Aldaron's proposal: Satisfied?

[Quixim]

That doesn't mean that Drizzle teams don't all need to be ready for it. What it means is that some of them already are ready for it.

However, that doesn't mean that Drizzle + Swift Swim would become a poor strategy. It just means that teams with Drizzle + Swift Swim also need a means of dealing with opposing Rain Dance teams. This on its own fills up more teamslots, and makes it more difficult to make a team loaded with Swift Swim Pokemon. So it's possible that teams with 3+ Swift Swim Pokemon won't even be an issue if this happens.

I agree with you here fully. In fact, I think I agree with you -too- much.

The main issue here is that if you choose to use a swift-swim pokemon with a drizzle team, it opens up the fact that you will enable another pokemon to entirely outclass one of yours in every regard. I'm not afraid of the drizzle swift-swimmers in the ban you've proposed - much the worse, I pity them. They can be dealt with by other teams (As they are obviously not broken, that means that a team can defeat them without having to be centered around it), and any team that contains the offenders would have an inherent advantage. I do not believe that swift swim would be viable.

Furthermore, I'd like to ask your opinion of banning the ability swift swim on the offenders. Ludicolo could still exist on drizzle teams with his rain dish, and swift swim teams wouldn't need to outright worry about their superiors coming in and ruining their day.

I just realized that since a drizzle team might be unlikely to run a lot of hazards, carrying a focus sash'd omastar with shell smash might sneak its way onto every team I have if drizzle gets popular.

 

[Nubbins]

I'm basically agreeing with this in the meantime (Although my vote is still to ban swift swim on the offenders outright).

Also, I'm wondering what you mean by "Reverse Sweep"?

Sweeping a Drizzle Team with double STAB Hydro Pump. Feels good man...

 

[Showsni]

I just realized that since a drizzle team might be unlikely to run a lot of hazards, carrying a focus sash'd omastar with shell smash might sneak its way onto every team I have if drizzle gets popular.

Drizzle teams should be running more hazards. Against sun and sand, winning the weather war is tantamount to winning the match; and setting up rocks and spikes is the best way to prevent too many Tyranitar/Ninetales switch ins, especially as if they switch in and are killed by the hazards the weather won't change.

 

[Thorhammer]

I agree with you here fully. In fact, I think I agree with you -too- much.

The main issue here is that if you choose to use a swift-swim pokemon with a drizzle team, it opens up the fact that you will enable another pokemon to entirely outclass one of yours in every regard. I'm not afraid of the drizzle swift-swimmers in the ban you've proposed - much the worse, I pity them. They can be dealt with by other teams (As they are obviously not broken, that means that a team can defeat them without having to be centered around it), and any team that contains the offenders would have an inherent advantage. I do not believe that swift swim would be viable.

Furthermore, I'd like to ask your opinion of banning the ability swift swim on the offenders. Ludicolo could still exist on drizzle teams with his rain dish, and swift swim teams wouldn't need to outright worry about their superiors coming in and ruining their day.

I just realized that since a drizzle team might be unlikely to run a lot of hazards, carrying a focus sash'd omastar with shell smash might sneak its way onto every team I have if drizzle gets popular.

That may be an issue, but I believe it is one that Drizzle teams can find a way to handle. If dedicated Swift Swim + Drizzle teams are not viable, but Drizzle teams as a whole remain viable, then dedicated Swift Swim teams will disappear, and Swift Swim Pokemon will instead find a place on more diverse and balanced Drizzle teams.

I wouldn't have any objection to banning Ludicolo + Swift Swim + Drizzle rather than Ludicolo + Drizzle. However, I believe keeping Ludicolo + Rain Dish + Drizzle allowed is less of an issue than getting Qwilfish + Swift Swim + Drizzle to be permitted. So I think it's best for us not to get hung up on the issue of non-Swift Swim abilities on Pokemon that are broken with Swift Swim while we still have more important things to focus on.

Is Rain Dish Ludicolo even used much? I don't recall it ever being very prevalent, even with Drizzle.

 

[idiotfrommars]

Personally I would rather have banned just Kingdra and possibly Ludicolo and Kabutops instead of instituting Aldaron's proposal. I feel like we cut off a large subsection of the meta game with the it and if possible at a later date I would like to revist it. That is mainly why I voted abstain in the original vote, but if it comes down to keeping it or allowing all SS I would rather have the proposal.

 

[Acritter]

I'm satisfied with it. We have more important suspects to deal with. Maybe if we have no suspects for a voting period or two, but not otherwise.

 

[B-Lulz]

No its not because weather in general makes this gen suck lol.

 

[Slightly]

I'm happy drizzle didn't get banned (I hate blanket bans)
But I still feel it should be fine tuned.

Although I don't use Drizzle or SwSw, I really don't mind facing them.

 

[Lbuh]

The proposal was a step forward from just straight out banning either Drizzletoad or Kingdra (or Ludicolo/Kabutops). Drizzle certainly isn't broken without SwSw and SwSw isn't broken without drizzle.

I personally like to see more complex bans in this case. I think the perfect ban would be Drizzle + Swift Swim + Kingdra (or Ludicolo, etc...), but I realize that would probably be too complex. A Drizzle+Kingdra ban however seems interesting, as it allows some other Swimmers to take their chance, while SwSw Kingdra is still of use in a normal rain dance team. Plus it's just as complex as the current Drizzle+Swsw. (I'd start out with testing a ban of Kingdra/Ludicolo/Kabutops + Drizzle and judge other potential suspects after testing)

This kind of ban might also clear the way for bans like Blaziken+Speed Boost, but that's a whole other discussion.

 

[Vratix]

I'm satisfied with it. We have more important suspects to deal with. Maybe if we have no suspects for a voting period or two, but not otherwise.

This

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

This. Before Aldaron's proposal, going against Drizzle teams meant abusing my focus sash Thunderus's T-waves to the max, judicious use of CS Abomasnow, and just hanging on for dear life. I'm assuming using Drizzle teams was like "lolololololol Kabutops lololololololol Kingdra lolololol Ludicolo lolololol" Not fun at all.

But after the SS+Drizzle combo ban, I can do crazy stuff like reverse sweep with Starmie and use Thunder/Hydro Pump Rotom-W on my Drizzle team. While Drizzle teams are still strong, playing against them now feels more like a challenge than a chore.

While individually testing Drizzle abusers would probably give the best end result, I feel like it might be to complicated, long, and raise questions on how far we'll go with these complex bans. I'll laugh so hard if we do test abusers individually and don't finish before Gray is released.

While Aldaron's proposal is the not the best, it's GOOD ENOUGH and I'm satisfied. But maybe as a compromise, couldn't we start with Aldaron's proposal and test upwards like SS Luvdisc, SS Armaldo, and work our way up the ladder of overpoweredness?

I would be considerably more in support of this than unbanning everything bar kingdra, Ludi and Kabutops. As a Rain user I think the playstyle is strong enough as it is, and the unbanning of things like Qwilfish and Floatzel would sikply send the metagame discussion back to round two, except that this time the very thing Aldaron's Proposal was meant to stop could occur: people get fed up with rain, ban it, and a cascade of bans follow.

tl:dr, while banning things like Luvdisc is meh, if we're going to retest stuff, test on a group by group basis, from weakest abuser to strongest.

Also,
[/QUOTE=Acritter]
I'm satisfied with it. We have more important suspects to deal with. Maybe if we have no suspects for a voting period or two, but not otherwise.[/QUOTE]
This

 

[charizard24]

I'm fine with the way the current meta is. The Drizzle+SwSw ban did wonders for the metagame in terms of balancing Drizzle. Could it be improved? Perhaps. However testing every Swift Swimmer from Luvdisc to Kingdra seems like too much work for too little a reward.

Even if we managed to test all of them and banned Drizzle + Kingdra/Ludi/Kabutops who's to say Omastar,Gorebyss, etc. wont be broken as well? Ultimately we will be gaining a few sweepers to an already powerful playstyle.

~30% of the voters still felt that Drizzle needs to be banned even with the proposal in place. Allowing yet more Swift Swimmers and sweepers into the OU metagame seems like a Death sentence for Drizzle to be banned outright. And then what will your Swift Swim Qwilfish do in OU after the rain is gone?

It just seems to be a waste of time at the moment. Maybe some time in the future when things have calmed down a bit more. Or perhaps on a seperate ladder but meh.....

 

[Ulevo]

While I feel Aldaron's proposal may have been necessary at the time it was implemented in order to save Drizzle from a hasty exit (and I am thankful for that), I have never enjoyed the idea of a complex ban. We've gone out of our way to ensure simplicity wherever necessary, and I don't like this being the mere exception. It screams favouritism, and there is definitely a better alternative.

My feeling is we should ban Swift Swim.

I'm not going to bother arguing at this point as to which component is at the core of the problem, because one cannot function without the other. It's a ridiculous task trying to justify any one cause when none can function without the all. It's not Drizzle, it's not Swift Swim, it's not Kingdra/Kabutops/et cetera... They're all equal contributions to the problem.

However, consider the alternatives.

If we stay as we are now, we're stuck with a complex ban. As you can see, a vast majority of at least the people paying attention to this thread aren't comfortable with that. While its a little early to tell how the poll will go, I don't see the votes improving for the side approving Aldaron's proposal. I'd also like to note that keeping this proposal raises eye brows, and it leaves excuses for attempts at implementing more complex bans. Simply put, I feel this should be moved away from.

If we ban Drizzle, we lose one of our weather's niches in OU. I don't think too many people want that, otherwise we wouldn't have gone completely out of our way to prevent its ban in the first place. There are implications with banning Drizzle, such as leading to a possible ban of Drought. While I do not believe that these implications should deter us from making the proper decision (if Drizzle HAS to go, then so be it), but it is important to keep in mind. It would also mean that these suspect tests thus far would have been somewhat a waste of time, and we may need to revisit other Pokemon, such as Manaphy. Again, we need to implement the appropriate decisions regardless of implication, but it is something to keep in mind.

We could visit Kingdra, Kabutops, Ludicolo, et cetera...individually. There are a few problems with this however. The first being that this would be a very long, very drawn out process. We would need to test each one individually, and eliminate a suspect at a time in order to prevent hasty nominations of numerous candidates and seeing them all go at once. Afterwards, we would need to test again, and assess if there is anything else of concern. This becomes problematic when you consider how many Pokemon learn Swift Swim (and as we know, it was Swift Swim + Drizzle that was the primary problem). I would also like to note that it would mean that we would have to go through another testing process with our up to date metagame with Drizzle and Swift Swim legal on the same team, and I think many players would be rather discouraged at having to go through that again.

The benefits of my proposal, banning Swift Swim:

1) It alleviates the complex ban, and promotes simplicity. That's the first, and most important benefit. If Swift Swim is out of the picture, obviously Aldaron's proposal is no longer necessary, and we can keep Drizzle unless of course it proves to be a problem by itself in the near or distant future.

2) All Pokemon that have Swift Swim as a non Dream World exclusive ability have immediate access RIGHT NOW to there Dream World abilities anyway. This means that no Pokemon would be banned out right should we choose to ban Swift Swim, since their Dream World alternatives are already legal. For a reference, please see this list:

http://www.serebii.net/abilitydex/swiftswim.shtml

http://www.serebii.net/blackwhite/dreamworldareas.shtml

This means that if Swift Swim goes, Magikarp, Surskit, Feebas, Huntail, Gorebyss, Luvdisc, Buizel, Floatzel are all legal. While many of these are notably irrelevant in OU (and even UU), we're not raising eye brows because we banned Magikarp (Lulz).

3) There is little difference competitively speaking with banning Swift Swim outright and following Aldaron's proposal. Swift Swim Pokemon are not seeing use due to the complex ban, as using Rain Dance is the inferior alternative. While some Pokemon, such as Kingdra, may benefit from using Swift Swim on a team that doesn't use Drizzle itself as a counter measure should that player come up against another player who provides the Drizzle effect, this is a rare exception, and in my opinion it is worth sacrificing for the cause.


So, tl;dr. Banning Swift Swim has almost the same desired effect with Aldaron's proposal without the complex ban, while not banning any Pokemon out right, and it is in my opinion the most effective, concise, and clean alternative.

 

[TSPhoenix]

I would be inclinded to agree that its Swift Swim that breaks Drizzle and not the other way around. Rain teams were strong because you could pack up to 5 Swift Swimmers on them. You'd take down Kingra and Kabutops only to have to face Ludicolo.

Banning Swift Swim does keep things nice and simple even if it kills the viability of a few things. I don't use rain enough to know how big a deal this is or how upset people would be.

The key point here is that Swift Swim is widely distributed. We banned Blaziken because it was the only overpowered Speed Boost user. Hypothetically if Sand Throw Excadrill was to be banned, we would probably ban the Pokemon because nobody uses Sandslash/Stoutland much.

So if there was to be any type of complex ban it would have to address this problem; the ban would have to reduce the distribution of Swift Swim. As such I wouldn't be averse to banning ability X on Pokemon Y.

The nice thing about this is you are banning less. Blaze Blaziken could be legal again, weaker Swift Swimmers wouldn't be totally useless and so forth.

The downside is the amount of testing it would require. This is really only true in the case of Swift Swim as testing Excadrill for example would be pretty easy.

 

[Benlisted]

I'm somewhat split on this issue, although essentially at this point I am happy with Aldaron's proposal, and don't think it really needs to be addressed until the meta is otherwise stable (hard to tell whether it is or not without stats but they'll come soon). Essentially, it did what it set out to and as such until there are no more pressing matters we should leave it as is.

Anyway, once the time comes, I think there are a few things that could be done. Personally, eliminating complex bans is an ideal to be sought after - we've all seen how the suspect thread has been clogged up with both SwSw+Drizzle ideas, as well as SV+Chomp or similar as well as even suggestions of Blaziken+Drought or Blaziken+Speed Boost. This is slowing down the suspect discussion considerably, and if we stick to simple ability or pokemon bans this will no longer be a problem (as much, people will always propose such things to some extent) and will benefit the process overall a huge amount.

Essentially, I think the two things we could do are ban SwSw, or individual abusers. Ulevo basically sets out the advantages of the former very nicely, but banning abusers is probably technically the more correct thing to do since SwSw is in itself not broken, just an easily definable breaking factor - and if we look at it that way then individual mons are easily defineable breaking factors for rain too. I doubt mon bans will occur due to the complexity of implementing them, but just wanted to say this. Personally, I think I'd support Ulevo's idea more than any other when we decide to alter Aldaron's proposal.

 

[Lucindril]

Rain is still a bitch. But it's made it far easier to handle.

 

[Treadshot A1]

I said that Drizzle + Swift Swim is not broken in Gen V any more than it was in Gen IV (where it wasn't banned), and i stand by it.

I have looked at the advantage for Rain HO teams, and it doesn't exist within the first 9 turns, which is basically when Rain HO does its damage. Only after 9 turns does it save you a turn that you would have used for Rain Dance.

Rain Stall gets a nice boost, but that was never broken, and frankly i think we really don't need to discuss the brokenness of Rain Stall; we all know it's not.

 

[theangryscientist]

fuck complex bans imo, just ban drizzle entirely and don't bother with anything else

 

[reachzero]

I'm with theangryscientist on this one. I intensely dislike the massive advantages Rain teams still enjoy over non-Weather teams: how they can freely load up on Steel types, the boosts to Water and 100% Hurricane and Thunder. My greatest dissatisfaction with the complex ban is that there are so many players now that believe Rain to be balanced, when in fact it is still considerably overpowered, in my opinion. Personally, I would very much prefer to simply ban Drizzle outright.

 

[Sajak]

I'm just going to keep my post here relatively short, since I don't want to clutter the thread even more with walls of text. :P

If the point of a ban is to get rid of what is actually broken or unfair, then only the Pokemon should be banned because:

Drizzle by itself is not broken
Swift Swim by itself is not broken
Swift Swim and Drizzle together are only broken on a few Pokemon

Considering that Pokemon are only banned using their best sets (Blaziken is a perfect example here), then why wouldn't Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops be banned when their best sets are broken under easily achieved conditions. This goes back to how Garchomp was banned last gen. Garchomp outside of sand was not broken, but with sand easily available and his ability, he was broken, thanks to his ability and ability to sweep and set up. The parallel to Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops is pretty clear to me.

 

[AlphaSpade]

At this point, is there really any consequence of just banning Swift Swim? I'm pretty sure most, if not all, have their DW abilities unlocked, and not many of them lose any important moves. The end result would pretty much be the same (only negative is that you can't revenge Rain teams with SpecsDra lol), but at least it would close the doors to those who want to extend it to Chlorophyll and Sand Rush (oh come on, Excadrill and the Muttstache poke are the only two pokes that get it, and the latter isn't even used).

I'm satisfied with the proposal, just not all the branches everyone is trying to extend it to.

 

[Raikaria]

I am statisfyed.

Alderon's Proposal prevented the destruction of 2 playstyles [Rain Offense without SS, and Rain Stall].

It also prevented at least 3 pokemon being made Uber, when they would not be anywhere near otherwise. And when I say at least, you can make a case for an awful lot of the SS pokemon.

Omastar: Shell Smash. Base 115 Sp.Attack and Base 125 Defense. Basically, able to easily set up a Shell Smash, and with the Rain Boost and Swift Swim... yeah.

Kabutops: One of the 'Broken Trio'

Quilfish: Not broken

Mantine: Not an offensive threat

Kingdra: Do I even need to go there?

Ludicolo: 'Broken Trio'

Huntail: Base 104 Attack and Shell Smash. And Baton Pass.

Gorebyss: Special Version of Huntail

Relicanth: Thankfully, cannot have Rock Head and SS at the same time. Otherwise... HEAD SMASH.

Luvdisc: Not even viable

Floatzel: Base 105 Attack, 115 Speed, Taunt, and Bulk Up, as well as a respectable physical movepool. Could be broken when it outspeeds EVERYTHING, and has Double-STAB.

Lumeinion: Not broken

Seismitoad: STAB Earthquakes from something that outspeeds everything is hardly nice. Bulky too.

Golduck: Not really broken

Poliwrath: Hypnosis + Belly Drum, anyone? Unstoppable force, except for maybe Jellicent or Mach Punches.

Armaldo: Bulk, Swords Dance, and, most importantly, provides additional coverage to the SS'ers. Not broken, but sure helps out the others.

Carracosta: Shell Smash

Beartic: Not broken.

So, if SS+ Drizzle was allowed, we would probobly have to ban:

Kingdra, Ludicolo, Kabutops, Omastar, Floatzel, Huntail, Poliwrath, Gorebyss, and Carracosta.

9 pokemon.

Who would otherwise be viable in lower teirs, and some are viable for other tactics anyway [Ludicolo in Rain stall teams, due to Rain Dish and Leech Seed]

Bear in mind, some of the questionable ones may also be broken. Ludicolo cannot set up, after all. Seismetoad could be broken, but I'm being conservative here.

I'd much rather ban Swift Swim and Drizzle being used together, than slow down the whole suspect testing process, and ban up to 9 pokemon who are otherwise fine. This banning would probobly take at least 3 periods too, as after the first trio are banned, the next trio will step up [Gorebyss, Poliwrath and Carracosta, probobly], followed by the final trio.

Let's face it, any water type who has any real form of competative viability in the first place, with Swift Swim, is broken by it. It takes stuff of Seaking's teir to not be broken. And Seaking is awful.

Also, at the above poster, Swift Swim is not broken in limited rain. There is nothing about just using Rain Dance, and having a limited sweeping time, that was broken in 4th gen, let alone 5th, where more weather runs rampant.

This leads me onto my point to Sajak. Blaziken was broken by being Blaziken. Kingdra, Ludicolo, and Kabutops were broken by the existabce of ANOTHER pokemon, Drizzle-Politoad. So, aside from the situation not being comparable due to this fact, which would you ban, up to 9 pokemon, or Politoad, ruining two other playstyles?

I said that Drizzle + Swift Swim is not broken in Gen V any more than it was in Gen IV (where it wasn't banned), and i stand by it.

I have looked at the advantage for Rain HO teams, and it doesn't exist within the first 9 turns, which is basically when Rain HO does its damage. Only after 9 turns does it save you a turn that you would have used for Rain Dance.

Rain Stall gets a nice boost, but that was never broken, and frankly i think we really don't need to discuss the brokenness of Rain Stall; we all know it's not.

It was broken in Gen 4...

Kyogre was banned, preveting the style from being used in OU, but, when CAP wanted to test weather abilities, to see if Drought would be acceptable for Pyoak, they allowed a Lv 1 Groundon into OU. They also did this with Kyogre, to test to see if Drizzle was acceptable.

They decided it Uber under Support. On Lv 1 Kygore.

Sure, this was not a 'true' suspect test, but seeing how many well-respected Smogon staff run CAP, I think it's a fair statement to say that Drizzle WAS broken in Gen 4.

 

[DJXO9]

I'm going to keep echoing reach's and theangryscientist's sentiments. The Swiftswim / Drizzle ban did some, but Drizzle is just way to powerful. However, if Drizzle were completely banned, the other weathers would take over. With that reasoning, I think we should just ban all weather-inducing abilities.

 

[jle1076]

They should only ban Ludicolo/Kingdra/Other HUGE threats that are broken by Drizzele + SS being on the same team

 

[Ulevo]

I am statisfyed.

Alderon's Proposal prevented the destruction of 2 playstyles [Rain Offense without SS, and Rain Stall]

Except that's not the case.

Rain offense doesn't exist in OU anymore. At least, not within the context of abusing Swift Swim. No one in their right mind would give up infinite rain and its benefits for 9 turns of speed (most likely 8) that can be stalled out.

Also, at the above poster, Swift Swim is not broken in limited rain. There is nothing about just using Rain Dance, and having a limited sweeping time, that was broken in 4th gen, let alone 5th, where more weather runs rampant.

You're correct. However, as long as Drizzle is around, no one will use Rain Dance. So banning Swift Swim for the sake of simplifying the ban makes the most competitive sense.

The only other argument that potentially makes more sense is banning Drizzle out right, but that's if you sit with the camp that has similar opinions of Reachzero, and believe that Drizzle is broken.

Either way, I don't support a complex ban.