let's rework bw sleep clause [SLEEP MOVES NOW BANNED, SLEEP CLAUSE LIFTED, POST#40]

[dice]

(this is me speaking, not the council)

a few weeks ago, Ojama brought forth the idea of banning bw sleep. after ruminating a bit, i wholeheartedly agree with this push moving forward.

if you're unfamiliar with bw building, one of the mandatory additions to any team is an anti-sleep mon. in most cases, this is a sleep talk user (i.e. amoonguss, latios, ferrothorn, random scarfs..), or a pokemon like protect gliscor (which forces your lead and loses to some amoong sets anyway). if you lack an initial response to spore, you will be at a 5-6 disadvantage due to the incredibly overpowered bw sleep mechanics. unlike any other old gen, bw has strongest sleep users with the least adequate counterplay. sleep talk rolls heavily influence games, leading to swingy situations where a 1/3 roll can change the game state.

the recent proliferation of breloom only cements spore as integral to the metagame, and i believe it provides an overwhelming strain on pre-game and the battle. with sleep moves banned, the tier will be able to more effectively cover many of the massive threats there are to offer, as well as have less rng involved in-game.

opponents of this have cited keldeo as a reason to not ban spore... but let's remember we shouldn't subscribe to "letting broken check broken". furthermore, if you need proof that you can cover keldeo without amoonguss, i have not used an amoonguss in a bw tour match in almost 2 years, winning the latest bw cup not using it once! (i can provide all logs if need be), and also going 3-0 in the last world cup without using a single amoonguss.

i believe this would be an excellent change to make to the metagame, especially right before spl, to further legitimize the tier's gameplay.

 

[zf]

dice u harlot.... love the concept. bw sleep is busted with turns resetting when u switch. i guarantee SpD loom will run train on spl

If u dont have a stalk mon (limited to specs latios, amoong, scarf lando, band kyub, specs kyurem, specs torn, occasional rain ferro) ur gonna have to pick 1 the instant u give a sleepmon a free turn which is utter bullocks. Basically turns spore into a 100% ohko move

We banned ohko moves we should ban sleep

 

[LuckOverSkill]

I 100% support this proposal, and I have nothing to add to dice's post.

Just know that many games have been decided by a combination of the following:
1) Sleep Talk picking the right or wrong move over the course of a match.
2) Pokémon waking up earlier / later and failing Sleep Talk / not clicking it.

As for Keldeo, there are many ways of beating it that don't rely on Amoonguss, and Amoonguss itself has lost a lot of usage in recent times, I'm sure we'll manage without Spore on it.

 

[McMeghan]

Quick thoughts so people know where I stand:

• Sleep is super strong, puts a pokemon out of the game pretty much, unless it has Sleep Talk which has become near mandatory in BW
• non-Sleep Talk counterplays are Poison Heal (Gliscor/Breloom), Magic Bounce (Xatu) and Natural Cure; which presents some issues: Natural Cure isn't a real counterplay because it actually puts Sleep back on the table after the switch and the NCer can't do anything against the sleeper pre-switch. PHeal and MBouncer are better counterplays but they're very limited in number, viability (Xatu) and can also lose to built-in counterplay from sleeper (HP Ice Amoongus forcing Gliscor out for example, just to give an example); furthermore, you might have to telegraph your lead to activate PHeal otherwise you're at risk of getting slept on
• my first thought was, while Sleep is strong, the meta and players adapted nicely over the time, between Gliscor/Loom and the Sleep Talkers now present in every team
• after some more thinking though, my biggest grip with BW Sleep is that the most common form of counterplay is RNG-based, Sleep Talk rolls are a thing, you're also at risk when clicking it twice in a row due to waking up
• keep in mind that Sleep is often a tool throughout the game because the tier has some extremely viable sleepers that can last long (Amoonguss/Breloom mainly)

I'm personally against RNG-based solutions to highly represented options, so I'll definitely keep an eye on this thread and entertain discussions on the matter here and on discord with the BW Council/Smogtours discord.

Hopefully we can come back at you with a clear decision!

 

[Ace-11]

I've always been a BW sleep hater and I truly support the idea of fixing the RNG factors that come with it. However, I am going to have to play the advocate of the devil and say that removing sleep moves is NOT a good idea. Let me explain myself:

It is important to look at the aftermath of such ban before moving forward. If sleep moves get banned, sleep talk will no longer be a necessity for most teams. This means that the major sleep-talkers will have their move slots opened to a bigger variety of moves. Let's look at Latios and Amoonguss for now. I am assuming that Latios will most probably run Trick as its 4th move, with a choiced item or even flame orb. More wacky sets can arise, but the overall idea is that Latios will be super hard to deal with and will mostly rely on guessing, since sleep talk will no longer keep it at bay. To make matters worse, Amunguss will turn into a true demon. We can all agree that no matter what we do to sleep moves, Amunguss will always be played as it is one of the best anti-rain measures. If we ban sleep moves, we open 2 new move slots for Amunguss, since sleep talk is not needed and spore is out of the question. So what new Amunguss set will most likely take over? 3 attacks+ Stun Spore seems pretty fair to me, except not fair at all. Imagine having an Amunguss which can paralyze any Pokemon with no counterplay at all. Poison heal Breloom and Gliscor/Thundurus are no longer counters, because like I said, you will have 3 attacks at your disposal now and Giga Drain/Sludge Bomb/HP Ice seems good. With sleep moves in place, Amunguss is restricted to giving up on coverage moves if it wants to run Stun Spore. Some of you will say, ''alright, I'll just let my steel type take the para and its whatever''. This is not what I call counterplay, especially if we add Magnezone to the table which can help Amunguss deal with them if needed.

I am obviously NOT supporting sleep moves and I hope this post doesn't give you the impression that I do. Sleep moves turn the game into an RNG-fest and something has to change. But is a completely unpredictable Latios and an almost perfect coverage Amunguss that spreads para that much better? This sounds worse to me, if anything. I hope the council takes serious consideration regarding the aftermath of sleep moves and makes the right decisions.

 

[Deleted User [433215]]

As someone who plays BW, I think this would be a great course of action for the tier and eliminate a lot of the issues we see with Sleep Talk rolls or Sleep turns in general in regards to how much they change the game. If your Sleep absorber isn't the Pokemon that takes the Sleep, you've basically lost one Pokemon on your team more or less, which is synonymous with OHKO moves in some ways except these moves are more accurate and have wider distribution. The fact every team needs a Sleep Talker who may not even be enough to handle Sleep on the basis of bad Sleep Talk rolls or the sleeper itself is a testament to how much Sleep has shaped the metagame in an unhealthy way.

• Sleep Absorbers that are good in the tier: Latios, Specs Kyurem, Banded Kyurem-B, Ferrothorn, Amoonguss (has some 4mss to some extent), BandNite, Specs Tornadus, the Natural Curers (not even sleep measures because they can't even touch some of the sleepers even if awake let alone asleep), Gliscor and Breloom (forces potential lead matchup and aren't that sturdy against some sleep users, mainly Amoongusss depending on its set and Technician Breloom).
• The Sleepers: Amoonguss and Breloom are the most prevalent but we also have Hypnosis Politoed and Ninetales who are more niche, especially the last of the list but still good picks.

How the Metagame Would (Likely) Change:

• Latios would get a free 4th move slot for one of Trick, Psyshock/Psychic, Thunder, Roost, and Hidden Power Fire or Fighting. It would maybe also become less necessary to many teams seeing as Sleep absorbing was a part of why it was so splashable and nice to have. It would still be absolutely amazing, however.
• Offensive Breloom becomes worse and Dual STABs, Bulk Up, Protect is further ingrained as the main set run.
• Amoonguss becomes worse and instead of Spore, it could run one of Sludge Bomb, Protect, or Stun Spore. It would still hold a decent place in the metagame as it will still check Rotom-W, Keldeo, and the like.
• The Early-Game and way Leads are picked may change a bit and make Sleepers worse leads and Pokemon that did badly vs Sleep better leads since we no longer have to worry about getting our Sleep absorber into the Sleeper and makes Poison Heal users not have to be led as often.
• We won't have to be as worried about predicting around the Sleep user, getting it in, or having checks invalidated (Roro mentioned on Discord having a Skarmory vs Amoonguss and being able to Spike without having to play around potential Spore 50 50s between the Skarmory and your Sleep absorber).
• Teambuilding and the metagame, in general, are more liberated as we won't have to worry as much about Sleepers and who's going to absorb them in terms of the teambuilder. Pokemon that couldn't absorb Sleep or had worse matchups vs the Sleepers have a better chance to shine (take this part with a grain of salt, it probs wont end up this way) and games come down to less RNG and rolls from Sleep Talk and Sleep turns in the long run, which is good for the community as it increases the overall quality of games.

Edit to Make My Stance Clear: I'm not trying to imply anything would be broken, banworthy or otherwise when I listed how the metagame would (likely) change or any part of my post.

 

[Rewer]

I 100% support. Gen5 sleep is very uncompetitive, restrictive and a RNG invite.

I would just like to add that the ban should be decided by the state of the metagame right now and not what would it be after. If Latios gets too crazy because of the moveslot freedom, and it might, we can take a look at him too afterwards. Personally I think banning sleep would enhance creativity, both on team building (latios moveslots, toed moveslots, new loom sets, amoon running other moves to patch weaknesses) and play (no more brainless leading with the sleep user into the other going to sleep talker and hoping to get the right moves, the amoon/ttar vs lati 50 50 heavily in favor of amoon, being forced to lead scor just for the poison else you lose a mon to sleep, no more dumb gambles against offensive toed with hypnosis, among other things).

 

[SoulWind]

I 100% support. Gen5 sleep is very uncompetitive, restrictive and a RNG invite.

I would just like to add that the ban should be decided by the state of the metagame right now and not what would it be after. If Latios gets too crazy because of the moveslot freedom, and it might, we can take a look at him too afterwards. Personally I think banning sleep would enhance creativity, both on team building (latios moveslots, toed moveslots, new loom sets, amoon running other moves to patch weaknesses) and play (no more brainless leading with the sleep user into the other going to sleep talker and hoping to get the right moves, the amoon/ttar vs lati 50 50 heavily in favor of amoon, being forced to lead scor just for the poison else you lose a mon to sleep, no more dumb gambles against offensive toed with hypnosis, among other things).

no

agreed with most of the arguments towards sleep. i think the removal of sleep moves could be beneficial for the metagame. counterplay to it is very minimal and it usually means you're gonna play a game of 5 v 6, given the shaky sleep talk users of the metagame. sdef breloom going from nowhere to be seen to one of the biggest threats atm because of how difficult it is to switch into it has been proven to be very succesful and there's little you can do about it. not sure how this affects keldeo that some users mentioned. keldeo's checks / counters will remain the same regardless of sleep. and amoonguss and breloom are still freaking good pokémon that have room to run more useful moves to their arsenals.

 

[Finchinator]

Posting on behalf of Posho:

This is a great idea brought to the table. The sleep move vs. sleep talk factor has become so integral in the metagame that I hadn't thought of removing it, much like the Landorus-t scenario. That being said, I agree with removing Sleep from the metagame, but to a certain degree. Banning the move Spore as it is the only 100% accurate sleep move available would be quite ideal; however, I wouldn't oppose to keeping moves such as Hypnosis, Grass Whistle, Dark Void and Sing since they're not as reliable and don't have many viable users (i.e Smeargle, Whimsicott, Bronzong, Milotic).

I believe the removal of Spore (at least) would open up a vast variety of team-building styles and concepts since up until now team-building has been limited because of certain must-slots. I'm not talking about having to cover or check Keldeo (for instance), which can easily be done by running a fast enough team that doesn't give it too many openings or yielding Amoonguss/Jellicent onto the classic sand balanced builds, I'm talking about not having your team get blown away by Breloom or Amoonguss with its usual tactics: TOrb + SD + Facade sets that are hard to counter or both leaving one of your slots vulnerable due to sleep.

Sure, that's easy to overcome with Sleep Talk and the fact that BW Sleep Mechanics reset the sleep counter on switch, but, when your countermeasure to a threat is leaving your Pokemon in a situtation where it relies on a 1/3 probability of choosing the most suitable move (also taking into account that it doesn't wake up, giving your opponent lots of momentum for setting up (breloom) or trapping with pursuit (tyranitar)), there is an issue.

For those who say that Latios might become an even bigger threat due to having less problems with 4mss, let me tell you that the first reason why Trick Latios is good is because its surprise factor, granted mostly it is expected as a sleep talk set. In a metagame infested with teams running protect galore or fast enough offensive rain teams or dragmags Latios can still be kept in check. Adding, also, that cancer mons such as Reuniclus become less of a threat with more slots available for taking countermeasures :-)

 

[dice]

I've always been a BW sleep hater and I truly support the idea of fixing the RNG factors that come with it. However, I am going to have to play the advocate of the devil and say that removing sleep moves is NOT a good idea. Let me explain myself:

It is important to look at the aftermath of such ban before moving forward. If sleep moves get banned, sleep talk will no longer be a necessity for most teams. This means that the major sleep-talkers will have their move slots opened to a bigger variety of moves. Let's look at Latios and Amoonguss for now. I am assuming that Latios will most probably run Trick as its 4th move, with a choiced item or even flame orb. More wacky sets can arise, but the overall idea is that Latios will be super hard to deal with and will mostly rely on guessing, since sleep talk will no longer keep it at bay. To make matters worse, Amunguss will turn into a true demon. We can all agree that no matter what we do to sleep moves, Amunguss will always be played as it is one of the best anti-rain measures. If we ban sleep moves, we open 2 new move slots for Amunguss, since sleep talk is not needed and spore is out of the question. So what new Amunguss set will most likely take over? 3 attacks+ Stun Spore seems pretty fair to me, except not fair at all. Imagine having an Amunguss which can paralyze any Pokemon with no counterplay at all. Poison heal Breloom and Gliscor/Thundurus are no longer counters, because like I said, you will have 3 attacks at your disposal now and Giga Drain/Sludge Bomb/HP Ice seems good. With sleep moves in place, Amunguss is restricted to giving up on coverage moves if it wants to run Stun Spore. Some of you will say, ''alright, I'll just let my steel type take the para and its whatever''. This is not what I call counterplay, especially if we add Magnezone to the table which can help Amunguss deal with them if needed.

I am obviously NOT supporting sleep moves and I hope this post doesn't give you the impression that I do. Sleep moves turn the game into an RNG-fest and something has to change. But is a completely unpredictable Latios and an almost perfect coverage Amunguss that spreads para that much better? This sounds worse to me, if anything. I hope the council takes serious consideration regarding the aftermath of sleep moves and makes the right decisions.

i hear you about latios, and that would definitely be on the radar if this change was put into effect. but.. are you arguing that an amoonguss without a sleep move will be... better... ?

i'll write a full-fledged post later regarding my vision for the tier's future. thanks for the responses thus far. this is not something i would like to exercise a suspect test on, because i believe we should only have experienced players' opinions on something that has impacted the metagame for so long. i would, however, be willing to do an initial vote, and if banned, a confirmation vote a la dpp latias to ensure this is the right path moving forward.

 

[Ace-11]

I'm only saying Amunguss will be very difficult to deal with if it runs 3 attacks+stun spore. I wouldn't really want my heatran/skarm/rachi to get paralyzed as my best counterplay, since gliscor and breloom are no longer switches to the stun spore set, because we are freeing 2 of its slots by banning sleep. Its not as good as running spore, but I can't view it as ''competitive'' to mindlessly spread para. After all, paralysis is kind of rng too.

 

[PDC]

amonguss doesn't really have the offensive ability to be threatening without spore. it could run 6 attacks and it would still just be too weak. an offensive amoonguss set would probably only be possible with spore. stun / giga / hp / clear smog-rest-foul play won't be very threatening at all. paralysis in bw isn't even remotely comparable to sleep, which pretty much eliminates a pokemon from contention the entire game sometimes.

this is a great idea, and even though i'm usually against retroactive tiering sleep in bw has become so ridiculous and so overcentralizing as of the past 2-3 years that i think it's time we take a look at it. i think most of the discussion surrounding spore should be that it forces a game to essentially consider a mon dead for an unspecified amount of time since sleep resets every switch. this is a form of rng that emulates something like a lesser form of moody in which a trial-and-error method of play is used to produce a favorable result. unlike other generations, sleep turns can't be burned and if you're asleep for a set amount of time before you switch, your opponent knows you'll be asleep for those turns at minimum and further exploit the slept mon without any consequence. all i can think about when ppl bring up bw sleep is the last turns of a game i had vs cosine years ago in which the final turn revolved around a sleep roll...

https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen5ou-102591

wonder how much better latios will get after not needing to run stalk anymore tho

 

[HANTSUKI]

Having always a Sleep Talker wasn't a thing years ago and we handled Latios with more moveslots the same way we do now. There's nothing to worry about stuff like that imo. I think removing sleep will make things easier on the team builder and that will be a good thing for BW. I also think it will not hurt the mushrooms that much. Breloom is GREAT because of Spore, but it's still pretty useful even without it. Same to the other mushroom who is still a great wall and can para spam which can be as deadly as a sleepy mon if you build around it.

Toeds hypnosing Ferrothorns were kinda annoying as well even with shitty accuracy. It's annoying that something with that acc can hurt so much in a match :weary:

Removing sleep will not change the meta drastically, it'll just make things more competitive and enjoyable imo. Go for it pls

 

[dice]

i'll leave this thread open for discussion until friday if anyone has additional input regarding this. there seems to be a pretty overwhelmingly positive response, and i will be advocating for a vote unless there are major detractors with legitimate arguments i have overlooked.

 

[z0mOG]

I have question with regards to this

because i believe we should only have experienced players' opinions on something that has impacted the metagame for so long. i would, however, be willing to do an initial vote, and if banned, a confirmation vote a la dpp latias to ensure this is the right path moving forward.

What will be the criteria for selecting the Experienced Players deemed qualified enough to vote? Not opposed to the concept of it -- this definitely seems like the right way of handling tests in an old generation with a small(er) playerbase.

That being said, setting some objective measurement that will also remain as the standard for future old gen tests, especially in BW, is needed. Otherwise it could end up getting "hand-picky" with who gets to vote or not vote predetermined on what the council wants to see done.

Nuke sleep then let's knock reun out of the way too btw

 

[dice]

I have question with regards to this


What will be the criteria for selecting the Experienced Players deemed qualified enough to vote? Not opposed to the concept of it -- this definitely seems like the right way of handling tests in an old generation with a small(er) playerbase.

That being said, setting some objective measurement that will also remain as the standard for future old gen tests, especially in BW, is needed. Otherwise it could end up getting "hand-picky" with who gets to vote or not vote predetermined on what the council wants to see done.

Nuke sleep then let's knock reun out of the way too btw

currently, if a test is to be held, we are looking at using the same parameters as last vote with a slightly expanded timeframe to account for sleep clause's expansive metagame impact. unlike shadow tag, for example, sleep hasn't only plagued us in recent time and wasn't a metagame dependent mechanic that suddenly gained traction.

- bw cup top 8 (2019, what we did previously)
- 5 or more games and 50% or more wins over the last 2 SPLs (sleep has been in BW for a long time, so spanning out to 2 SPLs/WCOPs increases pool size and does not compromise quality)
- 3 or more games and 50% or more wins over the last 2 WCOPs (^^)
- 8 best bw records in the last 2 smogon tour seasons (2019, similar to what we did previously, with a slight revision based on McMeghan's critique of our inclusivity from the last vote)

i will be advocating for these parameters, with possible adjustments from other councilmember input, to ensure steadfast regularity in the voting process. the only addition to these qualifications would be possibly adding last year's bw cup top 6 as well. i understand the implications of shifting goalposts in voter qualifications, and we will work to ensure that every test will have a near identical requirement to avoid council manhandling.

this is still a work in progress, of course, and a vote is not guaranteed to be held, but this is the current plan if so.

as of right now, reuniclus is not on the radar for a suspect vote. i hope this answers your questions and concerns.

 

[Finchinator]

There will be room tournaments in the Ruins of Alph room on Pokemon Showdown every day at 7pm EST from Tuesday through Saturday in BW OU without sleep moves. I will personally be posting replays of both semi-finals and finals of these tournaments in this thread if all goes well. I know that this time is not ideal for everyone (sorry to the Europeans who sleep at normal hours), but I would love for anyone who is free to participate in them. If you cannot make it, you will at least be able to see replays the following day!

---

The council is currently working towards a vote on sleep in BW. There is a chance it happens in the immediate future. I personally am in favor of banning sleep as it leads to less than ideal scenarios one way or another (either Sleep Talk playing a large role in deciding how a game goes or a Pokemon being rendered useless due to a single status move). I admit that this is escalating a bit quicker than I initially imagined, but the amount of support voiced to this thread and to the council is pretty overwhelming. If anyone feels strongly against this, I would recommend speaking up in the immediate future. The council is very open to discussion and we want what is best for the playerbase's metagame now and in the future. On top of this, if you have any questions or comments, my PMs are always open!

 

[shiloh]

def not the most well versed bw player so im not gonna talk that much abt whether or not sleep should be banned, i just want to have some stuff clarified before anything goes forward.

has council discussed what exactly would be on the table as the ban? because there are a few different ways i could see it going. the first way i see to do it is just banning all sleep moves. i think this is probably the most fair way to go about it; while banning spore or banning amoong/loom could remove two of the biggest abusers of sleep, this still leaves options like hypno toed/sleep powder on amoong (if spores the ban) etc. banning all sleep moves just cuts the problem off at the core; and prevents any further bans down the line, avoiding tests like bp and drill in the past.

going along w/ the sleep ban, this would make sense to also remove the sleep clause, but i think that gets messy with a few things. psycho shift w/o a sleep clause would probably be seen on mons like cress that could abuse the cycle, and w/o a limit to the # of mons it can sleep via this method it could get messy. also abilities like effect spore would get even more luck based as you could sleep multiple users w/ it, tho idt anything common in ou wants to run it anyway (amoong has regen / loom has pheal|technician), but i still think it should be addressed. basically what it comes down to is will sleep clause be lifted initially but then just reinstated if the prior strats start getting spammed, or should sleep clause stay even with a ban of all moves that induce sleep directly (spore, sleep powder, sing, hypnosis, lovely kiss, grass whistle, yawn). or should psycho shift / effect spore be included in the initial banlist.

personally i think just banning the sleep inducing moves but keeping sleep clause is the best way to avoid any revisitation down the line, but i think any option could work just as well. just think this is smth that should be decided before any potential vote, as ironing out the details after a vote could upset voters/the public.

 

[Finchinator]

PS is down for me, so I will unable to record the replays from the first tournament in the RoA room. I will be on tomorrow to do so assuming PS is up, so no worries there.

I personally am in agreement with the proposal Rozes posted as it is pretty foolproof, re: banning all the sleep inducing moves and keeping the clause in place in case of Psycho Shift + Rest + Sleep Talk shenanigans (or a sudden surge of Relic Song Meloetta or Effect Spore Pokemon). It's a very minor thing that may never come into play, but the clause is already in effect and it prevents future hassle, which is probably for the best seeing as sticking to the status quo in terms of clauses is the default as is.

With this said, we will be discussing this internally and come to a verdict before any potential vote.

edit: JK it's happening now

 

[Finchinator]

Unfortunately, we had a smaller tournament and no saved replay links due to PS experiencing some trouble today, but we still had a nice 8 man tournament and I downloaded replays for those who still wish to see. Most days I will only log semi-finals and finals, but since this tour was so small and I have time, I will include the entirety. Congratulations to Raiza on winning!

Round 1

Finchinator vs Opha

- r1, finchinator vs opha, download link

raiza vs EL TORO COMBO MEAL

- r1, raiza vs EL TORO COMBO MEAL, download link

gich101 vs airports

- r1, gich101 vs airports, download link

gin argent vs cheese555

- r1, gin argent vs cheese555, download link

Round 2

Finchinator vs airports

- r2, finchinator vs airports, download link

raiza vs cheese555

- r2, raiza vs cheese555, download link

Finals

Finchinator vs raiza

- finals, finchinator vs raiza, download link

As for some observations, I feel like the metagame is largely similar, but there is no more need to slap Sleep Talk on to things like Latios and there is less of a reliance on guesswork and playing from immediately behind due to early game sleep being pretty much a staple on some archetypes. I expect the same general archetypes to be used and I even believe that Breloom (and perhaps eventually Amoonguss) will retain viability, but neither of them made a showing in this small tournament. Regardless, it is very similar to the BW OU we have all played over the years, but without an element that we believe is problematic, which is definitely a step in the right direction.

 

[Eo Ut Mortus]

Official stance for transparency: Sleep was once viewed as a mechanic integral to Pokemon, and Sleep Talk as a reasonable accommodation people had to make in response. That said, sleep nerfs in later gens have shown us a game where this is no longer the case, and I think it's definitely worth re-examining BW without these previously held assumptions. It is a centralizing mechanic, and that alone is insufficient enough to declare it banworthy; however, the pool of responses is remarkably shallow and offers limited teambuilding expression and almost zero skill expression (the aforementioned RNG factor) compared to the alternatives already mentioned (i.e. the now vacant fourth slots on Latios/Amoonguss). In a vacuum, there's no reason not to try this as an improvement.

From a larger policy context, I support this because based on the response to this thread, it's easy to understand and supported by the general BW tour playerbase. Emphasis on the latter; people who have had long tenures playing BW and are continuing to do so, especially in SPL and Tour, should have the biggest stake in these decisions. Beyond things we consider immutable for the present, such as rain / Keldeo / Latios (this is not a formal distinction, but what I'm gleaning from both council/general opinion), I think sleep is the best issue we can possibly acknowledge.

Finally, I think rozes's suggestion is the most practical one. Banning all possible sleep-inducing moves/Effect Spore and undoing sleep clause is another alternative, but it's not like it's that much cleaner/easier to understand, and I think we should be framing this decision as a single change from the current game format, where Sleep Clause is a thing, and undoing it should be another discussion.

 

[ABR]

Before delving into specific solutions I’d like to state my overall support for this movement and the metagame benefits provided. Most people seem to be on board so I won’t spend much time arguing this point.

Regarding implementation, I don’t really see how you can both remove sleep moves and also keep the old sleep clause. If sleep moves are gone, then how can you say only one mon can be put to sleep? There would no longer be any way of inducing that. I think simply banning all of spore / hypnosis / effect spore / relic song is fine. As an extension of the teambuilder ban here you could consider rest + talk + psycho shift a sleep inducing move on it’s own. For simple wording it can just be “anything capable of inducing sleep on the opponent is banned.”

Either way I’d like to thank the council for their role in facilitating this.

 

[Hipmonlee]

Here's some speculative rubbish from someone who has too many thoughts on sleep clause.

I am wondering to what extent the current formulation of sleep clause is contributing to the problem? I can think of two situations where the current non cart compatible sleep clause actually increases the power of sleep. (As opposed to the cart enforceable "you may not select a sleep attack when your opponent has an involuntarily sleeping pokemon" or some similar rule).

Firstly, using this game as an example https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/azure-gen5ou-369573
Sleep talking on a pokemon with a sleep move is only possible because of our non cart sleep clause. Finch's Amoongus wouldnt be allowed to sleep talk on a turn that could cause him to break sleep clause. To some extent this is neutral, as the sleep users utility in blocking sleep is reduced, but that also makes its sleep move more potent. But, it does reduce the unpredictability of sleep talking a sleep move, which in this example was obviously pretty obnoxious. I guess Finch could have legally hit the first sleep but then would have had to not ST with his Amoongus from that point onward.

The second example is using Natural Cure as counter play. With the cart compatible sleep clause your NC mon can come in, take the sleep, and then you have a free turn where your opponent cannot select their sleep move (because your NC mon is involuntarily asleep). Allowing you to switch in something with poisonheal to activate its orb, or a sub user or whatever.

These things probably aren't exactly world shattering, but our current sleep clause is definitely overall beneficial to sleep users.

 

[Finchinator]

We had another tournament today in the RoA room on PS; this time around we had 32 people, which made it exciting! Below you can see the final three rounds of the tournament, which was won by Posho over Raiza.

raiza vs met gala - replay
finchinator vs 4G3NC cracked - replay
VIRTUALDIVA vs gamer snaga - replay
KingScorp456 vs sweet posho - replay

sweet posho vs gamer snaga - replay
finchinator vs raiza - replay

raiza vs sweet posho - replay

 

[Legitimate Username]

Why are Effect Spore and Relic Song being included in the discussion here? Both are luck-based and certainly capable of sleeping more than two Pokémon if Sleep Clause gets removed and luck allows it, but I don't think there's anything signifying that they'd be bannable on their own merits of being potentially so powerful or removing so much player control due to RNG that it'd warrant a ban. Effect Spore is an 11% chance of inflicting sleep when the opponent makes contact, while Relic Song has a 20% Sleep rate thanks to Serene Grace, neither of which seem particularly game-breaking when you compare it to Freeze which can net an even stronger and more RNG-based reward off of comparable odds. I'm pretty sure that Jirachi spamming Ice Punch fishing for Serene Grace freezes could accomplish more than Meloetta trying to do the same with Relic Song, a much more situational move on a much more situational mon with a 20% chance of even less reward for getting lucky. Should we get rid of moves with a % chance to freeze just because we did the same for Sleep?

I like the idea of just hard-banning all dedicated Sleep moves (and potentially the Psycho Shift setup) and removing the now-unnecessary Sleep Clause as a result of it, but cutting all sleep-inducing elements from the game just because "we're getting rid of all sleep now" when similar elements in Freeze have already existed in our metagames and haven't really gotten banned for being to long-term incapacitate a Pokémon out of dumb luck.

EDIT: Also, I don't get why we'd keep a game mod like Sleep Clause after outright banning the moves that make it necessary to have. Why not just re-introduce Freeze Clause at that point if we're going to be modding the game to reduce the power of lucky elements that we don't like? I don't really see the justification for this.