Policy Review DLC-related Nerfs and Bans

[dex]

CAP, unlike most other metagames, has the ability to nerf components of the metagame instead of banning. This has been used to good effect to make metagames better; the SM Jumbao thread is a good example of how and why nerfs are a good thing. However, SS and SV, with their DLCs, have shown that Pokémon, for the foreseeable future, is going to create very volatile metagames until the last DLC of a generation is released. This is obviously undesirable for CAP’s current nerf process, which is all about meticulously considering the effect a CAP and its qualities have on the metagame. We already have seen the downside of this once with Equilibra getting hit with the Nerf gun (yes that is purposeful) in early SS just to have its nerfs undone later, shaking up a metagame that was already fairly developed.

In my eyes, nerfing something and then unnerfing it in the same generation isn’t a good look and should be avoided. Therefore, I propose the following changes to CAP nerf and tiering policy:

• Outside of Post-Play Lookbacks (“PPLs”) and Quick Nerfs (also only applies to new CAPs), nerfs to CAPs in the current generation can only occur if all DLC have been released for the current generation
• In the event a CAP shows itself to be too broken/uncompetitive before the final DLC of the generation is released, the CAP should be banned until the next DLC is released. You can think of this process as similar to Pokémon that get retested in OU after a DLC release like Cinderace in SS.
• CAPs CANNOT be banned if all DLC for the generation has been released. This signals that the metagame is ready to enter a “steady state”. Any CAP that was previously banned must be immediately reintroduced to the tier alongside other DLC introductions. At this time, nerfs and their usual process may resume.

Banning could be up to the Council or it could be up to some provisionary suspect system. That’s something this thread can help decide as well.

 

[Gekokeso]

Missed this before, but given that no other people have talked here I might as well elaborate on this:

I think I can agree with most of the model proposed by Dex. We have enough precedent for CAP enacting its own separate tiering action that differs from OU with the Clefable ban in early SS CAP, that was not revised until after DLC 2 dropped. It also incentivises the player base to create CAPs that are going to be balanced from the get-go, else that CAP might suffer the unfortunate fate of being banned during its debut generation, rather than potentially going to multiple nerfing processes during a gen like Astrolotl did. I would personally choose the bans to be product of suspect tests, since it incentivises a lot of games to be played thus giving a more realistic view of how strong the pokémon is, since usually not many games tend to happen outside of tournaments, and gives the players a chance to not only defend the pokémon's right to remain in the meta, but also a last hurrah for any fans of the pokémon should it get locked up for most of the generation. I would also assume that the same shall apply to buff processes, especially since some of them like the Kitsunoh and Pyroak processes have resulted in quite the meta shifts, and both only occurred until the dlc 2 metas settled down.

The only issue I see with this model is that OU itself tends to unban a lot of pokémon before the final DLC arrives, as shown with the unban slate that occurred once the HOME meta was released. If a pokémon gets banned from the CAP metagame, should it be able to be judged by council to return to the tier in the same vein as OU tends to do, or should it remain banned regardless of what gets unbanned by OU? The latter option may mean that the pokémon misses out on a meta where it could either be fine or even a positive presence in the metagame, but the former sort of ilegitimizes the point of banning pokémon until the end of the the second DLC.

 

[shnowshner]

I have been vocal about my issues with how we treat CAPs in relation to their place and power in metas, and have been meaning to post in response for a while. Work and subsequent work fatigue have not made that easy, but this week has been extremely slow and remarkably free (I've only spent like half a shift at work in the past three days which is wild). So I am posting now.

• Outside of Post-Play Lookbacks (“PPLs”) and Quick Nerfs (also only applies to new CAPs), nerfs to CAPs in the current generation can only occur if all DLC have been released for the current generation
• In the event a CAP shows itself to be too broken/uncompetitive before the final DLC of the generation is released, the CAP should be banned until the next DLC is released. You can think of this process as similar to Pokémon that get retested in OU after a DLC release like Cinderace in SS.
• CAPs CANNOT be banned if all DLC for the generation has been released. This signals that the metagame is ready to enter a “steady state”. Any CAP that was previously banned must be immediately reintroduced to the tier alongside other DLC introductions. At this time, nerfs and their usual process may resume.

The system dex outlined above is quite elegant, but would almost certainly raise concern from a variety of users. The biggest thing would be that having CAPs banned undermines why we even make CAPs in the first place. We have active banned CAPs in Gen 5 and 6 (Cawmodore in both, Aurumoth was also banned until getting nerfed), and it doesn't paint the greatest picture, even if the decisions that led to the ban both in-process and from a meta perspective are far behind the vast majority of active CAP users today. Having a CAP banned in current generation is a different issue entirely, as its our most visible and active avenue of play, and I can definitely see people being upset over CAPs being inaccessible for current gens, especially for newer users who may not be comfortable picking up older gens.

Despite that, I think the tradeoff is worth it. There's a multitude of issues which stem from how we approach meta-warping CAPs during the beginning of a generation,

1. We need to figure out what exactly needs to be changed, and not undershoot to end up back here again, while also avoiding too hard of a hit to outright drop something from relevancy.
2. Whatever change is decided on then needs to be implemented onto PS, and subsequently removed down the line should the power level return to a state said CAP was built for.
3. The whole aspect of a "temporary nerf" muddies the history and future of any particular CAP, i.e. needing to update archival info, Smogon Dex info and team samples/structures.

In contrast, banning the CAP in question until the metagame has stabilized is far easier to implement and understand. What dex suggested with waiting until the very end of DLCs is a good benchmark to meet, but it may not always be obvious when a generation will stop receiving new content, so I think a more "suspect-test" style of implementation, where banned CAPs are labbed and tested in the meta to see if they aren't overbearing. If they're still a problem, even a little, ere on the side of caution and ride out until another big meta shift. It's more arbitrary in implementation, but may get a CAP back into play a good bit sooner.

I feel like there's more I want to say on the matter but it's probably me wanting to respond to the powercreep thread, so I'm gonna make headway on that while my synapses are still firing.

 

[spoo]

We already have seen the downside of this once with Equilibra getting hit with the Nerf gun (yes that is purposeful) in early SS just to have its nerfs undone later, shaking up a metagame that was already fairly developed.

In my eyes, nerfing something and then unnerfing it in the same generation isn’t a good look and should be avoided.

I don't think this is a totally fair framing of what happened. If we look at it from a different angle: we saw Equilibra get nerfed in SS, remain a generally positive meta element that promoted healthy diversity from OU, and then when it was deemed appropriate, its nerf was reversed with large public support and very few actual negative consequences for the tier.

Banning and unbanning our own creations, potentially multiple times, may not be a good look either when the less-dramatic option to nerf them is readily available. I am not really convinced that nerfing and unnerfing is actually worse optics than banning and unbanning; if anything, I would say the latter is a worse look. To me, banning our own creations when non-ban routes exist is the nuclear option. However, this is a hard point to argue either way, as it's totally subjective and difficult for us to judge when we live in our little CAP bubble anyways. (And regardless, optics isn't the deciding factor with this proposal.)

I worry that this proposal also risks complicating the main CAP creation process. When we're making a new CAP, should we design with considerations for currently banned CAPs, knowing that they will eventually be unbanned? Banned CAPs would occupy quite a strange space; we can't exactly create something that would be totally overshadowed by one, or something that would hard lose to one, or something that competes heavily, or something that would be broken in conjunction with one –– but we can't also theorymon the whole process either and design for a meta that literally doesn't exist. I can see this proposal muddying discussion and making arguments very circular. Imagine if Hemogoblin was banned during Chuggalong's process (it was DLC2 by this point so this wouldn't have happened, but bear with me):

• user A: "We can't lose to Hemogoblin, it's coming back soon"
• user B: "But it might not even be good when it comes back"
• A: "You can't know that; Pixiespeed will always be good, it's going to stop us in our tracks every game"
• B: "You can't know THAT; the next DLC might push it out of viability, and then we wasted resources trying to beat an unmon"
• A: "I'd rather be safe than sorry"
• B: "You're theorymonning for a meta that doesn't exist"
• A: "I'm just being realistic"
• continue forever

There's a multitude of issues which stem from how we approach meta-warping CAPs during the beginning of a generation,

1. We need to figure out what exactly needs to be changed, and not undershoot to end up back here again, while also avoiding too hard of a hit to outright drop something from relevancy.

I think it's debatable how much this is actually a Bad Thing, but yes, this is absolutely a challenge with nerfing CAPs. Threading the needle on a balanced nerf isn't always easy. Sometimes we undershoot, and sometimes we overshoot, but on the whole I think we (usually) do a good job. Bans are certainly simpler, I'll give you that, but observing that nerfs are hard to get 100% right and concluding that we should just ban CAPs instead feels like a solution entirely disproportionate to the problem.

2. Whatever change is decided on then needs to be implemented onto PS, and subsequently removed down the line should the power level return to a state said CAP was built for.

I don't really understand this one. Bans also need to be implemented and subsequentely removed on PS, this isn't an issue unique to nerfs. Nerfs can be more complicated to code than bans, but not so much that it would move the needle in any direction on this proposal.

3. The whole aspect of a "temporary nerf" muddies the history and future of any particular CAP, i.e. needing to update archival info, Smogon Dex info and team samples/structures.

Again, this isn't unique to nerfs, and is arguably much more of an issue for bans. Banning something like pre-nerf Equilibra in SS or pre-nerf Hemogoblin in SV would have shaken up resources like the VR and sample teams far more than a nerf did. A Hemogoblin HO sample team continues to function after Hemogoblin loses Knock Off; it does not continue to function after the tier loses Hemogoblin. As for resources like dex analyses, the base stats on SmogDex update automatically at some point, and we're usually able to just edit the analysis on-site to account for axed moves or changed EV spreads. A ban would render entire analyses useless.

---

Reiterating some old thoughts I shared in #prc, I think there is a high bar for proving that bans are outright "better" than nerfs. I am not inherently pro-status quo, but this is a huge change to our current system. With every further iteration on a CAP's state, whether that's a PPL, a quicknerf, a "standard" nerf, or a nerf reversal, we get closer to an optimally balanced product. As the CAP project has aged and grown, we have slowly embraced a more iterative process, with more and more levers being added to fine-tune and tweak. I don't know how much good it does to cut out one of those levers of iteration. I appreciate the motivations behind this proposal –– the nerf process is certainly imperfect –– but I would rather address those imperfections while staying within the scope of nerfs than go down this route that subverts them altogether.

While I'm here, I'll also repeat and expand on some thoughts quziel shared in our modchat, namely that we can't know a priori how many DLCs will be released in a generation. We might end up with three in Gen 10, and none in Gen 11, none of us really know. It might be fine if we just assume it's gonna be two DLC, but I think the current model allows us more flexibility. Quziel also suggested that we could revisit all nerfs after each DLC is released. There are probably other worthwhile suggestions for how to improve on our current nerf process; like I said, it's not a perfect system.

I think there's still room for productive discussion in this thread, so I'll leave it open in case folks want to disagree or agree with anything I've had to say. Aiming to resolve this thread in the next week or two max.

 

[dex]

This thread largely stemmed from my distaste for how Equilibra was handled in SS. If nerfs are always preferable to bans, and if they can be temporary as shown with SS Equilibra, then there needs to be more structure to their timing so as to avoid meta shakeups out of sync with the process.

My proposal can work fairly well with nerfs or bans, but I understand that DLC releases are unpredictable. It would perhaps be better to implement the following:

1. Nerfs can happen whenever at the discretion of the metagame council. This freedom of when to nerf is to promote metagame health.
2. Nerfs can be reviewed for reversal/changes at the release of a DLC or other Pokémon-release event at the discretion of the metagame council.
3. Nerfs cannot be reviewed in this manner outside of these events to avoid metagame shake-ups to steady-state metagames.

Again, this will only apply to current generation proceedings.

Hopefully this is more in-line with expectations.