Doubles Stage 3.5 Suspect Nomination / Discussion

[Pocket]

Suspect Nomination and Discussion​

So it's been a month since our last suspect test, and the council would want to know if there is anything that you feel strongly that requires testing. The council has identified no suspects, but we want to hear what the rest of the community has to say. This is a chance to persuade us to look at what you believe is an unhealthy element of the metagame.

You may also post if you believe the current metagame is balanced and satisfactory without any suspects left to test atm (which can always change in the future with the advent of ORAS or simple metagame trends).

Warnings​

Kangaskhanite:

Seeing how Kangaskhanite has been voted to stay TWICE (and seeing how we just tested it in our last suspect stage), we strongly discourage you from nominating it unless you strongly feel for the need for a third test. Good luck convincing the council, though :S

Ubers:

As for nominating current Ubers to be dropped into Doubles: do NOT nominate Ubers that would influence the metagame more than Kyurem-B, which is a Pokemon I consider as the benchmark for any drop-downs. Ubers will be dropped ONLY if they can seamlessly enter the metagame without causing major alterations to the metagame. It does not matter if you believe a Pokemon would add "further diversity" or other "benefits" without being overpowering. The effect of dropping Ubers should be recessive rather than dominant. We're not looking to shaking the metagame by dropping Ubers. Intentionally searching for Ubers to drop for the sake of more suspect tests is totally unnecessary and undesirable.

Clauses:

Do NOT nominate clauses for testing...the council will decide whether any of them are worth removing (the current stance is keeping them to filter out excessive luck factors from our metagame)

Gonna state the obvious here by saying that this thread will be moderated.

Duration​

You have an entire week (till July 7th) to make your case about any particular suspect, so post away ^.^

That's not to say that you cannot speak up once this thread is closed. Feel free to PM the council any time with your concerns about the metagame.

 

[AuraRayquaza]

Imo, the only viable suspect we have at the moment is mega gengar. The WoW trapping set is what i believe makes it broken. The way it can not only make physical attackers like mega kangaskhan and terrakion useless, but also trap them. Megagar and its ally can then gang up on the other poke, forcing 2 v 1 situations for the rest of the game, which i feel are unhealthy to the metagame. Let me direct you to a replay that im sure many have seen:

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-smogondoubles-10236

Me vs Laga. Now i know that i played badly in turn one and let mega kanga get trapped early, but thats not the point. Once kanga had been burned, it was useless, allowing terrakion and gengar to both attack my other fielded poke, promptly 6-0ing me. In another situation, a player would have switched out their physical attacker so it wasnt trapped. However, this means they cannot come back in for the rest of the game, as getting a ko will allow megagar back in to trap them, and mega kanga, the two time suspect, is nothing if it isnt on the field.

Personally, i dont feel the meta is healthy with megagar or mega kanga in it, but i hope megagar gets the chance to be suspected.

 

[Lolk]

Tbh I don't think you have played against Gengar enough as seen with your battle and post. The reason you lost so badly was Shadow Tag + Kickass partner, not Shadow Tag + Will-O-Wisp.

Keeping in a Kanga turn 1 permanently lost you momentum and a scrappy Fake Out could have at least put Terrakion on the defensive with Quick Guard later in the game. Plus, that Turn 2 Quick Guard really caught you off guard when you could have put either Gengar or Terrakion in KO range with Azumarill's Aqua Jet. You had the chance to take out Terrakion with Mach Punch (i guess Quick Guard was stopping you but fo reals that was your only chance). In addition, you definitely shouldn't have sent in Gourgeist last because Trick Room was your only reliable answer to this combo, and because it needed the double targeting to be taken out, a partner could have gotten a free hit (minus minimal Rock Slide damage). After that, 3 of your 4 methods (assuming Gourgeist was Trick Room) of dealing with fast mons were cockblocked by Quick Guard, so your particular team wasn't very well prepared for it.

I agree that playing a well built Mega Gengar team is quite the different experience due to the greater importance of switching in the right Pokemon at the right time, but it is definitely not broken due to its frailty and inability to KO many threats (most burned stuff can at least 3hko it).

I have a Mega Gengar team if you or anyone else wants to battle a few times, and I agree that a suspect would at least grant the Doubles community some exposure on how to play against Mega Gengar right (as it did for Mega Kangaskhan), but a How-to-play-against-Mega-Gengar article or practice tourney would accomplish the same thing with less time.

 

[Anty]

Mega Gengar is definitely not broken despite what people say. After experience with it i can say it is very good and threatening but not broken. JIt has the ability to trap and burn things, that doesnt make it op, will-o-wisp gengar is predictable (i know it may run tweaked movesets, but willo on it is predictable) and can be played around. You dont lead with something like kanga vs them, it is obvious to see if their team is gengar based, and most of the time it will be their lead or they lose momentum with gengar, which is what it's meant to create. Force them to switch lead off with special attackers with stabs which hit it or force it to switch, also be aware of what its partner could be - pokes like darkrai, conkeldurr or even cresselia are good leads (they all also can beat terrak (unless sash), a common partner), they put offensive pressure on the opponents team with either force gengar to switch or kill it, which gives you the momentum.

AuraRayquaza your replay doesnt show much. Generally, you should never lead with kanga vs a gengar team, even if you do, switch when you can. Scrappy fake out may seem cool (ik you didnt do that aura), but the gengar user knows about that, and will protect turn 1.

 

[BLOOD TOTEM]

I'd just like to point out that it's predictability doesn't really matter. It has Shadow Tag which means you can't switch out into a suitable counter even if you want to. Obviously you can Protect with what you expect will be taking the WoW and let you partner hit Gengar bu if the Gengar player is smart (s)he will Protect with Gengar so that (s)he is free to WoW your Pokemon on the next turn.

This situation also assumes that your partner Pokemon will be able to handle Gengar. Whilst rare, Mega Gengar does find opportunities to come into two Pokemon which can't really do very much. From this point it is much easier to abuse moves like Substitute, Dragon Dance or just start punching holes.

Doubles is a dynamic metagame where switching is key, Gengar is a Pokemon which totally changes the tempo and balance of the metagame just by preventing a simple mechanic. I for one am not sure whether it's broken or not but I know for sure that it's a damn good mon.

 

[Hashtag]

Gengar hurts certain teams more than others. teams with no ghosts, volt-turners, and a lot of physical attackers, are obviously going to have trouble with gengar, but this is part of the game, I think that if you try a team with 2 choice scarfs, (which i tend to do) you will find that it has trouble with trick room. before you say that it is broken, you should try different team archetypes against it, and probably build a team around it, to see exactly where it has trouble. I'm also not sure if a suspect test will help accomplish seeing if it is broken, since it hardly ever comes up on the ladder other than on shitty gimmick teams.

In OU when they were testing for the deoxys forms, almost every team had them: does that mean that in the suspect ladder, you were obligated to use them, and could this be implemented to doubles, where there are fewer people? I think that this would be a better scenario for a gengar test because of its low usage. However this will obviously result in people from the ladder who don't really know much about it using perish trap and normalize things. xD

 

[Mizuhime]

For those of you that don't know / can't read it. Dice has posted a thread in a secret forum that has made me rethink my stance on Mega Gengar. In this thread he talks about how Gengar is extremely good at it's job in the Uber Metagame. Some of you may be wondering why, but he uses the term "uncompetitive" followed by a definition.
"Uncompetitive game aspects (or strategies) are those that take away autonomy (control of the game's events), take it out of the hand's of player's decisions-- and do so to a degree that can be considered uncompetitive." He tells us how in Ubers, Mega Gar has the ability to remove nearly anything it wants from the opposing team, so it can support the sweep of another Pokemon. Removing support Arceus with the combination of the Taunt + Destiny Bond. Of course all of this is because of it's ability in Shadow Tag. He also tells us how players have adapted to it and started using Shed Shell on stall teams as to not lose part of the wall combo, and how people have started using sets such as Pursuit Mega Scizor or Pursuit Chople Tar, but Mega Gar has adapted to the situation and started running will-o-wisp and HP Fire as well. So Gengar is really good at it's job. There is no question about it, but now you're wondering why do I care about Ubers, I have no reason to this is a Doubles subforum.

Obviously this is a Doubles tier and Mega Gengar isn't broken. It doesn't Ovepower Mons the way some other things do BUT, does it follow that same definition of "uncompetitive' as it does in ubers? I believe that it does. One of Gengars more notable sets is the Perish Song set. Against certain teams. Perish song Gengar can remove 2 Pokemon at the same time, with very little effort, it punishes bulkier builds. They don't really have a way to kill Gengar before Perish Song runs out, and even if they do they run the risk of that move being disabled, and for those who have experienced it, being disabled and trapped makes for a rough game. Making it an uncompetitive Pokemon. Gengar can change the pace of the game, and take the power completely out of the hands of the opponent with very little effort. So it follows that same definition of Uncompetitive as posted above. And by this definition it's my belief that Gengar with Perish Song, in Unhealthy for the tier.

So what could we do? I mean Gengar isn't broken unless it has Perish Song. So we could have a complex test of Gengar using Perish Song, or being on a Perish Song team. We could just outright test Gengarite. Or we could ignore it. But these are just my thoughts and I want t ohear what the rest of the community has to say on this matter. Thank you :]



- Moves here as to pockets request :]

 

[Darkmalice]

For those of you that don't know / can't read it. Dice has posted a thread in a secret forum that has made me rethink my stance on Mega Gengar. In this thread he talks about how Gengar is extremely good at it's job in the Uber Metagame. Some of you may be wondering why, but he uses the term "uncompetitive" followed by a definition.
"Uncompetitive game aspects (or strategies) are those that take away autonomy (control of the game's events), take it out of the hand's of player's decisions-- and do so to a degree that can be considered uncompetitive." He tells us how in Ubers, Mega Gar has the ability to remove nearly anything it wants from the opposing team, so it can support the sweep of another Pokemon. Removing support Arceus with the combination of the Taunt + Destiny Bond. Of course all of this is because of it's ability in Shadow Tag. He also tells us how players have adapted to it and started using Shed Shell on stall teams as to not lose part of the wall combo, and how people have started using sets such as Pursuit Mega Scizor or Pursuit Chople Tar, but Mega Gar has adapted to the situation and started running will-o-wisp and HP Fire as well. So Gengar is really good at it's job. There is no question about it, but now you're wondering why do I care about Ubers, I have no reason to this is a Doubles subforum.

Obviously this is a Doubles tier and Mega Gengar isn't broken. It doesn't Ovepower Mons the way some other things do BUT, does it follow that same definition of "uncompetitive' as it does in ubers? I believe that it does. One of Gengars more notable sets is the Perish Song set. Against certain teams. Perish song Gengar can remove 2 Pokemon at the same time, with very little effort, it punishes bulkier builds. They don't really have a way to kill Gengar before Perish Song runs out, and even if they do they run the risk of that move being disabled, and for those who have experienced it, being disabled and trapped makes for a rough game. Making it an uncompetitive Pokemon. Gengar can change the pace of the game, and take the power completely out of the hands of the opponent with very little effort. So it follows that same definition of Uncompetitive as posted above. And by this definition it's my belief that Gengar with Perish Song, in Unhealthy for the tier.

So what could we do? I mean Gengar isn't broken unless it has Perish Song. So we could have a complex test of Gengar using Perish Song, or being on a Perish Song team. We could just outright test Gengarite. Or we could ignore it. But these are just my thoughts and I want t ohear what the rest of the community has to say on this matter. Thank you :]



- Moves here as to pockets request :]

There are some key differneces between singles (where this said Mega Gengar secrete thread is taking place) and doubles.
1) singles more reliant on switching than doubles
2) Gengar isn't as good as doubles in singles. As we all know, a general rule of thumb frail but fast and hard-hitting special attackers don't do as well in doubles as in singles, and Mega Gengar is not an exception.
3) because of how fast-paced doubles is, the turn that Gengar has to Mega evolve in is more significant than it is in singles, which makes it harder for Mega Gengar to abuse its Shadow Tag
4) Mega Gengar is trapping two Pokemon, and due to the diversity of pairs on the battlefield (4 Pokemon at once), it is harder for Mega Gengar and its partner to find themselves facing a pair that it can easily take down as opposed to singles, where Mega Gengar only needs to trap one Pokemon, and as there's less diversity in 2 Pokemon on the battlefield, it is easier to force a better match-up.

So essentially, Mega Gengar has less ability to take away autonomy in doubles than in singles. And I feel that this ability is not to the extent of uncompetitive. You have to play smarter with which Pokemon are on the field at the same time, but many other Pokemon mean you have to be careful with whom you have on the field. For example, Amoonguss or Breloom else they sleep both your Pokemon. And sweepers like Mega Gyarados and Mega Charizard X get a boost and then sweep your entire team - with the boost, they can stop Pokemon who would otherwise check it. Look what happened in Totem's vs Nollan's Teambuilding game, DD Tar + Liepard had a good match-up, so Ttar got a free boost and then went to town! It's not just Mega Gengar that takes away autonomy.

 

[Electrolyte]

Honestly I'd even go as far as to consider Mega Gengar's trapping set now lackluster. Will-O-Wisp has extended its usefulness- now people know how to handle it, or at least how to handle Mega Gengar. Mega Kang can easily bypass burns with PuP or even utilize them to hit more powerfully with Facade. Other teams run Safeguard, or know to switch to Fire-types / special attackers.

Mega Gengar's typing is what kills it. Almost every significant physical attacker in the game can hit it super effectively. Weaknesses to Ground-, Ghost-, Dark-, and Psychic-type attacks make it impossible to check some of the most powerful physical threats, including but not limited to Landorus-T, Garchomp, Bisharp, Tyranitar, Excadrill, Scrafty, Guts Conkeldurr, and almost anything physical with Knock Off. That is a pretty large portion of the physical meta, all of which MGar will be severely crippled by just trying to beat. Burning physical attackers isn't going to shut them down, either. Many more powerful attackers, such as Mega Mawile, Mega Kang, SD Mega Scizor, etc can either boost right back up or KO right through Gengar's frail defenses anyway!

Special attackers give even less of a fuck. They can't be crippled, and unless Gar can hit them super effectively (only 4 types are hit super effectively by Gengar's 2 STAB attacks, one of which [Grass] is rarely actually weak to Poison) they can just rely on their natural bulk to shrug off hits. Despite MGar's high stats, its offensive prowess isn't nearly as potent as other Megas due to the low (in comparison) base power of its moves. 120-BP-after-STAB Shadow Ball is nothing compared to 229.5 BP of Return after STAB+Parental Bond or 175.5 BP of Hyper Voice after STAB+Pixilate. Plus, because of its Poison typing, many offensive threats it would typically aim to kill can tank a hit and OHKO back anyway. It is not even that great of a trapper because it can't OHKO many Ghost- and Psychic-types reliably. Cress escapes the 2HKO with Sitrus and OHKOs with Psyshock, Aegislash easily sponges a Shadow Ball in Shield forme and OHKOs back in Blade forme, and even Sylveon / Mega Gardevoir can sponge a Sludge Bomb and OHKO back with Psyshock. (Even Latios survives Shadow Ball 1/6 of the time!)

Gengar's Poison typing is a double edged sword. It lets it sponge Fairy-type attacks and hit them super effectively, but in turn makes Gengar weak to Psychic- and Ground-type moves, which is really abysmal. It is extremely difficult for Gengar to do its crippling job in a meta full of Dark / Ground / Fire types and special attackers that can absorb a hit and OHKO back. And don't even forget about those Pokemon that can just power through the burn!


Yes, Mega Gengar is a powerful Pokemon, but it is high risk, relatively low reward. It might be fit on some teams, but it's not broken at all.

 

[Mizuhime]

I didn't say it was broken, I asked if it's perish trap set was uncompetitive ... lol

 

[Electrolyte]

Well I wasn't responding to your post, I was giving my thoughts on Mega Gengar in general

pls Mizuhime I don't need your sass ;P


And actually now that you bring that up, I would like to clarify:

I am in full support of suspecting Perish Song + Shadow Tag. Despite the fact that people rarely execute it in a fashion that exposes its full potential, I too agree that it's unhealthy for the metagame. Perish Song allows Mega Gengar to punish bad matchups- which is extremely unfair, especially since in a healthy metagame, battles should not be matchup-reliant. Darkmalice brings up some good points regarding the extent of which MGar can function as a trapper, but there are also ways (Encore + Disable) that Gengar and its teammate can use to expand the pool of targets exponentially (for instance, you can protect against a Spore and disable it. Then, Amoonguss and Breloom can do absolutely nothing to you except wait and die, unless your teammate can be targeted)


Some people were also talking about suspecting Swagger / Confuse Ray, which I support as well but don't put it in as much priority as what was mentioned above.

 

[champetero]

Yea so i'm one of the main users of perish trap and just want to say if an opponent is smart on what he sends out and stuff it's really hard for the perish trap user to force the opponent into a situation were he can get a perish trap off. Like you always need to have offensive pressure when facing perish trap. Like you don't send out amoonguss out on a perish trap team. If you always keep offensive pressure and not do anything stupid like protect or do anything non offensive then you should be able to deal with perish trap.

 

[Pocket]

After witnessing Randy go 4-0 with his Mega Gar team and having faced it multiple times in practice matches, I always regarded Mega Gengar as a much more potent force than Mega Kangaskhan.

Is Mega Gar good because of Perish Song + Shadow Tag?

Perish Trapping is one of the numerous things that Mega Gar does well. It has certainly added more fuel to full Perish Trap teams (see: iliketrains11) or semi-perish trap teams (see: champetero). However it is really not the only reason why it is so damn good. The ability to lock match-ups to the player's favor while possessing godly offensive typing and stats (170 base Special Attack AND 130 base Speed with a Ghost-typing? YEA DUDE). Randy used an offensive Mega Gar variant with Shadow Ball, Sludge Bomb, and Skill Swap, and IT GOT SHIT DONE. Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb easily picks off prey that Gengar trapped (Breloom, Shaymin, Azumarill, Gardevoir, Latios, etc), and once it's about to hit the dust it can transfer its godly ability to its partner (ie like to PSong Politoed). It can trap relatively harmless bulky support-type Pokemon like Hitmontop and Amoonguss for Pokemon like CM Cresselia to set up and become unstoppable. Pretty much what BLOOD TOTEM said above - IDK if it has garnered enough attention to deserve a suspect test, but there's no denying that it's hella powerful.

Is Shadow Tag the culprit?

I don't think it's the ability, but Mega Gengar's unique set of typing, stats, and movepool that allowed for a potent Shadow Tag user. I especially think its diverse special moves and utility moves combined with its 130 base Speed and Ghost-typing are what create the full package (a fast Disable, Wisp, Skill Swap, or Destiny BOnd is hot gravy, and ofc finishing off the opponent's Pokemon before they can fire off a move). Gothitelle (and Wobbuffet) lacks these elements. Darkmalice outlines principle differences between singles and doubles format that explains why Shadow Tag is a lot more manageable in this metagame than in singles format. Even though Shadow Tag does provide notable advantages to a player, there is a cost involved (needing to keep otherwise subpar Pokemon like Gothitelle and Wobbuffet out in the field). Mega Gar lacks this opportunity cost. I am pretty sure we can all agree that Gothitelle and Wobbuffet are much more niche compared to Mega Gengar. I'd say that the primary limiting factor of Mega Gengar's usage is how it takes up a mega slot (and it does compound the team's weakness to EQ and Bisharp), but it's no denying that it applies a considerably distinct influence to our metagame. I believe the issue is Pokemon-specific instead of Ability-specific.

Are we targeting Full Perish-Trap teams or Mega Gengar?

I'd like to know more about the general public view's about this one. Is the public more concerned about full-perish trap team that utilizes multiple Shadow Tag users or solely Mega Gengar? I can see why people may have issues with Full Perish Trap teams, since they can easily prey many bulky builds of high-quality Doubles teams that may not be able to kill off the Shadow Tag users in time. Full-stop to full perish trap teams are pretty niche (Volt Switch / U-turn, Skill Swap, fast Taunt, multiple Ghost-types, Red Card/Eject Button, having the right combination of Offense) and more than half of these countermeasures can be fucked over by Rage Powder/Follow Me.

champetero-style semi-perish trap team are fine. You can play around it, as mentioned by champetero. The problem arises when there are multiple Shadow Tag users to keep the target trapped even after Mega Gengar/original Shadow Tag user faints or switches out. If you don't guess the timing and positioning of the second Shadow Tag user entering the field, then the song will successfully count down to 0.

If you believe that it's full-perish trap teams that are problematic, then we can consider other options other than Gengarite, such as a Shadow Tag Clause - only 1 Shadow Tag user per team. However, if the problem of Mega Gengar lies beyond this team archetype, then Gengarite should probably be evaluated.

So which is it? Do we have beef with iliketrains11-style full Perish-Trap teams or simply Mega Gar in general? Or neither?

 

[finally]

As already pointed out, bulkier teams often have trouble against variations of perishtrap. Whether it be fullscale perishtrap, semi perish trap, or rain based perishtrap there is still a general disadvantage for the bulky team. I would like to point out that this could be a punishment for bulkier teams. Just as stall loses to stallbreakers in singles, perhaps bulky doubles teams could simply lose to perish trap.

Keeping emotions out of "what the metagame should be," the threat of perish trap could influence bulkier teams to form some sort of better defense against perish trap. As much as I dislike perishtrap, the idea that one should be prepared for all sorts of threats is the same idea as making a generally good team. Whether or not we personally believe "x is unviable and does not warrant being prepared for in teambuilding" or "y is so uncommon that i should not have to prepare for it" should not influence our decisions on whether or not to ban something. Even if something is extremely rare or unviable, just because of its rarity and ability to randomly beat otherwise well-constructed teams does not mean something should necessarily be banned. The victory with the rare team simply represents a forme of counter to some otherwise well-constructed teams. (think how mega venu increases your chances to win against rain, perish trap increases your chance to win against bulky teams. it is simply another way to win)

Just wanted to point this out so we don't ban shadow tag on pre-conceived notions of "what the metagame should be"

On uncompetitiveness,
I think the idea of shadow tag is uncompetitive, but the way it is implemented in the frail mega gengar often inhibits mega gengar's ability to properly abuse its ability to an uncompetitive level. more often megagar finds itself simply creating uncomfortable switch possibilities for the opponent (this is before the megagar is trapping, like "should i switch in amoong right now or is it gonna get trapped?) and not being able to achieve the burned hitmontop dream.
thus even though i think megagar and his ability may be uncompetitive by nature, they are not uncompetitive in practice

also pls ban swagger. it makes me ;;;;

 

[Pocket]

I agree with you to an extent. I do believe that if a certain team archetype consistently wins 80+% against current teams and forces people to include rather niche strategies just to deal with the strategy, then it may be restricting teambuilding excessively. However, I personally doubt that current full perish-trap teams are that powerful - in fact, they are quite inconsistent in performance. You really need to excel at Perish Trapping to win your games, lest you choke and lose terribly.

Also please elaborate more on Swagger if you are really serious about suspect testing it. This is just my personal stance, and not the council's stance, but banning Swagger or the confusion status altogether is off the table. Even in Singles, I only found Prankster Swagger to border ridiculous RNG abuse, but a status condition that induces temporary coin flips is hardly Moody-level or even passive evasion retarded. Remember, you must spend an entire turn inducing Confusion, an opportunity cost which may not even end up being fruitful. If you want to gamble with coinflips with confusion, that's fine if you are willing to take that 55% chance of losing (if you account for its imperfect accuracy). The opportunity cost more or less balances out the confusion effects, especially without the aid of Prankster to ignore Speed tiers and set up priority Substitutes for protection.

And the above is just from a singles perspective. If we're talking about Doubles, with two Pokemon on each side and Swagger only being a single-target move, the opportunity cost of using Swagger is even greater. Even Prankster Swagger can be rendered useless with relatively common tactics, such as Fake Out, Quick Guard, and Follow Me. If there was a move that elicits confusion to both opponents simultaneously, then that may warrant a closer inspection. However, the only current move that achieves this is Teeter Dance (iirc), but it also confuses your partner (which defeats the purpose, unless you're willing to use an Own Tempo partner) -_-;;

It's worth noting that other status afflictions, such as PARALYSIS, sleep, and freeze are all fully dependent on RNG, yet nobody is asking to shelve away these status-inducing moves. I am not saying that you can "outplay the coinflip." However, you can minimize/prevent the coinflip effect of confusion by reducing free turns given to the opponent / using skillful moves like Fake Out, Quick Guard, Follow Me, Taunt, Safeguard. In Doubles, you have more control in minimizing confusion hax this way than in singles. Ofc you can still lose despite your best efforts, because odds were simply against you. However, I'd rather not we make a habit of banning RNG elements that may take away a game or two just b/c we were extremely unlucky, as this can easily translate to banning other critical game pieces of Pokemon, such as paralysis, sleep, critical hits... Taking them away is essentially removing what makes Pokemon... Pokemon. I'd rather not warp this game to a serious degree and preserve much of the RNG elements that make Pokemon so hateful yet exciting. As DougJustDoug has once said in his Characteristics of Ubers, a moderate degree of RNG is desirable. Confusion, paralysis, sleep, etc are just that - moderate RNG in play since 1995.

In the off chance that we seriously consider testing Swagger, Nollan and I talked about a Confusion clause, where only one opposing Pokemon can be confused at any given time. Basically Sleep/Freeze Clause, except applied for Confusion. This is probably the only solution I would personally consider. If you have one lucid partner at all times, then Swagger spam would be a non-issue. I really doubt we have to implement this clause, though, as explained above about the opportunity cost of Swagger.

Again, this is just my take on the matter. I am NOT speaking in behalf of the council.

 

[Darkmalice]

I've told the tiering council my views on Swagger, but I'll make it public. This is just my view.

I am completely against Swagger being tested, and by extension confusion. Normally, we ban stuff for either being broken or being uncompetitive, and I feel it fits neither category

I do not think confusion is anywhere close to broken. See Pocket's post for more info.

Unlike in Singles, Swagger has a competitive strategy involving it - Swagger an ally holding a Lum Berry, Safeguard + Swagger combo etc. I don't want to ban a competitive, skilled-based strategies in order to reduce luck. You could argue for some crazy clause like confusion clause with swagger excepted, but that's sketchy and doggy-looking, and I don't think it's worth it seeing how Swagger is the main culprit of confusion anyways.

 

[Bughouse]

All I will say in re swagger is that a confusion clause is ridiculous in a metagame that lacks sleep clause. If you don't like Swagger, go play singles.

I'll have some thoughts on MGar eventually.

 

[finally]

to clear things up: ive actually revisited my thoughts on swagger and RNG as a whole and my above post was more a joke than a serious post. as pointed out by pocket, use of the move swagger takes up your turn and is risky for the user (55% enemy will still hit). it is an inherently risky way to win games and this makes the strategy more unviable because of the risk the user must put himself every turn. ive also come to think of the move swagger as kind of a way to immobilize the opponent. just how sleep would make the opponent not move, swagger simply acts in a similar manner to force the opponent to not move. so all in all, im not actually in favor of a serious swagger ban (altho the move still makes me cry everytime)

confusion clause is interesting, but probably not necessary because confusion is annoying but not actually that powerful.
freeze clause sounds really COOL. however i think the freeze condition should be viewed more as a secondary effect of some ice moves rather than just another element of RNG. the reason why we use ice beam and blizzard is because they are strong moves by themselves (base 90 and 110 ice stabs). but we also use the moves because of their strength in their ability to immobilize an opponent for an indefinite amount of time. this is part of the advantage which is implied and intended when using these moves with a freeze chance. and even though being immobilized for an indefinite amount of time sounds overpowered/uncompetitive, we have to remember that it is part of what make ice moves so strong. so i would say no to a freeze clause.

as for megagar, i agree that full perish trap loses much of the time (im p sure more than 50%+). the only viable ones i think are semi perish trap teams, and i think these are the types of teams we should focus on when evaluating the strength of mega gengar and shadow tag.

 

[Laga]

I think the best way to stop the parafusion element of Swagger is to ban user: KyleCole

also mega gengar is not at all broken, simply because Doubles is so fast-paced; any smart player who has a kanga or hitmontop in a lead matchup vs gengar will switch out, and now mega gengar can't be used properly until later. It's power and bulk are just extremely underwhelming compared to Pokemon such as Zard Y and Kangaskhan.

Edit: to rephrase, the fact that you can switch out once against Mega Gengar in such a fast paced meta, makes it's ability (it's only real merit compared to other megas) worth a lot less.

 

[KyleCole]

I think the best way to stop the parafusion element of Swagger is to ban user: KyleCole

 

[ForgottenOnes]

All I will say in re swagger is that a confusion clause is ridiculous in a metagame that lacks sleep clause. If you don't like Swagger, go play singles.

I'll have some thoughts on MGar eventually.

I completely agree with this. When there isn't even sleep clause, why would there be a confusion clause? If a pokemon is asleep, it is incapable of doing anything. While when a pokemon is confused, there is a chance that it still may be able to move. Although, I guess both clauses have their pros and cons. And you can abuse both of them.

 

[youngjake93]

I've told the tiering council my views on Swagger, but I'll make it public. This is just my view.

I am completely against Swagger being tested, and by extension confusion. Normally, we ban stuff for either being broken or being uncompetitive, and I feel it fits neither category

I do not think confusion is anywhere close to broken. See Pocket's post for more info.

Unlike in Singles, Swagger has a competitive strategy involving it - Swagger an ally holding a Lum Berry, Safeguard + Swagger combo etc. I don't want to ban a competitive, skilled-based strategies in order to reduce luck. You could argue for some crazy clause like confusion clause with swagger excepted, but that's sketchy and doggy-looking, and I don't think it's worth it seeing how Swagger is the main culprit of confusion anyways.

I just want to say that in both Singles and Doubles(moreso Singles), Confusion+Substitute fishing for hit yourself turns is a viable strategy and isn't hax based in the slightest. If you can reliably stall with Sub for enough turns for the chance of the enemy hitting themself to be very high, then they probably will. It was basically banned because "it's annoying"+"it allows worse players/teams to win sometimes" and it is arguably just as annoying in Doubles, but I prefer having it allowed in all metagames.

 

[Stratos]

I'm late to the party, yes, but I just wanted to say that it's a little ridiculous to compare singles and doubles mega gengar functions. Anyone who's ever played both knows how different they are; in singles if i clear out your geoxern counter with mega gar i sweep with geoxern. in doubles it's obviously not that easy. If we're going to evaluate mega gengar it's going to be on its own merit; pls no comparisons to singles unless you want me to ram my head into my keyboard in frustration / delete your post.

I personally hate this myth that "bulky teams struggle with this bulky teams struggle with that" when the most consistent and frankly best team i've ever made in the doubles metagame is still the pwnemon special. all of you people complaining that x metagame element destroys bulky teams are just bad at making bulky teams. A well built one will either have enough damage output to ko mega gengar (because he is ridiculously frail) or it will have Taunt. If your team has no presence and just lets the opponent walk all over it and hopes it can live by having pokemon with high defense stats then yes you will lose to gengar and everything else because that sounds sucky, but bulky teams do not instantly lose to gengar. Seriously, you cannot talk about Gengar without paying so much attention to his frailty. He is nigh on impossible to bring in on anything but a KO or a slow U-turn. Once he's in, he can be devastating (if you're stupid enough to leave in the wrong pokemon, which i covered in my earlier post on the subject) but good luck bringing him in.

p.s. randy's 4-0 is basically just a 3-0 because laga's not even worth counting :))))

 

[Qazoo306]

because he is ridiculously frail

252 Atk Landorus-T Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 140 Def Mega Gengar: 270-320 (83.3 - 98.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
60/80/95 isn't stellar by any stretch of the imagination, but it can do that. Also, ever hear of the moves Follow Me and Rage Powder? They, with his pre-mega-evolving ability levitate, give him ample opportunities to switch in.

I think uncompetitiveness of Mega-Gengar can fall under two (or more that I've forgotten about) main categories.
1) It isn't too obvious from team preview. Sure, This Team exists, but in most cases, you don't know that Gengar is the Mega. Gengar, along with Scizor, Gyarados, Tyrantitar, Garchomp, and a few others, are pokemon that can function well as both mega and non mega, and so if more than one is on the same team, you may have a little trouble deciding which can easily leave you open to loosing two pokemon to perish trap, or W-o-W trapping, or just loosing a pivotal member of your team, all because of one miss predictions. One miss prediction early in the game should be punished by putting you at a disadvangage, not by likely loosing the whole game. In soccer, you don't loose because your opponents scored on you in the first ten minutes. You don't loose a 5k race because you started near the back of the round for the start. Yes, comparing a sport to doubles is not a very good argument, but the principal is the same. One early screw up shouldn't cost you so severely.

2) It is unpredictable. Unpredictability alone doesn't break a Pokemon, but if it is combined with any other uncompedative aspects, it can make it broken. It can support it's team by trapping, taunting (thus crippling some bulky support pokemon), it can use WoW, it can Perish Trap, or it can run a combination of the above, or it can skimpily attack. This goes back to my point of over-punishing mis predictions. If a hyper offence team has several potential megas, I may assume attacker because of it's great coverage and move pool, but when I send in my Kanghiskahn trying to bait for an attack so I can use sucker punch,it get's WoW trapped and crippled for the rest of the game, or it gets perish trapped and thus it looses it's partner and itself. I don't think that it's 'broken' per say, you should be punished for early mis predictions, but I think that it is very uncompedative and unfun to play against.

Overall, I am definitely for banning gengarite.

 

[Stratos]

non-mega gengar is super bad so it's always mega; i don't know how unpredictable it is besides "is it sub or sludge bomb;" perish trap should be evident from team preview. try always assuming it's a mega gengar with Shadow Ball / Will-O-Wisp / Protect / Sub or Sludge Bomb unless it's next to a kangaskhan or mawile and you should have a better time of it instead of complaining that you got burned and trapped when trying to sucker a pokemon that will never attack kangaskhan and always has shadow tag