I'd like to see a ruleset that people are happy with tested in a circuit before sv natdex gets added to the flagship tour
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Tournament DCL II - Format Discussion
- Thread starter Princess Autumn
- Start date
- Status
Avoid all single slots.
Dcl 2 final format discussion
Dcl1:
476 signups
Sv: 379
Galar Dex: 314
Usum: 291
Oras: 238
Vgc: 169
Sitrus
Dpl S8
176 signups
Sv: 140
Swsh: 123
Usum: 112
Oras: 98
Dpl S7
195 signups
Sv: 161
Swsh: 155
Usum: 127
Oras: 99
Based on the numbers, purely looking at formats consistent in all three tours, the numbers support having SWSH as the doubled up tier. However, due to the general negative sentiment towards doubling up this slot from DCL1, the next option appears to be USUM.
As for formats that are not currently in the tour, none of them pull enough numbers to justify a spot, going based on previous tour signups of tours that were included on the calendar. Additionally, these formats had consistent formatting with other tours, so the structure carrying over has less friction for people trying these tours. Even so, they did not pull very good numbers despite being a part of the circuit.
Estimations of player count based on # of draftees divded by 0.625 (since only 62.5% of players minimum are taken for each tour)
ORAS - 545
Summer Seasonal - 522
SV Natdex - 489
Winter Seasonal - 473
USUM - 428
SS Natdex - 335
Ubers - 254
Low Tier - 219
VGC - 153
Based on these signups, the implication is that ORAS would actually be the preferred tier, with SV followed by natdex. So the numbers are contradictory in support of one tier over another, realistically favouring USUM, as that has historically had more team tour signups as the secondary format than oras, after swsh. SV natdex while in theory a good idea, would be incredibly uncompetitive as there is not a consistent amount of playtesting for this format and the tierlists are format are inconsistent across the board. For example, here are some example large communities that run natdex leagues, all with slightly to significantly varying formats:
Smogon Natdex:
SV Natdex - 489
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...94iVJTMvTWos/edit?gid=420655377#gid=420655377
EGA:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1eZB92fXEb5Ge3w40cLA-AnlOG8fw2vFs1HRnGsWKHCc/edit
Season 10: 67
Season 9: 101
BPL:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...QPc4zRpyTY/edit?gid=1919671787#gid=1919671787
Season 11: 161 (Standard NatDex)
Season 10: 194 (Reduced Standard NatDex)
These are some of the prominent natdex leagues in the community, which all have varying formats, tierlists, rulesets while all being "natdex". There is no consistency within the rulesets people play with, which make it hard to properly playtest a tier and ensure that it is competitively viable to be used in a team tour format. As such, natdex appears to be a less suitable option for the final tier.
Now based on VGC signup numbers, it should appear as a non starter for the final tier option. However, VGC draft in smogon setting was set up to fail from the start. The format was not included in the calendar, which is a big place for people to see upcoming tournaments to plan out the tournaments they want to play in so they are not overloaded. Additionally, the VGC draft tour was announced on April 2nd, 2024, having not wrapped up yet. Sitrus Team Circuit, a team tour dedicated solely to the playing of the VGC format, was announced on March 1st, 2024, to be run from April until July 7th. What incentive is there for a player interested in VGC to sign up for the VGC draft tour when it counts for no points and a more competitive option has been announced a month in advance for them to play in?
Additionally, the format for the VGC tour makes no sense within the context of the tour format, especially considering the other tours Smogon runs. The format run is 110 points for 10 pokemon. Not only does not a single other Smogon tournament run this format, it is also different from the previous DCL1 format, AND it is different from the premiere, largest and most competitive VGC draft community's tierlist (9-11. There is no competitive backing for this format across any other VGC format, and it is not consistent with other draft formats. How likely is someone who is not familiar with the format supposed to sign up when they have no baseline information to base their choice off of?
Next, the point of established VGC players not turning up is proven to be unfair from the DCL player signups
List of people who played at least 1 game in DCL for VGC, and what did they show up to play (smogon vgc draft, SITRUS or :
charmdi - played SITRUS, went 6-1
SMB - uncontested top 1 in DOU currently https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...jDr4yIrPS4zU/edit?gid=167927743#gid=167927743
sempra - OSDT 4 finalist https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...s-tournament-iv-finals-won-by-frixel.3744143/
tiddivicious - qualified for VGC worlds this year, played team canada WCOP (with sempra)
Lindwurm - played SITRUS, went 1-6
trace - played SITRUS, went 0-6
StreetCredCookie - played SITRUS, went 6-1
Feyy - won OSDT https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...es-tournament-iii-finals-won-by-feyy.3727972/
Mogo - played SITRUS, went 4-2
M1so - played SIRTUS, went 3-4
Bananacrazy111 - played SITRUS, went 2-5
Demantoid - top 10 all time smogon doubles player https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...jDr4yIrPS4zU/edit?gid=167927743#gid=167927743
Flying Beagle - played SITRUS, went 0-1, playing VGC tour called OPL https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1QNXHhPM_RDWWMs5nynvpAYT8ZCrzi7ufZpW2HGTkqP0/htmlview#
Lemurro - played SITRUS, went 4-3
All of your top players from last DCL played in other more competitive VGC or doubles formats, draft or non draft related. They have no incentive to play in the vgc draft tour, so why would they? Your newer players to the format have no incentive to play in the format, so why would they? If new and old players have no incentive to play, who is going to play your tour? Only the people who sign up for every single tournament or the diehard fans of the format would even be interested in playing this tournament.
Now, all these players should have tried smogon vgc draft at least once right? well they did. The list of players who played the format once again, this time with who signed for the initial smogon vgc draft tournament (which BTW, is not even in the draft forum, is in the VGC forum, so how do you expect casual draft players to even find this?) signed up will be represented through a Y, no sign up represented through a N.
charmdi - N
SMB - N
sempra - Y
tiddvicious - N
Lindwurm - Y
trace - Y
StreetCredCookie - N
Feyy - Y
Mogo - Y
M1so - Y
Bananacrazy111 - Y
Demantoid -
Flying Beagle - N
Lemurro - Y
57% of your DCL playerbase signed up for the inaugural vgc draft tournament. They then did not sign up for future tournaments for multiple reasons likely, with evidence pointing to lack of incentive. They do show up for VGC tournaments, even in remote locations that are more difficult to find, they just do not sign up when the tour provides no reason for them to sign up.
Now, the argument of the VGC players being on an "island" and having no support is a captains issue. If the captain decides to sign up for a tournament where 1/8 wins they could get they provide no support for, they are actively putting themselves at a disadvantage and it is no one but their own fault that they are in this position in the first place. Furthermore, draft players are actually showing interest in the VGC draft format through SITRUS and WBG signups, where they can learn the format in a team tour setting. Take the example of Professor Shuckle. Professor Shuckle was a DCL 1 captain, with his team making playoffs before being knocked out in the first round. Since then, he has signed up for the SITRUS team tournament, played in the VGC draft format and went 5-1. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...YAR6sXupAg/edit?gid=1662206979#gid=1662206979 People who have not had experience with VGC draft as a format who are looking to support their teammates in the future are actively doing so, learning the format and participating in team tour VGC settings where they are learning and performing in those formats.
Based on the above arguments, the criticism towards VGC appears to be fueled by poor timing, lack of incentives for new and top players in uncompetitive formats, and interest shown in other more competitive VGC and doubles formats within the community. There is no other draft format today that exists that is able to successfully run a full team tour centralized around one format other than VGC draft. There is more interest and growth towards the VGC draft scene in competitive team tour formats or places with adequate incentives. As such, I believe the best decision for DCL2's 8th and final format would be to have VGC2 as the final slot. Feel free to tag with any questions about the analysis that was done.
Thanks for reading, have a nice day :D
- Nick6564
Dcl1:
476 signups
Sv: 379
Galar Dex: 314
Usum: 291
Oras: 238
Vgc: 169
Sitrus
Dpl S8
176 signups
Sv: 140
Swsh: 123
Usum: 112
Oras: 98
Dpl S7
195 signups
Sv: 161
Swsh: 155
Usum: 127
Oras: 99
Based on the numbers, purely looking at formats consistent in all three tours, the numbers support having SWSH as the doubled up tier. However, due to the general negative sentiment towards doubling up this slot from DCL1, the next option appears to be USUM.
As for formats that are not currently in the tour, none of them pull enough numbers to justify a spot, going based on previous tour signups of tours that were included on the calendar. Additionally, these formats had consistent formatting with other tours, so the structure carrying over has less friction for people trying these tours. Even so, they did not pull very good numbers despite being a part of the circuit.
Estimations of player count based on # of draftees divded by 0.625 (since only 62.5% of players minimum are taken for each tour)
ORAS - 545
Summer Seasonal - 522
SV Natdex - 489
Winter Seasonal - 473
USUM - 428
SS Natdex - 335
Ubers - 254
Low Tier - 219
VGC - 153
Based on these signups, the implication is that ORAS would actually be the preferred tier, with SV followed by natdex. So the numbers are contradictory in support of one tier over another, realistically favouring USUM, as that has historically had more team tour signups as the secondary format than oras, after swsh. SV natdex while in theory a good idea, would be incredibly uncompetitive as there is not a consistent amount of playtesting for this format and the tierlists are format are inconsistent across the board. For example, here are some example large communities that run natdex leagues, all with slightly to significantly varying formats:
Smogon Natdex:
SV Natdex - 489
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...94iVJTMvTWos/edit?gid=420655377#gid=420655377
EGA:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1eZB92fXEb5Ge3w40cLA-AnlOG8fw2vFs1HRnGsWKHCc/edit
Season 10: 67
Season 9: 101
BPL:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...QPc4zRpyTY/edit?gid=1919671787#gid=1919671787
Season 11: 161 (Standard NatDex)
Season 10: 194 (Reduced Standard NatDex)
These are some of the prominent natdex leagues in the community, which all have varying formats, tierlists, rulesets while all being "natdex". There is no consistency within the rulesets people play with, which make it hard to properly playtest a tier and ensure that it is competitively viable to be used in a team tour format. As such, natdex appears to be a less suitable option for the final tier.
Now based on VGC signup numbers, it should appear as a non starter for the final tier option. However, VGC draft in smogon setting was set up to fail from the start. The format was not included in the calendar, which is a big place for people to see upcoming tournaments to plan out the tournaments they want to play in so they are not overloaded. Additionally, the VGC draft tour was announced on April 2nd, 2024, having not wrapped up yet. Sitrus Team Circuit, a team tour dedicated solely to the playing of the VGC format, was announced on March 1st, 2024, to be run from April until July 7th. What incentive is there for a player interested in VGC to sign up for the VGC draft tour when it counts for no points and a more competitive option has been announced a month in advance for them to play in?
Additionally, the format for the VGC tour makes no sense within the context of the tour format, especially considering the other tours Smogon runs. The format run is 110 points for 10 pokemon. Not only does not a single other Smogon tournament run this format, it is also different from the previous DCL1 format, AND it is different from the premiere, largest and most competitive VGC draft community's tierlist (9-11. There is no competitive backing for this format across any other VGC format, and it is not consistent with other draft formats. How likely is someone who is not familiar with the format supposed to sign up when they have no baseline information to base their choice off of?
Next, the point of established VGC players not turning up is proven to be unfair from the DCL player signups
List of people who played at least 1 game in DCL for VGC, and what did they show up to play (smogon vgc draft, SITRUS or :
charmdi - played SITRUS, went 6-1
SMB - uncontested top 1 in DOU currently https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...jDr4yIrPS4zU/edit?gid=167927743#gid=167927743
sempra - OSDT 4 finalist https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...s-tournament-iv-finals-won-by-frixel.3744143/
tiddivicious - qualified for VGC worlds this year, played team canada WCOP (with sempra)
Lindwurm - played SITRUS, went 1-6
trace - played SITRUS, went 0-6
StreetCredCookie - played SITRUS, went 6-1
Feyy - won OSDT https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...es-tournament-iii-finals-won-by-feyy.3727972/
Mogo - played SITRUS, went 4-2
M1so - played SIRTUS, went 3-4
Bananacrazy111 - played SITRUS, went 2-5
Demantoid - top 10 all time smogon doubles player https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...jDr4yIrPS4zU/edit?gid=167927743#gid=167927743
Flying Beagle - played SITRUS, went 0-1, playing VGC tour called OPL https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1QNXHhPM_RDWWMs5nynvpAYT8ZCrzi7ufZpW2HGTkqP0/htmlview#
Lemurro - played SITRUS, went 4-3
All of your top players from last DCL played in other more competitive VGC or doubles formats, draft or non draft related. They have no incentive to play in the vgc draft tour, so why would they? Your newer players to the format have no incentive to play in the format, so why would they? If new and old players have no incentive to play, who is going to play your tour? Only the people who sign up for every single tournament or the diehard fans of the format would even be interested in playing this tournament.
Now, all these players should have tried smogon vgc draft at least once right? well they did. The list of players who played the format once again, this time with who signed for the initial smogon vgc draft tournament (which BTW, is not even in the draft forum, is in the VGC forum, so how do you expect casual draft players to even find this?) signed up will be represented through a Y, no sign up represented through a N.
charmdi - N
SMB - N
sempra - Y
tiddvicious - N
Lindwurm - Y
trace - Y
StreetCredCookie - N
Feyy - Y
Mogo - Y
M1so - Y
Bananacrazy111 - Y
Demantoid -
Flying Beagle - N
Lemurro - Y
57% of your DCL playerbase signed up for the inaugural vgc draft tournament. They then did not sign up for future tournaments for multiple reasons likely, with evidence pointing to lack of incentive. They do show up for VGC tournaments, even in remote locations that are more difficult to find, they just do not sign up when the tour provides no reason for them to sign up.
Now, the argument of the VGC players being on an "island" and having no support is a captains issue. If the captain decides to sign up for a tournament where 1/8 wins they could get they provide no support for, they are actively putting themselves at a disadvantage and it is no one but their own fault that they are in this position in the first place. Furthermore, draft players are actually showing interest in the VGC draft format through SITRUS and WBG signups, where they can learn the format in a team tour setting. Take the example of Professor Shuckle. Professor Shuckle was a DCL 1 captain, with his team making playoffs before being knocked out in the first round. Since then, he has signed up for the SITRUS team tournament, played in the VGC draft format and went 5-1. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...YAR6sXupAg/edit?gid=1662206979#gid=1662206979 People who have not had experience with VGC draft as a format who are looking to support their teammates in the future are actively doing so, learning the format and participating in team tour VGC settings where they are learning and performing in those formats.
Based on the above arguments, the criticism towards VGC appears to be fueled by poor timing, lack of incentives for new and top players in uncompetitive formats, and interest shown in other more competitive VGC and doubles formats within the community. There is no other draft format today that exists that is able to successfully run a full team tour centralized around one format other than VGC draft. There is more interest and growth towards the VGC draft scene in competitive team tour formats or places with adequate incentives. As such, I believe the best decision for DCL2's 8th and final format would be to have VGC2 as the final slot. Feel free to tag with any questions about the analysis that was done.
Thanks for reading, have a nice day :D
- Nick6564
SIKE WE NOT DONE PART 2 BABY
The following numbers show the number of participants in DCL 1, followed by how many of them signed up for the below tournaments:
DCL1 - 99
USUM - 27/428 - 6%
ORAS - 28/545 - 5%
SV NatDex - 12/489 - 2.4%
These are the number of signups for each of the following tours that smogon draft ran over the last year for other potential formats to be chosen for the final slot. Why would you consider sign up numbers for tournaments that are not reflective of the tournament you are discussing the format for?
The following numbers show the number of participants in DCL 1, followed by how many of them signed up for the below tournaments:
DCL1 - 99
USUM - 27/428 - 6%
ORAS - 28/545 - 5%
SV NatDex - 12/489 - 2.4%
These are the number of signups for each of the following tours that smogon draft ran over the last year for other potential formats to be chosen for the final slot. Why would you consider sign up numbers for tournaments that are not reflective of the tournament you are discussing the format for?
no vgc pls.
honestly, whoever championed for there to be a vgc slot in the first DCL should be fired, or hopefully has been fired. because then we wouldn't be having this discussion lol.
also no natdex PLEASE.
it shouldn't matter that it had a large amount of signups, when the format itselfs leaves alot to be desired and needs a good amount of fixing before it can even be recommended to slot in. if u enjoy natdex, go play something else lol.
personally, i would just make the format bo9 w 3 sv and 2 of each old gen. so everyone gets to be happy!!!!
while it would be good to have a unique format for dcl to separate it from other team tours, i feel that trying to shoehorn in a format that most people aren't familiar with is only going to cause issues down the line and if you're trying to foster and showcase a competitive team tour then minimizing that should be ideal.
anyways uhhh yea no un-tiers pls!!!!
honestly, whoever championed for there to be a vgc slot in the first DCL should be fired, or hopefully has been fired. because then we wouldn't be having this discussion lol.
also no natdex PLEASE.
it shouldn't matter that it had a large amount of signups, when the format itselfs leaves alot to be desired and needs a good amount of fixing before it can even be recommended to slot in. if u enjoy natdex, go play something else lol.
personally, i would just make the format bo9 w 3 sv and 2 of each old gen. so everyone gets to be happy!!!!
while it would be good to have a unique format for dcl to separate it from other team tours, i feel that trying to shoehorn in a format that most people aren't familiar with is only going to cause issues down the line and if you're trying to foster and showcase a competitive team tour then minimizing that should be ideal.
anyways uhhh yea no un-tiers pls!!!!
If we are keeping track of this, I would like to add my support for a 2nd ORAS slot as well as for a 2nd VGC slot! I would be fine with either choice. SV NatDex and SV Low Tier are not really too different from SV Paldea Dex in my mind to have them as formats. Adding them would also make SV Singles have 4/8 slots which I thought was the argument used for not having a 4th SV Paldea slot.This doesn't indicate a decision one way or another, but by my tally this is where the posts made in this thread so far have leaned:
I also think using what format people signed up for team tours should not be used as an argument point since that data is skewed with some people just selecting tiers without really wanting to play it, just to have better odds of being drafted / play as a last resort if needed by the team. The number of people signing up for the individual tours and people expressing support for their preferred format here is a much better indication.
btw professor shuckle aka darkrai I want to do USUM
run dpl format
To be honest I was not aware that all of these were even options that were under consideration, but now that I am, much like Professor Shuckle, I would also like to contribute my opinions on these options for the sake of having it be recorded if it's being tracked.This doesn't indicate a decision one way or another, but by my tally this is where the posts made in this thread so far have leaned:
Personally, if I had to choose an easy fix, and assuming all of these options are on the table, I would choose to either:
(1) Make this tour a BO7 and have playoffs be a BO8 where the higher seed chooses the extra slot.
(2) Remove VGC Entirely and double both ORAS and USUM, as those 2 tiers seem to be the 2 oldgen tiers with the most support and active playerbase
I think option (1) fixes a lot of the issues that anyone has and also has the added benefit of not excluding the VGC subsection of our community, the only real objection to it would be that you want to keep it BO8 for potential closer standings in the regular season.
If the tour MUST be a BO8 regular season, then I think option (2) is probably the next easiest route, but I am not too excited about completely excluding the VGC player base from this tour.
Note: I am also still in support of simply adding an ORAS or USUM Slot, but given the options, I would choose one of the two options that I listed above before choosing to add a singlular ORAS or USUM slot.
Writing in support of SS NatDex whether it replaces SS or gets added in the open slot - it was what people mostly played when SS was cg for draft and most NatDex draft players would prefer it over SV.
Time to make a wall of text yahoo
I would like to argue that if anything, we disregard the data -- if we grant that VGC draft was in a bad position, we give it a better position in a fiuture individual tour based on feedback from the community. What this does NOT mean is that we should just arbitrarily include another VGC slot -- adding another Doubles slot to a primarily singles-based tour when we don't have good data for this community being integrated with SmogDraft recently -- if anything, we are at an impasse without data because if we account for the most recent tour in the data then including a tour that had only 63% of the games played in rounds 1-5 is NOT a good look -- I don't think anyone would disagree with me there.
As far as adding another slot goes, I feel like this would like be adding another DOU slot to SCL (although someone could disagree with me there) -- there's just not as much overlap between the singles scene and the doubles scene, it just seems odd to give special treatment of an extra slot to a format with a similar but different skillset to other tiers.
For the people who are arguing about how the VGC tour wasn't included as part of the circuit:
1: In smogon circuits singles tiers don't intermingle with doubles tiers from my understanding?
2: If we really wanna play that game of how VGC wasn't part of the circuit, SS NatDex also was NOT part of the circuit and got double the signups that the VGC tour did in spite of that, and definitely did not have the horrid forfeit rate that the tour did -- I will grant that there are factors like how the tour was swiss/in a separate server, however I would like to argue that Sitrus going on at the same time while being a factor still doesn't account for the fact that two huge singles tours in DPL and DLWC were also happening at the same time as SS NatDex was starting. The amount of demand for singles draft in the smogon community is just immensely bigger than vgc draft. Please stop using this argument to be pro having two slots lmao.
I'm sorry dude nothing personal but this is nonsense -- judging the tours by the percentage of DCL drafted players/the total number of the tour is just fucking with the numbers. I don't really get what you're aiming for. ALSO, again, if we consider that there were multiple other big singles team tours going on at the same time as these tours the fact that we got those numbers is pretty good (aside from the sv natdex but that's a separate demographic of interest).
I GOT GIVEN A TABLE:
4/14 (28.5%) of the DCL VGCers (idk why GXE is in this table?) signed up for this most recent tour -- I have no clue how many of them signed up for USUM or ORAS, maybe 1 or 2 but I doubt that it's going to shift the following data that much:
If we get rid of the VGC players and do not consider them as a factor from the DCL pool, that leaves 85 singles mains.
From Pandaa's data itself, if we consider the amount of singles mains that signed for each oldgen/the singles mains in dcl overall:
USUM - 27/85 - 31.7%
ORAS - 28/85 - 32.9%
Keep in mind that not every singles player cares for these various oldgens, but these rates are still impressive even without accounting for that. Even with multiple singles team tours conflicting with these individual oldgens, we have a rate that's essentially the same as the VGC players (granted it's a lower sample size of said vgc players) -- at best I would not call this a point in the VGC players favor. I don't get what the point of this argument is.
Conclusion:
Hopefully my rambling somewhat made sense, but I'm going to clarify some things:
1: I DO NOT WANT VGC REMOVED -- I think that we should give them a better chance timing wise and potentially advertising wise for a individual tour in the Smogon Draft community. However:
2: I don't think that VGC warrants a second slot to be 1/4 of our tournament -- the fact that sitrus exists is unironically super cool and I'm personally hoping to branch out to doubles someday, however considering the massive amount of interest in these miscellaneous singles formats and the lack of success of VGC in SmogDraft I don't think it warrants special treatment. I personally don't think that we need an insanely good VGC smogdraft individual tour, but one happening that doesn't have the insane amount of forfeits as well as Sitrus coming back and being even better than it was in the previous iteration would definitely give it some potential -- 10 slot DCL with 2 VGC slots is something that I could definitely see!
3: I don't personally care too much about what singles tier in particular we add, however I'll speak my piece on each:
My personal preference would probably personally be USUM = SWSH NatDex > ORAS > SV NatDex if we decide to commit to a singles tier and SS Galar is off the table.
note: btw if people wanna talk to me about this in discord dms or smth I'm def open to doing so
I would like to argue that if anything, we disregard the data -- if we grant that VGC draft was in a bad position, we give it a better position in a fiuture individual tour based on feedback from the community. What this does NOT mean is that we should just arbitrarily include another VGC slot -- adding another Doubles slot to a primarily singles-based tour when we don't have good data for this community being integrated with SmogDraft recently -- if anything, we are at an impasse without data because if we account for the most recent tour in the data then including a tour that had only 63% of the games played in rounds 1-5 is NOT a good look -- I don't think anyone would disagree with me there.
As far as adding another slot goes, I feel like this would like be adding another DOU slot to SCL (although someone could disagree with me there) -- there's just not as much overlap between the singles scene and the doubles scene, it just seems odd to give special treatment of an extra slot to a format with a similar but different skillset to other tiers.
For the people who are arguing about how the VGC tour wasn't included as part of the circuit:
1: In smogon circuits singles tiers don't intermingle with doubles tiers from my understanding?
2: If we really wanna play that game of how VGC wasn't part of the circuit, SS NatDex also was NOT part of the circuit and got double the signups that the VGC tour did in spite of that, and definitely did not have the horrid forfeit rate that the tour did -- I will grant that there are factors like how the tour was swiss/in a separate server, however I would like to argue that Sitrus going on at the same time while being a factor still doesn't account for the fact that two huge singles tours in DPL and DLWC were also happening at the same time as SS NatDex was starting. The amount of demand for singles draft in the smogon community is just immensely bigger than vgc draft. Please stop using this argument to be pro having two slots lmao.
I'm sorry dude nothing personal but this is nonsense -- judging the tours by the percentage of DCL drafted players/the total number of the tour is just fucking with the numbers. I don't really get what you're aiming for. ALSO, again, if we consider that there were multiple other big singles team tours going on at the same time as these tours the fact that we got those numbers is pretty good (aside from the sv natdex but that's a separate demographic of interest).
I GOT GIVEN A TABLE:
4/14 (28.5%) of the DCL VGCers (idk why GXE is in this table?) signed up for this most recent tour -- I have no clue how many of them signed up for USUM or ORAS, maybe 1 or 2 but I doubt that it's going to shift the following data that much:
If we get rid of the VGC players and do not consider them as a factor from the DCL pool, that leaves 85 singles mains.
From Pandaa's data itself, if we consider the amount of singles mains that signed for each oldgen/the singles mains in dcl overall:
USUM - 27/85 - 31.7%
ORAS - 28/85 - 32.9%
Keep in mind that not every singles player cares for these various oldgens, but these rates are still impressive even without accounting for that. Even with multiple singles team tours conflicting with these individual oldgens, we have a rate that's essentially the same as the VGC players (granted it's a lower sample size of said vgc players) -- at best I would not call this a point in the VGC players favor. I don't get what the point of this argument is.
Conclusion:
Hopefully my rambling somewhat made sense, but I'm going to clarify some things:
1: I DO NOT WANT VGC REMOVED -- I think that we should give them a better chance timing wise and potentially advertising wise for a individual tour in the Smogon Draft community. However:
2: I don't think that VGC warrants a second slot to be 1/4 of our tournament -- the fact that sitrus exists is unironically super cool and I'm personally hoping to branch out to doubles someday, however considering the massive amount of interest in these miscellaneous singles formats and the lack of success of VGC in SmogDraft I don't think it warrants special treatment. I personally don't think that we need an insanely good VGC smogdraft individual tour, but one happening that doesn't have the insane amount of forfeits as well as Sitrus coming back and being even better than it was in the previous iteration would definitely give it some potential -- 10 slot DCL with 2 VGC slots is something that I could definitely see!
3: I don't personally care too much about what singles tier in particular we add, however I'll speak my piece on each:
SS Galar -- I think this meta is underdeveloped and people could stand to branch out a little bit -- people often call it boring while drafting the same trash cores/overrated mons, and Spectrier being removed frees up the drafting stage quite a bit. However, I get that people don't want to include it.
SS NatDex: This could be really really cool as an inclusion -- it was the format that so many leagues took advantage of and enjoyed, and it's a way to represent the NatDex community while not going into the cesspool that is SV NatDex. Speaking of which:
SV NatDex: I would much rather not include this -- SS NatDex has a decent amount of power creep, but SV just takes it way too far in my opinion. I don't think the lack of consistency in rulesets among leagues in itself is an amazing argument but eh.
USUM/ORAS: Both of these still have active singles playerbases in team tours at the very least. While I personally dislike ORAS in some aspects (LandoT and Mega Gardevoir being by far the best performing picks statistically in singles draft team tours historically which tilts it in favor of whoever gets the top picks), I can understand why people enjoy both it and USUM.
SS NatDex: This could be really really cool as an inclusion -- it was the format that so many leagues took advantage of and enjoyed, and it's a way to represent the NatDex community while not going into the cesspool that is SV NatDex. Speaking of which:
SV NatDex: I would much rather not include this -- SS NatDex has a decent amount of power creep, but SV just takes it way too far in my opinion. I don't think the lack of consistency in rulesets among leagues in itself is an amazing argument but eh.
USUM/ORAS: Both of these still have active singles playerbases in team tours at the very least. While I personally dislike ORAS in some aspects (LandoT and Mega Gardevoir being by far the best performing picks statistically in singles draft team tours historically which tilts it in favor of whoever gets the top picks), I can understand why people enjoy both it and USUM.
My personal preference would probably personally be USUM = SWSH NatDex > ORAS > SV NatDex if we decide to commit to a singles tier and SS Galar is off the table.
note: btw if people wanna talk to me about this in discord dms or smth I'm def open to doing so
once again posting in favor of SWSH natdex, for the reasons stated above. if not swsh natdex, then USUM, but i think there's enough support in this thread to indicate that SWSH natdex should be looked at. i also think there's an argument straight replacing regular SWSH w/ it. pretty much everyone prefers swsh natdex to galar dex. i mean, that's a big part of the reason it's not 3 SV 2 SWSH etc etc. people didn't like the swsh slots last time, but people actually enjoyed swsh natdex when it was current gen.
we can all be real for a second and admit that galar dex in tours was a gregulator psy-op (shoutouts to LDI being galar dex but LD being natdex the season filled w/ LDI recruitment spots). that last part was mostly tongue in cheek, but come on, there's not a lot to be said here.
i don't really see a meaningful argument for keeping galar dex beyond some weird tier purity of "real meta" or that it emulates what smogon chose to do w/ OU in swsh, a decision i think should have no bearing on a draft tournament. it didn't have bearing on us when swsh was current gen and we all played natdex and it shouldn't have bearing now.
we can all be real for a second and admit that galar dex in tours was a gregulator psy-op (shoutouts to LDI being galar dex but LD being natdex the season filled w/ LDI recruitment spots). that last part was mostly tongue in cheek, but come on, there's not a lot to be said here.
i don't really see a meaningful argument for keeping galar dex beyond some weird tier purity of "real meta" or that it emulates what smogon chose to do w/ OU in swsh, a decision i think should have no bearing on a draft tournament. it didn't have bearing on us when swsh was current gen and we all played natdex and it shouldn't have bearing now.
Okay I'm well aware that I am not going to be in the majority on this opinion, but I figure its worth just throwing the argument out there for keeping SS2, or at the very least a SS2 with potential modifications from DCL1. At the end of this post, however, I'll also give my thoughts on the other (likelier) options.
Nick6564 's stats are fascinating to me. DCL1, DPL8, and DPL7 all had SS as the second most signed-up for format. I feel like that alone is grounds for keeping SS2. At the very least I think it makes any argument for a random USUM2 or ORAS2 completely ungrounded, and almost makes me wonder if the SS haters are just a loud minority, because *clearly* it is not as so absurdly unpopular as people seem to think. I feel like I haven't heard any justifiable explanation for ORAS2 or USUM2 that doesn't just boil down to subjective enjoyment of the meta, or the Smogon Tournament numbers in the case of ORAS (but I think as Nick also pointed out, regardless of PZZ's valid criticism of the statistical analysis, it is clear that there is somewhat of a difference in playerbase for DCL as opposed to the smogon tours broadly, so I'm not particularly swayed by using Smogon Tour numbers as opposed to just the numbers of the past 3 major team tours themselves).
But I'm sorry, if I'm looking at the second most popular format that signups voiced they want to play in during the last 3 major team tours, SS is clearly consistent in being more popular. The couple of posts on here that are just blanket stating that "its the least popular format" I think are blatantly incorrect. The fact that it is the second most recent gen is important! Do I think there is valid criticism of the SS format from DCL1? Yes. Absolutely. I think regardless of whether it maintains its second slot or not, the tier list is in need of a major overhaul. PZZ is right that the existance of Spectrier (and I think Zama and Frankenstein KB are also culprits) made drafts very stale. I'd like to see undrafted mons across the last 3 team tours majorly dropped in points and overused mid-tiers bumped up to make room for more innovation. I think some drastic tier changes based on usage to incentivize very different drafts could really make the format even more exciting. DPL got the ball rolling on this last season but I think there's room to push it even further. I (and I'm sure many other SS mains too) would be interested in helping make this happen if need be.
On the other side of that coin, I do want to say that the SS games in DCL were really dope and fun to watch! Obviously, like, all the games were. It was a great season, but there was no quality disparity in SS that justifies it being taken down a game in spite of its equal to slightly higher popularity than the other older gens.
Having said all of this, I'm sure SS2 will be replaced regardless so here are my thoughts on the other options (in order from least to most preferred):
SV Natdex - Hell no. Too inconsistent of a ruleset, and its just power creep to the max. 5 out of 8 formats every week being SV seems like wayyy too much. And fuck it, I'll be the one to say it, most of the people who are suggesting SV Natdex are not people who are gonna get drafted for DCL anyways.
ORAS/USUM - No. Signup stats don't justify it more than SwSh, and picking one over the other is arbitrary and weird.
Low Tier or some other niche Gen 9 format - I'm neutral but I just think theres better options.
VGC2 - I'm on board with it. I think its probably the silliest option but I think its also more justifable than the above options. The VGC games were genuinely some of the most exciting and intense to watch last season, and giving doubles players an extra player to work with seems dope. Plus it opens up for possibility for some singles players to try it out. ~Undead~ 's point about how teams should be drafting 2 VGC people regardless though is very true. Prep duo Lemurro and trace put ZFG on their back last season many times.
SS Natdex - Absolutely. I think it checks every box that folks are looking for:
- It spices up the SS meta, which some people find stale.
- It gives NatDex representation, which some people find important.
- It maintains the balance of 4 slots for older gens and 4 slots for Gen 9.
- It obviously takes mons, megas, and moves from USUM and ORAS metas, so its the most all-encompassing option.
- It is a NatDex meta with less of the pitfalls of insane power creep that SV Natdex has.
- It has had previous represenation in Smogon Draft with the recent tournament.
- I believe it has been tested in team tours in the past. King L5 Correct me if I'm wrong but I think it was done for a season or two in DPL?
- It keeps a second SS slot, which was, I repeat, the second most signed up for format in the past 3 team tours. Deal with it!
Regardless of the decision, looking forward to the next season! Much love to you all, including the admin for the opportunity to get the discussion going!
Nick6564 's stats are fascinating to me. DCL1, DPL8, and DPL7 all had SS as the second most signed-up for format. I feel like that alone is grounds for keeping SS2. At the very least I think it makes any argument for a random USUM2 or ORAS2 completely ungrounded, and almost makes me wonder if the SS haters are just a loud minority, because *clearly* it is not as so absurdly unpopular as people seem to think. I feel like I haven't heard any justifiable explanation for ORAS2 or USUM2 that doesn't just boil down to subjective enjoyment of the meta, or the Smogon Tournament numbers in the case of ORAS (but I think as Nick also pointed out, regardless of PZZ's valid criticism of the statistical analysis, it is clear that there is somewhat of a difference in playerbase for DCL as opposed to the smogon tours broadly, so I'm not particularly swayed by using Smogon Tour numbers as opposed to just the numbers of the past 3 major team tours themselves).
But I'm sorry, if I'm looking at the second most popular format that signups voiced they want to play in during the last 3 major team tours, SS is clearly consistent in being more popular. The couple of posts on here that are just blanket stating that "its the least popular format" I think are blatantly incorrect. The fact that it is the second most recent gen is important! Do I think there is valid criticism of the SS format from DCL1? Yes. Absolutely. I think regardless of whether it maintains its second slot or not, the tier list is in need of a major overhaul. PZZ is right that the existance of Spectrier (and I think Zama and Frankenstein KB are also culprits) made drafts very stale. I'd like to see undrafted mons across the last 3 team tours majorly dropped in points and overused mid-tiers bumped up to make room for more innovation. I think some drastic tier changes based on usage to incentivize very different drafts could really make the format even more exciting. DPL got the ball rolling on this last season but I think there's room to push it even further. I (and I'm sure many other SS mains too) would be interested in helping make this happen if need be.
On the other side of that coin, I do want to say that the SS games in DCL were really dope and fun to watch! Obviously, like, all the games were. It was a great season, but there was no quality disparity in SS that justifies it being taken down a game in spite of its equal to slightly higher popularity than the other older gens.
Having said all of this, I'm sure SS2 will be replaced regardless so here are my thoughts on the other options (in order from least to most preferred):
SV Natdex - Hell no. Too inconsistent of a ruleset, and its just power creep to the max. 5 out of 8 formats every week being SV seems like wayyy too much. And fuck it, I'll be the one to say it, most of the people who are suggesting SV Natdex are not people who are gonna get drafted for DCL anyways.
ORAS/USUM - No. Signup stats don't justify it more than SwSh, and picking one over the other is arbitrary and weird.
Low Tier or some other niche Gen 9 format - I'm neutral but I just think theres better options.
VGC2 - I'm on board with it. I think its probably the silliest option but I think its also more justifable than the above options. The VGC games were genuinely some of the most exciting and intense to watch last season, and giving doubles players an extra player to work with seems dope. Plus it opens up for possibility for some singles players to try it out. ~Undead~ 's point about how teams should be drafting 2 VGC people regardless though is very true. Prep duo Lemurro and trace put ZFG on their back last season many times.
SS Natdex - Absolutely. I think it checks every box that folks are looking for:
- It spices up the SS meta, which some people find stale.
- It gives NatDex representation, which some people find important.
- It maintains the balance of 4 slots for older gens and 4 slots for Gen 9.
- It obviously takes mons, megas, and moves from USUM and ORAS metas, so its the most all-encompassing option.
- It is a NatDex meta with less of the pitfalls of insane power creep that SV Natdex has.
- It has had previous represenation in Smogon Draft with the recent tournament.
- I believe it has been tested in team tours in the past. King L5 Correct me if I'm wrong but I think it was done for a season or two in DPL?
- It keeps a second SS slot, which was, I repeat, the second most signed up for format in the past 3 team tours. Deal with it!
Regardless of the decision, looking forward to the next season! Much love to you all, including the admin for the opportunity to get the discussion going!
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From Pandaa's data itself, if we consider the amount of singles mains that signed for each oldgen/the singles mains in dcl overall:
USUM - 27/85 - 31.7%
ORAS - 28/85 - 32.9%
(I do not understand how to quote so for reference this is from PZZ's post)
Hey, thanks for the feedback and use of the analysis I did! Discussion around what we want as the format, in support of any format, is good discussion, and glad more people are sharing their opinion.
I went back and double checked the numbers given that I gave misleading numbers (having the number of signups next to the people who signed up for DCL made those tiers look bad), and these are the numbers for the number of people who played in smogon draft tournaments for the tier they played at least 1 game in the respective tier in DCL:
oras1 - 13/21 - ~61.90%
oras2 - 7/21 - ~33.33%
Total: 20/42 - ~47.62%
vgc1 - 8/14 - ~57.14%
vgc2 - 4/14 - ~28.57%
Total: 12/28, ~42.86%
usum1 - 8/22 - ~36.36%
usum2 - 8/22 - ~36.36%
Total: 16/44 - ~36.36%
Based on this, I would be curious to understand the outspoken support for USUM as the second slot, when ORAS has a noticeably higher participation rate from the DCL playerbase in their respective tier's solo tournament. Additionally, I would question the argument that DCL VGC players did not show up for Smogon VGC events, and if there is a different explanation for why the turnout has been considerably lower for VGC tournaments (potentially explained by the tournaments being ran out of a separate discord? Though that does not explain the high forfeit rate, so not entirely sure.)
Also to the note of disregarding the data, I would agree that while some of the data is potentially helpful, some can be misleading and attributed to many varying factors. I agree that as a whole, sign up data does not fully reflect what formats we should have for DCL, or else natdex would easily be a shoe in for a format choice, despite having equivalent support as VGC in this thread.
At the end of the day, any discussion towards what we want as a format can only lead to more insight into what the community cares about and will only lead to better, more informed decisions.
USUM - 27/85 - 31.7%
ORAS - 28/85 - 32.9%
(I do not understand how to quote so for reference this is from PZZ's post)
Hey, thanks for the feedback and use of the analysis I did! Discussion around what we want as the format, in support of any format, is good discussion, and glad more people are sharing their opinion.
I went back and double checked the numbers given that I gave misleading numbers (having the number of signups next to the people who signed up for DCL made those tiers look bad), and these are the numbers for the number of people who played in smogon draft tournaments for the tier they played at least 1 game in the respective tier in DCL:
oras1 - 13/21 - ~61.90%
oras2 - 7/21 - ~33.33%
Total: 20/42 - ~47.62%
vgc1 - 8/14 - ~57.14%
vgc2 - 4/14 - ~28.57%
Total: 12/28, ~42.86%
usum1 - 8/22 - ~36.36%
usum2 - 8/22 - ~36.36%
Total: 16/44 - ~36.36%
Based on this, I would be curious to understand the outspoken support for USUM as the second slot, when ORAS has a noticeably higher participation rate from the DCL playerbase in their respective tier's solo tournament. Additionally, I would question the argument that DCL VGC players did not show up for Smogon VGC events, and if there is a different explanation for why the turnout has been considerably lower for VGC tournaments (potentially explained by the tournaments being ran out of a separate discord? Though that does not explain the high forfeit rate, so not entirely sure.)
Also to the note of disregarding the data, I would agree that while some of the data is potentially helpful, some can be misleading and attributed to many varying factors. I agree that as a whole, sign up data does not fully reflect what formats we should have for DCL, or else natdex would easily be a shoe in for a format choice, despite having equivalent support as VGC in this thread.
At the end of the day, any discussion towards what we want as a format can only lead to more insight into what the community cares about and will only lead to better, more informed decisions.
Going off my experience in running tours like Clash and the most recent SV Natdex tour I think having a 2nd VGC slot would be a great addition, as discussed earlier it won't be alienating the VGCer from the rest of the team since there would be extra support from another VGC player. It also makes drafting good VGC players more paramount since unlike the other tiers you can't just throw a singles main and expect them to know what they are doing right off the bat. Sort of like LC in Clash, it forces teams to draft players who know the tier and expand the player base within Smogon Draft which I think should be the main goal of anything we run. Having that 2nd slot also makes it less of a throwaway tier so teams won't just focus on drafting singles players and have a singles player halfway decent at VGC play the slot.
If the 2nd VGC slot is not being considered then I do want to caution from choosing SV NatDex. Unless there is a dedicated team to retiering NatDex who knows what they are doing, it is definitely the most exploitable option currently. The recent NatDex tour made me realize that the tier list is in need of an overhaul. It was a solid start but I would want the tier to have more testing before being used in DCL.
If the 2nd VGC slot is not being considered then I do want to caution from choosing SV NatDex. Unless there is a dedicated team to retiering NatDex who knows what they are doing, it is definitely the most exploitable option currently. The recent NatDex tour made me realize that the tier list is in need of an overhaul. It was a solid start but I would want the tier to have more testing before being used in DCL.
I haven't posted in this thread yet, but I've been discussing in the planning chat, so I wanted to condense the base of my thoughts into a post for here so this way my stance isn't some smoke-filled room nonsense. I have been skimming the thread and will continue to do so, but I will certainly read through any direct responses to my thoughts, as I've not seen the topic come up a lot in here or in our private channels.
I am concerned about the amount of drafting prep work that goes into DCL with the wide variety of formats. We're already seemingly moved on from Hacker's thoughts about n+2 draft boards for a tier- while not set in stone, I am operating under the assumption that it will happen, as I've not heard an outcry against it. If that changes, sure, but my concern is based on the fact that we have already have five different formats featured. While I won't advocate for the removal of VGC and in fact do not agree with it conceptually, adding a sixth format without much conversation about the draft complexity implications worries me.
I see a lot of good explanation and justification in basically every proposed idea, and I don't think any that have received serious consideration at this point are so outlandish as to need me to push against them. Additionally, there are also strong reasons to consider against many if not all of these proposed ideas, so whatever will come will involve some amount of subjectivity and community leaning.
However, I'd advocate the simplest solution of doubling up on an older generation already in the tournament, whether that's SM or ORAS, or even the secret third option of SS again. I do think that adding an entirely new tier with the three draft boards and new strategies and planning and all that comes with it is not a good idea. I don't feel particularly strongly about which old gen we double up on, I think that the best approach would be to pick one of the three of them and go with it.
I am concerned about the amount of drafting prep work that goes into DCL with the wide variety of formats. We're already seemingly moved on from Hacker's thoughts about n+2 draft boards for a tier- while not set in stone, I am operating under the assumption that it will happen, as I've not heard an outcry against it. If that changes, sure, but my concern is based on the fact that we have already have five different formats featured. While I won't advocate for the removal of VGC and in fact do not agree with it conceptually, adding a sixth format without much conversation about the draft complexity implications worries me.
I see a lot of good explanation and justification in basically every proposed idea, and I don't think any that have received serious consideration at this point are so outlandish as to need me to push against them. Additionally, there are also strong reasons to consider against many if not all of these proposed ideas, so whatever will come will involve some amount of subjectivity and community leaning.
However, I'd advocate the simplest solution of doubling up on an older generation already in the tournament, whether that's SM or ORAS, or even the secret third option of SS again. I do think that adding an entirely new tier with the three draft boards and new strategies and planning and all that comes with it is not a good idea. I don't feel particularly strongly about which old gen we double up on, I think that the best approach would be to pick one of the three of them and go with it.
Like many others, I do not want to see SV NatDex in this tournament. It doesn't have a unique playerbase to even justify over SV4, the majority of people that would want to see it in this tournament wouldn't get drafted, and I do not have enough confidence in it being competitively ready to be in this tournament with us only hosting one tournament with it. This also shouldn't be used solely against SV NatDex since it applies to adding any other unique tier(such as SS ND) but assuming my proposal of 3 drafts for slots with only one slot goes through we are adding 3 more drafts to work with in the drafting phase which alone I do not think is worth the tradeoff. Onto other options though.
SS NatDex is an interesting format and I wouldn't entirely mind it being in this tournament but it still runs into some of the same concerns I have with SS NatDex. It was a lot more popular than Galar during current gen which is a plus and is enough for me to justify in that regard bc it has seen actual play in high level tournaments before and doesn't entirely feel like a random slot. However, it also does not really have a unique playerbase at this point in time for me to think it deserves its own slot because most of those people either stuck to oldgens or just decided to play SV. I'm actually down in the future to consider replacing Galar with NatDex in future DCL's though, just not this one because we're so close to the start date and I think Galar as one slot is fine. But hey I'd prefer this over other weird formats or VGC2 for the eighth slot.
The arguments against doubling up USUM/ORAS are very silly to me though. SS did get more signups than USUM and ORAS last DCL but it was only twenty more and I think we can agree thats a minimalistic difference enough to solely justify it based on signup count. I also would definently describe them in having much more developed playerbases especially compared to SWSH because of how long these metagames have been played. I also genuinely struggle to name 8 SWSH mains who would rather play it instead of another gen, let alone 16 even if SWSH NatDex was included. I think I saw someone say doubling up one but not the other alienated the other playerbase but like genuinely how? Did doubling up SWSH last year alienate the USUM and ORAS playerbases lol? I can't really argue with adding one over the other being arbitrary but I think if it isn't current gen not all tiers need to be treated equal and I don't think that should be used as an argument unless you think doubling one but not the other is like somehow competitively bad for the tournament. I think saying SS should be favored as its the newest oldgen is also arbitrary though because it shouldn't actually mean anything in the context of the best and most competitive format this tour could run. I'm very back and forth on this but right now I think doubling USUM is good because it has the most community backing and I would say compared to the ORAS pool it has more depth to pull from both in the actual playerbase and during the drafting phase. ORAS playerbase is also really strong but I would say the top of it is significantly stronger than the rest and the drop off is a lot higher the more slots of it get included especially compared to USUM. If you wanna argue ORAS because it has the most signups in our individual tour thats more than valid though and I would say is the least arbitrary decision we could make if that means anything even if theres more people in support of a double USUM slot.
I think 1 VGC slot is great. I don't support 2 because the signups just aren't good enough to justify doubling it over any other tier. Managers should draft better so their VGC player isn't alone on their team, and if they don't wanna draft more than one VGC player than they should pick it up themselves and the tour shouldn't change format because of it.
Best of 10 with 4 SV and doubling up 2 oldgens should be on the table for future years. Not this year though to make sure our signups stay high and we'll have DFL to support players who go undrafted in the first place though.
tldr: literally double any oldgen but IMO double USUM > ORAS > SS > introduce SS NatDex
SS NatDex is an interesting format and I wouldn't entirely mind it being in this tournament but it still runs into some of the same concerns I have with SS NatDex. It was a lot more popular than Galar during current gen which is a plus and is enough for me to justify in that regard bc it has seen actual play in high level tournaments before and doesn't entirely feel like a random slot. However, it also does not really have a unique playerbase at this point in time for me to think it deserves its own slot because most of those people either stuck to oldgens or just decided to play SV. I'm actually down in the future to consider replacing Galar with NatDex in future DCL's though, just not this one because we're so close to the start date and I think Galar as one slot is fine. But hey I'd prefer this over other weird formats or VGC2 for the eighth slot.
The arguments against doubling up USUM/ORAS are very silly to me though. SS did get more signups than USUM and ORAS last DCL but it was only twenty more and I think we can agree thats a minimalistic difference enough to solely justify it based on signup count. I also would definently describe them in having much more developed playerbases especially compared to SWSH because of how long these metagames have been played. I also genuinely struggle to name 8 SWSH mains who would rather play it instead of another gen, let alone 16 even if SWSH NatDex was included. I think I saw someone say doubling up one but not the other alienated the other playerbase but like genuinely how? Did doubling up SWSH last year alienate the USUM and ORAS playerbases lol? I can't really argue with adding one over the other being arbitrary but I think if it isn't current gen not all tiers need to be treated equal and I don't think that should be used as an argument unless you think doubling one but not the other is like somehow competitively bad for the tournament. I think saying SS should be favored as its the newest oldgen is also arbitrary though because it shouldn't actually mean anything in the context of the best and most competitive format this tour could run. I'm very back and forth on this but right now I think doubling USUM is good because it has the most community backing and I would say compared to the ORAS pool it has more depth to pull from both in the actual playerbase and during the drafting phase. ORAS playerbase is also really strong but I would say the top of it is significantly stronger than the rest and the drop off is a lot higher the more slots of it get included especially compared to USUM. If you wanna argue ORAS because it has the most signups in our individual tour thats more than valid though and I would say is the least arbitrary decision we could make if that means anything even if theres more people in support of a double USUM slot.
I think 1 VGC slot is great. I don't support 2 because the signups just aren't good enough to justify doubling it over any other tier. Managers should draft better so their VGC player isn't alone on their team, and if they don't wanna draft more than one VGC player than they should pick it up themselves and the tour shouldn't change format because of it.
Best of 10 with 4 SV and doubling up 2 oldgens should be on the table for future years. Not this year though to make sure our signups stay high and we'll have DFL to support players who go undrafted in the first place though.
tldr: literally double any oldgen but IMO double USUM > ORAS > SS > introduce SS NatDex
Agree on all these points. Also yes, DPL S4 ran SWSH NatDex. I think other tours ran it primarily as well back in the day, such as TDT and PWS but I could be wrong about those, my memory is more hazy. There were also 8 mon individual tours like Trick House Tournaments I and II, I THINK the first two Cash Gangs were NatDex SWSH as well. There were also more minor tours/ones that didn't come back like Quarantine Draft Tour, but I digress.
I disagree w/ the notion that there isn't a justification for ORAS or USUM over SWSH, but if that is the stance people are taking, I implore SWSH NatDex to be the tier chosen. Like Addi says here, and Undead mentioned in a post much earlier in the thread, the tier bridges a lot of the gaps that people enjoy about each of the tiers. I think that take coming from a top USUM draft player in Undead and a top SWSH draft player in Addi is worth noting.
I disagree w/ Hacker's train of thought here, and I think this logic is worth exploring. While it's true that NatDex SWSH doesn't have a unique playerbase per say right now, it's worth noting the reason for that is mostly, if not entirely, due to the simple fact that the only major team tour in draft besides DCL that runs old gens, that being DPL, runs Galar Dex. Where are people supposed to play NatDex SWSH at a tournament level if none of the tournaments have it as a slot? Individual tours that run NatDex SWSH nowadays would be the Smogon Draft SWSH NatDex tour, which seemed to do well for itself considering, if I'm not mistaken, that it was not a part of the circuit this year?
As for the point about this being a future decision to make and not one now, I'm just kinda confused why that would be the case? This thread was put out to discuss format changes. There weren't any prior, open forum discussions on the topic for DCL's tiers up until a few days ago when this thread was made. If people are voicing their opinions on it now, surely that would mean now is exactly the time to consider that change? I think this argument just doesn't make much sense. If the traction for the change is there now, I think it's worth taking the traction and moving with it.
Importantly to me, I haven't seen much if any pushback from SWSH mains on doing NatDex SWSH, something I would expect to see if this was controversial to them. I mean, just look how much controversy and debate has surrounded the VGC slots. If this was something they were against, I would assume we'd have seen a lot more of it by now.
Bringing all this back a bit, I want to point out the obvious: a large part about why we even are having this thread in the first place is doing away with the second SWSH slot and moving it elsewhere. And it's no secret that SWSH, despite being the most recent oldgen, is not very popular. Whether or not that is reflected in the tour signups, I don't think is a great argument. I know it's anecdotal, but I've talked to a ton of DCL caliber players, and I'm sure everyone else here has too, and we all know the dislike people have Galar Dex at the higher, tournament levels. And I agree with the decision to remove the second SWSH slot, it was not popular last season. But I also think that saying that the dislike for Galar Dex reflects on NatDex SWSH in any way seems, idk, a bit weird? People obviously dislike Galar Dex, it has the smallest tournament level playerbase. But people actually do like NatDex SWSH. More people would want to actually play the tier. And it's also a tier that virtually everyone, with the exceptions of those who started draft since SV's release, has had a lot of experience with. Unlike Galar Dex which has kind of always been a tournament tier, NatDex SWSH was played in the vast majority of leagues. This makes it a flexible tier for teams, in a way that expanding USUM or ORAS or even VGC doesn't accomplish. Most of the tour signups would be competent at top level NatDex SWSH.
I make this specific point, because I think this point alone, should justify its inclusion in the tour.
fully agree with this. to add on, it doesnt make sense to add one of the old gens over the other and swsh natdex adds something unique. thank you juke for this well written post !!
If SS NatDex is with cut moves allowed like it was in the tour, it should never be slot 8. No viable league or team tournament has ever allowed cut moves. Even if cut moves aren’t allowed, this is another 2-3 drafts that need to also be done.
Can the 8th slot be chosen by whatever team each week between the three oldgens, that would also justify adding in more drafts for them and it would keep the oldgens equal, since that was a complaint for some reason.
Can the 8th slot be chosen by whatever team each week between the three oldgens, that would also justify adding in more drafts for them and it would keep the oldgens equal, since that was a complaint for some reason.
I was told that (paraphrasing) having an alternating tier of some kind, either like this or through the format DPL uses wasn't really an option, but that could have changed since/I may be stupid and that's not what was said.
I don't personally have a strong opinion on cut moves either way though.
Making both a galar dex and natdex SS slot is super goofy. If it would be added it should probably replace Galar Dex. USUM is the only viable option for the last slot.
what gives usum more credibility than other old gens tho? it does not make sense imo to prefer a specific old gen over the other
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