Format Discussion Metronome Battle

black cat no hat said:
Do you think it is possible for the worst team to win against a "normal" team by luck? Or would the worst team be so bad that it could never possibly win?
Click to expand...
On a related topic I did a personal challenge in Gen 7 to try winning with each level decreasing after a win using Simple Shaymin and got down to level 75 before I decided to stop (replay), though I think a lot of people may not have been using full EVs still so that might be harder today. It would be interesting to see how far a point you can still put up a decent fight with, but as mentioned luck can definitely force a win like with a T1 Explosion OHKO as well.


Happy November and end of daylight savings! As the flow of time reverses once more before the year approaches its end, we can take the season of remembrance to look back on October and be thankful for the echoes we leave behind.

In other Smogon news, the current CAP 35 in progress is looking to be an Electric/Normal type with a 136 HP / 73 Atk / 81 Def / 90 SpA / 98 SpD / 56 Spe (534 BST) stat spread which is pretty solid.

https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-10/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt
https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-10/moveset/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt

The battle count rises yet more up to 36561, breaking through the 30k threshold again.

October 2024: 1630-weighted top 10 + last month positions:​

#1: Mega Venusaur (no change) :venusaur-mega:
#2: Mega Heracross (no change) :heracross-mega:
#3: Blissey (#6) :blissey:
#4: Pecharunt (#3) :pecharunt:
#5: Mega Ampharos (#4) :ampharos-mega:
#6: Ting-Lu (#5) :ting-lu:
#7: Mega Sableye (no change) :sableye-mega:
#8: Mega Slowbro (no change) :slowbro-mega:
#9: Type: Null (#13) :type null:
#10: Necturna (#11) :necturna:

Not much has changed but Blissey stakes a claim for the top 3 while Ting-Lu slips yet further down the ranks reaching a new low again. Though as Slakoth has showed though, Blissey is not infallible. As for dark horses, Guzzlord makes a decent showing for itself in #22 with about half the uses of its surroundings, and Mega Pinsir makes #31 above Regirock and Mega Gardevoir, but there's a very big one that gave some red flags and turned this whole story around.

A name that immediately stuck out to me was Rotom-Wash at #17 as a mon I have not seen particularly talked about at all, yet suddenly breaking 1000 uses, and even in September it only reached 17 uses with even less in the prior months. If I had to guess, this would mark the return of hippobotas who I once noted in February 2021 as picking from a random selection of mons that seems to be consistent, including the notable choice of Rotom-Wash as a clear indicator of bot influence, and it seems like based on their replays they are indeed active again and using tera stellar in slot 1, as well as most of the mons placing from 11-17 (Mega Heracross, Mega Venusaur, Blissey, Mega Sableye, Mega Camerupt, Mega Slowbro, Snorlax, Rotom-Wash, Landorus-Therian, + Pecharunt, Ting-Lu, Swampert, Type: Null, Mega Ampharos noticed this time). My condolences to the person who was getting salty dealing with the bot but thanks for all the sample replays. To everyone else, I guess you can better know a matchup even though the bot still uses random picks anyway. And to hippobotas I still respect the unique nicknames per mon.

1730693188875.png

An example of bot influence.

With this in mind, it pretty much skews most of the top usage stats even higher, and moveset stats towards stellar tera types and such, so I'll just go into the viability ceilings (highest GXE of a user that used a mon) for now. Blissey has a major lead with 85, ahead of both Venusaur and Necturna's 82 and Heracross's 81, but 80 is tied with Zapdos and base Pikachu (not -Starter, still Imposter), though it doesn't look like they were particular partners. Following up at 79 are Ting-Lu (Simple/WP from the bot mostly), Dragonite/Salamence/Kommo-o all with some degree of Aerilate use though Kommo-o is mostly Bulletproof, as well as Magic Bounce Revenankh which seems to be the pair with Dragonite and Salamence/Kommo-o being their own duo, and lastly we have Friend Guard Dusclops, Mega Altaria (pretty divided between Pixilate/Pickup/Good as Gold/Magic Bounce/Contrary) and Mega Kangaskhan (mainly Good as Gold and Mirror Herb) in 78.

I'll leave off there, but the moveset stats should provide some good insight on the bot's sets in case you're wondering, though its success is probably more just due to sheer time than any particular strategy to be mimicked by a human. I guess I will point out the Rotom-Wash in particular as its trademark mon to me, being Levitate/Choice Specs/Quiet and having a viability ceiling of 70.
 
lmao sry ab that here's my take on my bot. pls lmk y'alls thoughts

pros: def shortens queue time, esp in deader hours / is funny (to me)
cons: poisons usage stats / can be annoying if it's all you can play vs

i've been trying to limit it to 1 match at a time and also not have it laddering all the time (i'd estimate maybe like 70% of the time it was laddering). should I reduce frequency? most of the sets in there are relatively 4fun. should this change? are there other issues i've overlooked?

i will confirm that it picks 2 sets uniformly at random w/o replacement from a pool. if it makes analysis too annoying i can make it stop lol

btw the bot had ~10k battles this month (and peaked #2!! wow!!)
 
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Hippopotas said:
lmao sry ab that here's my take on my bot. pls lmk y'alls thoughts

pros: def shortens queue time, esp in deader hours / is funny (to me)
cons: poisons usage stats / can be annoying if it's all you can play vs

i've been trying to limit it to 1 match at a time and also not have it laddering all the time (i'd estimate maybe like 70% of the time it was laddering). should I reduce frequency? most of the sets in there are relatively 4fun. should this change? are there other issues i've overlooked?

i will confirm that it picks 2 sets uniformly at random w/o replacement from a pool. if it makes analysis too annoying i can make it stop lol

btw the bot had ~10k battles this month (and peaked #2!! wow!!)
Click to expand...

Oh hey. I don't really see it as that much of a problem myself, just another factor to take in account as to why things are happening, which is interesting enough with not much else going on in the way of the meta. Personally I don't mind bot games just to have more games going since the quality of play doesn't really matter, though I haven't been on the actual ladder lately so I can't speak for everyone today, but hitting 10k battles seems like a pretty informing reflection of the ladder.
 
been on the metronome ladder a fair bit to test the new suspect system as well as for my own fun (see, 9 games to win w/ lo shuckle) and its nice to not have to wait too long for games. im a fan of the bot, but i also dont care much for usage stats for this gamemode
 
Hippopotas said:
lmao sry ab that here's my take on my bot. pls lmk y'alls thoughts

pros: def shortens queue time, esp in deader hours / is funny (to me)
cons: poisons usage stats / can be annoying if it's all you can play vs

i've been trying to limit it to 1 match at a time and also not have it laddering all the time (i'd estimate maybe like 70% of the time it was laddering). should I reduce frequency? most of the sets in there are relatively 4fun. should this change? are there other issues i've overlooked?

i will confirm that it picks 2 sets uniformly at random w/o replacement from a pool. if it makes analysis too annoying i can make it stop lol

btw the bot had ~10k battles this month (and peaked #2!! wow!!)
Click to expand...
I don't mind the statistical anomalies; the work you're doing to keep the format alive more than makes up for it my friend (:
 
Wanted to share the set I've been predominantly using:

Pecharunt @ Kee Berry
Ability: Good as Gold
Shiny: Yes
Tera Type: Poison
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Relaxed Nature
- Metronome

Heracross-Mega @ Choice Band
Ability: Intrepid Sword
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Brave Nature
- Metronome

I've done some experimenting with other teams, and I've also switched up the sides they're on since that can influence things like Blissey Teras. I've also discovered a couple things about the format generally:
  • The Ghost type generally is CRAZY good
  • A team structure of "one killy, one tanky" tends to work well
  • Metronome battles are really fun
 
Great progress dedede. It's interesting to see which individual choices people end up figuring out a feel for through personal experience, and I tend to like asymmetric teams too. I feel like I personally underrate Good as Gold and can't help but opt for Magic Bounce after so long, but I do like that they are very different options in practice.

And so, December has arrived. Whether finally starting to wind down or still keeping busy, life goes on while another year comes to its close. It's kind of an arbitrary point to set a marker at, but it feels like a manageable enough block of time to look back on, even with the 2020s just barely getting more distinct. It's like a day's cycle of forming your preferred approach with the options available, not being able to know who you'll encounter or what fate will have in store for the world, and going forth with resolution, accepting the given outcome at the end, yet coming back anyway to try to change it for the next time.

This month will mark a year since DLC2 released for SV's last major update. Things have pretty much settled in for a while, though Toxic Chain got banned in between, but at least 2025 will bring about some new options with the coming release of Legends Z-A. In other Smogon news, the new Electric/Normal CAP (136 HP / 73 Atk / 81 Def / 90 SpA / 98 SpD / 56 Spe) mentioned last time has since released and is usable on Showdown. It is an ox named Shox.

https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-11/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt
https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-11/moveset/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt

The battle count has fallen a bit to 31948, but is still hanging above 30k, which overall is still solid relative to the rest of the year.

November 2024: 1630-weighted top 10 + last month positions:​

#1: Mega Heracross (#2) :heracross-mega:
#2: Blissey (#3) :blissey:
#3: Mega Ampharos (#5) :ampharos-mega:
#4: Pecharunt (no change) :pecharunt:
#5: Mega Venusaur (#1) :venusaur-mega:
#6: Ting-Lu (no change) :ting-lu:
#7: Mega Sableye (no change) :sableye-mega:
#8: Type: Null (#9) :type null:
#9: Mega Slowbro (#8) :slowbro-mega:
#10: Wishiwashi-School (#15) :wishiwashi-school:

So, not a lot has changed as a whole, but there are a few main things of note like the big frog in the room. The hippobotas bot is still doing its thing outside the top 10 as noted last month. Rotom-Wash is at #16 which is my general reference point for pure bot usage, but I also overlooked Wishiwashi-School in my list of bot mons last time which immediately came back to bite me now when it got to #10, but at least I won't forget to address it again. Its main sets seem to be Ice Scales/Choice Specs with Life Orb/Magic Guard having about a third of usage, and I assume the bot is the former.

On the other hand, after maintaining a dominant #1 position for almost all of 2024 (except for June 2024 when it was #2 to Pecharunt), Mega Venusaur has fallen back down below the top 2 to #5 for the first time since August 2023, hanging back with its old partner Ting-Lu. Now 2024 isn't over just yet, but it's an interesting turn of events to keep an eye on. Even Venusaur's raw usage has been falling behind Heracross's in the last few months, though it still is #2 in raw usage. Has the coming of bot-powered rivals brought about a resurgence of parity as a new era begins, or are humans also moving on from the idea of Venusaur being a necessity as well? Hard to say. I don't see it getting much lower than this with it still having >10% weighted usage, but it more shows how these other mons have proven themselves in their own right.

The dark horse of the month I want to highlight is Mega Banette at #19 with 899 (moveset file) raw uses, just above the high uses of Dusclops, Dragapult, Hisuian Zoroark, and also Guzzlord who is also pretty much a dark horse with 729 uses. Raging Bolt at #32 this month and #30 last month is also noteworthy for a mon that hasn't really been highlighted in discussion, though I guess it has a memorable design with notably high BST, and admittedly it seems to mainly be used as a Ting-Lu partner with Good as Gold/Covert Cloak.

Over in the moveset file, I just want to start off with the viability ceilings (highest GXE of a user using a given mon) because they are also immediately raising the standard. Starting off we have an 88 viability ceiling on Type: Null and Dusclops representing Friend Guard/Eviolite bonkstall. I feel like this might be a record for the highest viability ceiling ever seen in these stats, and I'm not sure what the next highest candidate would be off the top of my head. Even if it's just on a new account going on an absurd run, it's still a notable first compared to anything else I can remember so far.

Following up from that is Ting-Lu alone at 84, favouring Simple/Weakness Policy. Then in 82, you have Dragapult and Blacephalon, just doing a lot of weird and varied mixed things as Dragapult usually does. Magic Bounce, Good as Gold, Magic Guard, and Technician all have >10% weighted usage, and the items are mainly Choice Band/Normalium Z/Mirror Herb. Blacephalon itself also has a decent amount of >1000 raw usage at #30 and is surprisingly split between Beads of Ruin, Levitate, Prankster, Storm Drain. Even its item slot is mostly Choice Specs with noticeable runner up Choice Band usage.

So at this point there's been 5 mons and none of them are in the top 5 of weighted usage, but that immediately changes at 81 with Venusaur and Heracross, still close in one area at least. Something I just noticed is that Defiant has been creeping back up on Heracross's usage, in September it was still ~8% but suddenly jumped up to 30% since October and is still around there, though on second thought this is probably also due to hippobotas judging from the Stellar usage. I suspect the same applies for Magic Bounce usage on Venusaur.

There's still one last mon at 80 and that is Pecharunt, which would be thematic if it was at 88 too. The above Kee Berry/Good as Gold set seems well represented but I also see Maranga Berry and Ice Scales which I assume is from the bot by elimination, though Kee Berry is above Maranga Berry and Ice Scales is still classically high. Lastly to round out to the top 11 mons, there is a three-way tie at 79 between Ampharos, Sableye, and Pinsir, with the latter seeming to focus on Sword of Ruin support for Heracross. I feel like this might be the highest point I've had to end off at by hitting enough mons, and having 8 mons in the 80s together also feels like some kind of record. Thanks for your reading.
 
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recently hit #1 on the ladder so i figured i'd share my team

stinky (Pecharunt) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Ice Scales
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

smelly (Pecharunt) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Ice Scales
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

pecharunt is essentially made for this format in my opinion - immune to normal moves, immune to toxic, decent attacking stats and insane bulk (especially with ice scales)

weakness policy is the main win condition but even in match ups where it doesn't matter much (mostly against imposter blissey) these two still tend to win because it takes a big hitter to knock them out effectively

really been loving this format, has been fun playing against y'all :3
 
Hippopotas said:
lmao sry ab that here's my take on my bot. pls lmk y'alls thoughts

pros: def shortens queue time, esp in deader hours / is funny (to me)
cons: poisons usage stats / can be annoying if it's all you can play vs

i've been trying to limit it to 1 match at a time and also not have it laddering all the time (i'd estimate maybe like 70% of the time it was laddering). should I reduce frequency? most of the sets in there are relatively 4fun. should this change? are there other issues i've overlooked?

i will confirm that it picks 2 sets uniformly at random w/o replacement from a pool. if it makes analysis too annoying i can make it stop lol

btw the bot had ~10k battles this month (and peaked #2!! wow!!)
Click to expand...
btw where is the team that has hippopotas in it should make one just for the memes
 
sunlightbear said:
Recently hit #1 on the ladder so i figured i'd share my team

stinky (Pecharunt) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Ice Scales
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

smelly (Pecharunt) @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Ice Scales
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

pecharunt is essentially made for this format in my opinion - immune to normal moves, immune to toxic, decent attacking stats and insane bulk (especially with ice scales)

weakness policy is the main win condition but even in match ups where it doesn't matter much (mostly against imposter blissey) these two still tend to win because it takes a big hitter to knock them out effectively

really been loving this format, has been fun playing against y'all :3
Click to expand...
Got #1 on ladder with this team too after a crazy run this evening, this setup feels great with the Pecharunts having enough bulk to take hits that proc weakness policy even against intrepid sword mega cross or other 2x atk/spec atk pokemon.
Also just got back into this format since gen 8, what's the game plan with tera?
I get Stellar or ghost is ideal but is it better to activate at the start of each duel or is it more ideal to use it midway though on a pkm that has better positioning for the end game.
1735090890516.png
 
heroninja666 said:
Also just got back into this format since gen 8, what's the game plan with tera?
I get Stellar or ghost is ideal but is it better to activate at the start of each duel or is it more ideal to use it midway though on a pkm that has better positioning for the end game.
Click to expand...
I think in nearly every circumstance immediate tera is best. Let's say you tera turn 6. Even if the expected value from your "well-positioned" tera is 2x the value generated from a turn 1 tera mon, you won't outpace the turn 1 tera until after turn 11. There's never any guarantee that metronome games last that long, and claiming a well positioned tera generates 2x EV from your turn 1 tera is also a stretch.
Basically there are two competing effects here: Early tera = more turns * lower value per turn, Later tera = less turns * higher value per turn
No matter when you do this "late tera," I claim (based on vibes) that the effect of more turns always, on average, outweighs the higher value per turn from late tera.
 
somebodyuknow2 said:
I think in nearly every circumstance immediate tera is best. Let's say you tera turn 6. Even if the expected value from your "well-positioned" tera is 2x the value generated from a turn 1 tera mon, you won't outpace the turn 1 tera until after turn 11. There's never any guarantee that metronome games last that long, and claiming a well positioned tera generates 2x EV from your turn 1 tera is also a stretch.
Basically there are two competing effects here: Early tera = more turns * lower value per turn, Later tera = less turns * higher value per turn
No matter when you do this "late tera," I claim (based on vibes) that the effect of more turns always, on average, outweighs the higher value per turn from late tera.
Click to expand...
I commonly late Tera with a mon using Weakness Policy (e.g. Ampharos-Mega on double Mega Amph teams). Weakness Policy's value plummets on mons with few weaknesses (e.g. every single mon that has gone Tera Ghost), and I prefer the safety net of Tera Ghost over the damage bonus of Tera Stellar (which encourages Terastallizing ASAP).
 
heroninja666 said:
Also just got back into this format since gen 8, what's the game plan with tera?
I get Stellar or ghost is ideal but is it better to activate at the start of each duel or is it more ideal to use it midway though on a pkm that has better positioning for the end game.
Click to expand...
I was playing some double Stellar tera offense earlier this month and I was thinking about this dilemma often. It might just be a fallacy, but my purely vibe-based approach in that case was waiting for turn 2 to see which mon looked healthier to make myself feel better than just deciding randomly turn 1 and feeling like my arbitrary choice was a waste. On the other hand, the bot seems to do well enough just pushing stellar tera on everything turn 1 all the time, so maybe it's just a mental barrier with the additional click, I don't know. It's a good question though.

Something pretty interesting I just noticed as well is that the teambuilder now links to this thread, as well as the format's new Smogon dex page, which seem to be recent additions within the month.
1735185107967.png
 
doipy hooves said:
I was playing some double Stellar tera offense earlier this month and I was thinking about this dilemma often. It might just be a fallacy, but my purely vibe-based approach in that case was waiting for turn 2 to see which mon looked healthier to make myself feel better than just deciding randomly turn 1 and feeling like my arbitrary choice was a waste. On the other hand, the bot seems to do well enough just pushing stellar tera on everything turn 1 all the time, so maybe it's just a mental barrier with the additional click, I don't know. It's a good question though.

Something pretty interesting I just noticed as well is that the teambuilder now links to this thread, as well as the format's new Smogon dex page, which seem to be recent additions within the month.
View attachment 698849
Click to expand...
By Boogity you're right. I requested the /formathelp entry on PS, but it looks like these were added too. I've submitted a description for the smogdex page that should hopefully be implemented soon.
 
So I was having a nice night getting ready to wind down, until I was nerdsniped by this thread claiming Metronome is the prime way to reverse engineer Showdown RNG seeds and predict every random outcome of a battle.

Myren Eario

Thread 'RNG Manipulation in Pokemon Showdown'

If you use the move Metronome 8-9 times in a battle, you have enough information to reverse engineer the RNG of Pokemon Showdown, and then you can predict all future random events:

Wasting time on Metronomes is of course quite bad, but being able to predict the RNG can give a huge advantage, so maybe this can be made into a viable strategy in the future.

Edit:
I've now also managed to reverse the RNG using 16-17 damage rolls from normal attacks:

Edit2: All of this has now been patched: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/on-rng.3758023/...
  • Like
  • Wow
  • Love

(Also before that, I found out Metronome is in a team tour which was also interesting and kind of led to finding this but wasn't really related directly.)

Notably there are some varied takes on how it would affect the Metronome Battle meta, from having no effect to breaking everything. Like most dichotomies, the true answer is neither yet lies somewhere between the two, though you can probably figure for yourself which side it falls more towards just by thinking about what Metronome gameplay is. But personally I wanted to see it for myself because it sounded neat.

So based on the instructions in the video, I played around for a while locally to get a feel for how the calls work, and you can see the fruits of my efforts with a proof of concept replay on main here kind of predicting stuff like this: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9metronomebattle-2271400207

(Fun fact: There are 581 Metronome eligible moves as of the current end of Gen 9.)

1735460554023.png


1735462840413.png
1735462866551.png
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1735462999620.png
1735462699004.png
1735463023750.png
1735462755575.png


1735466250482.png

Also I just want to show Azumarill getting the clutch win in this demonstration, even though I didn't press tera to change the outcome at all.

Putting together my rambling thoughts overall:

It's a fun party trick when it works. I don't think it really affects much for this format in practice but in theory maybe it does something.

Firstly it takes 2 turns to get enough info to work with, which is sometimes enough for the match to be decided anyway. I specifically set up the optimal conditions of having no speed ties and every mon actually getting an action for this to work out too.

The added effects of speed ties on random calls are very undocumented, which could also be said for many other interactions in the doubles format as I discovered on the fly, but speed ties especially seem to add a ton of frame advancements everywhere, which I believe includes when Intrepid Sword procs, which causes many edge cases that I just didn't want to bother with accounting for. Also mons can change speeds mid match and you have to account for that too.

In this test battle I was lucky to have a very simple T1/T2 to calc calls off of simple attacks and buffs/debuffs. Immediately after on T3 spread moves kind of messed me up, and I didn't really know what RNs are tied to proc chances or other things that could affect future outcome orders (though target choice seems pretty clear).

Maybe if you put in a lot of time in you could figure more patterns out, but even I don't think it's worth it, because there's just not that much to do other than show off and mess with people on ladder, if you have the time and correctly get the calls from the first 2 turns right. Ultimately the outcome is still mostly decided from the start of the battle.

Technically you do have one possible influence on the battle of pressing tera or Normalium Z or mega evolution at one point, but to actually take advantage of it you need to give up on pressing that button until you know it can matter, which by turn 2 may be too late. So there's already an explicit tradeoff you make by going this route to affect the battle later, by giving up a turn 1/2 tera to not affect the battle earlier, and running Normalium Z/a mega stone arguably doesn't make up for the item slot on its own either.

You also need to be able to predict future calls accurately too and the amount of future future calls that will be affected which I also would not want to bother with. Ultimately I just feel like the potential return on the outcome of a single game is too low for the effort put in, compared to just playing more games in the same time. But if there is ever a point that someone does manage to actually take advantage of this information to influence the outcome of an arbitrary metronome battle in practice, then I would respect the effort at least.

Even if you have a bot simulate the battle from that seed, you also can't account for the enemy's exact set or when they will press whatever button they have unless they already did it, and if we ever reach the point of Metronome 20XX where everyone is perfectly predicting each other then neither player will have pressed their button anyway. This was actually kind of similar to a thought experiment I had in Gen 8 with dynamax once.

So as of now I would say the "counterplay" is basically just having any speed ties involved, or Imposter, or something like Quick Claw or King's Rock that adds a unrevealed random call until it procs to throw people off, or just not bothering at all.

tl;dr I want to sleep. But I also wanted to figure out what this all means in practice. In conclusion I think this is neat and funny but probably won't practically affect anything, feel free to prove me wrong though with another example or anything I'm missing. Hopefully now you have a more informed idea of what this all means for Metronome Battles, because I don't know where to start with anything else. Maybe Showdown will do something about it and render this all irrelevant anyway before it even matters again. Who knows? These are interesting times. Even just Metronome (the move) getting a spotlight for something is nice and noteworthy enough for me.

Also the smogon dex description seems to be up, looking good.

EDIT: Expanded on the possible point that you could have to give up the impact of an earlier turn 1/2 tera just to potentially get something out of a tera later if you want to have an informed impact on the battle's outcome with this exploit, which is pretty timely to bring up regarding the recent question.
 
Last edited:
doipy hooves said:
So I was having a nice night getting ready to wind down, until I was nerdsniped by this thread claiming Metronome is the prime way to reverse engineer Showdown RNG seeds and predict every random outcome of a battle.

Myren Eario

Thread 'RNG Manipulation in Pokemon Showdown'

If you use the move Metronome 8-9 times in a battle, you have enough information to reverse engineer the RNG of Pokemon Showdown, and then you can predict all future random events:

Wasting time on Metronomes is of course quite bad, but being able to predict the RNG can give a huge advantage, so maybe this can be made into a viable strategy in the future.

Edit:
I've now also managed to reverse the RNG using 16-17 damage rolls from normal attacks:

Edit2: All of this has now been patched: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/on-rng.3758023/...
  • Like
  • Wow
  • Love

(Also before that, I found out Metronome is in a team tour which was also interesting and kind of led to finding this but wasn't really related directly.)

Notably there are some varied takes on how it would affect the Metronome Battle meta, from having no effect to breaking everything. Like most dichotomies, the true answer is neither yet lies somewhere between the two, though you can probably figure for yourself which side it falls more towards just by thinking about what Metronome gameplay is. But personally I wanted to see it for myself because it sounded neat.

So based on the instructions in the video, I played around for a while locally to get a feel for how the calls work, and you can see the fruits of my efforts with a proof of concept replay on main here kind of predicting stuff like this: https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9metronomebattle-2271400207

(Fun fact: There are 581 Metronome eligible moves as of the current end of Gen 9.)

View attachment 699643

View attachment 699648View attachment 699649View attachment 699650View attachment 699652View attachment 699653View attachment 699645View attachment 699654View attachment 699646

View attachment 699661
Also I just want to show Azumarill getting the clutch win in this demonstration, even though I didn't press tera to change the outcome at all.

Putting together my rambling thoughts overall:

It's a fun party trick when it works. I don't think it really affects much for this format in practice but in theory maybe it does something.

Firstly it takes 2 turns to get enough info to work with, which is sometimes enough for the match to be decided anyway. I specifically set up the optimal conditions of having no speed ties and every mon actually getting an action for this to work out too.

The added effects of speed ties on random calls are very undocumented, which could also be said for many other interactions in the doubles format as I discovered on the fly, but speed ties especially seem to add a ton of frame advancements everywhere, which I believe includes when Intrepid Sword procs, which causes many edge cases that I just didn't want to bother with accounting for. Also mons can change speeds mid match and you have to account for that too.

In this test battle I was lucky to have a very simple T1/T2 to calc calls off of simple attacks and buffs/debuffs. Immediately after on T3 spread moves kind of messed me up, and I didn't really know what RNs are tied to proc chances or other things that could affect future outcome orders (though target choice seems pretty clear).

Maybe if you put in a lot of time in you could figure more patterns out, but even I don't think it's worth it, because there's just not that much to do other than show off and mess with people on ladder, if you have the time and correctly get the calls from the first 2 turns right. Ultimately the outcome is still mostly decided from the start of the battle.

Technically you do have one possible influence on the battle of pressing tera or Normalium Z or mega evolution at one point, but to actually take advantage of it you need to give up on pressing that button until you know it can matter, which by turn 2 may be too late. So there's already an explicit tradeoff you make by going this route to affect the battle later, by giving up a turn 1/2 tera to not affect the battle earlier, and running Normalium Z/a mega stone arguably doesn't make up for the item slot on its own either.

You also need to be able to predict future calls accurately too and the amount of future future calls that will be affected which I also would not want to bother with. Ultimately I just feel like the potential return on the outcome of a single game is too low for the effort put in, compared to just playing more games in the same time. But if there is ever a point that someone does manage to actually take advantage of this information to influence the outcome of an arbitrary metronome battle in practice, then I would respect the effort at least.

Even if you have a bot simulate the battle from that seed, you also can't account for the enemy's exact set or when they will press whatever button they have unless they already did it, and if we ever reach the point of Metronome 20XX where everyone is perfectly predicting each other then neither player will have pressed their button anyway. This was actually kind of similar to a thought experiment I had in Gen 8 with dynamax once.

So as of now I would say the "counterplay" is basically just having any speed ties involved, or Imposter, or something like Quick Claw or King's Rock that adds a unrevealed random call until it procs to throw people off, or just not bothering at all.

tl;dr I want to sleep. But I also wanted to figure out what this all means in practice. In conclusion I think this is neat and funny but probably won't practically affect anything, feel free to prove me wrong though with another example or anything I'm missing. Hopefully now you have a more informed idea of what this all means for Metronome Battles, because I don't know where to start with anything else. Maybe Showdown will do something about it and render this all irrelevant anyway before it even matters again. Who knows? These are interesting times. Even just Metronome (the move) getting a spotlight for something is nice and noteworthy enough for me.

Also the smogon dex description seems to be up, looking good.

EDIT: Expanded on the possible point that you could have to give up the impact of an earlier turn 1/2 tera just to potentially get something out of a tera later if you want to have an informed impact on the battle's outcome with this exploit, which is pretty timely to bring up regarding the recent question.
Click to expand...
Yeah, this is an interesting prospect. I think there is some advantage to be gained for good strats people already use like Weakness Policy sets that wait to Tera, especially for teams that aren’t using something like Dauntless Shield to pop Mirror Herbs early. I think there’s a lot of potential for Normalium Z in particular to utilize this, but rather awkwardly, the best users of Normalium Z are the ones least suited to waiting a few turns, and holders of Normalium Z can’t Terastallize. I think having one HO mon like Intrepid Sword Mega Heracross or Download Blacephalon and one support mon like Friend Guard/Power Spot Type: Null would be the best way to try that.

If you were going to employ this RNG manipulation strategy, I think it you might as well program a bot to do it automatically, since Tera/Z timing is otherwise the only thing a bot doesn’t know when to do.

I’d never considered using this technique in Metronome battle, but I had thought about it before. The real formats to try this kind of thing in are formats with randomized team generation. If you’re player 1, then your team was generated first, so with six randomly chosen species of data, it seems pretty feasible to reverse engineer the battle’s seed and not only be able to predict RNG outcomes for the rest of the battle but also have full knowledge of your opponent’s sets. A format like Hackmons Cup practically gives you 6*4 metronome calls worth of RNG on top of the species, ability, item, EV, and IV randomization. With that much info and knowledge of your opponent’s lead species, it might even be feasible to guess the seed as player 2.
 
Happy new year and good fortune to all! Quite a bit suddenly happened right before 2024 ended, over the last page. Notably the teambuilder now featuring a links to this thread and also a Smogon dex page that you can also find under the Formats listing, with a whole description that I'm copying in here just to have an update on this topic.

Overview​

The main premise of Metronome Battle is one of tomfoolery and jest: you simply click Metronome with your two Pokémon and hope you survive longer.

Resources​

Metronome Battle is a Custom Game-based Unofficial Metagame in 2v2 format. Pokémon are only allowed one copy of the move Metronome each. Teambuilding is often a choice between stall, hyper offense, Flower Veil, Imposter, and various other fun pairings. Pokémon above 625 bst, Steel-types, residual healing, guaranteed passive damage, Pressure, and other centralizing mechanics are barred from use.
Click to expand...

Also there was a whole RNG exploit that technically affects all of PS and is still up in the air if it stands to be fixed or if cart is actually just as broken, but it is potentially practical to use in Metronome Battle by nature which accidentally added some depth in theory. Most of my thoughts are covered in the last post of last page and start of this one, but I will add on that other counterplay can include not knowing if a speed tie actually exists for certain and other hidden rolls through abilities like Poison Point. Honestly the threat of the timer or getting bored will probably work for most people too, unless someone really does work out a bot for this.

In the long run going forward, there's going to be plenty of Legends Z-A news to speculate about throughout 2025 up to its release. Hopefully there's some strong mon additions, or even items/abilities if the game actually has them, but any moves or mechanical changes probably won't matter if the [Gen 9] format remains the same. Either way, nothing is known about the game currently and that probably won't change until at least Pokemon Day. Personally I would be fine if they focused on a completely different gameplay genre though, like more of a city sim or playing around with different combat styles like PLA, but you just know there's going to be Pokemon Home and Gen 10 compatibility eventually while this franchise still lives on.

Back to the main monthly topic though, here are the usage stats for December 2024 to end off the year.

https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-12/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt
https://www.smogon.com/stats/2024-12/moveset/gen9metronomebattle-1630.txt

The battle count went down by a bit to 28122. Overall it's recovered well since the dip of Showdown being down in May 2024 though.

December 2024: 1630-weighted top 10 + last month positions:​

#1: Mega Heracross (no change) :heracross-mega:
#2: Pecharunt (#4) :pecharunt:
#3: Mega Venusaur (#5) :venusaur-mega:
#4: Blissey (#2) :blissey:
#5: Mega Ampharos (#3) :ampharos-mega:
#6: Ting-Lu (no change) :ting-lu:
#7: Mega Sableye (no change) :sableye-mega:
#8: Dusclops (#20) :dusclops:
#9: Type: Null (#8) :type null:
#10: Mega Abomasnow (#31) :abomasnow-mega:

Overall, there were more and less changes than I thought at both ends of the list. Ting-Lu is still hanging around #6 again (still favouring Simple/Weakness Policy but dropped off in viability ceiling to 74), keeping Sableye company (notably Sableye has been at #7 for 5 months now/since August 2024). Venusaur has rebounded in both weighted and raw usage since its fall from grace, though it still lags behind Pecharunt despite a raw usage lead, and Heracross ultimately managed to end 2024 on top, despite only barely taking its first #1 finish in 2024 last time in November.

Meanwhile in the latter half, Dusclops and Mega Abomasnow (Good as Gold having barely higher usage over Primordial Sea, seems to favor tera Ghost over Grass) have dug themselves out from pretty deep, though as minmaxed meta veterans they're no strangers to the top 10. In terms of the ongoing hippo/bot watch, Rotom-Wash makes #20 this time while Wishiwashi is at #19 and the other mons (Snorlax, Swampert, Regice, etc.) are spread in the places between, though I did notice Roaring Moon made #17 with 638 raw uses (counted from the moveset file) as a notable dark horse, right above Necturna. Other than that, a few mons still punch above their usage as usual like Iron Hands, Guzzlord, Pokestar Giant, Aurumoth, and Mega Banette again, though the border kind of blends around that point.

Not much else to highlight in particular, though I saw Rhydon at #39 which is kind of interesting, right above both Sirfetch'd (which I tried to use in December with Stellar but felt it was still too frail) and Mega Alakazam with its classic high uses/low weight among casual players. Also, the latest CAP Shox made its usage stat debut, and it actually made it to #74 with 65 uses, which is actually better than most surrounding mons with triple digit uses. Dhelmise is in a similar position at #58 with 91 uses... apparently it's been running Choice Band and mostly Mind's Eye/Refrigerate with Venusaur. Not what I would have ever guessed, but speaking of Mind's Eye, Porygon2 (#35) and Mega Kangaskhan (#37) seem to be making solid use of it as well.

Though I've previewed the moveset file a bit already, the viability ceilings (the highest GXE of the users that used a mon) will still serve well enough to cover the rest of the meta. Starting off, the bonkstall duo of Dusclops and Type: Null retain their lead from last month at 84, not as absurd but still a pretty strong lead. While Type: Null is more definitively Friend Guard aligned, Dusclops actually has its ability slot more closely split between things like Power Spot and Magic Bounce.

After that, Mega Venusaur is alone at 82 (Magic Bounce still a high secondary pick), followed by Mega Heracross (the usual sets lead, but I just want to point out 6% Aerilate usage right over 5% Sword of Ruin) and Mega Gallade (Defiant/Choice Band, tera Ghost) at 81. Gallade seems to lead with the thematic Gardevoir teammate pick, but also has a fair amount of Heracross and Venusaur usage which the former probably hit the ceiling with.

Next up is a three-way stall tie for 80 between Pecharunt (still Ice Scales but Weakness Policy gained a majority over Kee/Maranga Berry, with Mirror Herb probably comboed with Pickup over both too), Imposter Blissey (Mystery Berry actually gained a visible 11% usage, 56% Ghost/35% Stellar tera (I assume most Stellar usage is the bot but I don't know), and also only 26% of teammates are other Blissey (I assume most other teammates are also the bot)), and Mega Slowbro with a suspiciously specific Lightning Rod/Power Herb/Tera Stellar all with >50% usage majority. I assume this is just the influence of one particular lucky player, which goes to the potential weighted influence these ceiling players can have, but also it was paired with Pecharunt so maybe it carried some games too.

Lastly to round out to a nice 10 mons, the next highest viability ceiling is 78 with Mega Sableye (Bright Powder and Lum Berry finally beating Sablenite in usage), Mega Pinsir (Aerilate/Choice Band recovering compared to last month), and Mega Aerodactyl (Pickup/Mirror Herb). This time there were 7 mons within a ceiling of 80, which is still pretty a remarkable performance continuing from last month. Thanks for your reading.
 
doipy hooves said:
Not much else to highlight in particular, though I saw Rhydon at #39
Click to expand...
That’s me! I was trying to make Rhydon work on various teams last month, though apparently my usage of this one is what shines through the most by far
:heracross-mega: :rhydon:
Big Horn Energy (Heracross-Mega) (F) @ Mirror Herb
Ability: Defiant
Shiny: Yes
Tera Type: Electric
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Metronome

Fat butch (Rhydon) (F) @ Eviolite
Ability: Intrepid Sword
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

It’s… OK. You would think the abilities would make more sense swapped around, and you’d probably be right, but I was trying to find a way to give it a better matchup into Imposter by putting Intrepid Sword on the slower mon. That didn’t really help much the like 2 times I did run into Imposter, so it’s probably better to just give up on that matchup entirely and swap the abilities. Near the end of the month I pivoted to using Sword of Ruin on Heracross since Rhydon has defense to spare, which sort of helped.

In other news, remember this?
pyuk said:
On the topic of to-be-implemented mechanics, Mirror Herb should actually be substantially stronger than it is. It’s supposed to wait until certain intervals (after almost all switch-in related events, after moves, and probably somewhere in residuals? Needs more research) to actually activate, only then copying all the boosts it’s tallied up. For example, Mirror Herb vs. double Intrepid Sword should copy a total +2 Attack, not just +1. In the silliest case scenario, double Intimidate @ Mirror Herb vs double Defiant should result in each Mirror Herb copying a total +8 (capped at +6) Attack, while the Defiant Pokemon get a measly net +2 each. I’m currently trying to get this right on PS, but it needs more than just research. The event structure to support this kind of behavior isn’t really there, so I pretty much have to fix a bunch of other things at the same time in order for Mirror Herb Intimidate to really scare Defiant back into whatever hole it crawled out of after Opportunist’s de facto ban.
Click to expand...
2 years later and I’ve finally gotten around to doing this refactor for Mirror Herb’s sake, and I indeed fixed a bunch of other things at the same time. Admins are still not quite back yet from the holidays to review the pull request, but this could finally go through some time this month, so Mirror Herb might get a considerable buff soon.

Oh, and once that’s done, I’ll put in another very minor buff for Mirror Herb (and Opportunist) by implementing this weird recent find:
DaWoblefet said:
Mirror Herb and Opportunist can copy the increase in critical hit ratio from Dragon Cheer (see cartridge footage).
  • Mirror Herb / Opportunist can't copy Focus Energy.
  • When Dragon Cheer is copied, if the original target of Dragon Cheer was a Dragon-type, Opportunist will copy +2 in critical hit ratio.
  • If the Pokemon is already at 3 stages of critical hit ratio from Dragon Cheer, Opportunist will announce itself, but not attempt to copy any more.
  • Psych Up can copy the Opportunist-copied Dragon Cheer critical hit boosts.
Dragon Cheer is the only move in the move data dumps that has a value of 8 in the first element of the StatAmps column. So I imagine that's what is causing it to behave like other stat boosting moves that Opportunist can take advantage of.

0 = no stat change
1 = Attack
2 = Defense
3 = Special Attack
4 = Special Defense
5 = Speed
6 = Accuracy
7 = Evasion
8 = Critical hit rate
9 = Omniboost (Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special Defense, Speed)
Click to expand...
Honestly, though, that will probably be a nerf for Mirror Herb, not a buff. +1 critical hit ratio is nice and all, but popping a Mirror Herb for that before rolling Earthquake/Bulldoze/Brutal Swing/Sandsear Storm into double WP Ice Scales Pecharunt will definitely happen to someone, and it won’t feel good for them.
 
Just hit the 1500s on Metronome ladder with a team with Shox on it, and used the team below from 1400 to 1500s:
Screenshot_20250104-021108.png


:SV/Shox:
Shox @ Mirror Herb
Ability: Magic Bounce
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

:SV/Pecharunt:
Pecharunt @ Weakness Policy
Ability: Ice Scales
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Sassy Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome

Shox has great bulk and Pecharunt-like offences (went Brave on Shox to shore up its worse Attack stat). Being slower than Pecharunt and therefore winning Perish Song wars against it helps. Tera Ghost Shox on Turn 1.

Yes, you can blame me for a lot of last month's Shox activity on the Metronome ladder.

Mainly having free time during dead hours (and therefore laddering during said hours) helps.
 
Hey guys. I'll take this time to talk about this tier, from my perspective, since I left it and came back a few weeks ago.
1736732478728.png

I just cracked top 300. Yippee...

:Pecharunt: :choice band:
K (Pecharunt) @ Choice Band
Ability: Good as Gold
Tera Type: Stellar
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome


:ting lu: :clear amulet:
Trojan (Ting-Lu) @ Clear Amulet
Ability: Unaware
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def / 252 SpA / 252 SpD
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Metronome
^ This is the duo that did it for me. Before this, I tested out a duo of Imposter Blissey + Unaware Glastrier, but after realizing that Blissey isn't that great and Pecharunt/Ting-Lu offer more bulk, this was the better option for me.


Now, this tier to me is honestly pretty restricting. Personally, I feel as though the numerous Imposter, Flower Veil (at least, earlier in the laddering), Mega Heracross, Pecharunt, and Ting-Lu are just kinda... boring now. Like sure, every now and then, there comes the meta teams. And I respect the grind of wanting to peak the ladder. But at some point, it gets really boring seeing the same dudes over, and over, and over again. So with that, let me raise some ideas for meta shifts that may or may not happen (kinda like the rise of Mega Camerupt and Regirock a few years back).
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ FLAME BODY
This is a stupid ability. It allows you to burn 30% of all contact moves that hit you. If you are to pair this with a bulky pokemon like Glastier, Pecharunt, or Ting-Lu, this suddenly turns into an ability that procs on A LOT, of moves. Like... most physical moves already make contact, so this just makes things even easier for you.

TINTED LENS
Okay, now Intrepid Sword is pretty good. Defiant and Competitive are also, pretty good. But what if... instead of those abilities, we have Tinted Lens?? While unconventional, Tinted Lens deals neutral damage to every non-immunity in the game, no matter what happens. What this means in practice is say I were to use a Cross Poison on Pecharunt.
+1 252+ Atk Choice Band Heracross-Mega Cross Poison vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Pecharunt: 31-37 (8.1 - 9.7%) -- possibly the worst move ever
252+ Atk Choice Band Tinted Lens Heracross-Mega Cross Poison vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Pecharunt: 42-50 (11 - 13.1%) -- possible 8HKO
^ That right there, is an extra 4% worth of damage. It seems small, but every % counts in this meta. 1% is the difference between life and death, so I would recommend investing into this ability as a way to always deal solid damage every turn.

INNARDS OUT
The most exotic of everything I mention today. Okay just picture this though...
+1 252+ Atk Choice Band Heracross-Mega Fire Lash vs. 252 HP / 0- Def 0 IVs Wobbuffet: 613-722 (104.9 - 123.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO
^ A decently powerful neutral attack, in exchange for a KO. While seen a bit in the past, this ability has fallen out of favor, due to the prevalence of abilities like Defiant, Good as Gold, and the sort. But the very thought of having a super high HP, low defense Pokemon completely shatter the hopes and dreams of that Mega Heracross is just too good to pass up man. Best used on mons like Drifblim and Wobbuffet.

MUMMY
Now what if we had no ability? This is Neutralizing Gas, but only on contact moves. Like Flame Body, this ability is kinda nuts if used properly. It doesn't do well against a lot of strats like Intrepid Sword or Imposter, but aside from that really... you have free reign to toss around useless abilities to Pokemon that kinda want their ability.

:sv/avalugg:
Now, this is the peak of "all in". A mon so physically bulky, and yet so specially frail. This would probably be the best user of Flame Body, with a tera type of something like Rock or... something? To make your special bulk not seem so terrible. Maybe Tera Dragon, ironically, to be resistant to most special types (water, grass, electric, and sometimes fire)

:sv/Drifblim:
As said before, this is the Innards Out fella. A 150 base HP stat is ludicrous, but its got some pretty lackluster defenses (44 Defense, 54 Special Defense). Innards Out is INCREDIBLY risky of a strat, relying on your opponent having strong mons to KO, but... yk. It is a mon with a niche.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ That's all I got for y'all. I'll post anything I find, and test out the stats I talked about in this post. Huzzah for top 300, and bye bye folks.
 
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