alephgalactus
Banned deucer.
I like the idea of Tera requiring an item, but that seems too arbitrary to implement. If that was an option, it would’ve been done last gen with Dynamax.
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Metagame Terastallization Tiering Discussion [ UPDATE POST #1293]
- Thread starter Finchinator
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- The RBY reference's point is that prediction (as notably embellished in this meta) has always and will always exist in a healthy Pokemon metagame.
- Espathra is a Speed Boost Calm Mind sweeper. While most of us can agree that it's basically over once it gets set up, the only ways it can get set up are prediction, risky plays, and Cyclizar (because of course). Saying Tera is overpowered because Espathra can sweep with it is like saying Swords Dance is overpowered because Blaziken gets to sweep with it.
- I notice nobody has brought up that Breloom gets... Spore? And is like, way faster than Kingambit? A reasonable prediction goes something along the lines of, "My opponent will probably switch to a status tank due to, so they most likely won't Tera, as they think they'll get slept and have wasted it. I should Mach Punch before switching out". Better yet, run a safer Breloom and have Spore in the first place. That's how the metagame evolves.
Hi new user here, yippee.
Terastal is really fun and expands the game in a funky way, but it's also a pretty rough feel-bad mechanic; the fact that Tera so strongly benefits offensive play, makes defensive play worse, and punishes so many basic game functions while giving every offensive push in the game a minimum of like, three different ways to completely ruin an opponent's day by preying on a difficult prediction.
I'm personally for a full ban or a Tera Blast ban if a decision to restrict the mechanic is done; I dislike the notion of complicated workarounds like 'tera revealed at team preview' simply because it isn't like that on cart, and I think at least a little adherence to the system Showdown is built on is critical.
Terastal is really fun and expands the game in a funky way, but it's also a pretty rough feel-bad mechanic; the fact that Tera so strongly benefits offensive play, makes defensive play worse, and punishes so many basic game functions while giving every offensive push in the game a minimum of like, three different ways to completely ruin an opponent's day by preying on a difficult prediction.
I'm personally for a full ban or a Tera Blast ban if a decision to restrict the mechanic is done; I dislike the notion of complicated workarounds like 'tera revealed at team preview' simply because it isn't like that on cart, and I think at least a little adherence to the system Showdown is built on is critical.
I don't really think "x mon SHOULD check y mon, and the fact that it doesn't means Tera is broken" works as an argument, the fact that pokemon get answers to their checks and counters is part of the game. It's like saying Azumarill getting Superpower in gen 6 is OP because Ferrothorn should be able to beat it. If Tera makes a few pokemon specifically unbeatable, IMO we should just ban those mons.
Yes, the fact it was implemented in vs games on Gen 5, that's literally the only reason why lmao.
Real talk? I respectfully disagree.
There have always been ways to cover for match-ups. Terastal is strong, but it not only has counterplay and enough predictability to be handled, but it also benefits a multitude of playstyles.
Yes, just shoot that thang from beyond the arc, what could go wrong?
This kind of superficial analytics ball is why people have been trying to copy the Warriors, or more accurately, the Harden Rockets' Moreyball, and failing miserably.
There are a LOT of things that truly made the Dynasty Warriors such a force, one of the most important being Dray's incredible defense and playmaking.
That's not even counting how Giannis and the Bucks won the chip what, 2 years ago? They did it by building a balanced team around Giannis, his excellent defense and his ability to dominate the paint at will.
And just how you're missing the forest for the trees in basketball, you're missing why Terastal might actually be healthy for the meta, even if it needs a slight restriction of needing Tera Types to be shown on Team Preview.
Also, spoilers, the Jazz aren't going far in the playoffs this year.
As someone who mainly plays NatDex I'm not sure how much Home would impact tera staying, especially since we also don't have the Hisuian forms there until they drop. That being said, Roaring Moon (the defacto "sweeper who abuses tera type") got banned and outside of that it seems somewhat fine? I'll occasionally get match ups where I lost because I didn't prepare for one tera type on a niche sweeper and wasn't able to counter it, but not often. However, I rarely see anyone use tera types at all outside of STAB boosts anyway so I'm not sure how much input I can really even give. Maybe having enough of a varied pool of mons makes Tera a lot less bad than it is in normal OU but I really can't be sure.
I know this so isn't the point of the thread but the championship Bucks shot more 3s (as a percentage of total shots) than a league-average team (They were 12th). The NBA point was also that Tera is probably healthy because the NBA ultimately decided that a mechanic approximately as powerful as Tera with similar effects was perfectly fine. And yeah, obviously the Warriors wouldn't have 4 rings if they couldn't play defence, and the Jazz and Kings probably can't keep up their surprising runs.Yes, the fact it was implemented in vs games on Gen 5, that's literally the only reason why lmao.
Real talk? I respectfully disagree.
There have always been ways to cover for match-ups. Terastal is strong, but it not only has counterplay and enough predictability to be handled, but it also benefits a multitude of playstyles.
Yes, just shoot that thang from beyond the arc, what could go wrong?
View attachment 469259
This kind of superficial analytics ball is why people have been trying to copy the Warriors, or more accurately, the Harden Rockets' Moreyball, and failing miserably.
There are a LOT of things that truly made the Dynasty Warriors such a force, one of the most important being Dray's incredible defense and playmaking.
That's not even counting how Giannis and the Bucks won the chip what, 2 years ago? They did it by building a balanced team around Giannis, his excellent defense and his ability to dominate the paint at will.
And just how you're missing the forest for the trees in basketball, you're missing why Terastal might actually be healthy for the meta, even if it needs a slight restriction of needing Tera Types to be shown on Team Preview.
Also, spoilers, the Jazz aren't going far in the playoffs this year.
Those two bolded things are very important to each other. The NBA as a product is entertainment. Fans want to see long, difficult shots, high scores and unpredictability. There's no financial incentive for there to increase variance in a pokemon battle. Also, while there is perhaps a lot of variance in 3 pointers made game to game, I imagine there's less variance within the match (If I'm shooting really well, I make 3/4 in the first half and then 3/4 in second half. Next game I'm shooting poorly and shoot 1/4 in both halfs). I would say this more similar to matchups. My hyper offense team wins 5/10 games vs most teams, but loses 7/10 versus teams with scarf tapu lele, and wins 7/10 versus stall. Terastilization is like if one of the starting five on a basketball team's shots were worth double the points, but you didn't know which one until after they scored or something.
wait no shit ????
The arguement is that if you have a huge swath of pokemon that need to be banned because of a game mechanic, isn't better to ban the mechanic that's breaking them as opposed to the pokemon? The same people in this thread that are like "i love tera it's fun and unpredictable and we shouldn't get rid of generation gimmicks" would also probably not be happy about have way more bans than a normal OU generation receives.
I gotta say this is one of the more entertaining ways this thread has gotten off topic
I mean one of the gripes about 3 pointers is that it's almost impossible to beat teams on a hot shooting night, which is why teams that trade all of their stars can become great, and that running cold on 3s can just instantly torpedo a team (like the 0-27 incident), so it's pretty similar IMO.
The financial thing I get. The NBA cares about fans as a pretty central component while Smogon's primary responsibility and focus is on players. That said, there are some people who are at least trying to make careers out of this stuff, and they depend on fans wanting to watch as much as the NBA does.
Yeah Roaring Moon was in the first wave of bans (along with Flutter Mane, Palafin, and a bunch of Ubers mons they were trying to let back in), and it doesn't really fix the issues with tera in that meta but it's a lot calmer now that the main abuser is gone. Every now and then you'll see someone cheese something with a random Pokemon that is checked by being weak defensively but it isn't as rampant as Roaring Moon.
Yeah and this ultimately just turns into a matter of quantity. Does Tera break a huge swath of pokemon or just a few? But that's obviously not answered by a small number of specific matchups, that's answered by looking at large swaths of the metagame.
To be fair, we probably could have if we wanted to. It wouldn't be hard to use some useless item and justify it through "gentleman's agreement" if there was enough support for it.
The issue is there wasn't nearly the support for Dynamax that we are seeing now for Tera. What is this really about for people? Is it about the actual mechanics or is it about a popularity contest? I've ranted about this before, so I'll save it. But the difference now is Smogon already set the precedent in gen 8.
If they wind up doing things that way again, Tera will be banned. If we come to some sort of compromise solution, whether it works or not, that will essentially be an admission that the precedent set in gen 8 was wrong. Not that they ultimately banned it, but that the community didn't try harder to make it work first.
While I definitely see your point, I think this argument is a bit akin to saying that since the Choice items allow so many broken Pokemon to gain such a power boost, it would be prudent to ban them. Of course, if Tera breaks the entire meta, it definitely needs a ban. However, it's hard to know if it's an issue of the mons or the gimmick.
the goat IS already fire type
He made 4 consecutive NBA Finals, winning 2 of them, with the help of Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, and various role players.
You could also take the view that the support for Tera being higher means that it's a better, more competitive mechanic, and therefore justifies more effort to try and make work relative to Dynamax, which was much more heavily disliked. You could also say that tera is more strategic since it can interact with Pokemon in more ways than Dynamax did, because of the variety of Tera types. IMO it's not so comparable that we need to follow the Gen 8 precedent.
Not necessarily that they didn't try hard enough. The other issue is dynamax ban was more coherent with traditional tiering policy. Either ban it all or leave it all.
Flying Curry would be straight up banned. Imagine if he could just fly up and block shots like Mutombo while hitting from the logo. More broken than Flutter Mane, ban this shit pls.
Also, Curry > LeBald. No bias.
Let's get back on topic tho.
The thing about D-Max is that regardless of prediction, you were still screwed.
What good does it make knowing that I'm going to sic a Moxie Gyarados with a 130BP Flying STAB that raises Speed, doubled HP, any Item I want except Choice items because D-Max breaks the lock on them, and a 130 BP Ground move that raises SpD because fuck your Electric mons.
Dynamax was truly beyond busted and all but had zero drawbacks. There was 100% no way to even consider saving it.
Honestly, I don't think even RBY produced something THAT busted. And that game had Amnesia Mewtwo.
Terastal, as strong as it is, is nowhere near the level Dynamax was.
The big distinction in my mind between those is that they stayed around for future generations and were intended to be improvements to the battle system as a whole. Z-Moves, Mega's* and Dynamax (and what I Imagine will be Tera's fate) kinda get axed by Gamefreak next Gen. That said, the separation in my mind between them also exists because Z-Moves and Dyna have an overwhelm factor to me that (most) abilities and items never gave me, so YMMV on those as a whole.
(* = I know Mega Evo's were in Gen 7 but they got Axed in Gen 8, so.)
Any input is good I'd say. Surprised to hear that (Though not about the Roaring Moon ban), I was actually expecting it to be way more commonly used on the defensive side rather than for STAB Boosts? And I imagine it could just be that there's more answers for potential Tera's in NatDex for them (Or people are primarily playing in OU and haven't found out how to use it on older 'mons).
Dynamax was obviously worse, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it couldn't be nerfed through complex bans
I'm not the best Pokemon player (this is my first gen back after mainly playing a bit of 6, 7, and almost no 8) so I peak at like 1400 usually so it could just be low level play and people lower on the ladder using it more for the big STAB boost instead of defensively, since I only ever see it defensively on sweepers with pretty defined weaknesses
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