np: SV OU Suspect Process, Round 1 - Oops!...I Did It Again

[awyp]

I strongly agree with everything stated, Tera in it's current form is too unpredictable, which makes the metagame unhealthy.

There is no mind game involved at all. Sure, for example Annihilape usually run tera Water, but some people are also using tera Dark to bait people, so you have to cover Ghost/Fighting + Water + Dark at the same time, otherwise you have a high chance it can either setup in your face (especially if you are choice locked) or kill you with Rage Fist boosted.

Therefore, I would say showing the tera type at preview is the more healthy nerf, because it creates actual mind game = You know what tera type to expect, but the opponent can bait it as well because he's holding it.

It's clear that something needs to be done regarding tera either way.

Ageed, Terastallization kind of breaks logic, I look at it like a crutch. Don't forget Annihilape will sometimes also run Tera Typa Normal so it doesn't get hit by other Ghosts and continues to Bulk Up Resto Chesto.

I'm very passionate about how I feel about Terastallization as a whole from day 1 when it was first introduced on Pokémon Showdown, I was like "This is broken, not much skill involved aside from deciding when to use it". It's only base level Pokémon knowledge, I'm going to give this Pokémon a defensive Tera because it is weak to (THIS TYPE) naturally, and I really want to abuse the STAB boost of (THIS MOVE), so let me use it as an offensive Tera since I know it won't 2HKO unless it gets the 1.5x STAB boost which I can do with a click of a button.

If I do gain the privilege to vote for suspect testing of Terastallization I will be voting to 100% for tiering action (on Terastallization) the metagame at it's current state is quite unbalanced.


Outright ban (Terastallization will no longer be usable in SV OU) - I'm leaning with an outright ban, it's manageable as a mechanic (not saying it isn't broken) but you can get away with winning a couple of games / laddering high but I think down the line regardless of the nerfs below it won't be enough you'll have certain games where the mechanic itself especially from an offensive perspective will blow the game.
The idea of changing your Pokémon's type into a different pure type while retaining your Pokémon's original typing and having 2 different STAB boosts is a lot variables to prepare for. If you wanted a free Adaptability boost you can just Teratilise into the same type as your Pokémon. Going to the option route of having a free Adaptability boost on a Pokémon that already has a high attacking stat in my opinion could be overwhelming to handle (You see it with Chi-Yu quite often) it becomes hard to check for, you'll probably have to sack one of your Pokémon at least half of the time depending on the team matchup.

1 Tera user per team (Only the first member of your party will be allowed to Terastallize during the course of the battle) - This is my 2nd option of where I'm leaning, it's a solid nerf and the only one out of the nerfs I see working long term. You only have to focus on 1 Pokémon instead of 6.

Reveal Tera type at team preview (Any Pokemon can Terastallize, but the type they would do so into is disclosed at team preview prior to a battle) - (3rd Option) I like this as well and I do think it'll make a difference but still allows the user to abuse Terastallization, now you're just doing it while opponent see's it coming, ultimately I think if this is chosen, it won't be the last suspect test for Terastallization.

Only STAB Tera types allowed (Any Pokémon can Terastallize, but they may only do so to types that match their initial STAB typings) - Least favorite option, because it still gives the adaptability issue with all the Pokémon who abuse it like Chi-Yu, Dragapult, and Gholdengo. I believe if this is the option that gets chosen, it will force a lot of Pokémon to seem way more broken than they actually are. Tera will be used for only offensive utility at this point, which I can deal with but like echoed above by other users Offensive Tera Type Utilization is the REAL problem.

 

[Dubbidub]

A reminder that this is a firm rule. You are entitled to your own opinion, but we are working under this voting structure and this thread is absolutely not the place to question it or ask for change. It is disrespectful and counterproductive at this point after all the prior discussion to bring up moving the goalposts; this thread is specifically for discussion on the suspect presented in the OP. The same has been the case for every past suspect and will be the case for future ones as well. I hope to not have to delete more posts due to this. This is not directed at any post still up in this thread.

Even if you do not love whatever result comes, there is no perfect solution for everyone and there is likely to be another Test down the line to give everything another chance.

Are you still accepting PMs on this subject or has the time for that also closed?

To keep this post relevant to the topic:

I think we need to be clear that the purpose of smogon regulations is not to maximize the competitive nature of Pokemon battling. If that were the case, critical hits, random variance in the power of moves (i.e. low/high rolls) and other factors that introduce randomness would all be banned. The purpose of smogon rules, rather, is to promote a competitive metagame while preserving the essence of Pokemon battles in the mainline games. And generally when rules are implemented they are simple bans, forbidding overpowered/anti-competitive Pokemon and moves/abilities and dynamax in Generation 8. The only complex restriction that I'm aware of is the sleep cause, which has precedent in Pokemon stadium.

It's not enough to say that tera introduces randomness and thus should be banned. You need to argue that the harm to the competitiveness of the metagame resulting from tera is so significant that it justifies banning or restricting a generation defining mechanic. While the effect of tera on the competitiveness of the metagame cannot be quantified, the fact that the metagame is still fun and competitive for many makes me skeptical that action needs to be taken.

And when considering the options for restricting tera we should be mindful that complex rule changes carry greater risk of distancing OU from mainline Pokemon battles. OU should resemble in-game Pokemon battles with simple optimizations to enhance competitiveness. If only enhancing competitiveness was the goal we could justify changing the stats of Pokemon and effects of different moves and abilities to make battling more skill-based and predictable. Of the restriction options listed, showing tera in team preview seems most acceptable, as it mirrors the policy of VGC. This change would not alter the mechanic but would only increase the information available to the player about their opponent's Pokemon.

 

[Karxrida]

I don't have the time to make a text wall right now, but I think the "restrict Tera to one Pokémon" option people have floated around isn't ideal. It stifles less offensive team comps that might appreciate the flexibility provided by their tanks and walls being able to patch up weaknesses during specific matchups. This Generation hasn't been super kind to fatter builds and I don't think we need to kick them any further. (I understand Tera also superbuffs a lot of offensive Mons but shit like Fire Fish and Mega Weavile are already insane without it.) Plus if you're running something like E-Killer Dragonite you're likely banking on it as your primary Tera user anyway.

I find the other non-Preview restrictions (i.e. STAB only) so awful that I would rather have the mechanic banned outright tbh. They miss the point of Tera so bad that they would strip any potential it has.

And I mentioned this before, but I personally think we should try the Team Preview option before going for a ban. Maybe it works, and if it doesn't we can just ban the mechanic knowing we gave it a fair shot.

 

[alephgalactus]

I think we need to be clear that the purpose of smogon regulations is not to maximize the competitive nature of Pokemon battling. If that were the case, critical hits, random variance in the power of moves (i.e. low/high rolls) and other factors that introduce randomness would all be banned.

The purpose of the regulations is to maximize the competitiveness of Pokémon battling, while modifying the actual mechanics of the game as little as possible. That’s why RNG-heavy things like evasion, King’s Rock, and Moody are banned. If random crits or damage rolls weren’t a thing but there were, say, an item that made them a thing, there would probably be a strong case made for banning said item.

 

[Dubbidub]

The purpose of the regulations is to maximize the competitiveness of Pokémon battling, while modifying the actual mechanics of the game as little as possible. That’s why RNG-heavy things like evasion, King’s Rock, and Moody are banned.

I wrote one sentence after "The purpose of smogon rules, rather, is to promote a competitive metagame while preserving the essence of Pokemon battles in the mainline games." I'm not sure how your post significantly differs from what I said. My point is that competitiveness is not the only factor - not that it isn't a factor.

 

[alephgalactus]

I wrote one sentence after "The purpose of smogon rules, rather, is to promote a competitive metagame while preserving the essence of Pokemon battles in the mainline games." I'm not sure how your post significantly differs from what I said. My point is that competitiveness is not the only factor - not that it isn't a factor.

What do you consider “the essence of Pokémon battles”? The competitive landscape has developed for over a decade without Terastal; it’s certainly not a mechanic that’s central to the series. Meanwhile, stuff like evasion and OHKO moves have been around since Gen 1—before held items, Abilities, and three entire types—and we ban those because they’re uncompetitive, even though they’ve been here since the beginning and a case can be made that they’re part of “the essence of Pokémon battles”. Preserving something as ambiguous as “essence” is not part of Smogon philosophy.

 

[Dubbidub]

What do you consider “the essence of Pokémon battles”? The competitive landscape has developed for over a decade without Terastal; it’s certainly not a mechanic that’s central to the series.

But it is central to gen 9. No is arguing that it needs to introduced to Gen 1-8 OU. Gen 6 had megas and gen 7 had Z-moves, neither of which were determined necessary to ban. Gen 8 had dynamax, which was banned by an 87% majority for being uncompetitive and severely hurting the quality of the metagame. Basically, it's not just a question of does tera make introduce randomness but rather one of is the detrimental effect to the metagame so large that is justifies banning or restricting a generation-defining mechanic?

 

[alephgalactus]

Tera is balanced

No it isn’t

Basically, it's not just a question of does tera make introduce randomness but rather one of is the detrimental effect to the metagame so large that is justifies banning or restricting a generation-defining mechanic?

I don’t really think it being a “generation-defining mechanic” should enter into the discussion. We didn’t allow Dynamax to hide behind that term and we shouldn’t allow Tera to just because the brokenness is marginally less obvious.

 

[Battlion]

Hopefully will get to the Reqs needed soon but I’ve been watching the discussion and keeping my opinion to myself, however I’ve come down largely where I expected I would at the beginning.

I don’t think there should be a ban, Gen 8’s metagame felt really stale for me and as a primary cartridge player I instead focused on VGC and other things. I’ve also found the use of this 50-50 code to be pretty frustrating, the argument turned into that if you can’t predict what is going to happen that’s uncompetitive which frankly is ludicrous since we never know what an opponent is going to do. You can guess, sometimes you’re wrong and sometimes you’re right etc.

So I’ll vote No Action first of all, in the event of restriction the only plausible one for me that doesn’t completely nullify the point of the mechanic is to show on preview. Even that I think is a lot, we don’t give people full sets before we battle normally and revealing a potential strategy is uncomfortable imo.

On the other options, I’m uncertain where I’ll rank them but I’m not swayed by the Ban argument at all so far.

 

[alephgalactus]

I don’t think there should be a ban, Gen 8’s metagame felt really stale for me and as a primary cartridge player I instead focused on VGC and other things
…
we don’t give people full sets before we battle normally and revealing a potential strategy is uncomfortable imo

They actually introduced a rule this gen in VGC that requires open teamsheets, which means that you do in fact give people full sets before battling now. It’s significantly different from just showing Tera types, but it’s still worth a mention since you brought up VGC. This is why I think that “show Tera types at team preview” should be the absolute minimum action we should take—Tera was built around it.

 

[1LDK]

Im probably not gonna be able to get reqs because im a failure at everything i do, but if I could get them, I would be voting Yes, I want Tiering Action and the orden would be
1. Ban
2. Tera Preview
3. Only one can tera
4. Stabs

I had been fucked by surprise teras, like Tera water Corvi, Tera Grass Magnezone, Tera Grass Sandy Shocks and so on and so on, I have also lucked out victorys I shouldnt be having against most teams, while tera is a fun gimmick that is right now balanced because of the few mons, it adds a new layer of teambuilding that makes it more interesting and can change the course of battles but still within the reasoning limits, but here is the thing, im talking about the NOW, I think that, once the first DLC drops, there will be too much too handle, I would love to keep tera and I would love to vote no ban, but I have to think about the future, and if theres one thing I hate more than myself, is the idea of a +2 Life Orb Tera Steel Kartana

 

[hmsa2012]

I think the best option with Tera is allow to players call for action and to see the tera typing in team preview.

This suspect test is going to be crucial with how the metagame and Gen 9 in general shapes up to be. I think some within the community need to think Terstallization as its own mechanic rather than comparing it to previous mechanics such as Z-Moves and Dynamax. They are completely unique and independent from each other.

Personally, the biggest problem with Terstallization is the informational advantage that does not reflect the true skill levels of players. For example, if you know your opponent hasn't revealed any of their tera mons and you're about win, you now have to enter in a 50/50 situation to see if you can win by clicking the right move or you lose against X mon for whatever specific situation. Yes, you can argue that players can deduce logic by knowing metagame trends and determine what tera-typing a mon may have, but there 18 tera-typings to choose from. Yes, you can say that predicting or calling a 50/50 is a skill to an extent, a match may go out of control of the player's hand and they can instant lose (even with overpredicting). Does beating your opponent to the last mon then potentially getting reverse swept because you fell for the wrong tera-typing considered skillful in a even competitive field?

I think Tera typing in team preview would be balanced as both players will have the equal information on an even playing field. You can at least deduce and plan strategically with not just team preview but also in teambuilding itself. Preparing it would help balance competitiveness in a way. This would let OU battles in general be fun and balanced without having to ban an entire mechanic.

Also I disagree with the argument of "oh its too early for Smogon to be suspect testing something as huge as this mechanic". There was literally a survey where over 4,000 people and ~62% of the responses called for tiering action. The suspect test is a result of the community, not 9 people in charge of the tier. In addition, if the near 2/3 majority say that terstallizing is a problem, suspect test it now rather than waiting months knowing that its a problem among the community. It can always be revisited at a future date, especially if we get DLC metagames. If its too much to handle, then the proper tiering can be deduced.

Just my 2 cents. Been in several suspect tests so I've seen plenty from both sides of the coin.

 

[Pais]

Hi guys, I managed to get the reqs and I'll give my thoughts about Tera... I think that I'm going to vote for OUTRIGHT BAN:


1)Outright ban (Terastallization will no longer be usable in SV OU)

This is clearly the best option. I don't think there is any competitive benefit from a mechanic that allows you to change type canceling entirely some weakness claiming 1-2 free turns potentially for doing anything like revengekilling, statupping with some broken threat (Annihilape, Espathra are accurate examples of what I'm talking about, but not the only ones) or having some crazy insane Adaptability Boost on mons like Chi Yu or Chien Pao if you want to boost your stab. I would be hypocrite if I say that the metagame is this unplayable but I just don't find necessary having a mechanic that adds variance (not only in terms of 50/50, but also because some mon that can run multiple tera types can be hard to check). I want to take in consideration SS OU. Obviously Dynamax was way more broken than Tera and needed to go but the absence of the core mechanic made the metagame overall enjoyable and of good quality and at least in my opinion. It's not necessary to preserve the core mechanic to have a good metagame.

2)Reveal Tera type at team preview (Any Pokemon can Terastallize, but the type they would do so into is disclosed at team preview prior to a battle)

This is the 2nd most viable option because at least you can expect quickly and remove just a part of randomness from the games. The thing is that sometimes you'll add in-game some 50/50 situation that is not needed at all and this would not remove anyway the fact that really a lot of pokemon can abuse of Tera. Obviously there are Pokemon which tera type is predictable but with this option we would have more flexibility in-game and a bit more of long term planning.

3)Only STAB Tera types allowed (Any Pokémon can Terastallize, but they may only do so to types that match their initial STAB typings)
4)1 Tera user per team (Only the first member of your party will be allowed to Terastallize during the course of the battle)

I'm gonna put them together but the reason why I prefer Mono-Stab Tera more than 1 Tera user is that at least it follows some real logic and that reduces a bit of variance, but I don't think we really need to adopt this option: this would make stronger the common wallbreakers of the tier that are already strong & insane (chien pao, chi yu... but in case they will get banned there will be solid replacements) and this still in some case delete some of their weakness (in case of double typing for example a chi yu won't be weak a lot vs fight moves or to water moves) or the adaptability boost can just give to the mon who abuses of this mechanic the ability of destroying a possible common check. This is really an unviable option but surely less unviable of the option I ranked as 4th. 1 Tera user per team doesn't really follow any logic and sometimes you will need to terastalize a specific mon to check another mon terastalized from the opponent. It's like the worst thing that could happen. Not ironically I think that No Tiering Action would be better than Mono-Stab Tera and 1 Tera User per team. The skill & competitive aspect of the game should be prioritized over nintendo garbage mechanics (to be fair, we're not talking about megas or z moves that were overall fine, but let's not forget that they were mechanics that required the item slot to be sacrificed, that's why they were balanced).

 

[hmsa2012]

You can't do that in-game. Pokemon S/V doesn't allow to see tera type in team preview

In game =/= an unofficial competitive tier. OU has nothing to do with cartridge play.

That logic especially doesn't work when VGC (an official competitive format) has open team sheets, and Tera typings are known to players.

 

[MapCrimZ117]

To be quite honest, although many don't see a Full-Ban happening, I don't see any of the Tera-restrictions as a real solution, and in all honesty, may even Buff Offensive Tera-strategies moreso than defensive ones. Right now, as an example, with Full-Terastallization allowed, a pokemon like Chi-Yu has a possibility that it could result in getting tested/banned, but i dont see any of the 3 Nerf-options as real solutions toward stoping this inevitability for many of the would-be offensive Tera-Abusers/Enablers, let alone just Chi-yu.

1. Knowing Chi-yu is the Tera-User helps very little, as its the threat of the fact it can choose between 3 different types to blast with (and when), or to just go with STAB. The unpredictability and "random" factor doesnt really change here, nor does it change what u choose in ur teambuilder.
2. Only allowing STAB-Tera in the format may even make a pokemon like Chi-yu BETTER. think about it. Naturally, you have the option to just panic-Terastallize defensively into a type that resists fire/dark and maybe make it out alive, but in this Ruleset, Chi-yu doesnt have to worry about randomly not KOing and dropping dead itself, all while allowing it to give an extra boost toward its power to obtain that 2hko or whatever specwall it would otherwise not ko. I feel like this option specifically is not the correct way to address this. It will help for stuff like Regieleki sure, but it wont for anything that is attempting to win with raw power, which things like Chien-Pao and Chi-yu would love to continue to do.
3. Revealing the Tera-type in team preview, of the 3 Nerfs, is probably the only one that help, imo. However, this is really only once you get INTO the Battle, but you'd still have to prepare in the team builder for the pokemon who can tera into 5 different types, and thus i don't see much of a change. And regardless, you KNOW that dragonite is Tera-normal anyways. you KNOW that Skeledurge is Fairy. its about which one of their pokemon is going to terastallize and when. This only really addresses a handful of offensive Tera-users like Roaring Moon, Chi-yu, the eventual-regieleki, etc because of the abundance of types they could choose, but i would argue this options still hurts Defensive Terastallization comparatively. If the Chi-yu /sees/ that you can Tera into Water, its gonna just use a dark move. likewise Fairy and Fire. If Dragonite Sees Ghost/Rock/Steel as an option, itl use EQ instead of stab speed. And its all still a game of chicken. Like I said, it helps, but only a little.

So honestly, because i see the nerf-options resulting in the same broken mons still being broken, i see the best two outcomes of this suspect test to either have a Full Terastallization-Ban or... simply, No-Ban At All. I will say, that in a Full-Terastallization-allowed metagame, the ability to Defensively change your type to stop a would-be sweep is a large aspect of the current metagame, and all 3 of these Nerf-Options, in my eyes, weaken that power, which may net-result in less checks for the Offensive-Tera-abusers, and i think we all agree Defensive-Terastallization is not the problem here. You probably won't ever waste ur 1-Tera choice on ur Garganacl or Clodsire or defensive Tusk, and the STAB and Revealing Tera-type options i think help offensive terastallizers more (er.. nerf Defensive ones more), and i acknowledge that Panic-Defensive-Terastallization can be a replacement as a "X Pokemon Check" if you dont want to waste that slot in the teambuilder, AND i acknowledge the mindgame that the ability to Terastallize defensively gives. And although not a defining deciding factor, i also Acknowledge that removing Terastallization can result in the tier becoming Stale (while still needing to ban multiple mons) and in the end of the day, this is either the least important factor, or the most, depending on how you look at it. after all, this is the most enjoyable experience i've had in a current-Generation-OU since defog grace its presence upon us, so maybe having a bit of spice is a good thing. and if Terastallization is the identity of the generation, then i think thats okay. maybe. Is the ability to Terastallize Defensively worth keeping if it means allowing Full-power offensive Terastallizing? Would Allowing only 1/STAB/Revealing type Help in keeping pokemon like Chi-yu in check, or would those restrictions only hurt its competition/would be Checks? And i guess, in the end of the day, would the result just be the same thing but maybe more "boring"? i see these as possibilities, and because of this i think the only /real/ 2 options are either No-Action or Full-Ban. with maybe Revealing the Tera-type as the only possible Nerf-Option, of any.

Tho i think id rather have No-Action than Full-Ban.

(and then make a 2nd OU latter for the non-"standard" one :3)
("Haha" away, fellas)

 

[Lily]

I lost 8 games in my reqs run. In those games, I took note of the opposing Tera Pokemon every time just to see how much direct influence it had on the game. Here's what I lost to:

- Tera Flying Garganacl (didn't actually do anything of note - Dondozo + Alomomola stall just wasn't possible for my rain to beat)
- Tera Bug Ceruledge (got smoked by this)
- Tera Fairy Iron Valiant (had stopped using rain and was using a very valiant weak team in the end)
- Tera Dark Chi-Yu x4 (broken mon regardless of tera)
- Tera Grass Volcarona (was very bulky and lived my floatzel's ice spinner so i got owned)

In these Ls I didn't really feel like Tera was the defining factor in any of them. Even the Ceruledge - which directly swept me - was not really a case of me being too weak to random Bug Ceruledge, but rather Bulk Up Ceruledge just being a big issue for me in general. Obviously a small and anecdotal sample size, but I'd encourage others to take note of what's happening in their games to see what they're losing to.

Anyway, my preferred action on Tera is to show types on preview and I think anything more is extremely unnecessary for now. Honestly, I found that Tera was often worse for my opponent than not; for example, my opponents would often Tera Fairy with their Skeledirge to tank a hit from my Dragapult - which makes sense - but then they'd be vulnerable to Magnezone and no longer able to dissuade Flower Trick spam from Meowscarada, which left a lot of holes in their defensive integrity. I think this is a valuable thing to note because it makes building teams with random Tera lures actually quite difficult, since you need to make sure your defensive structure is still viable before and after your Terastallise. Not a massive issue for hyper offense squads or for mons lacking much by way of defensive utility in general, but OU doesn't have a whole lot of the latter (mostly Chien-Pao and Chi-Yu, which are unbalanced regardless tbh.)

If I could take any action myself, it would be that. Otherwise, I think it's best to leave it as is... I've laddered 200+ games of OU and 300+ games of UU in the past month, and truthfully I think Tera is strong but balanced. It allows for fun and creative teambuilding without feeling too overbearing to me, and I can confidently say that if you're good at the game, you will still win significantly more often than not, which I can't say was true for Dynamax, a mechanic that allowed those who were less skilled to super easily cheese wins off those who are more skilled.

I feel like if we ban Tera, this gen will just be boring tbh. SS was an absolute snoozefest. We have a higher power level now, sure, and it's unlikely that the game would slow down to SS levels even if Tera was gone, but I do think it adds a lot of fun and enjoyment to the game. We tend to get caught up in fierce competitiveness debates, and while those are important, we do have to remember that the game is exactly that - a game. And its primary goal is to be fun! Nobody would wanna play it if it's not - let's be real, nobody's playing competitive Pokemon because they believe it's actually a good game relative to the many, many other options they have. They play it bc it's fun.

If DLCs bring back more and more fatmons and we have to deal with shitty attempts to bust through regencores for 500 turns I just don't see the game being interesting anymore, and the mechanic just feels balanced and interesting beyond that. I think we should revisit the decision later on down the line regardless of whether or not Tera is banned, but for now it'd be best to show the types on preview, take some time to mess around with that, and then move forward with further action if necessary. M Dragon's post on the topic is very good, I encourage others to read through that as well.

ty for reading, I've posted this rain before but in case anyone wants it, I used it for like half my reqs run and it went fine.

 

[alephgalactus]

I feel like if we ban Tera, this gen will just be boring tbh. SS was an absolute snoozefest. We have a higher power level now, sure, and it's unlikely that the game would slow down to SS levels even if Tera was gone, but I do think it adds a lot of fun and enjoyment to the game. We tend to get caught up in fierce competitiveness debates, and while those are important, we do have to remember that the game is exactly that - a game. And its primary goal is to be fun! Nobody would wanna play it if it's not - let's be real, nobody's playing competitive Pokemon because they believe it's actually a good game relative to the many, many other options they have. They play it bc it's fun.

I had fun using Flutter Mane and Palafin, but they were broken and had to go. Hell, the Dynamax meta was the closest Gen 8 ever got to fun and it wasn’t even remotely skill-based. Adding to that, fun is subjective—some people, including myself, are having less fun specifically because Tera is still in the tier. Fun shouldn’t be something one considers when balancing the meta, and this meta does not put a smile on my face.

I’d think a tier leader would want to put balance before a factor as subjective as fun.

Also, for the record, I absolutely agree with you that last gen OU was boring as hell, but this gen’s changes have kind of demolished stall even without Tera around—the recovery PP nerf, the decreased distribution of Knock Off and Toxic, Scald being effectively completely removed, etc. Tera or no, this meta won’t be as boring as the last.

 

[Lily]

I had fun using Flutter Mane and Palafin, but they were broken and had to go. Hell, the Dynamax meta was the closest Gen 8 ever got to fun and it wasn’t even remotely skill-based. Adding to that, fun is subjective—some people, including myself, are having less fun specifically because Tera is still in the tier. Fun shouldn’t be something one considers when balancing the meta.

Yes fun is subjective lmao that's why I said I think the game will be less fun if Tera goes. If you disagree that's fine! That's why the suspect system exists - you can always make your own vote. I explained why I feel tera is a mechanic that allows for skill expression already so I don't think it's remotely comparable to the other three you've listed. Regardless, I'm not going to change my opinion that I've gathered over this many games, especially not just bc you're telling me I shouldn't care about how fun the game I play for fun is.

 

[RoyalDispenser]

If I get reqs, I'll vote for a total ban of tera.

Personally I do not think the other options solve the core problems that come with tera.

Why I think tera is broken in general

To me, its not the unpredictability, but the strats that were figured out to abuse tera with. Normal Dragonite, Fairy/fighting espathra, flying roaring moon, water ape, the list could go on and the scary part is we don't know when that list ends as we suspect and ban these individual mons and make room for new threats. There is definitely a slippery slope to keeping it and the metagame can't really develop unless we take that slide.

None of the current tera users I find to be broken without it, Espathra is kinda a shit mon or UUBL at best, dragonite is fine without the STAB extreme speed and losing its weaknesses to all but fighting, and Moon I believe is pushed more so by having a 120 physical move it gets STAB on thanks to tera flying + booster energy than being broken on its own. Dragapult is the only mon I personally think is busted with tera, and centralizing without, but that's for another day.

The fact I can list specific abusers and what tera they use tells me that team preview would not solve anything and be a huge waste of time (which would suck for cart players anyways, not everyone can share team sheets unlike tournaments where its as much as a requirement as the plane ticket to get there.), going the route of banning specific threats just opens doors for even more of them and we're in a new era of pokemon where DLC expands our metagames, then we have to back pedal every ban to see if they're balanced in the new metas, ban the new abusers, its just a headache and too exhausting to even think about let alone keep up with when any of it does happen.

First pokemon tera sounds potentially doable, but it still doesn't solve issues because 90% of the time if someone is carrying espathra, they're going to tera and win with it, something would need to go horribly wrong for them not to. When team building you're still having to prepare for the base version and tera version of whatever metagame threat is going around, first party member doesn't relieve the team builder part.

This is why I think ripping the band-aid off on nerfs is better, and its kinda silly those band-aid solutions are there to begin with given how smogon's policies operated for years, and the times we tried it we ended up throwing in the towel (baton pass's several nerfs until we realized complex bans are just dumb and total banned it). I'm glad we're open to re-testing should the first solution fail but its still better to just get it right or at least an option you can't go wrong with (no-ban/ban).

How is this any different from previous generation mechanics?

The only thing comparable is dynamax, because gen 8 dynamax was so broken there was no good solutions to preserve or adapt to it, the fact ypu had to meta ditto just to not auto lose to the first dynamax user is pretty telling how much of an impact it had. Tera isn't as broken as dynamax, but it does have a similar effect where you have to run very specific sets to deal with any of its abusers, and everything is a potential abuser making the mechanic itself the primary suspect of what's making the game unbalanced.

Mega Evolution also saw some bans, but it was primarily to individual mons, mainly because it wasn't always that broken, you could isolate specific problems and have a healthy stable meta game. Unlike tera, it was specific to certain pokemon so it was more easy to balance.

Z-moves are mechanically somewhat similar to tera, where you get 1 nuke to surprise would be counters or overwhelm certain checks, but it was 1 time use meaning if you could absorb it, its no longer a problem. Tera being a permanent buff is very close to having a Z-move every turn on the pokemon you STAB tera with or gain STAB on a coverage move for. You're not calcing if you can tank 1 Z move, you're calcing if you can tank multiple hits from a 1.5x boosted attack. A common theme if you go through the SM OU ban list you'll notice is very few if any of the bans were influenced by Z-moves, showing the mechanic itself was very managable. Naganadel you could make argument for being banned for getting a free draco without a stat drop, and getting a beast boost off of it, but we saw it was still problematic in gen 8 post any generational mechanics.

My conclusion

There's no fixing it, we shouldn't be trying to 'fix' gamefreak's ways to force 'fun' into a competitive metagame, and the methods of preserving it just creates more problems trying to balance the game around its existence. Idc if some believe the game is more 'boring' without it, because we didnt have a gen 8 gimmick, but we didn't have any gimmicks from gen 1-5 so this is news to me that generation gimmicks are a requirement to keep the scene from being dead.

 

[thelolcat]

I think terastallizing is really fun. If you want to play the same game you always have, play gen8 OU. I will ladder up so i can vote for it to not be banned, but I'll just play vgc/on my switch instead if this website bans it.
Every generation y'all kill off more players by turning pokemon into a different game.

 

[Dededestroy]

I'll try to get the reqs to vote here, and I would definitely vote Reveal tera at team preview. Here's my thoughts:

No ban/Ban tera blast:
Both are kind of similar in that they don't address the issue of tera directly. Picking this is understandable if you think that more thoughts are needed before a ban, but I feel that many people who want a ban will not change their minds, and that waiting might only make things worse.

1 Tera user per team:
This can be a reasonable pick, but it also doesn't solve many of the issues with tera. Choosing only one mon to have the tera capability can help prevent the guessing game of who will tera, but it doesn't help with the guessing game of what they will tera into, and why they tera into it. A lot of teams only have 1 or 2 candidates for tera potential, so this may not affect teams as a whole. However, this may affect weak pokemon that uses tera to help out with their toolkit/purpose. With only 1 tera option per team, it limits players on which pokemon should terastalize. It will create a ripple effect where the strongest mons that can utilize tera the most will be chosen, while weaker mons that can really utilize tera to become good will be left to dust, creating very centralizing mons and reducing variety.

Only STAB Tera types allowed:
This basically helps offensive mons while killing defensive mon viability. It will create a meta of hyper offense, which some people may want, but I don't think is best. And this doesn't mean tera can't be used defensively, it just means defensive mons can't really use it. For example, annihilape or iron valiant may want to remove their fighting type with tera to prevent a weakness to acro moon or similar. Overall, one of the worse options imo.

Outright ban:
This is a really polarizing choice. By what it seems, people will vote either this or Reveal tera types. Outright ban is not a good choice for a variety of reasons:
- Similarly to 1 tera per team, a lot of weaker mons that rely on tera to be as good as they are suffer a lot, while many already centralizing pokemon aren't affected by it..
- It removes a lot of the variety and personality of this gen. Tera is a very intuitive yet strong mechanic for this gen. It gives so many more pokemon the chance to see play, and removing it can really kill a lot of the fun of this gen.
- Tera isn't a one-click win. Terastalizing correctly doesn't secure you a victory. Hell, it might not even give you that big of an advantage. It's a commitment, and your opponent can play around it if you don't use it well.
- Tera is far from the biggest source of guessing for games. Take, for example, gholdengo. Is this dengo a scarf trick mon, where having it in front of a bulky mon can neuter the mon? Is it specs, where switching to an offensive mon secures you a kill? Is it setup, where no immediate action can lead to a loss? These are situations where the wrong choice can lose you the game, and you can never tell what a dengo may choose even with experience. Tera is in the same area, but with far more understandable consequences. You can even use similar tactics like baiting teras from the opponent so they reveal their hand too early and you have an advantage. It's not perfect, but an outright ban isn't the best solution.

Reveal Tera type at team preview:
This is the best solution to this situation. It removes a lot of the guessing game of what the purpose of tera is for an opposing mon, while still allowing it to be an option. Revealing tera types can be promote high-skill play, since knowing the tera type may mean knowing the pokemon's purpose. It also allows counter-play to be easier, since you don't have to struggle between picking from multiple tera options that your opponent has. Overall, this is the best option.

 

[turd2]

Ok, so I got 80.0 GXE with a minimum of 50 games. Attached a screenshot.

I see that I need to wait until Jan 1 to vote. Will my rating decay between now and then? Will I need to play more games, or can I just leave this account as is?

Voting no on everything btw. No ban, no team preview, no limits whatsoever. Keep it as is in game!

 

[ayevon]

Just got reqs. The only reason to have a ranked choice or restriction based tiering action on Tera as opposed to a normal ban/no ban suspect is to arbitrarily try to salvage the generation's gimmick. I actually think that's fine, but if you're going to go through the process of trying to find an arbitrary rule to keep Tera, I think it's important that it's done properly. I already think it was bad process the proceed with Tera tiering action before insanely obvious broken things such as Annihilape, Chi Yu, and Shed Tail have been banned. Regardless, I think the process should start with Tera at preview, if that's deemed uncompetetive, move on to one mon with Tera with type shown at preview, and then proceed to a pure ban vote. Tera can be a very fun mechanic, moreso do to the creativity it allows in the builder than anything in game, so I don't think there's a problem with making an attempt to save it for non-competetive related reasons. But I don't think rushing tiering action in a perhaps unoptimal way (I don't know what it'll ultimately look like post votes) for the sake of such things as SPL and OST is for the betterment of Smogon and competetive play. Ban Annihilape and Chi Yu btw

 

[Azery]

Managed to get reqs in the afternoon after a couple hours of laddering. Lost like 10~ games out of the 49 I played. In most of those, it wasn't particularly Tera that caused the loss so much as poor play on my end(I chose to run Knock-Less Great Tusk that matched up poorly into Balloon-Gholdengo and played that matchup poorly once or twice before I figured out my own way of handling it. Gholdengo is broken regardless of Tera, though.) or your 'ol bad luck(had a Roaring Moon crit, flinch and burn its way through every one of my checks to it : D).

That said, I'll probably vote to take action on it regardless. The M.Dragon post cited earlier sums up my own thoughts pretty succintly and better than I could myself, but my own thought on it is that the mechanic feels pretty fun and interesting to play with in the moment-to-moment, but the guesswork from the combination of timing and typing can make for some pretty toxic interactions. Being able to be certain of that variable would mean making decisions in the game itself would be infinitely more reliable.

Some people analogize Tera's effect to items, and that we would be having similar debates nowadays if items were introduced now, but I feel like items rarely have you needing to constantly second-guess yourself over which one of the 18-possible options your opponent decides to make one of their 6 Pokemon into, completely changing their answers on the flick of a switch that might never happen. You can reasonably filter out what possible items there can be from preview and they very usually have constant effect all game, but that doesn't work the same way at all for Tera. I hate playing against Espathra, for example, because of the coinflip of Tera-Fighting or Tera-Fairy pretty much deciding the game then and there, allowing it to be capable of surviving critical attacks like Kingambit's Iron Head/Sucker Punch, if you don't like, run Tera-Dark SpDef Dondozo. (Which I ended up doing because my 'dozo never really cared for Tera and having that check in the backpocket is nice.) Roaring Moon is another, probably even more egregious example, with the well-known by now Tera-Flying Acrobatics set being accompanied by Tera-Steel, while still having several other viable types to turn into if its builder so pleases(Tera-Fairy smoking me expecting Steel), all of which have an entirely alternate set of answers.

Beyond that -frankly necessary- aspect, I don't think we can reasonably take action on the mechanic as a whole when we've only had just under a month to really play with it. A full on ban feels disingenious when the only reason Dynamax was immediately banned was because it made the game downright unplayable in singles. My own view is that we ought to turn on Tera-Preview and then let things play out for some months, especially with Home and or DLC yet to come. Give it some time and come to the table again later next year when we've got a more holistic view of how it shapes the game over time and whether or not we think that's for the better.

addendum: i lowkey think that very shortly after this vote finishes, we should just have a full on suspect on Chi-Yu. Ran that thing my entire time laddering for reqs and it's downright unfair how much pressure it exerts, being able to blow through everything in the tier with contemptuous ease. Specs 3 Fire+Dark Pulse, HDB WoW+NP, Ruination, etc, its options are limited but it pretty much needs nothing but its stabs and the rare Terablast. Disgusting Pokémon that I would not be sad to see go.

 

[Boooo_Yah]

If I get reqs, I'll vote for a total ban of tera.

Personally I do not think the other options solve the core problems that come with tera.

Why I think tera is broken in general

To me, its not the unpredictability, but the strats that were figured out to abuse tera with. Normal Dragonite, Fairy/fighting espathra, flying roaring moon, water ape, the list could go on and the scary part is we don't know when that list ends as we suspect and ban these individual mons and make room for new threats. There is definitely a slippery slope to keeping it and the metagame can't really develop unless we take that slide.

None of the current tera users I find to be broken without it, Espathra is kinda a shit mon or UUBL at best, dragonite is fine without the STAB extreme speed and losing its weaknesses to all but fighting, and Moon I believe is pushed more so by having a 120 physical move it gets STAB on thanks to tera flying + booster energy than being broken on its own. Dragapult is the only mon I personally think is busted with tera, and centralizing without, but that's for another day.

The fact I can list specific abusers and what tera they use tells me that team preview would not solve anything and be a huge waste of time (which would suck for cart players anyways, not everyone can share team sheets unlike tournaments where its as much as a requirement as the plane ticket to get there.), going the route of banning specific threats just opens doors for even more of them and we're in a new era of pokemon where DLC expands our metagames, then we have to back pedal every ban to see if they're balanced in the new metas, ban the new abusers, its just a headache and too exhausting to even think about let alone keep up with when any of it does happen.

First pokemon tera sounds potentially doable, but it still doesn't solve issues because 90% of the time if someone is carrying espathra, they're going to tera and win with it, something would need to go horribly wrong for them not to. When team building you're still having to prepare for the base version and tera version of whatever metagame threat is going around, first party member doesn't relieve the team builder part.

This is why I think ripping the band-aid off on nerfs is better, and its kinda silly those band-aid solutions are there to begin with given how smogon's policies operated for years, and the times we tried it we ended up throwing in the towel (baton pass's several nerfs until we realized complex bans are just dumb and total banned it). I'm glad we're open to re-testing should the first solution fail but its still better to just get it right or at least an option you can't go wrong with (no-ban/ban).

How is this any different from previous generation mechanics?

The only thing comparable is dynamax, because gen 8 dynamax was so broken there was no good solutions to preserve or adapt to it, the fact ypu had to meta ditto just to not auto lose to the first dynamax user is pretty telling how much of an impact it had. Tera isn't as broken as dynamax, but it does have a similar effect where you have to run very specific sets to deal with any of its abusers, and everything is a potential abuser making the mechanic itself the primary suspect of what's making the game unbalanced.

Mega Evolution also saw some bans, but it was primarily to individual mons, mainly because it wasn't always that broken, you could isolate specific problems and have a healthy stable meta game. Unlike tera, it was specific to certain pokemon so it was more easy to balance.

Z-moves are mechanically somewhat similar to tera, where you get 1 nuke to surprise would be counters or overwhelm certain checks, but it was 1 time use meaning if you could absorb it, its no longer a problem. Tera being a permanent buff is very close to having a Z-move every turn on the pokemon you STAB tera with or gain STAB on a coverage move for. You're not calcing if you can tank 1 Z move, you're calcing if you can tank multiple hits from a 1.5x boosted attack. A common theme if you go through the SM OU ban list you'll notice is very few if any of the bans were influenced by Z-moves, showing the mechanic itself was very managable. Naganadel you could make argument for being banned for getting a free draco without a stat drop, and getting a beast boost off of it, but we saw it was still problematic in gen 8 post any generational mechanics.

My conclusion

There's no fixing it, we shouldn't be trying to 'fix' gamefreak's ways to force 'fun' into a competitive metagame, and the methods of preserving it just creates more problems trying to balance the game around its existence. Idc if some believe the game is more 'boring' without it, because we didnt have a gen 8 gimmick, but we didn't have any gimmicks from gen 1-5 so this is news to me that generation gimmicks are a requirement to keep the scene from being dead.

I disagree, the gimmicks of gen 3-5 were abilities, physical/special split, hidden abilities, and weather. And I don't think anybody is saying the game will die if Terastalization is banned. If you see, Smogon in general is getting a lot of traction on social media.