We are obviously not removing Gliscor. Other than not banning things unnecessarily, it wouldn't even fix anything. There's something to be said for simplicity of ruleset, but at the same time I don't think what we're doing is mind-blowingly complex, either. As Phil said,
What exactly is the cost of a complex ban? Some invisible barrier to entry into the tier? That's an absurd premise that I've never bought into. If anybody is going to take the time to learn an old metagame like DPP, a "complex" ban of speed + stat passing is not what's going to stop them. Give people some credit - Smogon is far more complex than that with the dozens of metagames with different ban lists to juggle. People figure them out just fine.
So roughly a month has passed. The council would like to move forward by
implementing the BW ban of: no more than 1 Baton Pass User per team + no using Baton Pass while the user's Speed stat is above +0 (excluding Choice Scarf). This will remove all issues.
We'd like to do this before semifinals of WCoP, so a little under a week is the time before we plan on pulling the trigger.
Funny, I brought this up on discord in a private group. Should have figured that was a foreboding omen... all of these post generational tiering decisions have really neutered DPP. Sigh
We've removed Gliscor's Sand Veil (which EVERYONE hated back in the day) and Mamoswine's Snow Cloak (complaining about this is an incredible stretch). BP has never been part of DPP's identity, it's ALWAYS been "that thing that ruins games." How have we neutered the tier? It's the same one we know and love but minus the bullshit, which is ultimately positive.
This is a really nice idea and all but in reality this is either an Azelf speed tie (lol) or Aerodactyl. (Or... Electrode/Alakazam. Also found on BP.)
2. Scarfers, particularly with Trick
So, Rotom and Jirachi (the latter doesn't even run Trick often). Not to mention it takes quite a bit of maneuvering to get these in on Gliscor before it's got an Agility (it doesn't have to come in immediately)... and we saw Gligar used effectively alongside it.
Even if you don’t have those, you still have a shot depending on your build if you put yourself in optimal position.
I said this in the old thread: EVERYONE who realizes they're facing Gliscor pass goes "oh shit I need to think about this" and exhausts every possible option before realizing they're just fucked. It's been happening for close to a decade. It removes the interaction in the game and decides it immediately.
Secondly, if it’s so busted, why isn’t everyone using it in top level matches?
Simple answer: Mirrors are atrocious. You devolve the entire game to chance. Yeah, what a quote unquote monster. Please.
BP isn't known for its reliability. That's why it isn't used in most important games. It's precisely this throw-everything-out-of-whack element that makes it so undesirable. This is also how I feel about it:
I think its because people that play DPP at the highest level have enough dignity to not rely on strategies like this. The problem (to me) is that you are forced to make sacrifices in the team builder that make you worse off against other teams just because you don't want to lose to BP on the big stage.
There's mostly the first one, but it's mainly the bolded part. Without getting into a diatribe on team matchup, the things that handle BP are so specific that it's unhealthy (and they're always finding ways around them as well).
My initial post is only in reference to Gliscor pass, not full BP. I don’t have a stance on it since I haven’t seen it used in ages.
I’m referencing the classic wdro build featuring Azelf lead. Electrode doesn’t have Memento, so it’s not going to force the switch on Gliscor’s entry turn. Plus it doesn’t have Reflect, so you can make a compelling case it’s worse than both Azelf and Uxie.
Electrode has Explosion and Gliscor generally doesn't need Reflect as badly. It's still a monstrous tank on the physical side, it tanks CB Gyarados Waterfall. While it no longer tanks Explosion, teams don't have that many and Glis can just come in and do it again. Azelf is still the preferred lead of course, arguably better because you don't know you're facing (some form of) Glis pass right away.
The most crucial part of the game is the beginning. The strategy is extremely vulnerable if everything doesn’t go according to plan.
"Everything" is in reality not that much nor is it uncommon, and if things do go to plan, as they quite often do, the game is over. Real good stuff.
In addition to those, leads that threaten status with the backing of a strong attack or flinch potential in the case of Jirachi will often force only a single screen.
Gliscor doesn't have to come in immediately though. It's not uncommon for it to switch in near the dying turns of LS and get its shit together.
Gliscor can be overwhelmed in many ways to pass only a single boost, which should be the speed unless they misplay. Behind screens, Vaporeon 3HKOs Gliscor. If Gliscor doesn’t Taunt, it will get phazed. Suicune has a chance to 2HKO behind screens. Suicune can also viably run Roar, which Gliscor is never checking. For that matter, Gliscor can only reasonably Taunt few phazers (Skarmory and Hippowdon, perhaps a few more). It’s a tough call enough to Taunt a Swampert since it can threaten formidable damage. It’s never going to Taunt something like Roar Raikou, which is actually a very neat combo on a defensive team since you severely discourage Starmie and throw your opponent completely out of synch in a condensed role.
RP on switch, Taunt, SD, pass. It's
really bulky with Light Screen. Offensive Hydro Roar Cune is the only real viable measure there, and it needs to be that specific set - cool, it's a great mon, not unreasonable at all - but it doesn't even work that well, since Hydro is only a 6.3% to even get that 2HKO against the standard spread.
I’m not buying it’s low usage as being player dignity. Have you seen all of the angle shots that occur every damn tour by name players? The real reason is because you, me, and everyone else feels that we have a greater likelihood of winning with a more conventional, nuanced team. I’ve used Gliscor pass 2 times in the last 8 years as a means of disrupting matchup perception to keep people honest when they prepare for me. If you use it with any regularity, the win rate takes a nose dive. People will stack against it if you use it more than one time in a very selective spot.
If it doesn't win regularly (and history shows us it does - way too much, in fact - but let's assume), it's used only to catch people off-guard and to play matchup fishing games... this is not a desirable thing to have in a metagame. Again, it DOES win. Cutting down on nonsense like this is only increasing the skill involved, which we should all agree is a good thing.
Let’s talk about these tiering decisions going completely willy nilly on anything unpleasant to face. There is a very clear bias in old gen tiering for consensus standards and any strategy, however small, that disrupts its success is an instant target. It’s presented to the community as a decision to improve and increase competitive balance, but what it really does is increase stagnation. Sun and Chlorophyll was a target because it disrupted those precious Sand Spikes balances. Now look at BW, truly laughable to see the proponents of moleman BW make a PR thread about how much it’s ruined the tier. Let’s go back to DPP Salamence, which was a totally contrived backdoor decision that many people voted on the basis that it’s presence was bad for defense. The opposite was true, Salamence was blocking the niches of several more diverse and harder to remove threats to defense, which is referenced in the OP here as being a major complaint of DPP players today.
This is a topic I feel strongly about so forgive the excess writing. Whenever I make a team, I am trying to cover every threat in the metagame to some degree while executing my strategy, a team that is consistently useful, because if a team isn't consistent to some degree then I don't really think it's that good. (Making 1-off "counterstyle" teams for a specific opponent in team tournaments is related, but that's another discussion.) This team I worked hard on that covers a wide range of threats is then dismissed as "lazy balance spam" (even if realistically the teams are more offensive than defensive but let's play along) and that I just want to safely counter everything for free wins. This dismissal of those consistently using the best Pokemon (who are the best because they're consistently effective) is one of my biggest annoyances and one I initially came to Smogon to get away from.
Also, this isn't exactly some new strategy we just need to adapt to. It has been a problem for far too long, in fact.
People say things shouldn't be banned because they annoy my favorite kind of team. Are you serious? There are so many things that I see more often that annoy the hell out of me that I wouldn't dream of banning. Since you mentioned BW, let's go with the examples of all forms of Garchomp, Hydreigon, Alakazam, Jirachi, Gravity Landorus-T, Tornadus, I could go on, that personally aggravate me to no end. In the end this is just a copout answer. If we're going with DPP, then Jirachi, Breloom, Infernape, Flygon, Dragonite, Gengar, Kingdra, Gyarados, Metagross, Machamp, all these guys are general pains in the asses to teams everywhere and are tough foes to fight. They are "annoying." There is a difference between "man fuck clefable it walls all my tspikes offenses" and what Baton Pass does.
Your BW example is also presented incorrectly. Sun and Chlorophyll DID need to go, it wasn't as simple as "lol it beats sand so broken. People who complain about BW now complain that Sun is still ridiculous or Excadrill. I'm not seeing any contradiction, they don't complain that lack of Sun/Chloro ruined the tier. What happened was a step in the right direction and we had to continue because a new issue arose. For what it's worth, Chlorophyll without Dugtrio/Arena is being looked at in the future, but again, new topic.
Salamence's presence was bad for every team, not just defense, and I don't believe it blocked the use of the other Pokemon I mentioned in the OP (who I don't believe are problematic whatsoever, that was just a pre-emptive "don't make stupid posts like "lol banning bp when iron head jirachi exists"").
What people fail to realize is that there are unknown ripples that emanate from every decision, no matter the scale. It should be reserved for absolutely impacting strategies that play an active role in team building. You mean to tell me you build your stall teams to take account for Gliscor pass above all of the conventional threats? And if you don’t, how often are you getting burned? If this is happening with regularity, then you can adjust your approach to eliminate it and their win rates will take a big hit, reestablishing equilibrium.
Making effective teams is tough enough already without having to worry about the possibility of getting Baton Passed. Cutting down on this sort of variance emphasizes skill. Yes, there's skill in choosing the right team, but there's a difference between punishing the Starmie abuser with Passho Heatran and using a team that straight up rolls over most of what it faces.
Sparsely used disruptor strategies are a sign of a healthy metagame. If you want to look to nature for parallels, the mutation of hemoglobin that causes Sickle Cell Anemia increases resistance to Malaria in the population. Remove these aspects and you have a very stagnant, vulnerable situation for the metagame where the checks and balances of Gliscor pass fall out of usage, potentially resulting in a worse overall situation for the tier.
This is a baseless claim. The checks to Gliscor pass are still going to be used because they're good Pokemon, but they are quite specific and not even guaranteed to work. You're just no longer forced to use them lest your opponent spring a cheesy matchup trap on you. They would not fall out of usage, and the metagame would not become stagnant, nor vulnerable (what does the latter even refer to?).
This is not to say that nothing should ever be done in old gens, but it has to be thoroughly proven to (1) destroy a majority of the metagame
I'm not seeing this in relation to BW. The 2016 metagame, pre-Rush Excadrill and Sun crazes of '17 and '18 respectively (note how both elements are harmful - it is not mere disruption, these are bona fide uber strategies), was considered by many to be BW2's best ever metagame and the best BW metagame since the end of BW1. In any case, I don't know what destroying a metagame consists of. If you mean nerfing Chlorophyll, which had countless arguments to its excessive power, then that's your prerogative, but the majority found the post-Chloro metagame to be vastly superior.
and (2) have the usage to support that the strategy is dominant to warrant an action. Before anyone goes off on this by showing how effective it is against common builds, first ask yourself do the builds it beats even pretend like it’s there.
These builds are already stretched to their limits handling the metagame at hand without trying to incorporate the specific techniques that handle BP that aren't even guaranteed to work. Matchup is a buzzword I don't like to throw around but this is a real case of it.
We used to run suspect ladders where you could see very evidently how something in question would perform when it is actually accounted for in the metagame. If people aren’t accounting for it, that in itself validates my point.
The DPP ladder is, by and large, a place without these BP strategies. It's just the same old DPP metagame. The impact of BP's loss wouldn't be (and already "isn't" if you want to look at it as not thoroughly affecting teams when it isn't used) a ripple on the metagame. It's interesting how something can be so overpowered/uncompetitive/unhealthy/whatever word you prefer and not have an effect on the "real metagame" (and we're drawing our subjective line here for the million reasons posted) when it leaves, but I guess that's what its curveball nature gives it.
There are plenty of disruptor strategies that don't take the form of battle-ruining nonsense. Potentially using unconventional sets with strong water moves to take advantage of stall teams that don't resist them is an example of such a thing. BP is not some incredible anti-metagame risk to be rewarded for.
