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Proposal On: SPL Format and adding VGC

shiloh

shiloh

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Tiering Lead
Continuation of this thread

We agree that theres quite a bit of burnout / staleness with the state of SV and the generation lasting a record length of time. Instead of dropping down to 10 slots though, we want to bring up the potential of adding VGC to the upcoming edition of SPL and keeping it 12 slots. (3x SV / 1x VGC)

VGC has been one of the most popular format on PS for a while now and has had a massive increase in popularity with the IRL circuit as well. With recent tournaments like NPA moving to Smogon, ChampsPL including two VGC slots, and the general revival of the VGC tournament circuit on the site theres all the signs that VGC in our official circuit should be a question of when not if. This upcoming SPL gives us a chance to test out VGC in a 'lower risk' opportunity due to the aforementioned burnout / staleness with SV and other non-champions tiers.

We acknowledge this proposal isn't without its risks as well. There have been plenty of concerns around adding VGC back to our official tournaments that we still don't have the answers to, but at this point we likely won't have these answers unless we actually take a shot and see how it does in our circuit. The main concerns being:
  1. The lack of potential top VGC players signing up for Smogon tournament, leaving us with a perceived 'lower quality' pool.
  2. Players not wanting to use their best teams for a tournament like this, preferring to keep anything they perceive as the 'best' for tournaments like regionals and ICs
  3. Players needing to be subbed out / unable to play when there are regionals during the weekend
There are other concerns as well that I'm sure will be brought up in the thread, and there are also counters for all the above concerns as well. Like ChampsPL being able to support 2x VGC slots with plenty of bigger VGC names signing up. We would also likely want to put out a survey / gauge the interest in this thread from VGC players on people who would sign up, what they think of the possibility of it being added, and anything else.

Overall this is in no way a decision that is set in stone and we will be heavily reliant on community interest / thoughts before moving forward with this. But considering we still have a few months before SPL and in general there has been a lot of interest in adding VGC to our tournaments we see it as a good time / place to bring it up. So please if you feel strongly about this on one side or another, if you are a VGC player who would be interested in SPL please post / let us know what you think.

We would be doing Bo3 with locked teams and OTS like how VGC is played in official events and the tier would shift to any new regulations the week after they are on Champions, same as would be for any lower tier if there was a shift. We also are definitely not sold one way or another as well, mainly want to gauge community interest in this in the first place before taking any further steps.

Also VGC is the only tier we are considering adding to this edition of SPL. Any post that suggest adding another tier / making the case for any others will be deleted. This thread should only be to discuss either moving SPL to 10 tiers (2sv being the only option, we won't go down to 1sv), staying at 12 with 3sv and 1vgc or 4sv. Thank you.
 
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I was talking with Rubyblood the other day and I do agree that 4 SV at this point is too much ...

With that said, I feel like we are at a turning point on Smogon with the release of champions because we are not sure what the battle mechanics for Gen 10 will be and it might just be relegated to Champions. For the first time, I feel like the release of a new generation is not going to guarantee a huge, lasting uptick of users and interest. With that real possibility in mind, VGC is just an inevitability really, and will become either impossible or against our interest in keeping it out.

With that mindset established, I do think it's a great opportunity this year to experiment with VGC in SPL. Plus, I like keeping SPL as 12 players; it's the biggest tour and having a massive team is part of the appeal. Plus, signup drops are not as severe as other tournaments and I would assume increased signups with VGC around.

As for the potential drawbacks, I see where they're coming from but I ultimately disagree with all of them. I don't think people will be hesitant to use their best teams in SPL in lieu of regionals, and if anything, it incentivizes them to use those teams in SPL as practice for the regionals. SPL is great, but you'd rather win regionals than your w5 game. And it's not like the main VGC players that usually win regionals will be in SPL or watching SPL. As for weekends, I think the VGC culture will be understanding if someone has to go to regional and agree to play early.
 
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Although I agree with the op, I'd like to propose sum too :
- Leaving the choice to players to agree on playing their set wether on bo1 or bo3 each week.
- Considering bo3 STour and bo3 masters.
- For the idea of a classic set, making it bo3 (gen 1-5) when both players get to ban one of them
- Reducing SV to at least 2, 1 if needed.
- Including VGC but there should be 2 slots so the players dont feel isolated on their teams.

Ultimately if there are too much struggle to find a good compromise with all that, separate the SPL in 2 tournaments with one carrying champions/fairy gen and the other one the old gens but I don't know yet how to make something like this different from ROAPL/OUPL i'm just throwing the idea and hoping for someone to shikamaru it into something good
 
This tournament has been sorely lacking in elitism competition for the past few seasons.

I think we’re on the decline, and making this tournament too easily accessible kills the very essence of this tournament.
It doesn’t help the SPL, which used to be known as the most prestigious. All the players who started ten years ago all dreamed of playing in the SPL because it was on a whole different level back then,which is quite paradoxical, since the singles matches are harder now because the average player is better than the average player of the past, thanks to the tremendous work of the contributors to the resources and the investment in each tier, as Ruffles did for ORAS.



So, talking of elitism, how can we restore this tournament to its rightful place? Quite simply by reducing the SV slot from 4 to 1. Honestly, we’re now in the fifth year of the SV, and it no longer makes sense to have so many slots, especially given how many of the matches are of very poor quality nowadays.

It's great to have new talent, but that doesn't necessarily help these players have a positive experience, since very few of them will play the entire season or have a good record. It also motivates these players to try harder in the side tournaments, which are perfect for improving once you start getting really into competitive play.

Another point that supports my argument is that veteran and respected players on this site eventually stop playing the SPL or only play very occasionally before disappearing, which means there’s always room for new players. In fact, there are a lot of new talents who will be able to play in this SPL since, in addition the rest of the tiers will always have only one slot( RBY->SS)
I also agree with adding VGC for the reasons mentioned below. I think we need to stop being for or against VGC simply because we play 6v6. We’re forgetting that we’re Pokémon fans first and Smogon players second. Trying both formats in the same tournament would be a great experience for both VGC and 6v6.
I’m not sure if it’s necessary to have two VGC slots, since managers will generally just have one support Pokémon in addition to their starter like yone mentioned

The format I'm proposing :

SV
SV VGC
SS
SM
ORAS
BW
DPP
ADV
GSC
RBY


This format highlights the VGC's good player base while limiting the SPL to 10 slots, meaning fewer players and a more elite competition.
Players who aren't selected because of this format will have an extra incentive to improve and earn their spots in the futur. That's what we used to do back then.



I can also see the arguments for including a Classic Bo5 or an ST Bo3, we need to see to what extent it’s possible to incorporate them. I think these formats would really elevate the tournament, because I can see those slots being filled by very strong players who have dominated in the past, like ABR, Empo, McM, Tricking, and many others.
Players who aren't selected because of this format will have an extra incentive to improve and earn their spots in the futur. That's what we used to do back then.

The best players have always been a big part of the hype surrounding a tournament, so putting these formats is an incentive to bring them back seems like an excellent idea to me.

I can also see the arguments for including a Classic Bo5 or an ST Bo3, we need to see to what extent it’s possible to incorporate them. I think these formats would really elevate the tournament, because I can see those slots being filled by very strong players who have dominated in the past, like ABR, Empo, Tricking, and many others.

Adding these formats is therefore a way to bring back the top players who have made their mark on these tournaments, and let’s not forget that these players have been a major part of the hype surrounding a tournament; a mix of veterans and newcomers or the best players of the actual period is an excellent combination to make the SPL as prestigious as it deserves to be.


( With 10 slots, it's also a good time to try out best-of-3 matches to make the tournament as competitive as possible, especially in GSC)


I would be happy to discuss this respectfully, pce.
 
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I'd love to entretain the idea of Champions OU or VGC into the tournament (maybe both all things considered). I think in these times in which Smogon is heavily struggling to keep player interest due to SV's staleness, the community would greatly benefit from inviting players from external communities.

I speculate that the arrival of a new generation might not suffice, so building a foundation with the champs/vgc community might net us a positive. I'm trying to think of a case in which WW isn't PS! playable and Smogon has to perhaps resort to promoting its own metagames (Champs OU / Natdex). But well, all I can say is that we'll cross that bridge at some point.

I'm definitely in support of VGC / Champs and as few SV slots as possible! Nice thread.
 
I like 10 slots for sure, seems obvious, I don't need to repeat the reasons everyone else has mentioned.
However I think we should be cautious about adding VGC. I played through the era of Doubles in SPL, and every year there was always the exact same problem - the tier and player get isolated from the rest of the team. The managers buy a starter and backup for the tier (or just a starter and invite a helper), and those two prep together all season with zero input from anyone else. Nobody else can get involved because we simply don't know anything about the meta, like not even enough to play a test game, let alone have any insight about prep. This works the other way too, the Doubles/VGC player doesn't know the first thing about any of the singles tiers either. That's nobody's fault either, it's just the way it is.
I think that VGC is absolutely the pinnacle of competition in Pokemon right now, but SPL is not the place for it. What makes SPL special is that it is a team tournament, and introducing a tier with a completely distinct playerbase does not encourage teamwork.
 
Commenting here as ChampsPL was mentioned and I'm happy to hear that it is viewed a success. However, we didn't just just say lets roll the dice and see what happens with two VGC slots. Instead, there was extensive planning / coordination with VGC leadership and active moderation efforts. Futhermore, BSS and Champions OU had very valid arguments for the second VGC slot and BSS leadership graciously forwent arguing for a second slot when they did not have to. A lot of work went into making the tournament a successful cross section collaboration that showcased the various ways that we all engage with our hobby instead of the 'crabs in a bucket' mentality that is unsettlingly pervasive. While there has surely been far more discussion than what has been made public, the initial post does make me wonder if ChampsPL is simply viewed as a success to use as a springboard instead of critically examining why it was successful and iterating on it.

We made it clear from the get go that we both valued and wanted VGC and BSS to be included in ChampsPL and the moderation team lacked experience with nor was part of the VGC community. Consequently, we had extensive conversations with VGC leadership and they lead those conversations and provided a list of recommendations. While we couldn't follow through on everything, we did follow through on a lot and some are pertinent to SPL. For example:

  • Doubles tiers in predominately singles tournaments, especially with one slot are often isolating and feel like being on an island. This is compounded by managers frequently lacking doubles experience and not caring enough to draft or solicit adequate support. While managers certainly can and should support these slots, they frequently don't, resulting in players needing to draw support from the VGC community or an existing network rather than their team.
    • A second slot alleviates this a ton, but we also committed to prioritizing VGC experience during the manager selection process if all else was equal.
  • A CA prize not being particularly motivating in part due to one already being guaranteed in the biggest Smogon VGC tournament
    • It isn't exactly a secret that there are a lot of good players that will join seemingly every tournament with a CA prize. This is, unsurprisingly, less of a motivator in VGC due to official support provided by Game Freak. The level of competition tends to be a stronger motivator than the chance at some pixels.
  • How VGC being an afterthought instead of being included from the ground up heavily impacts the perception of the tour within the VGC community and can impact the quality of signups
That last point is particularly pertinent and if not respected creates a feedback loop that culminates in the first bullet in Shiloh's post. That was the biggest thing that stood out to me after reading it a couple of times. While we didn't know if we'd be successful, we at least hoped that our efforts would make it clear to the VGC community that the Champions section values and wants to include VGC (and BSS) and is willing to put in the work to make that happen. If the efforts failed, we at least tried.

When I read the post I struggle to see why high level VGC players that are not already engaged with Smogon tournaments would find it compelling enough to sign up. The message isn't that VGC inclusion in SPL is because we value it as a format, but that Smogon formats are having enough issues that we are willing to consider it when we otherwise wouldn't. That message is amplified by the conspicuous absence of any mention of potential VGC inclusion beyond this edition of SPL. That framing is immensely impactful as it means we are pitching a functionally one time tournament instead of something longer term and those details matter. It doesn't seem that this would be appealing to VGC players whilst also signaling to [x] OU players that this edition of SPL is less prestigious.

At the end of the day I support inclusion and VGC in SPL is a great idea that has a lot of potential long term benefits for both communities. However, I don't think they are likely to materialize unless the VGC community is treated with respect it derserves instead of an afterthought.
 
RBY - SM
Replace SS with a STour Bo3 as to my understanding SS has the least passionate player base and I scoff at the people who have called it the most competitive gen because it's not close at all. This is a way to add an SV slot without adding an SV slot
1 SV slot
1 VGC slot
I think 12 slots would be kind of forced because you want A Second VGC slot so the people playing in the tournament don't end up hating it and from there you add either Champions OU or like SV BLITZ Bo3 if the community isn't lame. Or Champions OU Blitz Bo3. As long as managers draft people that don't need to download ram and have a stable internet connection blitz should be the most hype.

I don't think 12 slots is much of an issue, and I certainly don't think its avoidable, but if there are 10 slots I think it'd be ridiculous to not replace SS with a bo3 (it's ridiculous either way).
 
blank said:
OK stop.

I retract my Bo5 suggestion. I am against any nonsense suggestions like VGC or ChampsOU or Draft or tier picking or whatever.

Every time one of these format threads gets made, the same song and dance happens with these stupid suggestions. There will never be a strong consensus toward any of them. Stop wasting everyone’s time.

These are the options:
-Current format
-2 fewer SV OU slots

Thank you. I love you goldmason
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we need to include vgc in it both to encourage some quality signups from outside the community and also because a lot of the community is going to start playing vgc after the bots are better than them so its a good transition for them and might also help make them stay. Having VGC forces 12 slots because you want 2 vgc slots and there are 9 generations and there is no issue with blitz or champions ou (you literally can't play most (any?) of our formats on cartridge anyways. I have't read the thread thoroughly but I don't think anyone is suggesting like monotype or smth
 
So I'm sure there will be plenty of pushback from people for a variety of reasons, but I do think adding VGC, assuming it isn't automatically treated as a one-off that leads to nothing else, would be of benefit. I'm not gonna make a long post because others in the VGC community have a lot they plan to say, but I figured I should express my support here. CHAMPL went exceedingly well, and I along with the rest of the Smogon VGC team would do everything in our power to help this go the same, be it advertising or other forms of support.
 
fully agree with diogo that adding any sort of classic bo5/stour bo3/masters bo3 should be a nonstarter if we're not gonna consider allowing gentleman's bo3s for the folks that want them.

while i think that the addition of VGC or some other form of doubles into SPL could be cool, i'm also not sure how we'd keep up with say, a new regulation being introduced mid-tour or something like that, especially with how tpci has been handling dropping mons into champs in waves. not too dissimilar from tier shifts, but that's not really something SPL has had to deal with for a long time given its nature as an all OU tournament.

fully agree that we shouldn't really consider bo5 unless there's a strong consensus that it's going to catch the big fish we're looking for because no one really wants to do all that prep for a nine to thirteen week season. Bo3 stour (especially as a replacement for an SV slot so it's kind of a pseudo-SV) or bo3 masters would be fine probably.

i do think that we should be extremely careful about whatever we do decide to implement here and make sure that it's not just a mquick one-off to salvage activity and signup numbers before we get right back to business as usual in gen 10 though, would hate to get a new audience of people interested in SPL and then totally break their knees when we're back to 4x WW OU
 
1. SPL's purpose

A clean separation of current gen non-OU tiers and old gens will reduce the need for compromises anywhere and therefore produce tournaments that better reflect the desires of their primary stakeholders. The restructuring of the two team tournaments in this way also means that any non-CG OU tier can only be in one of the two tournaments. And while Doubles can distinguish itself from low tiers depending on how we choose to categorize non-CG OU tiers, the split being made here is really one between CG OU + old gens and CG OU + current gens. Under this dichotomy, it is clear that Doubles fits one tournament more than the other.

If SPL is the OU tournament, featuring current and past generations of OU, what the fuck are we doing with VGC in it. If you want VGC in a team tournament, SCL is the place for it, or even WCOP, before SPL. A random VGC slot serves nobody, least of all the VGC guy condemned to talk to himself alone in his channel.

The stakeholders of SPL are people that play OU tiers in tournaments, the purpose of this tournament is not testing how VGC fits in the circuit.

2. Bots
The best VGC player in the world is probably nessiebot. There are multiple worlds competitors that have played it 10+ times and lost over 70% of games. It's not quite nessiebot but there is already an open source VGC bot out there if you know where to look (not going to link to it for obvious reasons). Since the current plan to combat bots in tournaments is "hope people don't use them" we would have to be insane to add a tier that's already compromised to SPL. Have fun paying 23k for your VGC slot while another team pays 3k and the 20 dollar a month Anthropic subscription for the same (or better) record. This is probably coming to every other tier eventually, but it's already here for VGC, there's no reason to shoot ourselves in the foot in this way.

As for 2 vs 4 SV OU slots, either is fine. 2 is probably better.
 
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shiloh said:
VGC has been one of the most popular format on PS for a while now and has had a massive increase in popularity with the IRL circuit as well. With recent tournaments like NPA moving to Smogon, ChampsPL including two VGC slots, and the general revival of the VGC tournament circuit on the site theres all the signs that VGC in our official circuit should be a question of when not if. This upcoming SPL gives us a chance to test out VGC in a 'lower risk' opportunity due to the aforementioned burnout / staleness with SV and other non-champions tiers.
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This is such a big fuck you to all the communities that have been trying to get representations in official tournaments for the past years. There are multiple of communities which have maintained high level tournaments and activity for longer than that, and that have been ignored. Stating that VGC belongs to our official circuit with no argument to back it up is just weak; some people (including yourself) have already pointed all the problems that come with including it, but I want to remind some of them:
  • VGC players mostly don't care about Smogon and that results in the three arguments pointed out by shiloh (best players won't signup, players will prioritize using their techs in official circuit over Smogon circuit, official circuit will come first for scheduling).
  • There is currently a bot invasion in VGC and no anti-cheat measure developped.
  • VGC is very different from all the other formats in SPL; basically what Luigi said just above.
  • It's not a Smogon format. Introducing VGC is losing a part of Smogon's identity and blending more towards all the other Pokémon sites that are focused on VGC. That's notably a topic that's been brought up in the "Future Smogon" subforum which every TD has access to, but that they have not commented on.
This upcoming SPL doesn't give us a chance to test out VGC in a 'lower risk' opportunity, once a format is included in the official circuit, it's nearly impossible to remove. If VGC is introduced this SPL, it will stay by statu quo.

shiloh said:
Also VGC is the only tier we are considering adding to this edition of SPL. Any post that suggest adding another tier / making the case for any others will be deleted.
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I want to clarify my position because of this warning. I'm not suggesting adding another tier / making a case for them; I'm pointing out TD's hypocrisy in suggesting their favorite tier while automatically shutting down discussion on any other one. VGC is probably one of the least justifiable tier to add to the official circuit and the framing of this proposal is dishonnest.
 
I acknowledge that there are some rightful concerns such as potential scheduling issues with players that frequently attend majors. However, I’m going to address some shortsighted comments. First and foremost, there’s the idea that adding VGC will ruin the teamwork aspect of a team tournament by creating an isolated slot. You have to understand that this isn’t much different than the idea of having DOU in SCL, and there haven’t been major issues raised for that because if you’re concerned that the slot(s) needs help, then you simply draft a support. Yet, even then, this is different because of timing. The attention around VGC because of Champions is at an all-time high, and I’ve even noticed many singles players on my SCL team who actively play Champions and/or keep up with the metagame. Because of this, I’m sure there will be OU players on each team that would at least be willing to help its VGC players with testing. Next, there’s the concern that the signup quality won’t be good enough. Despite what you might think, there are a good amount of top players who would sign up just because there's a CA or for the chance to get quality practice against other top players. Take a look at ChampsPL: it garnered the attention of a sufficient amount of Worlds competitors and NPA-level players, and that’s without the guarantee of a custom and prestige that SPL has. Plus, I can assure you VGC leadership will do whatever we can to promote it because we feel strongly about this. Overall though, the idea that there might not be enough high level signups to fill the slots is an underestimation of the amount of top players there are from people who aren’t knowledgeable about the VGC community. I might tackle some more points later, but the last thing I’ll address because it made me laugh is a concern about VGC bots. I have played many bots on Best of 3 ladder, and I assure you, their patterns are very easily recognizable across an entire set, and it will be caught. Not to mention, it’s pretty clear when someone is drafted that surely doesn’t belong. If anyone on that player’s team becomes aware of this, it can be handled as well. So, yes, the plan technically is “hope people don’t do it,” but the simple fact is that the same concern could be made of other forms of cheating like ghosting, where the solution is also “hope people don’t do it.”

Those are my thoughts, and I will likely post more at another time, thank you.
 
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Champions has been out since April and it still has not been featured in a single official tournament yet. It will be 8 months by the time SPL starts and you have just started discussing if adding new formats to SPL will happen.

Regardless of what gets added to this tournament, from my perspective it seems that you are never prepared for what is coming and everything ends up happening too late.

gen9ou is not only a trash metagame but boring as hell and people are tired of it being spammed nonstop in every single tournament.

Do something entertaining and spice things up for once. SPL does not need the same crap ass 1-9 OU format again.
 
I have already expressed some thoughts on the SmogTours Discord, and I overall agree that lowering the number of SV slots in SPL is a step in the right direction.

However, I think this is distracting us from the elephant in the room. I don't think having four SV slots is a problem because of the quality of the player base or of the games. We've seen some really good players emerge over these four years of SV. I think the real problem is the burnout that SV mains are experiencing from playing the tier. The issue isn't the SPL format, but rather the fact that nothing really happens in SV OU. I don't necessarily think that some bans or unbans would help, but even if this isn't the right thread to discuss it, I think we need some major changes to the tier, such as implementing regulations in SV or taking whatever other measures might help bring some fresh air into the metagame.

Circling back to the main topic, I don't think we should decrease the number of slots by more than one. Smogon isn't in a position right now to promote an elitist community in these tours. We don't have the numbers to compete with the VGC playerbase, and we should try to involve as many players as possible. Significantly reducing the number of slots would also lead to a worse experience for the average spectator.

I don't necessarily think SPL format is the problem, but I think there's nothing wrong with admitting that SV has been somewhat of a failure in recent years (not necessarily because of the council or tiering policies, as there have also been unfortunate circumstances, such as the advent of AI or simply the fact that this metagame has been around for so long). Our main focus should be on asking ourselves how we can improve our flagship tiers rather than trying to fix the format of the most important tournament on the site. We can not ignore that Smogon identity is mainly based on the Current Gen OU. Frankly, I don't think there's any good tier that could necessarily replace the fourth SV slot if we decide to keep the tournament at 12 slots.
 
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Here's the POV as not only an avid watcher of SPL games, but also a VGC player:

Please cut down on the SV Slots. I think we can honestly go down to 2 slots pretty reasonably. The tier feels stale to watch, especially when compared to other tiers. Additionally, we're entering the 5th year with this tier; while I can't speak for others, I imagine many are a tired of playing SV. I think we can, for this, go down to 10 slots (SV/SV/SS/.../RBY). Why not add VGC, you may ask?

I am an advocate for VGC in more official tournaments. I don't think SPL is the tour for this. The main focus of SPL is OU, going back to RBY and coming all the way to CG OU. WCoP seems like the best fit for VGC imo, considering the amount of players from around the world who play VGC and will thus get to share their talent. SCL also seems like a strong option; a lot of Doubles OU players have extensive or at least solid knowledge of VGC, so having one slot won't cause total isolation.

If VGC were to be added into SPL, I would probably add two VGC slots (going from 10 -> 12) to help beat that isolation problem. Of course, supports can be bought if we want 3 SV + 1 VGC, but again I think any amount of SV that isn't 2 is too redundant or too little (3 is maybe fine but eh). VGC players not bringing their best teams is a valid concern and unfortunately there just isn't a way to go against that; same with their conflicting schedules with Regionals and ICs. The lack of good talent signing up is not true, however. Many, and I mean many, Worlds-level or NPA-level players would sign up for this tour largely because of the CA alone. Bot issue is also easy to go around; they have predictable tendencies, as Code has said previously, though maybe we refrain from adding VGC into official tours like these until the AI detection gets stronger, because that could still be a major issue with newer and better models.

TLDR; Either go down to ten slots (cut 2 SV) and don't add VGC and save it for later down the road / WCoP / SCL or add 2 VGC to SPL and cut 2 SV or add 1 VGC to SPL and cut 1 SV.

hope this is easy to read lol
 
Can't really speak much for the VGC aspect, but I think Champions has made a good job at making it more accessible to everybody, to the point where I see a lot of talk about the metagame in chats where I would normally not hear a word about it. To me, at the end of the day, SPL is but the biggest online social gathering on this site. A lot of singles players currently engage in it, so it wouldn't hurt to try, even if there's a certain lack of reciprocity. There is more to this tournament than just pokemon talk.

If VGC is discarded, I think we should at least consider Champions OU. As SoulWind pointed out, we've neglected the presence of Champions for the past 6 months. I think it should at least be considered for this year as an impasse between SV and WW, especially given we're not 100% sure WW will be playable or if Smogon will have to resort to pet modding it.

Also, I mentioned it on discord, but I'd be soooo in favor of adding a bo3 slot for Masters/Smogon Tour tiers. My experience with bo3 slots in unofficial team tournaments has been nothing but positive. I would certainly place it instead of a 3rd SV OU slot. If Smogon doesn't want to embrace Champions, I would at the very least entretain this idea for the sake of novelty. I don't believe people would have much of an issue with a slot of this kind, given we've repeatedly seen bo3 slots for unofficial team tours and the feedback has been positive.

I believe going with the same gen 1-9 OU format will further cement the decline of the tournament scene. I hope the Tournament staff takes into consideration all the feedback. We got the Lobby back, people are talking and interacting more. Let's ride that momentum wave!
 
Thought I would jot down a few thoughts

1) As a VGC player who has played as the 'VGC' slot in these kinda singles team tournaments before I can confirm it is very isolating. I was lucky to have managers who mained VGC, along with a good VGC teammate, but I have 0 clue who else was on my team, what they were doing and generally felt pretty uncomfortable trying to help the singles players with their matchups as I simply did not have the ideas on how to approach the matchup (from either side). Of course there are alot of great VGC players who are also great singles players (unlike me) but I still do believe it is a little awkward.

2) I would not worry about cheating too much. Of course VGC has been infested with high performing bots, but as long as teams pick up known players with good sporting reputations I don't think it is anything to really worry about (maybe naive idk).

3) I generally find there is kinda an inverse relationship in these tournaments between skill and motivation. The really really good players are highly skilled, but will be looking to put their energy into winning much larger tournaments than this one (larger in a monetary/reputational sense), and maybe looking to hide teams. You could prob find some players with less reputation but more motivation to do well in this kind of tournament, but then the prestige of the tournament ends up lower. Additionally I have 0 idea of which the strength of players that sign up, maybe you get marcofiero maybe you get me I really don't know (you don't want me).

4) VGC players are willing to play games not on the weekend if the other has a regional to attend

5) This does just seem like an afterthought tagged on to try to breathe some life into a tournament that is struggling to be as exciting as it used to be (idk that is just the sentiment I am getting from the comments I have been reading from others more knowledgeable). I could understand VGC being added into some other Smogon Tournaments, but isn't this supposed to be an OU-only tournament?

I am sorry about the burnout you guys are feeling with how long S/V has been going on. Imo it is prob just more worth cutting a S/V slot, but keeping the number of players on the teams the same so players don't have to play as many games, and the prep workload for each game can be shared across more people. Good luck with whatever decision is made!
 
Two VGC is too much of an investment pivot, removing any of the 9 OUs is silly. People complaining about isolation aren’t valid. Most tiers have 3-4 strong contributors max as anything additional becomes counterproductive. In addition, people are always happy to help, even people on other teams.

Options (IMO)
a) 3 SV OU + 1 VGC/Champs
b) 2 SV OU + 1 VGC/Champs + 1 TBD
 
I will say, the lack of quality players in the pool for VGC will most likely be a complete non issue, especially since supposedly there would be around 1 or 2 slots. For NPA for example, there are around 100 slots to fill up and every year it still feels like a lot of very good players still dont make it. I would expect the sign up competitiveness to be even higher than that for SPL with the lower amount of slots, and since its a very prestigious team league with CA on the line, I see no reason for the quality to drop.
 
There is no shortage of SV talent available for SPL. Consider that some of the worst records in the 4-slot format last year were JustFranco, Gama and myjava, who are by all accounts excellent players. It's not like SV fatigue has damaged the pool to the point where teams are picking up random guys destined to go 0-10 or whatever, it's still the most dominant playerbase on Smogon and even with 4 slots, there are many SPL-caliber players consistently going positive in WCOP or SCL or having good runs in OST or OLT that don't get in. The supply of top-level talent far outweighs the demand, and going down to only 1-2 slots greatly exacerbates that issue. Most of the complaints as far as I can tell stem from people finding SV stale to watch from an outsider PoV, which while it is a reasonable stance to have, it is more important to serve the playerbase first and the spectators second, in my opinion.

I suppose I'm just apprehensive about the need to downsize at all. Frankly, with the bot crisis, the potential lack of traditional turn-based gameplay in Gen 10, the lack of singles support in Champions, etc, etc. This could be some of the last of Prime SPL we see. Maybe if, god forbid, some stuff doesn't go our way in the future then downsizing is a good idea but I think it would be regrettable not to push it to the max while we still have gas in the tank.

As for VGC, I think it's cool and I also lowkey think it's the future but I understand if people think it's weird. 3 isn't as good as 4 but it's still probably enough slots to accommodate the SV playerbase with a reasonable level of comfort so if TD's decide to go ahead with a VGC slot there should be enough leeway to make it work.
 
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Re: cheating concerns for VGC, would it be possible to just play on the official Champions app to stymie that? From my understanding it is significantly harder to set up a bot in that setting compared to a browser unless you made it yourself. Accessibility also isn't an issue since it's basically designed to be as accessible as possible, and I presume anyone who is in marginally interested in VGC already plays on the app. The main issue would be setting up a stream so people can spectate, but that seems like a minor hurdle all things considered.
 
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