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A ban on Serene Grace was mostly frowned on due to the fact that Meloetta would've been unintentionally banned as a result, as it has no other ability to use, otherwise, that would've been banned in place of Jirachi. This kind of policy has been universally applied to just about every metagame.

It's not as simple as just hitting and missing, though- The Sleep turns themselves have their own RNG that you forget to mention.

Maybe we're not playing the same metagame, but predictions and probability are the two biggest aspects in 1v1 over anything else-

Sleep adapts about as far as item changes; sure, it's better than nothing, but you're not exactly changing the set all that much, because you can't, because just like Vulpix without Drought in UU, they're mostly just useless mons, otherwise.

Everything diminishes teambuilding capability to some extent. But that's an argument best served towards Sleep being broken. Either way, Sleep (speed traps in particular) still offers little to no playaround or prediction at all, beyond being forced to sacrifice a moveslot for Taunt or something. Gyarados may always leave you guessing as to whether or not it's gonna mega, but you can at least DO something about it.

Meloetta being banned by accident is my point. By trying to remove something you don’t like you remove something you don’t need to. Why target sleep if sleep isn’t the issue main issue but rather an abuser that does mean things?

Sleep turns rarely matter. Sleep is used to gain 1 free turn most of the time. Sure they have an rng, but that’s not what’s important.

Predictions matter a fuck ton in team preview, but beyond that, it’s super meh. There risk/reward aspects during battle are super decisive and usually they’re just if I click this move I win if they click that move/button but if they don’t I lose. The only time predictions really matter are in super complex match ups, which don’t occur with a large amount of mons in the metagame anyways.

Jumpluff adapts to Donphan with bulk. Venu (which shouldn’t run sleep at all) can adapt vs steels.

But also how can you judge sleep adaptating sets. Why would I use snorlax with yawn without protect and something to utilize my free turn.
It’s like asking why doesn’t choice scarf pz adapt to use defensive tools. Because why would it.

There is plenty of play around with speed traps (which don’t just apply to sleep mons) with priority, sound, speed boost (not just the ability), grass types, taunt, misty terrain, safety goggles, lum berry/Chesto, rest, etc.

You can do things if you’re being beaten by a certain user. Just like you can do things if you’re beaten by a physical menace.

The next best alternative would've been complex bans, but complex bans are complex bans, so rip- Which is something I'm surprised you don't go for, considering how you like going against smogon's set policies and frameworks-

The lethal net gain of turns is exactly the point, and is the exact reason why other strategies that get users a net gain of turns over opponents have all been banned or restricted-

That's fair. Just wanted to be sure you weren't saying ALL predictions and stuff didn't matter.

So you can bulk a priority hit or two from the handful of mons that use them, big whoop. More often than not, that bulk plays little to no role in matchups. The comparison of the right mon using the wrong moves does not relate to a mon being overall bad in most contextes-

I wasn't arguing that there aren't counters, just that having to switch to them sucks, because they do in fact suffer from a high opportunity cost; most anti sleepers only beating a single digit of extra mons with said extra coverage, if they don't just naturally beat them.

Complex bans should only ever be used in super dire circumstances where changing the ban one way or the can drastically change the metagame. Also I don’t what you mean about me not considering smogon’s set policies. Smogon defines uncompetitiveness by the nature of random elements. No one has shown real use of sleep to depend on such.

What no they haven’t. Paralysis, confusion, attraction, protect, endure, are all still allowed. The only thing banned was evasion and accuracy.

I don’t understand what you mean by the right mon using the wrong move.

High opportunity cost is literally the name of the game for strong threats. It’s why niche Pokémon are ranked low even though they beat high ranked threats. It’s what they’re designed to do and when you put them on your team you understand why your team needs it.

Sleep enforces RNG for the two possible turns the opponent could wake up. No other move or setup works in the same way Sleep does besides the ones you listed in that middle comment, with they key difference being that Sleep works much more often. That key difference is why Sleep is just a notch over those alternatives, and the same reason why Togekiss wasn't banned alongside Jirachi.

With the "all strategies" comment, I was more referring to Sleep in 6v6, Freeze in haxmons, Swagger, evasion, etc.

With the "right mon wrong move" comment, I suggested you were comparing apples to oranges with good mons using bad moves vs. overall bad mons