It's true Gzig that sometimes opposing opinions are pushed aside.
For example Kurashi made very good points on how weather will not effect the majority of OU statistics, but instead of commenting on the basis of his whole argument people pinpointed the small error he made about Heatran because it was the only thing they could criticize and prove wrong.
It's called a fundamental part of making an argument, Ethos. Prove that you are more credible than your opponent by criticising him. Did he deserve it, no, but hey it's the internet.
Not only this but I feel like sometimes people are misreading and putting words in peoples mouths. Sand Rush Stoutland is nowhere near as broken as Sand Rush Excadrill. As KingClown has roughly said, sandstorm itself isn't broken, it does not mess around with stab boosts and weaknesses like drizzle and drought but however certain abilities within sand storm are broken. Such as the Sand Rush ability on Excadrill (which is just like drizzle + swift swim btw).
You admit that Sand Rush isn't broken and then imply it's broken in Sand. Excadrill is only broken in ideal situations(SS up) and even then it's possible to deal with it. Sand Russ Excadrill isn't like Drizzle+Swift Swim because it's only on a SINGLE pokemon and doesn't provide that extra STAB you mentioned.
On this note sandstorm would be the hardest to differentiate. However, this doesn't mean that it cannot be done. I myself have battled on a server which has banned drizzle and drought abuse but allows sandstorm. The main Broken Pokemon however, within sandstorm are banned i.e SR Excadrill and SV Chomp. (Hail is still allowed because nothing about it is broken.)
Excadrill and Chomp have viable checks and counters in SMOGON's server which allows drizzle and drought. Without other weathers one is going to be dominant, they balance each other out.
I know the argument is that if we were to do this on smogon too, it would mean everything would need to be tested again. But this is not the case. We are not promoting banning separate abilities on every Pokemon. We are referring to ban only such Broken Abilities in OU, such as SV Chomp which was banned in 4th gen because it allowed a one turn hax to effect the outcome of the match. Yes I know hax is a part of the game, but it doesn't mean we should be abusing it.
The issue is that those abilities aren't broken by OU standards. Drought isn't broken because SR skrews up Ninetails and Chlorophyll sweepers aren't as powerful as the Swift Swim sweepers were. SV Chomp, actually all Garchomp, was banned in Gen IV because it was overcentralizing and lacked true counters. Besides, banning in Gen 5 has NOTHING to do with how banning in Gen IV occured.
'Yes but that's making it like 4th gen. This is 5th gen deal with it'
When something is broken it should be banned. Full Stop. No ifs and buts.
I hope that's not how you view people against banning Garchomp. This is 5th gen, Garchomp has counters now and isn't broken anymore esp with Lati@s runnin around.
"Also, you act like by carrying 2 sun checks, you now only have 4 members left. Guess what? Those 2 checks can do other things besides checking sun. There's no rule that says "Sun checks may do absolutely nothing besides check sun." You still have 6 members."
True statement. A check to sun is typically a check to other pokemon as well or at least good in support.
We have to carry counter checks for sun/rain/ sand(excadrill or chomp) do you get how ridiculous this is sounding? There is nothing that counters all of the above. Unless you count using a weather team yourself. This is called over centralizing. Yes these checks do other things aswell, but to create an 'effective' team which counters everything broken, you are limited to a very narrow choice, with only one or two spaces on you're team left.
Weather was 40-something percent of the metagame in April. No, it's not ridiculous to expect a cmopetitive pokemon player to counter/check popular threats in the metagame, it's playing the metagame. And to saying nothing counter the above, there are 643 pokemon, you CAN'T counter them all. Weather is centralising, but counting the fact that (WARNING:Rounded Figures) 20 odd percent is based on a single weather (sand) and all weathers play differently it's not over-centralising, it's good and therefore became popular. Btw, "Effective teams" counter/check popular threats in the meta while covering their bases. It might be a narrow choice, but if you can't beat a weather in OU you might as well not play or get really used to ragequitting.
Mario With Lasers: "I am not saying that Drizzle per se is broken (I'd agree on banning Thundurus/Starmie before Drizzle...)"
Nuff said.
To conclude this argument I would like to point out that weather effects the whole of the metagame in a negative way. It's not like one Pokemon which in itself is broken such as shadow tag Chandelure. Weather (drizzle/drought) mixes up stab boosts and weaknesses of a large majority of Pokemon. It allows Pokemon 'X' to live Pokemon 'Y's' attack. It allows 'Y' to kill pokemon 'Z'. Without permanent weather 'Mario With Lasers' things such as 'Thundusus/Starmie' wouldn't need to be banned. Like KingClown has said 'why isn't weather being blamed for over centralizing?'
Weather has been blamed for being over-centralizing. I did it a few times on this thread. But weather itself is a strategy you can't ban almost entirely because of Hail never being broken and Sand being managable, and Rain/Sun having prominent threats that you can't pick out and say is broken. Having a combination of those pokemon makes weather good and that isn't broken, it's synergy.
Now if anyone would like to falter my argument instead of pinpointing a weaker argument to counter, I would be happy to
listen to you.
