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Project Suggestions for OM Improvement
- Thread starter Giagantic
- Start date
omfl is a tournament that is intended to give newer players an opportunity to prove themselves and also get experience in a team tour environment. instead it's being used by veterans who don't want to put effort in to bully these players in squash matches.
of 85 players that signed up, 41 did not sign up for ompl. many of these will be people who did not feel like it was worth it because they wouldn't be drafted anyway but a select handful of them would almost certainly have been picked up. im putting the full list in a spoiler tag below to give them an opportunity to provide their pov if they so choose.
my pov is you cannot suggest that new players should be facing osake, shing, mamp or dragonillis. i think these people should be ashamed of themselves.
an easy fix would be to implement the following rule: you may only signup for omfl if you signed up for ompl OR your account signup date is less than a year old (so that we can still advertise the tour to new players). if you don't meet either criteria, you're out.
of 85 players that signed up, 41 did not sign up for ompl. many of these will be people who did not feel like it was worth it because they wouldn't be drafted anyway but a select handful of them would almost certainly have been picked up. im putting the full list in a spoiler tag below to give them an opportunity to provide their pov if they so choose.
estra
Giagantic
pecha nerd
Saaaaakill
A Welcome Guest
Test Rex
MAMP
giatneh
Genhui
Kayzn
shuzoku
pkcc
Remnonc
Evie
LogOffNow
Red-Bull Gyarados
choicebadkyurem
Amstan
hotpineapple
Mincera31
TheZackman99
a fairy
Dragonillis
cat
pheonix_gaming67
Medasus
iiFWM
rarre
Theycallmephil
ThundergamesPT2
CarTulo
LUCASQUAQUE
leall
GOATED im_m0rtal.
TheIronPikachu
Chris Chien Pao
Osake
Shing
Sir Tetris
Wifi
HikawaNozomi
Giagantic
pecha nerd
Saaaaakill
A Welcome Guest
Test Rex
MAMP
giatneh
Genhui
Kayzn
shuzoku
pkcc
Remnonc
Evie
LogOffNow
Red-Bull Gyarados
choicebadkyurem
Amstan
hotpineapple
Mincera31
TheZackman99
a fairy
Dragonillis
cat
pheonix_gaming67
Medasus
iiFWM
rarre
Theycallmephil
ThundergamesPT2
CarTulo
LUCASQUAQUE
leall
GOATED im_m0rtal.
TheIronPikachu
Chris Chien Pao
Osake
Shing
Sir Tetris
Wifi
HikawaNozomi
my pov is you cannot suggest that new players should be facing osake, shing, mamp or dragonillis. i think these people should be ashamed of themselves.
an easy fix would be to implement the following rule: you may only signup for omfl if you signed up for ompl OR your account signup date is less than a year old (so that we can still advertise the tour to new players). if you don't meet either criteria, you're out.
Not a bad idea, we could have it so the following rules apply to OMFL applications.
Signing up for OMFL requires one of the following:
- Previous Application to OMPL.
- User creation under a year.
- Lack of history regarding OM tour participation.
Dunno if I count as someone experienced since I figured since I never apply to forum tours or OMPL that OMFL was a good entry way for me to dip my toes into.
I 100% support what Greybaum said. OMFL should be a tour to showcase new OM players, and experienced players playing in it is just non sense. It could be seen as hypocrisy since I signed up for OMFL, but I am well aware that it should not been the case, I hope it'll be fixed for last year, but the rules allow it and well I might've taken the slot for a new player but I want to have fun too ig, and I believe it makes a stronger argument to prevent this, as only Evie and I (from the 4 OMPL managers sign up I think) have really played in OMPL in the past and are arguably "stronger" players that should not be there, so it won't stay unnoticed.
Players that would get drafted for OMPL do not need this spotlight, but also they do not really care of the tour most of the time and wants to test fun ideas / teams so they aren't even a guarantee of quality, and probably do not put as much effort in the tour to help other players as well (it depends obviously). Only fair option is to only allow OMPL undrafted players to sign up for OMFL (and as Greybaum pointed out on Discord, hosts should be careful to not allow price fixing OMPL signups that just want to farm OMFL, but it should be a minority of shameless players that are easy to figure out). I do not know about the 1 year old signup date as a new player could as well sign up for OMPL in order to play for OMFL so I'm not sure what it does but it's not a big deal anyway.
Adding as food for thought stuff that has been discussed on cord and maybe people / mods will have an opinion on it: delaying OMFL starts to not split time and energy between both tours, so managers from OMFL can fully support their team without having to support/play in OMPL (cuz most of OMFL managers are OMPL players, although I believe we should allow non-ompl players to manage and buy themselves in OMFL to once again promote new faces), but also spectators are more interested in how OMFL is going bc atm I feel like I'd rather watch an OMPL replay than looking at what's going on in the farmer league, so I won't actually care that much of those new players (barring 1-2 maybe). This is my view though and maybe people care more of OMFL that what I think / what I do when I'm not playing or managing it (like Ren).
Issue with this is that people that signed up for OMPL (and went undrafted) may not be available anymore for the duration of OMFL, and it's too much commitment to require people to be available on like 4 full months with OMPL + OMFL while they're signing up for OMPL (as Greybaum's suggestion was to start OMFL signups during OMPl finals), and I didn't find a good way to delay OMFL while keeping the core idea of only undrafted OMPL players are allowed to play (and if anything, I definitely value this more than delaying the tour, farmers should not be allowed in the farmers league, ironically)
E: just saw Giagantic's post so I'm answering here: including a non-OMPL participation in past editions could be a good criteria, although it would mean people that come back on the game after a long time and may not get drafted in OMPL (like lepton this year, MAMP maybe, ojr had he not beg Ivar) do not have anywhere to get the rust off / prove that they are still good at the game. But it's def an interesting criteria and we can surely figure out a good way to make OMFL more interesting than it is today by removing players that should not be there
Players that would get drafted for OMPL do not need this spotlight, but also they do not really care of the tour most of the time and wants to test fun ideas / teams so they aren't even a guarantee of quality, and probably do not put as much effort in the tour to help other players as well (it depends obviously). Only fair option is to only allow OMPL undrafted players to sign up for OMFL (and as Greybaum pointed out on Discord, hosts should be careful to not allow price fixing OMPL signups that just want to farm OMFL, but it should be a minority of shameless players that are easy to figure out). I do not know about the 1 year old signup date as a new player could as well sign up for OMPL in order to play for OMFL so I'm not sure what it does but it's not a big deal anyway.
Adding as food for thought stuff that has been discussed on cord and maybe people / mods will have an opinion on it: delaying OMFL starts to not split time and energy between both tours, so managers from OMFL can fully support their team without having to support/play in OMPL (cuz most of OMFL managers are OMPL players, although I believe we should allow non-ompl players to manage and buy themselves in OMFL to once again promote new faces), but also spectators are more interested in how OMFL is going bc atm I feel like I'd rather watch an OMPL replay than looking at what's going on in the farmer league, so I won't actually care that much of those new players (barring 1-2 maybe). This is my view though and maybe people care more of OMFL that what I think / what I do when I'm not playing or managing it (like Ren).
Issue with this is that people that signed up for OMPL (and went undrafted) may not be available anymore for the duration of OMFL, and it's too much commitment to require people to be available on like 4 full months with OMPL + OMFL while they're signing up for OMPL (as Greybaum's suggestion was to start OMFL signups during OMPl finals), and I didn't find a good way to delay OMFL while keeping the core idea of only undrafted OMPL players are allowed to play (and if anything, I definitely value this more than delaying the tour, farmers should not be allowed in the farmers league, ironically)
E: just saw Giagantic's post so I'm answering here: including a non-OMPL participation in past editions could be a good criteria, although it would mean people that come back on the game after a long time and may not get drafted in OMPL (like lepton this year, MAMP maybe, ojr had he not beg Ivar) do not have anywhere to get the rust off / prove that they are still good at the game. But it's def an interesting criteria and we can surely figure out a good way to make OMFL more interesting than it is today by removing players that should not be there
perhaps criterion could look like:
you may sign up to omfl if either of the following criterion applies to you:
- you have not participated in the last two* editions of ompl
- you signed up for this year's edition of ompl and was not drafted
I think these two points cover everything discussed above neatly thus far. point one covers for newcomer accounts, and also people who have participated in ompl before but are a bit out of it while excluding those who are actively at the top level of play. Could be missing something wit this for sure, and some might think a two edition ban is a bit high
you may sign up to omfl if either of the following criterion applies to you:
- you have not participated in the last two* editions of ompl
- you signed up for this year's edition of ompl and was not drafted
I think these two points cover everything discussed above neatly thus far. point one covers for newcomer accounts, and also people who have participated in ompl before but are a bit out of it while excluding those who are actively at the top level of play. Could be missing something wit this for sure, and some might think a two edition ban is a bit high
Im kinda washed, returned to mons a year and half ago, only played last ompl since. I went negative and costed 3k.
I used to be a good player back in the day, now im trying to git gud again cuz I like BH but I have very little free time.
MAMP comes from a similar place, his first games of current gen BH will be played during omfl.
I signed up for omfl cuz I want to actually play, and to be leveled with the current pool instead of overwhelmed. I didnt want to be bought for 3K on OMPL to just support and not play.
And I dont really like individual tours, before you propose, I like having a team.
With that said, I agree with your feelings, and I would agree to said measures to be applied, even if that meant I cant play. I would try to signup for ompl explaining I dont really want to get drafted in such instance tho.
Obligatory, "I do not speak on behalf of the staff team"
On principle, I 100% agree with this. OMFL has regularly become a tournament that is simultaneously not treated "seriously" because of the low entry bar for getting in while simultaneously seen as unfun from a newer (tour) player's perspective because of the number of highly tenured tour players using it as their stomping grounds, leaving pretty much nobody fully satisfied with it.
It's unfair to almost everyone involved; managers have to stress about drafting a team that doesn't wipe to one of the lucky teams who picks up someone that could easily 4-2 in OMPL, newer players feel beaten down on when put up against someone with years of experience, spectators don't exactly take joy in watching smurfing. I love OMFL, and I'm aware I hold it in a far better light compared to many of my peers, and I want to see it improved for everyone involved.
That being said, there's not an easy one-size-fits-all solution to solving that problem. It's incredibly unfair to characterize every PL caliber player who would prefer to participate in FL as doing something shameful; some just prefer the lower stakes environment of the tour, some are simply unlucky and didn't get picked to participate in PL, some just missed the original window. I don't think villainizing or barring these players from entry is the way to go about this.
Instead of making the tournament more competitive by lowering the skill ceiling and barring players from entry based on what are always going to be subjective criteria, I'd like to propose the opposite: Raise the skill floor. Make it so more experienced players want to take part in this team tour. Here's my proposal for how we can go about this. Once again, these are my thoughts, not those of OM Forum Staff.
Keep OMFL the same, but edit the roster of tiers to create a more competitive environment.
This is already the status quo to an extent, just pushed even further. OMFL already dropped the AAA-2 and Bo3 slots for a more competitive tournament this year, and lowering the scope of the tournament just a little further could be the push we need to entice more players into signing up. I'd personally propose a four-tier roster of AAA, BH, Mix and Mega, and STAB, with Bo3 tiebreakers.
Reducing the focus of the tournament to our 4 core tiers would not only make those pools a lot more competitive, but it would also make OMFL a viable alternative to OMPL for players not currently at the caliber to compete in the big leagues or for players who want to prove themselves for next year's OMPL. These pools would, in theory, be competitive enough to where both seasoned veterans and mid-level players with some support behind them could do well.
Would love to see thoughts on this, I want OMFL to be satisfying for everyone involved, but I also want this tour to get the respect it deserves. Instead of just being the dumb little brother to OMPL, we can make it worth following in its own right
On principle, I 100% agree with this. OMFL has regularly become a tournament that is simultaneously not treated "seriously" because of the low entry bar for getting in while simultaneously seen as unfun from a newer (tour) player's perspective because of the number of highly tenured tour players using it as their stomping grounds, leaving pretty much nobody fully satisfied with it.
It's unfair to almost everyone involved; managers have to stress about drafting a team that doesn't wipe to one of the lucky teams who picks up someone that could easily 4-2 in OMPL, newer players feel beaten down on when put up against someone with years of experience, spectators don't exactly take joy in watching smurfing. I love OMFL, and I'm aware I hold it in a far better light compared to many of my peers, and I want to see it improved for everyone involved.
That being said, there's not an easy one-size-fits-all solution to solving that problem. It's incredibly unfair to characterize every PL caliber player who would prefer to participate in FL as doing something shameful; some just prefer the lower stakes environment of the tour, some are simply unlucky and didn't get picked to participate in PL, some just missed the original window. I don't think villainizing or barring these players from entry is the way to go about this.
Instead of making the tournament more competitive by lowering the skill ceiling and barring players from entry based on what are always going to be subjective criteria, I'd like to propose the opposite: Raise the skill floor. Make it so more experienced players want to take part in this team tour. Here's my proposal for how we can go about this. Once again, these are my thoughts, not those of OM Forum Staff.
Keep OMFL the same, but edit the roster of tiers to create a more competitive environment.
This is already the status quo to an extent, just pushed even further. OMFL already dropped the AAA-2 and Bo3 slots for a more competitive tournament this year, and lowering the scope of the tournament just a little further could be the push we need to entice more players into signing up. I'd personally propose a four-tier roster of AAA, BH, Mix and Mega, and STAB, with Bo3 tiebreakers.
Reducing the focus of the tournament to our 4 core tiers would not only make those pools a lot more competitive, but it would also make OMFL a viable alternative to OMPL for players not currently at the caliber to compete in the big leagues or for players who want to prove themselves for next year's OMPL. These pools would, in theory, be competitive enough to where both seasoned veterans and mid-level players with some support behind them could do well.
Would love to see thoughts on this, I want OMFL to be satisfying for everyone involved, but I also want this tour to get the respect it deserves. Instead of just being the dumb little brother to OMPL, we can make it worth following in its own right
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was tagged to express my thoughts (I think?) and tbh I don't really have a huge stake in this but I'll say what I think anyw. realistically I'm not invested enough to debate but I'm hoping you guys can use me as a springboard and if I'm just yapping into the void then that's fine too
-there are valid reasons to sign up for omfl and not ompl (lower stress environment for playing and/or learning a new tier, the weeks being at a better time for your schedule, wanting to get to know people, derusting, also just not wanting to see yourself go undrafted in ompl) and I think it'd be bad to force someone to sign up for and go undrafted in ompl to be able to participate in ompl
-however, between the extremes of unrestricted involvement and restricted involvement, I prefer the latter as this tour to me is meant to showcase talented players who are less well known or developing
-personally i didn't sign up for ompl and signed up for omfl because i don't really care for the more tryhard environment of ompl currently and i love getting to know lesser known players and help them w making connections and getting more into the community. i probably would've been more inclined to sign up for ompl if jrdn/word had been picked as i enjoy having close friends to banter/discuss the tour with, but my core reasons remain the same and id only ever have participated as a sub at most in ompl whereas i would've been more willing to be a starter in omfl because less stress. bc I know it's already gonna get brought up - no, the jrdn thing doesn't matter for this convo, I'm just trying to be as transparent as possible, it's been a month, we're all over it. im a grown ass adult and it's currently pride month, i have more important things going on
-i deleted my signup both bc of not feeling invested and also not wanting to "take away" a spot from someone wanting to showcase themselves.
-having established players in omfl can be beneficial in motivating lesser known/developing players to build more comprehensively, showcase their gameplay more, and getting more upsets. a win against ivar (just an example) gets more eyes on you than a win against CyrusIsMySoulmate69. hell, even a good game against an established player gets eyes on you. you don't have to win to show that you know your shit
-in the off season, you all should be shouting out players you steal teams for already but especially if they're not as widely known in the community. this also gets eyes on them. and bc someone's fuming rn - ive tried shouting out every player i have gotten teams from in the past, but there have been moments where i haven't. that is bad. do as i say, not as i (used to and maybe still) do.
-tldr i think regardless of what the qualification standards are, any player who didn't get drafted for the current iteration of ompl should be able to sign up for omfl, period. that's the base criteria. any additional criteria to not only widen the pool but also accommodate players who have different reasons for signing up for omfl and not ompl is beneficial and probably worth talking about, but idc much for discussing it to completion.
also for any omfl players reading this and/or the discord and feeling awkward bc really, the way some people are talking about you guys is sorta weird imo: you got drafted for a reason, the managers are all qualified players who went out of their way to pick you out of the other people and you do have traits worth drafting. sometimes the reason for not getting drafted is being known, sometimes it's meta knowledge, sometimes it just is team composition where they can't fit you (redflix didn't deserve the hate he got during that one ompl I stand by that). sometimes it's just what the managers of ompl had for breakfast that morning. there's a ton of reasons, don't let yourselves get down and keep putting in effort and work. you all got dis
-there are valid reasons to sign up for omfl and not ompl (lower stress environment for playing and/or learning a new tier, the weeks being at a better time for your schedule, wanting to get to know people, derusting, also just not wanting to see yourself go undrafted in ompl) and I think it'd be bad to force someone to sign up for and go undrafted in ompl to be able to participate in ompl
-however, between the extremes of unrestricted involvement and restricted involvement, I prefer the latter as this tour to me is meant to showcase talented players who are less well known or developing
-personally i didn't sign up for ompl and signed up for omfl because i don't really care for the more tryhard environment of ompl currently and i love getting to know lesser known players and help them w making connections and getting more into the community. i probably would've been more inclined to sign up for ompl if jrdn/word had been picked as i enjoy having close friends to banter/discuss the tour with, but my core reasons remain the same and id only ever have participated as a sub at most in ompl whereas i would've been more willing to be a starter in omfl because less stress. bc I know it's already gonna get brought up - no, the jrdn thing doesn't matter for this convo, I'm just trying to be as transparent as possible, it's been a month, we're all over it. im a grown ass adult and it's currently pride month, i have more important things going on
-i deleted my signup both bc of not feeling invested and also not wanting to "take away" a spot from someone wanting to showcase themselves.
-having established players in omfl can be beneficial in motivating lesser known/developing players to build more comprehensively, showcase their gameplay more, and getting more upsets. a win against ivar (just an example) gets more eyes on you than a win against CyrusIsMySoulmate69. hell, even a good game against an established player gets eyes on you. you don't have to win to show that you know your shit
-in the off season, you all should be shouting out players you steal teams for already but especially if they're not as widely known in the community. this also gets eyes on them. and bc someone's fuming rn - ive tried shouting out every player i have gotten teams from in the past, but there have been moments where i haven't. that is bad. do as i say, not as i (used to and maybe still) do.
-tldr i think regardless of what the qualification standards are, any player who didn't get drafted for the current iteration of ompl should be able to sign up for omfl, period. that's the base criteria. any additional criteria to not only widen the pool but also accommodate players who have different reasons for signing up for omfl and not ompl is beneficial and probably worth talking about, but idc much for discussing it to completion.
i like this idea as a rough draft, you guys should polish it but it isn't a bad avenue to explore.
also for any omfl players reading this and/or the discord and feeling awkward bc really, the way some people are talking about you guys is sorta weird imo: you got drafted for a reason, the managers are all qualified players who went out of their way to pick you out of the other people and you do have traits worth drafting. sometimes the reason for not getting drafted is being known, sometimes it's meta knowledge, sometimes it just is team composition where they can't fit you (redflix didn't deserve the hate he got during that one ompl I stand by that). sometimes it's just what the managers of ompl had for breakfast that morning. there's a ton of reasons, don't let yourselves get down and keep putting in effort and work. you all got dis
Let's be real, I'm not the focus here, but I'll post anyway. I'm a terrible player who's captaining in OMPL, me self-buying there would be actively detrimental to my team. Frankly, I shouldn't even be starting in OMFL, my record last year was barely positive and it's not like I've played much since. I think that adding restrictions to ensure that farm leagues shouldn't have PL-level players is beneficial, and I recommend them in every farm league more or less. The manager-in-pl loophole is a hard one to navigate for sure - I'd completely understand being locked out of playing in FL if it came to it, though. But, something as simple as "must have signed up for PL to sign up for FL" is simple, reasonable, and fixes a huge problem with very little downsides.
With all due respect to some folks, a FL should not have PL-level players. There will always be folks on the threshold, FlamPoke is a good example of someone who could've been 3k'd in OMPL and just wasn't, sure, but I think it's ridiculous that someone can pass on a tournament with actual stakes to farm a buncha folks trying to establish themselves and learn the tier because they don't want the challenge or whatever. We had this problem with UUFPL, where RBY UU and Ubers UU simply didn't have a chance for FL-level players to play because those formats were in UUFPL but not UUPL for some reason, so the top level of both were able to play in it. I don't think PL-level players should be encouraged or even allowed to play in a farm league, and the way to do that is to limit the FL to players who were passed on in the PL.
i don't particular like this third point just because it introduces subjectivity into the calls. ideally we wouldn't have any increased workload for hosts to sort out and while i acknowledge this is subjective i think there's a lot of crossover between tiers; if some spl winner decides to try out aaa they are only going to need a week or two to adapt and i don't think we should have an avenue for them to access omfl for that.
they can, but people miss tour signups all the time. this part of my suggestion is just because anyone with this little experience is going to be the kind of person we want playing in omfl anyway.
adding onto that, omfl should not be seen as a place to unrust. you have opens, room tours, friendlies with... well, friends. if you unrust then you'll be picked up for ompl, and if you aren't then yeah whatever just play omfl and use the proving ground for its exact purpose.
this is also why i'm not a fan of "have not played ompl in x years" because if stresh feels like re-learning bh i don't think he should be doing that in omfl. there are far better avenues to go down for that. stresh i'm using you as an example because 1. you're the goat 2. you're not scummy enough to actually do this.
thanks @ everyone for the discussion, i recognise my last post was more antagonistic than it should have been and that's on me.
I don't know what the consensus is on this is or whether there is one, doesn't seem like there was actually a lot of discussion on this thread. The Other Team Tour is scheduled to start in about 3 months so i think it's worth thinking about this again. these are like 2 cent thoughts so are not really refined so please feel free to critique or discuss
A rehash of OMPL sounds really unappealing ngl. It's the easiest format to run but even if it has something else going on (blind draft, snake draft, etc) it just sounds so incredibly samey to what we have rn. I guess like it will probably end up being fine but I don't think we need two OMPL's a year and I think we could do better.
I think OMWC is a very good / the best option. I think given it would have a CA it would attract a lot more signups and there probably wouldn't be as much as a hassle to field 8 teams. Eligibility and balancing issues are reasonable to have, but I think for a lot of people this is a highlight of the year and it would be a shame for them to have this tour dropped. Although if we do run this back I think we need to have a look at how it's actually run - 2 pools is fine but within those pools it should really be round robin, having 2 weeks to play 3 games takes the structure out of the tour and makes it really unfun as a spectator. it also means qualification for semis is kinda fucked ngl
e: on discord it was suggested by pannu to split europe into scandinavia benelux (belgium nederlands luxembourg) and rest of europe. this creates two extra teams and also balances the regions a lot better. this does cause the question of what do we do if we hit more than 8 teams but that is a bracket issue and can be sorted out closer to the time
Spotlight Tour is also a good option, but there's the question of how and what tiers are included. I personally think a mix of current gen non-permas / oldgen permas would be fire, maybe a uuom or two if we're feeling spicy. something like camo / inh / ss aaa / ss gg / usum mnm / bh uu or oldgen bh / aaa uu / stab uu is something i think sounds super cool.
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Can we implement a different policy of having more "impulsive" bans specifically for OMOTMs, especially during their debut? The current policy is that we must follow a rigorous process of evidence gathering and analysis to actually take action upon a banworthy element, which can take up multiple days or even weeks. While this is fine and important for regular metagames, OMOTMs only last around 4 weeks, meaning that the first week of an OMOTM is usually filled with chaotic strategies and clearly banworthy elements. Combine this with how Github commits take around 1-3 days to actually be implemented to the server and how new threats almost always appear after the first banwave, and we are looking at roughly 1.5-2 weeks of the month being spent just on balancing broken elements.
This has been shown with Twisted Dimension (Dec 2024) having to spend 1 week before banning Power/Ball items.
This has been shown with Nature Swap (Jan 2025) banning Flutter Mane, Gouging Fire, etc 0.5 weeks in (amazing speed), but only having their bans implemented around 1.5 weeks into the month.
This has been shown with Alphabet Cup (Feb 2025) having to ban Dragonite and Glare after 1.5 weeks after the first banwave of Dragapult, Baxcalibur, and Meowscarada, (0.5 weeks-ish) and then later Sceptile (almost 4 weeks in).
This has been shown with Trademarked (May 2025) banning Annihilape, Heal Bell, etc 4 days after the month was over, Ogerpon-H, Focus Energy, Glare, confusion, etc being banned 1 week in, and then Poison moves being banned 2.5 weeks later (only implemented 3+ weeks later).
This didn't occur in Frantic Fusions (Mar 2025) because it had been OMOTM twice already this generation and only suspected 2AC.
This didn't occur in Formemons (Apr 2025) because it is an Ubers-based metagame and more lenient with bans.
This didn't occur (arguably, the survey shows public opinion is split on Ubers) in Tier Shift (Jun 2025) because the meta was extremely diverse.
And now, unless something changes, I expect a similar 1-2 week time waste to occur in the new OMOTM of Battlefields, with permanent Trick Room, Screeens, and the plethora of legal Ubers likely being broken and being banned.
In my opinion, it is far better to accidentally ban non-broken elements and have a relatively stable metagame, instead of having an unbalanced metagame for 25-50% of the month to follow policy and attempt to create a near perfectly balanced metagame. The only risk of overbanning Pokemon is that too many healthy elements of a metagame might be banned just for being slightly controversial, but these can simply be unbanned later as the metagame becomes stable. However, the risk of following policy is that you are forced to take the slow route and only ban elements that are broken, not those that will be broken. This has already been show with Trademarked performing a mass banwave 4 days after the month ended.
Allowing more impulsive bans in OMOTMs will not fully fix the issue of a chaotic metagame at the start of the month, but it would greatly reduce the time that the metagame stays unbalanced.
This has been shown with Twisted Dimension (Dec 2024) having to spend 1 week before banning Power/Ball items.
This has been shown with Nature Swap (Jan 2025) banning Flutter Mane, Gouging Fire, etc 0.5 weeks in (amazing speed), but only having their bans implemented around 1.5 weeks into the month.
This has been shown with Alphabet Cup (Feb 2025) having to ban Dragonite and Glare after 1.5 weeks after the first banwave of Dragapult, Baxcalibur, and Meowscarada, (0.5 weeks-ish) and then later Sceptile (almost 4 weeks in).
This has been shown with Trademarked (May 2025) banning Annihilape, Heal Bell, etc 4 days after the month was over, Ogerpon-H, Focus Energy, Glare, confusion, etc being banned 1 week in, and then Poison moves being banned 2.5 weeks later (only implemented 3+ weeks later).
This didn't occur in Frantic Fusions (Mar 2025) because it had been OMOTM twice already this generation and only suspected 2AC.
This didn't occur in Formemons (Apr 2025) because it is an Ubers-based metagame and more lenient with bans.
This didn't occur (arguably, the survey shows public opinion is split on Ubers) in Tier Shift (Jun 2025) because the meta was extremely diverse.
And now, unless something changes, I expect a similar 1-2 week time waste to occur in the new OMOTM of Battlefields, with permanent Trick Room, Screeens, and the plethora of legal Ubers likely being broken and being banned.
In my opinion, it is far better to accidentally ban non-broken elements and have a relatively stable metagame, instead of having an unbalanced metagame for 25-50% of the month to follow policy and attempt to create a near perfectly balanced metagame. The only risk of overbanning Pokemon is that too many healthy elements of a metagame might be banned just for being slightly controversial, but these can simply be unbanned later as the metagame becomes stable. However, the risk of following policy is that you are forced to take the slow route and only ban elements that are broken, not those that will be broken. This has already been show with Trademarked performing a mass banwave 4 days after the month ended.
Allowing more impulsive bans in OMOTMs will not fully fix the issue of a chaotic metagame at the start of the month, but it would greatly reduce the time that the metagame stays unbalanced.
My proposal for the upcoming team tour is that we keep it as Other Metagames World Cup - for now. I'm not convinced by Snake Draft, Blind Draft, Ghosting Tour, or any of the other team tournaments proposed so far. So yeah, give the custom to World Cup as one last hoorah... or we can just accept there isn't a third tournament deserving of a custom avatar prize and we don't use it this year lol.
The second part of my proposal concerns Other Metagames Farm League and is twofold:
1- Delay OMFL so that Week 1 does not start until the date that OMPL is expected to enter playoffs stage. As a manager and a former player I find it hard to set aside time to watch OMFL games because of how much is already going on with OMPL - and because nobody is linking the games in Discord (please do!). Putting a bit of time between OMPL and OMFL would likely help establish OMFL's identity a bit more.
2- Give OMFL the third Custom Avatar prize with the provision that we're able to iron out the 'smurfing' problems it has first. It's the only other team tournament we have that deserves to be taken seriously and a CA would give the tournament more prestige while also encouraging people to sign up for both it and its parent tour, OMPL. I recognise this is unorthodox and that in order to work we'd need hosts to be much more attentive with regards to potential price fixing / activity concerns but I truly think this is our best option for 2026.
One last quick note is that we can and should run more tours even if there's no prize on the line - some of these tours people are suggesting sound interesting and I'd love to give them a try later this year even if there's no prize on the line. There's a void in the community when Circuit and OMPL aren't going on and I want weird freak tournaments like Fishmons Cup and Ghosting tours to fill it.
The second part of my proposal concerns Other Metagames Farm League and is twofold:
1- Delay OMFL so that Week 1 does not start until the date that OMPL is expected to enter playoffs stage. As a manager and a former player I find it hard to set aside time to watch OMFL games because of how much is already going on with OMPL - and because nobody is linking the games in Discord (please do!). Putting a bit of time between OMPL and OMFL would likely help establish OMFL's identity a bit more.
2- Give OMFL the third Custom Avatar prize with the provision that we're able to iron out the 'smurfing' problems it has first. It's the only other team tournament we have that deserves to be taken seriously and a CA would give the tournament more prestige while also encouraging people to sign up for both it and its parent tour, OMPL. I recognise this is unorthodox and that in order to work we'd need hosts to be much more attentive with regards to potential price fixing / activity concerns but I truly think this is our best option for 2026.
One last quick note is that we can and should run more tours even if there's no prize on the line - some of these tours people are suggesting sound interesting and I'd love to give them a try later this year even if there's no prize on the line. There's a void in the community when Circuit and OMPL aren't going on and I want weird freak tournaments like Fishmons Cup and Ghosting tours to fill it.
i recommend against giving a CA to a farm league - a farm league should be for newer players to a format, do not mess with the incentive structure to encourage people to skip out on ompl or cheat or whatever - a farm league as a tournament should not incentivize gaming the system with prizes, there is no ironed out rules about smurfing that can prevent the problems of a system where two tournaments award the exact same prize but one of them is marketed as the "easier" one
I’d like to oppose World Cup getting the CA. People have already said all the issues with it so I won’t belabor the point, but we only ever have a few competitive teams and even our jostling about eligibility is never fun. I’ll echo a fairy about farm league as well.
In terms of tours with CA, I wouldn’t hate it if we just decided it went to AAAPL or BHPL, but I would personally favor an old gens tour (predictable from an OM boomer, I suppose). Failing that, we could also go for trying a few different team tours ideas (in addition to standards like snake, it might be fun to try a no johns team tour with 4 and 3 day “weeks,” or a ghosting tour) and then pick whichever one goes best this year as the one to give a custom next year (and give it to an individual this year?).
In terms of tours with CA, I wouldn’t hate it if we just decided it went to AAAPL or BHPL, but I would personally favor an old gens tour (predictable from an OM boomer, I suppose). Failing that, we could also go for trying a few different team tours ideas (in addition to standards like snake, it might be fun to try a no johns team tour with 4 and 3 day “weeks,” or a ghosting tour) and then pick whichever one goes best this year as the one to give a custom next year (and give it to an individual this year?).
Its not BHPL, its HPL as it includes both PH and BH metas. And idk about giving the CA to either HPL or AAAPL as giving it to either would be a case of favoritism, as I dont think there is an objective, 100% one sided to give it to either.
About QTs proposal, to not make it a one liner;
While the no johns tour sounds interesting I think it limits a lot of players who have a job or other stuff and wouldnt have much time to build/play, I dont know. I like the idea of Team-wide ghosting tours but I dont know to what amount does this really diferentiate itself from OMPL, if any.
If you need to give the CA away while you think what to do, and dont want to do a second OMPL or WC or whatever, you could just do a losers bracket for the circuit and give a CA to the winner of the losers bracket too.
About QTs proposal, to not make it a one liner;
While the no johns tour sounds interesting I think it limits a lot of players who have a job or other stuff and wouldnt have much time to build/play, I dont know. I like the idea of Team-wide ghosting tours but I dont know to what amount does this really diferentiate itself from OMPL, if any.
If you need to give the CA away while you think what to do, and dont want to do a second OMPL or WC or whatever, you could just do a losers bracket for the circuit and give a CA to the winner of the losers bracket too.
This is actually a great point in favor of giving the CA to Hackmons Premier League since it means that the Pure Hackmons community will have the opportunity to win a CA, which they can't do in OMPL or in Circuit. Their community is pretty much entirely separate from the OM community despite Pure Hackmons belonging in the OM subforum, which is a shame.
Anyway I've also got my own idea for a fun tour that I'm workshopping ATM, although it probably wouldn't be a good idea for the CA tour, which is a single elim teams tour where the winning teams get to recruit players from the losing teams.
To be fair, yes good point.
PH folks are so overlooked they arent even taken into account in these types of conversations.
I dont the argument of not consistent gameplay / not enough players doesnt really apply anymore, as results have shown in both HPL and the midyear offshoot PHPL.
I understand current generation PH is objetively broken, but thats exactly the reason why the one that has ladder is a retro generation (gen7).
Im not going to propose giving the CA to HPL as I dont want to show bias as a host, but regardless of that, I would love for PH to get some representation in any tournament you come up with for the CA slot.
Currently, PH folks are so alienated they dont really feel like an OM anymore (when arguably, they are one of the core fathers of OMs themselves), and I dont think that should be a status quo to keep.
Im leaving more things in the inker, but I cant really put my thoughts together properly right now as I need to go sleep and I have an exam tomorrow. I may expand tomorrow if someone makes a significant reply.
PH folks are so overlooked they arent even taken into account in these types of conversations.
I dont the argument of not consistent gameplay / not enough players doesnt really apply anymore, as results have shown in both HPL and the midyear offshoot PHPL.
I understand current generation PH is objetively broken, but thats exactly the reason why the one that has ladder is a retro generation (gen7).
Im not going to propose giving the CA to HPL as I dont want to show bias as a host, but regardless of that, I would love for PH to get some representation in any tournament you come up with for the CA slot.
Currently, PH folks are so alienated they dont really feel like an OM anymore (when arguably, they are one of the core fathers of OMs themselves), and I dont think that should be a status quo to keep.
Im leaving more things in the inker, but I cant really put my thoughts together properly right now as I need to go sleep and I have an exam tomorrow. I may expand tomorrow if someone makes a significant reply.
Honestly, I would literally just allow a PHPL and give it to the Pure Hackmons room. World Cup comes with a whole slew of issues and none of the other alternatives have great traction, so it would be better to delegate it to one of our subrooms and as much as I want to advocate for OM Mashups I can't in good faith right now with the Pure Hackmons room being a much more suitable choice (not to mention TPP having a CA this year).
I do want to note that I specifically listed PHPL and not HPL, as this would give Balanced Hackmons players yet another potential CA on top of their already potential two, and highlighting the specific Pure Hackmons metas that have been properly developed (3 through 9 + alternatives like SM PH and XY PH although idk if they're that developed) is a better thing overall. I do understand this is technically a step back from HPL as a whole, but this is again directed towards giving the Pure Hackmons room their own CA.
I do want to note that I specifically listed PHPL and not HPL, as this would give Balanced Hackmons players yet another potential CA on top of their already potential two, and highlighting the specific Pure Hackmons metas that have been properly developed (3 through 9 + alternatives like SM PH and XY PH although idk if they're that developed) is a better thing overall. I do understand this is technically a step back from HPL as a whole, but this is again directed towards giving the Pure Hackmons room their own CA.
Yes, that does sound like a good temporary measure. I do not think it is sustainable in the long run.
As ignored as PH has been we dont want to overcompensate and I could see it turning off other OM players.
The true, sustainable solution would be to simply reconsider again adding PH to tournaments. I am not meaning to add it to circuits or such, but we have been looking for stable OMs for OMPL for a while, and PH is literally right there, with a sizeable and zealous playerbase and despite the stigma, quite showy representation of skill (Look up PHPL or HPL results).
As it stands, PHPL has already happened like 3 months ago. I dont think leadership would agree to give it a CA, as sweet as that would be.
I really would love everyone to consider adding PH to OMPL and akin tournaments for next year. I know we OMs guys dont have much contact with PH guys but thats cuz they have their own separate (and quite active) server (which again, takes part in the alienation).
Edit: We are looking for a new tournament right? Well adding PH to ir would a very good trial run and show of good faith.
As ignored as PH has been we dont want to overcompensate and I could see it turning off other OM players.
The true, sustainable solution would be to simply reconsider again adding PH to tournaments. I am not meaning to add it to circuits or such, but we have been looking for stable OMs for OMPL for a while, and PH is literally right there, with a sizeable and zealous playerbase and despite the stigma, quite showy representation of skill (Look up PHPL or HPL results).
As it stands, PHPL has already happened like 3 months ago. I dont think leadership would agree to give it a CA, as sweet as that would be.
I really would love everyone to consider adding PH to OMPL and akin tournaments for next year. I know we OMs guys dont have much contact with PH guys but thats cuz they have their own separate (and quite active) server (which again, takes part in the alienation).
Edit: We are looking for a new tournament right? Well adding PH to ir would a very good trial run and show of good faith.
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I have two small suggestions for our tour circuit.
Official tours have recently implemented a few new rules around scheduling, namely making activity wins less automatic in later rounds and codifying that re-scheduling times is allowed. I think these would both be good rules to officially adopt for our circuit to promote more games being played, especially in the later rounds of tours.
I have not seen these be major problems in OM tours, but would obviously like to see the rules officially in place before they become relevant.
Also, specifcially to piss off pannu, can we bring the alt rule back?
Official tours have recently implemented a few new rules around scheduling, namely making activity wins less automatic in later rounds and codifying that re-scheduling times is allowed. I think these would both be good rules to officially adopt for our circuit to promote more games being played, especially in the later rounds of tours.
I have not seen these be major problems in OM tours, but would obviously like to see the rules officially in place before they become relevant.
Also, specifcially to piss off pannu, can we bring the alt rule back?
cool change suggestion (outside of alt rule, i think that one is a bit too formal/"corpo-feeling" and oms is quite close-knit) but my biggest issue is that certain users that i wont name sometimes like to try to push their luck and abuse rescheduling rules a lot as is and this only feeds into such behaviour - is there a considered punish for such behaviour if this ever goes into effect?
The punish in official tours is the host can deny rescheduling if one party is being unreasonable, and even infract in extreme or repeat cases. We could do something similar
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that re-scheduling times is already allowed. Purely anecdotal but I've never seen someone try and reschedule the time in advance and had it be outright denied, and I've personally re-scheduled with people who've missed times on many occasions, whether they've messaged me after the scheduled time while I'm still online or just missed a weekday time.
enforcing re-scheduling is a different matter entirely, and I think it causes more problems than it solves. A bad faith actor can lie about their activity, because it's indiscernible from the life of someone who touches grass. I'm dogsitting for my parents this week and going back home either on Saturday or Sunday - I don't know which yet, and can't guarantee availability on either day. Is this true, or am I lying through my teeth?
Introducing a mediator to subjectively decide what constitutes "extenuating circumstances" to force games to happen suggests to me that people are going to be antagonized for making plans mid-week instead of reserving back-up times for opponents who haven't gotten a hang of basic addition yet. 15 minutes is plenty of leeway, especially when it's almost always significantly longer than this (I dunno about you guys but I'm usually offering to play 10+ minutes early because I'm a human and I don't sign on to play at the very last possible minute). If we really want to promote games being played we should be going in the opposite direction and tour-banning people who regularly miss scheduled times.
I disagree with the alt rule as well even though it's probably being proposed as a joke; this actually could be used to cheese automatic wins and the minor improvement to the spectator experience isn't worth that.
enforcing re-scheduling is a different matter entirely, and I think it causes more problems than it solves. A bad faith actor can lie about their activity, because it's indiscernible from the life of someone who touches grass. I'm dogsitting for my parents this week and going back home either on Saturday or Sunday - I don't know which yet, and can't guarantee availability on either day. Is this true, or am I lying through my teeth?
Introducing a mediator to subjectively decide what constitutes "extenuating circumstances" to force games to happen suggests to me that people are going to be antagonized for making plans mid-week instead of reserving back-up times for opponents who haven't gotten a hang of basic addition yet. 15 minutes is plenty of leeway, especially when it's almost always significantly longer than this (I dunno about you guys but I'm usually offering to play 10+ minutes early because I'm a human and I don't sign on to play at the very last possible minute). If we really want to promote games being played we should be going in the opposite direction and tour-banning people who regularly miss scheduled times.
I disagree with the alt rule as well even though it's probably being proposed as a joke; this actually could be used to cheese automatic wins and the minor improvement to the spectator experience isn't worth that.
"and the opponent to cooperate outside of extenuating circumstances"
this is the main part i take extreme issue with and agree w/ the above post pretty much entirely, i really do think that greybaum brings up several good points that make sense to me as a fellow life haver. i've always said that if you schedule for 4:00, 4:00 is the last possible minute you should show up and anything afterwards is late. youre not on time if you show up at 4:15. if someone says no to rescheduling after they show up and their opponent doesnt, i feel like that's fully fair on their end. i dont even really need to know the reason - if they're rescheduling, they're being charitable and doing a good thing. that doesn't mean someone in the same position who refuses to reschedule is doing a bad thing - if their week is occupied, that's really all we're entitled to know. it doesn't matter if it's to watch superman at a specific time or if it's because they're just unwinding and don't really wanna do anything during that time. maybe stuff is happening they dont wanna talk about either - we dont really know. if that bothers people, they're getting tilted at the wrong party.
idk. i feel like there's a stigma around claiming act and having to feel bad for it which i def felt when i was new to the site, and i personally would always reschedule if i'm able to even rn, but i think it's in bad faith to blame the player who didn't miss the time for "act fishing" when they're not the one who was late/didn't show up. it really isn't any of our business and this feels like it's heavily overstepping by needing to know irl reasons so you can determine if said reasons fit said extenuating circumstances. staff, 95% of the time, are not entitled to know what we do with our time outside of how we spend it when we're on this website and the 5% of the time is when you guys are doing investigations on actually malicious users. i get wanting to make games happen, but this feels like an ill advised way to go about it
this is the main part i take extreme issue with and agree w/ the above post pretty much entirely, i really do think that greybaum brings up several good points that make sense to me as a fellow life haver. i've always said that if you schedule for 4:00, 4:00 is the last possible minute you should show up and anything afterwards is late. youre not on time if you show up at 4:15. if someone says no to rescheduling after they show up and their opponent doesnt, i feel like that's fully fair on their end. i dont even really need to know the reason - if they're rescheduling, they're being charitable and doing a good thing. that doesn't mean someone in the same position who refuses to reschedule is doing a bad thing - if their week is occupied, that's really all we're entitled to know. it doesn't matter if it's to watch superman at a specific time or if it's because they're just unwinding and don't really wanna do anything during that time. maybe stuff is happening they dont wanna talk about either - we dont really know. if that bothers people, they're getting tilted at the wrong party.
idk. i feel like there's a stigma around claiming act and having to feel bad for it which i def felt when i was new to the site, and i personally would always reschedule if i'm able to even rn, but i think it's in bad faith to blame the player who didn't miss the time for "act fishing" when they're not the one who was late/didn't show up. it really isn't any of our business and this feels like it's heavily overstepping by needing to know irl reasons so you can determine if said reasons fit said extenuating circumstances. staff, 95% of the time, are not entitled to know what we do with our time outside of how we spend it when we're on this website and the 5% of the time is when you guys are doing investigations on actually malicious users. i get wanting to make games happen, but this feels like an ill advised way to go about it