Philosophical Approaches to the Metagame - a Discussion Resource

[jpw234]

Philosophical Approaches to the Metagame​

NOTE: This post was only made after consultation with the OU mods. The moderators were justifiably worried that this post would attract terrible posters and lead to bad discussion. The decision that was reached was that the post would be allowed, but subject to heavy moderation. INFRACTIONS AND DELETIONS WILL BE HANDED OUT FOR BAD POSTS. Please do not make this necessary.

"People sometimes forget that WE ARE THE GAME MAKER, when it comes to the metagame. The metagame is not owned by Gamefreak or Nintendo, it is owned and manufactured by us. Not, "us" as in Smogon specifically; but "us" as in the collective players of competitive Pokemon. We make this metagame, and as such, we should probably have a solid idea of what kind of game we want. You can't write a good story without making a good plot. By the same token, you can't make a good metagame without knowing the general end result you are trying to achieve."
- DougJustDoug

"Actually, the question is not "which is more important", the question is "which should be more valued (by the community)".
ie. As a community, which should we try to emphasize/foster?
If we are going to build a metagame (with bans), is it better to build a metagame that:
a) Supports team building-- by having a great diversity of threats, you give people more team building options AND FORCE THEM to deal with a greater number of threats in team building. Great meta diversity puts emphasis on team building skills.
b) Supports in-game decision making-- by having a lower diversity of threats (fewer threats), you allow people to be more educated about what their opponent can use. You also take the pressure off their team building skills (they don't have to be as prepared for as many threats), and lower the chance of losing "because of bad team match up.""
- Chou Toshio​

Introduction

Hi all, this is jpw234 and I’m going to use this post to discuss a subject very important to our metagame. To begin, I want to hypothesize that the troubles we’ve experienced during our Gen V banning process have resulted mostly from a schizophrenic community that, from my view, has trouble deciding exactly what it wants from our metagame – which DougJustDoug accurately predicted would be detrimental to creating a good battling environment. This post attempts to remedy this by analyzing our community debates and identifying the foundational concepts at issue in our discussions.

As Chou Toshio states, the core issue for our suspect discussions is generally a difference between those who primarily value team-building (who I call “teambuilders”) and those who value in-game decision making (who I call “battlers”). Understanding this binary, its relevance and arguments attached to it will go a long way toward improving site-wide discourse on suspects. This issue is subjective. The divide between the two factions may be impassable. However, I believe that an increased understanding of the issue will only help rational discussion and increase the quality of our community dialogue.

Goals of this Post

As to this post, I will be defending the teambuilder’s side of Chou Toshio’s divide. The motivation for this comprehensive “treatise” is to create a foundation for like-minded individuals which can be referenced as grounding for arguments across all future suspect discussions. In recent such threads I have noticed teambuilders who can’t concisely express their views because of the ambiguity involved. Here’s an example from a respected user:

"...I don't really find Landorus-I broken in a power sense. Alone, it has its checks and counters, and while its powerful, if im honest I find it hard to declare it "OP" in that its not typically something that is obviously too strong for OU (unlike something like Tornadus-T for instance). I guess If we wanted to get technical, then yes, id be voting to ban it because technically I would currently be considering it "unhealthy for the Metagame" but I always hated those terms so im sorta stuck."
- ginganinja

I sympathize with ginganinja. I didn’t find Lando-I massively overpowered like a Blaziken or Shaymin-S. The notion of “unhealthy for the metagame” is powerful in the minds of teambuilders but often difficult to express. Hopefully here I can provide background for the arguments teambuilders generally deploy and create an anchor point that can be referred to by any user looking for understanding of them. A centralized resource that pre-outlines key arguments goes a long way toward improving clarity and, therefore, discussion.

(note – this thread is NOT about any specific suspect. It is about the underlying rationales that create opinions on specific suspects, rather than any particular cases)

Investigating the Split Between "Teambuilders" and "Battlers"

I will now attempt to tease out the nature of this divide and display quotes to indicate how these two philosophies are expressed in recent suspect tests.

Typically teambuilders appeal to a suspect’s unhealthy effects on the metagame. They note limited numbers of checks/counters to a pokemon and are persuaded when a suspect can get around its checks/counters with different movesets. Versatility is a common tipping point for the teambuilder. In general, they favor more bans and have a lower threshold for banning.

The teambuilder’s metagame pursues diversity and aims to increase the pool of viable pokemon by banning “overcentralizing” threats. It is characterized by a smaller number of top-tier threats.

Battlers usually point to the existence of hard counters and checks, as well as styles which can manage a suspect. If the suspect is not unmanageable they are typically unconvinced that a ban is necessary. They typically only support bans to pokemon who fit the “OP” that ginganinja described above – obviously too strong for the metagame.

The battler’s metagame pursues as few bans as possible and more top-tier threats. It accepts some centralization to make the metagame more predictable and less chaotic, to maximize the relevance of battling skill.

Here are some specific quotes from both sides coming from the Keldeo and Lando-I suspect discussions, all from great users.

Lando-I battler: "Since when did we start banning pokemon when they weren't broken by themselves (In BW OU)? (Bar simple support like Stealth rock support or weather, since those are easily utilized). Excadrill was broken because it only had one to two counters, Blaziken because it was virtually unwalled and had 4MSS that could take on most of all its counters after +2, Deo-S since you didn't know if was screens, LO, or hazard stacking, and so fourth.
Landorus-I is not broken by itself. Even when utilizing U-turn, Gengar can still wall it; Latias, Latios and Celebi (depending on spread) can arguably recover the damage off, Scarf Keldeo is an excellent way to RK it and check it, SpD Jellicent can manage it, Chansey can manage it, and many other Pokemon can outright outspeed it and kill it."
- Shurtugal

Lando-I teambuilder: "It is reasonable to just try to outplay them or use them yourself, but look at the spectrum of defense and offense in other metagames. When you're dealing with them using methods of "run 6 weird mons that are faster" or "just use offense" (obviously this is a simplification but the point is clear), the play of the metagame gets stale. There's no where near an even distribution of teams between Hard Stall on one end and Full Heavy Offense on the other, the right side of the teeter-tooter is going through the ground by people obeying their competitive interests."
- yee

Keldeo battler: "Keldeo is a very good mon, sure, but it also plays an important role in the metagame. Not only that, but its usual checks/counters are still good Pokemon regardless of Keldeo's existence, and its not putting a strain to our teambuilding the way Landorus did. Jellicent is still the best spinblocker in the game; Lati@s, Celebi, Amoonguss/Roserade are good checks to Breloom and other fighting types; Starmie and Tentacruel spins; physically defensive Gastrodon handles Rotom-W and numerous rain and physical threats; Toxicroak is still a solid rain sweeper, and so on."
- gr8astard

Keldeo teambuilder: "My thought on Keldeo is, as it has been for a couple months now, that it's unhealthy for the meta and needs to go. People who throw around comments like "Just learn to check it. If you're keldeo weak, you're just not building good teams, etc." are being silly. You're forced into selecting from a small pool of defensive checks (that Keldeo can still pressure very effectively) or it's going to really open you up. No one is saying that you can't play around it, because that simply isn't true. It's rare to encounter a team that is utterly demolished by it because everyone is forced to run one of its checks specifically for Keldeo. I don't expect much to be said that hasn't already been said in the original thread, so I doubt I'll be convinced that it isn't banworthy. Can't wait to get rid of it."
- Lady Alex

The influence of the two philosophies is evident. Shurtugal points to the existence of counters and that Lando-I was not as broken as previous “obviously OP” bans. yee fears that Lando-I forces narrow team archetypes and tips the scales against several styles, creating staleness. For Keldeo, gr8astard notes popular pokemon that can counter Keldeo while performing other roles. Lady Alex, on the other hand, dislikes the constrained pool of counters and the resultant centralization. These are all easily traced to the above characteristics of teambuilders and battlers.

Criterion for Judgement: Promoting Skill and Fun

There are two factors that should guide our decision between philosophies: skill and fun.

Maximizing skill is a necessity. Without skill, “competitive pokemon” would be meaningless. No great battlers could break away from the masses.

Maximizing fun is a necessity. Without fun, nobody would play this game and our community would die.

The philosophy which best promotes these two factors is objectively preferable.

Investigating Skill: Which Philosophy Lets the Best Rise to the Top?

The Battler’s Appeal to In-Game Decisionmaking, and the Teambuilder’s Response

The typical battler’s argument regarding skill is that in-game decisionmaking is the most skillful thing about pokemon. Prediction and bluffing are the manifestation of skill and what we should seek to maximize. Teambuilders hurt this because their metagame, with a large number of threats, creates a situation where most battles are decided by team matchup. In contrast, the battler’s metagame, with its smaller set of centralized threats, is more predictable, allowing battling skill to shine through. I have done my best to accurately represent this line of argument without strawmanning it.

There are many flaws here. Most central is the claim that the teambuilder’s metagame will cause team matchup to decide battles. The implicit assumption made is that the wide variety of threats will make it impossible for a team to cover all of them so that even top teams will have large vulnerabilities. I will explain why this is not the case.

This inaccurately presumes that threats in the teambuilder’s metagame would be as dangerous as current threats, which is unsubstantiated. The larger diversity of threats means each threat is smaller. Unlike Keldeo or Genesect who can 6-0 a team without counters in place, the new threats that would emerge from lower tiers would not be all-or-nothing gamebreakers. They would be specialized, niche threats that had potential to do small amounts of extra damage with tiny windows of opportunity. It stands to reason that a good teambuilder will cover top-tier threats like Terrakion or Garchomp no matter how many threats there are. If there were other similarly threatening pokemon, they should already be viable. It does not make sense that with several more bans there would suddenly exist 20+ pokemon who require a hard counter to be safe from, as with Keldeo, Landorus, Terrakion, Volcarona, etc.

This argument turns against the battler because the existence of niche threats creates more opportunities for battling skill. New threats will not be able to blast through large portions of the meta. They will have to pick their spots and be carefully planned to be effective. This incentivizes smart battling.

Additionally, top-tier battlers must be competitive in the long run. A team reliant on team matchup is necessarily coinflippy and will average out to a 50/50 record, which is not conducive to sustained success. There is a competitive incentive to build teams able to handle as much of the metagame as possible, and competitive battlers will rise to this challenge.

Finally, the battler’s smaller number of threats hurts skill in the long run because the metagame gets “figured out”. In this situation, in-game scenarios between top pokemon become routine which minimizes the ability of prediction to swing battles. Here, “prediction” ceases to exist, and 50/50 plays with blind guesswork become standard, which rewards luck over skill. The teambuilder’s diverse metagame will be resilient to “figuring out”, avoiding this situation.

Teambuilding Skill: the Second Factor

The battler relies on in-game battling skill, which we have already discussed. Another form of skill is the ability to create a metagame-defining team. The battler’s philosophy can’t access this because their metagame tends toward centralization, which devalues teambuilding as there are fewer options to choose from. Look to the current metagame’s stagnation and lack of unique teams as an example of this. In contrast, the teambuilder’s metagame has a great diversity of threats and viable pokemon. This makes innovative strategies possible in the long run, allowing for the best team builders to rise to the top by constantly shaping the metagame.

I would additionally argue that teambuilding skill is preferable to battling skill. Regardless of how we marvel over prediction skills, it’s ultimately educated guesswork mixed with an intuitive understanding of psychology. It can’t be relied on as a consistent barometer of skill. In contrast, a great teambuilder will be able to consistently have solid teams that beat his opponents over a long period of time. A random Smogonite might beat a top battler in an individual game with the same team, but if the battlers have to make their own teams, the good one is likely to win.

One retort worth addressing is that teams can be copied, nullifying the advantage of teambuilding skill. There are several responses. First, the non-copyable nature of battling skill supports the argument that it isn’t skill, as skill can be learned. Second, the diverse metagame of the teambuilder means that even if copycats steal a team good teambuilders can stay ahead of the curve with new innovations. Copycatting is not sustainable, teambuilding skill is.

Investigating Fun: Which Philosophy Creates the Most Enjoyable Battling Experience?

Fun as Derived from Individual Battles

Typically the battler’s reasons for his metagame being the most fun rely on the unpredictable and exciting nature of individual battles. From this perspective, the importance of in-game decisionmaking is most exciting because each battle comes down to several high-tension moments: outstanding predictions, pivotal switches, etc. The teambuilding philosophy is seen as less fun because battles are boring affairs largely determined by team matchup. Again, I don’t believe this to be a strawman.

Note that this argument relies on the assumption that the teambuilder’s metagame is overreliant on team matchup, an assertion which I have comprehensively addressed above. Applying that analysis here: since the teambuilder’s metagame incentivizes well-balanced teams (in the sense of covering the spectrum of threats, not HO vs. stall) there exists great potential for fun and exciting battles.

There is a strong argument that the battler’s metagame won’t be fun at all. The centralized nature of this metagame is prone to stagnation and the proliferation of very similar teams (see: today’s meta). Individual battles become predictable and generally reliant on coinflip decisionmaking, which is more vulnerable to “hax” and creates weaknesses to sub-optimal play. This is not fun; anybody who has been haxed or beaten by a bad player making nonsensical moves can attest to this. In the long run, the battler’s metagame gets boring.

On the flip side, the teambuilder’s metagame stays fresh over the long term. Creative new threats and team archetypes avoid stagnation and keep battles exciting. I argue that this would be far more fun that a battler’s centralized metagame in the long run.

An Additional Argument: Fun as Derived from Teambuilding

An extra benefit of the teambuilder’s perspective is the fun gained from creating your own, unique team or discovering innovative sets. In the battler’s metagame this is difficult because top level play is optimized. Any innovations that occur are either quickly assimilated (ex. NastyPass Celebi) or quickly discarded (ex. Shell Smash Cloyster).

In the teambuilder’s metagame you can have fun creating your own team. This is more of a personal preference, but I get the most fun in pokemon from creating my own team which isn’t standard and is still competitive. This is difficult in the battler’s metagame. An additional advantage of the teambuilder is that there is more space for “fringe” styles and sets which are not standard, but not unviable, because the top-tier threats are less overwhelming. Ultimately, this keeps the teambuilder’s metagame fresh and exciting over the long haul.

Conclusion: Looking Back, Looking Ahead

Gen V is almost over. Pokemon X/Y are almost here. Some consider BW1/2 to have been outstanding metagames, some lost causes, most see positives and negatives. Regardless of how you view the metagame, we should all agree to learn from it and use our experiences to help us as we move into Gen VI, which will bring unique new challenges. Understanding the fundamental debate that underlies our tiering discussions will ensure healthy discussion and improve banning policies. No matter which philosophy you ascribe to, I hope this post clears up the core contentions of both factions and makes you more confident in your ability to argue your position.

Please, discuss below.

(note – in order to avoid cluttering the thread, if you have a question or issue with a small detail, please PM me)
(note – if I quoted you and you feel like I did so out of context or in a manner that doesn’t represent your views, PLEASE PM me with your concerns)

 

[Potential]

Well and--it seems to me--thoroughly argued (though I suppose that might be because my opinions lie mostly in the same direction). I haven't been keeping up with battling much this generation since after early BW1, so perhaps I can take this purely philosophically. I think this is an accurate diagnosis of the rift between banning paradigms, and it certainly seems to make thinking about banning clearer for me, for whatever that's worth.

To expand upon the preference to teambuilding over battling as defined above, or perhaps just to put it in different words, one might say that teambuilding is a requisite skill to battling. Fundamentally, in a Pokémon game, you have to first build a team, then battle with it. Because of this particular flow, that teambuilding is in some sense in a tier above battling, it is possible to value directly teambuilding over battling, and the skill involved in the former will "trickle down" to the latter. I think it's clear that going the other way does not work similarly. So, based on the reasoning in the Investigating Skill section, I think it's valid to describe the two components this way.

Another thought, in a different direction, is a (perhaps subconscious) anti-ban argument based on fun. One thing that is important in the game, even one that I believe GameFreak intentionally designed to be important to Pokémon games (I'm just noting this, as it's increasingly clear to me with all the pre-release information on X/Y, but obviously not using GameFreak's intentions as a primary argument), is the fun value of individual Pokémon. By banning particular Pokémon, you entirely eliminate the fun they can bring to OU as individuals, and it's not clear that the additional Pokémon their banning allows into the metagame compensate for that loss of potential fun. I suppose you could call this a "battler's" argument, since what I'm focusing on is the fun of using a particular Pokémon in battle, using its unique combination of moves etc.

 

[Jukain]

I think about banning from a battler's perspective, and would like to provide arguments against your assertions about the battler's side. I will use '' around some words because the definitions for them are opinionated and vary among users.

First, let me begin by stating my own personal beliefs. I believe in a diverse metagame that is centered around a certain manageable number of archetypes and a somewhat limited number of sets. This metagame has rain HO, weatherless (usually suicide hazard lead) HO, sun bulky offense, rain bulky offense, sand bulky offense, weatherless balance, rain balance, sand balance, sand stall, Cresselia sun stall, and rain stall as its main playstyles. Now, give or take one or two, this is a perfect list. There are many, many threats viable between these playstyles -- the surprises I find each battle are what make this game interesting; however, I can manage most if not all of these threats on one team thanks to general archetype checks. Bluffs and unique sets exist among the limited threats, which I find more 'fun' (which as you stated is a core value, though it is vaguely defined). I believe that in-game decision making is supremely important, and think good play should be essential to victory. I do not think that team match-up is a real concern or issue, as I have seen supposedly 'bad' team match-ups turn out in favor of the purportedly 'disadvantaged' player thanks to good play. No match's outcome is decided entirely at Team Preview.

The team match-up 'issue' in all honesty stems from the teambuilder's point of view. A teambuilder will quickly identify archetypes and provide a quick answer of which player will win the battle. I don't think this is truthfully possible. Take, for example, Meru stall. Meru stall, if you're unaware, is defensive Hippowdon / speedy, slightly less bulky Roserade / defensive Skarmory / CB Stoutland / defensive Jellicent / SubCM Latias. A teambuilder would say that on paper, this team auto-loses to Kyurem-B thanks to its coverage allowing it to destroy every member of the team -- theoretically. However, from the battler's perspective, one could reasonably say that this team can play around physical variants with ease thanks to Hippowdon. Mixed with Ice Beam (most of them, admittedly) is obviously more difficult to deal with. I'd say that the team can pivot between Latias, Jellicent, and Skarmory, as well as utilize its two phazers with hazards and Stoutland to handle it to some extent. The team will have trouble, but will not auto-lose.

Sand stall and stall in general can run adaptions like a speedier Jirachi to handle Kyurem-B better. Personally, I've been running 252 HP / 144 SDef / 112 Spd Jolly on Jirachi to better handle Kyurem-B. I can still take special hits reasonably well (Latios/Latias are still countered, except for DD Latios). This outruns max Speed Kyurem-B, which will often try to Earth Power you. You can Iron Head for 60-70% percent, which is a kill after stall's hazards. I find this an excellent countermeasure to Kyurem-B. Prediction goes both ways and etc., but for the record:

252+ SpA Kyurem-B Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 144 SpD Jirachi: 178-210 (44.05 - 51.98%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

You might ask why I went through that admittedly convoluted set of points defending Kyurem-B's place in OU -- after all, this is not a Kyurem-B suspect thread. I also will not pretend to be an expert on the matter. However, my point is that teams can make adaptions that put them in a fair position against team types with an 'advantage'. I think this term only comes from the teambuilder side.

I want to take a point from PttP on IRC; no one complained about team match-up in BW1. People complain about team match-up from time-to-time in every metagame that exists. I find such accusations that 'battles in this metagame is decided at the team match-up' incorrect, and my analogy to Kyurem-B explains my reasoning, pretty much.

The typical battler’s argument regarding skill is that in-game decisionmaking is the most skillful thing about pokemon. Prediction and bluffing are the manifestation of skill and what we should seek to maximize. Teambuilders hurt this because their metagame, with a large number of threats, creates a situation where most battles are decided by team matchup. In contrast, the battler’s metagame, with its smaller set of centralized threats, is more predictable, allowing battling skill to shine through. I have done my best to accurately represent this line of argument without strawmanning it.

There are many flaws here. Most central is the claim that the teambuilder’s metagame will cause team matchup to decide battles. The implicit assumption made is that the wide variety of threats will make it impossible for a team to cover all of them so that even top teams will have large vulnerabilities. I will explain why this is not the case.

This inaccurately presumes that threats in the teambuilder’s metagame would be as dangerous as current threats, which is unsubstantiated. The larger diversity of threats means each threat is smaller. Unlike Keldeo or Genesect who can 6-0 a team without counters in place, the new threats that would emerge from lower tiers would not be all-or-nothing gamebreakers. They would be specialized, niche threats that had potential to do small amounts of extra damage with tiny windows of opportunity. It stands to reason that a good teambuilder will cover top-tier threats like Terrakion or Garchomp no matter how many threats there are. If there were other similarly threatening pokemon, they should already be viable. It does not make sense that with several more bans there would suddenly exist 20+ pokemon who require a hard counter to be safe from, as with Keldeo, Landorus, Terrakion, Volcarona, etc.

This argument turns against the battler because the existence of niche threats creates more opportunities for battling skill. New threats will not be able to blast through large portions of the meta. They will have to pick their spots and be carefully planned to be effective. This incentivizes smart battling.

I spot a couple flaws with this argument, at least from my perspective.

Your first paragraph does an excellent job representing the in-game decision-making argument...except that you mention nothing about the real values. The valued things are properly using risk/reward to make your moves, and making strategic moves that contribute to some sort of goal, as well as creating goals throughout the battle that create a win condition. These things are the epitome of skill, at least in my opinion. Prediction and bluffing come secondary. Speaking of which, I want to touch on prediction. Prediction is over-glorified. Many top players have commented on this in suspect threads, and I am inclined to agree with it. 50/50's are rare situations in Pokemon, as risk/reward should guide you to the correct move in almost all scenarios.

I disagree that the existence of niche threats inherently creates more opportunities for battling skill any moreso than, say, bluffing. Bluffing takes quite a bit of skill to pull off, and can change games when done correctly. You have to lure the Pokemon in AND ensure the opponent doesn't think you have whatever you're bluffing. Let's just say, for instance, that Celebi comes in on my Hidden Power Bug Expert Belt Keldeo. I need to switch to something that can handle Celebi the first time. Heck, I can even pull a switch out, as risk/reward would cause any opponent with a decent level of skill to send in Celebi, at least provided I don't have a Pursuit user. Making this play will convince my opponent that I don't have the move. However, a good player will still be wary, so I have to make the technically 'disadvantageous play' multiple times, simply because I want to lure in and kill Celebi at some point so I can smash apart my opponent's team. I am making smarter plays, at least I think, than getting 'windows of opportunity', which are essentially 'trap its counters' and 'U-turn/Volt Switch it in or bring it in after a kill'. Finding windows of opportunity comes down to no more than battering down the opposing team and letting something die in order for it to get in. The difference with niche threats, in my opinion, is that they usually only have one set that they can use to be viable. This makes many of these niche Pokemon, while unexpected in typical play, fairly predictable when you do see them. For example, I don't account for Sharpedo on my typical team. However, I know that it will be running some variant on Aqua Jet / Ice Beam or Ice Fang / Waterfall / Crunch in pretty much every case, as otherwise Sharpedo is almost completely unviable.

Since bluffs are inherently unpredictable, I find that greater diversity of threats =/= more creativity. Innovations like Trick + Flame Orb Latias, Flying Gem Acrobatics Scizor, and Normal Gem Double-Edge Gyarados challenge perceptions of checks and counters. These go against the standard, and are even MORE effective and rewarding to play with than some niche threat because everyone knows what they usually run. Since niche threats typically lack diversity in their movesets, they are more predictable. A knowledgeable battler knows the possible sets of every viable Pokemon. This makes bluffs and niche sets BETTER for the teambuilder's goals. The teams you like building that challenge the standard incorporate these types of sets, which are ideal in a battler's metagame. A battler's team has Pokemon with sets that challenge the standard, as his or her values will compel him or her to use said.

I just want to make a note -- I am not contradicting my point that bluffs are secondary. Bluffs refer to, as I have stated, gimmicky and creative sets as a whole, and not just those one-off lure and kill sets.

In conclusion, team match-up is a poor argument against that teambuilder's ideal metagame. However, in ignoring the diversity of individual threats and over-glorifying the unpreparedness for niche threats, you ignore a huge part of the metagame, from what I see. Thanks for reading, and I hope this gives you a better insight on the battler's point of view.

 

[jpw234]

Thank you for a very in-depth post, Jukain. This is the type of thing I was hoping would occur, where both sides could articulate their fundamental viewpoints so that anybody can be helped by this thread.

The team match-up 'issue' in all honesty stems from the teambuilder's point of view. A teambuilder will quickly identify archetypes and provide a quick answer of which player will win the battle. I don't think this is truthfully possible. Take, for example, Meru stall. Meru stall, if you're unaware, is defensive Hippowdon / speedy, slightly less bulky Roserade / defensive Skarmory / CB Stoutland / defensive Jellicent / SubCM Latias. A teambuilder would say that on paper, this team auto-loses to Kyurem-B thanks to its coverage allowing it to destroy every member of the team -- theoretically. However, from the battler's perspective, one could reasonably say that this team can play around physical variants with ease thanks to Hippowdon. Mixed with Ice Beam (most of them, admittedly) is obviously more difficult to deal with. I'd say that the team can pivot between Latias, Jellicent, and Skarmory, as well as utilize its two phazers with hazards and Stoutland to handle it to some extent. The team will have trouble, but will not auto-lose.

Sand stall and stall in general can run adaptions like a speedier Jirachi to handle Kyurem-B better. Personally, I've been running 252 HP / 144 SDef / 112 Spd Jolly on Jirachi to better handle Kyurem-B. I can still take special hits reasonably well (Latios/Latias are still countered, except for DD Latios). This outruns max Speed Kyurem-B, which will often try to Earth Power you. You can Iron Head for 60-70% percent, which is a kill after stall's hazards. I find this an excellent countermeasure to Kyurem-B. Prediction goes both ways and etc., but for the record:

252+ SpA Kyurem-B Earth Power vs. 252 HP / 144 SpD Jirachi: 178-210 (44.05 - 51.98%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

You might ask why I went through that admittedly convoluted set of points defending Kyurem-B's place in OU -- after all, this is not a Kyurem-B suspect thread. I also will not pretend to be an expert on the matter. However, my point is that teams can make adaptions that put them in a fair position against team types with an 'advantage'. I think this term only comes from the teambuilder side.

I want to take a point from PttP on IRC; no one complained about team match-up in BW1. People complain about team match-up from time-to-time in every metagame that exists. I find such accusations that 'battles in this metagame is decided at the team match-up' incorrect, and my analogy to Kyurem-B explains my reasoning, pretty much.

Hm, I think you may have perhaps misunderstood some of what I said in this section of your post. In my experience the teambuilder's side does not discuss team matchup as an argument at all, rather, battlers argue that a teambuilder's metagame would be less desirable because team matchup would decide battles from the outset. I agree, actually, that the rigid belief that X archetype loses to Y archetype is incorrect and that even seemingly inevitable disadvantages can be turned around with creative teambuilding and good play. In my view, this is an argument for the teambuilder's metagame, as it shows that even with an increased number of viable archetypes we won't end up with a situation where team matchup is a supreme concern.

Your first paragraph does an excellent job representing the in-game decision-making argument...except that you mention nothing about the real values. The valued things are properly using risk/reward to make your moves, and making strategic moves that contribute to some sort of goal, as well as creating goals throughout the battle that create a win condition. These things are the epitome of skill, at least in my opinion. Prediction and bluffing come secondary. Speaking of which, I want to touch on prediction. Prediction is over-glorified. Many top players have commented on this in suspect threads, and I am inclined to agree with it. 50/50's are rare situations in Pokemon, as risk/reward should guide you to the correct move in almost all scenarios.

I'm glad we agree here, and perhaps I did not perfectly explain the specific value of "in-game battling skill". I had intended to include things like proper calculations/strategic thinking but didn't fully express that. I also agree that prediction is over-glorified.

I disagree that the existence of niche threats inherently creates more opportunities for battling skill any moreso than, say, bluffing. Bluffing takes quite a bit of skill to pull off, and can change games when done correctly. You have to lure the Pokemon in AND ensure the opponent doesn't think you have whatever you're bluffing. Let's just say, for instance, that Celebi comes in on my Hidden Power Bug Expert Belt Keldeo. I need to switch to something that can handle Celebi the first time. Heck, I can even pull a switch out, as risk/reward would cause any opponent with a decent level of skill to send in Celebi, at least provided I don't have a Pursuit user. Making this play will convince my opponent that I don't have the move. However, a good player will still be wary, so I have to make the technically 'disadvantageous play' multiple times, simply because I want to lure in and kill Celebi at some point so I can smash apart my opponent's team. I am making smarter plays, at least I think, than getting 'windows of opportunity', which are essentially 'trap its counters' and 'U-turn/Volt Switch it in or bring it in after a kill'. Finding windows of opportunity comes down to no more than battering down the opposing team and letting something die in order for it to get in. The difference with niche threats, in my opinion, is that they usually only have one set that they can use to be viable. This makes many of these niche Pokemon, while unexpected in typical play, fairly predictable when you do see them. For example, I don't account for Sharpedo on my typical team. However, I know that it will be running some variant on Aqua Jet / Ice Beam or Ice Fang / Waterfall / Crunch in pretty much every case, as otherwise Sharpedo is almost completely unviable.

Since bluffs are inherently unpredictable, I find that greater diversity of threats =/= more creativity. Innovations like Trick + Flame Orb Latias, Flying Gem Acrobatics Scizor, and Normal Gem Double-Edge Gyarados challenge perceptions of checks and counters. These go against the standard, and are even MORE effective and rewarding to play with than some niche threat because everyone knows what they usually run. Since niche threats typically lack diversity in their movesets, they are more predictable. A knowledgeable battler knows the possible sets of every viable Pokemon. This makes bluffs and niche sets BETTER for the teambuilder's goals. The teams you like building that challenge the standard incorporate these types of sets, which are ideal in a battler's metagame. A battler's team has Pokemon with sets that challenge the standard, as his or her values will compel him or her to use said.

I think that this is the meat of your post and will spend most of my time addressing this.

Your take on the predictability of niche threats is a good point which I had originally failed to consider in my OP. It is true that right now something like Sharpedo will pretty much always run the same set, while a more mainstream pokemon like Latias or Terrakion has a variety of different options to choose from. However, I don't believe that this hurts creativity in the metagame. First of all, even if they are one-dimensional, there's still many more options to choose from in teambuilding and much more to think about when battling. Volcarona is fairly one-dimensional, but that doesn't make it not effective or decrease the battling skill required to use it or play against it. Same with Alakazam or Tentacruel and many other OU pokemon. Secondly, I think that the perception of one-dimensionality creates even more opportunities for creative sets, particularly in a less centralized teambuilder's metagame where there isn't pressure on lower-tier pokemon to do one thing well or not be used. Maybe you switch your Skarmory into Sharpedo and get whacked by a Life Orb or Water Gem Hydro Pump. The ability to vary up sets like this will increase the battling skills you argue for like bluffing.

What I think the rest of your argument fails to do is establish why the benefits you've isolated (bluffing, the ability of mainstream pokemon to run creative new sets) are not accessible by the teambuilder's metagame. In debate parlance, these "advantages" are not "unique" to your advocacy - they are captured by mine as well. In a teambuilder's metagame I see no reason why there would not be room for innovative sets on top pokemon such as the examples you described (Trick/Flame Orb Latias, Flying Gem Scizor, Normal Gem Gyarados, etc). In fact, I believe there would end up being more sets like this. Let's examine why. These sets almost universally exist in order to...beat counters, right? Trick/Flame Orb Latias beats Tyranitar and Scizor, Acrobatics Scizor beats Jellicent and Tentacruel, Normal Gem Gyarados beats Rotom-W, etc. However, in a battler's metagame with a limited number of viable pokemon, there are equivalently a limited number of possible counters. Scizor pretty much knows what it needs to beat, so it can innovate once (to get around its counters), but after that there's not much exploration left to do.
On the contrary, in a teambuilder's metagame, there would likely be more counters to top threats like Scizor, creating more possibilities for counter-innovation. Perhaps people start running a lot of Cofagrigus or Eviolite Dusclops, making Night Slash a good option on Scizor. Perhaps Zapdos becomes more common and people start running Normal Gem Double Hit Scizor (+2 252+ Atk Normal Gem Technician Scizor Double Hit vs. 248 HP / 228+ Def Zapdos: 308-364 (80.41 - 95.03%) -- guaranteed OHKO after Stealth Rock...wat). For every additional counter that crawls out of the woodwork once the metagame smooths out, there is additional possibility for innovative and creative sets amongst top pokemon. The same goes for top defensive threats who will have to change things up in response to offensive pokemon that become more popular.

Basically, I'm incorporating what Potential said here:

To expand upon the preference to teambuilding over battling as defined above, or perhaps just to put it in different words, one might say that teambuilding is a requisite skill to battling. Fundamentally, in a Pokémon game, you have to first build a team, then battle with it. Because of this particular flow, that teambuilding is in some sense in a tier above battling, it is possible to value directly teambuilding over battling, and the skill involved in the former will "trickle down" to the latter. I think it's clear that going the other way does not work similarly. So, based on the reasoning in the Investigating Skill section, I think it's valid to describe the two components this way.

As Potential notes, you build a team, then you battle with it. The ability to have increased diversity in the initial teambuilding stage should, in most (if not all) cases, translate to an increased ability to have good bluff sets and show off your battling skill. I have yet to hear a good argument which explains why the teambuilder's metagame excludes the benefits that the battler's metagame claims for itself, which makes the decision fairly clear to me.