np: OU Suspect Testing Round 3 - So Long and Thanks for all the Fish

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@Unholy Confessions
Sand wasn't used in gen 4 because it was sand, it was used because it was a by product of using Tyranitar and Hippowdon. There were no sand abusers unless you consider the SpDef boost, so it can't really be said that it was a dominant strategy.
 
Specs Latios is underwhelming? That's a GIANT change from all the trouble he apparently caused from last generation.

Like, what exactly is a choice specs Latios giving setup chances to after it draco meteors something? Life orb pokemon get their lives cut short. Frail setup sweepers die to the -2 draco meteor anyway.

SpecsLatios is far from underwhelming. He's about as "underwhelming" as any choiced pokemon is period. And he has trick to top it off. LO Latios doesn't have to switch as much, but such is a choiced pokemon guys.

In any case, I've been having more trouble with CM Latias simply because it's bulkier and harder to get rid of. I've sen a couple of CM Latios too, and I really have to ask...why doesn't anybody use this thing?
 
Calm Mind Latios and Latias is a matter of whether you want immediate power or an easier chance of set up. I would rather use an offensive version of CM Latias, perferably, because it's Specil Defense is still so deceptively easy to use against special attackers.

Yeah, I think the metagame is adapting to Specs Latios, which has been slightly evitable these last few days.
 
I'd have to guess that Latias isn't used much because her CM set is outclassed by Reuniclus and her other offensive sets by Latios.

At any rate, I'm really liking the way this metagame is looking. I only have a slight nagging doubt that Deo-D might be broken once people really discover him, but aside from that everything is manageable now.
 
Unholy Confessions said:
It was dominant as in, it was used too often. If I use Drought but have no abusers, it's still a Sunny Day team, because it's present and set up Sunny Day.
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So... if you have sunny day up and no fire attacks and no water weak guys, no chlorophyll, no leaf guard, and you have sunny day for shits and giggles? A team who has no use for sun at all is running sunny day, and you consider it a sunny day team?

I guess at this point you are arguing semantics. You say "sunny day team" because it has sunny day. I say it isnt a sunny day team because it is no team there, its just a sunny day present on the field for no reason at all, it just came with the ninetails and is present to your completely non sunny day team.

Either way, "used too often" still only applies to 25% of teams, which is a lot, yet, but considering it was the only weather of gen4 that was permanent aside from hail (lol), then I consider that absolutely great.

And again, as I said before, Sand is manageable. I have no problem with sand. The only thing that changed with sand from gen 4 to 5 is that I need a mach puncher/aqua jetter, which is a good idea already anyways.
 
Nanoswine said:
Neither of those opinions had enough support to even get put on the ballot, so now that Aldaron's proposal has accomplished what it set out to do, why is everyone hating on it all of a sudden?
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Its just as overgeneralising to say everyone loved aldarons proposal as it is to say that now a lot of people are hating it. I don't think anyone would disagree that it hasn't effectively balanced the meta, the only thing being discussed is how to possibly refine it.

Miscellaneous said:
So you would rather have a "simpler" banning system that results in a worse metagame, than a "complex" one, that not only works currently but allows greater freedom for future bans? Alternatively: is the ban in and of itself more important than what the ban's purpose is?

I understand your argument behind selective qualities, but it's rather contradictory. Standard is 6v6 not 1v1. A ban that targets a strategy is a ban that targets a quantity in its largest possible form. Rain was broken, ban imposed, metagame is balanced. Is that truly different to: Mewtwo was broken, ban imposed, metagame is balanced. Yes, there is a distinction to be made between trying to "keep" something OU (such as removing moves from Mewtwo) and lessening the effectiveness of a strategy (such as banning SS + drizzle on rain teams). Personally I trust the community to make that distinction. Common sense is needed to acheive the best metagame possible, not defitions of what a ban is allowed to be.

I also understand this wasn't the best example to use, as you aren't completely set against complex bans. It's more of a reply in general to those ridiculous "creation of slippery slope" arguments. I'd like to see more than just paranoia at what could happen when people try to argue against "complex" bans.
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Its a little unfair to question whether I'd rather have better banlists or metas when I specified that my points were theoretical and I'm happy with everything as is lol. But fair play, as it was for arguments sake I understand your response.

I'd agree that the thing needed was a way of culling rain as a playstyle, but this could also be done by the conventional method of mon bans, albeit several. I'm dubious as to whether doing so would result in a worse meta at all - which is in fact the only reason I even considered it. If a similarly good meta could be achieved with conventional bans, I personally believe that would be ideal. If not then a minimum of complexity is fine - just not furthering the complexity when the meta is just fine. I understand that practical concerns mean we probably don't want to do this however, and as such I'm not going to nominate such an idea unless no more pressing suspects are present, or if people nominate for more complication.

Like you were, I'm not really arguing against your point of view, just another stance in particular, I just wanted my 2c. Sorry for bumping this a few pages too..
 
@ the discussion of rain bans
I've come to the conclusion I'm just past caring. We get the (almost) same result no matter what we do. Here's how I figure it:

We keep the complex ban. We end up with nerfed rain, a still viable strategy (rain offense), and a destroyed strategy (hyper offensive rain teams).

We ban kingdra, kabutops, and ludicolo. We end up with nerfed rain, a still viable strategy (rain offense), and a destroyed strategy (using any of those pokes).

Banning swift swim entirely would give the same result. The only ban that is really different is banning drizzle, and I don't know how much support that will get.
 
Well another thing that Aldaron's proposal allows is that when we sort out UU, we will be able to use Rain Dance teams. If we just banned Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops, Rain wouldn't stand a chance in the lower tiers.

Also, Quagsire is fucking awesome on Drizzle teams. It stops pretty much every Sand sweeper, and almost nothing on a Sand team runs Grass moves. It also is a total counter to Mixtar. The only common Pokemon on a Sand team it has trouble with is Virizion, and that is on Sand just to take care of Rain anyways.
 
Banning swift swim entirely would give the same result. The only ban that is really different is banning drizzle, and I don't know how much support that will get.
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Huntail, Omastar, Gorebyss, etc. Three SSers that aren't broken in the least and would have seen usage in UU.
 
Lightning Tiger said:
Well in MY experience Nattorei can be taken out by pokes not named kingdra, and i dont try to switch it into Dory Or Land cause thats retarted, if im swtiching anything into those guys its Porygon 2 or some other wall i use, Kingdra comes in and changes weather after something dies.

Yeah, there are pokes that Kingdra cant just switch into, but you can say that about any poke.
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Ok??? My point is that there are BETTER options than using Kingdra, that it has been severely nerfed by this ban and that most people will likely use something else like another dragon or another water type to do the job. Gyarados does DD better, Latios/any other dragon does Specs/Special/Mixed sets better. I know it has its Rain Dance niche but Kingdra really needs 4 moves to do its job.

nonsense, Smogon is its own competitive battling community, its always been and always will be.

And theres nothing complex about "dont use drizzle with rain dance", this isnt rocket science.
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Smogon has in the past been a community with rules for itself, but with its grown popularity it is now the guideline for many other communities. With these ridiculous bans coming about, Smogon could lose its title as the premier competitive community. I embrace having more users, but it seems like we're taking a step back with these bans. Beta seems to have it together a lot better imo.

And it is just a term for the aldaron proposal, I don't actually think there is anything complex about the ban, just most people read important threads before posting so I thought it would be understood.
 
The idea is they are sorted into two groups: banning a Pokemon outright and banning some combination or parts of things. We need names, and so we use Complex and Simple. They are simple names because compared to the other type they are both as their names suggest. It really doesn't matter.
 
It's still a pointless ban though. In the end, we're making SS Pokemon useless to use because we're banning what was good about them. Just ban them (the Pokemon), at least then Kingdra can use SS all he wants in Ubers, instead of it being banned in all tiers.
 
RD (move) + SS = retarded. You get 8 turns. Oh wow. That was fine before Politoed with Drizzle. Now? Bad idea. Too little time and too many threats can either stall out the 8 turns, or you can't effectively end it in 8 turns (this).
This being the same as banning SS, because SO MANY Pokemon can do ANY job better than a RD+SS required one.

Drizzle = SS = BAN'D (ZOMG SO COMPLICATED!!!!)
 
Unholy Confessions said:
RD (move) + SS = retarded. You get 8 turns. Oh wow. That was fine before Politoed with Drizzle. Now? Bad idea. Too little time and too many threats can either stall out the 8 turns, or you can't effectively end it in 8 turns (this).
This being the same as banning SS, because SO MANY Pokemon can do ANY job better than a RD+SS required one.

Drizzle = SS = BAN'D (ZOMG SO COMPLICATED!!!!)
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that is nonsesnse, it was fine before drizzle and it still is now, it didnt just suddenly become a horrible because drizzle toad suddenly exists.

From what i see your just looking to ban pokemon for no reason when they dont need to be banned, not at all.
 
Can we ignore the troll and get back on topic?

In other words, what is everyone else using to beat Thundurus and Tornadus? Especially Thundurus, I really can't think of anything that, even if it manages to get in on it, can take an attack from it and KO back. Anything fast enough to outspeed and KO gets Twaved, and anything slow and bulky is 2HKO'd.
 
*goes to post a really angry rant*
*reads through again to prepare, but ignoring Unholy Confessions's posts*
*suddenly can't think of much to rant about*

But actually,
Just ban them (the Pokemon), at least then Kingdra can use SS all he wants in Ubers, instead of it being banned in all tiers.
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No idea where you got that idea, dude. The combo ban applies only to OU. Obviously -.-

In all seriousness, though, I think that some people here have a very wrong idea of why the combo ban was put in place at all. I'm not sure why I'm even posting this because the relevant people aren't going to read it, but the combo ban is a compromise both to prevent a cascade of bans and to avoid needless testing in lieu of actually recognizing the real, obvious problem with the Round 2 metagame. It is unfortunately not the kind of ban that can be "tweaked" very easily, and I for one would rather not sacrifice more simplicity of the ruleset just to give Swift Swim Qwilfish the possibility of being viable. The combo ban put in place has clearly improved the metagame significantly. I say, either argue that whatever modification you're proposing will do the same or gtfo. Harsh, but that's how I'm going to say it.

If some of you somehow think that rain was fine or even "easy to beat" in round 2, then you can go tell that to 2/3 of my opponents when I used my rain team back then. A good amount of them were fairly effortless. No, I didn't use a "linear" aggressive rain team; I usually prefer a bulky sort of offense over that. I think that that in itself speaks volumes about the problems that rain posed. Yes, most of these opponents had Ferrothorn, Virizion, etc. Yes, many of these opponents ran sand. I was still quite able to run through 2/3 of them.

Now, can we please move on and talk about this metagame, y'know, the one that's actually close to balanced, enjoyable and skill-rewarding?
 
Maybe it is a good sign that people can't find things to complain about in this metagame. Maybe it means we are finally getting close to balance and the end of all of this banning?
 
The problem is that people are masochists, instead of enjoying this nearly perfect metagame they want to go back to an age with rain teams bearing multiple swift swimmers hammering away at you with rain boosted stabs till you die, except without kingdra, Kabutops, and Ludi... why?,... poor Quilfish thats why.

Just keep things the way the way they are now please.
 
To get back to Thundurus, I find that ScarfChomp is probably the most effective scarfer to deal with him. If you can lure it into trying to blast something on your team with Thunder, you can come in and threaten with Stone Edge, avoiding priority Thunder Wave. It even makes a decent initial switch-in but it has to be careful due to HP Ice.

There isn't much defensively that manages to check it, though. Porygon2 gets a mention for tracing Mischievous Heart and getting off that priority Thunder Wave before the Focus Blast, and I guess specially defensive unaware Quagsire works, too.

My question is, how are people dealing with Tornadus. Flying has such great neutral coverage with fighting that I find myself limited to revenge killing - the types that resist Hurricane are either frail (most electric types), or weak to Focus Blast (rock and steel types). I've found LO to be a bit more threatening because it can switch moves, too.
 
I think most people are trying to switch cleverly to scarves and boosted Pokemon, like Dory and ScarfTar. It also works to work it down due to LO recoil, which compounds with Sand damage to allow very weak hits to finish it. I personally use Dory to revenge, Scizor BP to revenge or clever switching and potentially a speed tie, depending on the team. But I do find it can be a big problem. I mainly find that if I use it my opponents really struggle, as opposed to the other way around.
 
@Unholy Confessions

If Scizor comes in on a choiced Shadow Ball (Pretty damn easy if you have any clue about prediction) it can survive and kill it off with CBpursuit.

@everyone

Why do I get the feelling we're feeding a troll?

Anyway, rain is more threatening than ever with Specs Tornadus' Hurricane flying around. My team can't stop that thing. Then Latios is just flying around being the annoying ass it always is. I don't care to much about Tornadus sense its few and far between but Latios really needs to go. It's the only pokemon I know of that can single handedly take out my entire team with one set (That being the specs set) that I commonly see. I can't speak for anyone else but I really hate seeing those things. I think that's the last thing that really needs to go before the metagame can really calm down to a good standard level.
 
KurashiDragon, has it occurred to you that if Specs Latios can sweep your team through then there might be a problem with your team?
 
One thing is for certain, if we wanted competitive pokemon-- we got it. It's definitely intense on the ladder. Or rather, if there's anyway to easily win your way up it-- someone tell me!
 
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