OU Someone refresh my memory

What were the arguments against HP zap/raikou ban again?

edit:

the more and more i think about it, the snorlax-esque argument totally doesn't work for the electrics. lax is centralizing in a good way, all i can fathom are electrics centralizing in a bad way. zap is way too much of a "catch-all" in its current state, raikou is more niche, which is good, but zapdos winning the 1v1 vs nidoking the majority of the time is all sorts wrong. the beneficiary's of the change are mostly towards pokemon that are significantly weak in the current meta, and this would punish explosion teams in a extremely good way.

vap wouldn't run any more rampant, it is a pretty specialized pokemon right now, and if winrates are any indication, it isn't all too effective. the electrics would be no less of a counter to vap in its current state -- they'd be better if anything -- there's just less of an incentive to run them. and if playing the game has taught us anything, it's usually snorlax/other things that are the primary threat to vap.

steelix/marowak are two mons in the current meta that should benefit heavily from the change. playing against marowak would take more finesse now. steelix makes shuffling a much stronger strategy, which i suppose is ok. rhydon would be amazing. i like rhydon, it should be ou. this in turn should make starmie more than a one trick pony. suicune deserves a comeback too.

egg/cloyster should largely be unaffected by this change. dp/crunch ends up doing more damage to egg actually, but eggs have less incentive to trade for electrics in the first place now. the matchup against gengar is also sorta untouched in the same way.

machamp gets mostly a lateral change too imo. its matchup is worse against dp zapdos, however the usage of zapdos in general should go down, which definitely isn't a bad thing for machamp. dragonite should be better too, and who doesn't like more dragonite.

as for upsetting the raikou vs zapdos balance, that's to be seen. i think raikou is still a ridiculously good special wall, and zapdos is no longer the "catch all" splashable thing that counters every ou pokemon while being a status absorber/abuser all in one. this paves way for more screen zapdos, which is good. i don't think anybody is arguing zap/raikou falling to anywhere near BL status, they'd still be top tier OU pokemon.

snorlax gets stronger proportionally, since all we do is knock #2 and #3 down a peg while leaving #1 untouched. however in theory, there should be more physical attackers with the hp legends gone, which should make snorlax a bit tougher to play. this is just pure theory though.

we leave the hp jolteons untouched.

as for teams in general, stalls and offense both take a small hit, but gain a small boost. explosion teams are punished now with zapdos being less flexible than before, however you have more offensive tools with marowak/rhydon being better. nidoking/dragonite gets a boost too, as does steelix. basically we bring back skill to offense. defensive teams are hurt in the same way, but again with steelix/rhydon being better means you have more options running those two on pure stalls abusing spikes. miltank is definitely better now, and umbreon might make a comeback. this in turn might mean kanga and shit coming back too

i literally can't find a single thing negative about banning hp on these two.
 
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Disaster Area

formerly Piexplode
I think some of the main barriers are things like complexity of ruleset (not a big deal really in this case) and the size of the playerbase.

That being said with such a small playerbase, if all of the top players of it agree that this would be a positive change to the ruleset, I can't see the problem. Perhaps invalidating older discussion to some degree (like happened to an extent with paraslam mechanics in RBY) but it wouldn't invalidate it too greatly, whilst GSCers are thankfully great discussers - there'd be plenty to read in no time if this were indeed implemented.

I don't play GSC in any sufficient way to make a metagame-analytical comment, but I'm looking forward to reading responses. :)
 

Jorgen

World's Strongest Fairy
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I think Oglemi's view of it is basically the argument. Basically, "why did we even decide it was broken?" coupled with "it's a weird arbitrary house rule that some people decided was standard for some reason". Modern arguments against such a ban would deal with simplicity (if you must ban, ban mons if you can, and avoid banning combinations of mons and moves).

I agree that HP Zapdos is a bit of a problem, as it counters basically everything. HP Raikou isn't that big a deal imo, it can punish certain switches but can't stay in on literally anything, which is the main reason why HP Zap is so good.

I think Snorlax being "good" for the metagame is a totally subjective thing that's hard to define and not really demonstrated at all. Meanwhile it's obviously a gigantic centralizing gatekeeper of viability that's mandatory on any serious team, which I think most people agree is bad in terms of a game like Pokemon where half the fun is having a large pool of colorful critters to pick from. But that's just me, Mr. Ban Lax, speaking.
 
so i think one exception we made considering snorlax was that being "overpowered" isn't a necessity to warrant a ban. the entire basis for snorlax being allowed in ou is that it makes for a "better metagame", that gsc without snorlax is much worse than gsc without. throughout that thread, we've alluded to the fact that snorlax is both better than ho-oh and celebi, but it itself encourages a healthier metagame than one with celebi or ho-oh (although the ho-oh case is much weaker).

given that criteria, hp legends are NOT overpowered, but that doesn't mean it SHOULDN'T be banned from a metagame perspective. and unlike the ho-oh unban which is a bit arbitrary, the hp legends ban has sorta been rooted in gsc history. it clearly holds water. complexity of ban should NOT be an argument at all since this was a smogon rule to begin with, we're not pulling random shit out of our ass as with ho-oh. there's history there.

i agree that hp raikou is not the catch-all that zapdos is, but if we choose to remove it from zapdos and not raikou then that's a bit nitpicky/complicated. i think it's all or nothing if this is to be taken seriously.

so from a metagame standpoint, are there ANY arguments for hp legends at all? this seems like a total no-brainer at this point actually.

if this takes place, then we can revisit the snorlax ban with a new light, since hp raikou/zapdos being centralizing themselves would no longer be an issue. 4th/5th in command in gsc are not nearly as flexible as the top 3.
 
The main problems with the HP legend ban are not so much 'good/bad for the metagame', but more so the arbitrariness of it.
For example:
Why ban hidden power instead of banning something like Rest?
And if your answer is that hidden power legends are hard to get, the mere fact that it is possible means that it should be allowed, since on smogon we don't ban stuff for being hard to get/rare/etc.
Would you support an across the board HP ban for legends (including suicune etc), whether or not they are significant as to their viability?
 

M Dragon

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World Defender
If I remember correctly HP legends were banned because "getting them ingame was hard", which makes 0 sense in competitive play, and that was the reason why we allowed HP legends again back in SPL 1 (with most GSCers supporting that).
I am completely against complex bans excluding sleep + trap + PS for obv reasons, and I do not think HP legends are overpowered enough to ban them.
One thing is a pokemon (Ho-oh, Celebi, Lax), you could discuss if the metagame is better with the mon or without it, but when using complex bans, I think that there should be a big reason to do that (read: perish trap sleep ban)
 
Would you support an across the board HP ban for legends (including suicune etc), whether or not they are significant as to their viability?
yeah i'd support hp legend ban, hp yellows, whatever. either way the main culprits are raikou/zapdos, however you want to word it is totally up to you.

please stop stating the complexity/arbitariness as an argument please, it doesn't hold water. banning something has always been a bit of a mixed bag, nobody knows the exact criteria, at least with gsc. uber ban seems like totally a lore thing and independent of power, because again unquestionably snorlax > ho-oh. cheapness/ease of use seems to be the idea behind sleep perish trap. idk if it's still in place but quick claw/choice band/brightpowder "luck" items were also banned in smogon. double team was banned. so basically luck is banned, but how can you even begin to ban luck in a game like pokemon?

i'll let you in on a bit of a secret. through gsc history, i was actually the only person against sleep trapping as a whole. to me a jynx running nightmare/ib over psong is every bit as good. getting trap spored by smeargle is every bit as retarded. but that whole bit about it "having been banned in plenty of tournaments" or "vets being split between it and just a sleep perish trap ban" is anecdotal evidence, aka i made it all up. at first it was to see if i could get away with it, this was al the way back in 2006 or 2007 mind you, to see if i could get the metagame to change because it was something I felt was cheap, literally nobody else felt this way. ask vil, floppy, g80, karrot, mr.e, havoc or whoevers left from that era, sleep trap wasn't a thing at all. i'm full of bullshit. but sleep trap had sort of a ring to it when you say it. sleep trap vs sleep perish trap is really just a typo away from each other, and they're both really easy to justify IF we play the history card. the requirements to keeping something the same is much lower than the requirements for change, and that's ok, that's how life is. look at how hard it is to amend the constitution. look at how difficult it is to get faster internet in the us - the initial 768kbps definition for dsl is totally arbitrary, look how retardedly hard it is to change that. basically, it's funny that people use arbitrary to classify the hp legend ban, when there's actually CONCRETE evidence for it having existed, whereas i've shadily gotten away with amending the gsc ruleset for the past 7 years or whatever. when po started, i made the initial set of gsc tiers; i also made the initial ruleset where i casually tried to solidify the clause. it worked. for 5 years i'd been arguing and lying that it had always been a controversial clause. MY ASS. literally only i gave a shit. if we bring up "sleep trap" now, nobody would be like "yeah that's random as fuck", because i basically lied and my guides got popular and people took it as fact. but clearly the idea was good and so people accepted it, and it was a lot easier to argue on equal footing as to why it's justified rather than trying to ratify a sweeping change. if we did a flat comparison between "sleep trap" and "sleep ptrap" now it'd be much closer to a split decision. so now you know. i'm just a cheater. i'm the highest form of cheating. i cheat so hard the rules change around my cheating so that i'm not even cheating.

think about it, if historically gsc players had been split between pro-snorlax meta and a snorlax ban, with numerous tourneys with either ruleset, then a snorlax reform such as the one jorgen's been proposing would be way more accepted. we'd be open to it more. IRONICALLY, hp legends are literally a been-there sort of thing, it's been banned before. for like 3 years actually, and it HAS been banned on tafop and shit. and this was global too, nobody was being split, it was just the way it was.

anyway, i'll also be the admit that i was originally against the hp legend ban against mostly for myself. all my teams used it, and it was something extremely easy to use, flexible, and filled so many roles that actually made many of my teams flexible. there is literally no pokemon in the game that comes remotely close to replacing an hp zapdos's role on a team, i would lose a lot of consistency if i were forced to scrap it. but EVEN then, zapdos is probably still the best pokemon in that slot. basically, no hp legend = hard for me to adapt, so i was against it. i've always thought it made the game more skillful to use dp zapdos/crunch raikou, but i was against change -- i was against what i knew and what i was use to. no shame in admitting that now.

if anyone has any metagame arguments, throw them my way. because there's been 5 replies and literally every one of them is shying from arguing on metagame grounds. i'll start:

in theory there's more viable pokemon, but that doesn't mean there's more viable teams. because zapdos covers so many holes, you're free to use egg, cloy, steelix all on the same team and still have good coverage defensively, while not leaving gaping holes offensively. if zapdos could no longer hit rhydon, then an hp bug rhydon would get a free switch every time and literally run through that team.

counterargument: it doesn't make that team non-viable. it weakens that specific team, but explosion teams are honestly way too fucking good for how easy they are to play right now. so yes it is meant to target explosion teams/hard stalls in particular. that's a bad thing how?

complexity is 100% how you word it. how stupid is double team/minimize ban aka evasion clause? and the choice band quick claw shit? i've never had that be an issue for like 3 years of play between 2002-2005 before smogon. luck item clause or whatever.

and can someone tell me if double team is still banned? one of the main reasons i'll never build a team without a STABed surf is because of last poke shuckle. jesus that thing is good, and we took that away from current players. monsters.

edit: also growtheons were never banned -- i only said that to build hype for my nigga vaporeon. but now vaporeon's pretty good in its own right, so truth's out.
 
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Royal Flush

in brazil rain
is a Past WCoP Champion
I'm actually ok with rebanning HP legends, as long as the game feels better (and it actually gets a lot better). I know for Smogon's standards this might not be a legit reason to ban, but then again Lax would probably be banned by a community suspect test with its same standards. If anything, we could start doing a gentlemen's aggreement at tournaments to not use HP legends (I'm pretty sure no active GSC players would be dicks to break the aggreement to get easy wins) if we want to play something cooler.

Also Borat's post is amazing thanks gscgods for this
 

Disaster Area

formerly Piexplode
if it makes the game more enjoyable (and still a good test of skill that's fairly in line with what current GSC offers or better) I see no reason not to do it (so long as it isn't a significant extra barrier of entry to newer players) n_n

I mean this game's all about having fun yo
 

Mr.378

The Iron Man of Ubers
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Honestly I can't help but agree with borat's logic here. All of his points seem sound and his points are all backed up sufficiently well. Doing this, on paper at least, adds something to the GSC metagame that feels mostly for the better. While it doesn't totally change it it still seems like a welcome one that makes two of the current best three more balanced while letting overlooked Pokemon have a new opportunity.

btw the luck based item that you speak of borat is the Focus Band, not the Choice Band.
 
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Jorgen

World's Strongest Fairy
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What does it really add to the metagame though? It makes Grounds better. Okay, so what? Outside of the super-specific "Marowak and Rhydon are cool" principle, why should I think such a game would be "better"?

I bring this up because we're tossing out the fairly common assumption that something being centralizing beyond some threshold X is inherently bad in Pokemon. So if banning HP Yellows to spread the wealth of viability can't be the inherent good, what principle are we using to conclude that the particular way HP Yellows centralize things isn't copacetic?
 

Oglemi

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The real question to be asked is: does banning HP Electrics somehow create a metagame that rewards the better player more than the current metagame? If it doesn't, then why ban it? They're not broken, and no one seems to be arguing that point.

The argument being posed here, if I'm understanding correctly, is that the spread of used Pokemon becomes a bit wider without them, and therefore creating a more fun metagame. If an overwhelming majority feel that the metagame is more enjoyable without them, (as a TD) I'd be open to considering re-instating a ban on the HP Electrics. But if there really isn't a majority, then I wouldn't want to allow it.

Also I have a slight feeling a few people that are in favor of the HP Electric ban are more tantalized by the prospect of the shaking up the metagame more than actually creating a more enjoyable metagame for the future.
 
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if the metagame without hp legendaries is supposed to be way better than the current one, maybe go ahead and ask for matches under that ruleset.
 
What does it really add to the metagame though? It makes Grounds better. Okay, so what? Outside of the super-specific "Marowak and Rhydon are cool" principle, why should I think such a game would be "better"?

...

The real question to be asked is: does banning HP Electrics somehow create a metagame that rewards the better player more than the current metagame?
Jorgen Oglemi
that's the beauty of this change actually. i think explosion teams are going to be the ones to suffer the most from this change, since they're the team that totally anchors on zapdos. explosion teams are honestly way too fucking good for how stupidly easy they are to play. i've always directed people who are newer at the gen: if you need one win against a better player, explosion is the way to go. banning the yellows would definitely make explosion teams require more finesse; much of the buffs are to mixed sweepers, so offense as a whole imo won't get a huge hit if any. skilled offense is buffed, braindead offense is nerfed, that's a win in my book for the metagame.

also, hard stalls might be a tad weaker as a result of stuff like nidoking/marowak/rhydon becoming better. again, this is a good thing imo. basically, hp legends are too easy to use, and cover your ass in so many ways, all the while being a huge offensive threat; the only thing that compares is curselax, but that's another story.

so if you think weakening explosion teams, buffing mixed sweepers, and weakening hard stalls is a bad thing, then this would be an unhealthy ban. skillwise, mixed sweepers definitely require more skill and finesse than explosion, no questions there i hope.

team building is also more difficult, because again, zapdos literally fills every hole without creating new ones, the latter point being a big issue with "team building skill".
 

Mr.E

unban me from Discord
is a Two-Time Past SPL Champion
I'm not even going to entertain the argument when the undisputed #1 mon goes untouched, and for what? To create an arbitrary metagame shift that may or may not be subjectively more enjoyable? "Requires more skill?" Let's not act as if there's no skill in playing with them because "they fill every hole" (especially Zapdos), the same is true for opponents using them. You could say it tests slightly different skills; it doesn't test more skill.

I'm pretty much just chiming in to say, "No, fuck you." because I don't want Oglemi changing the rules on me. Is the game broken as-is? No? Then don't fucking touch it. Period. End of story. Insert Sirlin link here. It isn't inherently positive or negative to keep them around. That's how the game is, though, and therefore how it should stay.
 

M Dragon

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World Defender
About complex bans and why I am not a fan of banning Pokemon + Moves combinations:
I still don't see any reason to ban HP legends.
The metagame will be different? Is that a reason for a complex ban like HP + Legendary pokemon ban (which makes 0 sense, and it was probably the most stupid ban ever done in competitive pokemon because the reason was "they were too hard to get ingame")?
Hyperbole example: What about non Amnesia and non Recover Mewtwo in RBY, or non Curse + Recover Lugia in GSC?
There is a reason why we like avoiding complex bans generally (it could be like opening a Pandora box), and yes HP + legend mon is a complex ban (why not banning Zapdos if you really think it is "that broken" with Hidden Power (note: it is not at all, and I am not even mentionating "Snorlax")?
I do not think that banning a move (or an item) is a complex ban btw, it is not much different than banning a Pokemon.


About HP legends vs non HP legends meta and why I think that it is NOT a good reason for a ban:
Tbh I have played both metagames and I find that HP legends meta is better than old non HP legends meta, I don't think that grounds like Rhydon, Nidoking or Marowak being a bit worse vs electrics is not a bad thing a lot. Also remember that you still need to cover Growth jolteon (yes, you can 100% wall Zapdos with a Rhydon if it cannot use HP, but you cannot rely on Rhydon alone as your electric check, or things like Growth Jolteon will probably destroy you.

i think explosion teams are going to be the ones to suffer the most from this change, since they're the team that totally anchors on zapdos. explosion teams are honestly way too fucking good for how stupidly easy they are to play. i've always directed people who are newer at the gen: if you need one win against a better player, explosion is the way to go. banning the yellows would definitely make explosion teams require more finesse; much of the buffs are to mixed sweepers, so offense as a whole imo won't get a huge hit if any. skilled offense is buffed, braindead offense is nerfed, that's a win in my book for the metagame.
Zapdos is not that important for boom teams, it is just another abuser that can also take sleep (read: nidoking, egg...). In fact now Zapdos could easily run a screen (maybe restalk + screen + thunder), which could be a great help to things like Machamp, Vaporeon, Marowak, Charizard... all of them common abusers in boom teams. With Light Screen Nidoking has nearly 0% of beating Zapdos while making Vaporeon, Machamp, etc even a greater threat (now vaporeon could easily beat electrics and Starmie's Psychic will not beat Machamp), or with Reflect so the ground mons will do very little damage and they could also be good set up fodders for other threats. To sum it up, Zapdos would lose the ability to beat mons like Rhydon, Steelix, Nidoking, Marowak etc in 1vs1, but it still can get a huge advantage with a screen, something common abusers will like.
I do not thing boom teams will be worse at all, they will probably have a different approach.

also, hard stalls might be a tad weaker as a result of stuff like nidoking/marowak/rhydon becoming better. again, this is a good thing imo. basically, hp legends are too easy to use, and cover your ass in so many ways, all the while being a huge offensive threat; the only thing that compares is curselax, but that's another story.
I disagree with this part completely, since most stalls have Raikou as the electric mon (if they have any), and it is definitely not a good answer vs ground mons, stall teams need at least another mon to deal with those threats. I do not see the HP legends ban affecting how good grounds vs stall teams at all. Also do not forget that Crunch is a p decent move that can get important sp def drops and it is used a lot even if HP raikou is legal atm.

buffing mixed sweepers
how??? the only mixed sweeper that could be better with the ban is Nidoking, but it still beats Raikou most of the times and Zapdos could still take the sleep and maybe set up a Light Screen making it useless and allowing another mon like Marowak/Vaporeon to easily set up and be a huge threat.
Dnite is still walled by both electrics
TTar is also walled by Zapdos if it has no RSlide and by Raikou if it has no EQ, nothing changes here.
If you mean vs non electric teams... maybe there would be more non electric teams, but there are still a lot of things to check them, such as Miltank, Suicune/Vaporeon (not in Dnite case), Umbreon, Gengar in Dnite case, probably curse restalk lax, Heracross...
I don't think Mixed sweepers would be much better.



So basically, Zapdos loses the ability to hit grounds (other than with drill peck), but it can still be an awesome support mon with screens, and it can still be a great wall, take sleeps and hit very hard. Raikou will just use Crunch as the secondary attack, which is weaker than HP vs grounds, but it can get special drops to beat some walls in 1vs1.
Grounds get more usage (except Quag, which will not be used much), while Raikou usage gets lower because now nearly every ground will beat Zapdos AND mons like Rhydon will also be able to check non EQ Curselax (which could free a slot in stall teams).
Jolteon will also be much better, because a lot of teams will rely in Grounds to beat Kou + Zap, something both Agility and Growth Jolteon will like since HP Water will destroy them. That means that Kou in stall teams maybe be needed to stop Jolteon from sending free Growths/Agilities all the time (especially if they chose to use Rhydon as the Electric + FBLax check). So basically, a ground will not be enough to beat electrics, because Jolteon could be a huge threat if you do that.

Will this be a better metagame? Well, that is subjective, some people will think it is better, others will think that it is worse, and others like me will think that it will just be different (and not that much in team building because the threat of Jolteon will mean that a Ground will not be enough, it will mainly affect to Zapdos and Raikou roles, especially the former).
Is it enough for a ban? In my opinion NO.
 

Jorgen

World's Strongest Fairy
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Still a lot of focus on the "what" and not the "why is it good". The best I can figure is it goes down to the "maximize the chance the better player has of winning" principle, although that often gets applied to luck-based aspects of the game. When it isn't (as it does here), I think user Kristoph made a thoughtful distinction somewhere that such changes often are made simply to increase the influence of breadth of skill in matches while ignoring the also-desirable influence of depth of skill. The proposed HP Yellows ban sort of falls into this category.

In the end there probably isn't a deeper principle here, nor one that's even feasible or worth really thinking about for the sake of fucking pokemon. Maybe the "Marowak and Rhydon are cool" principle is all we should really care about. But then you're in a position where this becomes less an argument to ban and more a plea, as there's no solid link to what a good metagame should be for you to go and say "no, objectively, you should agree with me". It's just "this shit objectively changes, do you like it or not?" And the problem is that there does seem to be a central principle after all: old-genners all HATE changes to rulesets of any sort, so naturally they don't like it. One bit.

I kind of have to agree with that sentiment. If there's ambiguity as to whether a change is needed (as there definitely seems to be), then inertia should rule, lest we arbitrarily impose mixing times where players adapt to the new rulesets, thereby attacking the sacred "depth of skill" element that is the main draw of older gens (if only slightly, but if the change is slight, the "who cares" card can be played both ways). This probably should have applied to unbanning them too, but now that they're unbanned, inertia works the other way.

For what it's worth I think the principle of balancing offense vs. defense can also be a decent principle, but the thing about HP Zapdos is it anchors teams well enough where they then have enough flexibility to have active answers to Snorlax. Without this anchoring effect, I can see teams drifting a little stallier lest they simply not be capable of dealing with all of Lax AND heavy Grounds AND mixed attackers, and I think the current balance is kind of nice.
 

Disaster Area

formerly Piexplode
I think your post goes a long way to explain why precedent with rulesets exists and is perceived by many to be important. I mean if borat lied about some stuff that eventually managed to get a rule change that we're still stuck with several years later now then it's kind of not totally relevant that it happened like that, point is this is the way things are at the moment and there's the inertia there to stop the justification of a reversion of that change, irrespectively of whether it made the game better or worse, but simply because it's more familiar. *-*
 
your criteria for “complex” is a bit arbitrary, which makes it impossible to argue. hp legends is not complex at all to me, it is to you, let that be that. i think we should just focus on metagame effects and let that dictate. we have the technology to make such complicated bans now.

Zapdos is not that important for boom teams, it is just another abuser that can also take sleep (read: nidoking, egg...). In fact now Zapdos could easily run a screen (maybe restalk + screen + thunder), which could be a great help to things like Machamp, Vaporeon, Marowak, Charizard... all of them common abusers in boom teams.
that sounds like a good thing to me. i would love to see diverse zapdos sets. i would love to see explosion teams have a different approach. i would love to see them forced to use more strategical offense such as screen passing. i would love for them to use more difficult/finesse pokemon like machamp and wak instead of plug and chug cloy/lix/egg/gengar how is any of this bad?

I disagree with this part completely, since most stalls have Raikou as the electric mon (if they have any), and it is definitely not a good answer vs ground mons, stall teams need at least another mon to deal with those threats.
g80 had raikou in a no hp legend meta and switched to zapdos in an hp legend meta. he had pretty much the archetype of stalls. using crunch to take down wak and king is really the beauty of gsc isn’t it? stuff doesn’t just die. every take down is more strategical.

Zapdos could still take the sleep and maybe set up a Light Screen making it useless and allowing another mon like Marowak/Vaporeon to easily set up and be a huge threat.

Dnite is still walled by both electrics
again, screening zapdos is awesome and i would love for it to be used. raikou can run reflect, that shit is great. this sounds like more support.
dnite is buffed compared to before, i don’t see how there’s any argument there? andwhile not “truly” mixed per say, i consider rhydon, marowak, and machamp “mixed sweepers”, and all three of those benefit.

in no metagame ever has jolteon cracked the top 10. you're greatly exaggerating how "dominant" a jolteon could be. but the goal was never to strictly buff grounds, that makes little sense. jolteons being better proportionally is also bonus points for this argument i think, it's another "more skilled offense" pokemon.

the gsc we know is sorta gone with the rise of explosion teams. games are like 50-60 turns on average, shit just dies. the whole chipping away at stuff, doing relevant 30% damage, the chess match of gsc is dead. it's just a game of "can i get you to explode cloy on my steelix", "can i avoid egg exploding on zapdos/snorlax". there's no screen passing, stuff like drumlax/drumzard/tenta are all considered gimmicky now. seriously, the proportion of curselax to every other lax, and drumlax was definitely the most skilled lax variant to use. it's dead. curselax + zapdos duo to cover holes, then run explosions and/or nidoking. that's 90% of your "offensive" teams.

So basically, Zapdos loses the ability to hit grounds (other than with drill peck), but it can still be an awesome support mon with screens, and it can still be a great wall, take sleeps and hit very hard. Raikou will just use Crunch as the secondary attack, which is weaker than HP vs grounds, but it can get special drops to beat some walls in 1vs1.
Grounds get more usage (except Quag, which will not be used much), while Raikou usage gets lower because now nearly every ground will beat Zapdos AND mons like Rhydon will also be able to check non EQ Curselax (which could free a slot in stall teams).
Jolteon will also be much better, because a lot of teams will rely in Grounds to beat Kou + Zap, something both Agility and Growth Jolteon will like since HP Water will destroy them. That means that Kou in stall teams maybe be needed to stop Jolteon from sending free Growths/Agilities all the time (especially if they chose to use Rhydon as the Electric + FBLax check). So basically, a ground will not be enough to beat electrics, because Jolteon could be a huge threat if you do that.
and i wholly want 100% of these changes. thanks

Jorgen
If there's ambiguity as to whether a change is needed (as there definitely seems to be), then inertia should rule, lest we arbitrarily impose mixing times where players adapt to the new rulesets
i think that's the biggest hurdle. everybody is comfortable where we are now. hp electrics aren't "broken" enough to warrant a conventional ban so to speak, at least not without banning snorlax. given modern gen criteria, i'd be in favor of banning all 3. but that totally changes the landscape of gsc, and no longer makes gsc what it is. gsc is a "classical" game, to allow newer and older players alike to essentially get into a time capsule to play a historical game. that's why the lax/electrics ban will never happen, despite it probably being the healthiest way to modify the meta. i think as long as we leave the "spirit of gsc" untouched, i don't see why we can't go about balancing it. arbitrary? maybe. but we have some of the greatest minds in pokemon in this gen. hopefully that's not for naught?

edit:

so i'm not 100% caught up with current trends, but heres what i could find:

Code:
Rnk | Pokemon | Use | Use % | Win %
1 | Snorlax | 59 | 98% | 49%
2 | Cloyster | 32 | 53% | 47%
3 | Zapdos | 30 | 50% | 50%
4 | Exeggutor | 25 | 42% | 48%
4 | Raikou | 25 | 42% | 56%
6 | Skarmory | 17 | 28% | 47%
7 | Forretress | 15 | 25% | 53%
7 | Steelix | 15 | 25% | 40%
9 | Tyranitar | 14 | 23% | 64%
10 | Gengar | 13 | 22% | 62%
so basically... every single ou explosion mon cracks the top 10, plus lax/electrics and skarm/ttar. so yes, i do believe targetting explosion teams in general seems like a good approach. and as a more old school gsc player, i utterly despite this meta, so forgive me if i'm not all too unbiased by singling out explosion teams.

for comparison's sake, cloyster has seen more use (32) than the offensive mons nidoking, marowak, dragonite, rhydon, jolteon, tentacruel, and charizard combined (31). like what in the fuck is wrong with gsc nowadays.
 
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M Dragon

The north wind
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your criteria for “complex” is a bit arbitrary, which makes it impossible to argue. hp legends is not complex at all to me, it is to you, let that be that. i think we should just focus on metagame effects.
I consider it a complex ban because it includes a pokemon and a mon (Raikou/Zapdos + Hidden Power basically)
Ok, I will just focus in metagame effects.

that sounds like a good thing to me. i would love to see diverse zapdos sets. i would love to see explosion teams have a different approach. i would love to see them forced to use more strategical offense such as screen passing. i would love for them to use more difficult/finesse pokemon like machamp and wak instead of plug and chug cloy/lix/egg/gengar how is any of this bad?
I never said it was a bad thing.
My point was that metagame would be different (screens zapdos being more popular in explosion teams for example), and that boom teams would still remain p similar (I havent seen the standard cloy/lix/egg/ggar/zap/lax in ages, everybody is using a machamp or a vaporeon or w/e abuser/variation there).
Screen Zapdos is perfectly viable in this metagame! In fact it might be even better than in a metagame with no HP legends, because it is more unpredictable (who does not expect HP zapdos xD)

g80 had raikou in a no hp legend meta and switched to zapdos in an hp legend meta. he had pretty much the archetype of stalls. using crunch to take down wak and king is really the beauty of gsc isn’t it? stuff doesn’t just die. every take down is more strategical.
But raikou role is not usually that in stall teams, raikou role is usually setting up reflect for something like Lax, phazing (best phazer in the game with spikes) and walling stuff (mainly mixed sweepers), it will rarely try to sweep (in fact there are a lot of Kous with no HP in stall teams)

again, screening zapdos is awesome and i would love for it to be used. raikou can run reflect, that shit is great. this sounds like more support.
dnite is buffed compared to before, i don’t see how there’s any argument there? andwhile not “truly” mixed per say, i consider rhydon, marowak, and machamp “mixed sweepers”, and all three of those benefit.
Rhydon and Marowak are better now because they are a better switching in vs electrics without worrying about the HP that could 2hko them, you basically added some more counters to the #2 and #3 mons in GSC, that is another thing that would be different.
Machamp is not better, especially if Reflect Machamp gets more popular.

in no metagame ever has jolteon cracked the top 10. you're greatly exaggerating how "dominant" a jolteon could be.
Ok so if we ban HP legends, one of the first things you can think is: ok, now a ground will be enough to check electrics. NO. Growth Jolteon is still a powerful electric that can still use the HPs. Yes, Jolteon is much less bulkier than Raikou and Zapdos hits harder, but Jolteon can Growth and it can BP the boost as well, so a team that relies in a ground mon to check electrics (especially if the ground is the roarer) will have troubles with Jolteon.
My point was not about how dominant Jolteon could be. My point was that Jolteon is the reason why you cannot change much how you prepare vs HP electrics in a normal team. Ok, Zapdos and Raikou which are the top 2 electrics would be now walled bu grounds, but you cannot forget that the #3 electric (Jolteon) is still there, it can use HPs, and it has its own weapons to be very dangerous.



So basically:
Zapdos is now nerfed and is no longer the big offensive threat it is atm, but is still a great supporter with the screens (a role it can already do in both stall and offensive teams and that is really good). Reflect is probably better in defensive teams, and Light Screen in offensive teams with mons like Machamp or Vaporeon or Marowak.
Raikou is also nerfed because there are more safe switchings now, which affects the restalk set offensively. It is still the best phazer with spikes and a great mixed wall.
Grounds are more common because they counter the top 2 electrics now. However Jolteon still exists, so relying in a ground to beat electrics might not be a good idea.

The metagame will obv be different, but I don't really think it will be better, other than encouraging players to use different strategies such as screens Zapdos and increasing the usage of ground pokemons.
I honestly thing that non HP legends metagame is not that much better to consider a ban.
It could be funny? Yes, maybe, it is something different, but I would rather consider making a tournament or something with no HP legends as a fun thing than banning something that clearly is not broken and that I do not really thing that makes the metagame that much better.
 
Machamp is not better, especially if Reflect Machamp gets more popular.
machamp definitely get weaker against the new zapdos, BUT the overall use of zapdos goes down. all your arguments are anchored around zap/kou being on 100% of teams, whereas i believe they no longer become mandatory. good? sure. probably still some of the best sleep talkers in the game, but it would no longer be an impossibility.

Ok so if we ban HP legends, one of the first things you can think is: ok, now a ground will be enough to check electrics. NO. Growth Jolteon is still a powerful electric that can still use the HPs.
whatever's keeping jolteon in check now (aka snorlax, roar kou, steelix) will still keep jolteon in check. no difference there.

again, i fully support most of your conclusions, i do believe that makes for a better game. zapdos/raikou gets a knock, but not into oblivion. they're probably still top 5 mons. the big change being, however, electrics are no longer mandatory. this is HUGE from a diversity standpoint. running zapdos/raikou might put your team at a complete standstill against threats like nidoking/rhydon/marowak which if your team has trouble with, means you might have to actually consider your options. right now, you can throw zapdos onto ANY team and have no repercussions. zapdos isn't weak to anything, it doesn't give anything a free switch, and it's good against so many pokemon. even SNORLAX has issues sometimes, but no, not zapdos.

from a metagame perspective, everything you mentioned: screen passing being more popular to aid sweepers, growth jolteons, all that sounds great. that's finesse offense. it's all very welcomed from a skilled perspective.

EDIT:

to flip the script, apart from "less bans = better", can anyone tell me what positive impacts hp legends have on the meta?
 
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M Dragon

The north wind
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Thing is, those strats are already very viable strategies, and electrics are not mandatory at all. In fact, people that know how I team build /
I have played 6 GSC games in this SPL, and I have not used electrics in 3 of them if I remember correctly, and I have not used HP in a legendary not even a single time in my games.
About the SPL stats, I do not think it is a problem about the HP legendaries, but about how people is using the same kind of teams every game

from a metagame perspective, everything you mentioned: screen passing being more popular to aid sweepers, growth jolteons, all that sounds great. that's finesse offense. it's all very welcomed from a skilled perspective.
Those strats are already very good in current metagame. LS + Charizard for example can easily destroy a ton of the teams people is using nowadays.
I think that the problem is that there are a lot of people stuck in the classic boom cores because its "solid" and it "works", but there are a ton of other strategies in both offensive and defensive teams that can work very well in the current metagame, such as screens passing (electrics are nearly everywhere? take advantage of that with something like LS + vaporeon!) or growth jolteon (zapdos is suddenly a great set up fodder).
HP legends do not make those strats unviable, and that is why I do not agree with that point.

Yes, I understand your points and why you opened this thread, but I think the problem is more about player mentality than about the HP legendaries.
 

Royal Flush

in brazil rain
is a Past WCoP Champion
I kinda agree with M Dragon about player mentality, GSC is not that limited. It's actually funny people praising boom offense as the real way to play GSC or how it makes the game fast paced/less boring/whatever when it's essentially a dumb gamble to explosion paying off or not.

The thing is, people don't wanna think outside of the box, but what if we force them to? Boom offense is easy to use so people will obviously give it a try and actually grab some wins, Zapdos is on the same boat. Maybe we're not adding diversity, but forcing diversity. So why the hell not.
 
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Jorgen

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To target a tangential point: is high Cloyster usage really that surprising? Spikes are awesome, and no amount of banning the top 3 will make them any less awesome.

To target a more central point: asking "what positive effects does X have on the metagame" is the last refuge of the scoundrel in these sorts of discussions; it's tantamount to admitting there isn't enough reason to implicate thing X as harmful enough to warrant a ban. That said, I'm growing fond of using Machamp teams to punish the almighty Snorlax as of late (novel concept I know), and Zapdos' defensive prowess gives me the flexibility needed to feel comfortable with the fact that Machamp functions defensively as a second look to Ttar and Snorlax and that's it. So in that sense, HP Legends allow a lot more pressure to be put on Lax, giving it a lot less leeway to dominate GSC. Which is something I take to be a good thing.

How good is Explosion offense really? I feel like you might be lamenting it mostly because PO ladder dudes use it disproportionately (which is your own fault, really). I find it's pretty scary to try to bring "the" Explosion team in a tournament setting; something about needing to rely on confident clicks of Explosion in the best case, and needing to play around a cruddy matchup against a MixTar in the worst case, isn't terribly appealing.
 

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