On Banning Attacks

[TVboyCanti]

I decided to post this in PR instead of Stark because I think this is both a very important and controversial policy issue that, once solved, will make crafting and enforcing Smogon policy concerning banning attacks much easier.

Many of you are familiar with MTI's "Stealth Rock thread", and the rat's nest that it turned into with those who wanted SR suspect repeating the same non-sequiters and irrelevant arguments Ad Nauseum. Because I was not satisified with the lackluster arguments that were being given by both sides, I tried to provide "intelligent" arguments for SR being suspect so that the staff could provide intelligent counter arguments that SR was not suspect instead of just pointing out fallacies designating burden of proof. Despite my best effort, I could not objectively prove that SR is borked, but not because of Stealth Rock's merits, but because there is currently no definition for what "broken" means when applied to a move, and I remarked that the underlying problem of trying to argue for SR's banning probably deserved it's own thread. Well this is that thread.

Currently there is no official justification for the banned status of certain moves. There is only the de facto argument that OHKOs and Evasion do not require skill to use, which is really based on the biased opinion of those(myself included) that do not want these moves to be a part of the metagame and not on any objective data. This is causing a great deal of controversy amongst the community as they start to realize this and has led to the creation of many annoying threads. I think it is in the best interest of Smogon to define what makes an attack broken so that threads like this, this and this stop popping up more than once.

I would like to make it clear that we can't apply to attacks the same principles that make a Pokemon broken, because the difference between a Pokemon and an attack is the difference between a strategy and a tactic. A Strategy is a plan for victory that spans over multiple turns, while a Tactic is the action taken during each turn to realize the strategy. Accepting the following definitions, a Pokemon is actually multiple tactics connected to a sprite, employing the tactics that a battler uses to set up their strategy, which is why we need a completely different definition for what makes an attack broken vs. what makes a Pokemon Uber. Essentially this will be the "Portrait of an Uber" for attacks.

The purpose of this thread is to provide frameworks for which we can justify claiming a move as "broken" - things to consider are Evasion (Double Team, Minimize), OHKO, "Stealth Rock" (It won't be tested, don't worry). This thread should try to explore how one can justify OHKOs/Evasions and the such and provide framework for people to comment with if there is ever a suspect test.

Remember, Tradition should not be a vaild reason for banning OHKO moves and Evasion. Saying that they've always been banned and there's no reason to change things should not cut it when it comes to policy.

 

[lilyhollow]

I disagree with the first and second (and third) definitions because both issues can be solved by banning Pokemon, which I think should be our focus for reasons stated here.

That post also pretty much sums up my entire opinion on this matter, which is similar to the fourth definition, though your Manaphy/Volbeat situation is a bit iffy to me. On the one hand, I'm not sure where I lean anymore when it comes to banning a move on something completely nonviable (Volbeat) just to make something else usable. I'm just not convinced that these situations are relevant enough for us to actually consider them, and they open up for silly things like "Tanga Berry Celebi is too good, let's ban Tanga Berry though because I still like Celebi and nothing else uses it" when really there are some theoretical options like Tanga Berry Alakazam (or something) that could potentially pop up in the future.

Another issue I have with your scenario is that Tail Glow is identical to Nasty Plot, which obviously isn't broken, even on Pokemon that would be solid OU either way. Besides, I think we have to consider that, Manaphy or Tail Glow, either way we're banning something, and choosing to unban Manaphy could effectively be us "banning the wrong thing for the wrong reason," if the metagame were to take a step back in terms of balance. Sure, if we had something to gain from unbanning Manaphy, we might not care enough about Volbeat to mind making the metagame better at its expense, but what that's telling me is "let's test a 'Manaphy-lite' metagame for a few weeks on the basis that, even though we know Manaphy itself is broken, we can nerf it by making an unjustified but small change to the ruleset." I'm not sure I like that, and I still consider the Lati@s situation to be somewhat different because Soul Dew literally only applies to those Pokemon.



Also, would it be fair to say that items and moves can both be treated similarly in most/all cases?

 

[TVboyCanti]

Tanga Berry/Celebi is completely different from Soul Dew/Latias and Tail Glow/Manaphy. In the case of both Latias and Manaphy, there is only one other pokemon that gains an effect from the item/attack at hand. In one case that pokemon is Uber, and in the other it is NU, or will be, and can't possibly drop any lower in viability as NU is the lowest tier. However Celebi is one of 7 pokemon in the same tier that can gain an effect from Tanga, regardless of whether Tanga is viable or not. Saying "Soul Dew is too good because it makes Latias too good for OU and has no effect on anything else" is WAY different from "Tanga Berry is too good because it makes Celebi too good despite the fact that 6 other pokemon in OU can use Tanga Berry's effect".

And it can be argued that Tail Glow and Nasty Plot are not the same move for the purposes of banning, as they are learned by different pokemon. Therefore banning Tail Glow would have different effects from banning Nasty Plot.


If your going to take issue with the definitions that the community believes in without providing your own that's fine, but know that if you do that you are saying that you have no problem with all attacks being allowed in standard play, including OHKOs and Evasion.

 

[Syberia]

Tail Glow and Nasty Plot are the same move from a competitive standpoint. A move's name is not a competitive feature.

Latios and Latias have different stat distributions and slightly different movepools, which does make a difference competitively, so it is not a valid comparison at all.

 

[maddog]

Banning a Pokemon and banning a move are two completely dfferent things. And while this statement may have very little to do with your thesis, it has everything to do with your definations. One of the problems I have with this:

A move is broken if it makes an otherwise balanced pokemon uber.

We just simply can't go defining things like this at all. I'll use Outrage as an example. Let's say that Salamence is going to be a suspect, and the "main factor" of why it would even be declared Uber is Outrage (let's just say). Now according to this defination, our solution would not be to ban Salamence, it would be to ban Outrage. But the thing is, there are many other things that learn Outrage that aren't broken users of it, like Tauros for example. If we even want to begin this discussion, let's at least get our definations right.

And even talking about this refreshes the reason why I am against the banning of any move that is not evasion/ ohko related. That move does not apply to every Pokemon equally, and if a move is the reason something is broken, then maybe the problem is the Pokemon, and not the move. I'll give a very common example from the early stagest of the D/P metagame: Pursuit. Many people actually voted this move as one of the best moves in the game because things like Weavile and Tyranitar could use it so well. But, if we look now, some are starting to (not seriously) talk about SR and Trick, or whatever is going on. Why has Pursuit fallen from the limelight? People adjusted. And while the true potential of SR and Trick are being used because of new developments, we will come to a point where we can deal with these things. Let's let the metagame reach that position on its own, and if we need to declare Pokemon uber like Garchomp again, we will make that adjustment. We don't need- and the competitive scene doesn't need- new moves being banned. I would go as far to say we would lose some of our influence if we started seriously having this discussion with any move, with the very very slight exception of Stealth Rock.

 

[TVboyCanti]

Maddog, I would like to make it clear that those aren't definitions that I thought up, they are the justifications I've seen used for banning certain moves. They don't have to be the definitions used to define policy.

If you take issue with them that's fine, and you make very good points for why the third definition is iffy. I myself did not think it was a valid definition. However I do not agree with the special treatment you seem to giving to OHKO/Evasion when you say that no move should be bannable. We need to be able to justify the banning of OHKO/Evasion with vaild reasons.

 

[darkie]

A move is broken if it makes an otherwise balanced pokemon uber.

To summari(s/z)e what maddog said: if one move makes one Pokemon broken, it is the fault of the Pokemon, not the move. If that one move makes multiple Pokemon broken, however, it could be safe to say that it is the fault of the move.

 

[kd24]

i agree with darkie and maddog, banning a move obviously wont help if only 1 pokemon benefits from it. this is why i dont feel attacks such as spore or close combat should ever be considered broken. parasect and smeargle have access to spore yet they are both uu. breloom has spore and (this is quite farfetched but best example i could find) think it is uber because of a 100% sleep move. in that case, it is not the move, its the pokemon. brelooms high speed and attacking power as well as other attacking options would be what make him uber, not spore itself

i am not saying breloom is uber, not at all. this is just an example to fit what you are saying.

 

[lilyhollow]

Saying "Soul Dew is too good because it makes Latias too good for OU and has no effect on anything else" is WAY different from "Tanga Berry is too good because it makes Celebi too good despite the fact that 6 other pokemon in OU can use Tanga Berry's effect".

Well as long as we manage to clarify that then I'm fine, I was more worried about the community trying to bring up such an argument because the "but we don't care about Volbeat because it's useless" situation can seem similar. "Look nobody will ever use Tanga Berry Azelf that's just dumb, let's just get rid of it so we can keep Celebi in the game!"

If your going to take issue with the definitions that the community believes in without providing your own that's fine, but know that if you do that you are saying that you have no problem with all attacks being allowed in standard play, including OHKOs and Evasion.

I've now made at least two or three lengthy posts detailing pretty much my entire opinion on how we should handle move and item bans, and justified my position from at least a couple of different angles. I don't think there's much more I can do at this point besides explain why I disagree with the other definitions, or clarify my own, which is already pretty similar to the last one in the OP anyway.

If that one move makes multiple Pokemon broken, however, it could be safe to say that it is the fault of the move.

Again, I could probably go into Ubers and find a few Pokemon who wouldn't be broken without move X and then say "OK let's test now!" I realize that "that's Ubers" but I think the situation applies, I mean, who's to say that getting rid of Gengar, Rotom, and Metagross wouldn't be good for the metagame, even if they'd all be "just fine" without Trick? How are those Pokemon necessarily indispensable to us? I don't think that they are, and considering that we literally can't place full blame on Trick itself (there would still likely be a number of Pokemon OU viable with and without Trick), I'd keep it on the basis that it's a unique option for multiple Pokemon that would not be effectively replaced if removed.

 

[darkie]

Again, I could probably go into Ubers and find a few Pokemon who wouldn't be broken without move X and then say "OK let's test now!" I realize that "that's Ubers" but I think the situation applies, I mean, who's to say that getting rid of Gengar, Rotom, and Metagross wouldn't be good for the metagame, even if they'd all be "just fine" without Trick? How are those Pokemon necessarily indispensable to us? I don't think that they are, and considering that we literally can't place full blame on Trick itself (there would still likely be a number of Pokemon OU viable with and without Trick), I'd keep it on the basis that it's a unique option for multiple Pokemon that would not be effectively replaced if removed.

Can you rephrase? I don't understand half of this paragraph in context and I don't want to reply to a misunderstanding.

 

[Chou Toshio]

Frankly, I am annoyed that we have to try to create word-definitions for whether moves (and pokemon I guess) are "broken" or not. You will not be able to do it, period. If a pokemon/move makes the game obviously unplayable, we should ban it-- but "how much is too much" is not something I feel we can descibe.

On that note, if in generation 5 Nintendo released a move like:

Glacier Rip
Type: Ice - Physical
Power: 200
Accuracy: 100
PP: 30
effect: 40% chance of freeze
Learned by: Weavile


I'm pretty sure we would ban it. Something like stealth rock though, is inevitably controversial.

Though I am saying this in the context of moves (though it could be applied to pokemon as well), maybe we should be more hesitant of bans on things when there is a great deal of controversy.

I am also not too against the idea of nerfing a move's power with clauses, while I would agree with someone like Obi that Clauses have to be enforcible in game (like sleep clause).

What if we were to set a clause like: Stealth Rock can only be set up once per game

Suddenly, Rapid Spin might seem like a move that's actually viable.

 

[Tangerine]

Frankly, I am annoyed that we have to try to create word-definitions for whether moves (and pokemon I guess) are "broken" or not. You will not be able to do it, period. If a pokemon/move makes the game obviously unplayable, we should ban it-- but "how much is too much" is not something I feel we can descibe.

Can you drop this, really? It's very very annoying to see you come up every time and literally parrot points made in threads months and months ago and then literally tell us that attempting to even set the frameworks of what may be broken is futile and you would accept "I don't like Latias therefore it is uber" as a valid reasoning for it being "uber". Seriously. The point of the thread here or any of our attempts was to find working frameworks that people can use to better accentuate their points - not to draw a fine line on what is uber or not. We are attempting to create lenses for people so people can look at the metagame "more clearly" so their points are better expressed

It is very discouraging? annoying? to see your posts repeating your point every single time. It was never our purpose to draw a fine line nor will it ever be and just because we can't draw a fine line doesn't mean that we can't have people think about the metagame in more objective terms. We're not setting the bars here and we have made that clear many many times but these are things that people can use to argue "this may be a suspect" and to better explain to us "this is broken" etc. These are tools for the community to use not for us at PR to "make the decisions" because we made it clear by the suspect test that we are not drawing the line even though we are more than capable of drawing up a picture of our own ideal metagame and acting accordingly.

-----

ANYWAY, the purpose of this thread isn't to "just discuss" the viewpoints TVBoyCanti provided for us but also to provide frameworks for which we can justify claiming a move as "broken" - things to consider are Evasion (Double Team, Minimize), OHKO, "Stealth Rock" (It won't be tested, don't worry). This thread should try to explore how one can justify OHKOs/Evasions and the such and provide framework for people to comment with if there is ever a suspect test.

 

[Caelum]

Here is my shot at an "attempted" definition of when a move would be reasonable to ban or consider a suspect.

"A move can be considered "broken" if to counteract the effects of that move it limits a particular team to the point where it is not reasonably competitively viable otherwise if the move is not used."

Edit 2, Amendment to definition: Also, it's important to remember for my definition I'm speaking of a move that is available to a decent number of Pokemon (5 +, there is wiggle-room) and the effects of said move are independent of the Pokemon that uses them (this has some questionable boundaries). If Gengar were to get Nasty Plot and found "broken" it wouldn't be because the move Nasty Plot is broken, it would be because Gengar with Nasty Plot is broken and hence Gengar would be broken. This is applicable to Deoxys-S. Deoxys-S was largely banned because of the DSDS set (does anyone else call it that :/) but Reflect and Light Screen themselves are not banned because there effects on team building were not independent of the Pokemon in question (Deoxys-S).

A messy definition (I'll clean it up later lol) but let me give an example. Let's say that OHKOs moves were unbanned. Also, lets assume, that to counter-act the effects of OHKOes moves on a particular team you are forced to use several Pokemon with the ability Sturdy. A team consisting of several Pokemon with the ability Sturdy would not be competitively viable (look at the list of them) if OHKO moves are not being used in that match. The scenario I just described would be a case (remember it's a hypothetical, one that I think is at least reasonable, I'm not 100% saying that would happen if OHKO moves are unbanned) where a move (or class of moves technically) would be considered broken under the above definition.

Using my definition above, I would argue Stealth Rock is not broken since I feel you can still have a reasonably competitively viable team that is effective against both opponents that use Stealth Rock and those that do not use Stealth Rock. Maybe you disagree with my belief but I'm just giving working examples where my definition could be used.

That's my primary definition. I have some others I could throw out there but I feel they are lesser options and want some feedback on this idea first since I'm sure it has a few flaws (or maybe you disagree entirely heh).

Edit: Sorry for kind of hijacking the thread for my own idea :[

 

[Calciphoce]

The question is, Caelum, would it be better to ban a few moves on a Pokemon to "dumb it down" to a point of not being Uber or just forgo the whole thing and say the Pokemon themself is? Would Darkrai be OU if we took away Dark Void? It seems pointlessly tedious to try and test tons of moves to make a single Pokemon un-uber if you will, but I feel that testing with one or two moves banned from a Pokemon's movepool in OU could lead to a (supposedly) broaded metagame. Obviously this is heavy theorymon and Dark Void-less Darkrai could be even more centralizing, but my point remains.

I realize this is a bit repetetive of what other users have said, but I wanted to bring up this specific case to see what you guys think.

 

[Caelum]

My proposal exclusively deals with moves available to to a decent amount of Pokemon and so that discussion is outside what I was referring to but I'll engage you anyway Calciphoce.

The problem is Dark Void isn't the reason that Darkrai is uber. Dark Void is more the icing on the cake because Darkrai has the stats, move pool, and a ability to so effectively abuse it. Look at Smeargle, Smeargle with Dark Void isn't broken. If Dark Void was given to Gengar, it would not be broken. The move itself is not what is broken. It's the Pokemon using it so effectively that is broken. This is why I do not believe in banning individual moves on specific Pokemon. A move should only be banned if the effect of the move is independent of the user (within reason), as I stated above. If the moves efficacy or "brokenness" (for lack of more eloquent terms) is solely dependent on the user (in this case Darkrai), I feel that is the fault of the Pokemon.

Edit: And no, I don't believe in banning multiple moves from a Pokemon's move pool to "dumb it down" to standard because I believe that is not practically feasible and going down a path that won't get us anywhere.

 

[lilyhollow]

Can you rephrase? I don't understand half of this paragraph in context and I don't want to reply to a misunderstanding.

If one move "makes" several pokemon broken, it's still ambiguous as to whether the move or the Pokemon are at fault, as long as there are any other Pokemon with that same move that aren't broken. So even when every Pokemon in Ubers would be OU if we just banned Tail Whip, the fact that Rattata can use Tail Whip means that, from a purely technical standpoint, we can't say that the move itself is fully blamable. That said, banning Tail Whip obviously isn't that big of a deal, but we still need some sort of reason to do so besides "we're allowing more pixels in the game!" If an "Ubers minus Tail Whip" metagame was balanced, but still worse than OU, that's a pretty terrible situation when we didn't really have a good reason to take action in the first place. Obviously the other side to the coin is that "Ubers minus Tail Whip" is actually better than current OU, and then things start to make a little more sense.

But that basically means that "every time we don't know whether the Pokemon or the move is technically at fault, we should test both the move and the Pokemon as Suspects in isolation to see which metagame is better," which seems like a waste of time to me when banning, say, the three most powerful Trick users won't have a permanent adverse affect on the metagame, while still keeping that unique option in the game and adhering to precedent.

The question is, Caelum, would it be better to ban a few moves on a Pokemon to "dumb it down" to a point of not being Uber or just forgo the whole thing and say the Pokemon themself is? Would Darkrai be OU if we took away Dark Void? It seems pointlessly tedious to try and test tons of moves to make a single Pokemon un-uber if you will, but I feel that testing with one or two moves banned from a Pokemon's movepool in OU could lead to a (supposedly) broaded metagame. Obviously this is heavy theorymon and Dark Void-less Darkrai could be even more centralizing, but my point remains.

I realize this is a bit repetetive of what other users have said, but I wanted to bring up this specific case to see what you guys think.

Well now it looks like you're getting into banning "certain moves on certain Pokemon" which I don't really see as an option (for pretty much the same reasons I detailed above, with the added risk of causing our ruleset to become extremely overcomplicated). Well, basically what Caelum said I suppose.

A messy definition (I'll clean it up later lol) but let me give an example. Let's say that OHKOs moves were unbanned. Also, lets assume, that to counter-act the effects of OHKOes moves on a particular team you are forced to use several Pokemon with the ability Sturdy. A team consisting of several Pokemon with the ability Sturdy would not be competitively viable (look at the list of them) if OHKO moves are not being used in that match. The scenario I just described would be a case (remember it's a hypothetical, one that I think is at least reasonable, I'm not 100% saying that would happen if OHKO moves are unbanned) where a move (or class of moves technically) would be considered broken under the above definition.

But what if banning the top X OHKO users solved the problem? As long as that isn't the case, I would agree with your overall point, because it's basically saying "Sheer Cold Sealeo still does all of the same things that other OHKO users do to my team, without bringing any real redeeming strategic elements to the game, so let's ban it because you really have to overprepare for it and not just a number of Pokemon that happen to be able to use it," which makes sense.

 

[Caelum]

But what if banning the top X OHKO users solved the problem? As long as that isn't the case, I would agree with your overall point, because it's basically saying "Sheer Cold Sealeo still does all of the same things that other OHKO users do to my team, without bringing any real redeeming strategic elements to the game, so let's ban it because you really have to overprepare for it and not just a number of Pokemon that happen to be able to use it," which makes sense.

In my opinion, then you would ban the Pokemon that can effectively abuse the moves. If only one or two Pokemon can abuse the moves well, then that is the fault of the Pokemon not the move. Under my definition with this scenario, OHKO moves would not be banned and those Pokemon using them that are broken would be.

Also, I think in the case of OHKO moves this wouldn't apply since I feel due to the nature of them they can be used just as effectively regardless of the Pokemon (within reason - obviously Hippowdon using Fissure is better than Wormadam-G) and their effects are independent of the Pokemon using them.

 

[Chou Toshio]

Can you drop this, really? It's very very annoying to see you come up every time and literally parrot points made in threads months and months ago and then literally tell us that attempting to even set the frameworks of what may be broken is futile and you would accept "I don't like Latias therefore it is uber" as a valid reasoning for it being "uber". Seriously. The point of the thread here or any of our attempts was to find working frameworks that people can use to better accentuate their points - not to draw a fine line on what is uber or not. We are attempting to create lenses for people so people can look at the metagame "more clearly" so their points are better expressed

I don't ever once recall referring to "setting frameworks" to be "lenses of understanding" as futile.

It is very discouraging? annoying? to see your posts repeating your point every single time. It was never our purpose to draw a fine line nor will it ever be and just because we can't draw a fine line doesn't mean that we can't have people think about the metagame in more objective terms. We're not setting the bars here and we have made that clear many many times but these are things that people can use to argue "this may be a suspect" and to better explain to us "this is broken" etc. These are tools for the community to use not for us at PR to "make the decisions" because we made it clear by the suspect test that we are not drawing the line even though we are more than capable of drawing up a picture of our own ideal metagame and acting accordingly.

However, in that case the word "definition" is mis-leading. If you can't get the jargon right, you can't get the debate right either-- you'll just confuse people even more. Not saying you yourself are guilty of this Tangerine, but we as a community certainly are.

On the subject of "frameworks" that allow for better group comprehension/consensus of what makes a move worthy of banning or not, @OP--

1-- Luck, should we ban it or not? We got threads and threads of it going on right now, and I honestly don't have an answer better than the rest. I'd tend to agree with the things Obi says so. There's no point in "testing" something if you don't know what you are testing for. If there's a fundamental problem, we can fundamentally make a decision to ban it or not based on that. Beats me how we would do this.

2-- -- We have yet to ban anything move based simply on its risk/reward rate, right? Though we've opted to nerf all sleep moves with sleep clause. While the only other real potential example is Stealth Rock (though extremely controversial), I'd guess that if Explosion did not cause you to die, or belly drum did not cut your life in half, we would ban them. While a risk/reward example that is very clear does not exist, theoretical obviously "uber" moves could be imagined, in which case we should consider whether such an argument could be considered for moves that do exist. SR seems to be the only one worth question though. Even then, I'd be on the side for SR-- Flyers are just not fun without it. I'd be up for considering clauses to nerf SR though (as mentioned in my above post).

3-- I am not really in favor of altering a pokemon's movepool just to make it "Viable in OU." A pokemon's moveset is part of its inherent design as much as its base stats, typing ability. Where would Ninjask be without speed boost or Blissey without its base HP stat? Maybe we could bring Kyogre down if we swapped drizzle for swift swim and took off 30 points from each of its base stats. While these may seem much more drastic than taking dark void off of darkrai, I'd argue you're doing fundamentally the same thing.

I guess one could argue "but move banning can be enforced in game," but I mean Mewtwo might be OU if we forced it to have terrible IVs, a -speed nature, and carry macho brace. There's always ways to imagine rules that could nerf a pokemon/move/item that can be enforced in the game.

Inversely, I do think it's important to take in consideration what pokemon are using the move. I know blame game made a comment about minimize v. double team somewhere, and I'd be on the side that says that a move's potential "uberness" has to be considered with what pokemon can learn it. I think none of us would be all that happy with spore if it were azelf using it instead of breloom/smeargle.

If the move is carried by a lot of pokemon, and considered broken on all of them, then we could consider banning it as a move instead of from individual pokemon "to make them ou."

 

[Caelum]

I just wanted to clean up my definition and get more feedback on it :0

A move can be considered broken if it satisfies both of the following conditions under common battle conditions:

I: The usefulness, efficacy, and / or viability of the move is reasonably independent of the user.

II: For a player to counteract the effects of an opponent using a particular move (or class of moves) it is necessary to design his or her team such that it is not competitively viable if an opponent does not use the particular move (or class of moves) in question.

 

[Seven Deadly Sins]

That definition does seem like an effective one, though the main thing is that it doesn't actually have anything to do with the move's brokenness. By that definition, Stealth Rock would be broken, which is arguable for a number of reasons. So would stuff like Roar/Whirlwind, or healing moves, etc.

 

[MythTrainerInfinity]

Sorry for replying a bit late, but yeah what made it extremely difficult to debate for either side in the SR thread was there was no solid definition of what qualifies as a banhammer worthy attack, whereas everything is somewhat objetable.

I think Caelum has the best ideas of a bannable move though.

I just wanted to clean up my definition and get more feedback on it :0

A move can be considered broken if it satisfies both of the following conditions under common battle conditions:

I: The usefulness, efficacy, and / or viability of the move is reasonably independent of the user.

II: For a player to counteract the effects of an opponent using a particular move (or class of moves) it is necessary to design his or her team such that it is not competitively viable if an opponent does not use the particular move (or class of moves) in question.

Its good, but I agree with SDS it seems a little broad and could be interpreted in many ways. I is good, but II seems a little confusing...

In the case of Evasion and OHKO I think perhaps a third component (or have the second one expanded on a bit; condensed from TVboyCanti's first post in the thread) of something like:

A conscious effort to increase the reliance of luck with little or no drawback and / or significantly decreasing the skill in a battle.

People could say ParaFlinch Togekiss fits under this, but there is a drawback because it takes time to set up, but there's little to no drawback to firing off a Sheer Cold on a free turn.

Also, could some of these same definitions apply to held items too? (Ex. Brightpowder.) If we were to have a solid definition of having Double Team banned it could be argued that some of the some principles applied to Brightpowder. It doesn't seem right to ban Double Team and let Brightpowder be free to use. It might open another can o' worms, so I'll make a thread for the discusssion of items if it really deters from the intended discussion from this thread.

 

[Hipmonlee]

How do you increase luck with no drawback? Surely increasing luck is a drawback by itself.

I still think luck is irellevant in these discussions, for instance take OHKOs.

Alright, the problem with OHKOs is that if your opponent uses OHKOs, there is effectively no way to stop them except hope that they miss. The problem isnt the 30% accuracy, the problem is that there is no way to stop them (that is otherwise competitively viable). So yeah, luck is already being considered by his second requirement. Any luck that is easily counterable has never been banned before..

However I guess there is a centralisation aspect being missed here. Like perhaps you can counter OHKOs with a specific team that is effective in standard, but with no other team. Like, in advance a BP team would have no problems with OHKOers, but pretty much every other type of team would really struggle. In this scenario should OHKOs be banned?

Have a nice day.

 

[Caelum]

That definition does seem like an effective one, though the main thing is that it doesn't actually have anything to do with the move's brokenness. By that definition, Stealth Rock would be broken, which is arguable for a number of reasons. So would stuff like Roar/Whirlwind, or healing moves, etc.

I disagree. I think my definition captures a more subtle point of when a move is broken. My definition is essentially saying that "move X" (or class of moves) is so powerful and effective that for my team to sufficiently handle "move X" I must design it so it's not competitively viable to handle the rest of the metagame when "move X" isn't used. I think it's a testimony to how powerful "move X" is.

The definition is purposefully fairly vague but I actually believe my definition would say the opposite, that Stealth Rock isn't broken. Most of my teams are designed to account for Stealth Rock (I have a Spinnerw w/ a Pursuiter for Ghosts, I keep my SR weak in check etc etc etc); however, if I ran into a serious of teams that didn't use Stealth Rock my team would still be effective. The same is true of Roar / Whirlwind.



I'm not sure we really want to get into a definition such as "decreases skill"; I think that is getting into a more difficult area that is outside the scope of what we should and shouldn't be banning.

 

[Tangerine]

I'm not sure we really want to get into a definition such as "decreases skill"; I think that is getting into a more difficult area that is outside the scope of what we should and shouldn't be banning.

Exactly. Skill is an act of manipulating random variables to your favor. Saying that Double Team is "skill less" is a bit silly and extreme.

The issue with Caelum's definition is that - despite one move being Broken, you have 23 other moveslots to use. There will be variety either way.

My proposal for banning moves is the same justification as banning pokemon - a move is "broken" if it allows a significant number of Pokemon to break the clauses of uber under standard conditions. The significant number of Pokemon is to be debated - should we ban one move to make two Pokemon "not broken"?

I think this is the best lead we have on banning moves. Sword Dance won't be banned for the sake of Garchomp - neither will "Yache Berry" - as far as we know so far Garchomp was the only one to abuse these items to the point of it being uber. It was Deoxys' speed and access to other support moves that made it broken - not "taunt" and "double screen". Such as encore being broken when used in tandem with Wobbuffet (arguable).

I think it is bullshit that we even consider pokemon that will never use the move, or never be able to compete in standard play as an "excuse" to not ban the move. Should we not ban Double Team because there are certain Pokemon who can never use it efficiently and will still be inefficient even with Double Team? No. The Problematic Theorymon OHKO users were things such as Gliscor and Lapras - not Seaking. Then again there's a lot of hypocricy in people arguing such arguments anyway.

Not that I'm actually for/against testing Draco Meteor or Outrage or Stealth Rock or anything - but I think we need to seriously sit down and "complete" this so we can have grounds if people do want to discuss it without people filling it out with "I disagree with the notion of banning moves so this thread is dumb" comments.

 

[X-Act]

The problem isnt the 30% accuracy, the problem is that there is no way to stop them (that is otherwise competitively viable).

Substitute is competitively viable and is already used quite a lot.