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Ladder Tier Shift ORAS (Swift Swim Banned)

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Drizzle should just be banned from TS (and Drought). Because, the boosts would be +5 and not +15 if the abilities were not banned from UU. Just like how Shadow Tag is banned.

Eevee General said:
But Pinsir is NU and Mega Pinsir is definitely not. Pinsir w/ a stone receives zero boosts, correct? Pinsir without receives +15, right? Why can't banned abilities follow this precedent also?
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It's not that simple to do...
 
Eevee General said:
But Pinsir is NU and Mega Pinsir is definitely not. Pinsir w/ a stone receives zero boosts, correct? Pinsir without receives +15, right? Why can't banned abilities follow this precedent also?
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Is there another Pokemon that follows this? It sounds very... weird that a Pokemon can't receive boosts based off the tier it's in. Even if an Ability is banned, it sounds weird. So what would be the boosts they get for the ability? If it's not actually in a tier, than... +0?
 
unfixable said:
Is there another Pokemon that follows this? It sounds very... weird that a Pokemon can't receive boosts based off the tier it's in. Even if an Ability is banned, it sounds weird. So what would be the boosts they get for the ability? If it's not actually in a tier, than... +0?
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All stones tiered above their base formes follow this rule.
The Immortal said:
It's not that simple to do...
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It's as simple as adding a special ability clause, much like the mega stone clause.
 
Eevee General said:
All stones tiered above their base formes follow this rule.
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That isn't what I asked. I'm asking about the ability. The Mega is ranked in a different tier (by ranked, that means it's used / on the VR / whatever else not) and for the most part, Megas are in the tiers they deserve. What other Pokemon are affected by their ability? How are the boosts applied?
 
unfixable said:
That isn't what I asked. I'm asking about the ability. The Mega is ranked in a different tier (by ranked, that means it's used / on the VR / whatever else not) and for the most part, Megas are in the tiers they deserve. What other Pokemon are affected by their ability? How are the boosts applied?
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None, that's why I'm bringing it up as a possible solution. Politoed w/ Drizzle is a loophole that's gaming the premise of TS. You can't use Drizzle Poli in NU, so why should you get the boosts?
 
Eevee General said:
None, that's why I'm bringing it up as a possible solution. Politoed w/ Drizzle is a loophole that's gaming the premise of TS. You can't use Drizzle Poli in NU, so why should you get the boosts?
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Or, we can do what The Immortal said, and ban Drizzle. That's my support. But in the case of future policy of boosts Pokemon with banned abilities, such as Ninetales, should they just receive the buff of the first tier they're allowed in? All of the weather abilities are OU, so no boosts given to them. How does that sound?
 
The Immortal said:
Drizzle should just be banned from TS (and Drought). Because, the boosts would be +5 and not +15 if the abilities were not banned from UU. Just like how Shadow Tag is banned.
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I don't like a Drizzle ban (or especially a Drought ban but thats a lot different since Drought isn't uncompetitive) because it only really fixes so much. One of mine and Deathly's replays clearly showcases that the Rain Offense playstyle can pretty easily do without Politoed. Another big part of not banning Drizzle to me is that it kills non-broken playstyles entirely vs just a few mons that Swift Swim ban would. What I'm mainly talking about is Rain Stall, abusing stuff like Rain Dish and etc to improve longetivity.

And with your argument that its like Shadow Tag, it's really just a shitty coincidence that Stag and Rain are broken in some ways, I see no need to ban a perfectly competitive playstyle (Sun) as a result of it.

Let's be sure to keep in mind Poli isn't the only broken component of Rain teams btw. If anything, it's the abusers doing most of the damage. Kabutops, Ludicolo, Omastar, Kingdra, and hell even Beartic to a lesser extent all get boosted in some way shape of form, and that pushes a lot of them (namely Ludi and Kabu) over the edge
 
Well the first question to answer is "are rain teams or a specific rain pokemon actually broken". The consensus seems to be that it is at least overpowered in relation to other team styles, even if no specific rain mon is broken. Personally I've never been that troubled when facing rain teams but when I use them vs other offensive teams they can seem too strong. Of course, every team you build has to be constructed with rain in mind since they have the combination of speed and lots of power (but I would say I find building to beat stall more constraining than rain at the moment).

If indeed rain teams are thought to be overpowered then in my view banning damp rock would be a good place to start. Going from 7 to 4 turns to sweep at a time would be a sufficient nerf I think, without completely invalidating the style (bear in mind that sun or sand may take its place).

Btw Peef your replays only carry so far - they are all against one team (easier to play against the second time), that didn't have the best match up against rain (3 water weak), with some misplays thrown in. TR, stall, bulkier teams and weather would have been better tests since we know rain is great against weatherless offense.
 
unfixable said:
Or, we can do what The Immortal said, and ban Drizzle. That's my support. But in the case of future policy of boosts Pokemon with banned abilities, such as Ninetales, should they just receive the buff of the first tier they're allowed in? All of the weather abilities are OU, so no boosts given to them. How does that sound?
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Boosts are attached to pokemon not abilities. Drizzle may technically be BL, but Politoed isn't . Drizzle Toed may be banned from NU, but Toed is still NU, and Drizzle isn't banned from TS yet. Therefore Drizzle Toed still gets NU boosts. The Megas don't get boosts based on their base form because they are a seperate form. Such as how Shaymin-Sky is ubers but Shaymin is UU. I personally still think a suspect on the individual abusuers (Kabutops, Ludicolo, Politoed) helps us best obtain the balance we are looking for. Next a Drizzle+SS ban or just Drizzle. Banning Swift Swim completely kills the strategy's viability, which isn't what this suspect should be trying to do. A Drizzle ban makes much more sense.
 
While you can blame me doing well without drizzle on a number of factors, it really isn't that much harder than just spamming Politoed. It takes a tiny bit more prediction, but really doesn't change the fact that rain is incredibly powerful and, in my opinion, broken. I'm also not saying that its broken just because I can't beat it, I use rain a lot. It would actually be worse for me if it was banned because I win so often with it.
 
Eevee General said:
But Pinsir is NU and Mega Pinsir is definitely not. Pinsir w/ a stone receives zero boosts, correct? Pinsir without receives +15, right? Why can't banned abilities follow this precedent also?
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Out of all the options i've seen, Eevee General's proposal is definitely the best in a healthy point of view. It doesn't hurt the metagame and render rain unviable, and it makes a lot of sense to boot.

If Eevee's proposal isn't possible, then a Swift Swim ban is the most feasible because Drizzle isn't the main problem; Aldaron's proposal and banning Drizzle itself will not resolve the overcentralization.
 
Adrian Marin said:
Out of all the options i've seen, Eevee General's proposal is definitely the best in a healthy point of view. It doesn't hurt the metagame and render rain unviable, and it makes a lot of sense to boot.

If Eevee's proposal isn't possible, then a Swift Swim ban is the most feasible because Drizzle isn't the main problem; Aldaron's proposal and banning Drizzle itself will not resolve the overcentralization.
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It's much less of a fix than banning drizzle since only drizzle drought and Stag are banned in UU
 
I'm late to the party, but it looks like a decision hasn't been made yet. The biggest problem with rain is that there's almost no opportunity cost to using it. Seven turns of Pokemon that already have tremendously boosted stats also having doubled Speed and a boosted STAB is insane. I know we all know this, but actually spelling it out really puts into perspective just how incredible rain is. On top of the incredible power and Speed of Swift Swim users, Politoed itself gets massive boosts to its stats, which makes dealing with rain all that more difficult. It is perfectly reasonable for Politoed itself to outlast the rest of the team, which means there's pretty much a constant source of rain that doesn't require wasting a turn, but merely a slight shift in momentum that is more than recovered when you get to bring out Kabutops, Ludicolo, Omastar, Kingdra, etc. I don't think there's much debate on whether or not rain in its current form is broken, so I'll spare us all some time there and jump straight to where my thoughts lie.

The biggest flaw of rain sweepers is how they can all struggle to break through strong defensive cores. The one I've used the most in Tier Shift to handle rain is Ferrothorn / Gastrodon, which does a good job of handling the main rain sweepers and only really struggles with Focus Blast Ludicolo. Even that, however, can be easily covered with an incredibly powerful wallbreaker, from which there are tons to choose because of the massive amount of viable Pokemon in the metagame. Mega Heracross, Gallade, Kyurem-Black, Moltres, Toxicroak, Sawk, etc. all fit in well on rain because the Speed that causes them to struggle against offense is more than compensated for by the Speed of Swift Swim sweepers. This is where opportunity cost comes in. Between how incredibly easy it is to cover all defensive Pokemon and still trample offense on top of the ease of setting up rain consistently throughout the match, rain is both too easy to use and too good not to use.

Because of this, it's obvious that something needs to be done to nerf rain, and I feel least intrusive way to increase the opportunity cost of rain is to ban Damp Rock. While it will still be trivial to set up rain regularly throughout the match, the momentum shift from the sooner ending of rain makes it easier for offense to respond, and the drop in power and Speed of Swift Swim sweepers makes it easier for defensive teams to recuperate from their onslaught.

Why not ban Drizzle, the combination of Drizzle and Swift Swim, or any specific Swift Swim sweepers instead? While all of these proposals are solutions to the problem, they unnecessarily nerf or completely kill rain as a playstyle while we have a much cleaner solution. Even in its current state, rain is hardly impossible to prepare for or play against, but it's undeniably difficult to do both. Without Damp Rock, I doubt it will suddenly become easy to build and play against rain, but it's much more possible in much more ways, while rain itself will still be playable. If we take this route and I turn out to be wrong, no real harm is done. We're already over half way through OMPL, and there are no other major Tier Shift tournaments. What I'm saying is that we have time to go further in the event that I'm wrong and rain is still broken without Damp Rock. Even so, OMPL would be the perfect testing grounds for the new metagame if anyone feels frisky enough to try post-ban rain in a tournament setting.

As a final small aside, I could see rain without Drizzle or the Drizzle Swift Swim combination still being broken. Uxie, Klefki, Liepard, Volbeat, etc. are all fantastic potential rain setters, and many of them have access to U-turn to pivot into a rain sweeper as well. Politoed is great because you don't have to spend a turn using a move in order to set up rain, but seven turns of rain is still seven turns of way no matter how you spin it.
 
ninjadieter said:
I see but it says : "Nu and below" There is no official tier under NU so that's why I thought pu would deserve a +20 bonus.
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Honestly, you need to draw a line somewhere. You can say "PU would deserve this boost", but then people would go and ask for FU boosts. Then for w/e is below the cutoff in a hypothetical meta below that. You could keep going like that until all Pokemon are tiered, but it's pretty pointless. It's a good limit to say "only official tiers get used", since otherwise it's hard to stop.
 
The Immortal said:
That means NFE/LC Pokemon that are not in NU. Everything in PU that is fully evolved is technically NU because PU is not official.
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Thanks for the definition.

Snaquaza said:
Honestly, you need to draw a line somewhere. You can say "PU would deserve this boost", but then people would go and ask for FU boosts. Then for w/e is below the cutoff in a hypothetical meta below that. You could keep going like that until all Pokemon are tiered, but it's pretty pointless. It's a good limit to say "only official tiers get used", since otherwise it's hard to stop.
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Yea we have to draw the line somewhere I get that but it would definitly make it cool imo
 
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Apologies for this taking so long. You can blame me for being lazy and busy.
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Swift Swim is banned from Tier Shift. The council voted with two in favor of banning Drizzle, two in favor of banning Swift Swim, and one in favor of banning Damp Rock. A tie-breaker vote was in favor of Swift Swim over Drizzle. The whole council agreed that rain needed to be nerfed in some way but not everyone agreed on how much. Drizzle was less of a nerf than the others that forces alternative rain setters that have to take hits to set up rain and cannot take advantage of a free switch not to waste a turn of rain. However, this was felt to not be enough of a nerf by some that chose to ban Swift Swim instead. The playstyle rain has the most advantage against is offense, precisely because of Swift Swim. Taking that particular ability made sure rain was not overpowered, however it does severely reduce the viability of rain and may stop it from being used at all at the highest levels. Banning Damp Rock would have also nerfed rain plenty but most felt that Swift Swim was a better option overall. Tagging The Immortal to implement the ban.
 
I would like to encourage the other voters to post their reasoning. I will soon, and as I know I had strong opinions on this vote, I'm sure others would like to voice theirs to the general public. I will post my reasoning here later.
 
First off lol the op says that victini, celebi and jirachi all get speed boosts.

Now for the actual point of this post, I'm here to spread the word of our lord and savior, Combusken.

Combusken @ Eviolite
Ability: Speed Boost
EVs: 72 HP / 252 Atk / 184 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Swords Dance
- Low Kick
- Flare Blitz
- Rock Slide

Speed EVs are for 4 Speed Heatran even though that really isn't relevant it's better safe than sorry. HP EVs avoid the 3hko form Alomomola's scald, the OHKO after rocks from Jolly Durant's Superpower, 3HKOs from the Knock Offs of: (Adamant Black Glasses) Bisharp, Weavile, (Jolly Life Orb) Krookodile, (Jolly and Crunch) Mega TTar, (Jolly CB) Drapion, (Jolly Life Orb) Shiftry, (Adamant Crunch 2hko and Jolly Crunch 3hko) Mega Sharpedo, (+Spe 3HKO Life Orb Dark Pulse and 2HKO Life Orb Fire Blast) Houndoom, (4HKO +Spe Dark Pulse and 3HKO +Spe Fire Blast) Mega Houndoom, etc. I think you get the point. Also stops most Bug, Ice, Grass, Steel, and Fire-types

For those that do not know, Combusken was recently dropped to nu from bl3 due to the bp clause being added. Some of you might think that the only reason to use Combusken is bp but that's where you're wrong. The Swords Dance set is amazing and terrifying for almost every team archetype in existence, when in tandem with speed boost. We all know that pretty much sd anything viable tears apart balance/stall/slower teams that aren't trick room, and we all know that sanic-speed things eat offense, so why don't we combine both? The lovechild of a slow team destroyer and an offense destroyer is none other than Combusken. The moves should be pretty self explanatory: I don't think SD needs any explaining, Low Kick is there because Combusken's Fighting-type STABS are pretty shitty and Brick Break is piss weak, Flare Blitz is a very strong Fire-type STAB, Rock Slide lures in Flying-types namely Talonflame and Charizard. There are a few downsides to Combusken, but there are a plethora of viable pokemon with these problems. These include its Ground, Water, Flying, Psychic-type weaknesses, all very common types in the tier shift metagame, it has a lot of trouble with Alomomola though if 100% healthy it can pressure Alomomola via sd, and it being pretty weak at +0. All in all Combusken is a solid pokemon in the tier shift metagame and I hope that you guys realize that.

Also Snaquaza coded super tier shift and (I think) pu boost ts on aqua.psim.us :O
 
I'm fairly certain it will still be legal, as Shadow Tag and Huge Power are banned in BH but you can still use the respective mega-stones to give the ability to the base forms.
 
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