Separate Tiering of Mega Pokemon

[Zarel]

OU is a usage-based tier while
BL is a banlist that is almost completely separate from usage, yet Altaria and Pinsir are in directly comparable situations.

????????

BL is a banlist that only bans things that would otherwise be UU by usage, so lower tiers are unaffected. It allows us to make tweaks to our usage-based tiers while keeping them usage-based.

Banning mega stones like Pinsirite is a huge affront to our usage-based tier system. Pinsir's usage is now a lot lower than it would be if Pinsir was allowed to use its best set.

Banning Pokémon works in harmony with our usage-based tier system. Banning items, abilities, and moves is a direct attack on our tier system.

I'm not saying it should never be done. DrizzleSwim Clause, Baton Pass Clause, Evasion Clause, even Sleep Clause Mod were necessary complex bans to deal with situations the tiering system couldn't deal with. But it shouldn't be our first resort.

Even with Baton Pass Clause, we asked ourselves, "What if we banned Smeargle and Espeon?" But that turned out not to be enough. The complex ban was our last resort.

We didn't ban Kangaskhanite because it was overpowered no matter what Pokémon held it. We banned it because we wanted NU to be able to use non-mega Kangaskhan for some reason. By that logic, we should tier all megas separately, and I would have zero problems with that.

But if we keep on insisting that megas are the same Pokémon as their base forme, I'm fine with that too. Just ban Kangaskhan to Ubers. This is what the tiering system is for.

People use Altaria in OU because Mega Altaria is good. People would use Pinsir in UU because Mega Pinsir would be good, but because Pinsirite is banned from UU there's no reason to use Pinsir. As a result, Pinsir drops out of UU. I'm not seeing the issue.

Yes, you have in fact described how our tiering system currently works, while pretending not to see a problem with it.

"We treat BL megas completely differently from OU or UU megas. As a result, the tiering system is massively fucked up. I'm not seeing the issue."

Do you really think the fact that you can describe it is enough to prove that it's not an issue? We can describe "tier megas separately" and "tier megas together", as well. Those are in fact a lot easier to describe. On the other hand, banning an item feels like a complex ban to me.

I'm really not seeing a difference between mega stones and Speed Boost Blaziken. Speed Boost isn't OP on Pokémon other than Blaziken, Kangaskhanite isn't OP on Pokémon other than Kangaskhan.

In conclusion: Tiering megas together isn't a problem. Tiering megas separately isn't a problem. Tiering OU and UU megas together and BL megas separately is ridiculous.

 

[Bughouse]

Banning Pinsir as a whole rather than Pinsirite (or Kangaskhan or whatever other Pokemon with a mega that has had its stone banned) is definitely more consistent.

It's also cutting off your nose to spite your face.

You want Charizard in NU so much that you prefer a path that bans Pinsir and Kangaskhan to one that allows them. That's just insane to me. I get a desire for a consistent path (I don't think the current system is all that inconsistent but whatever)... But pick one path to advance, not both. If the goal is more Pokemon legal in more tiers they "should" be in, then banning Kanga is contradictory to your goal and you should not be advocating for it.

 

[Zarel]

Banning Pinsir as a whole rather than Pinsirite (or Kangaskhan or whatever other Pokemon with a mega that has had its stone banned) is definitely more consistent.

It's also cutting off your nose to spite your face.

You want Charizard in NU so much that you prefer a path that bans Pinsir and Kangaskhan to one that allows them. That's just insane to me. I get a desire for a consistent path (I don't think the current system is all that inconsistent but whatever)... But pick one path to advance, not both. If the goal is more Pokemon legal in more tiers they "should" be in, then banning Kanga is contradictory to your goal and you should not be advocating for it.

I have a weak preference for megas to be tiered separately, but honestly, I'd be fine either way.

The main thing I care about is for tiers to stop banning mega stones. That is honestly what I care about the most. I want bans to work alongside the tier system instead of against it. The goal is consistency.

What is so bad about banning the item? We ban items when they're broken on every Pokemon that can make use of them. We've done this with Soul Dew since gen 4 (when Latias was briefly allowed). It's not like banning Speed Boost on Blaziken at all; you aren't cherry picking one specific Pokemon in one specific situation. You're essentially banning a form.

Banning the Pokemon outright reduces the number of available Pokemon. Separating Megas from Base forms assumes that they're separate Pokemon, which they are not. By just banning the item, we achieve the goal of allowing base forms in lower tiers when their mega is overpowered, while not violating our "usage drives tiering" philosophy.

Why are you fine with banning a forme, but not tiering a forme separately? If the forme isn't tiered separately, it shouldn't be banned separately.

 

[Aldaron]

Lots of posts and lots of repeating of points...

To answer Antar's OP questions:

1. We don't tier other Pokemon-specific items separately (Soul Dew, DeepSeaScale, Light Ball Pikachu...), nor do we tier dynamic-forme-changers separately (Relic Song Meloetta, Zen Mode Darmanitan).
2. How would you count it? Plenty of Pokemon defer Mega Evolution for a few turns (Sableye, Charizard, Gyarados, Audino...). Does it make sense to not count usage of a Pokemon as Mega when it spends a large amount of its time on the field as non-Mega?
3. What would we do with Pokemon whose non-Mega usage is higher than its Mega usage (Lati@s comes to mind)

1.) I'm fine with what you stated in your OP. Context changes, reliance on precedent changes as well. No issue altering this if found to be a potential positive.
2.) I would 100% support the "Intent is King" strategy (if only for simplicity) and say that if it has a mega stone, it counts as the mega form.
3.) I don't actually think this is a problem. You stated that "Or we could decide that a Pokemon cannot be tiered higher than its Mega... but then we're not really tiering them separately, are we?" but I don't think this is an issue. We are tiering them separately so long as the mega is more used. If it isn't, they're in the same tier. Just because we aren't tiering them entirely separately doesn't mean we aren't still tiering them separately. We can just say that the pure logical end to this, banning the base form except when it holds the Mega Stone is too convoluted for our rules and go with that.

In case anyone is asking for us to tier the Pokemon with the stones themselves, I might as well come out and say the chances of this happening is very very low (for various reasons I won't drown the thread with atm).

If however I am guessing Antar's intention correctly and he and others are simply asking we tier the Mega form and the base form separately, I see no issue with this.

Antar's concerns I believe can be managed, and I do see a worthwhile reason to change the status quo in allowing things like Charizard in NU and Metagross in UU.

 

[Zarel]

It looks like we mostly came to an agreement? The Immortal or I will probably implement this (tiering megas separately, megas can't fall below tier of base form) in PS soon unless someone vetoes or I'm missing some sort of policy.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

It looks like we mostly came to an agreement? The Immortal or I will probably implement this (tiering megas separately, megas can't fall below tier of base form) in PS soon unless someone vetoes or I'm missing some sort of policy.

Unless I'm mistaken the intention was to implement this policy either around the release of "Z" or near to Gen 7.

 

[Aberforth]

Out of curiosity, why wait? I don't particularly care about when this goes into effect, but I don't see why we can't just include it in the next tiering update. Waiting an unknown amount of time to implement a policy just for the sake of not doing something different without a stimulus seems weird to me.

Edit: Fuck my phone and it's autocorrect, towering updates don't happen.

 

[Antar]

The Immortal or I will probably implement this (tiering megas separately, megas can't fall below tier of base form) in PS soon unless someone vetoes or I'm missing some sort of policy.

Most of the work is going to be on my end--I have to change my stats code to treat Pokemon separately based on item.

Out of curiosity, why wait?

Because that's about 20 Pokemon we're suddenly dropping into lower tiers, and Grand Slam is going on now. How long is the Smogon Tour season? Is there time to do this between Tour and SPL?

 

[Aberforth]

I did say next tiering update, and the next one will be in November (I wasn't talkig about quick drops), in which I believe that the grand slam should be over, or in the finals (based on last years GS), in which an executive decision could be made to use the tiers as they were at the start of grand slam.

 

[blarajan]

Lots of posts and lots of repeating of points...

To answer Antar's OP questions:



1.) I'm fine with what you stated in your OP. Context changes, reliance on precedent changes as well. No issue altering this if found to be a potential positive.
2.) I would 100% support the "Intent is King" strategy (if only for simplicity) and say that if it has a mega stone, it counts as the mega form.
3.) I don't actually think this is a problem. You stated that "Or we could decide that a Pokemon cannot be tiered higher than its Mega... but then we're not really tiering them separately, are we?" but I don't think this is an issue. We are tiering them separately so long as the mega is more used. If it isn't, they're in the same tier. Just because we aren't tiering them entirely separately doesn't mean we aren't still tiering them separately. We can just say that the pure logical end to this, banning the base form except when it holds the Mega Stone is too convoluted for our rules and go with that.

In case anyone is asking for us to tier the Pokemon with the stones themselves, I might as well come out and say the chances of this happening is very very low (for various reasons I won't drown the thread with atm).

If however I am guessing Antar's intention correctly and he and others are simply asking we tier the Mega form and the base form separately, I see no issue with this.

Antar's concerns I believe can be managed, and I do see a worthwhile reason to change the status quo in allowing things like Charizard in NU and Metagross in UU.

How would "intent is king" take into place if I laddered with a team with six Pokemon each holding their corresponding Mega Stone? Would I be able to unnaturally inflate usage statistics for Mega Pokemon by merit of using five more than other teams? If so, what are the negative consequences of this? Antar

 

[Antar]

blarajan, hopefully weighted stats would take care of that, as the team wouldn't be very good. We could also say that a Pokemon's Mega usage = Has Mega Stone / Total Mega Stones On Team.

 

[blarajan]

I believe the former is most likely to happen, so I'll take your word for it. I don't like the second idea however, as then the Mega you end up using that battle only gets a fraction of the use it should, since the mega that is not used is effectively just a regular Pokemon.

What about, in cases of teams with multiple Pokemon holding their correct Mega Stone, the Pokemon that effectively Mega Evolves gets counted for full Mega usage, and the rest count as their base form? If a team with multiple Pokemon holding their correct Mega Stone does not successfully Mega Evolve that battle, THEN we say the Pokemon's Mega usage = Has Mega Stone / Total Mega Stones? Or am I too invested in the fringe case?

 

[Zarel]

I believe the former is most likely to happen, so I'll take your word for it. I don't like the second idea however, as then the Mega you end up using that battle only gets a fraction of the use it should, since the mega that is not used is effectively just a regular Pokemon.

What about, in cases of teams with multiple Pokemon holding their correct Mega Stone, the Pokemon that effectively Mega Evolves gets counted for full Mega usage, and the rest count as their base form? If a team with multiple Pokemon holding their correct Mega Stone does not successfully Mega Evolve that battle, THEN we say the Pokemon's Mega usage = Has Mega Stone / Total Mega Stones? Or am I too invested in the fringe case?

This inflates the usage stats of their base forms, though. I think has/total is sufficient for this case.

I did say next tiering update, and the next one will be in November (I wasn't talkig about quick drops), in which I believe that the grand slam should be over, or in the finals (based on last years GS), in which an executive decision could be made to use the tiers as they were at the start of grand slam.

This sounds good to me.

 

[Punchshroom]

On the other hand, banning an item feels like a complex ban to me.

I'm really not seeing a difference between mega stones and Speed Boost Blaziken. Speed Boost isn't OP on Pokémon other than Blaziken, Kangaskhanite isn't OP on Pokémon other than Kangaskhan.

Really now? Then care to explain why the Soul Dew ban was perfectly acceptable if you said earlier that "banning items fucks up tiering"? Are you suggesting than if OU simply banned Mega Kangaskhan as a whole Pokemon (including Kangaskhan) instead of its item, it would warrant the banning of the Eon twins from OU as well?

In conclusion: Tiering megas together isn't a problem. Tiering megas separately isn't a problem. Tiering OU and UU megas together and BL megas separately is ridiculous.

I've been meaning to ask how the process of separating a Pokemon from its Mega form would even work, as I've many questions and I want to know if I got the gist right (if Antar can kindly chip in):

Would it be based off an item-based usage benchmark? How much usage would it require for a Mega Stone or the Pokemon itself to be defined as OU or UU (current tier placement vs lower tier placement)? We know that there are Pokemon who basically see OU usage in their Mega Forms exclusively (Altaria, Lopunny), but other lesser used Pokemon do as well (Glalie, Ampharos, Camerupt), so I assume the system would be looking at the Pokemon's tier placement first before delving into item usage. And even then, how would the usage percentage of the Mega Stone affect the mon's tiering? Would it be that:

- if a Pokemon's "non-Mega Stone" items usage percentage falls under a certain benchmark, it gets permitted to be dropped in the lower tier(s)? Examples: Manectric, Metagross, Altaria, Venusaur, etc. (which do not exceed 10%), Sableye (which barely exceeds 10%), Heracross (~14%),
- if a Pokemon's "non-Mega Stone" items usage percentage succeeds in exceeding the certain benchmark, it stays in its current tier? Examples: Scizor (~50+%), Gyarados (~42%), Alakazam (~47%)
- if the Mega Stone falls below the certain benchmark (essentially, if a Pokemon's "non-Mega Stone" items usage percentage exceeds the respective benchmark), it wouldn't matter because the Pokemon itself isn't permitted into the lower tiers? Examples: Slowbro (Slowbronite ~25%, non-Slowbronite ~75%), Lati@s (both Stones <10%, non-Mega Stones >90%)

Even if I got your "presumed system" down correctly, there's still my final question regarding Charizard, which has 2 Mega Stones...

| Charizardite X 60.810% | Charizardite Y 38.699% | Other 0.491% |
| Metagrossite 93.684% | Assault Vest 3.735% | Other 2.582% |

The "non-Mega Stone" items for both of these Pokemon would be far too low (Charizard's is 0.491%, Metagross's is 6.317%), meaning their base forms are permitted in the lower tiers, which is be what this system would be aiming for. However, what of Charizard's Mega Stones? Would one of them be able to accompany Charizard to UU? If so, would there also be a "Mega Stone usage precedent to be considered OU" (which can influence mons like Scizor, Gyarados, and Alakazam)? If not, I expect there will be some inquiries about why Charizardite Y did not at least join Charizard upon its descent into UU if we're going through all this "tier the Pokemon differently from its Mega" business, since that can also imply tiering the MegaZards differently as well.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I mean at the end of the day, all of this is simply my assumption on how the Mega Stone tiering system is going to be implemented, because frankly I don't know how else you're going to do it. I just hope you can create a system with less "loopholes" than the current one, not that I am even dissatisfied with it as it is now.

 

[Agent Gibbs]

You're making this a lot more complicated than it needs to be. It's actually quite simple. Assuming we go with the "Mega Stone = Mega form" rule, all you have to do is multiply the Mega Stone's usage on the base Pokemon by the usage of the base Pokemon as a whole and see if that falls over or under our 3.41% OU benchmark. For example, according to the 1695 OU stats from last month (assuming we were using them for our next tiering update), Charizard's OU usage as a whole was 11.35043%. Of that, Charizardite X received 60.810% usage, Charizardite Y clocked in at 38.699%, and normal Charizard received a mere 0.491%. Therefore, base Charizard would have about 0.0557% usage, Charizard X would have about 6.90% usage, and Charizard Y would have about 4.39% usage. Thus, both Mega Charizards would be OU since they land above the 3.41% benchmark, whereas normal Charizard would drop like a rock to UU and beyond.

 

[Antar]

Agent Gibbs, duh. But I still have to incorporate this into all the scripts, including the stuff that computes the tier diffs. That's nontrivial, because it involves species identification. Moveset analyses (and check/counter stats) should also be separate for megas vs. non-megas.

 

[Agent Gibbs]

Agent Gibbs, duh. But I still have to incorporate this into all the scripts, including the stuff that computes the tier diffs. That's nontrivial, because it involves species identification. Moveset analyses (and check/counter stats) should also be separate for megas vs. non-megas.

Oh, I was referring to Punchshroom's post above mine, not to your proposal in the OP. Sorry if I didn't make that clear.

So basically what I'm saying is that option 2a in the OP is a good and simple way to go about this.

While I'm here, I'll just chime in on one other thing that I meant to post about last week but never got around to. With regards to the "Mega Pokemon tiered below their base forms" debacle, I don't see why we don't just add a lesser used Mega form to the "BL" tier below the usage tier of the normal form. I mean, the raw definition of BL is basically, "You can't use this in UU, but it's also not used enough to be OU." Obviously, the "can't use" part of that is generally due to the fact that the Pokemon in question was banned from UU (or whatever other usage-based tier we're talking about), but what if we expand the definition of the "BL" tiers to include Pokemon that are mechanically impossible to use in a given tier? For example, if Garchomp is OU but Mega Garchomp drops to UU, then it will be automatically placed in BL since it is impossible for Mega Garchomp to actually appear in a battle without the use of Garchomp, a banned Pokemon. Therefore, a Mega Pokemon will still never be available in a playable tier where its base form does not exist, and we also avoid the problem of placing a low usage Mega Pokemon in the same usage tier as the base form and thus creating the false implication that it's common in that tier.

 

[Punchshroom]

So we already have ways to determine which Mega Stones remain OU and which don't, but what of the base forms that aren't using the Mega Stone? I made a list of some (not all) non-Mega Pokemon vs their Mega counterparts:

MEGA

Scizor 9.57339%
Metagross 8.22761%
Lopunny 7.11067%
Charizard X 6.91068%
Venusaur 6.08156%
Sableye 5.74067%
Gardevoir 5.58514%
Altaria 5.26111%
Manectric 5.01344%
Diancie 4.77519%
Charizard Y 4.39791%
Gyarados 3.52991%
(--->)Alakazam 3.19107%(<---)
Medicham 2.97268%
Pinsir 2.30505%
Heracross 2.05321%
Slowbro 1.70220%
Swampert 1.64059%
Sceptile 1.18260%
Gallade 1.01002%
Latias 0.97853%
Ampharos 0.94956%
Aerodactyl 0.92597%
Tyranitar 0.88413%
Garchomp 0.88195%
Latios 0.34732%

NON MEGA

Scizor 9.5955%
Metagross 0.5408%
Lopunny 0.0357%
Charizard 0.491%
Venusaur 0.6139%
Sableye 0.1863%
Gardevoir 0.6112%
Altaria 0.019%
Manectric 0.035%
Diancie 0.4123%
Gyarados 2.560%
(--->)Alakazam 2.804%(<---)
Medicham 0.041%
Pinsir 0.027%
Heracross 0.314%
Slowbro 4.879%
Swampert 0.240%
Sceptile 0.022%
Gallade 0.034%
Latias 11.306%
Ampharos 0.011%
Aerodactyl 0.414%
Tyranitar 9.976%
Garchomp 24.85%
Latios 15.96%

So from what I understand from the system: if the Mega Pokemon exceeds 3.41% and the non-Mega does not, the base Pokemon drops to the tier below (would this include Gyarados?); if the non-Mega Pokemon exceeds 3.41% usage and the Mega Stone does not, the base Pokemon remains OU and the Mega Stone drop would be irrelevant. What I like to know is what happens in the case of Alakazam, which does not show up as either a Mega or non-Mega often enough to be considered "OU", yet receives a solid 5.922% usage overall. Do we leave Alakazam as is?

 

[Zarel]

Really now? Then care to explain why the Soul Dew ban was perfectly acceptable if you said earlier that "banning items fucks up tiering"? Are you suggesting than if OU simply banned Mega Kangaskhan as a whole Pokemon (including Kangaskhan) instead of its item, it would warrant the banning of the Eon twins from OU as well?

I didn't say it was perfectly acceptable, I said that I didn't like it (I weakly objected to Soul Dew Clause when it was proposed in gen 5) but that it's nowhere near as bad as the mega stone situation, for several reasons (it has precedent in official Nintendo formats, it only affects OU, it has an official named clause, and it's only one item instead of six or so mega stones per tier).

 

[Antar]

Punchshroom, Alakazam gets to drop!

Edit: BOTH, to be clear.

 

[jas61292]

I honestly don't care too much about the issue, but I do think one thing to keep in mind is that the simple fact that a Pokemon has a mega effects their usefulness and usage, and I feel the proposed systems fail to account for this. What I mean here is that a mega, if it is at least somewhat viable, is an option at the Pokemon's disposal. Whether or not it uses it is irrelevant. Up until the opponent figures out your item, they have to consider the possibility that your Pokemon can mega evolve, and for many Pokemon, the way the mega is handled is different than the base. Acting like the mega and its base are different Pokemon is just... well... incorrect. The viability of the base effects the viability of the mega.

Alakazam is obviously one of the best examples here. As it stands, neither form alone would have enough usage to be OU, but combined they do. However, is that saying that no Alakazam is good enough for OU? Absolutely not. Its saying that there are two different ways to use Alakazam, and both are at least somewhat viable. In fact, the very fact that the base form is viable makes the mega more viable, and vice versa. If the mega didn't exist at all, its overall usage would likely drop, but at the same time, there would likely be more usage for the base form, since the mega would not be taking away that usage. In theory, base Alakazam could have OU usage if its mega did not exist, but under this proposed system, simply because it does have a mega and therefore is better, has more options and, most importantly, gets MORE usage, it would be in a lower tier. That is absolutely absurd.

To me, most of the stuff in this thread is basically a solution seeking a problem. There really is not much of a problem, as far as I can see. Sure, some things might not be the most intuitive at a cursory glance, but they still make complete sense if you look at the reasoning. And frankly, that is true of our entire tiering system. I just don't see what is so special here. Megas are a set that a Pokemon can run. I don't see any reason to treat them as something else.

 

[Quite Quiet]

To me, most of the stuff in this thread is basically a solution seeking a problem. There really is not much of a problem, as far as I can see. Sure, some things might not be the most intuitive at a cursory glance, but they still make complete sense if you look at the reasoning. And frankly, that is true of our entire tiering system. I just don't see what is so special here. Megas are a set that a Pokemon can run. I don't see any reason to treat them as something else.

At the same time, it has never been a policy to ban a set, just to keep the Pokemon around. If Megas are effectively sets a Pokemon can run, then by the tiering process up until the first Mega got tested, the base form should have been banned and not the item. You can't, on one side say that megas are just a set of the base form, yet still think treating them differently is okay.

 

[jas61292]

At the same time, it has never been a policy to ban a set, just to keep the Pokemon around. If Megas are effectively sets a Pokemon can run, then by the tiering process up until the first Mega got tested, the base form should have been banned and not the item. You can't, on one side say that megas are just a set of the base form, yet still think treating them differently is okay.

This is a fair point. I think I probably could have worded that better. What I should have said is that Mega Stones are just items, and sets that use them are just sets. Yes, they should be treated no differently than any other set, that much is true. At the same time, the item should be treated no differently than any other item. When looked at in that light, I think the current system is justified, especially when you look at precedent. Soul Dew and Eviolite are good cases to look at, though I'm sure there are others.

In the case of Soul Dew it was judged to be universally broken. It was not just broken on Latios. It was not just broken on Latias. It was broken on both, and those are the only two Pokemon that can use it. Yes technically anyone could hold it without any effect, but it is not the only useless item such Pokemon could hold, and as such, banning it got rid of the broken element in the metagame without any collateral damage.

In the case of Eviolite, it has been judged to not be universally broken. In the situation where an individual Pokemon using Eviolite was considered broken in a given tier, the Pokemon was banned. Eviolite itself was never the broken element; rather brokenness only arose with the combination of the item and the base stats, movepool, typing, etc. In such a situation, banning the Pokemon was the only single item ban that could be done that would not have any real collateral damage.

Mega Stones are much closer to Soul Dew than to Eviolite. They only effect one Pokemon a piece, meaning that, if the situation where a Pokemon using a set with a Mega stone would be broken, but the Pokemon using a set without it would not, then we can say that the mega stone is the Broken element. You could not say that with Eviolite since changing the base stats or tying of the user has a massive effect too, but with a Mega stone, there is only one user. Its base stats, typing and the lot never change. If it is fine without the Stone but not with it, the Stone is the problem.

Basically, overall what I am trying to say is that, as mentioned in my last post, I don't think we should treat a mega any different than a normal set. But at the same time, I don't think we should treat a mega stone any different than a normal item. Our current system already covers both perfectly fine, without arbitrarily making either a special case.

 

[Zarel]

Basically, overall what I am trying to say is that, as mentioned in my last post, I don't think we should treat a mega any different than a normal set. But at the same time, I don't think we should treat a mega stone any different than a normal item. Our current system already covers both perfectly fine, without arbitrarily making either a special case.

It doesn't cover both perfectly fine, which is what the entire thread is about.

 

[jas61292]

It doesn't cover both perfectly fine, which is what the entire thread is about.

Well, obviously, I would disagree with this. I have yet to see a single post in this thread that actually gives a reason I find convincing why the current system does not cover both perfectly fine, much less provide a system that would cover both better. Whether they say it or not, most posts in favor of change, to me, at least, seem to be saying that something is wrong because it something just seems... off. Yeah, I admit it is a bit weird that Pinsir can be used in NU but mega Pinsir can only be used in OU. However, policy wise, it is perfectly consistent and makes sense. As others have said, we should never tier things based on where they "should" go, because there is no "should" when it comes to tiers. It may seem weird that Charizard is OU when Pinsir is not, but it objectively makes sense, and I believe that changing it would be just giving into a subjective sense of what feels right, which is never, ever a good thing to bring into this.

Edit: Also, for what its worth, I would argue that the system not being fine is not what this thread was about. The OP was clearly about just comparing the options, not necessarily saying what we are doing now is bad and something else is better.