np: UU Stage 4 - I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas

[Mishra]

Maybe I should have been more clear. I am not saying froslass is useless outside of hail, but trying to preserve it because of the fact that is isn't as good without hail does not seem like a good justification for a complex ban.

@Bryn: I think the council did a great job of covering this, but Hippowdon was definitely the major factor in the whole sand core debate. We have had sand and stoutland for a while now, only when hippowdon came down did sand get the power it needed to (I don't want to say stranglehold the meta), but it made me not want to play anything that didn't run Hippowdon/Abomasnow/Rain Dance.

@SJCrew: He has a couple of stops, and Slowbro definitely hurts him, but the rest of my team can deal with slowbro pretty easily, but that may be an issue later on. Fortunately, as long as chandelure is around, I haven't seen too many slowbros on the ladder.

 

[breh]

I'm not sure, but I'd assume that Thunderpunch 2HKOes it with Guts (or, for that matter, sheer force).

Hippowdon may well have been the better ban; you have to remember that it's stupidly bulky in the first place and also quite strong. That's not something you can say about Abomasnow, which can pretty much only throw around Leech Seed, Blizzard, and statuses.

 

[Mishra]

Eh,

244 Atk Hariyama ThunderPunch vs 252 HP/252 Def Slowbro: 28.93% - 34.52%

However, after a BU or a guts boost:

244 +1 Atk Hariyama ThunderPunch vs 252 HP/252 Def Slowbro: 43.15% - 51.27%


I am not sure what the standard EV spread for a Slowbro is nowadays...

 

[jamashawalker]

I am not sure what the standard EV spread for a Slowbro is nowadays...

I believe slowbro run enough SpAtk EVs to OHKO an offensive roserade with psyshock..I'm not sure how many EVs that is though

 

[SJCrew]

106.5% - 126.4%

Zero, lol.

Standard 252/252 is all Slowbro needs.

 

[Godsend]

That's not how it works. We didn't say "if spikes breaks moltres ban moltres, not roserade". Is stoutland broken outside sand? Obviously not. So it must be sand that breaks it. Big hippo and little hippo both provide sand, but big hippo also provides massive amounts of team support, just like how Deo-S and Deo-D both provide spikes but Deo-S does a much better job of it. It made sense to ban big hippo.

In this case though, I would say it makes more sense to ban snow cloak than it does to ban abomasnow, just because I don't think hail is inherently broken.

This is a classic debate between banning the abuser and what makes the abuser broken. In this case, all we did was slightly nerf Sand, and now people assume that it isn't broken, which isn't really true. Stoutland is still as deadly as ever, and baby Hippo still can switch into the things that wall Stout like Coba. I'm not going to argue about what we should have done, because that is pointless, but Stoutland has always been the problem, and I never agreed with banning Hippowdon.

Edit@ Mishra: Hippowdon only made people aware of Sand. Scoopapa DESTROYED the ladder with his team using Hippopotos. The only change he made when Hippowdon fell was to change baby Hippo for big HIppo. His team still destroyed. I'm sure his team with the baby Hippo would still wreck right now.

 

[SJCrew]

Sand has always been good prior to Hippowdon, but now that it has to depend on Hippopotas as a key physical wall, which I specifically outlined not dealing with Stoutland's common checks in any fashion in my suspect paragraphs (its EQ doesn't even 2HKO Leftovers variants of Cobalion, Rhyperior ignores it entirely, with or without hazards), it's not going to be anywhere near as dominant this round, and probably never again as long as it continues to play tug-o-war with Hail (which can also use Snover if Abomasnow ever went BL). Deny the changes as you wish, but the shift is clearly out of Sand's favor this round and neither Stoutland nor Sandstream are looking for a ban anytime soon.

 

[Ziqo]

I still find it stupid that sand veil / snow cloak is not a part of the evasion clause when brightpowder is. As I recall there was a pretty good disscussion about it just before the tier changes (when a bunch of stuff dropped), and i think it was jabba who said it might actually be possible to get something like that passed? (Don't quote me on this though, it's a long time ago now, but with the removal of hippo snow cloak abusing teams will most likely rise again)

 

[Steamroll]

I still find it stupid that sand veil / snow cloak is not a part of the evasion clause when brightpowder is. As I recall there was a pretty good disscussion about it just before the tier changes (when a bunch of stuff dropped), and i think it was jabba who said it might actually be possible to get something like that passed? (Don't quote me on this though, it's a long time ago now, but with the removal of hippo snow cloak abusing teams will most likely rise again)

Should we also ban Hustle because it lowers the accuracy of moves that are supposed to hit 100%? How about banning No Guard because it makes moves that are supposed to miss 100% accuracy? Abilities SHOULD NOT be under the evasion clause because they lower the accuracy of the moves, not act as +1 acc like moody would often do.

 

[GTS]

Should we also ban Hustle because it lowers the accuracy of moves that are supposed to hit 100%? How about banning No Guard because it makes moves that are supposed to miss 100% accuracy? Abilities SHOULD NOT be under the evasion clause because they lower the accuracy of the moves, not act as +1 acc like moody would often do.

That is the point of those abilities, to alter Accuracy in some way. Hustle negatively affects the user, so you have to pay for the power just like with any high power move like Focus Blast.

No Guard hasn't proven to be broken, even if Machamp can land Dynamicpunches and Stone Edges every time. Few mons get this ability, but it still doesn't affect Evasion Clause in any way.

On the other hand, Snow Cloak is much like brightpowder in that it instantly puts the opposing player at a disadvantage that can't even be outplayed thru logic. You just have to hope for the best, which is just not a fun game to play.

 

[nooblikeaboon]

10% Burn/Freeze-Chance on certain moves and critical hits put one side at a disadvantage too and certainly arent fun to play with (speaking from experience).

So, if we ban Snow Cloak/etc. pp. id like to ban these things too. Makes the game more competitive.

 

[Godsend]

Sand has always been good prior to Hippowdon, but now that it has to depend on Hippopotas as a key physical wall, which I specifically outlined not dealing with Stoutland's common checks in any fashion in my suspect paragraphs (its EQ doesn't even 2HKO Leftovers variants of Cobalion, Rhyperior ignores it entirely, with or without hazards), it's not going to be anywhere near as dominant this round, and probably never again as long as it continues to play tug-o-war with Hail (which can also use Snover if Abomasnow ever went BL). Deny the changes as you wish, but the shift is clearly out of Sand's favor this round and neither Stoutland nor Sandstream are looking for a ban anytime soon.

The baby hippo can still come in on Stout's checks and Roar them out. Next time Stoutland's checks come in, they won't be so healthy and won't so easily check Stoutland.
IDK, Sand didn't get nerfed as bad as people make it seem, hopefully people will realize that eventually.

@Steamroll: First, from Bulbapedia, "Snow Cloak causes evasion to increase by 20% in a hailstorm." There is almost no comparison between Hustle and SC/SV. You cannot compare you lowering your own accuracy and your opponent raising their evasion. No one is complaining about moves with low accuracy missing, they are complaining about an ability that forces moves to have lowered accuarcy with out any effort. Flareblitz summed up the difference between Jirachi's Iron Head and SNow Cloak hax already, so please, don't bring that up.

 

[pharaohcalvin]

I am just going to say, for all those people out there complaining about Snow Cloak causing hte 20% evasion that they can't control. You can control it, change the weather, use flamethrower over fire blast to increase the landing chance. It really seems like a bunch of people are just complaining about a little salt in the wound because they missed 1 out of 5 moves. It isn't snow cloak you guys have a problem with, it is Froslass. Don't go getting a bunch of other pokes caught up in you vendetta against her. It is her combination of stats, typing and move pool that lets her due what she does, it is not just snow cloak.

 

[Heysup]

10% Burn/Freeze-Chance on certain moves and critical hits put one side at a disadvantage too and certainly arent fun to play with (speaking from experience).

So, if we ban Snow Cloak/etc. pp. id like to ban these things too. Makes the game more competitive.

I wonder of the game will listen to us if we tell it "we ban critical hits and secondary effects".

I doubt it. You're confusing altering game mechanics with making a ban list.

Not to mention that for any of those you need to actually get an attack off and they can be played around. With Evasion moves and abilities, the players aren't in control of the game. The RNG is. We don't want that.

 

[Notty]

I am just going to say, for all those people out there complaining about Snow Cloak causing hte 20% evasion that they can't control. You can control it, change the weather, use flamethrower over fire blast to increase the landing chance. It really seems like a bunch of people are just complaining about a little salt in the wound because they missed 1 out of 5 moves. It isn't snow cloak you guys have a problem with, it is Froslass. Don't go getting a bunch of other pokes caught up in you vendetta against her. It is her combination of stats, typing and move pool that lets her due what she does, it is not just snow cloak.

I dunno. When you've got a Pokemon like Mamoswine who, in addition to having basically no safe switch-ins, also has at least a 1 in 5 shot of beating it's checks as well, I'd be inclined to say that my problem is, indeed, Snow Cloak.

 

[jamashawalker]

I am just going to say, for all those people out there complaining about Snow Cloak causing hte 20% evasion that they can't control. You can control it, change the weather, use flamethrower over fire blast to increase the landing chance. It really seems like a bunch of people are just complaining about a little salt in the wound because they missed 1 out of 5 moves. It isn't snow cloak you guys have a problem with, it is Froslass. Don't go getting a bunch of other pokes caught up in you vendetta against her. It is her combination of stats, typing and move pool that lets her due what she does, it is not just snow cloak.

This: http://www.smogon.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3989882&postcount=142

A quote from razza a page back which I will say represents alot of untold matches fighting against snowcloak

Also choosing flamethrower and missing because of evasion is still missing..happens to me alot when Im sweeping a hail team with Azelf..I literally have to toss a coin and hope that snow cloak doesnt stop his sweep.

Changing the weather against hail is the exact same thing as saying using haze against double team

 

[FlareBlitz]

Should we also ban Hustle because it lowers the accuracy of moves that are supposed to hit 100%? How about banning No Guard because it makes moves that are supposed to miss 100% accuracy? Abilities SHOULD NOT be under the evasion clause because they lower the accuracy of the moves, not act as +1 acc like moody would often do.

Hooray this argument again.........

Here are all the things wrong with it.

1) If I use blizzard, I have a 10% chance of freezing your mon. If you use blizzard, you have a 10% chance of freezing my mon. Under hail conditions, if you use a 100% accurate move, it has a 100% chance of hitting. If I use a 100% accurate move, it only has an 80% chance of hitting. Do you see the difference? The only way to avoid this imbalance is for me to use my own Snow Cloak Pokemon, which obviously just feeds back into why the ability needs to be banned.
2) Hustle is an ability you actually have to pick, whose consequences you have to deal with. You do not pick Snow Cloak on your opponent's Froslass.
No Guard is an ability that has the same effect on both parties, and can sometimes harm the Pokemon that use it (Machamp can never rely on hax to avoid the 2hko from CBperior)
3) There's nothing wrong with banning anti-competitive abilities. If Gamefreak released an ability in Pokemon Grey that automatically puts an opposing Pokemon to sleep, would you say that it shouldn't be covered under sleep clause? If not, then why do you think an ability that automatically increases evasion shouldn't be covered under evasion clause?

Edit: 4) Also, in order to get the hax chance for blizzard/fire blast, you actually have to use blizzard and fire blast. Snow Cloak is passive.

 

[Pocket]

This is a classic debate between banning the abuser and what makes the abuser broken. In this case, all we did was slightly nerf Sand, and now people assume that it isn't broken, which isn't really true. Stoutland is still as deadly as ever, and baby Hippo still can switch into the things that wall Stout like Coba. I'm not going to argue about what we should have done, because that is pointless, but Stoutland has always been the problem, and I never agreed with banning Hippowdon.

It's not really pointless to debate about past suspect. Someone stated in the Council thread that the council's main advantage is its flexibility - if the council is convinced enough to rescind their last decision, they can do so. With the past Suspect Process it's much more tedious to go back on past suspects.

Personally I just can't help that banning Hippowdon only served as a scapegoat to keep our favorite UU sand sweeper. All of the council member's paragraph explained how Hippo facilitates Stoutland's sweep. Why not simply remove the more threatening Stoutland? Returning to metagame back to "status quo," isn't a strong argument, because this same line of reasoning could have banned Politoed / Drizzle in OU ("Swift Swimmers weren't a problem until Drizzle was available!").

Is not Stoutland the more overbearing half of the Stoutland - Hippowdon dual core? Would we be more threatened by a Hippowdon-less sand team or a Stoutland-less sand team?

 

[Ace Emerald]

Personally I just can't help that banning Hippowdon only served as a scapegoat to keep our favorite UU sand sweeper. All of the council member's paragraph explained how Hippo facilitates Stoutland's sweep. Why not simply remove the more threatening Stoutland? Returning to metagame back to "status quo," isn't a strong argument, because this same line of reasoning could have banned Politoed / Drizzle in OU ("Swift Swimmers weren't a problem until Drizzle was available!").

Is not Stoutland the more overbearing half of the Stoutland - Hippowdon dual core? Would we be more threatened by a Hippowdon-less sand team or a Stoutland-less sand team?

The situation with Stoutland and Hippowdon is nothing like Swift Swim and Politoad. For starters, Hippo in UU is much better by itself than Politoad in OU. The main difference is perma sand already existed in UU, where as perma rain did not. Therefore, we had knowledge that Stoutland was not a problem in perma sand as a sand sweeper, only when paired with Hippowdon was he too strong. Politoad was the first and only Drizzler in OU, they couldn't ban toad under the argument that Swift Swim with perma rain wasnt broken before toad, but now it is, so toad is the problem. Set up weather really isn't comparable at all to perma weather, the conditions, strategy, and possibilities are totally different.

 

[TM13IceBeam]

The situation with Stoutland and Hippowdon is nothing like Swift Swim and Politoad. For starters, Hippo in UU is much better by itself than Politoad in OU. The main difference is perma sand already existed in UU, where as perma rain did not. Therefore, we had knowledge that Stoutland was not a problem in perma sand as a sand sweeper, only when paired with Hippowdon was he too strong. Politoad was the first and only Drizzler in OU, they couldn't ban toad under the argument that Swift Swim with perma rain wasnt broken before toad, but now it is, so toad is the problem. Set up weather really isn't comparable at all to perma weather, the conditions, strategy, and possibilities are totally different.

...aren't you implying that Politoed should be banned from OU?

 

[Ace Emerald]

...aren't you implying that Politoed should be banned from OU?

No. The point was there were two completely different situations. I'm saying the for the situations to be comparable, we would have to have banned Politoad in a meta where perma rain already existed. Perma rain never existed in OU before Politoad, so Politoad couldn't have broken perma rain for OU. However, perma sand already existed in UU, and Hippowdon broke it.

 

[Godsend]

The situation with Stoutland and Hippowdon is nothing like Swift Swim and Politoad. For starters, Hippo in UU is much better by itself than Politoad in OU. The main difference is perma sand already existed in UU, where as perma rain did not. Therefore, we had knowledge that Stoutland was not a problem in perma sand as a sand sweeper, only when paired with Hippowdon was he too strong. Politoad was the first and only Drizzler in OU, they couldn't ban toad under the argument that Swift Swim with perma rain wasnt broken before toad, but now it is, so toad is the problem. Set up weather really isn't comparable at all to perma weather, the conditions, strategy, and possibilities are totally different.

Honestly, this sort of drives me crazy. Yes, Sand was already in the tier before Hippowdon fell. That does not mean that Stoutland was not broken, it just hadn't been discovered. Hippowdon is what made people recognize that Stoutland was a threat, Hippowdon didn't make Stoutland any faster or stronger, it didn't give it a better movepool when compared to Hippopotos, it just made it get noticed.

Here's an extreme example:
If people started think that Honchkrow was broken because because a new drop from OU was a good supporter for it and people notice how good Honchkrow is, we aren't going to ban the new drop, we would ban Honchkrow. You may see a similarity between this and Moltres+Spikes from last gen, but because Spikes arguably made Moltres "broken" but banning a Pokemon and a game mechanic are very different things. Spikes didn't break all Pokemon, just Moltres. This phantom supporter doesn't break all Pokemon, just Honchkrow.

Did that make sense?

 

[FlareBlitz]

Spikes didn't break all Pokemon, just Moltres

...wouldn't that be an argument for banning Moltres? This line of reasoning seems counterproductive to your point...

And we weren't talking about banning a game mechanic, just the premier spikers (Roserade, Froslass) which were banned.

 

[Godsend]

...wouldn't that be an argument for banning Moltres? This line of reasoning seems counterproductive to your point...

And we weren't talking about banning a game mechanic, just the premier spikers (Roserade, Froslass) which were banned.

I'm sorry, I guess I wasn't very clear. If it came down to just banning the abuser of a mechanic or the mechanic itself, we, at least should, ban the abuser. So, last gen when people sayed they wanted to ban Spikes (which happened from time to time) because they said Spikes made Moltres too powerful, I always just sayed to ban Moltres. In relation to the argument at hand; Spikes made Moltres broken, I'd say ban Moltres, if Hippowdon made Stoutland broken, I'd say band Stoutland.

Yes, the best spikers were banned, but at least from my understanding not because they made specific other Pokemon too much to handle, but because they were great Pokemon. Roserade could do offensive or support and was great at both, and people still bitched about Snow Cloak evasion from Froslass. People didn't say "Froslass has Spikes, ban it," they mentioned all of its good qualities.

 

[pharaohcalvin]

This: http://www.smogon.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3989882&postcount=142

A quote from razza a page back which I will say represents alot of untold matches fighting against snowcloak

Also choosing flamethrower and missing because of evasion is still missing..happens to me alot when Im sweeping a hail team with Azelf..I literally have to toss a coin and hope that snow cloak doesnt stop his sweep.

Changing the weather against hail is the exact same thing as saying using haze against double team

It is not the same, changing the weather has more uses. You can use it as a check to Snoutland as well, you can use it to boost you own strength. Also isn't rain dance quite common for Kingdra to use to begin with? Once again, I really see most of this just being complaining about Froslass :/.