Using The Gen 4 UU Testing Process For Gen 5

[TAY]

And can you please elaborate on why it's not important to create the most "competitive" (as you defined it) metagame that we can? You kind of just said it isn't important.

It isn't important to continuously strive for a metagame which the best players most excel (or enjoy most) because there is almost no practical difference between a metagame developed through a continuous testing process and one developed through a time-limited testing process (i.e. one which will definitely end after a period of time, like Cathy's). Put in fourth gen terms, Earthworm and Gouki and Husk would kick most players asses whether we had banned Garchomp and Salamence or not. Why bother trying to improve the metagame for good players if they can already win consistently (and as I argued earlier, the UU process only does improve the metagame for the best players)?

Because any slight advantage that one player has over another, without factoring in skill, makes the "best players" have less of a chance of winning if they don't use said Pokemon. Additionally, if they are forced and you're ok with that, then this creates a metagame that no "good" player enjoys.

Pokemon is a game of managing probabilities. The best players are those that are best at managing the probabilities of their options, and banning pokemon does not change this at all. A better ban list does not significantly reduce the luck element of the game, it only plays to our intuitive desire for diversity. Note that I am assuming that a continuous testing process would produce a "better" ban list, which is definitely not necessarily the case!

Also, plenty of good players participated in VGC, which basically requires that you use Kyogre, Groudon, Dialga, Palkia, or Mewtwo. It was still highly competitive and drew in a lot of talent. I think a lot of us enjoyed it?

And on what grounds are you saying that the UU test encourages people to ban Pokemon they merely find annoying?

I made a mistake in even saying this because the context of my paragraph made it seem like I thought this was a problem. Almost no one votes to ban or not ban a pokemon based on our definitions of uber...they vote based on their gut instinct. Just the fact that players are required to nominate based on Smogon's criteria doesn't mean that they are making their decisions based on those criteria! (And let's be honest, it is pretty easy to fabricate a justification for nomination under one of those criteria). Since players are voting based on gut feeling anyway, why bother requiring conformation to our definitions. The nominations paragraphs were nothing more than an inconvenience.

Also...

You are encouraged not to ban anything, actually.

This is obviously a huge problem! The testing process should not encourage players to ban or not ban anything. What's worse is that the discouragement from banning comes only from inconveniencing players through lengthy ban nominations, while for some reason requiring literally zero explanation for "no suspects".

And you seem to have the idea in your mind that I am suggesting that we ban nothing. I am mainly opposed to the UU process because it literally never ends and does not produce a much better game than a limited-time process. The limited-time process could produce more bans, who knows!

Not only is this ridiculously subjective, but it's also always assuming that you're only producing marginally better results, which is legitimately impossible to know at this point.

Of course it is subjective. The UU testing process is also not only "ridiculously" subjective, but entirely subjective, since it bans based on how players feel rather than based on data. However, even though it is subjective, it is easily and quickly measurable (see Cathy's process). This is extremely important, as it is a quality that the UU process lacks.

Although it is impossible to know for sure, but considering how small of a difference there was in "the good players winning" between every single iteration of gen IV OU, I would say that it is a safe bet that there will be little difference in gen V. Once again, EW and Gouki and Husk will probably be kicking ass no matter how long we spend on our ban list.

Additionally, if it is "impossible to know" whether the UU process will produce far better or marginally better or even worse results than a time-limited process, why on earth would we jump right into the more complex and time consuming process? Wouldn't it make more sense to start with a time-limited process so that, in case things go awry, we are not locked into a terrible process (and don't say we won't be locked into it, we were definitely locked into the gen IV OU and UU testing processes)?

You're making the very large assumption that the UU process produces the best results, while criticizing my suggestion because I assume that it will produce comparable results to the UU test. Apparently it is "literally impossible to know", so why go with the more complex option?

Why is it better to settle for mediocrity when this test takes something we do for the metagame anyway (analyze it) and just simply allows us to do something about it?

Settle for mediocrity? I am not suggesting we have no bans, just that we do not have a never-ending process. The problem with "doing something about" what you perceive to be a major problem is that it takes a huge amount of time and effort, and whether you see it or not it is a huge inconvenience to the player base. The majority of players do not want to jump through hoops to vote, they want to just play the game. The UU process forces the player base continually to either jump through those hoops or accept changes made by a third party (i.e. not nintendo) without their input.

The UU testing process is very powerful as a continuous testing process. It has worked very well for DPP UU. I am not trying to insult its creators or those who maintain it. What I am trying to do is get the idea across that just about any continuous testing process is a very bad idea. It requires significant time and effort, and ultimately produces a comparable result to a time-limited process, while discouraging people from just doing their best to play (and win) the game.

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

The UU testing process is very powerful as a continuous testing process. It has worked very well for DPP UU. I am not trying to insult its creators or those who maintain it. What I am trying to do is get the idea across that just about any continuous testing process is a very bad idea. It requires significant time and effort, and ultimately produces a comparable result to a time-limited process, while discouraging people from just doing their best to play (and win) the game.

I'd just like to note 2 things.

1: If Dream World abilities are to be injected into the metagame on a fairly regular basis, then a continuous testing process may be necessary to handle these changes. If not, it's entirely possibly to "formulate an endgame" for the process, such as simply cutting it off when you have at least 2 months of "no suspects" votes or something like that.

2: I sincerely doubt that having a testing process makes players not play their best or play to win. There are 2 types of players: Those who would strive to make rating and actually have a say, and those that don't care. Those that don't care about the testing process are thusly entirely uninfluenced by any effects it may have, and I'd be willing to hazard a guess that this is the majority of players. The second group *is* interested in playing to test, and in order to do so, they have to make rating, and in order to do that, they have to play their best and play to win. Along the way, they pick up important knowledge about the metagame, which they then apply during the nominations and voting. I'm not sure how this creates a mentality that reduces competitiveness or makes people not play to win.

 

[TAY]

1: If Dream World abilities are to be injected into the metagame on a fairly regular basis, then a continuous testing process may be necessary to handle these changes. If not, it's entirely possibly to "formulate an endgame" for the process, such as simply cutting it off when you have at least 2 months of "no suspects" votes or something like that.

Is it worth it to have a never-ending testing process to deal with the three or four pokemon that could even possibly break the game upon release of their shadow tag ability? Note that you are making the assumption that every dream world pokemon will be released, and that they will be released on a semi-regular basis.

What could really break the game with its Dream World ability besides:
Shandera (Shadow Tag)
Urugamosu (Swarm)
Ninetails (Drought)
Gyarados (Overconfidence)
Blaziken (Speed Boost)
Politoed (Drizzle)
Salamence (Overconfidence)

Even if I missed as many as I found, preparing for the release of 14 Pokemon does not justify spending literally 2+ extra years of testing for almost no benefit. We can just hold a fast emergency vote if something ridiculously powerful is released.

Is this really the only justification for a continuous testing process vs a time-limited process?

2: I sincerely doubt that having a testing process makes players not play their best or play to win. There are 2 types of players: Those who would strive to make rating and actually have a say, and those that don't care. Those that don't care about the testing process are thusly entirely uninfluenced by any effects it may have, and I'd be willing to hazard a guess that this is the majority of players. The second group *is* interested in playing to test, and in order to do so, they have to make rating, and in order to do that, they have to play their best and play to win. Along the way, they pick up important knowledge about the metagame, which they then apply during the nominations and voting. I'm not sure how this creates a mentality that reduces competitiveness or makes people not play to win.

When there is a possibility of a pokemon being banned, players will play under the assumption that it will be banned in the future, or not bother trying to counter it because it "should be banned". While this is unavoidable with any testing process, there is no reason to draw it out through the entire time we are playing BW.

And just because some players like to "play to test" doesn't mean that all competitive players enjoy always having the possibility of tier changes. You're leaving out a huge number of people with your description.

 

[cim]

When there is a possibility of a pokemon being banned, players will play under the assumption that it will be banned in the future, or not bother trying to counter it because it "should be banned". While this is unavoidable with any testing process, there is no reason to draw it out through the entire time we are playing BW.

Despite this being the intuitive reaction you'd expect, this has been far, far less of a problem in DP UU than many ever thought it would be.

 

[Erazor]

When there is a possibility of a pokemon being banned, players will play under the assumption that it will be banned in the future, or not bother trying to counter it because it "should be banned". While this is unavoidable with any testing process, there is no reason to draw it out through the entire time we are playing BW.

No, this hasn't ever been the case in UU. This can be seen very clearly in the Heracross metagame right now - it's quite competitive and no one is "not bothering to counter it". In fact, Heracross is not as broken as people thought it would be. Neither was Rhyperior. Neither was Dugtrio. Clearly, the UU testing process was good enough to ensure that enough Pokemon that were "clearly broken" were not in fact so.

The UU ladder is not a "play to test" ladder. It is a competitive ladder.

 

[Firestorm]

All of your arguments are based around the misconception that we don't know enough about this way of testing. You guys seem to be forgetting that we have evidence of this working, and creating a substantially more competitive metagame - something you would know if you participated in (or payed attention to) the UU test. That was SDS's original point. You're acting as if we don't know the results to the tests, but we do. You're acting as if we don't know how the test works out in the end (and how fast). And again, we do. You're accusations are partially true I guess, since you don't know. People who even occasionally get involved in the UU tests, however, do know. We played our metagame this way, and we watched it work significantly better than any other test on Smogon. Read the threads if you like, the evidence is there.

.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that this is relevant. Was the UU Process better than the OU Process? Yes. Nobody is denying this. What TAY, I, and others are saying is that this is still worse than leaving things be. Read Articuno64's topic here.

Aside from that, you need to realize anything you say about the voters in the UU process are invalid as the ones who will be voting in this test will be completely different.

However, most importantly, I'd like to restate that what you call "more competitive" is not actually "more competitive". I've already made my arguments for that.

I understand we'll likely play in a game where certain Pokemon are banned. I'd like that to happen quickly (ideally six months) and then stop happening. We shouldn't be testing Pokemon to ban mere months before the release of the next game.

 

[Heysup]

The invisible hand[/URL]" (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations)

This basically suggests that people generally do the best they can do benefit themselves, not other people. Therefore, people will produce the best quality "goods" if they want people to buy their "goods". They are making the best quality good they can for selfish reasons, but they will be directly benefiting society while they do this (by supplying quality goods), even if it's not intentional.

How does this apply? Well the whole idea of suspect ladders / testing is based on this theory, to be honest. If there is a rating requirement, people will want to get to that rating regardless of how. This means that while people may not give a shit about anything besides getting rating requirements, they are benefiting the test by playing as best they can, providing us with a very valid test.

The only flaw in this test is that "people can vote dishonestly", but this is taken care of by moderators (Reach and Jabba did a great job in UU, I see absolutely no reason why OU mods/playerbase would be any worse, which is what you and firestorm seem to be suggesting).

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that this is relevant. Was the UU Process better than the OU Process? Yes. Nobody is denying this. What TAY, I, and others are saying is that this is still worse than leaving things be. Read Articuno64's topic here.

And I'm saying it isn't. You're ignoring evidence of a working test with a "hunch" that may end up working out but may not. The game HAS to be enjoyable, which I think that topic completely ignores. Of course discussing rules is annoying, but it is a necessary evil to create a "balanced / competitive / skill-based / etc" metagame that people are actually willing to play.

Aside from that, you need to realize anything you say about the voters in the UU process are invalid as the ones who will be voting in this test will be completely different.

This is a baseless assumption. What makes UU voters different than OU voters? Are you aware of the significant overlap of players?

Even just strolling through the forums (when checks were given out), chances are you'd see more double checks then single UU checks.

Not only are there are a lot of the same players, but you have no evidence that UU voters are different than OU voters when they are part of the same community.

I don't think this is a logical assumption at all.

However, most importantly, I'd like to restate that what you call "more competitive" is not actually "more competitive". I've already made my arguments for that.

It is more competitive as I have defined competitive and even as TAY has defined competitive. You can be pedantic all you want and say "that's not what it means", but when it comes down to it, this site stands for having a "skill-based" metagame that allows players to differentiate themselves. If, for example, Kyogre dropped into DP UU (to prevent you from saying "well OU may be able to handle it, we don't know!"), you would either use Kyogre or lose. With the UU banlist, it's obviously not as "obvious" as Kyogre, but the same effect happens.

I understand we'll likely play in a game where certain Pokemon are banned. I'd like that to happen quickly (ideally six months) and then stop happening. We shouldn't be testing Pokemon to ban mere months before the release of the next game.

As SDS pointed out: Dream World abilities may force us either way.

Additionally, putting an arbitrary time limit to testing does nothing but flaw the test. Is there anything you hate more than when you're writing an exam, and you're not done (even if you think you may be), but the professor calls "Times up!". Are you really going to try and argue that you wouldn't have done any better with a longer time limit? Isn't it ideal to have a test that takes out the variable of time and focus's only on results?

All a time limit would do is a) rush it, or b) have it not finished.

I wouldn't expect everyone who doesn't participate in the tests to know this, but when you ban a Pokemon, other Pokemon can become broken in that metagame. This is because the previously not-banned Pokemon can cause distraction, centralization, and even outright check, counter, or outclass said threat. Does this knowledge change your thoughts at all?

 

[cim]

This is not true.

If I may, I'd like to bring up an economic term: "The invisible hand" (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations)

You're not the first user to bring economic theory into Pokemon, and a certain fruit-named asshole also proposed this idea. Unfortunately, the missing link in Pokemon is incentive to win. There's a reason terrible Pokemon like Ninjask saw play in OU all generation long last year, and despite Wobbuffett being utterly dominant in the right hands it never generated enough usage to be worth talking about in that context. Otherwise, we could use pure usage to dictate bans, really.

The principle holds true, that dominant Pokemon in general will see accelerated use, otherwise they either aren't dominant or something very, very weird is going on, like with Wobbuffett.

 

[lilyhollow]

It is more competitive as I have defined competitive and even as TAY has defined competitive. You can be pedantic all you want and say "that's not what it means", but when it comes down to it, this site stands for having a "skill-based" metagame that allows players to differentiate themselves.

This site existed long before "testing" was ever a fixture of this community. Creating the "perfect metagame" wasn't even slightly on people's minds throughout Advance, much less RBY and GSC. So it is in fact extremely safe to say that "skill-based metagames that allow players to differentiate themselves" is a laughably inappropriate definition of "competitive" as far as Smogon goes. This site is about fostering a competitive mindset or spirit. Incidentally, I fail to see anything pedantic about that distinction.

This is a baseless assumption. What makes UU voters different than OU voters? Are you aware of the significant overlap of players?

4th gen OU had like, 8 times the number of battles that 4th gen UU did or something. That disparity between 4th gen UU and 5th gen OU will only be greater.

 

[cim]

4th gen OU had like, 8 times the number of battles that 4th gen UU did or something. That disparity between 4th gen UU and 5th gen OU will only be greater.

However, 4th gen OU and UU had an overlapping voting pool, so at least at the top with people that cared abut tiering, the only people relevant to this discussion really, they had some overlap.

 

[lilyhollow]

I'm aware that they had overlap, but what's important is that there will almost certainly be huge differences between the 4th gen UU and 5th gen OU voting pools.

 

[cim]

What leads us to believe that the 5th Gen OU voting pool will suck, when the UU one didn't?

 

[Firestorm]

I'll address Heysup's post once I'm home and can spend more time on it, but I wanted to say that the playerbase difference between UU and OU was a really minor point. I'd rather concentrate on the more important points than that as whether or not they're the same doesn't affect the "let's stop playing mad scientist" argument.

 

[lilyhollow]

I never said that the 5th gen OU voting pool will suck. It will be different and larger, though, meaning we still need to be careful about encouraging a "play to test" mindset. Of course, I never conceded that the UU voters somehow magically avoided that mindset to begin with. They may have stopped banning things a while ago, but that doesn't mean their attentions are constantly focused on playing to win, and it certainly doesn't mean that a new "potentially-banworthy" (except not really) threat can't emerge in the future.

edit: I do agree with firestorm that the playerbase issue is relatively minor. It is another thing to consider, though.

 

[Heysup]

You're not the first user to bring economic theory into Pokemon, and a certain fruit-named asshole also proposed this idea. Unfortunately, the missing link in Pokemon is incentive to win. There's a reason terrible Pokemon like Ninjask saw play in OU all generation long last year, and despite Wobbuffett being utterly dominant in the right hands it never generated enough usage to be worth talking about in that context. Otherwise, we could use pure usage to dictate bans, really.

The principle holds true, that dominant Pokemon in general will see accelerated use, otherwise they either aren't dominant or something very, very weird is going on, like with Wobbuffett.

Then I guess he forgot to mention outliers. Usage statistics only show what Pokemon people use to try and win. Of course, some people try to use gimmicky shit teams with Ninjask, etc. to get a "surprise" win. It's still playing to win.

In any event, I don't think you actually believe that people don't play to win. People play to win. They want a check mark, voting rights, to gain respect in the community, and simply just for the pleasure that human beings get from accomplishing something.

To claim that there is no incentive to win is absurd. I think this is just another reason that people who haven't/don't play Pokemon shouldn't be discussing mentality of ladder players. It's kind of funny that you bring that "fruit-named asshole" into this argument, because his signature was trying to talk about Pokemon/Policy without actually playing it. I don't see much coming from this discussion if you're going to keep dismissing my points based on hunches while people with immense ladder experience are posting in this threat just to tell you "this is not how it is".

This site existed long before "testing" was ever a fixture of this community. Creating the "perfect metagame" wasn't even slightly on people's minds throughout Advance, much less RBY and GSC. So it is in fact extremely safe to say that "skill-based metagames that allow players to differentiate themselves" is a laughably inappropriate definition of "competitive" as far as Smogon goes. This site is about fostering a competitive mindset or spirit. Incidentally, I fail to see anything pedantic about that distinction.

There's a reason why RBY is often referred to as the "coin flip" metagame.

You know what "competitive" refers to on this site and you are trying to point out small details about how inaccurate this definition is, when in context of the goals of this community, it's definitely close/on track (not exact, since it's just my definition). Is my definition of pedantic wrong too?

In any event, these metagames had less powerful Pokemon and thus less problems. Assuming gen 1-5 all produced at least one "uber", would it not make sense that you would have more and more things to test and deal with as generations are added? RBY didn't need to "test" to put Mewtwo/Mew in the Uber tier. With Adv, you barely needed to. With Gen 4, you have Pokemon like Salamence with the new physical Outrage, Garchomp, etc.

4th gen OU had like, 8 times the number of battles that 4th gen UU did or something. That disparity between 4th gen UU and 5th gen OU will only be greater.

And?

I don't see your logic in assuming that more players = ....votes differently?

How does one even relate to the other? This is even ignoring the immense overlap in the voters. The only difference is sample size, but not only would that not matter, but it would produce more accurate results if they changed their minds. Your argument for them being a different mentality will remain invalid as long as we're talking about an active ladder.

 

[cim]

To claim that there is no incentive to win is absurd.

But, there isn't! Nothing changes if you do win. People still want to win sometimes, but playing to lose has no detriment and playing to win has no external gain. There is no penalty you miss out on from flooding the ladder with a Magikarp team. To say no one wants to win would be absurd, which is why I didn't say it, but there is no incentive to win, nor is there one to not lose.

This lack of incentive is the very reason Wobb never saw heavy use. People followed bullshit "honor codes" where they promised to others they wouldn't use Wobbuffett, because to them, the Ladder is about having fun, and there is just as much incentive to have fun as there is to win on the Ladder.

Anyway, the incentive you claimed existed is to win in order to gain respect in the community. If someone seriously plays Pokemon to get people to respect his Pokemon skills, that's honestly kind of pathetic. The other "incentives" you talk about are created by a Suspect system and generally motivate those who either are already deeply involved in Smogon, or, less so, those who want any particular kind of change.

 

[lilyhollow]

Nothing you have said is of any substance so I'm unsure as to how to continue this debate. You accuse members of lacking the necessary experience to comment on these matters, which is not only nonsubstantive, but insulting and false. You claim, on the bases of intuition and limited, semi-analogous experience, that everyone plays to win based on weak incentives like forum graphics and personal satisfaction (really??), even in the face of outright political encouragement of a playing to test mentality and the fact that personal ego very much plays a part in the "new major threat: ban please" methodology. You refer to RBY as a "coin flip metagame," most likely violating your "experience principle," whereas members such as Articuno/Jackal (I don't have the IS access to confirm which, though it could be both) have used their experiences with RBY as justification for a "keep the banlist static" philosophy. You immediately contradict your reckless "coin flip" statement by saying that the "Pokemon were weaker and so there was less reason to test things back then," indicating that the metagame was in fact so balanced that there was apparently no need to test it or its horrible, degenerate coin flip-esque gameplay (???). You willfully ignore my response to Chris' criticism of my post, which was a straw argument, repackaging it in the form of a more blindly confident straw argument.

Finally, you claim that my/Firestorm's/whoever's definition of "competitive," which this and other competitive gaming communities have repeatedly laid precedent for, is a mere pedantic distinction from your completely unprecedented definition. You accuse me of intentionally distorting your definition of competitive, which I am secretly in complete agreement with, to further my own personal agenda.

Where in your post, Heysup, have you ever shown your "definition" of competitive to be more appropriate--not in the context of Smogon's present culture, but in general-- than the one Firestorm has repeatedly proposed (not because he invented it, but because it is the definition that every other competitive agency would assume without question)? The answer is that you haven't. Where have you shown that Smogon's own personal definition of competitive--not the one that you are just now forging on the basis of our current test-oriented culture, but the one that has implicitly existed from the very inception of "competitive Pokemon" itself--is intentionally inconsistent with the standard ("Firestorm's") definition? You haven't. Have you even shown that the current, test-oriented, "let's make the best metagame ever" cultural makeup of Smogon is perhaps so important as to overpower the precedent laid not only by Smogon itself in past generations, but by all other competitive communities--thus necessitating either a redefinition of "competitive" or a step away from Smogon even being a so-called "competitive" community in the first place (perhaps we could be an "enjoyable-metagame-construction Pokemon community)? No, you haven't. You have insulted people, you have made baseless assumptions, but you have not given any reason to believe that this community should not strive towards "Firestorm's" definition of "competitiveness" at all times.


Does it make sense to have a banlist? If it makes the metagame deeper or more enjoyable to the extent that more players are more often encouraged to play to win, yes. If it doesn't, then there is no need to rock the boat and encourage people to "play to test," or "play to win mostly, but then run into a threat that they don't like dealing with, and then play to test again." Therefore, if we don't have any reason to believe that any significant ("Firestorm's definition of") competitive benefit will be gained from an indefinite testing process past the first few months, we should not implement such a process. Doing so is uncompetitive, whether or not Heysup happens to be supremely confident that everyone in the previous UU process was somehow completely unaffected by their participation in regular prompts to cast votes on the ban-worthiness of any Pokemon of their choosing.

 

[Heysup]

But, there isn't! Nothing changes if you do win. People still want to win sometimes, but playing to lose has no detriment and playing to win has no external gain. There is no penalty you miss out on from flooding the ladder with a Magikarp team. To say no one wants to win would be absurd, which is why I didn't say it, but there is no incentive to win, nor is there one to not lose.

This lack of incentive is the very reason Wobb never saw heavy use. People followed bullshit "honor codes" where they promised to others they wouldn't use Wobbuffett, because to them, the Ladder is about having fun, and there is just as much incentive to have fun as there is to win on the Ladder.

As I said, there are outliers. Wobbafet wasn't "used" for one reason that may or not be following the "play-to-win" mentality. I'd delve deeper into this point, but it's made moot by the fact that SEXP is used in the UU tests. If you don't have experience with a suspect, you can't vote on it.

Nothing you have said is of any substance so I'm unsure as to how to continue this debate. You accuse members of lacking the necessary experience to comment on these matters, which is not only nonsubstantive, but insulting and false. You claim, on the bases of intuition and limited, semi-analogous experience, that everyone plays to win based on weak incentives like forum graphics and personal satisfaction (really??), even in the face of outright political encouragement of a playing to test mentality and the fact that personal ego very much plays a part in the "new major threat: ban please" methodology.

It isn't as ridiculous as you make it out to be. People don't play just to become respected in the community, but it's one of the incentives. You're just trying to pick individual incentives to win and saying, "it's not cool" or "it's not a big deal" when the former is irrelevant and the latter ignores that these incentives add up.

Read the Smogon Philosphy article. It explains why we're playing to win.

in this arena, the stakes are higher—a human being is often a much more difficult and unpredictable opponent than an AI, making the victory much more satisfying and desirable.

If you think this is all irrelevant then I suggest you move to a different community.

I don't see a point in convincing someone who doesn't play the ladder that there is incentive to win on the ladder. In fact, you are my evidence. I am my evidence. Let's take you and me, for example. You love reviewing policy, analyzing metagames, and the like for the Smogon website, like many other smogoners but you don't see a point to laddering, so you don't. I, on the other hand, in addition to analyzing metagames and the like, I want to play the ladder. I want to beat good players. I want my name in the top 5 when people look at the leaderboard. I want to have upper requirements as a sense of accomplishment. I want people to listen to me when I talk about a metagame. I want people to respect my opinion when I talk about a metagame (read: you have no credibility in a metagame you don't play). I want to beat people at a skill-based strategy game. You don't see these as incentives while I do.

It ends up being you, someone who doesn't see a point in laddering and winning, who doesn't play on the ladder. It ends up being me playing on the ladder; someone who DOES have incentive to win.

Your credibility on discussing the mentality of a group you know nothing about is not very high compared to the numerous UU players who are telling you otherwise. Sorry if you feel that I'm insulting you, because that is not my intention. You just can't get away with insulting a group of people because of a "conjured up for the sake of your argument" mentality. It does not exist. You're only proving my point anyway, people like you who don't see incentives to win (and you are condescendingly referring to them as jokes) do not play on the ladder. People like myself, SDS, Erazor, and others (who consequently don't feel the need to post here for the reason's I'm claiming you to be wrong) end up playing on the ladder because winning does matter. We don't see a reason to ladder if not to beat other people in a skill-based game, rating requirements, and being on the leaderboard (ya i know pathetic people feel a sense of accomplishment for a Pokemon game).

I don't like making arguments personal, but the easiest way to prove you wrong is comparing people who don't ladder to people who do.

Even ignoring all of the UU players telling you that you're theory about UU ladder players is bullshit first hand, logic itself dictates that they are correct in this matter.

You refer to RBY as a "coin flip metagame," most likely violating your "experience principle," whereas members such as Articuno/Jackal (I don't have the IS access to confirm which, though it could be both) have used their experiences with RBY as justification for a "keep the banlist static" philosophy. You immediately contradict your reckless "coin flip" statement by saying that the "Pokemon were weaker and so there was less reason to test things back then," indicating that the metagame was in fact so balanced that there was apparently no need to test it or its horrible, degenerate coin flip-esque gameplay (???). You willfully ignore my response to Chris' criticism of my post, which was a straw argument, repackaging it in the form of a more blindly confident straw argument.

It was not my intent to claim that RBY is not a competitive metagame, it is, and I do play it. The point is that it is largely luck-based. Even Jackal will admit to that, he has before (I was on his SPL team, wins (since Jackal is strong) and even losses because of hax were a common topic). This doesn't have anything to do with the banlist, this was more aimed at the "skill-basedness" of a metagame. There's not much you can do to "balance" a metagame when it's the mechanics themselves that cause the major imbalances. This is why everyone would (justifiably) prefer a static banlist. Sorry if I wasn't clear.

If they are using RBY as a justification for keeping a static banlist, that's where I would disagree. RBY in the sense of "which Pokemon are too good" is completely different than (in particular) Gens 3-5. Mew and Mewtwo were so much better than your average OU Pokemon that it would be impossible to not notice them and ban them. There were no OU Pokemon that were "suspect" in the tier. I'm skipping gen 2-3 because the changes were more prominent in Gen 4. Gen 4 introduced many new incredible OU Pokemon as well as buffs for the current OU Pokemon. You had Pokemon that were so much better than the average Pokemon that they could be considered "too good" for the metagame. No matter how you define broken, this is undeniably true. There are more Pokemon on the borderline in gen 4 than gen 1, 2, and 3. Gen 5 does not remove any of the gen 4 Pokemon. If we are using any sort of common sense, Game Freak tends to add better OU Pokemon (you can tell by testing, or just looking at stats/moves/typing). This is why I'd prefer testing to deal with potentially broken Pokmeon rather than not realizing a threat would become broken after we did our last ban. Why stop if you're not done? Would you stop writing an exam if you weren't done just because you didn't want to write it anymore?

Where in your post, Heysup, have you ever shown your "definition" of competitive to be more appropriate--not in the context of Smogon's present culture, but in general-- than the one Firestorm has repeatedly proposed (not because he invented it, but because it is the definition that every other competitive agency would assume without question)? The answer is that you haven't. Where have you shown that Smogon's own personal definition of competitive--not the one that you are just now forging on the basis of our current test-oriented culture, but the one that has implicitly existed from the very inception of "competitive Pokemon" itself--is intentionally inconsistent with the standard ("Firestorm's") definition? You haven't. Have you even shown that the current, test-oriented, "let's make the best metagame ever" cultural makeup of Smogon is perhaps so important as to overpower the precedent laid not only by Smogon itself in past generations, but by all other competitive communities--thus necessitating either a redefinition of "competitive" or a step away from Smogon even being a so-called "competitive" community in the first place (perhaps we could be an "enjoyable-metagame-construction Pokemon community)? No, you haven't.
You have insulted people, you have made baseless assumptions, but you have not given any reason to believe that this community should not strive towards "Firestorm's" definition of "competitiveness" at all times.

The "OU metagame" is the result of a search for a balanced game, where player skill, teambuilding skill, and a certain amount of luck combine to execute victory. The "OU metagame" is in no ways perfect, but it should be pointed out that 99% of multiplayer games are often plagued by imbalance and the resulting "tiers", and it is fortunate that Pokémon's detailed depth, combined with the intelligent minds of its players, working to prevent various abuses, is capable of producing a diverse and enjoyable arena.

Smogon's goal is to produce a game that is fair and prevents various abuse. No matter how you want to define competitive, Smogon make's the game more suited for play by competitive players that use "player skill, teambuilding skill, and a certain amount of luck" to win.

If you want to continue this argument, the only thing you can really do now is attack the article itself in which case that's not for this thread; please make your own thread for this if that's your concern.

It's ironic that you suggest I've been insulting people and making baseless assumptions.

Does it make sense to have a banlist? If it makes the metagame deeper or more enjoyable to the extent that more players are more often encouraged to play to win, yes. If it doesn't, then there is no need to rock the boat and encourage people to "play to test," or "play to win mostly, but then run into a threat that they don't like dealing with, and then play to test again." Therefore, if we don't have any reason to believe that any significant ("Firestorm's definition of") competitive benefit will be gained from an indefinite testing process past the first few months, we should not implement such a process. Doing so is uncompetitive, whether or not Heysup happens to be supremely confident that everyone in the previous UU process was somehow completely unaffected by their participation in regular prompts to cast votes on the ban-worthiness of any Pokemon of their choosing.

I've addressed this already. Stop making the same baseless assumptions already. You know nothing about the mentality of the UU ladder. If I didn't know shit about the NBA, would it make any sense for me to jump in out of nowhere and say "man the NBA sucks people don't play to win they just want money so it's not a competitive sport".

Additionally, I've given you an absurd amount of reasoning why your assumptions are false even though I really have no obligation to.

 

[Firestorm]

Incentive
Although playing for something as prestigious (in our community) as the Smogon Tour Trophy or making sure not to let your team down in SPL certainly pushes players, playing for a $2000 cash prize is quite different.

That said, I see few cases where lack of incentive in Pokemon has been a large factor - I think Wobbuffet is the only outlier. Shitty Pokemon will see use even in a competitive environment with cash incentives. I use Young Link in SSBM even in tournaments after all. The top players will likely gravitate towards the best regardless of "honour codes". I would hope that our best players would use Wobbuffet / Kyogre / etc if made available to them and they were the best tools for the job regardless of "honour".

Competitive Philosophy
First off, I need to head off your idea that I am "trying to point out small details about how inaccurate this definition is". I'm saying the definition is false. You said yourself that you're trying to create an enjoyable metagame and that's not supposed to be the point. Either the game is enjoyable or it isn't. You speak as if only Pokemon the way it is at the end of the Generation IV tiering process is enjoyable. I believe that is false. In fact, I think Pokemon would have plenty of players whether or not we had any of the clauses we currently do. Hell, even without Sleep Clause the Video Game Championships this year saw record turnout with people having an absolute blast. Competition was fierce and I'd like anyone to make an argument that anyone was not playing to win or that the competitiors winning the Regionals, Nationals, and Worlds weren't skilled.

I am not saying the UU Testing Process is unsuccessful. I'm saying it's set up to achieve something that is different from what we should move towards competitively. If we decide to go the route of playing God again, which unfortunately I think we are, then sure I support using the UU process over the old OU process.

I would much rather we just follow Nintendo's tier list and rid our hands of the responsibility altogether. It worked in RBY. It worked in GSC. It worked for all the clauses that see no real controversy (Sleep Clause, Species Clause). Really, it as Gen 3 (Wobbuffet, and then unbanning Jirachi / Celebi) and then Gen 4 (where we started out thinking "wait maybe we shouldn't be banning everything" which then led to actually banning more things) did we start trying to control the game through external regulation rather than actual play.

People bitch about Nintendo and Game Freak being so different from our "competitive" standard, but almost every aspect of our game is implemented in the Stadium line of games. Well, aside from the points which see the most controversy (borderline Pokemon bans, DT/OHKO).

What people find enjoyable is subjective. Leaving the game be does not mean we are striving for mediocrity. You can make the game that the top players find most enjoyable. That is the current purpose of our tiering process. However, as this is supposed to be a competitive community, I don't think that's what we should be moving towards.

God I hope that was coherent. I typed half of it and had to come back to it an hour or so later. Let me know if I need to clarify.

 

[Heysup]

Just want some clarifications:

So if I understand this correctly, you don't want to test at all....but if we have to you'd rather the UU format over the OU one?

I thought you previously mentioned that you wanted a limit?

Additionally, Smogon's Philosophy is to have the best possible "competitive player"-suited metgame. Leaving a metagame as it is (with excessive luck factors and various abuses) goes against that Philosophy. Changing the Philosophy should probably be another topic.

 

[lilyhollow]

There is a lot of factually incorrect stuff about your post. For example, almost everything about my "experience level" is wrong on some level or another. That doesn't matter, though, because as a whole it is so completely out of place in any sort of rational argument that I'm not really sure how or why I would ever even respond to it. I hope others don't take that section of your post seriously as an argument in favor of an indefinite testing period, though I'm not sure how they could possibly interpret it that way anyway.

You also seem to try and argue the following: "there is no problem with an environment that encourages 'playing to test,' so long as the players who enjoy playing to win play to win. The players who play to test are irrelevant and we simply don't care about them. It would not be any better for the community to encourage those players to play to win." Feel free to tell me where this interpretation is wrong.

Your statement that RBY's lack of "skill-basedness" has nothing to do with its banlist seems crazily wrong. I literally cannot envision any asymmetrical game whose banlist has no effect on its skill ceiling. The fact is that there could have been Suspects in RBY, and probably would have been had that metagame been introduced in a culture more similar to the present one. There weren't, though, because the culture was different. The community was still "competitive," and yet the idea of fashioning its own perfect utopia of a metagame probably never even crossed its mind.

You've brought up the Smogon Philosophy a lot, even though it also says things like "Smogon attempts to avoid bans as much as possible," which hasn't been true in years, and also contradicts the "why stop testing when we haven't reached the perfect metagame??" philosophy. Anyway, none of that matters at all either, since none of the excerpts you quoted even remotely contradict "Firestorm's" definition of competitive. It says that we want a balanced metagame, where teambuilding and battling skills are relevant. I don't even know why you bolded the other part about diversity, but I'm assuming you thought it meant that "OU also strives for a diverse metagame" (which the philosophy does not actually suggest). None of this even slightly supports your position. It only proves what we both already know: Smogon constructs playable metagames.


Also, I think the NBA is pretty terrible because it places too much influence on individual players, among a number of other reasons. Is there a Policy Review forum for the NBA?

So if I understand this correctly, you don't want to test at all....but if we have to you'd rather the UU format over the OU one?

I don't know of any member in the entirety of Smogon who does not want to test anything. It's ironic you suggest we lack the proper experience to make statements on this matter, when you apparently are completely unaware of who is actually arguing what? Actually, I think Seven Deadly Sins did the same thing earlier on. Am I missing something?

This is the process that I advocate. I am pretty sure most of the people arguing against the UU process are in favor of it as well, so maybe those of you who advocate UU process should actually read it?

edit: oh, by "test anything" I mean test/ban, since there definitely are a number of players who advocate just going with some basic Nintendo banlist or whatever. I was thinking in "no initial banlist" terms.

another edit: I didn't realize you were responding specifically to Firestorm, so it turns out I was "missing something" after all. =)

 

[Firestorm]

Just want some clarifications:

So if I understand this correctly, you don't want to test at all....but if we have to you'd rather the UU format over the OU one?

I thought you previously mentioned that you wanted a limit?

Sorry I wanted to address that but forgot in the end.

My #1 Preference: Using the Battle Subway banlist as our banlist throughout the generation.
My #2 Preference: Using no ban list to start with and if it's between UU and OU formats, then using the UU format over the OU one as that seems to have worked better last generation (even though I find neither ideal, if we're going to start playing mad scientist you might as well do it more efficiently)

As for the time limit, I said ideally it would be done within 6 months because that's when the English release is so it would be awesome to go into it with a stable list that isn't going to keep changing because people are being babies about this or that being broken. I was not proposing there be a hard limit.

Additionally, Smogon's Philosophy is to have the best possible "competitive player"-suited metgame. Leaving a metagame as it is (with excessive luck factors and various abuses) goes against that Philosophy. Changing the Philosophy should probably be another topic.

Philosophy needs to be updated, yes, but it's a pretty vague article that supports my arguments about as much as they do yours.

 

[Heysup]

There is a lot of factually incorrect stuff about your post. For example, almost everything about my "experience level" is wrong on some level or another. That doesn't matter, though, because as a whole it is so completely out of place in any sort of rational argument that I'm not really sure how or why I would ever even respond to it. I hope others don't take that section of your post seriously as an argument in favor of an indefinite testing period, though I'm not sure how they could possibly interpret it that way anyway.

I'm going to be blunt. You have never played on the UU ladder (and if you have, not successfully or I'd know). Nor am I using this fact as rational. I'm merely claiming that a bunch of non-ladder players are pushing ideals they know nothing about the practice of. You're making baseless claims, and because you are not experienced in any way with this process, your assumptions/opinion don't hold much weight. Sorry for the bluntness.

You also seem to try and argue the following: "there is no problem with an environment that encourages 'playing to test,' so long as the players who enjoy playing to win play to win. The players who play to test are irrelevant and we simply don't care about them. It would not be any better for the community to encourage those players to play to win." Feel free to tell me where this interpretation is wrong.

Incorrect.

What do you hope to accomplish by ignoring the fact that I addressed your baseless "environment that encourages playing to test" baseless, conjured up to support your argument, invalid theory? You make the same baseless assumptions in every single post that you've made on this topic. It's getting really old, I suggest (for your sake as well as mine) that you stop.

In the simplest form:

People on the UU ladder play to win. People that don't give a fuck about winning (ie you and chris is me) don't play competitive Pokemon. And no, we don't really give a fuck about people who don't play competitive Pokemon in a competitive Pokemon community.

So to fix your interpretation:

"The UU test process encourages playing to win with many extra incentives directly related to testing (upper requirements, lower requirements). People that don't play to win don't play competitive Pokemon. If you play for another reason, you will not meet the requirements that can only be achieved by winning."

Somehow I'm not sure if simplifying it is going to help, there's not much I can do to stop you ignoring the facts.

Your statement that RBY's lack of "skill-basedness" has nothing to do with its banlist seems crazily wrong. I literally cannot envision any asymmetrical game whose banlist has no effect on its skill ceiling. The fact is that there could have been Suspects in RBY, and probably would have been had that metagame been introduced in a culture more similar to the present one. There weren't, though, because the culture was different. The community was still "competitive," and yet the idea of fashioning its own perfect utopia of a metagame probably never even crossed its mind.

Isn't that line contradicting everything you've been arguing? You're saying that banlist affects the skill ceiling (which I'm assuming you mean to be "skill involvement", and in a positive way).

The RBY metagame did not have suspects. If there were Pokemon that were too good, they'd have banned them. Obviously there wasn't a need for that, and until Gen 4 it hasn't been needed. You not playing Gen 4 severely limits your ability to understand why the tests are needed.

You've brought up the Smogon Philosophy a lot, even though it also says things like "Smogon attempts to avoid bans as much as possible," which hasn't been true in years, and also contradicts the "why stop testing when we haven't reached the perfect metagame??" philosophy. Anyway, none of that matters at all either, since none of the excerpts you quoted even remotely contradict "Firestorm's" definition of competitive. It says that we want a balanced metagame, where teambuilding and battling skills are relevant. I don't even know why you bolded the other part about diversity, but I'm assuming you thought it meant that "OU also strives for a diverse metagame" (which the philosophy does not actually suggest). None of this even slightly supports your position. It only proves what we both already know: Smogon constructs playable metagames.

You're once again being pedantic about the definition of competitive exactly when the bigger picture are smogon's goals. Competitive battling is defined as Firestorm defined it, but it's only a small part of Smogon's goal. I barely misused the term once (it's commonly understood that competitiveness and "skill-basedness" generally meen the same thing, but that was my mistake to assume they did) and you're literally focusing your entire argument.

this site stands for having a "skill-based" metagame

The "OU metagame" is the result of a search for a balanced game, where player skill, teambuilding skill, and a certain amount of luck combine to execute victory.

Doesn't support my position? Please.

Also, I think the NBA is pretty terrible because it places too much influence on individual players, among a number of other reasons. Is there a Policy Review forum for the NBA?

Trolling doesn't disprove my point. I don't know shit about the NBA but I'm trying to push my opinion as fact in their policy discussions. I'm also making claims about how their players act, even though I have never been a part of the NBA.

I don't know of any member in the entirety of Smogon who does not want to test anything. It's ironic you suggest we lack the proper experience to make statements on this matter, when you apparently are completely unaware of who is actually arguing what? Actually, I think Seven Deadly Sins did the same thing earlier on. Am I missing something?

Yes.

As for the time limit, I said ideally it would be done within 6 months because that's when the English release is so it would be awesome to go into it with a stable list that isn't going to keep changing because people are being babies about this or that being broken. I was not proposing there be a hard limit.

This is the part I disagree with. You're not considering the fact that if the metagame can be stable in said 6 months, it will with the UU test. The banlist won't change if the metagame has no broken Pokemon.

Philosophy needs to be updated, yes, but it's a pretty vague article that supports my arguments about as much as they do yours.

This is true. This is why I was more so using it for Blame Game/Chris is me posts.

 

[cim]

Just to be clear, I've never said that Smogon battlers don't aim to win in general, or that it's not a goal of the battlers. And yes, I've read Smogon's Philosophy... I'm just saying that there's no true incentive in an economic sense, which is what your original argument was using. I'm not even sure what you're arguing about right now.

 

[shrang]

You also have to take into account how much people want to win as well. There are cases where I'd be using an alt and not caring whether I won or lost because I'm testing new things or just being totally stupid (Like running Pikachu in Ubers, SD Skarm, and other random sets). While I want to win, a lot of the time, I (and I'm quite sure many others) would be just playing to try new things, and winning is just something nice to have come out of it.