State of the Game (04/11/2011) (Now with MAJOR announcements)

[Deck Knight]

Yeah, it's been too long. That's why this is here.

First order of business is the new ASB structure. I will list the nominees for each position and declare the winner.

Nominees for Secretary:

-Charmander-
Acklow
Venser
Seven Deadly Sins
DarkSlay
Dogfish44

Winners:

Seven Deadly Sins
DarkSlay

I feel these two had the best writing samples and would be able to pose the best questions in an SotG because of their experience and their immersion in all the mechanics.

Nominees for Head Team Approver:
smashlloyd20
Kaxtar

Winner:

Kaxtar

Kaxtar is very thorough and explains any minor details in the course of his approvals. It's a lot of data to mull through in the beginning, and someone who knows every facet of the initial profiles is ideal.

Nominees for Head Referee:
Flora
Zarator
Destiny Warrior

Winner:

Flora

Flora has a very thorough reffing style and has excellent writing skills in general. She's also easy to work with from my experiences, so she should be perfectly able to get ref skills up to snuff.

Nominees for Standing Committee Members:

Acklow
smashlloyd20
Fire Blast
zarator
Destiny Warrior
Athenodoros
Rolf
Rediamond
HD
goldenknight
Alchemator
danmantican
tortferngatr
Engineer Pikachu
Its_A_Random

Winners:
zarator
Fire Blast
Engineer Pikachu
danmantican
Alchemator
Its_A_Random
Limewire

Remember this is a rotating committee, so if you weren't selected this time, you'll have a good chance next time. 15 people signed up with the info needed for a committee of seven, which means whoever didn't make it this time will likely get in next time. Everyone who applied had a good record of contributions, battles, and refs. In particular I was looking for people who wanted to expand or help in other areas, and showed great diligence in their work.

Thus, the first CAP ASB Game Policy Committee is as follows:

Seven Deadly Sins
DarkSlay
Kaxtar
Flora
zarator
Fire Blast
Engineer Pikachu
danmantican
Alchemator
Its_A_Random
Limewire

If you aren't listed, please do feel free to post. These are just the members who will be actively voting on any proposals, a system which we have to set up in the thread.

Since I've been so detached, I really only have a few questions:

1. So how did that sleep and confusion nerf work out?
In truth it was probably overdone, and I'd prefer a 2/3/4 structure for severity, but I'll leave it to the committee to talk about and vote on based on their experiences. It's been nerfed for a month, plenty of data time.

This is a committee question: How often should we do SotGs? This one took a little over a month between them because I kinda fell off the earth up, but they were being done weekly. What do you think is the best method for determining regularity? Remember, unless otherwise changed, new committee members are rotated out each SotG. Another alternative is we could handle Committee member nominations on a monthly basis separate from the SotGs. I look forward to any proposals you have.

If any policy members (esp. Secretaries) have other questions they want to address, please offer a motion to adopt a question. Once it is seconded (it needs only one second) it will be incorporated into the SotG questions to vote on (barring a veto by myself).

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

I'd say that smaller SotGs should happen every week, but every 2 weeks makes sense as well, and I'd be okay with both. Also, Standing Committee Members should rotate monthly.

On to the actual question:

1. So how did that sleep and confusion nerf work out?
I feel that the sleep nerf is perfect now. It's still effective, and still at the very least as cost-effective as Protect, but it has a significant (>50%) chance to prevent more than one action, which is pretty major.

In addition, I'd like to make the following motions:

1: Should the cutoff for ***** be decreased to 125?

I know this is something that have been bandied about, but I think it's something that would really help. 125 is viewed as "very high" attack, definitely more than 130, and having things like Gyarados, Heracross, and Bisharp have only **** attack seems "off" in a lot of ways. Same for stuff like Reuniclus and Hydreigon's Special Attack. This would result in a "buff" to a number of Pokemon, but definitely not an unwarranted buff, and also a buff that makes these Pokemon "feel" as effective as it seems they should be.

2: Should Move Counter costs be more normalized?

As it stands, there are a number of moves that just seem like they're too expensive to be cost-effective. I'd like to see the following scale be implemented:

• 1 MC for Level-Up
• 2 MC for TM (any gen) or Move Tutor
• 3 MC for an Event Move

3: Should moves from generations 1 and 2 be removed from some Pokemon's movelists?

There are a number of Pokemon that are affected by this, but many of the moves that were TMs in generations 1 and 2 (or event moves) were completely removed from the movesets of the Pokemon that learned them in generation 1. Some specific moves that are affected by this are Bide, Teleport, and Curse, which were EXTREMELY widespread TMs in the first and second generations, but completely removed from many movesets in Generation 3. Another reason for this is that in the games, Pokemon from generations 1 and 2 cannot be transferred to Generation 3, making Generation 2 a "logical cut-off point" to wipe the slate clean.

Anyone affected by this change would have their Move Counters returned to them, of course.

4: Should in-game illegal egg move combinations be included?

Since "in-game" is the only precedent we use for deciding what Pokemon can learn what moves, it makes sense for us to also implement egg move illegality. Stuff like Ferroseed only being able to learn 2 out of the 3 of Leech Seed, Spikes, and Stealth Rock, or Belly Drum + Aqua Jet being illegal on the Azumarill line.

 

[Athenodoros]

Not on anything, but adding my 2c.

Sleep and Confusion nerf:
Great idea. It is much more balanced now, and before it was just silly.

***** cutoff:
I agree. 125 is still a godly stat, and it does seem weird that stuff like Gyara and Hydreigon doesn't make the cut.

Move Counters:
I agree that they are too high. I would suggest 3 MC instead of SDS' two for old TMs. It doesn't seem right that older TMs, especially from RBY/GSC should be the same. On that note, though:

Removing old moves:
I disagree with this. Things like Egg move combinations have been ignored for ASB, as well as ability restrictions. I think it should stay that anything so far is fair game, given that those Pokemon can learn those moves at certain points.

EDIT: dammit SDS Editting against what I say:
I disagree with this too. It just seems wrong to me, but I must admit this is a feeling. It also would mean that we would probably have to go with DW ability restrictions (Mamo etc.) and from there to released DW, and if we completely follow in-game then we will end up with one ability, four moves, and basically just a forum version of Pokemon Online. I oppose this whole move, which I think goes against the spirit of ASB.

Okay, another one:
I suggest a limit to conditional attacks that ref can pull out in the case of one player just being a bad guy. I remember a match where someone just listed all of my offensive attacks, and allocated Mirror Coat or Counter to each. Needless to say, I didn't do well. Thus I propose that, as one option, the energy cost of conditional attacks is raised, or else that you can only give conditions for a set number of moves, although I prefer the first option. Thoughts?

I think I had other things to raise, and I might edit those in later, but this'll do for now.

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

I'm not saying completely follow in-game, but I'd appreciate not getting slippery slope'd here.

In-game is the only precedent we use for move selection. Level is used for starting moves, and moves are separated based on their source in-game. We use "ability to learn the move in-game" as our criteria for whether or not a Pokemon can learn a move. And as it stands, since we're basing this ASB league on Generation 5, it would make sense to limit Pokemon only to moves they can learn in the generation 5 games. I honestly don't care about Egg Moves, but it's the Generation 1 and 2 moves like Curse and Teleport that got given out like candy and then never showed up afterwards.

EDIT: I also have another thing:

Counter, Mirror Coat, and Metal Burst need to be addressed.

As it stands, CounterCoat (or just counter or coat) and Metal Burst are moves that will basically guarantee that you kill your opponent faster than they kill you. These moves basically rest in a very precarious position: too little damage and they aren't worth using, too much damage and they become overpowered. Either way, these moves NEED to be addressed, because a Bastiodon just using Metal Burst basically every round is pretty brutal, since you can't kill it outright and you can't Taunt it or anything.

 

[Deck Knight]

Per SDS's proposal, as far as scale balancing, here's a few interesting mons for cutoffs:

Current scale minimums:

0: *
26: **
56: ***
96: ****
126: *****
156: *****(+1)
186: ***** (+2)
216: ***** (+3)
246: ***** (+4)


Base 60: This is a huge group that includes a ton of things from Gengar to Mismagius (HP) to Machamp and Haxorus (SpA)

Compare Alakazam and Raticate at 55 Base HP.

Theres also a shitton of mons at Base 65 Def/SpD like Excadrill and Emboar. This hurts them quite a bit and I don't think it should. I like 96 though, otherwise Kingdra (all 95s but Speed and HP IIRC) is simply insane.

For higher scale numbers, you have Emboar and Braviary at 123, Haxorus at 147, various legends at 150-154 Chandelure at 145, and various high def mons like Aggron, Cloyster, and Deoxyi at 180. Shuckle sits at 230 and he's defensive enough already with Sturdy.

So from the proposals I think we could try the following:

0: *
26: **
66: ***
96: ****
121: *****
141: *****(+1) [aids Chandelure, Probopass, and Cofragrigus where 146 doesn't]
176: ***** (+2) [aids a bunch of 180 def mons]
206: ***** (+3) (nothing to see here)
236: ***** (+4) (or here)

Alternative High-End scale:

141: ***** (+1)
161: ***** (+2) (aids Wailord, Bastiodon and Rampardos)
191: ***** (+3) (Aids 200 Base mons like Steelix and Regirock)
231: ***** (+4) (no seriously Shucks GDIAF)... Or we could just cut this one out entirely since it applies to all of Blissey and Shuckle.

 

[Fire Blast]

Regarding your first question, I believe the sleep/confusion nerf was a bit to harsh. I think a 2/3/4 would work much better and actually actually make sleep/confusion.

SotGs should be done every 2-3 weeks. Most battles get about 3/4 rounds a week and there is absolutely no point in changing the rules every week without even giving a chace to use them. Members should be rotated every 2 SotGs because th first is where a mechanic is changed and the second one is where it is reviewed/edited (usually). The members will be involved with the mechanic and so it makes sense that they are with it till the end.

Btw, I was also wonderig what your opinion is on what I posted in the policy review thread:

This isn't an existing position, but I'm going to reccomend it. I want to be someone who helps with the role-playing part of ASB. There are a ton of cool ideas in the thread and I would like to make those ideas a reality. I also like the idea of monthly tournaments so if I could maybe run those. If have some ideas for tourneys and how we can make them work. So if this is a good role, perhaps I could be in charge of it.

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

I'd like to note that Deck's modified stat star spread was my idea first :<

Anyway, I'm definitely in support of the new stat star cutoff set, with High Cutoff 2 as the way to go.

 

[Deck Knight]

Okay, another one:
I suggest a limit to conditional attacks that ref can pull out in the case of one player just being a bad guy. I remember a match where someone just listed all of my offensive attacks, and allocated Mirror Coat or Counter to each. Needless to say, I didn't do well. Thus I propose that, as one option, the energy cost of conditional attacks is raised, or else that you can only give conditions for a set number of moves, although I prefer the first option. Thoughts?

If someone did this, their Pokemon should have just been a sitting duck (confused from too many commands). That's way more than one substitution command. I don't know how expansive your offensive movepool was, but in any case that sounds like at least the equivalent of seven sub attacks. "Physical attacks" and "Special Attacks" are too broad to be used for a substitution command.

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

Oh, ONE MORE THING

Should a Pokemon automatically faint if it runs out of energy?

Personally, I'm a bit miffed about this, since Energy is supposed to be effectively the equivalent of PP in-game. I'd personally say that if a Pokemon runs out of energy, it should be forced to Struggle until it faints.

 

[Athenodoros]

I was talking about this:

If he uses Dragon Pulse, Surf, or Thunder: Mirror Coat
If he uses Slam, Wrap, or Extremespeed: Counter

This was in the first game or so, so this was basically all that I could do.

As for restricting previous gen moves, all I can say is that I think that "everything it can/could get legitimately is fair game" seems like a good spirit and rule to have. I think that anything that could ever be learned was because it worked well flavour-wise and fitted with the Pokemon, and I think this should trump the fact that some moves are very good but are widespread because they were TM moves in RBY or something.

EDIT: I agree so much with the above, and meant to raise it before. It shouldn't just faint. Have you ever seen something do that in the anime? It should just have enforced chill, or probably just idle.

 

[Banryu]

....Okay.... I have a few points yet unlisted that I'd like to bring up as well.

First off, I want to just say that I completely agree with and support the following proposals by SDS:
- Move Counter normalization
- generation 1-2 move cutoff
Other topics mentioned I have no opinion on at this time, or do not wish to address for other reasons.

My following proposals are a combination of an effort to balance certain other aspects of the game, as well as to differentiate the ASB metagame from the in-game metagame; these will tend to vary in the amount of work they would take or impact they will have.

- Burn mechanics change(s) (nerf?) : As it is right now, burns work pretty much exactly the same way they do in-game. A burned Pokemon has its entire body affected, and its physical strength is lowered because of the pain of the burn. The first part of this proposal is the introduction of different stages of burns (much like those of paralysis) inflicted by the different types of burning attacks. (For instance, Will-O-Wisp and Inferno inflict a 3rd degree burn, Fire Blast / Lava Plume inflict 2nd degree, Flamethrower 1st degree, etc.) The different stages would vary between the amount of damage inflicted each turn and the amount of physical damage reduction on the inflicted Pokemon's attacks.

The second more optional part of this proposal would be to optionally allow certain body parts to be burned, rather than the entire body all the time (as can be done with freezing moves). A partial burn in this fashion would merely reduce the power of attacks performed with said part or appendage; for instance, a Pokemon with a burn on its arm would have an attack like Mega Punch reduced in power, however, its Mega Kick would still have its full force. This mechanic has a balancing aspect to it, but is also intended to be a more realistic feature.

- A Nerf of Counter/Mirror Coat/Metal Burst is what I want to discuss next. As it is right now, I think most people are in agreement that Metal Burst (especially when combined with Taunt, which a lot of Metal Burst-users also get) is pretty imbalanced in the ASB metagame right now. Counter and Mirror Coat are easier to deal with in my opinion, but Metal Burst has very few repercussions in its usage. My idea for dealing with Metal Burst is actually taken directly from SDS (who by this point may have edited his post with it, though at the time of writing has not mentioned it): rather than 1.25x damage reflected back (or whatever the current Metal Burst damage reflection is), I'd like to suggest that Metal Burst reflect 1x the damage inflicted on the user. Of the many suggestions for nerfing Metal Burst I've heard from various people, this one seems like the best solution to me. Simply raising the move's energy cost hardly prevents people from winning with it anyway. I believe the move would still be worthwhile at that value, but not too good.

As for Counter and Mirror Coat, I believe that simply placing tighter restrictions on move substitution and perhaps raising the energy cost of these moves might be sufficient, and I believe that any number of measures could easily restrict CounterCoat if they're considered to be overpowered (I personally don't very much believe that they are).

EDIT: Flora is right, the CounterCoat idea I had about only reflecting certain move types was not a good one. I failed to consider that such a suggestion has bias against specific types of attacks. :0

- Expansion of Stealth Rock / Spikes / Toxic Spikes definition : Much like Will-O-wisp, these moves currently behave exactly the way they do in the cartridge games, acting as passive damage whenever Pokemon switch into that side of the battlefield-- and that's it. To completely blunt about it, I think this is a complete waste of potential for these moves which could otherwise have very potentially-creative and interesting uses. With their current definition these moves have little place in ASB, where switching is not only a far less significant factor than in the cartridge game, it's also drastically less common (most matches disallow switching pre-KO). The purpose of this proposal is simply to expand the definition of these moves, allowing them to be used more freely and creatively as roadblock barriers, crowd-control mechanisms, or whatever the player can think of. Additionally, in the case of Stealth Rock (though this could be applied to the spike moves as well), there is an energy cost associated with each individual rock (perhaps 4 total, as in the current definition of the move) so that the player can choose whether to set out all four at once, or less than the max amount if they so choose for energy conservation reasons (like Double Team).

I've discussed this with Deck and he claims that such a use of the moves is currently allowed, however the definitions are not clear enough in this regard. My first attempted use of Stealth Rock was in a 1v1 match as a blockading move, however the ref felt he had no choice but to interpret it according to the current defintion, which as I assert is currently too restrictive or not wide enough. To put it simply, I'm just asking that it be clarified that these moves do not HAVE to be used exactly as they are in-game.

...erm... I suppose that's all I have for now. o____o I hope my points will be well-recieved/considered.

 

[Its_A_Random]

Yay, I made it...

So how did that sleep and confusion nerf work out?
I reckon the nerf is fine now. Pre-Nerf, Sleep was pretty broken, particularly if you were lucky to get a 6-turn sleep on your opponent, as you can abuse it to either deal a lot of damage or boost your stats by a lot in that time. The nerf has balanced things out, & if we didn't have the nerf, there would be a lot of complaints further down the line about how broken sleep is, etc. Confusion was also broken pre-nerf imo, but I'm not that worried about Confusion... tl;dr, the nerf improved things a lot.

SDS's Proposal
I agree on this (Mostly because one of my monsters will have 6-star Defence, but...), Base 125 is a huge number, & ummm...yeah. I don't have too much to say on this subject.

0 Energy=/=Faint
I tend to disagree on this matter, I think it should stay the way it is, sure you don't see anything like this in the anime, but when you run out of energy completely, you would collapse, wouldn't you? This also increases the importance of Chills, & all this would do is make a long battle even longer, so I disagree.

Atheno's proposal
Agreed, I would say max 1 substitutions at a time or as a penalty, the Pokemon will do nothing.

Move Counters
I agree on the new system, not much else to say.

I may edit in more later, like my suggested changes & whatnot, but that's my opinion on these subjects.

 

[Flora]

For Deck Knight's question:

The 1/2/3 system of sleep is perfectly fine the way it is. It's a gamble to sleep to gain an extra turn or two. 2/4/6 is a bit too long and just makes you want to rip your hair out if you unluckily roll 4 or 6. For confusion, however, 2/3/4 would probably be best for it. Unlike sleep, it has a chance to do absolutely nothing if that 1 turn doesn't make the foe hit itself, making the efforts of confusion worthless. With another action, it has another chance to redeem itself (but otherwise, yeah, it can still fail hard). Still, 1/2/3 for confusion is fine, just putting out some thoughts.

For SDS's stuff:

I like Deck's proposal with the alternative high-end scale. It seems like Pokemon such as Gengar/Excadrill are more bulky than they appear to be currently, and two star defenses should do them justice in exchange for their extreme offensive capabilities. (I'll miss my Excadrill's defenses but that's okay.)

I like the Move Counter changes; I don't have any opinions on them... yet.

So no gen 1 and gen 2 moves means no Lovely Kiss Nidoking/Politoed/Poliwrath/Snorlax/other random stuff. I don't really have a solid opinion on this topic, but I would appreciate having the freedom to choose these moves since they were legally available in the past. That argument can go both ways just fine though, so again, I don't mind what happens.

I wouldn't really like illegality with egg moves being included. Some Pokemon would really like this one good egg move, but can't get the other two decent egg moves as a result. If someone went for that good egg move, they are going to start with one egg move total. This might deter people from choosing the Pokemon they wanted. Although another topic, if the ability to choose another egg move via counters is kept, maybe move its cost to 2 Move Counters?

Counter/Mirror Coat/Metal Burst... the first thing that comes to mind is banning the moves altogether, but that goes against my "freedom of moves" ideal. Maybe have the move have more of a recoil of some sort. It does have negative priority which can be taken advantaged of, but otherwise maybe a few more minor restrictions such as "can't be used next action/round" would work out. Perhaps the next action would have the CounterCoaterBurster attacks do half damage due to being too "weary" from executing that move or something.

For Pokemon running out of Energy and fainting, I'm neutral on the idea of "Struggle to death". Currently, though, Struggle takes Energy to perform, so that will need some tweaking to no Energy. Otherwise, enforcing Chill until it's out is fine (but I don't see why the player wouldn't have been doing that already). I wouldn't want the Pokemon to just idle around doing nothing/live when it's not doing much as that would extend the match even farther, so that's where the "just faint from 0 Energy" would be good.

Banryu stuff:

For burn, Banryu's proposal sounds pretty cool. No real objection until other people shed some light into the subject. Same thing for entry hazards.

I don't really like the Counter/Mirror Coat only certain moves part though. That would really segregate Pokemon into being generally better than others. Ones that can use Earthquake/Stone Edge/Rock Slide/Magnitude/Rock Blast (notice how they're all Ground/Rock) would always be safe against a Counter user, while something like Staraptor is basically screwed altogether. I don't know, I just don't like the enforcement to use those types of moves, especially if the opponent resists it (and he'll probably have an substitution move that will outdamage your move). I'd like a different solution if we can come up with one.

Metal Burst to x1... doesn't seem like a bad idea. It ensures that the Metal Burst user will never win in a full HP fight (and thus makes spamming the move not a great idea). It'll turn out to be a move only used when the enemy is weak enough for the move to KO or when all the other moves do less damage than Metal Burst at that time. It would devalue the move in most cases (making it not overpowered), but it'll have its use in a few other cases (not underpowered... though there's a tilt leaning on that underpowered scale).

Oh, Atheno's substitution thing:

Yeah, maybe the player can have three subs, but only one can be used when the round goes. I'd like a limit, but it shouldn't be that crippling for the player issuing the subs. Anyway, I'll wait on more people to weigh on this. I don't really have good ideas...

 

[Deck Knight]

In regards to Metal Burst, it is fair to point out that with the new HP Scale (and alternative high-end since that seems more popular), Metal Burst users have the following stats:

Aron:

HP: 90
Atk: ***
Def: ****
SpA: **
SpD: **
Spe: 30

Lairon:

HP: 90 [-10]
Atk: ***
Def: *****
SpA: **
SpD: **
Spe: 40

Aggron:

HP: 100
Atk: ****
Def: *****(+2) [+1]
SpA: ** [-1]
SpD: ** [-1]

Sableye:

HP: 90
Atk: ***
Def: ***
SpA: ** [-1]
SpD: ** [-1]
Spe: 50

Mawile:

HP: 90
Atk: ***
Def: ***
SpA: **
SpD: **
Spe: 50

Shieldon:

HP: 90
Atk: **
Def: ****
SpA: **
SpD: ***
Spe: 30

Bastiodon:

HP: 90 [-10]
Atk: **
Def: *****(+2) [+1]
SpA: **
SpD: *****
Spe: 30

Dialga:

HP: 110
Atk: ****
Def: ****
SpA: *****(+1) [+1]
SpD: ****
Spe: 90

Bisharp:

HP: 90 [-10]
Atk: ***** [+1]
Def: ****
SpA: ** [-1]
SpD: ***
Spe: 70

Cobalion:

HP: 100
Atk: ***
Def: *****
SpA: ***
SpD: ***
Spe: 108

So basically a lot of Metal Burst users have their HP dropped. Even assuming you maximized Metal Burst damage and somehow deflected all attacks, 90 x 1.25 = 112.5 HP. So it could take out mons with between 96 and 120 Base HP, but not basically every mon. The obvious exception is Sableye because it has reliable Recovery (Rest is quite limited in scope). (And I guess Mawile with Stockpile and Swallow).

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

Oh, an alteration to the burn thing.

Many cases of "increase/decrease by 50%" are translated into direct numerical modifiers. For example: Defeatist reduces by 3 base power, when the actual ability reduces by 50%. Also, Overgrow/Torrent/Blaze increase damage by 2 base power, which is much less than 50%.

To bring Burn in line...

Should Burn's physical damage reduction be reduced to a flat number like 2 or 3 base power?

 

[Athenodoros]

Speaking of which, why is Rest so bad in ASB? I feel like it should have an effect more like the in-game one. Obviously not as good as restoring full HP, but at least more than the one twenty-fourth of a HP per action or whatever that it does now.

EDIT: -3 per attack would be good for burn. It would fit a lot more with what we are doing most of the time.

EDIT2: I just remembered: ROLE PLAYING. What is happening? That htread has been up since the dawn of time and nothing really seems to be going on. All I've seen is that list of unnoficial leaders on IRC. Can anyone shed any light?

 

[Banryu]

I don't really like the Counter/Mirror Coat only certain moves part though. That would really segregate Pokemon into being generally better than others. Ones that can use Earthquake/Stone Edge/Rock Slide/Magnitude/Rock Blast (notice how they're all Ground/Rock) would always be safe against a Counter user, while something like Staraptor is basically screwed altogether. I don't know, I just don't like the enforcement to use those types of moves, especially if the opponent resists it (and he'll probably have an substitution move that will outdamage your move). I'd like a different solution if we can come up with one.

You're right, and the fact that most non-contact physical moves and non-elemental special moves are all of a similar type or type vein is something that I failed to consider with that suggestion. :0 I don't like this idea anymore either. :P Please disregard it. (Knowut, I'll just edit it out of my post, actually)

As for nerfing Counter/Coat in general, I honestly don't think they're that bad as long as certain restrictions are placed on move substitution (only one sub per round, like Athenodoros suggests, would be good). They're really only overpowered in sitations where you're up against a dedicatedly physical or special Pokemon with the appropriate countering move, and even then, they can sort of be worked around. I don't think they're nearly as much of a problem as Metal Burst is.

Should Burn's physical damage reduction be reduced to a flat number like 2 or 3 base power?

I don't have an opinion regarding this myself at the moment, but this needs to be addressed before we decide what to do about my burn suggestion, I think.

Since burn is being brought up again though, let me make an attempt to expand on my suggestion: (and yes I realize this is a bit contradictory to what I just said.)

- Burn mechanics change(s) (nerf?) : As it is right now, burns work pretty much exactly the same way they do in-game. A burned Pokemon has its entire body affected, and its physical strength is lowered because of the pain of the burn. The first part of this proposal is the introduction of different stages of burns (much like those of paralysis) inflicted by the different types of burning attacks. The different stages would vary between the amount of damage inflicted each turn and the amount of physical damage reduction on the inflicted Pokemon's attacks.

The second more optional part of this proposal would be to optionally allow certain body parts to be burned, rather than the entire body all the time (as can be done with freezing moves). A partial burn in this fashion would merely reduce the power of attacks performed with said part or appendage; for instance, a Pokemon with a burn on its arm would have an attack like Mega Punch reduced in power, however, its Mega Kick would still have its full force. This mechanic has a balancing aspect to it, but is also intended to be a more realistic feature.

I went ahead and drew up a more formalized hypothetical burn 'tier list' of sorts, similar to the current list of types of paralysis found in the Data Audit thread. (Note that it's based off of percentages for damage reduction, though it could easily be changed around if we decide we want to go with SDS' proposal for burn damage reduction.)

[B]1st Degree Burn[/B] - reduces the damage done by a Pokemon's physical attacks by 25% (0.25x) for the part of the body affected by the burn. 
In addition, the Pokemon suffers two (2) HP of damage per action.
[I]Inflicted by[/I]: All 10% burn chance attacks (Flamethrower, Fire Punch, Tri Attack, etc.)

[B]2nd Degree Burn [/B]- reduces the damage done by a Pokemon's physical attacks by 50% (0.5x) for the part of the body affected by the burn. 
In addition, the Pokemon suffers two (2) HP of damage per action.
[I]Inflicted by[/I]: Will-O-Wisp, Scald, Lava Plume, Fire Blast, Blue Flare, Searing Shot, Ice Burn

[B]3rd Degree Burn[/B] - a grievous burn that affects a Pokemon's entire body, reducing the damage done by all of a Pokemon's physical attacks by 50% (0.5x). 
In addition, the Pokemon suffers three (3) HP of damage per action. 
[I]Inflicted by[/I]: Inferno, Sacred Fire

I like the fact that Inferno might actually be useful this way.
Another potential aspect is that the Pokemon can avoid taking passive burn damage when not using the body part that has been burned in battle (cradling a burned arm or something for instance), or that it takes additional 2 or so damage when attacked on that body part. It might be simpler to just skip this extra detail, however, I only suggest this because I think it could add an interesting tactical element to battles.

EDIT: Oh, forgot to say this but furthermore, Pokemon could potentially have multiple burns at the same time, such as one afflicting an arm and another afflicting a leg. Another idea is that the passive damage from multiple burns could stack, however that might be too much passive damage to be considered balanced. :0 But it's something to consider.

 

[Pallas Athena]

First off, I like SDS's proposals on burn MC, and stats. However, I hate the Kanto/Johto moves and Egg moves. First off, as Atheno said, we're going to run into issues with the DW if we ever try to make stuff like that make sense. As for Gen's one+two, only Egg moves are actually within the price range of most people. Under your proposal those moves could be the new 4MC range. Also, Athenodoros, we should probably formalize the substitution rule (even if I'm guilty of breaking it). As for Role Playing, the battle system has kind of semi-stabalized. We could probably start some of that, and it is kind of overdue. Aside from burn, there's not much broken. Except for the mindset.

I really, really dislike battles with veteran players. Why? There's no creativity. I'll admit to being guilty of this, but when the attack button is so tempting, people forsake creativity. In fact, it's almost impossible to win creatively anymore. It's like a neo-attack spamming. It's boring, it's not creative in the slightest, and it's really boring to ref. It also happens to be the best way to win, as movepools are growing to the point where there are often multiple SE attacks, and no reason to not just straight up attack. I think Deck mentioned somewhere that it is much more rewarding to hit the attack button in this ASB. I agree completely. I would link (on my phone), but see my Battle vs Its a Random, in addition to SDS vs badass. People who try to run/play defensively will lose, and the opponent will often be at full health. I'm not saying that stall should be possible, just that hyper offense shouldn't be the only option. Therefore, I propose raising the energy cost of all attacking moves by one. It might actually make a battle interesting for once...

 

[Athenodoros]

I remembered something that we noticed on IRC the other day: I don't know if has been brought up already. It doesn't really make sense that boost damage is not included in SE/NVE damage multipliers, but the ref thread lists it as outside those brackets. That should probably be changed. Also, I agree that battles are too offensive now. ASB should be slower and more tactical. Things like increased damage for attacks from close up or other small mechanics changes might do it.

 

[Rolf]

I remembered something that we noticed on IRC the other day: I don't know if has been brought up already. It doesn't really make sense that boost damage is not included in SE/NVE damage multipliers, but the ref thread lists it as outside those brackets. That should probably be changed.

I've talked to Deck about this a long while back, and he said that boosts are wayyy overpowered if you put them inside the brackets. Just one Swords Dance and a 4x Super Effective attack is adding a whopping 7 damage to whatever move you choose. Tail Glow, and you get an extra 10 or 11. Even just with a 2x SE move, an extra 5 damage is dealt with a Swords Dance. Generally speaking, Super Effective is not hard to come by in ASB.

----

Totally agree with SDS on most everything - burn mechanic to -3 damage, 2nd set of high tier reqs, MC costs - except illegal move combinations being banned as well as old gen TMs. One of my favorite things about ASB is being able to have a boatload of moves to choose from after some MC investment, and it's not making or breaking any Pokemon to have an egg move together with other egg moves. It just adds unnecessary confusion to the already-daunting task of newcomers making teams. It's not broken and it'd only make things harder, don't fix it.

I also disagree with the 0 energy Struggle proposal. Adds length to battles that are pretty much already over at the point a poke is struggling, no need for refs do ref an extra 1-2 rounds until the HP drops also... even an auto-chill doesn't make sense as battlers should know when their pokes are about to drop from exhaustion; it's not the hardest thing to calc how much energy your moves are going to use up. It's 100% in the trainer's hands whether or not their top dog falls to 0 energy.

Sleep and Confusion = good and balanced. I could go with Flora though in saying that 2/3/4 for Confusion wouldn't be bad.

.... :,(

 

[Rising_Dusk]

I'm not on the committee, nor did I want to be, but I do feel compelled to post my thoughts on a few of these topics. Conveniently, for a vast majority of the suggestions, my opinions coincide with Rolf's.

Totally agree with SDS on most everything - burn mechanic to -3 damage, 2nd set of high tier reqs, MC costs - except illegal move combinations being banned as well as old gen TMs. One of my favorite things about ASB is being able to have a boatload of moves to choose from after some MC investment, and it's not making or breaking any Pokemon to have an egg move together with other egg moves. It just adds unnecessary confusion to the already-daunting task of newcomers making teams. It's not broken and it'd only make things harder, don't fix it.

I also disagree with the 0 energy Struggle proposal. Adds length to battles that are pretty much already over at the point a poke is struggling, no need for refs do ref an extra 1-2 rounds until the HP drops also... even an auto-chill doesn't make sense as battlers should know when their pokes are about to drop from exhaustion; it's not the hardest thing to calc how much energy your moves are going to use up. It's 100% in the trainer's hands whether or not their top dog falls to 0 energy.

I agree with everything here. I especially agree with "do not restrict past gen moves", "do not enforce egg move illegalities", and "do not unnecessarily prolong battles by forcing 0 energy struggle/auto-chill when you hit 0 energy". The last one really bothers me. It is the trainer's prerogative to make sure his Pokemon doesn't faint due to exhaustion, and quite frankly, as a ref I don't want to sit there and force one player to struggle until it faints while the other Pokemon boosts every single one of its stats to +6 for the next oncoming Pokemon.

I also really don't like the "burn certain parts of the body" aspect of burn that Banryu is harping. If someone burns my Riolu's left hand, I'm going to use his right hand for attacks, and other equally retarded things. ASB already makes mixed attacking far more viable than it is in the games, and I don't think punishing status like burn is really helping the program. I am in agreement with Banryu's suggestion that burn have stages, but I totally disagree with burning parts of the body.

121: *****

I knew I shouldn't have fricken' picked Weavile....

This reminds me of something I wanted to bring up. Having exceptional Speed in ASB is not really all that helpful. In every case, I'd rather have more HP or better actual attacking/defensive stats. I've found that, for instance, my Jolly Sneasel is really not that impressive with his 133 Speed. Sure, I can Taunt first against like all of the two Pokemon that exist just under that bracket, but in practice it's really not useful being that fast. I know that a Speed-boosting nature boosts accuracy of moves by 5%, but quite frankly, most exceptionally fast attackers don't have inaccurate moves they'd want to use at all. I'd like there to be some better incentive for boosting Speed and in general just having higher Speed. Perhaps if you're fast enough, you could use 2 actions for 1 action every 6 actions, or maybe the Base Power of your attacks is raised by 1 or 2 if the difference in Speed between you and your opponents meets some thresholds. I don't know. I just want there to be some discussion about this, because Speed is almost always useless to repeatedly boost with natures or stat-boosting moves. This, coupled with the distribution and raw strength of priority moves, makes me wish I could've picked different Pokemon than my favorites.

 

[Objection]

About the sleep/confusion nerf: I have heard complaints about 1 turn not being enough since, with the case of sleep, you might as well have used Protect instead. Bumping up the minimum amount of time for sleep/confusion to 2 sounds good, but bumping the maximum up to 4 may not be. Perhaps just a scale of 2/3 might work. I mean, do we have to have three stages of sleep/confusion?

About burn: while I do not support the current mechanics for burn, I would prefer a simple system over a complex one. Something like a flat -2 to damage or even a flat -2 to base power.

About fainting after reaching zero energy: it's the trainer's fault for not working out that their moves would take them below zero energy. They deserve to suffer for that decision and their pokemon fainting sounds like an appropriate penalty. However, refs should give a clear indication that the pokemon is low on energy, such as "Pokemon X is looking exhausted. If Trainer Y pushes him too far, he might just collapse." If the trainer still elects to use high-powered moves throughout the entire round, they're an idiot.

May edit with more thoughts later.

 

[Fire Blast]

About burn, I do think that it needs a nerf. Getting passive damage AND significantly lowering attack is too much. I think that there should be two levels of burn, one that does -2 base power, 2 damage or -1 base power, 1 damage.

Pokemon should faint at 0 energy. No question about it, it just makes sense.

I don't think we should ban old moves because it goes against the logic of the anime, and if the pokemon had the move at one time, it can have it now.


Regarding role play, I want to repost this from my post in the PR thread.

This isn't an existing position, but I'm going to reccomend it. I want to be someone who helps with the role-playing part of ASB. There are a ton of cool ideas in the thread and I would like to make those ideas a reality. I also like the idea of monthly tournaments so if I could maybe run those. If have some ideas for tourneys and how we can make them work. So if this is a good role, perhaps I could be in charge of it.

 

[zarator]

My 2 cents about the proposals being brought up here:

First of all, I agree with the scale proposed by DK to replace the old one. 125 should definitely be worth a 5-star.

About the MC costs SDS suggested, I'm not too fond of them. Consider that a fully evolved Pokémon with his Dream world ability unlocked is going to get 2 MC per battle on average (1 MC and 1 KO). TMs from past generations and Egg moves should definitely be expensive in my opinion, since they often add significant power to the Pokémon.

Also, no to illegal movesets. We don't want ASB to become in-game like to that point, probably. Same goes with Gen 1 and 2 TMs. Save few exceptions, old Pokémon are generally weaker than new ones, so they should enjoy the added unpredictability of the bloated movepools.

About Counter, Mirror Coat and Metal Burst, I'm going to go against the whole community and I'll say they're not broken, for a simple reason: Substitute. Every Pokémon in the game learns Substitute, and it's easy enough to tweak the HP of the Sub to absorb the Counter/Mirror Coat in a way which advantages the Sub user. This is especially true if the CounterCoat user goes first. If he goes last, it becomes much trickier, but there are still ways around it.
For one, not many Pokémon learn both Counter and Mirror Coat (Blastoise, Swampert, Wobbuffet, what else?). So, if you face Electrode, for example (who has Mirror Coat only iirc), just use physical moves if you go first. You can also resort to Special Dark and Physical Ghost moves to neutralize CounterCoat. Another way is status. Every Pokémon learn both Toxic and Substitute/Protect. There's also Paralysis + Flinch moves and Subseed. I'm sure there are other possibilities too.
The only issue I see could be with Metal Burst users. However, let's look at them. Mawile is really weak, so I'd rule him out. Aggron, Bisharp and Bastiodon all have 4X weaknesses, so you can simply hit them when they go first with Fighting/Ground moves while resorting to stallish tactics (Substitute, screens, status) when you go first. Cobalion and Dialga are legendaries, so let's forget about them. The only suspect may be Sableye, who has Recover, Will-o-wisp, Mischievous Heart and a gazillon other tricks. Despite his low stats, he may very well be broken. However, so far I'm not sure I've seen even one person abusing Sableye. If someone can do it with success, fine, but I would not hasten my judgement here.

I completely agree with the Burn nerf. I'd be in favor of a flat - 3 damage to physical moves, personally, but I'm open to other options.

@R_D: Speed is not really relevant because reffers underplay it most often. For example, they allow 50ish speed mons to avoid 120 ones with stuff like Dig, which most times is beyond ridiculous. Speed is and should be a vital stat, not a useless score which make stuff like Weavile look almost retarded

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

1: Most Metal Burst users are Steel-type, and the one that isn't has priority Taunt. That makes Toxic go out the window (and also Sub/Protect, for what it's worth).

2: Saying "yeah, it's so easy to beat countercoatburst, all you need to do is put substitute on every single mon" is a bit limiting considering that Substitute is almost always a TM move, and essentially mandating that every Pokemon carry a specialty TM move so that they don't autolose to a certain set of play is silly.