On the Radar - Arena Trap

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Hello everyone,

now that the PRC thread about separating CAP tiering from OU has concluded, it's time we address the issue of Arena Trap. Throughout the past few months, it has been brought to the CAP council's attention that this ability is problematic within the current metagame. Dugtrio in particular is problematic, as it can take care of basically all the checks to common, fast offensive Fairy-types like Jumbao and Kerfluffle, such as Mollux, Toxapex, and Equilibra very reliably. This has led to the metagame centralizing almost purely around removing Fairy-type checks and offensive Fairy-types; whoever manages to trap the Fairy-type check first, gains a massive upper hand and will almost always win. An example of the way Arena Trap warps the entire metagame is how Mollux is now forced to run Shed Shell to avoid being trapped, which leaves it much more vulnerable to being worn down by residual damage, making it much less reliable. Such centralization is not something we want to encourage within the metagame.

The reason we will be targeting Arena Trap rather than Dugtrio, if action is taken at all, is because throughout the generations, Diglett and Trapinch have proven time and time again to be serviceable replacements for Dugtrio, meaning that banning Dugtrio would not take care of the issue at hand.

Use this thread to voice your opinion on Arena Trap.
 
I'd like to support a quickban on Arena Trap.

Arena Trap's a massive issue within the current metagame. As the OP states, Fairy-types are very hard to deal with in the current metagame, which can mostly be attributed to Dugtrio and Arena Trap as an extension of that.

On top of just how oppressing it is in games, its strain on teambuilding by forcing Pokemon such as Mollux, Clefable, and Toxapex to run a suboptimal item in Shed Shell is also not a healthy influence on the metagame. In a similar vein, many people have been forced into running Aegislash and Jellicent to keep Fairy-type + Dugtrio cores in check. Of course, Aegislash is by no means a bad Pokemon, but I'd much rather focus on Jellicent a little. Jellicent's forced to run a specially defensive spread to keep Fairy-types like Kerfluffle in check, leaving it unable to check Dracovish, which is often what's desired from a Pokemon immune to Water such as Jellicent. All of this has made building in the CAP metagame very awkward and linear, and Dugtrio's the culprit of it.

I don't want to keep reiterating the OP as I feel it touches on what makes Arena Trap an issue very well. However, I would like to go a little further in-depth on why I support a quickban rather than a suspect test which we can technically do thanks to our new policy. Because of time constraints, mostly placed by the process of CAP27, it's incredibly important that we take care of this issue in the metagame rather soon, as it is bound to have a massive influence on the process. I think we should handle Arena Trap before the end of Concept Submissions. I'd love to hear what other people think of Arena Trap and their take on how we should handle.
 
I agree with what Jordy has to say. I can't say that I have played a large amount of the SS Cap metagame, but Arena Trap is consistently a busted ability and having the matter sorted out before CAP 27 progresses too much further will be very helpful for the concept assessment. Removing Arena Trap and subsequently Dug I think will lead to much larger team diversity.
 
I played a fair bit of SwSh CAP in the holiday bash, and my conclusions there were essentially that any match where Dugtrio was used came down to whether the opposing player heavily cteamed trio (eg shed shell Mollux + Trace Jumbao), or, if they didn't, whether they could withstand losing any mons in trapping range (they often couldn't). The incredibly matchup-based metagame that Dugtrio has created is harmful and curtails team diversity by forcing a small selection of Fairy-resists that cannot be trapped (Corviknight, a mon that requires secondary support, Shed Shell Mollux, or Aegislash, a mon that dies to Jumbao's Shadow Ball). As such I support a Dugtrio ban or suspect test.
 
There are multiple fairy-resists that don’t get trapped that have not been brought up yet, such as Chandelure, Gengar, Cawmodore, Kitsunoh, Rotom-H, and a few others. Many of these mons have a lot of potential imo, especially Lure.
 
13electrode13 said:
There are multiple fairy-resists that don’t get trapped that have not been brought up yet, such as Chandelure, Gengar, Cawmodore, Kitsunoh, Rotom-H, and a few others. Many of these mons have a lot of potential imo, especially Lure.
Click to expand...

This may be true, but Kerfluffle and Jumbao don't particularly mind these Pokemon that much. For Kerfluffle, which runs this set:

Kerfluffle @ Life Orb
Ability: Natural Cure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Sludge Wave
- Parting Shot

252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Chandelure: 101-120 (38.6 - 45.9%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Moonblast vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Gengar: 117-139 (44.6 - 53%) -- 28.1% chance to 2HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Cawmodore: 298-351 (123.6 - 145.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kitsunoh: 110-131 (36.5 - 43.5%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-Heat: 220-261 (72.6 - 86.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
252 SpA Life Orb Kerfluffle Moonblast vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-Heat: 87-104 (28.7 - 34.3%) -- 1.9% chance to 3HKO

Note how Kerfluffle can chunk pretty much all of these on the switch-in (notably Moonblast + Focus Blast achieves at minimum a KO on HP-invested Rotom-H, meaning it'll have to run heavy SpDef investment to be safe (even then it's not that safe). Also, Kerfluffle can just Parting Shot out of all of these Pokemon. In the case of Chandelure, Gengar, and Kitsunoh, Dugtrio STILL threatens to OHKO them with Earthquake assuming they aren't Choice Scarf sets.

For Jumbao,

Jumbao @ Life Orb
Ability: Trace
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Moonblast
- Focus Blast
- Shadow Ball
- Synthesis

252 SpA Life Orb Jumbao Shadow Ball vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Chandelure: 239-283 (91.5 - 108.4%) -- 50% chance to OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Jumbao Shadow Ball vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Gengar: 278-330 (106.1 - 125.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Jumbao Focus Blast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Cawmodore: 209-247 (86.7 - 102.4%) -- 18.8% chance to OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Jumbao Shadow Ball vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kitsunoh: 265-312 (88 - 103.6%) -- 25% chance to OHKO

252 SpA Life Orb Jumbao Focus Blast vs. 248 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-Heat: 155-183 (51.1 - 60.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Jumbao can also chunk down these checks pretty well too. Trace can switch into Flash Fire Chandelure too if it feels particularly brave.

Now, while I've been focusing on these Fairy-types and their strength, what's more important is that these Fairy-types currently lack proper checks because the good, reliable checks are all stuffed by Dugtrio. Namely Mollux, Bulletproof Equilibra (which is necessary to block Focus Blast), Toxapex, Sylveon, and Clefable are all stuffed by Choice Band Dugtrio (or forced to run Shed Shell which is really dumb). Kerfluffle and Jumbao may be strong Pokemon that have ways around their checks, but there's no way we should force teams to run these flimsier checks (that sort of get run over by Kerfluffle and Jumbao anyway) just because Dugtrio can trap all the good checks. They should have to play like every other Pokemon in the metagame and be placed in strategic cores that require skillful play that wear down mutual checks.

The metagame will be leagues healthier than it is now with an Arena Trap ban, so I, speaking as an individual player and not a council member in this instance, support a quickban. Every generation there seems to be a discussion in OU about whether or not trapping is healthy or not. Now that we have our own banlist, it's my personal opinion that we just cut to the chase and quickban Arena Trap when it's an even larger issue for us.

edit: oops ban Arena Trap as a whole not just Dugtrio, Diglett and Trapinch can work just fine if you want them too - mechanic is broken
 
First off, Im really happy that CAP has separated itself from OU. This gives the community way more control over the format which I love.
Second, its about time we address the 3 headed mole in the format. And based on my experience with CAP, I support at least a suspect test if not the banning of Dugtrio/Arena Trap.

As others have said right now, offensive fairy types are huge threats in the meta and a good part of their effectiveness is Dug since Dug traps and removes the checks to fairies like Mollux. The fact that :Mollux: (among other Pokemon) run Shed Shell just to evade Dug hurts since those Pokemon really want to use other held items. An example of this is :Mollux: who really wants Heavy-Duty-Boots to decrease the amount of residual damage it takes from hazards. But the biggest issue I have with :Dugtrio: is how it hurts team building/diversity. Your fairy checks need to be unable to be trapped by Dug and there are not a lot of those and Dug+Fairy pressure is really overcentralizing to team building. My usual opinion is to suspect test things when they create an overcentralized metagame because an over centralized meta is a boring meta. I personally don't like quick banning things because I like there to be sufficient data to be present to make an educated opinion (which is why I do not support the quick ban of Melmetal), but I think there has been enough time with :Dugtrio: for me to take a fairly solid stance.
 
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