CAP 37 - Part 2 - Concept Assessment

[Askeia]

The problem with your statement is that everything else isn't actually a design exercise. Beak blast is a good move with a condition to be better. Barb barrage is a hex clone in behavior even with differences. Temper flame/Stomping tantrum are wholely unique in design space, THAT'S why I believe they're the best. Eruption/water spout/dragon energy are also unique and GREAT options.
Also their VERY consistent because it literally make others move inconsistency more consistent.
And be realistic we can make a mon not just viable but broken if our only limitation is one move

I think Stomping is pretty limiting in terms of downstream design because of it doesn’t have a proactive condition.

It ideally wants to have a strong spammable STAB that warrants the opponent switching to an immunity, but once it gets 2 or more strong moves Stomping starts to get more and more optional.

In order to keep the concept around Stomping, our move pool will probably end up with 1 strong STAB, Stomping, and a bunch of moves weaker than unboosted Stomping. And with a theoretical move pool like that, our mon probably would need a sky high Atk to make all the low BP moves work.

Maybe I’m just not creative enough, but atm it looks like we may have to jump through a lot of hoops to keep Stomping a move that whatever we make would want to run.

 

[Amamama]

Thoughts on the slate:

1. Immunities:
This is something that we sorta haven’t really discussed so far, as it it is at most adjacent to the main concept but still feels like it has to be taken into account with the slate.
I like that a big part of the slate are moves that also include a second layer of conditionality because of an immunity. This adds a level of intricacy and interest especially to moves with soft conditionality (moves that still work if the condition isn’t met)

2. Fully conditional Vs. soft Conditional:
Thunderclap has seen a lot of pushback and I can see why, given the fairly limited designspace.
However atm it is the only fully conditional move (aka fail if the condition isn’t met) on the slate.
IMO fully conditional moves are an one expression of this concept and thus at least one fully conditional move should be on the slate, so that voters which are most interested in exploring this aspect have an option to vote for as opposed to moves which still are successful albeit weaker if the condition isn’t met.
If thunderclap is removed I would advocate for Double Shock as alternative although I can also see the inclusion of both or another suitable alternative to give a bit more variety and depth to the slate.

3. Temper/Tantrum
Given their overlap in effect and nature of use, it’s most realistic to expect these moves to end up as none STAB coverage, which prompts me to believe that they could be picked as a pair at this point and a final decision which of both to work with could be postponed to after typing.
If we want to only include one option on this slate I think it is necessary to already look at typings and how these moves might interact with the chosen STAB options.
This might be poll jumping but I feel like this is a discussion we need to go through now:
Due to their effect these moves are likely going to be paired with a STAB typing which hits into an immunity.
Of the existing typings this includes:
Dragon
Electric
Fighting
Ghost
Ground
Normal
Poison
Psychic

For Dragon, Ghost, Normal, Poison and Psychic both moves seem roughly equivalent as coverage options (although Ghost, and Psychic don’t really gain much from the moves effect as they don’t hit the immunities that would want to switch in in most cases.)
Electric, Ground and Fighting likely prefer Temper Flare to complement their Stabs though neither fighting nor Electric gain much from it.

Overall I think you either group both since Dragon and Poison cannöake use of both or go with Temper Flare since it is applicable to more types than tantrum.

 

[earthflax]

Just to clarify, if Stomping Tantrum is on the slate, does that mean Stomping Tantrum + Temper Flare are on the slate, or just Stomping Tantrum? The first feels like it would make more sense to me because it leaves more flexibility in typing stage, but it is hard to interpret the presence of clones in the "On the Bubble" section if that is the case.

Agree w/ spoo on Thunderclap. Double Shock (or clones) and Water Spout (or Eruption, Dragon Energy sucks) would be cool.

Just Stomping Tantrum. I don’t see the need to delay the specific choice of move until after Typing as that would likely make the Typing poll an implicit poll on Tantrum vs Flare, which isn’t good.

 

[Amamama]

Just Stomping Tantrum. I don’t see the need to delay the specific choice of move until after Typing as that would likely make the Typing poll an implicit poll on Tantrum vs Flare, which isn’t good.

For these moves to be viably used there are some considerations to make:
1)The Pokemon should be to be able to reliably trigger the effect
With the easiest way to ensure this being to give it a main STAB option or way of making progress that hits into an immunity.
2) If Temper/Tantrum aren’t secondary STAB, The Pokemon that would like to switch into this main STAB commonly can be hit Super effectively by Temper/Tantrum

Assuming Temper Tantrum as non STAB coverage, this already excludes a lot of potential primary STAB types.
The only Temper/Tantrum Target for a Dragon moves is Hemogoblin.
The only Temper Tantrum Target for Electric types moves is Equilibra unless you include Thunderwave in which case you could add some electric types as well as Garg and Dengo
Fighting types could use the moves to hit a couple of the ghosts in the tier quite hard, though I’d argue that neither of the moves is like optimal coverage for Fighting.
Ghost types only gain an advantage on Shox.
Ground Types could use temper flare to hit some of flying steels as well as Equilibra and Balloon Dengo
Normal Types overlap with Fighting, though I’d argue that both types are slightly better as coverage for normal than for fighting.
Poison type appreciates both to hit steels though given the steels in the tier Temper flare has a slight edge imo.
Psychic types can hit Gambit and Weavile (though gambit likely falls flat in practice due to sucker).
if you consider all of these specific interactions with mons in the tier, most primary STAB types that would like to use one of these moves as secondary STAB or coverage could use either or, which imo means they feasibly could be slated together.

If anything I think that temper Flare is overall slightly favored as coverage move as it hits slightly more relevant pivots with immunities in the tier.

 

[a fairy]

Personal rambles on the slate draft since I'm handling the next category so want to be able to ramble a bit on the options before I gotta start treating whatever wins fairly /lh

Beak Blast - feels uninspired, I dunno. The most exciting part of this move to me is weirdly the negative priority attached, the burn on contact is wildly overrated in my mind and I'm really not a fan of this being the big selling point for this move. I am curious to see how such a CAP will develop, but I can't see myself ranking this option very highly at all on most slates. I'm not seeing the hype here. I'm not upset or anything, by any means, I really do enjoy sitting adjacent or opposite to thread orthodoxy a lot of times, and this is another one of these, but I've tried to understand the advocacy posts for this one and I'm not getting there.

Barb Barrage - I'm actually kinda stunned this became as popular as it was. This move isn't even really all that good even when the conditional is met. Sure, 120 has become a standard playground for moves like Pyro Ball, Outrage, and Make It Rain - powerful moves to be sure but for myself I'm not exactly cowering in fear when I see the Cinderace ready to click Pyro Ball - I switch to your defensive wall or my fire resist and the damage doesn't feel all that great. Like, it's... fine, it's a move with a conditional and exploring a powerful spammable Poison-type move is something weirdly new to competitive Pokemon in modern gens - the closest that exists is what, Malignant Chain? There are a grand total of 4 moves in /nms poison, power>99, and that's including Belch and Noxious Torque.

Stomping Tantrum - I'd personally prefer Temper Flare here honestly, but the quibbles about type coverage and immunities is actually fairly small here all things considered and it's not a meaningful thing. This is a fine pick, move failure is a condition that really hasn't seen a ton of exploration in the competitive Pokemon sphere, and I'm curious what there exists. A base 150 power move is pretty strong, and it weirdly makes me think of the casual->competitive mentality tradeoff of "why set up when I can attack twice instead" kinda thing. I'd like to see us explore this move and what can come of it.

Thunderclap - sure, maybe the poster child of conditional. I think it being this one of SPunch for the angle of immunities is interesting for me, and I actually think for this one I prefer TClap over SPunch. I think that Pokemon like Kingambit or MMaw or Urshifu who tend to run it don't exactly run it for the sake of it, but because of the things that it provides. If Gambit had another 40-50 base Speed I bet it's clicking Kowtow way more often, yknow? I do really like this move conceptually, and I think adding a type immunity and a a few ability immunities is actually pretty cool for this one compared to ST.

--
Burning Bulwark - I would like to see this slated, gut instinct. I think it stands pretty alone in the design space that we're exploring, being the only move that explicitely does not deal damage directly. I think that exploring Protect and the value that comes with it is really cool to me, even if I worry it's maybe a bit off the beaten path conceptually. Additionally, it's conditional, but is it conditional in a way that matters? Disregarding the double Protect shenanigans that are clearly not the primary point, burn on contact is something I've already grumbled on in Beak Blast. I see the value but it just feels a bit nothingburger. Maybe not actually worth slating, but is there value in having non-damaging conditional moves on the slate on its own merit?

Mirror Coat - I stand by my posts made, I won't bother people with more rambling about this one. Will it win? Nah, it won't. Should it be slated? I think so.

Double Shock - I've yo-yo'd between being strongly not in favor of this one and being willing to give it a shot over the course of this concept assessment. I think where I'm standing currently is being willing to give it a shot, I think it has a leg up on Barb Barrage in the sense that its conditional de-activates rather than activates, if that makes sense? Like, Barb Barrage gets to 120 only after TSpikes/Toxic/using it twice and winning the first coinflip, whereas Double Shock starts at 120 and then de-activates itself sorta after being used. I think it could be worth slating.

Clones - I touched briefly on some of the important clones in the section on the move itself. I kinda don't think there's a ton of value in slating more than one move with the same condition. I'm not necessarily against it, but I think it's okay to have a smaller slate with all distinct options than have a larger slate visually that in reality kinda just has the same move or two doubled up.

 

[dex]

Prelim slate:
Beak Blast
Barb Barrage
Stomping Tantrum
Thunderclap

Of these, I think Stomping Tantrum would be a poor move to choose to base a process around. Stomping Tantrum is a commonly used move on a bunch of Pokemon, but never for its conditional effect. It is primarily used because it is the best Ground-type coverage a Pokemon has access to. Its conditional effect usually never comes up. Let's ask: why?

On its face, Stomping Tantrum has a powerful conditional effect: it can double its BP to 150, which is pretty strong. However, the cost to set up that condition, failing a move, is too high for this effect to be worth building for. You are essentially purposely taking a turn off, which is never a good thing in Pokemon. That is why immunities are so valuable; getting a free turn is one of the most momentum-swingy plays you can make in Pokemon. Building for the idea that we are giving the opponent free turns is not particularly great in my mind. I think Stomping Tantrum works better as a supporting move to a different conditional effect, but as a standalone move and with the rest of the process in mind, I think it would be an exceedingly bad choice.

If I were to rank the these options, it would be Beak Blast > Barb Barrage > Thunderclap >>> Stomping Tantrum.

On the Bubble:
Burning Bulwark
Mirror Coat
Double Shock

Of these, I believe the only one worth pursuing is Double Shock. Double Shock has a pretty unique condition among conditional moves in that you already start with the condition achieved and then lose that condition upon using the move. This is a really interesting style to play around with. I think of any of the moves, Double Shock would essentially always see play. It is the safest option we have available to us and I think it has a great design space.

Of the moves that have not been included in the preliminary slate or the bubble, I think Water Spout deserves a mention. It isn't my favorite, but I think HP-centric moves certainly have enough design space to work with and present interesting questions about immunities and the value of HP in battles.

Including these moves, I would rank all of them as such:

Double Shock > Beak Blast > Barb Barrage > Water Spout > Thunderclap >>> Stomping Tantrum

 

[viol and bass]

Did some thinkin.

Stomping Tantrum: I don't fully agree with Dex, because part of the function of a move like this is to make the rest of your moveset more clickable. You're not trying to make a move fail, but you're much more free to click a threatening move that might fail knowing you haven't lost much ground if it does. HOWEVER. The "big damage" turns are extremely telegraphed, and ground has a plethora of diverse immunities in this metagame. You're quite likely to whiff and spend two turns in a row doing nothing, which isn't acceptable to me. It's not even easy to target these immunities with coverage, since mons like Libra, Dragonite, Corviknight, etc. require very different answers. Temper Flare is way better in this respect, because there are very few immunities, and the ones that exist are pretty easy to target with another move in our kit. I support Temper Flare's inclusion on slate over Stomping Tantrum.

One thing to note on these moves is that it's fine to deny quake/blitz if we need to. I don't think that cheapens the process or means failure, since the goal is just to make effective use of the conditional move.

Water Spout: I think it's worth including. Even if we go with the most straightforward build which is a fast hole puncher, the conditional aspect of this move is significant. You generally want to run a choice item with a move like this, since not outspeeding and killing the opponent means you're likely taking damage and rendering the move unusable in a lot of cases. This makes the hazard weakness significant, and boots is a serious sacrifice for this reason. Choiced sets are also not happy with mons like Wellspring and Mollux existing, when you may not get many opportunities to enter freely and not take damage. Even if there's recovery in the mix on non-choiced sets, you have to somehow end up at or near full health while being faster than your opponent, which is not always easy. Clicking Recover while a slower mon hits you back isn't sufficient. Healing Wish also applies before hazard damage, so the move doesn't even help that much for non-boots sets. Priority is a hurdle too. The move's conditionality becomes more pronounced on a slower mon, since the move is basically neutered when you take a hit. If you're not generally outspeeding the opponent, the move could easily become unworkable. It's a conditional move with a lot of serious considerations to take into account, in addition to a lot of unexplored angles. I believe it would make for a very good process.

Double Shock: I'd include this. It's a mechanically interesting move, and I like the "fails entirely if condition is not met" representation personally. Building around losing the ground weakness or turning a neutrality into a resist is a possibility, but you have to be able to do something while staying in, which is easier said than done. The conditionality is real, particularly because if we're an Electric type, tera electric is pretty likely to be godawful in this meta. Using that is going to be a real tradeoff, it's kind of another layer of conditionality. Worth noting that I don't think selecting a non-electric type is workable here. It might be feasible if Electric were a better tera type in general, but as it stands, that's just way too tenuous to be functional for a process in my view. But if we're electric? Cool move, great process.

Beak Blast, Thunder Clap, and Barb Barrage: They're great moves, they're fully concept-relevant, and I think they would be fine to build around. There are unique angles you can take with all of them. They should probably remain slated. My only concern is this: the concept we've chosen is very very different from a concept like Ramnarok's, in which concept fulfillment was difficult, and a constant consideration at every stage of the process. This made for really rich discussions throughout. Fulfillment of this concept is comparatively quite trivial: if we run a conditional move, and we're at least somewhat viable, we've succeeded. This alone isn't a bad thing, but I worry that selecting a move that is quite easy to build around (obviously there are degrees to this) will make discussions in a lot of stages a bit more shallow. That's not to say moves like Beak Blast are perfect or don't have tradeoffs, more just that building around them is not as much of a problem to solve as some of these other options. That "problem solving" element that we tackle as a community through discussion is maybe the coolest part of CAP, so yeah. These moves are neat and they have gotten plenty of support for good reason, but I probably wouldn't rank them particularly high on a process basis. Take that with a grain of salt.

Burning Bulwark: I want to believe but I'm having trouble seeing a vision for it that's not sort of Gliscor. I think it's more interesting if it's something offensive to evade priority or whatever, but in general it doesn't feel quite slatable to me.

Mirror Coat: Just not sure about this one honestly. It's hard for me to see more than a couple angles on this move, but I would be happy to expand my horizons on this one.

 

[a fairy]

Dang, af, your topic leader lets you have two posts focused on a specific move you want to see on slate?

Nah, but for real, I'm surprised that nobody's formally suggested Focus Punch. We were talking in the TLT chat and I asked face blank if there was a move worthy of slate consideration that hadn't been put up, and we got onto the conversation of Focus Punch off of that. Feels like we spent a while talking about it, but when push came to shove and people started putting up their specific moves they wanted, Focus Punch kinda vanished.

I think especially when we have a TLT mostly disagreeing with each other's preferences (just from what I've seen in posts, tbc i see this as a good thing) and a slate that is pretty small all things considered with a lot of clone moves present in the conversation, I'd like to explore the potentiality of something that's had a fair bit of discussion prior to names being put up but kinda disappearing with not as much advocacy in terms of someone throwing their post behind it. Potentially a usable option, something worth slating if there's further conversation on it that leans favorably?

• the move’s condition

Maybe a bit silly, but in my mind, this is the conditional move. Don't get that turn? Move succeeds. Sure, it may not have been the first (did y'all know Wobbofett is a Gen 2 Pokemon?) but I think the mental imprint left on several generations of Pokemon players is pretty impactful. Focus Punch is an incredibly powerful move, with precious few non-Z moves at that space consistently - in some ways, Focus Punch is one of the strongest of the bunch, with a relatively easy-to-meet condition and no major drawbacks, compared to something like Hyper Beam and siblings or the HP=BP group.

• the consistency of the condition and the payoff upon activation

Sorta spent a bit of time discussing it already, but I think Focus Punch has a uniquely cool balance here. The payoff is pretty incredible, 150 BP is pretty sweet, I went over a bit already how 120 can feel a bit disappointing with how the generations have developed, but I think that 150 is enough above that it stands out somewhat, and the consistency of the condition really does scale with player skill. The better you are at reading your opponent's likely plays, the better you are at bluffing move choice and taking advantage of opponent misposition, the more you can make use out of Focus Punch.

• relevant constraints that the move will create on the rest of the process.

It's probably gonna need STAB, right? It also for sure leans Physical stats-wise, and would need a complimentary movepool that also doesn't have something that can take its place, which might be a touch contradictory/difficult to handle. I don't really think it'd have a major impact on ability or stats as a whole, though, no more so than the average "this mon uses this move" type concept.

 

[Gekokeso]

Regarding the choices between clones of moves I say these are better:
Temper Flare > Stomping Tantrum: You really never run stomping tantrum unless you don't have better ground options like high horsepower or eq, but temper flare does have a lot more working material given the fact it has no typing immunities so unlike stomping its effect is easier to take advantage.
Double Shock > Burn Up: Dshock is a physical electric move which very little mons get access too, while burn up competes with a massive amount of competition on the special side as a fire move. Both are really good options however.
Water Spout > Eruption/Dragon Energy: Eruption has use in very niche sets, while dragon energy is very mid. Water Spout I think is the more viable of these moves and the one with more exploring space.
Barb Barrage > Infernal Parade: BB is way more unique compared to infernal parade which is pretty much just a better hex, which we know its a good move already.
Thunderclap > Sucker Punch: Not thrilled with neither of these moves for reasons I have mentioned before but admitedly thunderclap could at the very least make for an abuser that can differ enough from bolt to be unique.

 

[spoo]

temper flare/beak blast/barb barrage/double shock/thunderclap/water spout

my ideal slate

thunderclap: coming around to it, slowly. i think my judgment on thunderclap was a bit premature, tho it is still the least or second least interesting to me out of the above options. just because a move has MANY great abusers across a million different tiers doesn’t necessarily mean that these abusers are ideal or optimized. even gambit, despite being one of the most viable sucker punch users of all time, is not the best pokemon at using sucker punch of all time. consider mega absol, a much worse pokemon but arguably a better sucker punch abuser because of its ability to punish common counterplay to the move via pursuit and magic bounce. building around thunderclap would basically be hyper-optimizing a move that has few truly ideal users despite being so common across comp mons. still not crazy about it but more routes than i initially gave credit for

temper flare better than stantrum for reasons already mentioned. i like this one a lot because it results in the least obvious process / end result. something like barb barrage would result in a fairly linear process IMO because its use case is so obvious. temper flare represents an actual problem to solve, which is the spirit of this project. yes the move is worse than more consistent stabs but it’s not even inherently Bad - i think framing it as a “box concept” or “cap bad” concept is dismissive and reductive. the point is not to build around giving the opponent a massive advantage (free turns) so that we gain a minor advantage (2x boost), that would be dumb. the point is that even some of the best moves in the game have immunities and therefore risk, and temper/stantrum offset this risk, making the rest of our kit more consistent by extension - basically what vile said. however, i think the criticism that this is more of a complementary option, not a “build around” option, is fair enough

beak blast: strong move all around, IMO the rest of the process would be quite easy which is a good thing or a bad thing depending on who you ask. it is a safe and popular choice, probably the poster child for this concept, although i would prefer something that results in less obvious paths forward. i think it would still result in a pokemon with a unique play pattern, though, which redeems it for me

barb barrage is like beak blast in the sense that it’s sorta a cakewalk to the finish line, but without the unique gameplay dynamics that help redeem beak blast in my eyes. this just seems like sludge bomb on roids…? it undeniably fits the concept though

double shock: i wish i talked about this one first because i am on mobile and getting tired of typing now, it’s probably my first or second choice though, this gets cooler the more i think about it. begging for this to be slated

i dread the ability discussion for water spout but it is a dope move. more drawbacks compared to many other options here, which is a plus for me. fully workable but not immediately obvious how you get there. i agree with vile that this would be a good process

 

[Spammernoob]

On its face, Stomping Tantrum has a powerful conditional effect: it can double its BP to 150, which is pretty strong. However, the cost to set up that condition, failing a move, is too high for this effect to be worth building for. You are essentially purposely taking a turn off, which is never a good thing in Pokemon. That is why immunities are so valuable; getting a free turn is one of the most momentum-swingy plays you can make in Pokemon. Building for the idea that we are giving the opponent free turns is not particularly great in my mind. I think Stomping Tantrum works better as a supporting move to a different conditional effect, but as a standalone move and with the rest of the process in mind, I think it would be an exceedingly bad choice.

I'd argue that the Tantrum / Temper Flare effect exists specifically to mitigate the issue outlined here (namely, losing momentum when the opponent switches in an immunity). Specifically, they enable you to click your high power STAB move without giving up momentum if the opponent switches in an immunity.

For example, we can look at Great Tusk. Great Tusk wants to click Rapid Spin or Headlong Rush all of the time. A common interaction in OU is Great Tusk vs Balloon Ghold, where the Great Tusk player has to guess whether Ghold will switch in or not and click Ice Spinner or Spin / Headlong respectively. If the Great Tusk player gets this turn wrong (eg. letting Ghold in for free, or clicking Spinner into a mon that they could kill with Headlong), they lose a ton of momentum. However, consider if Great Tusk has Temper Flare. It can freely click Headlong, and if Ghold switches in, it can follow up with a 150BP Temper Flare. This is notable because Ghold lives 75BP Temper Flare, so the Tusk player would have to click it on the switch otherwise to KO.

Of course, Great Tusk has better options, most notably Knock, but Temper Flare still occasionally sees use on Sun to snipe Corv. The principle is well demonstrated, however. Temper Flare / Stomping Tantrum effects are not something you actively aim to activate, but rather a hedge to reduce the risk of clicking a move with immunities. The question would then be, do we want to base our process around a move that is effectively there as supporting coverage... maybe, maybe not.

Water Spout > Eruption/Dragon Energy: Eruption has use in very niche sets, while dragon energy is very mid. Water Spout I think is the more viable of these moves and the one with more exploring space.

I actually think Dragon Energy is the most unique out of the 3. It is also probably the worst...

Water Spout is odd in that there is a lot of competition for Water-type breaker. The big 2 are Wake and Ogerpon-W, but you have some more obscure stuff like Keldeo and Prima too. It's a bit hard to see a path that doesn't heavily overlap with one of these, since Water Spout is ultimately just a strong Water move. We could lean more into the survivability aspect, eg. Torn-T or Kril build (ngl, Kril with Water Spout would be hella cool...) but this process seems pretty awkward to me.


Also, Double Shock is cool. It should be slated.

 

[Just A Shroom God]

Y'all have no fucking idea how much I wanted to suggest around Wring Out or Hard Press. Did you know that this conditionally active normal-type move only goes up to 120 base power? It's even worse for Hard Press, which is only 100 and has an even worse offensive typing. Why can't we have nice things, Gamefreak?

I don't think we should be looking at a move that has 0 viable users (aside from beak blast because STABmons), because frankly, that produces a messy concept where we'd have to diverge pretty heavily if our chosen gimmick doesn't work out. For that reason, I can't suggest Temper Flare or Stomping Tantrum, because pretty much everything that uses them uses them because they don't have stronger coverage. I think trying to balance a CAP around this would just lead to giving them a sky-high attack stat, and balancing around such a specific and reactive activation condition makes them completely unviable when the metagame shifts anyway. Same deal with Focus Punch, sorry a fairy. Thus, any move that we choose must have at least some viable users already, so it must have already been explored a little bit. The challenge is finding a move that we can do something new with. And that comes down to the specific move.

I think SuckerClap, CounterCoat/Metal Burst, and Beak Blast pretty much have been explored fully, in that they have users that use them to their full potential already. How would we make a mon revolving around Sucker Punch that's significantly different from Kingambit without giving it several complementary moves and moving into gimmick territory? CounterCoat and Beak Blast are the same way, in that it's hard to make a CounterCoat user that's better than AVmola, and hard to make a Beak Blast user that isn't just STABmons Corv. I'm sure these moves would give us a successful concept, but it wouldn't be anything new or interesting. Being new and interesting ultimately does come second in the process to making a viable mon, but I'm certain there's more design space to be explored here, so I'd be mildly disappointed if one of these got chosen.

Barb Barrage is both viable and underexplored on its only abuser, Overqwil, but personally, I find it completely uninteresting. Its activation condition and its payoff are the same thing, spamming the move, and unlike the similar moves Scald or Infernal Parade, its effect can be completely nullified by two very prominent types. Plus, even if you do activate it against a mon, it's not like you even super need the extra damage against a poisoned mon, and it takes 2 turns of use to even equal sludge bomb's damage. I can't think of a CAP for this move that wouldn't just be recreating every defensive poison type ever. Barb Barrage would've been better in Fidgit's Role Compression concept and even then it's like, 5% better than existing options

The moves I would like to see slated are one of Eruption/Water Spout/Dragon Energy (side note: isn't it so silly that we have to choose a specific move at this point, basically locking in the typing phase for no reason?), Burning Bulwark, Infernal Parade, Hex, and Double Shock. Make no mistake, we will have to work for these to be interesting: it's entirely possible we end up with just another Dragapult for Hex, or neglect Double Shock's typing change gimmick entirely and just give strong electric STAB to any random physical attacker, but these are the moves I believe there is design space left for something new.

Edit:

Just Stomping Tantrum. I don’t see the need to delay the specific choice of move until after Typing as that would likely make the Typing poll an implicit poll on Tantrum vs Flare, which isn’t good.

You don't see the need to determine the typing of the CAP during the typing stage? "An implicit poll on Tantrum vs Flare" is just deciding which type you want the mon to be, given that the moves are literally identical otherwise, and like, yeah, deciding the typing is something we need to do, but in its own stage. Not combining Tantrum and Flare just invalidates that entire stage? Am I missing something obvious??

 

[cat111ca]

Temper flame
The idea behind this move is that it makes other moves not be risky. perfect when paired with strong stab to not worry about immunities.
I prefer it over stomping tantrum because against stomping tantrum you can just switch to an immunity while fire immunities are rare. the point of the move is to make the opponents good switches bad for them. great when paired with rapid spin


something I thought of is that kingambit is practically what were trying to make, so..]
1. sucker punch already has a mon abusing it and shouldn't be picked
2. we should look into kingambit to see HOW to make this concept work

 

[StarFalcon555]

Quick post to share my opinions on some alternatives and some moves I think should be slated:

If we go for Water Spout/Eruption/Dragon Energy, I would prefer Eruption. I think it hits a nice sweet spot of having a good design space, being viable, and not having as much competition.

I'm not as keen on Thunderclap or Sucker Punch due to how prominent Raging Bolt and Kingambit are, but if we had to pick one, I would prefer Thunderclap for the reasons spoo laid out. It's a Gen 9 signature move, meaning it's much less explored and would be a more engaging process than Sucker Punch IMO.

I think Focus Punch should be on the slate. I miss my wife (Gen 4 SubPunch Breloom) Tails, I miss her a lot, I'll be back am honestly stunned it took this long to suggest this move considering how much it was being talked about in the Discord server post concept polls. What I love about Focus Punch is that it's a conditional move that was viable in past generations but isn't anymore, which would make the process of building around this move extra interesting IMO.

Also throwing support behind Beak Blast, Temper Flare, Double Shock, and Barb Barrage for reasons already stated by others.

 

[Lightniong]

don’t really have that much strong opinions on this topic but I’m just gonna throw out some thoughts.

Focus Punch should at least be given a try, we really haven’t seen a Pokemon put any work using it in a long time, and I feel like it has the potential to be extremely consistent if given the right tools to work properly,

I really don’t like Sucker Punch / Thunderclap on the slate imo, just feels like that’s already been solved and we don’t need more of sucker punch / t clap mind games for one gen

I think Stomping Tantrum is fine here, but I believe if we are going that route, Temper Flare should probably be chosen over it because stomping tantrum is mostly used as a ground immunity, + the fire typing can lead to some more creative innovations with this process.

Water Spout / Eruption / Dragon Energy could make for an interestng process, but it just sounds like a whole lotta work to make it either good or not broken.

Also showing support for Beak Blast, Barb Barrage, and Double Shock for reasons already stated above, go read theirs they’re really good.

 

[quziel]

I expect to see a subset of Focus Punch / Thunderclap / Double Shock / Temper Flare / Water Spout / Beak Blast / Barb Barrage on slate. I wanted to give my opinions on the relative worth of these options. We can make a successful product with all of these. I am going to be rating them on how "narrow" I think they'll all be, that is, how much room we'll have in various stages, and how much a suboptimal choice will constrain further stages. An additional point is how central the move is going to be to their gameplan. A final point is how much I feel we'll be learning. I'll be grouping the moves as a result:

Beak Blast, Thunder Clap, and Barb Barrage are all moves that have pretty obvious pathways forward, as we have a lot of examples of the moves, or very similar moves, working on mons in either lower tiers or OMs, and can draw heavily from them. Beak Blast and Barb Barrage ask us to give them stab, and ask for a chassis that can play a longer, grindier, game. Beak Blast has an interesting interaction with Knock Off, and if we can make a mon that they really want to Knock that ensures we get at least one burn spread. Barb Barrage basically asks us to make a mon that would run Scald, but can't due to typing, but there is the added wrinkle of Poison just not being a great attacking type. Thunder Clap is pretty to look for existing examples for, being Sucker Punch with an additional immunity. These will all be very easy processes that nonetheless don't teach us a huge amount.

Double Shock and Water Spout are a sorta odd grouping, but they're premium STAB options that are also somewhat unreliable. As a result they're natural fits to a more interesting process. I will note Water Spout / Eruption / Dragon Energy all fill me with a bit of trepidation, as by far the easiest way to ensure you stay at full HP is to equip Choice Specs and Tera-Water and try to ensure all you get is OHKOs. I'm not sure there's a ton of depth in creating Convergence Inteleon. Double Shock by contrast is going to be central to any set the mon runs, but at the same time unreliable enough that we have to really think about our typing, moveset, and stats.

Focus Punch and Temper Flare are both in the category of moves that work well to support a primary attacking option, but are going to be really rough to rely on as your main move. Temper Flare basically exists to lower the risk of clicking a Dragon/Poison/Electric/etc move, and as a result while I do think there's a lot to be done with the design of the mon, its very much so not at the center of any set we're running. I do think it'll have very interesting implications on ability and typing, but its a question of how much desire there is to base a concept around a move that's not your main option, a la Saharaja. Focus Punch has more potential to be our main STAB, as its just nuclear strong, but well, the last time we saw any Focus Punch usage in OU it was SM era with Substitute Mega-Mawile. This is probably the riskiest and hardest option on the poll as the move fell off for a very good reason. Unlikely Temper Flare which is mainly outclassed (though does see a small amount of usage on Great Tusk), Focus Punch is actively awkward to use.

 

[earthflax]

Alright everyone, I got a little caught up this weekend, but here’s the final slate of moves:

Barb Barrage
Beak Blast
Double Shock
Focus Punch
Thunderclap

I felt that these moves all have a fairly good mix of adequate design space and viable execution. If you have any questions about exclusions or inclusions please let me know, but my answer will probably be that the move lacked one of the aforementioned qualities. Thank you all for your suggestions and for putting up with such a lengthy stage. Onto poll!