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Resource Simple Questions, Simple Answers Thread

I am new to the forum so I hope here is the right thread for my question. I am pretty new to competitive Pokemon but especially since the DLC came out I don't really understand the metagame anymore. :pikuh: So I hear that a lot of players are discontent with the current metagame. One thing I heard is that some people feel that the metagame has become too bulky I think ( Toxapex and Clefable and more ) because there are not enough breakers. But also we have Pokemon like Urshifu, Cinderace and the banned Magearna who are/were deemed to be too powerful. But aren't those breakers?
So my question is, what is the reason why player dislike the current metagame (at least what I experienced) and what are the future endeavors to establish a "better" metagame/ what needs to happen to get a better metagame.
Sry if my question is too convoluted. :blobthinking:
 
BackToSui said:
I am new to the forum so I hope here is the right thread for my question. I am pretty new to competitive Pokemon but especially since the DLC came out I don't really understand the metagame anymore. :pikuh: So I hear that a lot of players are discontent with the current metagame. One thing I heard is that some people feel that the metagame has become too bulky I think ( Toxapex and Clefable and more ) because there are not enough breakers. But also we have Pokemon like Urshifu, Cinderace and the banned Magearna who are/were deemed to be too powerful. But aren't those breakers?
So my question is, what is the reason why player dislike the current metagame (at least what I experienced) and what are the future endeavors to establish a "better" metagame/ what needs to happen to get a better metagame.
Sry if my question is too convoluted. :blobthinking:
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Pokemon like Urshifu, Cinderace, and Magearna were breakers, but each of them forces defensive counterplay. For instance, most, if not all stall teams currently should run 2 of Hippowdon, Toxapex, and Mandibuzz in order to be safe vs. Cinderace. They should also run Clefable + a regen mon to beat Urshifu. Even the busted mons of Urshifu and Cinderace cannot break through a stall that has these. They're breakers, but they force defensive counterplay, rather than offensive. Think about OU Manaphy. It can break through pretty much any stall with its signature tail glow. Therefore, if you switch in a defensive pokemon when Manaphy tail glows, you're just going to have to sack a mon vs. it. But if you bring in an offensive mon as it tail glows, then it is forced out.

Essentially, Cinderace and Urshifu have defensive counterplay which is taken to full effect by Balance and bulkier teams. Neither Urshifu nor Cinderace will be able to break through a well prepared stall team without significant team support and multiple 50/50s. The reason why they are busted is that this defensive counterplay is so limited that it has to be run on any team with a defensive backbone in order to be safe against them. It is very difficult to out-offense them, but out-defensing them is easy with the very limited selection of mons that counter them.
 
I'm not very familiar with the reasoning behind tiering decisions so I'm curious as to why Cinderace as a whole is being tested rather than Liberio CInderace in particular. Prior to Cinderace getting Liberio nobody thought it was broken or unhealthy, and if it gets banned I doubt Raboot or Scorbunny will be ruling the tier so I don't think Liberio itself is broken. Because of this I'm not sure what the rationale for banning Cinderace as a whole is rather than specifically Liberio Cinderace is.
 
Hobie said:
I'm not very familiar with the reasoning behind tiering decisions so I'm curious as to why Cinderace as a whole is being tested rather than Liberio CInderace in particular. Prior to Cinderace getting Liberio nobody thought it was broken or unhealthy, and if it gets banned I doubt Raboot or Scorbunny will be ruling the tier so I don't think Liberio itself is broken. Because of this I'm not sure what the rationale for banning Cinderace as a whole is rather than specifically Liberio Cinderace is.
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Banning Libero would make a complex ban-situation and usually the members of the council in each and every tier try to avoid any complex ban-situations, therefore Cinderace is being suspect tested as a whole rather than its ability Libero. The tiering decision as to why Cinderace is retested is, that the Council wants to give Cinderace a chance and people have a glance on how it'll turn out during the suspect wether or not it's still too good for the tier. But banning Libero would make a complex ban and usually the council tries to avoid them.
 
Katy said:
Banning Libero would make a complex ban-situation and usually the members of the council in each and every tier try to avoid any complex ban-situations, therefore Cinderace is being suspect tested as a whole rather than its ability Libero. The tiering decision as to why Cinderace is retested is, that the Council wants to give Cinderace a chance and people have a glance on how it'll turn out during the suspect wether or not it's still too good for the tier. But banning Libero would make a complex ban and usually the council tries to avoid them.
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Whats the reasoning for the council avoiding complex bans? It seems to me that if the issue is a specific aspect of a mon and not the entirety of the mon itself then that aspect should be banned rather than the mon itself. This seems especially true for Cinderace because Court Change provides an entirely unique niche that will be lost if the mon itself is banned rather than just Liberio on it.
 
Hobie said:
Whats the reasoning for the council avoiding complex bans? It seems to me that if the issue is a specific aspect of a mon and not the entirety of the mon itself then that aspect should be banned rather than the mon itself. This seems especially true for Cinderace because Court Change provides an entirely unique niche that will be lost if the mon itself is banned rather than just Liberio on it.
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That's just not how Smogon works. Non-Pokemon bans are reserved for things like trapping abilities and evasion moves. Things that are egregiously broken and uncompetitive. Libero's a great ability, but it's nowhere near that level of toxic.
 
DrPumpkinz said:
That's just not how Smogon works. Non-Pokemon bans are reserved for things like trapping abilities and evasion moves. Things that are egregiously broken and uncompetitive. Libero's a great ability, but it's nowhere near that level of toxic.
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I agree that Liberio isn't broken and said so in my first post, my question was why does smogon not do complex bans if its clear that a specific aspect of a mon is what is making the mon overpowered?
 
Hobie said:
Whats the reasoning for the council avoiding complex bans? It seems to me that if the issue is a specific aspect of a mon and not the entirety of the mon itself then that aspect should be banned rather than the mon itself. This seems especially true for Cinderace because Court Change provides an entirely unique niche that will be lost if the mon itself is banned rather than just Liberio on it.
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If we ban Libero, then that means that Pokemon such as Raboot are no longer usable in lower tiers, so that already is an unfair solution as it departs from the status quo and has noteworthy collateral. However, let's say there would be no collateral and it was a different case of banning an ability. If we ban an ability because it only breaks one Pokemon, then the logic is to preserve the Pokemon in the tier. If an ability is broken on numerous Pokemon, then perhaps it is worth looking into. So now we're looking at issues that are broken only on one Pokemon -- if only Cinderace got Libero, then we will still look at Cinderace, not Libero.

If we start tiering abilities like this, then what stops us from tiering other fragments of Pokemon? All of a sudden, we're banning specific moves and abilities. We're no longer tiering Pokemon and usage is no longer reflective of the metagames as we are tiering Pokemon, abilities, items, moves, etc. -- it creates an awful slippery slope that we refuse to conform in to. If we give in once, then it opens the flood gates and devalues the entire system.

Now let's say we tackle the issue in the most specific way possible: a ban of the combination of Cinderace and Libero. This is called a "complex ban" and it is also something we try to avoid at all costs. If we ban the combination of Cinderace and Libero, then why not try to balance every single Uber Pokemon by banning it + its ability, it + its signature move, it + a specific item or items, etc. -- it creates a similar slippery slope that would derail the entire tiering system.

At some point, it becomes very complicated and defeats the purpose of tiering overall. Needless to say, we want to prevent starting this issue and Cinderace will be tiered as a Pokemon because of this.

Let's conclude discussion on this topic here so others can use this space for their questions and we avoid a formal debate. If you have more questions on other topics, feel free to post here. If not and you have more on this topic, feel free to PM me anytime and we can discuss further!
 
RoyalReloaded said:
maybe not the right place for this, but...

teambuilding is hard. very hard. are there any good resources? preferably a guide of some sort
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Hey,

ya teambuilding isnt that easy for beginners, but there are some helpful rescources for the start:
first and foremost the viability rankings, they show which mons are good and which mons have only a niche as a guideline to show, how the metagame-state is and which mons perform well currently: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-viability-ranking-thread.3666340/

here are some good ou cores from the get go, means you can build teams around these pokemon, they are differentiated in offensive cores and balanced / defensive cores: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-good-cores.3657595/

the role compendiu is one of the best threads to get together some ideas of what mon does which role and you can build up on that: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-role-compendium.3657644/

and sample teams: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-sample-teams-updated-on-sep-5.3666247/ where you get some ideas from what can work out in the metagame. a very good sidenote is, that you can orientate yourself on the sample teams and have a basic guideline on how to build up your own team(s).

last but not least:
Finchinator did a great video how to build in ss ou and i am pretty sure this guideline will also help a ton.
 
Katy said:
Hey,

ya teambuilding isnt that easy for beginners, but there are some helpful rescources for the start:
first and foremost the viability rankings, they show which mons are good and which mons have only a niche as a guideline to show, how the metagame-state is and which mons perform well currently: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-viability-ranking-thread.3666340/

here are some good ou cores from the get go, means you can build teams around these pokemon, they are differentiated in offensive cores and balanced / defensive cores: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-good-cores.3657595/

the role compendiu is one of the best threads to get together some ideas of what mon does which role and you can build up on that: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-role-compendium.3657644/

and sample teams: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/ss-ou-sample-teams-updated-on-sep-5.3666247/ where you get some ideas from what can work out in the metagame. a very good sidenote is, that you can orientate yourself on the sample teams and have a basic guideline on how to build up your own team(s).

last but not least:
Finchinator did a great video how to build in ss ou and i am pretty sure this guideline will also help a ton.
Click to expand...
thanks!
 
Spyro said:
Thanks I thought it was like counter teaming or something like that but just wanted to make sure.
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For what it's worth, "counterteaming" in tournaments is perfectly allowed. In fact, preparing for your opponent is encouraged. However, creating a team to specifically counter that which you expect your opponent to bring will oftentimes open up significant weaknessess to other things, so while it's allowed it's fairly cheesy. Proper prep in tournaments is basically assembling a team that is solid overall but matches up particularly well against the type of teams your opponent likes to bring without sacrificing too much counterplay to other things, and playtesting it of course.
 
ea7.gif


What are some emerging boots users that aren't rocks weak (similar to Zeraora and Dragapult)?
 
Negative Charge said:
ea7.gif


What are some emerging boots users that aren't rocks weak (similar to Zeraora and Dragapult)?
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We have seen boots on Tyranitar, Hippowdon, and Gastrodon as well as those two when discussing viable users who are not SR weak. This oftentimes enables team structures that do not rely on Defoggers such as Corviknight or team structures that prefer having their own Spikes up, therefore functioning best when hazards or on both sides or the opponent is forced to fog. These pokemon typically do not work on these builds due to a big vulnerability to Spikes and TSpikes, but now work well.
 
Monky25 said:
I have a question about suspect length. The cinderace test took about 14 days to complete, but the RU sigilyph test only goes on for 10 days. Is there a reason why it's like that?
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Not 100% sure, but I'm pretty sure the councils of the correct tier can decide on however long they want it to be. Also it's likely the RU one was shorter because less people play RU so most of em would've qualified within 10 days anyways.
 
Monky25 said:
Thanks for responding. This question is mostly for the OU council, but would it be possible to lower the time for gaining suspect reqs for the incoming dlc to make them go faster or has this already been tried and 14 days is the most optimal option ?
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If gamefreak sticks with the DLC model, then I personally think lowering the suspect lengths to something like 10 days would be more appropriate and it is something I will bring up. However, that is just my personal opinion and it also hinges on what the future has in store. Hopefully there will not be many more DLCs and we will have a longer period of time to settle future metagame states, which will be doing everyone involved with OU tiering a favor of course. Be it later this generation, next generation, or whenever we know more about DLCs, we will be sure to discuss it and act in accordance with what we believe to be best.
 
hmmm out of curiosity maybe some of the council members will see this and be able to answer. Why was cinderace tested when the crowned tundra is comming around the corner and offering new ways to keep it in check in overused while right now it was clear it would cause issues in ou? I'm just confused why it was tested at this point?
 
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