CAP 37 - Part 1 - Concept Poll 2

[Da Pizza Man]

Before you vote, it's important that you read through each concept carefully, as well as look at our TL earthflax's final post in the concept submissions thread with their justification for each that made the slate, since this concept will guide the discussion for the rest of the CAP Process. This is linked here.

This will be a Ranked Pairs vote (RP) (a form of voting where each candidate is ranked according to head to head matchups with each of its competitors in a directed acyclic graph), the details of which were discussed here.

This is a ranked vote: order does matter! You can upvote your favorites and downvote your least favorites. You may choose to rank as many or as few options as you like, but we encourage you to rank as many options as possible to ensure your preferences are taken into account fully.

Bold your votes and nothing else!

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Most Preferred
Second Most Preferred
Third Most Preferred

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IMPORTANT: When voting, use only the exact name of the concept submissions as listed below! The concept submissions are quoted below in order of submission:

Perfect Conditions

Name: Perfect Conditions

Description: This CAP excels at using moves with a conditional activation or effect.

Justification: Moves with a conditional activation such as Sucker Punch and Destiny Bond have seen a wide range of success throughout competitive history as well as moves with a conditional effect such as Grassy Glide or Rising Voltage.
More on point examples would range from sets like SubPunch Breloom in DPP OU to Beak Blast Celesteela in SS STABmons. Even nowadays, you still see some of these moves with usage in almost every competitive tier such as Sucker Punch and Hex. Although as time has gone on, some of these moves themselves have also become less popular whether that is due to exclusivity (Beak Blast, Comeuppance, etc.) or just straight up unviability (Attract, Covet, Steel Roller, etc.). Some of these moves can have extremely powerful effects when procced which can allow for an interesting process on how to navigate the ability to achieve the success of running a move with these conditions attached to it.

Questions to be Answered:

- What's the difference between a move with a conditional activation and a move with a conditional effect? What are the similarities? Is one more viable than the other with regards to usage?

- What makes a move with a conditional effect work in a competitive scene like Hex or Thunderclap while others such as Thief falter?

- Why are moves with these conditional effects, outside of moves such as Sucker Punch and Hex, rarely seen? Is this just due to the nature of having to activate the condition or is it the lack of accessibility for Pokemon to utilize these moves?

- What needs to be achieved to successfully utilize the effects of these moves? How does one leverage these effects to apply pressure or put the team it is on at an advantage?

- What advantages are there to using these moves with conditional effects?

Which Road Leads to Rome?

Name: Which Road Leads to Rome?

Description: This Pokémon can be played in two competing modes aimed at achieving the same goal: one high-risk, high-reward, the other more consistent but with lower immediate impact.

Justification: A defining dilemma in competitive Pokémon is the choice between high-risk, high-reward options and things that consistently generate value but with a lower immediate outcome. This is seen in iconic examples like Dragon Pulse vs Draco Meteor, or how, in CAP, Sticky Hold on Shox sees more use than the immediate power provided by Electromorphosis, which could whiff into a Ground-type. So what goes into deciding between these options? The impact of high-risk options is sometimes necessary to break through enemy plans in one go. On the other hand, lower-impact, consistent options don't leave a game up to chance and often help with secondary effects (e.g., Horn Leech over Power Whip on Ogerpon, or Heavy-Duty-Boots on an offensive Pokemon over a damage-boosting item). In SV, Terastallization can also power up lower-powered, non-STAB options (which leads to things like Dragonite not running STABs now).

The current metagame provides a unique space to investigate the many facets of risk vs safety (accuracy, secondary effects, being locked into a move, recoil, coverage, setup, etc). So why not put it to the test? The idea is to make a single Pokémon that can adopt two different modes: one that exemplifies risk, and the other, safety. By trying to make these modes mutually exclusive but still aim for the same goal, we can see which is more suited to achieving it, how it is possible to achieve such a separation within the same Pokemon (whether it is with investment, different abilities, or moves), and learn a lot about risk in Pokémon the process.

Questions To Be Answered:

• What constitutes risk? What constitutes safer options?
• For a given goal, which of the two modes is optimal for achieving it?
• What is the number of changes between sets for the same Pokémon to make them distinct, in terms of moves, investment, ability, or Tera type?
• How cleanly is it possible to make mutually exclusive approaches, given that the Pokémon will have the same stats, movepool, typing, and perhaps even ability between the two modes? Is the emergence of "middle-ground" sets, which take the best of both worlds, possible or even inevitable?
• Given a design process aimed at making the two modes relatively balanced in strength, how heavily skewed are the actual usage statistics towards one mode? Does this change over the course of a metagame's evolution, or during a generation change?
• In team-building, how easy is it to fit in risky sets versus consistent sets that function well in most contexts?

When All You Have Is A Hammer

Name: When All You Have Is A Hammer

Description: This Pokemon is specifically built to effectively and viably utilize one move as its primary source of damage, with the other three moveslots acting as support for that damaging move.

Justification: The four moveslots available to a Pokemon are one of the most important parts of the series' core mechanics. Choosing which four moves to run is an incredibly important part of teambuilding, and figuring out when to use these moves forms the very basic of the strategy that makes up Pokemon's gameplay. Zeroing in on one of these moveslots and building the rest of the Pokemon around that one move would provide us with a unique challenge to overcome, but one that I think would be very fun to overcome!

Questions to be Answered:

• What kinds of moves make up for a limited moveset? Are attacking moves the only way to go, or is it possible to viably use up one of our three remaining moveslots on a status move?
• In terms of attacking moves, how much does the BP matter? What about the move's accuracy or any secondary effects it may have? How do these factors work together to allow a move to viably fit onto a Pokemon's moveset?
• In terms of status moves, are there certain kinds of status moves that synergize with a limited moveset better? What factors allow for this synergy? How much of an impact should these status moves have on CAP37's role?
• What types and type combinations benefit the most from a lack of move variety? What factors make these types able to rely on limited movesets without sacrificing viability?
• Are there any Abilities that synergize well with a more limited moveset? What factors create the most synergy between an Ability and a moveset?
• What other Pokemon in Smogon history have been able to focus on a single move as their main source of damage? What metagame factors have allowed these Pokemon to make their limited movesets work, and how can we accommodate for the lack of some of these metagame factors in the Gen 9 CAP/OU metagame? How can we use these previous examples to make CAP37 work?

Once again, your options are:

Perfect Conditions
Which Road Leads to Rome?
When All You Have Is A Hammer

This poll will be open for 24 hours.