullet Punch) to outright sweep which was approximately a 49% chance. Paralysis makes this even worse of course and so does moves without 100% accuracy, Sand Veil is pretty cancerous. IronBullet had Milotic which sort of would have dealt with a Toxic Gliscor, but the set + luck is able to punish.

I wouldn't argue that Gliscor is broken even with Sand Veil, it does have a common hard counter in Skarmory, but I think Sand Veil itself is just too uncompetitive. There is no reason to keep it in any shape in OU. The problem is: as much as I want to hard ban Sand Veil because it is uncompetitive, you can't in Gen 4 because Dream World abilities have not been released. Thus, pokemon with one ability (in this case Sand Veil) would be Uber. Cacturne and Sandslash should not be Uber...

On a separate note, if we are on the subject can we do some sort of complex ban on Gliscor Pass. I don't think full Baton Pass is nearly as good in DPP as it was in XY, but dual screens Gliscor passing +2 +2 to Metagross is still beyond stupid.

This presents another question, if Gliscor is the source of all of these problems, just ban Gliscor?