Entry Hazards - Are They Broken?

[jpw234]

Spikes is categorically different - it doesn't disproportionately affect different types outside of Flying, takes three turns to set up to its full potential, and has a much less wide distribution.
I am strongly of the opinion that making "a couple of Pokemon a little bit more viable" is very important to the metagame. Variety in teambuilding is (as I outlined in the rain debate thread) I think the most important value that competitive pokemon has and things which stifle that should be banned. I also think you underestimate the effects that Stealth Rock has. Yanmega is not a "little bit" less viable because of Stealth Rock, it is completely unviable. Ditto Moltres. Things which take huge hits include Hail, sun sweepers like Darmanitan and Victini, Togekiss, etc. Stealth Rock has a large and sweeping effect on the metagame.
Togekiss is only not a viable option because Stealth Rock exists. It is not fair to assume that Stealth Rock is a necessary component of the metagame simply because it is currently a component of the metagame. It is an otherwise viable option which the existence of Stealth Rock precludes, which I am using as an example of how Stealth Rock limits diversity.

As to alexwolf's edit on his previous post: I'm a bit disappointed that you completely skipped over the content of my post, considering that you did it on the rain thread as well - is there something I've done to you to make you angry at me? I'm also kind of annoyed that you said I'm dragging down the quality of the thread without explaining what you're talking about. I think I've done a reasonably good job of explaining my positions.

@Agent Gibbs: Since you seem so offended I am happy to remove those comments from my previous posts. My stance is this - argue respectfully and I will respond in kind, argue maliciously and I will respond in kind. Also, I will never claim to be not an asshole :P

 

[Lady Alex]

The weight is in the pro-ban side to present good arguments as to why SR is broken. I don't need to present any argument as long as am i able to refute yours.

Which you have yet to even attempt to do. Your entire reasoning is based on the premise that the opposing arguments don't meet a certain level of objectivity necessary to be a legitimate argument, which is not in any way an argument that denies any of the reasoning given as to why SR deserves to be banned.

Let me show you some much more objective criteria for banning something than those that your group presents: Keldeo is very difficult to check for offensive teams because of the limited amount of Pokemon that can avoid the 2HKO from Keldeo's Scarf Hydro Pump/Surf, forcing them to use few specific Pokemon to deal with it.

You say that this criteria is "much more objective criteria" for being banworthy than anything the Anti-SR side has presented, yet go on to say that when the Anti-SR side discusses how unreasonable SR is to deal with, it is only "somewhat objective."


Therefore Keldeo can be suspected under the criteria of restricting certain playstyles. The statement that Scarf Keldeo is very difficult to check for offensive teams and forces them to run few specific Pokemon is not subjective at all, it is a fact that every player who uses offensive teams knows. Whether or not the strain that Keldeo puts to offensive teams with its scarf set is enough to get it banned or not is up to each person's opinion, but the reason for suspecting Keldeo is mostly objective.

Likewise, one can use your reasoning and say "The statement that Stealth Rock is very difficult to check and forces them to run few, specific pokemon is not subjective at all." Saying that something is or isn't difficult to deal with is an inherently subjective claim, and suggesting otherwise is simply not true. Also, claiming that this idea is an indisputable fact that every offense player knows is way out of line.



So long, the only somewhat objective reason for suspecting SR is that it is difficult to deal with, and this is the only real reason presented to suspect SR. This means that if the majority doesn't find SR to be hard to deal with then it shouldn't be suspected, and so far this is the case. Finally, packing a Rapid Spinner doesn't mean that a team goes out of its way to deal with SR. Rapid Spin deals with Spikes as well, and the popular spinners have multiple uses as well. In the same way that packing a Celebi to deal with Keldeo doesn't meant that you are overprepared for Keldeo, it's the same with packing a spinner.

Another huge leap of reasoning. The statement "This means that if the majority doesn't find SR to be hard to deal with, then it shouldn't be suspected" is a horrible line of reasoning. We're no longer in the suspect days where what was put up for testing was based on what the majority of the community would nominate. What ultimately gets suspected is up to the council. If the council finds that an aspect of the metagame is potentially broken,it can be suspected regardless of what the majority of the community feels. After that, it's up to what the majority of voters, which are not a majority of the community by any means, finds broken.

Yes, packing a spinner is going out of your way to deal with hazards, stealth rock being, by far, the primary reason to carry it. It's distribution and immediate damage it provides as opposed to spikes's comparably poor distribution and needing more than 1 layer to be as effective is much more pressing. Lastly, packing Celebi to check keldeo is an extremely poor parallel to having rapid spin to check stealth rock. Switching Celebi in against Keldeo gives you momentum. Finding a turn to spin is a liability that forces you to lose considerable momentum that outweighs the ease and lack of opportunity cost of setting SR up. I'm not going to address the point that you don't find the reasons the Anti-SR side has given are "not objective enough," since that has already been addressed, and you are now simply repeating yourself without anything else to back your statement.

 

[youngjake93]

I'm actually surprised that only 60% of people said hazards aren't broken considering it is so ingrained into the metagame.
I thought the SR is broken group would have to fight more of an uphill battle than this.

Edit: lol at people calling everyone on their side of the argument intelligent and those on the opposite side are idiotic. Whatever works I guess.

 

[Curtains]

I have been respectful all throughout this thread. I haven't name called or took jabs at anyone once (although i was tempted to). Jpw234, that yanmega and togekiss post was terrible. You completely disregarded basic OU strategy and generalized so much that it was impossible to respond legitimately to that. Also you can't go on about debate skills and respectfulness and then call me an asshole.

In your atrociously formated response your comment on the diversity of OU you state 7 cherry picked SR weak pokemon: Yanmega, Honchkrow, Moltres, Froslass, Togekiss, Rotom-H, and Weavile. All these pokemon are completely usable in OU and can be put on a OU team. The reason they are not OU is because there are pokemon that are better. What niche's do these pokemon have that make them OU worthy of a top battler to use them? Of course a top battler could use them.. I have seen all of these pokemon on the ladder. However, all of these pokemon are extremely fragile or have really bad coverage moves. Or most likely they simply don't fit on most teams. Believe it or not (i doubt you play much of the game or have much experience based on your last few post) there is a thing called team building. When people make teams they make teams that have a chance to compete with the most popular pokemon in the tier. Most of those pokemon you shown are very weak to scizor and rock moves. So a battler would try to make good synergy to make sure that those specific pokemon don't get picked off by scizor or most priority moves. See, we really can't predict the OU metagame. That is why we have usage stats to dictate that. We can look at the pokemon that are already OU and see why they are better. To make the assumption that these pokemon are lowered tiered because of SR may be partially true. But you have to look at the entire picture. Is SR keeping pokemon like rhyperior from being OU? Would having someone use a rhyperior add to the competitiveness of the metagame? Why is a pokemon like cobalion not OU? That is a diverse pokemon! It is fast and has a very strong stab. It takes almost nothing from SR. Yet it is UU. It is outclassed by terrakion and keldeo. OU is just a classification. You can use any pokemon you want. No one is stopping you. If you want to knowingly be a smartass and knowingly use pokemon that are 4x weak to SR then good luck. But SR is not stopping the other 640+ pokemon from being used.

Kidogo: There are many users that agree with me (check the poll). But if mods want to infract me based on my opinion then that is up to their discretion. But I have not broken any rules by calling names, having bad grammar or taking half of the post to call someone elses post misguided or stupid like you guys have been doing all thread. Just because you don't agree with me doesn't mean my post should be infracted.

@False Sense: I said that Rocks may be a reason. But rocks are probably not the only reason as I have stated. I think SR has helped keep pokemon like that from becoming too dangerous.

@kidogo 2

You are mixing up a misunderstanding and a argument. I completely understand your post and actually applauded your effort for the SR calculation. You expect me to automatically think your point is correct. That is not a misunderstanding. That is me telling you that I don't agree with your post or what you are posting doesn't make much practical sense. Also what do you mean about intelligence? is that a jab at me? We are all playing the same game. We aren't talking about real scholarly stuff here we are talking about pokemon. I am just or even more intelligent as all you pro-ban advocates. I am not going to change my view point based on your assumption that I should bow down and agree automatically to you "intelligent badged users". Absolutely not. Stop it.

 

[Kidogo]

First, thanks jpw and others, I was getting tired of responding to the incredibly misguided arguments by the other side, and you articulated some points very well. I really would refrain from insulting anyone in future, mainly because it draws attention from the validity of your argument and let's the opposition just respond to your name-calling instead of your argument. Seriously though curtains, you deserved that--I begged you to think before posting, and yet you keep posting with such a lack of sense that I can only come to the conclusions that you must either be not reading our posts or deliberately misinterpreting them (which I can hopefully rule out, since that's kinda contrary to the point of discussion), or that you are somehow unable to understand our points even when plainly articulated for you. I believe jpw assumed the second was the case (as I'm starting to have to) and voiced this. Please, take the lesson here. And seriously, if ginga is allowed to infract for a "flawed post", what is going on here that this hasn't happened yet. I'm not sure if there's just some sort of mod bias (again, I'd like to think not) or if this has just been missed, but please--do something about this so we don't have to waste any more time repeating ourselves. Jpw though, please don't take an eye for an eye mentality--it's justified, but doesn't help our argument, and we can hopefully trust mods to sort this out.

That's mainly what I wanted to say atm, but let me clear up another issue. Lowering the number of viable mons IS A BAD THING. We want a DIVERSE meta. I am 100% convinced (you are welcome to argue otherwise, but back it up) that banning SR increases the number of viable OU mons greatly. Sure, we may lose donphan, and we may have to ban volc, but stuff like togekiss becomes viable as a counter to landy! (which we just proved!) And for heaven's sake, don't say that this is bad because it will mean kyu-b is no longer handleable in OU--of course not! It's a point against SR that it was able to degrade something as incredibly unfit for OU as kyu-b to OU status!

And why on earth should excessive switching be punished?! Switching is the most thought-provoking, high-level part of the game. And no, I'm not leaving out the facts that don't favor my argument. Yes, ghost-types are vulnerable to trapping as well as spinners. However, jellicent beats ttar and scizor easily 1-on-1, and gengar OHKOs ttar and scizor with the appropriate moves. But even mroe basically than that, who cares?! The point of the spinblocker is to come on in the RS, die or w/e, and then let the spinner get trapped by the next mon. I will gladly sac my spinblocker to kill your spinner--it's done its job! Sure, you can double-switch and try to predict (yay switching--the most essential, strategic part of the game), but you're taking hazards damage on both trapper and spinner, the ghosts can beat many common pursuiters as just mentioned, and it's nowhere near guaranteed--SR is so so easy to set up that I don't even have to bother blocking it the first time, I can just go to something that threatens your starmie out while scouting for a trapper switch. And i can afford to do this strategic switching, because you don't have hazards up! Spikes does not even come near this because so many mons are immune to it, it takes much longer to set up, and its users have so much fewer opportunities to do so because they are in general worse mons, since the distribution is so different! Lastly, I'm not assuming every team runs a trapper--all I'm saying is that, if I want to keep SR up on your side of the field and you want to keep it off, it is so so much easier for me to guarantee this will happen than for you to.

EDIT:
OK, I'm sorry, curtains, I don't swear at people as a rule and I don't call names. Rest assured that, were that not the case, this post would contain a lot of insults. We are not saying that you have been posting especially disrespectfully (at least, that's not my main complaint). We are saying that your arguments make no sense and seem to indicate you either have not read our posts or are incapable of constrictive discussion. Jpw and I (and others) have tried as best we can to explain our arguments as clearly as possible, and you keep misinterpreting them. When you say something like "the reason they are not OU is because there are pokemon that are better"...I don't really know how to reply to that respectfully (and I'm doing my best here). You are not only assuming your conclusion (that SR has nothing to do with their not being OU), you are so clearly disregarding the fact that jpw has pointed this exact tendency of yours out over and over in his most recent posts. God...you even ask, what niche does togekiss have in this meta? Jpw JUST POINTED OUT A NICHE AS A SF LANDY COUNTER! This niche is ONLY non-existent because of the presence of SR--what in the world are you talking about? You are ignoring what we say, assuming your conclusion, and generally posting idiotically (not ad hominem, i hope everyone can tell why).
As I noted above, there are two logical conclusion to draw from this: you are deliberately doing so, or; you are simply unable to understand our arguments. I'm not gonna even attempt to say which it is at this point, but please. Take a step back. Consider the fact that many highly intelligent people are saying you don't have a clue what you're talking about. Why in the world has a mod not done something about this?

 

[False Sense]

@Curtains: Just for clarification, are you saying that Stealth Rocks doesn't play a large role in the tiers of pokemon? Because it just seems that's a bit of a stretch. I imagine that threats such as Darmanitan or Victini would see much more usage if Stealth Rocks weren't an issue for them, as they could switch in and out without having 25% of their health stripped away, and as a result be able to spam their ridiculously powerful attacks more freely.

 

[Kidogo]

Curtains, how could I possibly explain more clearly why I am objecting to your posts? I have written paragraphs and paragraphs, and repeated myself. My reason for believing you should be infracted is not because I don't agree with you! This would be obvious if you considered it for a second--as you just stated, many others agree with you. And yet I'm not calling for any of them to be infracted...yet another flaw in your reasoning. Please, actually read my most recent post, maybe you'll be able to tell why I and others are having a hard time putting up with your posts. Then again, I'm not optimistic on that front.

False sense has just highlighted one of the primary points we've discussed, that SR limits the viability of many otherwise-potentially-OU-material mons. To which you respond that it isn't the only factor. Who ever said it was?!! Come on. I'm too tired atm to explain once more why that doesn't make sense to say, hopefully others will get what's wrong there.
Oh, and then you say that SR has helped keep pokemon from becoming far too dangerous...please, someone stop this guy from posting so I don't have to waste any more time addressing the same issues over and over when he doesn't read any of my or other's posts (this is the generous assumption as to why you're just not getting it).

 

[jpw234]

Curtains, nobody cares and I should not have brought it up. I think your tone was slightly overaggressive in several posts but it is nothing that is not common in forums debates or that I have not done myself. Several things which I said were unnecessary. I apologize for calling you out. Sorry.

However, I still vehemently disagree with several of the arguments you are making. I do not believe in my "yanmega and togekiss" post that I "generalized the OU metagame" or "disregarded basic OU strategy". If you have a legitimate gripe with anything that was said please bring it up, but to this point I have not heard one. I also think you vastly oversimplified my argument in your four line "response" and was slightly insulted by your perceived slight at my intelligence.

As to the rest of your comment, I'm not really sure what to say. First you say that I clearly don't play the game and can't teambuild, which I will choose to ignore. Then you say that "none of those mons have any place in OU" which...is true! Because OU right now has Stealth Rocks in it and they all take massive damage from them! But I find it ridiculous to say that none of them could have a niche were this initial barrier removed. Rotom-H, for example, deals with sun threats and Celebi much better than Rotom-W while retaining much of the same utility, but takes 25% from Stealth Rock. Honchkrow is a fantastic late-game cleaner with Moxie and Sucker Punch, but takes 25% from Stealth Rock. Froslass is a great spiker, offensive spinblocker, and utility pokemon with Destiny Bond, but takes 25% from Stealth Rock. Moltres has outstanding special attack, a niche in Sun (with Fire Blast) and Rain (with Hurricane), but takes 50% from Stealth Rock. Yanmega is a great LO sweeper with Speed Boost or revenge killer with Tinted Lens, but takes 50% from Stealth Rock. Weavile is an outstanding speedy trapper and Dragon-type check, but takes 25% from Stealth Rock. Togekiss is a great ParaFlincher and special wall (as the Landorus calcs show), but takes 25% from Stealth Rock. Etc., etc. These are just examples which I came up with off of the top of my head and with experience in DPP. I'm sure there are many more that we haven't thought of because they don't seem viable as long as Stealth Rock is so widespread. I don't know why you brought up Rhyperior or Cobalion, these pokemon are not Stealth Rock weak and Stealth Rock does not affect them.

"If you want to knowingly be a smartass and use pokemon that are 4x weak to Stealth Rock then good luck". You are still assuming that Stealth Rock is a necessity. There is no reason it has to be in our metagame, it just has been. Your sentence carries "weight" based on the assumption that these pokemon are unviable or useless because they are weak to Stealth Rock. This does not have to be the case.

 

[False Sense]

@False Sense: I said that Rocks may be a reason. But rocks are probably not the only reason as I have stated. I think SR has helped keep pokemon like that from becoming too dangerous.

So, Rocks "may" be a reason their in UU, but it also helps them from becoming too dangerous... But if their too dangerous without Stealth Rocks, you think that would make them OU, right? I apologize if I'm interpreting this wrong, but it seems to me that your statement is somewhat contradictory. Could you possibly clarify on why my two examples (Darmanitan and Victini) are UU besides Rocks?

And keep in mind, I only use these two as examples. I'm not arguing that these are the only things affected by Stealth Rocks. There have been other pokemon in a similar position already listed by others.

 

[Curtains]

Curtains, how could I possibly explain more clearly why I am objecting to your posts? I have written paragraphs and paragraphs, and repeated myself. My reason for believing you should be infracted is not because I don't agree with you! This would be obvious if you considered it for a second--as you just stated, many others agree with you. And yet I'm not calling for any of them to be infracted...yet another flaw in your reasoning. Please, actually read my most recent post, maybe you'll be able to tell why I and others are having a hard time putting up with your posts. Then again, I'm not optimistic on that front.

You haven't really given a reason how I am breaking any rules. You just don't like my argument and that is fine. You don't have to take an entire post to say it though.

Honchkrow is a fantastic late-game cleaner with Moxie and Sucker Punch, but takes 25% from Stealth Rock.

If it is late game why should SR really be the deciding factor? Honchcrow should be sweeping as advertised. If it can't take a hit then you didn't play it correctly.

I don't know why you brought up Rhyperior or Cobalion, these pokemon are not Stealth Rock weak and Stealth Rock does not affect them.

That is my point. They are UU for more reasons than SR. SR is not hindering tiering as much as you want to believe.


All those pokemon can be of use jpw234 like I said. But they can still do their job in spite of SR if you wanted to. Most players don't use them so they are UU.

@false sense yeah it was a typo dont kill me over it.

 

[False Sense]

You haven't really given a reason how I am breaking any rules. You just don't like my argument and that is fine. You don't have to take an entire post to say it though.


If it is late game why should SR really be the deciding factor? Honchcrow should be sweeping as advertised. If it can't take a hit then you didn't play it correctly.


That is my point. They are OU for more reasons than SR. SR is not hindering tiering as much as you want to believe.


All those pokemon can be of use jpw234 like I said. But they can still do their job in spite of SR if you wanted to. Most players don't use them so they are UU.

Um... I hope you saying Cobalion and Rypherior are OU was a typo...

Anyway, I have to agree that bringing up lower tier pokemon resistant to Stealth Rocks doesn't really show us anything. Of course there are other factors limiting their usage; Rypherior has low speed and crippling weaknesses, and Cobalion doesn't have a lot of raw power to work with. The real question is if Stealth Rocks is one of the big factors in deciding the tiers of pokemon weak to them. What about Victini? It has the same stats as the amazing Celebi and Jirachi, as well as having an incredibly powerful move in V-Create. So why is it UU? Would you say it's because of Stealth Rocks, or something else?

 

[jpw234]

"SR does not fuck every UU pokemon over" does not equate to "SR is not fucking many UU pokemon over". Earlier you criticized me of "cherrypicking" - how is this not the same thing? In the end, if the existence of Stealth Rock restricts a large number of pokemon from being viable (and I have given you seven examples), and there are not compelling reasons to leave it in OU (I have not heard a single one), then why are we not at least giving it a suspect test?

"...they can still do their job in spite of SR if you wanted to". Yes. A Moltres at 50% health can still attack. But this does not mean that it retains its effectiveness. Just because we don't see SR killing pokemon doesn't mean that it isn't hurting the metagame. Taking 25% or 50% off of a pokemon's HP before it can even move is a huge handicap that many niche pokemon are unable to overcome. A specific example which I have given (while you have not cited even one) is the example of specially defensive Togekiss checking SF Landorus. For offensive pokemon, every HP is a good HP, although it is less easy to show specific scenarios where it is relevant.

 

[MMII]

That's mainly what I wanted to say atm, but let me clear up another issue. Lowering the number of viable mons IS A BAD THING. We want a DIVERSE meta.

I am 100% convinced (you are welcome to argue otherwise, but back it up) that banning SR increases the number of viable OU mons greatly.

And why on earth should excessive switching be punished?! Switching is the most thought-provoking, high-level part of the game.

When you say something like "the reason they are not OU is because there are pokemon that are better"...I don't really know how to reply to that respectfully (and I'm doing my best here). You are not only assuming your conclusion (that SR has nothing to do with their not being OU)

God...you even ask, what niche does togekiss have in this meta? Jpw JUST POINTED OUT A NICHE AS A SF LANDY COUNTER! This niche is ONLY non-existent because of the presence of SR--what in the world are you talking about?

LN and I had an interesting discussion on diversity/variety on IRC recently. (although it was concerning Evasion in Ubers and not SR) An interesting point he brought up (or was it chaos...) was that increased variety does have the potential drawback of putting additional strain on teambuilding. I can't really remember much how that conversation ended (outside of Limi wrecking us both with his logic bomb) but I think we can apply it here to say that it isn't as straightforward as the way you presented it.

That's a pretty bold statement to make seeing as we have yet to do anything with SR. I know you criticized curtains for saying that lower mons aren't lower because of SR but I think he does touch on a very big point. SR isn't be any means the sole factor for a mon's placement (if that were true the tiers would look very different). So I feel that to say that there would be a sure increase in diversity or that a Pokemon is in the lower tiers as a result of its SR weakness is a bit too much of a stretch. It may or may not be true. (I know this may seem like reason to suspect but many large changes to the metagame have the potential to shake things up. Curiosity isn't sufficient reason to start a suspect test.)

Switching is a very powerful tool and I feel that such a powerful tool needs to have some sort of significant drawback. To draw poorish sort of parallel, switching without hazards is like Final Smashes in SSBB. It is very powerful with the ability to completely shift the tides of battle in one favor without much risk. Sure you could argue that placing yourself at risk when going for the Smash Ball (like a risky/prediction based switch/double switch) to seek the advantage of an easy kill(s) (like trying to have the better matchup by switching out your mon) is already a drawback but I feel that this just simply isn't enough when compared to the massive advantages that this can bring.

In fact, adding that additional risk through SR increases the demanded thought behind smart switching. Having that additional damage forces you to make sure each of your switches are productive as you risk far more than a temporary poor matchup or momentum lose, you risk your Pokemon actually dieing from your careless plays. Because of this, the presence of SR allows a better player to beat a lesser player in spite of bad matchup or unfortunate hax. A threat that would otherwise completely wreck a team can be beat by playing around it with intelligent switching and eventually beating it thanks to the passive damage from hazards. (like Ubers Stall may often find itself doing when pitted against the likes of Specs Kyurem or Rayquaza) Being able to do so becomes very important in a game as diverse and filled with potential threats such as OU. (no I'm not trying to say that SR is needed to keep broken threats in line, just that banning SR may actually put more strain on teambuilding than it would remove)

(Quoted the bit that addressed Curtains since I used it earlier in this post. Also, what I explained here may be what Curtains was trying to say with his post.)

I don't want to get too much into theorymon on this point but the dreaded Lando-I is also one who is only effected by SR when switching. This means that walling it isn't enough especially when you factor in the possibility of crits over an extended game. Just something I thought I would throw out there to show that it isn't, by any means, just defensive play that "benefits" from the lack of hazards.

 

[jpw234]

Sorry Melee Mewtwo, bu I don't buy that at all. I find no justification for the argument that SR should exist as a punishment for switching. There already is a punishment for switching - you can't do anything that turn and have to absorb an attack. That itself is a gigantic disincentive and is what makes switching the most important competitive part of the game - you have to determine whether switching to a pokemon with a better matchup against your opponent's current mon is worth absorbing a hit, letting him set up, or risking a double switch/U-Turn or Volt Switch to an even worse matchup. There is no reason to tack on an additional penalty to this. Think of this - with Stealth Rock, an offensive team could theoretically never be attacked and die to passive damage just from switching. SR effectively puts a timer on the battle and takes an element of it out of the player's hands. That's not a good thing.
You also say that this penalty means a good player is more likely to beat a worse player. Exactly the opposite. A good pokemon player means that you are a good teambuilder, and a good battler. A good battler means predicting effectively, making smart moves and making good switches. Given equal starting teams, the biggest part of how a better player outplays a worse player is by making better switches. Penalizing that only reduces the skill ceiling.

I think you're being willfully blind if you think that removing SR would not promote diversity. Why are Yanmega, Moltres, Togekiss and Honchkrow definitively not viable in OU? Because they aren't. I love Honchkrow but nobody uses him in BW2. And these are good pokemon. While they may be outclassed in certain respects, I defy anybody to argue that there is a larger reason than the prevalence of Stealth Rock that these pokemon (along with others, these are just immediate examples) are not used more.

 

[alexwolf]

As to alexwolf's edit on his previous post: I'm a bit disappointed that you completely skipped over the content of my post, considering that you did it on the rain thread as well - is there something I've done to you to make you angry at me? I'm also kind of annoyed that you said I'm dragging down the quality of the thread without explaining what you're talking about. I think I've done a reasonably good job of explaining my positions.

The content of your post??? You mean the post that had one of the most childish, irrelevant, and ironic arguments ever? You want people to take you seriously when you do your little dialogue things to show how Yanmega is not viable in OU, like this even brings a point? Up until this post, i thought you were at least somewhat reasonable, but from the tone and the content of this post i can see that this isn't true. Here are just some of your ridiculous sentences in this glorious dialogue of yours:

Pretty much, yeah. Look, why don't you stick to the list of approved pokemon, like Jirachi and Terrakion. Don't you worry your little noob head about innovation, leave that to the people who know how to play.

Didn't I tell you not to ask silly questions? We need Stealth Rock because it's been around forever! Plus, how would we deal with Dragonite or Volcarona without it?

Are you even trying to make a serious discussion at this point?

 

[jpw234]

I'm sorry, when I asked you about your edit I was mistakenly under the impression you had perhaps just skipped over my post with the intent to return, or were busy arguing with other people. Apparently I was too generous in giving you this intention, and instead you were busy being an uptight jerk about clearly satirical comments. Did I miss the part of the Smogon rules where it said humor was not allowed when posting? What could I possibly have done in the midst of a friendly discussion to warrant you unprovokedly telling me that I was childish, irrelevant, unreasonable, or ridiculous?

I was ATTEMPTING to inject some levity into a very loud discussion while still addressing issues that pro-Stealth Rockers brought up, such as the argument that SR was necessary to keep pokemon like Dragonite and Volcarona in check, the argument that because SR only manifests itself through chip damage it doesn't swing battles, and your argument about specific criteria being necessary to ban things. In fact, I thought that by quoting specific people and providing specific responses in the context of such a humorous dialogue, I was doing a reasonably decent job of that. I also think that there were genuine and specific responses to the arguments you made, which you have apparently chosen to ignore entirely because of the format I chose to present them in. I'm sorry that my post offended your sensibilities so.

Edit: Seriously, I was expecting a friendly response from alexwolf and was entirely shocked by this comment. Does anybody think that I did or said anything to deserve that?

 

[alexwolf]

jpw234 if this is your definition of humor and your way of lightening up the atmosphere then just don't do it... When your ''humor'' is based around belittling the arguments of the opposing side while picking only the weaker of them to address, then of 'course your post becomes ridiculous. If you still can't see what i mean then i guess we don't have anything else to talk about.

That's mainly what I wanted to say atm, but let me clear up another issue. Lowering the number of viable mons IS A BAD THING. We want a DIVERSE meta. I am 100% convinced (you are welcome to argue otherwise, but back it up) that banning SR increases the number of viable OU mons greatly. Sure, we may lose donphan, and we may have to ban volc, but stuff like togekiss becomes viable as a counter to landy! (which we just proved!) And for heaven's sake, don't say that this is bad because it will mean kyu-b is no longer handleable in OU--of course not! It's a point against SR that it was able to degrade something as incredibly unfit for OU as kyu-b to OU status!

Limiting diversity may be a bad thing, but it is a necessary one, and every single dominating force in OU does that. You think that Keldeo, Terrakion, etc, etc promote diversity more than they limit it? SR may limit diversity but not to the point of needing a ban or even a suspect test. SR does not prevent any playstyle from being viable and it does not take away the viability of lots of Pokemon that were viable in OU at the first place. While it is true that Moltres, Yanmega, Charizard, and Togekiss would be more viable without SR present and would be able to make an impact in OU, most SR weak Pokemon that are good enough to be OU viable even with an SR weakness are already. Gyarados, Volcarona, Salamence, Kyurem-B, Zapdos, Salamence, Dragonite, Ninetales, Thundurus-T, Tornadus, Kyurem, Victini, Xatu, Darmanitan, Cloyster, and Weavile, are all very viable Pokemon in OU and you want to convince me that SR limits diversity to the point of being broken just because a handful of Pokemon are invalidated by it, and solely by it?

 

[MMII]

Sorry, I'm going to address your post backwards.

One of the reasons I stay out of theorymoning is because I've more or less quit OU because I was tired of its garbage. I'm an Ubers player so I can't really try to theorymon with you why those mons aren't viable. However, I can say that I find Honchkrow to be a legitimate (as in more than just a gimmick) mon in Ubers despite the SR weakness. (actually, I don't think packing a spinner when running Krow in Ubers is required because it is eating up so much of its HP and isn't really meant to be switching around much anyways) This leads me to believe that there are other metagame related reasons why Honchkrow (and thus potentially these others) are not quality OU picks. (again though, I don't want to get into theorymon especially with a metagame I've sorta fallen out of)


I don't feel that giving up a free turn for a better matchup is such a drawback. There are a lot of safe switches when playing a game so the damage you take would be minimal and the momentum you have now in exchange would be useful. Course this would go both ways which is pretty much my problem with it. The lack of SR removes pressure from switching and thus leaves a lesser involved risk for lazy play. There is a larger margin for error which dumbs down the game and smudges the gap between a really good player and a good one.

The other thing you have to remember is that we aren't trying to justify SR in OU, we have to justify why ban SR from OU. So whether or not the additional penalty is needed isn't the question to be asking. If we are going to consider banning/suspecting SR we need to find strong arguments showing why it's presence is overbearing and how that penalty is too much. I know that is exactly what you have been trying to do but I personally don't find it sufficient. I feel this argument is more focused around personal preferences between a metagame that applies more pressure on switching smartly and one that applies more pressure on punishing switches yourself.

Again, I don't find SR to be an overbearing or unbalancing force. It isn't the cause for the lack of viability of certain playstyles. The only one that doesn't really exist (or is far less viable) in OU is Stall and there is a lot more problems with it right now than just the additional chip damage of SR. (The death of Stall is probably the biggest reason I dropped OU) Many, many battles have shown that SR was not the do or die factor that completely threw the matchup in the hands of the one who had it up vs the one who didn't. There are many Pokemon that are SR weak (or even horribly crippled like Volcarona) that remain top OU Pokemon. There are teams that technically have a noticable SR weakness yet remain successful. (first one to pop in my mind is Novaray's Focus Sash team) The pool of OU Pokemon that are currently viable is the largest that we have seen than in any generation before. All this makes me feel that SR doesn't have such a negative effect on the metagame that it warrants a ban/suspect.


Again, keep in mind I'm a huge fan of a metagame where every playstyle is a strong choice and where hazards are the dominant factor in it. I'm going to be very biased towards keeping SR as I believe that hazards are fundamentally good for Pokemon. (speaking of which, I may start posting about hazards in Ubers soon just because I'm very much in love with it and advertising the tier while informing potential newcomers of the inner workings could be promising)

 

[lokt]

I don't believe that over-centralization should be used as an argument for or against the "brokeness" of stealth rock. As Kidogo said, We're not banning the move SR--we're banning the condition of having rocks up. Stealth rock, along with other entry hazards, are a major mechanic of the game. Entry hazards are meant to directly influence battling by having the effect of damaging pokemon that switch in. Yes, stealth rock is a move, but the use of this move activates the mechanism of entry hazards, which as a whole are mechanics of the game. Game mechanics are defined as the internal workings of the game. Because hazards are a large part of the game itself, being "over-centralizing" means nothing. This is because the game itself is always going to be centralized on its mechanics. I'll give examples to show that the argument of over-centralization can be used on practically every mechanic of battling. Let's take the physical-special split that was introduced in gen4, the same time that stealth rock was introduced. This physical-special split redefined the metagame. Moves of a certain type were no longer connected with the stat that the type corresponded to, but instead moves were split between the 2 categories. It can be argued that this move split is over-centralizing because it forces every pokemon to use either a physical or special move depending on their better stat. It could be argued that a pokemon with access to useful moves that go along with their better stats would be more viable. People could even go as far as saying that this split makes certain pokemon ou viable and some not. The same can be said about switching, because a player who uses switching effectively will beat the other player, centralizing the metagame around the concept of switching to get a positional advantage. Both of these game mechanics are required to be used to succeed in competitive pokemon, and a player that doesn't use these mechanics well is put at a large disadvantage. Over-centralization around a mechanic of the game is simply due to how the game was meant to be played. The game mechanics add a layer of depth into the game and define the metagame itself. Since these mechanics define the metagame, a game mechanic by nature is going to be over-centralizing. Therefore, the pro-ban side has to prove that the over-centralization around stealth rock is harmful to the metagame and would benefit the metagame if it was removed or limited, and shouldn't argue that stealth rock's over-centralization makes it ban-worthy. Yes, stealth rock helps determine what pokemon is viable and which pokemon isn't. However it is a major game mechanic like the physical-special split and switching. It shouldn't mean anything that these mechanics determine the metagame because they are supposed to. If we choose to ban stealth rock on the basis that it is over-centralizing, all that we will achieve is creating an entirely new metagame based off of different battling mechanics. Banning stealth rock will effect the metagame so much more then any previous bans, and it will completely change the viability of certain pokemon(not necessarily improving or harming the metagame). The pro-ban side should prove that stealth rock is unhealthy for the metagame, and that banning it would lead us on the right track in eventually creating a better metagame. I'm not saying that arguments other then the brokenness of stealth rock haven't been stated, but I'm saying that many people have been basing their arguments completely on how centralizing stealth rock is, which doesn't prove anything.

 

[hathater]

I don't get why stealth rocks should be banned. Stealth rocks are usually a must of a team. Also, anyone can counter stealth rocks with rapid spin. If you think entry hazards are broken, go to the vgc tier, the vgc tier is doubles, and entry hazards are looked down on. Without entry hazards, FEAR rattata would be overused and get incredibily repetitive and annoying. Why ban a staple move on teams? There is no reason.

Sorry Melee Mewtwo, bu I don't buy that at all. I find no justification for the argument that SR should exist as a punishment for switching. There already is a punishment for switching - you can't do anything that turn and have to absorb an attack. That itself is a gigantic disincentive and is what makes switching the most important competitive part of the game - you have to determine whether switching to a pokemon with a better matchup against your opponent's current mon is worth absorbing a hit, letting him set up, or risking a double switch/U-Turn or Volt Switch to an even worse matchup. There is no reason to tack on an additional penalty to this. Think of this - with Stealth Rock, an offensive team could theoretically never be attacked and die to passive damage just from switching. SR effectively puts a timer on the battle and takes an element of it out of the player's hands. That's not a good thing.
You also say that this penalty means a good player is more likely to beat a worse player. Exactly the opposite. A good pokemon player means that you are a good teambuilder, and a good battler. A good battler means predicting effectively, making smart moves and making good switches. Given equal starting teams, the biggest part of how a better player outplays a worse player is by making better switches. Penalizing that only reduces the skill ceiling.

I think you're being willfully blind if you think that removing SR would not promote diversity. Why are Yanmega, Moltres, Togekiss and Honchkrow definitively not viable in OU? Because they aren't. I love Honchkrow but nobody uses him in BW2. And these are good pokemon. While they may be outclassed in certain respects, I defy anybody to argue that there is a larger reason than the prevalence of Stealth Rock that these pokemon (along with others, these are just immediate examples) are not used more.

Please don't insult or facepalm. This isn't very true, SR promotes strategy; death fodder, more thinking during team building, etc. Without vast amount of strategies in pokemon,
most of us wouldn't be playing in the first place. Stealth Rocks is a primary strategy. One downside to SR as a whole is shedinja, shedinja is killed by SR litterally. But, you can rapid spin before shedinja. Rapid spin does magical things. Entry hazards are very helpful for teams, you can break focus sash if anyone bothers to use it, and it breaks sturdy, and it helpfully weaken pokemon. Yanmega, charizard etc is damaged by Sr half way, well, don't use it, if you want to use it, RAPID SPIN. Banning SR is pointless. To prevent entry hazards, rapid spin, or simply ko the user. Banning SR would promote diversity? This is arguable as you can use non OU pokemon in OU, seriously there are great pokemon that are simply not used in OU like; Cresselia, Durant, Dusclops, Herracross etc. Also, saying inflicting damage upon switching out is a punishment can be argued. There is predictions to be made, you can use death fodder, switch out predicting a move... etc.

PS my spelling isn't the best or puncuation isn't the best. Stupid Ipad without spell check. lol

 

[alexwolf]

Pls Lady Alex, next time quote me normally, as you know it's difficult to talk like that.

Which you have yet to even attempt to do. Your entire reasoning is based on the premise that the opposing arguments don't meet a certain level of objectivity necessary to be a legitimate argument, which is not in any way an argument that denies any of the reasoning given as to why SR deserves to be banned.

If your side's arguments are so subjective while not even having the majority in their favor (i am referring to the majority because you are referring to subjectivity, and the only way to measure whose subjective arguments are ''better'' is the majority). Once again, highly subjective reasoning for suspecting something should be avoided, as it holds little ground to whether something deserves to be banned or not. Smogon almost always made bans that had highly objective criteria. The only way for this kind of reasoning to hold any weight is to have the support of the majority, which isn't happening. An argument has been made, but you seem to not understand it.

You say that this criteria is "much more objective criteria" for being banworthy than anything the Anti-SR side has presented, yet go on to say that when the Anti-SR side discusses how unreasonable SR is to deal with, it is only "somewhat objective."

Now you are going into details without a reason, because it isn't even relevant to what we are discussing. If the phrase ''somewhat objective'' annoys you, then you can change it to ''plain objective'' for all i care.

Likewise, one can use your reasoning and say "The statement that Stealth Rock is very difficult to check and forces them to run few, specific pokemon is not subjective at all." Saying that something is or isn't difficult to deal with is an inherently subjective claim, and suggesting otherwise is simply not true. Also, claiming that this idea is an indisputable fact that every offense player knows is way out of line.

We already agreed that this reasoning is objective, so let's stay at that. This reasoning however doesn't warrant the suspect testing of SR because the arguments made are not well enough and are disputable. And please let's stop with the semantics as it has started to get kind of annoying and gets in they way of a good discussion. What is important is that there are reasons for suspecting things that are objective to a certain degree, and this kind of reasoning is usually needed in order to suspect something. Lastly, are you really gonna call me out for saying that Keldeo is hard to deal for offensive teams? Have we gone to such a level of nitpicking and semantics arguing?

Another huge leap of reasoning. The statement "This means that if the majority doesn't find SR to be hard to deal with, then it shouldn't be suspected" is a horrible line of reasoning. We're no longer in the suspect days where what was put up for testing was based on what the majority of the community would nominate. What ultimately gets suspected is up to the council. If the council finds that an aspect of the metagame is potentially broken,it can be suspected regardless of what the majority of the community feels. After that, it's up to what the majority of voters, which are not a majority of the community by any means, finds broken.

Yeah you are right that when talking about objective reasoning, it's not up to the majority to decide whether or not something should be suspected, so sry i messed up there. However, if the pro-SR ban side fails to explain why SR is too hard to deal with and is so bad for the metagame then it can't expect the council to take their request seriously. And so far, i haven't really seen any solid reasoning as to why SR is so bad for the metagame nor why it is so hard to deal with.

Yes, packing a spinner is going out of your way to deal with hazards, stealth rock being, by far, the primary reason to carry it. It's distribution and immediate damage it provides as opposed to spikes's comparably poor distribution and needing more than 1 layer to be as effective is much more pressing. Lastly, packing Celebi to check keldeo is an extremely poor parallel to having rapid spin to check stealth rock. Switching Celebi in against Keldeo gives you momentum. Finding a turn to spin is a liability that forces you to lose considerable momentum that outweighs the ease and lack of opportunity cost of setting SR up. I'm not going to address the point that you don't find the reasons the Anti-SR side has given are "not objective enough," since that has already been addressed, and you are now simply repeating yourself without anything else to back your statement.

Your first statement means nothing. Picking Celebi to deal with Keldeo may be the main reason for picking Celebi, does this mean i overprepared for Keldeo? Second, stop comparing Celebi and Rapid Spin as answers to Keldeo and SR so simplistically, as if they are in the same boat. While using Rapid Spin does cost you momentum, SR does much less immediate damage than Keldeo, making it a much smaller short-term threat. This means that Celebi is much more pressed to come in against Keldeo than the spinner is when SR is up, making the switch-in to Celebi much easier to predict and take advantage of. Furthermore, if Celebi goes for Recover, in order to be in good shape and check Keldeo later after taking a hit, then it also gives a free switch-in to the opponent, exactly as Rapid Spin does. So trying to compare the ways that each answer deals with the problem in answer is pointless to our discussion and the real conclusion here is that carrying a Rapid Spin user to deal with one of the most dominant forces in OU doesn't mean you overprepared for it. It means you prepared for it, period. You would be overpepared for it if you purposely carried two spiners, one spinner and one magic bouncer, or one spinner and no Pokemon that care about SR.

 

[jpw234]

...

@Melee Mewtwo

I don't feel that giving up a free turn for a better matchup is such a drawback. There are a lot of safe switches when playing a game so the damage you take would be minimal and the momentum you have now in exchange would be useful. Course this would go both ways which is pretty much my problem with it. The lack of SR removes pressure from switching and thus leaves a lesser involved risk for lazy play. There is a larger margin for error which dumbs down the game and smudges the gap between a really good player and a good one.

A free turn is a massive disincentive. The fact that you have to take an attack when you switch in is what creates the distinction between checks and counters. You don't think that the game would be vastly different if you could had no penalty for switching and could instantly attack? A dead turn is definitionally the penalty for switching and you don't need anything else to penalize it. Switching is not "lazy play". Utilizing a counter is not "lazy play". There is not a larger margin for error without chip damage on switches - incorporating Stealth Rock gives a larger margin for error for offensive pokemon because they don't have to do damage equal to the remainder of a pokemon's HP, they have to do damage equal to the remainder of a pokemon's HP - 12.5%.

Again, I don't find SR to be an overbearing or unbalancing force. It isn't the cause for the lack of viability of certain playstyles. The only one that doesn't really exist (or is far less viable) in OU is Stall and there is a lot more problems with it right now than just the additional chip damage of SR. (The death of Stall is probably the biggest reason I dropped OU) Many, many battles have shown that SR was not the do or die factor that completely threw the matchup in the hands of the one who had it up vs the one who didn't. There are many Pokemon that are SR weak (or even horribly crippled like Volcarona) that remain top OU Pokemon. There are teams that technically have a noticable SR weakness yet remain successful. (first one to pop in my mind is Novaray's Focus Sash team) The pool of OU Pokemon that are currently viable is the largest that we have seen than in any generation before. All this makes me feel that SR doesn't have such a negative effect on the metagame that it warrants a ban/suspect.

The existence of pokemon who are weak to Stealth Rock but still are viable does not disprove that Stealth Rock makes pokemon unviable. It only shows that Stealth Rock does not make every pokemon unviable. That is an unreasonable burden of proof and unnecessary to show that Stealth Rock should not be in the metagame. Just because a state of affairs is not "as bad as it could be" does not mean it is not bad.
You also said that the onus is on pro-banners to provide an argument and we don't need a reason for Stealth Rock to exist. Fair, but we have provided several. Namely - it's no-risk and no-opportunity cost and high returns, and these types of plays should be discouraged in the metagame - it makes a wide spread of pokemon unviable due to large amounts of up-front damage. Without a single reason to keep Stealth Rocks around (and I haven't heard one other than inertia), these arguments are sufficient to ban.

@lokt
That's a distinction without a difference. There is no functional difference between banning the move Stealth Rock and the "condition of rocks being up". It's also vastly different from integral mechanics like the physical-special split. The physical-special split is an inherent, background condition that exists from the beginning of any battle regardless of the actions of the battlers. Stealth Rocks only go up if one player uses the move Stealth Rock. Also, you say

the pro-ban side has to prove that the over-centralization around stealth rock is harmful to the metagame and would benefit the metagame if it was removed or limited

That's what we've been doing - listing a large number of pokemon who are unviable due to Stealth Rock, and strategies/types that lose effectiveness, shows that Stealth Rock is harmful to the metagame. In the absence of any convincing arguments that Stealth Rock benefits the metagame, it is reasonable to assume that the metagame would benefit if SR was removed.

I simply fundamentally disagree with your characterization of Stealth Rock as a game mechanic on the basis above - it's a move and only comes about as a direct consequence of using a move. That's still distinct from stuff like paralysis and sleep. Using a move induces the state of paralysis/sleep/freeze, but then the mechanics take over and there is a percentage chance (based on the mechanics and independent of the actions of the player) that certain things happen. With SR, you use SR, and every result is constant. Everything that comes about is a direct and predictable effect of the actions of the player, not an independent game mechanic.

@hathater
Much of this has already been gone over. SR is a must of a team - this is part of the pro-ban argument against it. That's not a necessity, it's a function of the current metagame and is part of the reason it's undesirable. We've also gone over how Rapid Spinning is difficult in the meta.
I don't think I was being insulting to Melee Mewtwo. SR promotes "strategy" but it's shallow strategy - "I'm going to use one pokemon as a dedicated lead to set up Stealth Rock independent of the opponent's team or the situation of the battle" is technically a "strategy" but not the type of strategic thinking we generally characterize as "strategy".
"SR is a primary strategy" is again not a necessity, it is only a function of the current metagame. If that is not beneficial, then it should be removed. Inertia is not a reason to oppose a ban.
"SR promotes more thinking during teambuilding" - no, for several reasons that have already been discussed. SR's wide distribution among already good pokemon means you don't have to stretch to include it. The only thing it changes is limiting the viable pokemon to those who aren't weak to SR - that's not promoting more thinking, that's promoting less thinking.

@alexwolf
I am happy to remove my arguments from the format I presented them in in order to better engage in a discussion. Specifically, you stated that the accepted criteria used to determine whether something was banworthy included

''does a Pokemon restrict a certain playstyle to a big extend'', ''does a Pokemon only have few ways to be dealt with, out of which most are only useful for dealing with it'', and ''does a Pokemon force teams to be overprepared for it or lose''

1. We've established how Stealth Rock disproportionately affects certain playstyles. I'm probably in the best position of anybody here to testify as to how limiting Stealth Rock is to hail teams, and stall teams are disproportionately affected because they are the most focused on switching in their gameplay. This is clearly visible in HO teams' willingness to sacrifice an entire teamslot against stall for the express purpose of setting up SR.
2. Once SR is up (so excluding Taunt and Magic Bounce, although I think a reasonable person would concede that these are not widely used or particularly viable ways of preventing SR from being set up) there is literally only one way to deal with it - Rapid Spin. How many viable Rapid Spinners are there? Two definite ones (Starmie and Tentacruel), two more alright ones (Forretress and Donphan). You're saying that Keldeo is bannable, there are more Keldeo counter/checks than there are SR counters (Celebi, Jellicent, Amoonguss, Slowbro/king, Latias, Tentacruel, Roserade, then offensive check/revenge killers like Latios, Focus Sash Zam, Rotom-W, etc.)! In addition, there is a guaranteed way to prevent spinning (spinblocking) along with fantastic deterrents with trappers, people using spinners as set up opportunities, offensive pressure preventing you from getting a spin off, etc.
3. As I stated, there's a difference with how you could overprepare for a pokemon like Keldeo and a field effect like Stealth Rock. But there are parallels. Whenever I'm building a team, if any integral member of my team is 2x or 4x weak to Stealth Rock, a Rapid Spinner becomes an absolute necessity rather than just a luxury, and if it's more than one member that's weak, I probably want a Pursuiter to stop opposing spinblockers as well. That sounds like overpreparation to me.

 

[ginganinja]

Look, the last few pages have turned very aggressive with certain users unleashing personal attacks on others. I won't mention names (as it should be exceptionally obvious who those users are) but I will mention that I will not accept any more of this shit. Stop the personal attacks against users or receive an infraction. If you are unsure if you post is a personal attack - then don't post it. I am highly disappointed that some of the users we picked in the debate act are acting improperly and hardly acting as the role models we would like them to be.

Consider this a general warning to all, keep this "aggro" shit out of your posts.

 

[deidarasenpai]

Think of this - with Stealth Rock, an offensive team could theoretically never be attacked and die to passive damage just from switching. SR effectively puts a timer on the battle and takes an element of it out of the player's hands. That's not a good thing. You also say that this penalty means a good player is more likely to beat a worse player. Exactly the opposite. A good pokemon player means that you are a good teambuilder, and a good battler. A good battler means predicting effectively, making smart moves and making good switches. Given equal starting teams, the biggest part of how a better player outplays a worse player is by making better switches. Penalizing that only reduces the skill ceiling.

I'm going to just pick out something I dislike about this argument. I believe that having a "timer on the battle" as you called it is not necessarily a bad thing. This puts pressure on both parties to make the most effective moves or obtain the most beneficial results in a shorter amount of time, and Stealth Rock harshly penalizes players slipping up, which arguably increases the amount of skill required to successfully win a match. I'd like to also point out that only an extremely poor player would continue switching and switching until all of their Pokemon died to residual damage, so the above (bolded) argument is irrelevant. I do believe that having some sort of penalty, though perhaps it is a bit harsh at the moment, is necessary in that blindly switching is no longer an option, and forces the player to think even more carefully about their decisions, weighing risk vs. reward when it comes to switching to gain a match-up advantage. I believe that the more capable player will be able to balance the residual damage incurred by Stealth Rock with possibility of gaining a good match-up or avoiding a poor one, and Stealth Rock in that way promotes skill. I do not understand how Stealth Rock can reduce the "skill ceiling", and you have given no arguments to support your claim. On the contrary, on first glance, I believed that you were for keeping Stealth Rock in play. Hopefully I don't sound harsh in this, and I have no intent in doing so.

 

[jpw234]

I think you're probably right that the bolded argument is pretty weak, I was just stretching for an example. However, I do think that the argument that "Stealth Rock is a punishment for switches" is patently absurd. Whenever I switch out, I have to make the calculation - is making this switch worth giving him a free turn to do whatever he wants to do - boost his stats, attack me, set up a substitute, or perhaps even set up Stealth Rock? There is no need for an external and arbitrary HP penalty when doing so. I do not understand the characterization as "blindly switching". If I've got an Infernape in against a Keldeo, I'm going to switch to Celebi. Why is that "blindly switching"? Why should that be punished? I'm taking the risk that he hits me with HP Bug, or sets up a Substitute to Calm Mind, or switches to a better matchup himself, for the potential reward of sponging a Hydro Pump. Why do I have to pay a 12.5% tax to do so? That's not a game mechanic, that's just inherently limiting. I say that it limits the skill ceiling because it often makes such decisionmaking impossible. Now let's say I'm in the exact same situation but Celebi's at 60% health and Stealth Rock is up. The exact same decision is arguably the logical, skillful thing to do (Celebi vs. Keldeo is a better matchup than Infernape vs. Keldeo) but the existence of SR makes it impossible because I have to pay a 12.5% HP toll to even get in the battle which means I'll be 2HKOed by HP Ice. Now I have to knowingly switch to a worse matchup. I think it's self-evident that given similar teams, the way a good player beats a noob is by making the best switches. Penalizing that hurts better players.