1) Doesn't that fact that Swift Swim isn't the only "broken" thing seem suspicious. Manaphy is broken as well, due to Drizzle. Clearly, rain makes multiple things "broken". So why ban every little thing instead of a single ban which would alleviate the need to neuter many other pokemon. People are basically saying that we should ban a bunch of things broken in rain, simply so that rain can exist.
Ban the things or their ability? Kingdra has agility son...& Dragon dance... yeah Kingdra is as fast as it god damn wants to be. Without Swift Swim, Kingdra may just have to set up to sweep...which is the EXACT same thing it will do if you ban drizzle since it will need rain dance set up. A turn is still being used regardless.
Drizzle benefits MANY pokemon not just Swift Swimmers. Parasect, All hydration users, all rain dish users, anyone who wants fire damage reduced (Bronzong), anyone who carries a water move.
The total list of pokemon who benefit from rain period whether Drizzle or RD is higher than those who just use swift swim.
You weaken the affect all those pokemon who benefit in rain if you force them to use RD to get that benefit..
2) This goes in with the above. If Smogon likes to ban as few things as possible, then why shouldn't we do that. If we ban Drizzle, Politoed is neutered and Rain Stall dies. If we ban Swift Swim, many mons are neutered and Rain Offense dies. Either way, a playstyle dies, but we neuter fewer mons by banning Drizzle. We end up with fewer bans and and a just-as-good end result.
Rain offence does not die. That's a misconception. That's like saying Fire pokemon don't do well in Sunny day because it's not boosting their speed, only their stab. The STAB boost on rain is already an offensive benefit.
Oh and Empoleon has higher SpA than Kingdra....gets agility.
Kingdra gets agility & Rain dance. No Rain offence does not die, it changes.
With infinite rain it's still hardly "weak". If Swift swim goes, Rain Offence gets reworked but survives and rain stall exists. So both rain offense & rain stall exist.
3) Analogy time. Inconsistent Bibarel is broken, right? However, pretend that when we ban Inconsistent, Simple turns out to be broken. We could ban it, since Bibarel also has Unaware. But the fact that more than one ability would be broken on it suggests that it is Bibarel which is broken, not the abilities on it. Now, we don't ban pokemon+ability combos, so this analogy seems flawed. But my point remains intact. Repeating number 1, if mulyiple things are broken in rain, then perhaps rain is the broken thing.
Name all the things in rain that are broken without swift swim.
What Manaphy...and? What Vaporeon? No one bitches about Vaporeon so what? Manaphy and...? Parasect? People say it's amazing and rain but they're not calling it broken. Whats broken in rain when swift swim is gone?
I may have been repetitive, but I'm trying to say that banning Speed boosting abilities would be a dire mistake in this stage of metagame-development.
Because what?
If you ban Drizzle it's just favouring Rain offense, it's a bias towards that.
If you ban swift swim it's a bias to...everything else, knowing that Rain offense will still exist in some form, as the damage boosting qualities of rain REMAIN. I don't want to be rude, theres definitely a point that you and everyone else are making by saying to go after Drizzle itself, but if you remove swift swim that should also be a viable alternative to addressing the rain issue, while keeping rain offense, stall & any other teams using rain for support.
Unless you feel rain offense is not viable at all without break neck speed pokemon. No swift swimmers learn thunder so who's missing out on the always accurate thunder if drizzle is banned? Not swift swimmers.
When you remove drizzle from 5th gen you are removing more than just infinite manaphy hydration or the sweeper's having their speed boosts forever.
Rain dish users take a hit
Hydration users
Pokemon that want reduced fire damage
Synthesis, morning sun and moonlight have more chances to do their full heal.
Thunder's not always at peak accuracy
Dry skin users take a hit
Water damage is not as high
If you remove swift swim, all that remains but the sweeping potential is brought down to reasonable levels when you consider the benefits that they're getting.
Kingdra has to either outspeed only what pokemon under 85 base speed...or it can carry agility or Dragon dance.
Floatzel's naturally fast...and still has agility.
Rain offense isn't going to die when they still have an infinite power boost to their moves.
You allow a lot more things to be competitive if you keep drizzle, and tone down the ridiculousness of current rain when you remove swift swim.
Oh and for those swift swimmers that are slow?
With infinite rain, you can still run trick room sets.
Yeah everyone on Rain still has a place in rain. It's just Rain would naturally adapt to the loss of swift swim.
Which isn't going to be hard when the rain is infinite.