Ladder Monotype [Read post #393 for Tiering Updates]

[scpinion]

Hi.

I was thinking about Monotype; the meta, the chatroom, and the community and honestly I feel really, really frustrated with the current state of affairs. It's not the current metagame that frustrates me, unbalanced as it is (suspect mega-altaria already); but rather a collection of issues with the way the meta is discussed, evaluated, and balanced.


1. The means through which players discuss the meta are obtuse
Monotype, as a meta, has become into the most popular OM with a thriving user base and a vigorous metagame worthy of balancing. But you wouldn't think it looking at these forums, where all discussion on the monotype metagame is squashed into 3 massive, unwieldy threads. We have outgrown these threads, which are wholly un-conducive (IMO) to a coherent, community-driven discussion of the meta-game. We deserve our own sub-forum where community discussion isn't as restricted and can spread out and grow in an accessible, efficient way.

2. The means through which the community evaluates the meta-game is inefficient.
As I'm not staff, I can't speak to the exact methods by which suspects, unbans, and other meta discussions are decided upon; but as a user I can say that whatever the process is it is deeply inefficient. It feels as though whatever efforts are put forth to balance the metagame are mired by the obtuse means of discussing it and lack of dedicated staff/players to said evaluation. And again, as a layman I can't say whether the problem lies in shoddy management, low motivation, or gridlocking amongst the staff; but that leads me to my third point.

3. There is a massive disconnect between the community and the monotype staff.
There is a huge lack of dialogue between the monotype staff (or whatever entity evaluates the meta) and the user base at large. There is overlap with the previous two points here, in that the average user is completely disconnected from the threads upon which all discussion of the metagame is forced to take place. And that whatever the obscure processes that govern the future of the monotype meta are, the average user is neither aware of them or empowered to affect it, and that's worrisome. It leads to scenarios like the Zapdos ban where the majority of players were entirely clued out.


Idk; There are so many active, motivated monotype players that fill the chat rooms; such a wealth of unharnessed energy that could be channeled into truly community-driven discussions of the meta-game and how to balance it. But we, or at least I, feel disempowered; it's hard to have agency when the threads upon which all discussion of the meta takes place are so incoherent and produces so few tangible results. And even if problems were being addressed by staff the lack of dialogue means we wouldn't know or feel involved in those proceedings.


Those are just my thoughts. These issues aren't anyone's fault, but they should be addressed for the benefit of the metagame and the community surrounding it. I might be entirely wrong here, but IMO the monotype community and staff need to be more aggressive about opening up means for accessible community-driven discussions; perhaps by getting a sub-forum in the OM's page. And from there just practice more transparency with the community and making more effort to involve the growing userbase in discussing the meta.

um... so yeh.

Bye.

Most of the things you're saying I agree with whole-heartedly.

I disagree with DM about not derailing this thread. This is the only place we have to chat about this stuff where "everyone" can contribute. The point of the thread is to discuss the metagame, and how it is run is a part of the metagame. Someone else can chime in on this if I'm wrong. x_x

I'll respond to some of your concerns individually.

A Sub-Forum
As much as I'd love to see it too, it just isn't happening in the immediate future. I'm sure the OM Leaders will chuckle when they read this because I've harassed them about Monotype stuff quite often over the past month. The philosophy from the OM leadership is to treat all OM's with a permanent ladder equally. We (as the Monotype community) can dislike this, but we should respect it.

Metagame evaluation is inefficient
Yes, it is. As a member of the staff I promise we're not just sitting here twiddling our thumbs about this. While I'm not privy to any of the discussions, I believe the RO's work very hard for our metagame. We just don't always see it. The trouble is coming up with a solution that is fair, transparent, and will produce good results without disenfranchising an individual or group.

Disconnect with the staff (or w/e entity polices the meta)
This is a tricky thing, because the Monotype room staff are technically not the entity that should be evaluating the metagame (think PS! OU room staff vs. OU Council).

Nani Man is our Tier Leader. We don't have a council or a Co-Leader. Those decisions are his responsibility.

Freeroamer is right, if you're unhappy with something and nothing is getting done. PM Nani. The staff have some amount of input, but the decisions are not ours to make. For me, I thoroughly enjoy the metagame and the room, so I try to create projects/things that will help the metagame develop and the community grow. Technically, that is the only thing I can do. :)

I might be entirely wrong here, but IMO the monotype community and staff need to be more aggressive about opening up means for accessible community-driven discussions;

Believe me, I wish I could just snap my fingers and make something like that happen. The Monotype community is in an interesting position where we're an OM with a very large (and devoted) community, but we're still an OM. Smogon and the OM leadership are going to treat us like an OM. I used to expect something different and have found out that is something that just isn't going to change.

 

[DoW]

I don't have much to say here that hasn't been said either by DM or scp, but there's one thing I will say.

One of the hardest things I remember having done is try to get people to participate in discussion. There have been times when staff were /walling this thread multiple times a day, hoping people would see it and contribute to the discussion. We have gone to other servers and asked them to announce about it there, with varying levels of success. We have done everything we can to get people discussing tiering in the room to come to this thread and discuss it here. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but this thread is the place to discuss tiering, and we have put a large amount of effort into getting people onto this thread.

If you're wondering whether discussing things on this thread works, just look at greninja, among others. When Nani makes his decisions, my understanding is that this thread is one of the biggest influences on his decision. Sure, we could do with more feedback. But putting your thoughts here helps.

 

[Freeroamer]

The reason I said about not posting it here is because it's essentially bombed the thread and especially when a lot of the stuff said in that post is made on assumptions which are false, I welcome people wanting to make this metagame+community better because I do believe it has declined since I first joined way back when. However what here couldn't be covered by a PM to all the staff?

Point 1 is just never going to happen, had any mod been asked about this before it was posted they would've said as much

Point 2 is on Nani, and would've had the same effect as PMing him, without destroying this thread

Point 3 is mainly on the staff, if it's believed such a disconnect exists why should it be on the community to try and fix this when part of the staff's responsibility is ensuring they stay in touch with the community. Worth noting here that I agree there's a disconnect but I think a PM to the staff would've been more efficient seeing as the likely result is you'll end up deciding a course of action via the staff PM anyway. That's not intended to sound derogatory in any way, it's just being honest.

Don't get me wrong I'm glad that I'm not the only one who shares these concerns, but how much of the proposed solution is actually going to be decided in this thread if we're realistic. Half of the staff never even post here anyway, so probably won't see this until told about by another member at which point a PM would've done the same thing again.

 

[thesecondbest]

I think what we need is a new thread, this is ninety pages long and still has XY in the title -.-

 

[ArVaDa-]

I have been very inactive, but I have had this thought float in my head a few times. Does nani need a bit of help? I know the staff is willing to do anything if he just gives the command, but they cannot make executive decisions. Perhaps there needs to be another powerful fellow (my vote would be a current staff member), so that nani has more time to draw my damn february podium!

 

[Freeroamer]

I floated the idea of co-leadership(Nani+someone able to be active on both the forums and in the room) potentially being a thing a while back but nothing ever came of it. Not sure why because Co-Leadership has a ton of positives and very few negatives.

-2 brains are better than one, can bounce ideas off each other and reduces a bias factor somewhat as long as both people are reasonable

-If one is unavailable for any length of time the other can pick up the slack, meaning there's no delay in getting things done.

-More approachable, noone can be around all the time so having 2 people to bring concerns up to makes communication much easier.

Those are straight off the top of my head, pretty sure there's more too

 

[vanderlylic]

I think what we need is a new thread, this is ninety pages long and still has XY in the title -.-

Finally, a new thread will be posted for discussion tomorrow, replacing this one as this thread is rather clunky and I would like to have more control with the next one.

Nani Man did say a new one would be posted about 20 pages back when he announced the Zapdos, Greninja and Metagrossite bans. I imagine the most natural time to start a new thread would be when the decisions/bans are announced about smooth rock + other suspects.

I do agree with what Tyke said about this thread being incoherent. I think the main issue here is that there can at any given time be about five topics running at once, with whichever one getting the most noise being the current focus. I mean, I think about over the last two months and we have been discussing Smooth Rock / Gravity / Landorus / Sand some kind of nerf for Ground, we have looked at M-Altaria and M-Charizard-X, Genesect, M-Sableye, and every now and then someone brings up the idea of unbanning something ridiculous to help out Ice or Electric. It seems like whenever someone has a bad day laddering, they come here to say that their biggest threat was broken, or that their type needs a boost. After a while, the cycle repeats because people forget what the old arguments were and can't be bothered sifting through 20+ pages to find them. Perhaps if the thread was more directed where we discuss one or two mons at a time for a certain period, finalise discussion on them and then move on to the next point of conversation would be more effective. The downside of this however is that it would discourage people from sharing other cool things to talk about, which would probably be more harmful than good. But there must be a better way than the current system.

 

[Zinnia]

Things have been slow and I can only apologise for how slow things have been. Nani has been extremely busy and it's been difficult for him to get the new forum started up. Hopefully it should be on the way soon however.

 

[Entei]

Before the Hoopa hype, can we decide on what we're doing with this totally competetive team?

http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/monotype-248595955

 

[Freeroamer]

I've already PMed Nani about this, and as far as I see, we have no reason not to adopt OU's policy on this once it's finally ironed out and implemented. While passing without Speed might still be an issue, it's the best place to start, and then we can see if anything further needs to be done.

 

[thesecondbest]

I think just ban the move personally. I see no reason to change in game mechanics to stop a pass of two stats when a simple sd pass mew is still overpowered. Use that team and you'll still get free wins. You can nasty pass to a mega gardevoir still, baton pass is still a broken move, strategy, etc. Ban the move itself.

 

[Freeroamer]

If you can't pass the Speed boost to that Gardevoir, then sure it hits hard as hell but is at a very vulnerable Speed tier of 100. Almost all mono teams carry a Scarf user because they don't have the defensive backbone to afford not to run one due to a redundancy in team options because obviously everything has to share a type. What I'm trying to say is, if Mew does theoretically set up, pass, and the Garde gets a kill(thats 3 turns right there so what are you doing for those turns?) you still have the ability to deal with it. I don't think the move needs banning, I think if anything the combo of Screens+Pass might be broken even without being able to pass Speed, but again we can't know that until we try it. Can't get behind a full ban, NastyPass, SDPass etc. are strategies in of themselves and have a lot of risk associated with them regarding the matchup they get, unlike the current BP which just passes bulk+speed to the mon in the best position to fuck up the opposing team while sitting behind screens.

 

[thesecondbest]

oops gardevoir cant learn agility
nvm my post
but yeah if you want screens + pass to be broken, then why not just ban the move at that point?

 

[Freeroamer]

Because we avoid collateral and don't ban unbroken strategies, but anyway I think following the OU rule is a good place to start.

 

[Fractions.]

Personally, I don't think Baton Pass should be banned 'cause its an important part of my teams. lol

 

[Lukethehedgehog]

I haven't been reading the latest messages, but hoe are the suspect discussion going?

 

[Balto]

Okay, so I've heard rumors of an altaria ban/suspect, and it's been a while since I've posted so I figured I'd put my thoughts down.


First of all, the way the bans are decided (and the bans already done) is atrocious. Not to try and bring up old discussion, but there's really not another ban I can refer to(lmao). Between the bans of Kyurem White, Shaymin sky, there's an obvious hole in the idea or sheer possibility of these mons getting banned. The types these mons were allowed on weren't overpowered. I feel like that's something few few people actually touch on when making these posts, which is super annoying. By all means it's completely unfair to label a mon overpowered if (VERY CLEARLY) the types they are on aren't overpowered as well.

Ice and Grass were quite literally at the bottom of the food chain without their 'ubers', but WITH them they were nothing but okay types, I really can't stress that enough. They were okay. Not overpowered, not broken, not unbeatable, just good, and viable. Not only were these two on subpar types, there were PLENTY of other mons in the metagame that can virtually play the exact same role. For example, flying (Arguably the best type in the fucking meta) has Scarf Togekiss. The two share the exact same ability, and the exact same special attack. However, I do understand that the two have a difference in speed, I personally think that togekiss makes up for it's lack of speed in it's bulk, but I can see from that point that the two are not totally alike.

With that being said, I've noticed one of the most stupid and annoying traits on some of the past posts. People are complaining about having to run a check for something. God did you really have to make an adjustment to your team to meet the meta's new standards?I'm so sorry man!

Now I'll get to the initial spark of me wanting to come the forums, the alleged 'altaria suspect.' The entirety of this suspect is literally based on it 'shitting on dark.' Well by looking at this handy-dandy win percentage chart, we can see that it's really not the case.

Hide

http://prntscr.com/7s2izm

http://prntscr.com/7s2jg4

So there you have it! By the also handy-dandy matchup labeler on the monotype site, we can see that matches 40-60 are considered neutral, SO since dragon(altaria's most used type) only beats dark 53% of the time, barely over half, and since flying(altaria's other type) only wins 57% of the time, then it's labeled neutral. However, this flying vs dark matchup is completely and utterly irrelevant, so forget I even mentioned it. By the also very handy dandy usage stats on the monotype website, we can see that altaria is only used on roughly 1/10 of all flying teams. This means since Altaria is rather, not as common on the type as the other megas, it doesn't play as large of a role in the statistic. With that being said, Altaria has such minimal usage that it seems a little ridiculous to label it 'overpowered', don't you think? I'd much rather focus on the important megas(zard).

note:shoutout to whoever runs the monotype website, they truly did a great job in giving monotype players access to all the information necessary to break down and understand the tier.

 

[Acast]

Okay, so I've heard rumors of an altaria ban/suspect, and it's been a while since I've posted so I figured I'd put my thoughts down.


First of all, the way the bans are decided (and the bans already done) is atrocious. Not to try and bring up old discussion, but there's really not another ban I can refer to(lmao). Between the bans of Kyurem White, Shaymin sky, there's an obvious hole in the idea or sheer possibility of these mons getting banned. The types these mons were allowed on weren't overpowered. I feel like that's something few few people actually touch on when making these posts, which is super annoying. By all means it's completely unfair to label a mon overpowered if (VERY CLEARLY) the types they are on aren't overpowered as well.

Ice and Grass were quite literally at the bottom of the food chain without their 'ubers', but WITH them they were nothing but okay types, I really can't stress that enough. They were okay. Not overpowered, not broken, not unbeatable, just good, and viable. Not only were these two on subpar types, there were PLENTY of other mons in the metagame that can virtually play the exact same role. For example, flying (Arguably the best type in the fucking meta) has Scarf Togekiss. The two share the exact same ability, and the exact same special attack. However, I do understand that the two have a difference in speed, I personally think that togekiss makes up for it's lack of speed in it's bulk, but I can see from that point that the two are not totally alike.

With that being said, I've noticed one of the most stupid and annoying traits on some of the past posts. People are complaining about having to run a check for something. God did you really have to make an adjustment to your team to meet the meta's new standards?I'm so sorry man!

Now I'll get to the initial spark of me wanting to come the forums, the alleged 'altaria suspect.' The entirety of this suspect is literally based on it 'shitting on dark.' Well by looking at this handy-dandy win percentage chart, we can see that it's really not the case.

Hide

http://prntscr.com/7s2izm

http://prntscr.com/7s2jg4

So there you have it! By the also handy-dandy matchup labeler on the monotype site, we can see that matches 40-60 are considered neutral, SO since dragon(altaria's most used type) only beats dark 53% of the time, barely over half, and since flying(altaria's other type) only wins 57% of the time, then it's labeled neutral. However, this flying vs dark matchup is completely and utterly irrelevant, so forget I even mentioned it. By the also very handy dandy usage stats on the monotype website, we can see that altaria is only used on roughly 1/10 of all flying teams. This means since Altaria is rather, not as common on the type as the other megas, it doesn't play as large of a role in the statistic. With that being said, Altaria has such minimal usage that it seems a little ridiculous to label it 'overpowered', don't you think? I'd much rather focus on the important megas(zard).

note:shoutout to whoever runs the monotype website, they truly did a great job in giving monotype players access to all the information necessary to break down and understand the tier.

You're forgetting a few things when you made this post.

When Shaymin-S and Kyu-W were banned again, Nani Man essentially told us that we would be changing our focus in regards to bans and unbans. We would no longer be trying to make the bad types (ice and grass in this case) good. We would, instead, be focusing on individual pokemon and making sure that each individual is not overpowered as long as each type is at least usable. So type usage is more or less irrelevant.

You also make it sound like Shaymin-Sky and Togekiss are equals, when they really aren't. Yes, the have the same ability and they love flinching the opponent to death, but what sets them apart is that Shaymin-Sky has Seed Flare. That's a huge advantage for a pokemon with Serene Grace. It allows Skymin to take down Chansey with any luck at all, something Togekiss couldn't do easily even if it carried Aura Sphere. Togekiss is almost always either a cleric or a flinchaxxer. Shaymin-Sky can operate as both a wallbreaker and revenge killer on the same set. Beyond flinch hax, these two are not comparable.

On to your points about Altaria.

Usage oftentimes is an indicator that a pokemon is good, but it's never a reliable way of showing exactly how good a pokemon is. Think about Baton Pass. It's a strategy that's really not common at all. You rarely see it, yet OU had to introduce a new clause just to keep it from being too uncompetitive.

Personally, I agree with you in that I don't think Altaria is that overpowered, but the arguments you make aren't adding up. So you're saying M-Altaria isn't used very often on Flying? Ok, that statement is accurate when you compare it to other flying megas. But you also said that the Flying vs Dark matchup is even at the moment, so obviously M-Altaria isn't too much for Dark to handle, right? Well think about this: What if Mega Altaria does become common on Flying teams? How do you think the Flying vs Dark matchup would change? I'd be willing to bet that the more common Altaria becomes, the more lopsided that type matchup will be. The statistics are an amazing resource and they do show us a lot, but they can't show us everything. Mega Altaria's domination of Dark teams is one of those things that we can't see just be looking at the statistics provided.


Now after all that, I do want to say that I 100% agree with you on these 2 points:

People are complaining about having to run a check for something. God did you really have to make an adjustment to your team to meet the meta's new standards?I'm so sorry man!

I can't agree enough. This is something that a few people really don't understand. Adapting to the meta should be your primary reaction to something new. If a person's first reaction is "My old team can't beat it so you guys need to ban it for me!", there's something wrong with the way that person views bans.

note:shoutout to whoever runs the monotype website, they truly did a great job in giving monotype players access to all the information necessary to break down and understand the tier.

Again, I can't agree enough. scpinion has worked long and hard to make those statistics readily available and easy to understand. I never realized how helpful those statistics would be until they were there and now I don't know what we'd do without them.

 

[scpinion]

Okay, so I've heard rumors of an altaria ban/suspect, and it's been a while since I've posted so I figured I'd put my thoughts down.


First of all, the way the bans are decided (and the bans already done) is atrocious. Not to try and bring up old discussion, but there's really not another ban I can refer to(lmao). Between the bans of Kyurem White, Shaymin sky, there's an obvious hole in the idea or sheer possibility of these mons getting banned. The types these mons were allowed on weren't overpowered. I feel like that's something few few people actually touch on when making these posts, which is super annoying. By all means it's completely unfair to label a mon overpowered if (VERY CLEARLY) the types they are on aren't overpowered as well.

Ice and Grass were quite literally at the bottom of the food chain without their 'ubers', but WITH them they were nothing but okay types, I really can't stress that enough. They were okay. Not overpowered, not broken, not unbeatable, just good, and viable. Not only were these two on subpar types, there were PLENTY of other mons in the metagame that can virtually play the exact same role. For example, flying (Arguably the best type in the fucking meta) has Scarf Togekiss. The two share the exact same ability, and the exact same special attack. However, I do understand that the two have a difference in speed, I personally think that togekiss makes up for it's lack of speed in it's bulk, but I can see from that point that the two are not totally alike.

With that being said, I've noticed one of the most stupid and annoying traits on some of the past posts. People are complaining about having to run a check for something. God did you really have to make an adjustment to your team to meet the meta's new standards?I'm so sorry man!

Now I'll get to the initial spark of me wanting to come the forums, the alleged 'altaria suspect.' The entirety of this suspect is literally based on it 'shitting on dark.' Well by looking at this handy-dandy win percentage chart, we can see that it's really not the case.

Hide

http://prntscr.com/7s2izm

http://prntscr.com/7s2jg4

So there you have it! By the also handy-dandy matchup labeler on the monotype site, we can see that matches 40-60 are considered neutral, SO since dragon(altaria's most used type) only beats dark 53% of the time, barely over half, and since flying(altaria's other type) only wins 57% of the time, then it's labeled neutral. However, this flying vs dark matchup is completely and utterly irrelevant, so forget I even mentioned it. By the also very handy dandy usage stats on the monotype website, we can see that altaria is only used on roughly 1/10 of all flying teams. This means since Altaria is rather, not as common on the type as the other megas, it doesn't play as large of a role in the statistic. With that being said, Altaria has such minimal usage that it seems a little ridiculous to label it 'overpowered', don't you think? I'd much rather focus on the important megas(zard).

note:shoutout to whoever runs the monotype website, they truly did a great job in giving monotype players access to all the information necessary to break down and understand the tier.

Glad to see the stats pages are getting put to use. :)

When you're using the type matchup page it is best to use the percentages in the upper-right portion of the table. Those values are weighted. For the lower left, the guy that loses his first battle on the ladder counts exactly the same as you winning a high ladder match vs. someone like AFD or Kaiser. The lower-left portion is only there to compare to the upper right.

For instance, you can answer the question "How much more likely is a good player to win in a type disadvantage?" by comparing the upper-right value to the lower-left value. It probably isn't a surprise, but good players are more likely to win in a disadvantage. :P

Both matchups you mentioned are neutral even with the weighting.

 

[Balto]

You're forgetting a few things when you made this post.

When Shaymin-S and Kyu-W were banned again, Nani Man essentially told us that we would be changing our focus in regards to bans and unbans. We would no longer be trying to make the bad types (ice and grass in this case) good. We would, instead, be focusing on individual pokemon and making sure that each individual is not overpowered as long as each type is at least usable. So type usage is more or less irrelevant.

You also make it sound like Shaymin-Sky and Togekiss are equals, when they really aren't. Yes, the have the same ability and they love flinching the opponent to death, but what sets them apart is that Shaymin-Sky has Seed Flare. That's a huge advantage for a pokemon with Serene Grace. It allows Skymin to take down Chansey with any luck at all, something Togekiss couldn't do easily even if it carried Aura Sphere. Togekiss is almost always either a cleric or a flinchaxxer. Shaymin-Sky can operate as both a wallbreaker and revenge killer on the same set. Beyond flinch hax, these two are not comparable.

On to your points about Altaria.

Usage oftentimes is an indicator that a pokemon is good, but it's never a reliable way of showing exactly how good a pokemon is. Think about Baton Pass. It's a strategy that's really not common at all. You rarely see it, yet OU had to introduce a new clause just to keep it from being too uncompetitive.

Personally, I agree with you in that I don't think Altaria is that overpowered, but the arguments you make aren't adding up. So you're saying M-Altaria isn't used very often on Flying? Ok, that statement is accurate when you compare it to other flying megas. But you also said that the Flying vs Dark matchup is even at the moment, so obviously M-Altaria isn't too much for Dark to handle, right? Well think about this: What if Mega Altaria does become common on Flying teams? How do you think the Flying vs Dark matchup would change? I'd be willing to bet that the more common Altaria becomes, the more lopsided that type matchup will be. The statistics are an amazing resource and they do show us a lot, but they can't show us everything. Mega Altaria's domination of Dark teams is one of those things that we can't see just be looking at the statistics provided.


Now after all that, I do want to say that I 100% agree with you on these 2 points:


I can't agree enough. This is something that a few people really don't understand. Adapting to the meta should be your primary reaction to something new. If a person's first reaction is "My old team can't beat it so you guys need to ban it for me!", there's something wrong with the way that person views bans.

Again, I can't agree enough. scpinion has worked long and hard to make those statistics readily available and easy to understand. I never realized how helpful those statistics would be until they were there and now I don't know what we'd do without them.

I disagreed with a few of your statements on the posts and I'll explain why.

You can't really compare baton pass to Altaria. Baton Pass' means for getting banned were the lack of competitiveness with the strat, whereas Altaria is literally just a standard setup sweeper that carries a good matchup vs dark. Another thing is you can't throw out these 'what ifs' on the metagame. "What if Altaria's usage increases?" We're analyzing and banning on the current metagame. That follows my next point, that dark only has a (roughly) 10% chance to play a mega altaria on flying. So yes, by all means the statistics do tell all in this story.

Note:there's no question altaria is great vs dark, but is a mon that's only played 10% of the time on flying really going to be labeled overpowered? That's aside from the fact that dark has a GREAT check in weavile.

 

[Tyke]

I disagreed with a few of your statements on the posts and I'll explain why.

You can't really compare baton pass to Altaria. Baton Pass' means for getting banned were the lack of competitiveness with the strat, whereas Altaria is literally just a standard setup sweeper that carries a good matchup vs dark. Another thing is you can't throw out these 'what ifs' on the metagame. "What if Altaria's usage increases?" We're analyzing and banning on the current metagame. That follows my next point, that dark only has a (roughly) 10% chance to play a mega altaria on flying. So yes, by all means the statistics do tell all in this story.

Note:there's no question altaria is great vs dark, but is a mon that's only played 10% of the time on flying really going to be labeled overpowered? That's aside from the fact that dark has a GREAT check in weavile.

Regarding Mega-Altaria
I don't really view mega-altaria as a surefire ban, but I feel it's worthy of a suspect based on the way it can set up and sweep on so many types so easily. Dark, Fighting, Fire, Dragon, and Electric teams all provide ample opportunity for mega-altaria to set up and struggle to take it out.

Electric: Electric struggles with it's lack of poison or steel coverage. It has Magnezone, but all magnezone sets are outsped at +1 and unless you run air balloon or have a unbroken sturdy you're stuck relying on thunder-wave Thundy and hoping Maltaria doesn't abuse healing wish support or just switch out. Counter Ampharos is something I've been trying lately to deal with both Mega-Altaria and Mega-Charizard X, as you can bait an attack and live it without mega-evolving with moderate investment; but it's an incredibly niche set.

Dark: Mega-Altaria sets up on an upsetting number of Dark Pokemon; Mandibuzz, Tyranitar, Crawdaunt, and more. You mention Weavile as a check but Weavile can only finish altaria off; unless the Altaria isn't running enough speed EVs to outspeed at +1 (252 Atk Life Orb Weavile Ice Shard vs. 64 HP / 0 Def Mega Altaria: 151-179 (49.1 - 58.3%) -- 98.4% chance to 2HKO). Even then Mega-Altaria can switch out and come back with healing wish later.

Fighting: Again, fighting struggles to stop a mega-altaria at +1 and provides the opportunity for Queen-DDD to set up. Fighting has supply to scarfers who can outspeed a +1 altaria but neither terrakion or Keldeo can KO it, only slow it down with icy wind or hope for a flinch with iron head. Bullet Punch Priority exists but again mega-altaria is bulky enough to roost it off and can just switch, ultimately.

Fire: Hope that Heatran is a jolly scarf or has an intact balloon. And again, Mega-Altaria can just switch out. Rotom-H can paralyze it maybe?

Dragon: Hope you have a +spd scarf Kyurem-B, a unbroken multiscale, or managed to set up mega-altaria first.

Those are just the most lopsided match ups; mega-altaria can also set up easily on normal teams who can really just hope they have the right Ditto happiness. A pokemon's usage doesn't translate to whether it's OP or not; it might make it less of a priority however. I think Mega-Altaria is suspect worthy.


Regarding Shaymin-Sky
I'm not sure how you can defend Shaymin-Sky's presence in the meta-game. Sure, Grass's usage didn't skyrocket or anything but as I already said, how commonly a type is used doesn't really change whether it creates an imbalance. Shaymin-Sky was ridiculous, for a couple of reasons.

-Many types lacked any sort of switch in for Shaymin-Sky who could take apart their defenses. This is a reality of monotype; every type isn't going to have reliable switches for every threat, obviously. But Shaymin-Sky was able to completely break the cores of way too many types. Water, Bug, Grass, Fighting, Ground, Rock teams had little to nothing in the realm of defensive checks/counters.

-Scarf Set could not be revenge killed by some types. Again, Fighting, Bug, Ground, and Water teams struggled to revenge kill scarf sets. Even pokemon who are neutral to air slash can often fall victim to flinches and be 2HKOd regardless. Priority is an option, but again, grass's defensive core covers Shaymin-Sky's checks very well. Even in grass vs grass the winner is often decided by who wins the speed tie.

-Flinch Hax and Seed Flare Hax. Shaymin-Sky's blitzing speed allows to outspeed and 2HKO an wide breadth of pokemon with air slash. And with Seed Flare it effortlessly broke the defenses of walls, even of types that resist Skymin's STABs like Dragon, Steel, Fire etc. Even the defenses of types with resists like flying, dragon, steel, and fire could be broken on a switch with seed flare and whittled with air slash. You argue that Togekiss does the same thing, yet it isn't banned. This is true to an extent, but Shaymin-Sky does it far far far better without needing a scarf or para support to flinch opponents to death (although it has access to both).

Believe me, I understand the frustration of the argument "oh no i have to run a check" people vomit to justify suspecting various threats. Just reference my post about mega-sableye. But Shaymin-Sky is so difficult to check and what checks exist, regardless if they're uncommon, are often unreliable due to the nature of Flinch-Hax; not to mention the support skymin receives on grass teams (excellent hazards, healing wish, phasers, reliable switch ins, volt/turn). While I believe you need to adapt to the meta-game, staff gave the ladder several months to adapt to Shaymin-Sky and found it too ridiculous for many types. There is a balance to what you can adapt to before you compromise your team to many more common threats.


Regarding Kyurem-White
I never really saw enough usage on Kyurem-White to say whether it truly deserved to be banned. But like Shaymin-Sky it made several match ups entirely lopsided. What was grass, flying, or poison supposed to do? And like Shaymin-Sky, Mirror Matches were entirely determined by the speed tie. While Kyurem-W didn't have the same support Skymin had on grass, it was still a ridiculous offensive threat and staff felt it was unhealthy for the meta-game.


Regarding Monotype Statistics
Yeh. thanks scpinion <3

 

[Acast]

I disagreed with a few of your statements on the posts and I'll explain why.

You can't really compare baton pass to Altaria. Baton Pass' means for getting banned were the lack of competitiveness with the strat, whereas Altaria is literally just a standard setup sweeper that carries a good matchup vs dark. Another thing is you can't throw out these 'what ifs' on the metagame. "What if Altaria's usage increases?" We're analyzing and banning on the current metagame. That follows my next point, that dark only has a (roughly) 10% chance to play a mega altaria on flying. So yes, by all means the statistics do tell all in this story.

Note:there's no question altaria is great vs dark, but is a mon that's only played 10% of the time on flying really going to be labeled overpowered? That's aside from the fact that dark has a GREAT check in weavile.

I agree that we can't just assume things about the metagame. I guess I phrased that point poorly. What I mean is that Altaria's domination of dark teams is not affected by its usage.
If, for some strange reason, Mega Metagross was hardly ever used while it was still legal, I strongly believe that it would have still deserved a ban because the few times that a fairy team would see a Megagross would still be an automatic loss. Now, Metagross vs Fairy is more extreme than Altaria vs Dark, but the same principle applies.
I don't know if Altaria is an automatic win vs Dark, but if it's concluded that it is, then are Dark users just supposed to accept a loss every time they see the fluff bird on the ladder? No matter how rare that situation may be, I don't think it would be fair.

 

[Whydon]

With that being said, I've noticed one of the most stupid and annoying traits on some of the past posts. People are complaining about having to run a check for something. God did you really have to make an adjustment to your team to meet the meta's new standards?I'm so sorry man!

It depends, really. Obviously if you need to bring something in order to check something, then this is understandable. But take for example Landorus-I in OU. Its only two checks were Mega-Latias and Cresellia. This required you to either a) Use up your mega spot for this single Pokemon (while other megas could be considered better for most teams), or b), Bring a Pokemon from from a different tier just to take this single Pokemon on. Do you really think people really want to bring Cresselia or Mega Latias on their teams for a single Pokemon? Cresselia is easily outclassed by other OU walls (hence why it's in UU), and Mega Latias (while good) forces you to use up your mega slot.

But, as you said, in some cases this argument simply does not work. For example, if a Pokemon forced you to use either Mega-Metagross, Chansey, or Heatran on your team, then this is different because those three Pokemon actually have their usage outside of being checks for Pokemon.

 

[thesecondbest]

It depends, really. Obviously if you need to bring something in order to check something, then this is understandable. But take for example Landorus-I in OU. Its only two checks were Mega-Latias and Cresellia. This required you to either a) Use up your mega spot for this single Pokemon (while other megas could be considered better for most teams), or b), Bring a Pokemon from from a different tier just to take this single Pokemon on. Do you really think people really want to bring Cresselia or Mega Latias on their teams for a single Pokemon? Cresselia is easily outclassed by other OU walls (hence why it's in UU), and Mega Latias (while good) forces you to use up your mega slot.

But, as you said, in some cases this argument simply does not work. For example, if a Pokemon forced you to use either Mega-Metagross, Chansey, or Heatran on your team, then this is different because those three Pokemon actually have their usage outside of being checks for Pokemon.

You are wrong. Lando's only counters are those two. It had tons of checks and was quite slow without a rock polish boost. When people complain about needing checks, such as the stupid ou voters who banished lando, they clearly don't know what is ban worthy. But something like skymin had no checks because it could flinch you to death.

 

[mullin]

You are wrong. Lando's only counters are those two. It had tons of checks and was quite slow without a rock polish boost. When people complain about needing checks, such as the stupid ou voters who banished lando, they clearly don't know what is ban worthy. But something like skymin had no checks because it could flinch you to death.

A counter is something that flat out does just that it stops it and it in turn can't do much to it. Like heatran with talonflame. A check is a bit different like a it stops it but doesn't shut it down in full. Skymin again isn't banned for air slash if that's the case tkiss would be as well seed flare made most things alot more manageable and does not even allow chansey to switch in for free to to the spdf drops.