The merciless hax in RBY

Joim

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Introduction
We all know about hax. Remember that time you were going to win but you were fully paralysed and critted in a row? Or that one time when that fast Pokémon critted four times in a row, sweeping the remains of my otherwise winning team? So do I. It's one of the first things you learn about in competitive play, it's one of the first things you read whines about, and be damn sure it will most likely be the first thing you whine about if you are new to the competitive world of Pokémon. Well, if you never played RBY, be warned: it's the most luck-based generation and you must always account for the dreaded hax. It was definitely a very different game than the one we know today.

The causes
If you don't play RBY often, you might wonder why hax is so present. For starters, critical hits are calculated on base speed. That means that several critical hits are bound to happen in any given battle. This mechanic shaped the metagame, giving a huge advantage to faster Pokémon, like Tauros, which can crit a 21.5% of the times. Moreover, high critical rate moves have a chance to crit so close to 100% that they basically always crit. Persian is the best user of this tactic, breaking physical walls like Reflect Alakazam with its powerful Slash. That's only the beginning. Freezed Pokémon never thaw unless you are naïve enough to hit them with a Fire-type attack or use Haze while they are one the field, and none is really common in RBY OU. That means that if a Pokémon is frozen by the 10% chance on either Ice Beam or Blizzard, both of them common, it's basically dead. It's only useful to use it as a fodder or pivot; if it's active, to keep hold of Freeze Clause so your Chansey is not frozen too. Moreover, paralysis is the most prevalent status in RBY, it's very common to spread it to all the Pokémon you can; that translates to fully paralyzed being really common, in some battles it get as common as attacking! But that's not all, since common used moves have secondary effects, especially Body Slam, that paralyses, and Psychic, which lowers Special; both have a 30% chance for their secondary effect to happen, just as Scald in gen 5. We all know what that means. In case that all wasn't enough, unless you're using Swift all moves have a 1/256 chance to miss regardless of their accuracy, which, despite being a very small chance, you can expect these misses over the time and they can be gamebreaking. If you sum that all, you have a great chance for some kind of hax to occur.

Dealing with hax and its consquences
If you think you are winning a match, think it again. There's still chance of a comeback if there's a single Pokémon alive. Imagine you're up with your Tauros against the opposing Tauros—diverse teams are out of the question in RBY—, you're ready to attack. Well, you get that 1/256 chance and your Body Slam misses while the opposing Tauros' attack crits and paralyzes you. Your Tauros is done and the remnants of your team are all slower than Tauros. Normally, you would be able to deal with it, right? Well, it's not the case. That hax costs you the game because Tauros can KO all your remaining Pokémon with a non-recharging Hyper Beam since they are all at half their max HP or less. Good game! In fact, a critical hit Hyper Beam from Tauros can OHKO most Pokémon, so even a healthy Alakazam could be dead stopped easily. Since critical hits are more common, it's also more common for them to be game changing. You could be setting up an Amnesia Slowbro, ready to sweep, but then a critical Thunderbolt from Zapdos can throw all your work to the dustbin, getting through the Special boosts and KOing your Slowbro.

That's it. In RBY, missing a move can be really game changing. AgiliWrap Dragonite, basically unstoppable in paper, can be easily obliterated if he fails Wrap a single time. That single fail is enough to paralyze, KO it with Blizzard, or maybe even freeze it. Sleeping it could mean you get rid of it, but sleep is more random in RBY as well: it might last just one turn. So, even if you risk it by having the fastest sleeper, Gengar, and do not miss the Hypnosis, which is almost as probable as hitting it, the sleep might just last a move and the next Hypnosis might fail, leading to a clean KO by a powerful STAB Earthquake. That's why sometimes you should rely on other sleepers such as Jynx or Exeggutor, who will fail less times.

You will also be in disadvantage if you lose the Sleep lead war, which happens often due to the shaky accuracy of the Sleep moves available. The only way to take advantage of it is to use it to take incoming Thunder Waves or to take resisted attacks, but that can lead to bad match ups. In the meanwhile, turns will run for its sleep counter and, since its not reset upon switch out, it will finally get awake. You need to avoid paralysis like the plague, while trying to inflict it to every Pokémon you can!

Of course, the most common and most infuriating form of hax in RBY is your Pokémon being fully paralysed. Paralysis spread is one of the most common tactics, so it's only natural that this side effect of paralysis is seen very, very often. It's almost granted that you'll suffer this at least once in a row. Imagine both teams end up with the same setup of Alakazam, Chansey, Tauros, and Exeggutor paralysed. Given a similar skill, it's luck that will decide the outcome of a match. Want to Explode on that Chansey's fat face? Nope. Exeguttor is fully paralysed and KOd by a nasty Ice Beam. What happens next? Your Tauros is fully paralysed too and dies to yet anoter Ice Beam, which this time is a critical hit. There, two 25% chances just decided that you must lose. You should always take into account this and try the most safe route. Sometimes, you just have to rely on luck to win. In an endgame where it's just an unstatused Chansey against unstatused Chansey, both will spam Ice Beam aiming for the game-deciding freeze. Freeze basically means KO, so Ice Beam spam fishing for one is seen too. The first one to freeze or the last one to use its last PP will win.

Conclusion
To play RBY, you must accept its haxy nature. All teams will look very similar, so you will need extra skill and extra luck to have an advantage on any opponent. Sometimes you will lose to it, sometimes you'll win to it, so it's kinda a status quo. Due to RBY's luck oriented nature, it's best to consider all options and outcomes every turn. Every time you switch an unstatused Chansey into Starmie, there's that 10% chance that it will be frozen and you have to take it into account. When you switch your Exeggutor or Starmie into a fresh Tauros, that might mean they get paralysed and KO'd on the next turn, or simply critted. A good RBY player will always take into account all these chances: 10% freeze chance, 25% fully paralysed chance, and 30% secondary effect from moves chance. They all add up and they can always happen. You must know when to rely on them and when to not to risk them back. Try not to tempt the luck, though, Chansey will not want to face Ice Beams or Blizzards and a Hyper Beam crit from Tauros can really ruin your day; and sometimes you are using that Tauros and you need to risk it and try to crit to win a battle. Risk it when necessary and have fun!
 
Just saw this and don't have a lot of time now, but some things that come to mind is that you could maybe emphasize more on FPs and maybe talk about Chansey 50/50 freeze wars. It think you can remove the mention to 100% critting moves, since if they crit 255/256 it's not a big deal as far as hax is concerned. Keep the reference to 1/256 chance to miss though, since those are always funny. Happen a lot more often than crit moves not critting, because Slash, Razor Leaf and Crabhammer are pretty uncommon after all.
 

tehy

Banned deucer.
You start out by saying "we all know about hax". So I guess maybe this is unwarranted, but perhaps a quick explanation of what hax actually is might help you out? even just a quick anecdote "Like that time X got paralysed, or critted, and it cost you a match" or something.
 

Joim

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Updated OP taking into account two previous posts, I will take another look when I can :)
 
Oh, I'll give this a read and comment it later today whenever I have time. Sorry that I had forgotten about this >.>


fully paralysed four times in a row? Or that one time when that fast Pokémon critted four times in a row
This is still extremely unlikely even from a rby standpoint! I'd change it to something like a crit and a fp in a row, which honestly happens quite often and can be quite devastating as well depending on when does it occur.

Moreover, high critical rate moves have a chance to crit so close to 100% that they basically always crit. Persian is the best user of this tactic, breaking physical walls like Reflect Alakazam with its powerful Slash.
I'm partial to just remove this. I mean, if something has a (very close to) 100% chance to happen, i doesn't depend on luck right?

paralysis is easily the best status in RBY
change it to "the most prevalent status" or something similar. I mean, freeze is still the best status!

that translates to fully paralyzed to be almost as common as making an attack
25% to 75% after all, so I'm not totally sure about that "almost as common". Maybe reword this sentence a bit?

unless you're using Swift all moves have a 1/256 chance to miss regardless of their accuracy.
maybe add something like "despite being a very small chance, over time 1/256 misses will happen and expect them to be potentially gamebreaking". You know, I expect 1/256 to look extremely unlikely at first glance for the reader, so it'd probably be cool to emphasize that 255 misses actually happen from time to time!

That single fail is enough to paralyze, freeze it, or KO it with Blizzard.
remove freeze imo. You go for the 4x effective hit, but not for the freeze, it's just too situational. Paralysis is another story because its a 100%/75% status and really cripples dragonite.

If you lose the Sleep lead war, it's best to leave the asleep Pokémon asleep to try to gain advantage from hax. Once a Pokémon is asleep, you can use it to take incoming Thunder Waves or to take resisted attacks. In the meanwhile, turns will run for its sleep counter and, since its not reset upon switch out, it will finally get awake. You need to avoid paralysis like the plague, while trying to inflict it to every Pokémon you can!
I think this doesn't exactly have to do with hax. And you know, you probably shouldn't be suggesting to switch sleeping pokemon very often because that could easily lead to bad matchups; it sometimes works if you only do it a few punctual times but it's not something you should do repetitively. It's okay to talk about sleep duration and accuracy though, since this has more to do with luck.


Maybe crit thunderbolts breaking through Amnesia Slowbro wouldn't hurt as a quick note somewhere. Oh and that, as a fallback, a crit hyper beam from tauros can KO pretty much anything. You, know maybe just as a quick comment that could go in the second-to-last paragraph. Just a couple of ideas.

Conclusion
I think the conclusion should include something about the fact that due to the luck-oriented nature of RBY, it's important to consider your options in each turn taking into account all the possible outcomes. That is, for example, you should consider that everytime you switch Chansey into Starmie it's probably a 10% chance that you'll end up frozen. When you switch your Exeggutor or Starmie into a fresh Tauros, well, do it at your own risk. And that's why people whine and get mad, because they simply think the effect is so small that shouldn't happen. With the 10% freeze chances, the 25% fp chances, the 30% secondary effect chances etc being all present very often, a good rby player should always take into account the possibility of all these effects happening. A good player should know the position he is at, to know when to rely on a 25% or 30% chance, and when not to risk them back.


That's all. Pretty long post I know :P Hopefully it helps. Good job with the letter!
 

Joim

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Heh, I went on holidays and totally forgot about this one. I've updated the OP, thanks for the input, Crystal_!
 

Isa

I've never felt better in my life
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I think Crystal was 100% spot on in #5. Implement his suggestions.
 
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This is going to be a QC and GP check in one - mostly GP since Joim's grasp of RBY is much better than his English. Edits are in bold.

Introduction
We all know about hax. Remember that time you were going to win but you were fully paralysed and critted in a row? Or that one time when that fast Pokémon critted four times in a row, sweeping the remains of my otherwise winning team? So do I.
"fully paralysed and critted in the same turn". "In a row" is a metaphor that only applies to identical events.

"sweeping the remains of your otherwise-winning team". Don't randomly switch person in a "Remember X? So do I." construction. Also hyphens.

It's one of the first things you learn about in competitive play, it's one of the first things you read whines about, and be damn sure it will most likely be the first thing you whine about if you are new to the competitive world of Pokémon. Well, if you never played RBY, be warned: it's the most luck-based generation and you must always account for the dreaded hax.
"it's one of the first things you read people whining about". Co-opting the verb "whine" as a noun looks lazy.

"if you've never played RBY", or "if you never played RBY in its day". Makes the tenses agree more smoothly.

The causes
If you don't play RBY often, you might wonder why hax is so present. For starters, critical hits are calculated on base speed. That means that several critical hits are bound to happen in any given battle. This mechanic shaped the metagame, giving a huge advantage to faster Pokémon, like Tauros, which can crit a 21.5% of the times. Moreover, high critical rate moves have a chance to crit so close to 100% that they basically always crit. Persian is the best user of this tactic, breaking physical walls like Reflect Alakazam with its powerful Slash.
"faster Pokémon, like Tauros, which crits 21.5% of the time." The grammar there was shot.

The last two sentences need some rewording; you should mention in some fashion that this makes them non-hax. Moves that always crit are not a source of hax, because critting is expected; as such, they are actually more predictable than normal moves in terms of their damage output. The way you've currently phrased it sounds like they're some sort of mega-hax.

Freezed Pokémon never thaw unless you are naïve enough to hit them with a Fire-type attack or use Haze while they are one the field, and none is really common in RBY OU.
"Frozen", and "on the field". In addition, the way this is worded sounds really clumsy. I propose the following, but I'm open to other ideas (it's really hard to get number agreement when talking about the nebulous "a Fire-type attack" alongside the specific "Haze").

"Frozen Pokémon only thaw if an opponent is kind enough to use a Fire move or Haze on them - highly unlikely in RBY OU as these moves have no competitive use."

It's only useful to use it as a fodder or pivot; if it's active, to keep hold of Freeze Clause so your Chansey is not frozen too.
"It's only useful as fodder, a pivot, or (if Freeze Clause is active) to keep in reserve to prevent your other Pokémon from also being frozen."

1. "Useful" is already talking about "use". "Useful to use it as" is repetitive.
2. The "or" needs to be between the second-to-last and last items of the list.
3. "it" should not refer to "Freeze Clause" before "Freeze Clause" has been mentioned.
4. Any freeze sucks, not only Chansey freezes. Keeping the clause on is worthwhile even if you don't have a Chansey (or indeed if it was the first 'mon frozen), so Chansey shouldn't be singled out as the only reason.

Moreover, paralysis is the most prevalent status in RBY, it's very common to spread it to all the Pokémon you can; that translates to fully paralyzed being really common, in some battles it get as common as attacking!
"In addition, paralysis is the most prevalent status in RBY; most players spread it to all the Pokémon they can, which makes full paralysis really common - in some battles it gets as common as attacking!"

Corrected the punctuation between the clauses, and tightened up some wording ("moreover" implies that the facts after it are more important than those before, which isn't really true in this case; "very common" is weasel-wording that's unnecessary here). Consider dropping the last clause (the hyphen and the stuff after it) entirely, as it just sounds whiny rather than actually imparting any new information.

But that's not all, since common used moves have secondary effects, especially Body Slam, that paralyses, and Psychic, which lowers Special; both have a 30% chance for their secondary effect to happen, just as Scald in gen 5.
"The commonly-used moves Body Slam and Psychic also have secondary effects (Body Slam inflicts paralysis; Psychic lowers Special) with 30% chances of occurring, like Scald in gen 5."

1. Body Slam and Psychic are in fact the only two common moves with 30% secondary effect chances. Flinching moves are very uncommon, as are Fire Blast and Lick.
2. "But that's not all" is somewhat repetitive given the preface to your next fact.
3. lolgrammarnazi

In case that all wasn't enough, unless you're using Swift all moves have a 1/256 chance to miss regardless of their accuracy, which, despite being a very small chance, you can expect these misses over the time and they can be gamebreaking.
I've heard from reliable sources both that Swift can and can't 255-miss (it's certain that evasion and accuracy don't affect it, but according to Azure Heights the 255 check still occurs). I honestly don't know which source is correct; if AH is right then you obviously need to drop the reference to Swift. So I'll put the relevant bit in [] to show that it may need removing.

255s are only unexpected when dealing with moves that have "100%" accuracy, so they only need to be mentioned in that context. The technical fact that other moves have slightly lower accuracy than displayed is beyond the scope of this guide.

"In case all of that wasn't enough, all moves [except Swift] with "100%" accuracy actually have a 1/256 chance to miss; while this chance is very small, you can nevertheless expect these misses to occasionally occur, and they can be devastating."

If you sum that all, you have a great chance for some kind of hax to occur.
"Between all of these, you have...".

If you think you are winning a match, think it again. There's still chance of a comeback if there's a single Pokémon alive.
"think again."

"There's still a chance of a comeback if your opponent has a single Pokémon alive."

Imagine you're up with your Tauros against the opposing Tauros—diverse teams are out of the question in RBY—, you're ready to attack. Well, you get that 1/256 chance and your Body Slam misses while the opposing Tauros' attack crits and paralyzes you. Your Tauros is done and the remnants of your team are all slower than Tauros. Normally, you would be able to deal with it, right? Well, it's not the case. That hax costs you the game because Tauros can KO all your remaining Pokémon with a non-recharging Hyper Beam since they are all at half their max HP or less. Good game! In fact, a critical hit Hyper Beam from Tauros can OHKO most Pokémon, so even a healthy Alakazam could be dead stopped easily. Since critical hits are more common, it's also more common for them to be game changing. You could be setting up an Amnesia Slowbro, ready to sweep, but then a critical Thunderbolt from Zapdos can throw all your work to the dustbin, getting through the Special boosts and KOing your Slowbro.

That's it. In RBY, missing a move can be really game changing. AgiliWrap Dragonite, basically unstoppable in paper, can be easily obliterated if he fails Wrap a single time. That single fail is enough to paralyze, KO it with Blizzard, or maybe even freeze it. Sleeping it could mean you get rid of it, but sleep is more random in RBY as well: it might last just one turn. So, even if you risk it by having the fastest sleeper, Gengar, and do not miss the Hypnosis, which is almost as probable as hitting it, the sleep might just last a move and the next Hypnosis might fail, leading to a clean KO by a powerful STAB Earthquake. That's why sometimes you should rely on other sleepers such as Jynx or Exeggutor, who will fail less times.

You will also be in disadvantage if you lose the Sleep lead war, which happens often due to the shaky accuracy of the Sleep moves available. The only way to take advantage of it is to use it to take incoming Thunder Waves or to take resisted attacks, but that can lead to bad match ups. In the meanwhile, turns will run for its sleep counter and, since its not reset upon switch out, it will finally get awake. You need to avoid paralysis like the plague, while trying to inflict it to every Pokémon you can!

Of course, the most common and most infuriating form of hax in RBY is your Pokémon being fully paralysed. Paralysis spread is one of the most common tactics, so it's only natural that this side effect of paralysis is seen very, very often. It's almost granted that you'll suffer this at least once in a row. Imagine both teams end up with the same setup of Alakazam, Chansey, Tauros, and Exeggutor paralysed. Given a similar skill, it's luck that will decide the outcome of a match. Want to Explode on that Chansey's fat face? Nope. Exeguttor is fully paralysed and KOd by a nasty Ice Beam. What happens next? Your Tauros is fully paralysed too and dies to yet anoter Ice Beam, which this time is a critical hit. There, two 25% chances just decided that you must lose. You should always take into account this and try the most safe route. Sometimes, you just have to rely on luck to win. In an endgame where it's just an unstatused Chansey against unstatused Chansey, both will spam Ice Beam aiming for the game-deciding freeze. Freeze basically means KO, so Ice Beam spam fishing for one is seen too. The first one to freeze or the last one to use its last PP will win.

Conclusion
To play RBY, you must accept its haxy nature. All teams will look very similar, so you will need extra skill and extra luck to have an advantage on any opponent. Sometimes you will lose to it, sometimes you'll win to it, so it's kinda a status quo. Due to RBY's luck oriented nature, it's best to consider all options and outcomes every turn. Every time you switch an unstatused Chansey into Starmie, there's that 10% chance that it will be frozen and you have to take it into account. When you switch your Exeggutor or Starmie into a fresh Tauros, that might mean they get paralysed and KO'd on the next turn, or simply critted. A good RBY player will always take into account all these chances: 10% freeze chance, 25% fully paralysed chance, and 30% secondary effect from moves chance. They all add up and they can always happen. You must know when to rely on them and when to not to risk them back. Try not to tempt the luck, though, Chansey will not want to face Ice Beams or Blizzards and a Hyper Beam crit from Tauros can really ruin your day; and sometimes you are using that Tauros and you need to risk it and try to crit to win a battle. Risk it when necessary and have fun!
Ugh my eyes are going out of focus I'll be back to finish it later; posting so the forum doesn't randomly eat it.
 

Isa

I've never felt better in my life
is a Tournament Director Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnus
I'd also like to add something that disturbs me more than anything else, which is the overall tone of the article. It feels like the author is really not a fan of RBY, and is trying to convince others not to play it. There's so many "you thought you won HAH now you lose" moments in the text - the introduction is just one big example, the conclusion is another. It heavily overemphasizes how much RNG matters in a game of RBY, from what I am reading I am led to believe that it is pointless playing the tier to begin with.


And overall I really must question the need of this article. What good does it really do other than cause people to shy away from RBY, a perfectly fine and enjoyable metagame? If I wanted someone to pick up the tier, this would be the last article I'd show, assuming I'd even show it.
The only thing this piece does is to spread the idea that RBY is a coinflip tier without merits, which has already led to its removal from SPL (the RBY playerbase is healthy so don't go there).

Overall, I don't want to see this published. If you must, there's a lot of changes that need to happen, but I don't want it to happen even if the suggested changes occur.
 
Now that I think about it I agree with Isa. The "RBY is coinflip tier GTFO luckers" attitude is bad (even more bad than "GSC is stall tier boring", since that at least attracts the patient) and perpetuating its growth here on Smogon is also bad. It already knocked RBY, the mega-nostalgia gen, out of SPL, that's bad enough, let's not drive people away from it any more.

Yes, hax happens. Hax happens in later gens, too, though; Stone Edge, Scald, Hydro Pump, Focus Blast, Air Slash, Iron Head, Waterfall... these are all pretty haxy moves. RBY has more potential "hax" moments, but for the most part it's not too bad. Much as I hate the guy's attitude, GGFan has a point when he says that if RBY was just luck he wouldn't be able to maintain a 9-or-10-to-1 WLR. And most of the hax has counterstrategies; good RBYers manage paralysis spread to one or two 'mons (except when outplayed by even better RBYers), Lapras/Cloyster/Jynx can't be frozen, and so on. And like the article you linked in the first sentence said, if your "counter" doesn't work vs. a crit, maybe you need a better counter. RBY's not a very diverse gen; there's not too many threats to cover. If Zam's "haxing" you with special falls and crits, stick Slowbro in its face. Or Light Screen Chansey. Or even Light Screen Starmie. If Tauros is scaring you with its Body Slam crits, invest in a couple more Thunder Wavers, get less predictable with your switches, or dump the things it double-switches on (Jynx, Gengar, Rocks). If Starmie's always freezing your Chansey, then play with a backup like Jolteon or Alakazam. Or stick Stun Spore on your Egg and make it eat the hax instead. Is hax going to happen? Yes. But 90% of the time, when I look at a battle that I or someone else "got haxed" in, I or they let that hax happen with careless play. There's a couple of things that are genuine coinflips - the Tauros ditto and the Chansey ditto being the most obvious - but a) you CAN avoid Chansey dittos, and in some cases Tauros dittos, with smart play, b) any ditto in any later gen is also going to be a coinflip (or stall-out), and neither Chansey nor Tauros is essential for a top team (recommended - yes, essential - no).

A guide to the intricacies of RBY probability and how to play around hax could certainly be very useful. This probably ain't it.
 
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