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Data State of The Game (11/13/2011) - IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT IN POST #233

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I'm honestly not too sure about grouping moves together for substitutions. It kind of ruins the point of getting similar moves, and it makes countering your weaknesses too easy. For example, right now, I may have to sub against Surf, Hydro Pump, Scald, and more if I'm a Camerupt against a Tentacruel. However, with the grouping, it'd just turn into "IF (Tentacruel uses <long-ranged Water attack>) THEN (blah)" which is waaay too easy.
 
Consider you're a slow(er) pokemon against a foe with dig/bounce/dive/protect/double team/substitute/taunt, how do you plan on hitting him with a strong attack if you go first?, and those kind of pokes DO exist (you're against a Colossoil in the example), and there's a whole lot of this kin of isruptive moves, torment, disable, fake out, status... grouping them gives a change of doing damage instea of losing the whole turn doing nothing more than spening your energy

I think the grouping shoul ONLY be for moves that cause the same effect (1 action evasion, the same status, protection, etc...) similar attacks (Hydro pump/Surf/Scald, Crunch/Night Slash/Bite, HJK/Close Combat) shoul remain in different substitutions
 
I do agree that it becomes almost impossible to cover something with over 40 moves. However, I do not support handling things by lumping clones together, as it removes some of the point of expanding movepools.

Perhaps 1 + [#of moves/20] grounded substitutions?
A 20 move Pokemon would get 2 subs, which is fairly close to our current mark.
A 40 move Pokemon would get 3, which is good but not covering everything, which negates the "no point in learning more moves" argument.
A 60 move Pokemon would get four, which seems reasonable.
An 80 move Pokemon would get five. If you have 80 moves, you need five to not get destroyed.

100 moves shouldn't be necessary to calculate...


It might upset some, but getting the same number of subs against a 22 move Salamence and zarator's Sabeleye is -_-
 
I disagree. Every Pokemon only has a certain number of Bide/Counter/Mirror Coat/etc and you should not be penalized for buying out your movepool. For example, if you look at my Snorlax, zarator's Sableye, or Athenodoros' Lapras, there are plenty of useless moves that we will almost never use (e.g. Rage). If these substitutions were implemented, then we would have absolutely no reason to buy these moves if it meant having to warrant an additional substitution. When you have this many moves, you often buy duplicate or inferior moves just so you can circumvent substitutions (Water Pulse and BubbleBeam, for example).
 
I still don't see why we can't make a list of good/very good moves and base substitutions on that. I agree that people shouldn't be punished for buying lots of extra moves, but 2 substitutions is NOT enough to beat Protect/Detect/Substitute/Swagger/Double Team/Fly/Dig/Bounce/Dive/Agility/Bide/Counter/Mirror Coat/etc. And yes, no Pokemon is likely to have all of those but 99% of Pokemon have 4 guaranteed (Protect, Swagger, Substitute, and Double Team can be learned by practically every Pokemon that can learn TM moves) plus others.
 
Why would you want to buy Rage in the first place? Once again, if you're still buying moves up into that stage, you probably should spend the UC elsewhere. And one extra sub isn't much of a penalty. For the 80 moves, 5 sub example your still at 16 moves per sub. Chances are you can still easily outplay your opponents, as you should have something good by that point (read: 6 good options)
 
That's ridiculous. For one thing, most mons have far more than 20 useless moves which are never goin to be used. In fact, I would say that there probably isn't a mon out there with more than 40 moves which are actually properly good moves. Adding subs after then is stupid, because it is giving extra subs where no extra moves worth using are present.

As well as that, it complicates the system hugely. Subs are already chaotic as all buggery, and adding another six would just make everything unplayable.
 
Also, the useless moves are used because of they being niche moves that you want to have when the moment arrives, but you shouln't be penalize since you'll rarely use them, think bulldoze when earthquake is subbed, icy wind when ice beam and blizzard are, etc... or to get the full movepool and get the extra (also because one extra move is probably better than just having the MC lying around unused)
 
Rediamond said:
Why would you want to buy Rage in the first place? Once again, if you're still buying moves up into that stage, you probably should spend the UC elsewhere.
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Say I spend some BT on my Pokemon. Then, they go into battle. They get MC, do they not? And why would I choose to not spend their MC if I could buy moves, however useless?
 
Current system: You have 80 moves. I get two subs. I can cover 1/40 moves against me.

I seriously doubt I will ever order first without getting utterly screwed.

Proposed system:

I will /probably/ get screwed, but I can cover some of my options. "I don't have enough subs to cover it," is getting to be a common complaint. And contrary to your argument, this simplifies the substitution system by making it even numbers (20) and not IF 19 BRT and 22 moves OR 18- BRT and... yeah, fun.

If you mean substitution chains getting too complex, I would prefer complex balance to simple imbalance. Most refs can handle it.

And while it could be considered punishing for extra moves, most moves have some situational use and thus should contribute somewhat, as defining a "good move" is doomed to be horribly arbitrary.

New question: How should substitutions involving combinations work?

Read: If Earthquake, Magnet Rise

Would I use Magnet Rise on a Super Earthquake? What about a Magnitude+Earthquake? I've seen a lot of confusion on this and wondered what the answer was.
 
I have an idea-Why don't we allow players to voluntarily opt to not use certain moves before battle to make their effective move total less than certain thresholds? It lets people flesh out their "bad" movepools, but still lets us make substitution totals that go above 2.

Also, a revamp of the multiples substitution rules would also be nice.
 
Rediamond said:
And while it could be considered punishing for extra moves, most moves have some situational use and thus should contribute somewhat, as defining a "good move" is doomed to be horribly arbitrary.
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CAP does this just fine. I see no reason why we can't. It's already horribly arbitrary as it is, at least we could make it more fair by doing it this way.
 
Ugh, I really dislike all this talk of increasing subs. I think 2 is more than enough. Moving second is/was always designed to be an advantage, thats why it is alternated. Plus you're all forgetting that in addition to making subs you're actually ordering first. You can dictate a whole hell of a lot about what the other player is going to do based on just your own actions. And unless you are horribly counterteamed or just outmatched you are highly unlikely to die in one round and get to turn it all around in your favour next round. Any more than 2 subs would be complete overkill and just isn't necessary.

However, I do think it is necessary to codify how subs deal with combinations. In all my reffings I have always activated substitutions for a combination involving the subed attack and I believe this is how it should be done. Some clarifications either way on this is definitely going to helpful for everyone though.
 
Okay guys, here's a compromise.

Since most of the bitching here has to do with 'mons that use extraneous moves (generally agreed to be >40), I propose this system.

1 Sub: <20 moves
2 Sub: 20-39 moves
3 Sub: 40+ moves

This gives one extra substitution to help deal with Pokemon with big movepools, but doesn't penalize Pokemon that buy inane amounts of useless moves (read: >60) to help deal with substitutions.

Thoughts?
 
It was decided that if a move is used in a combo, then it triggers that substitution.

Other than that, I agree with deadfox.
 
A lot of people are saying "More than forty moves herp derp overkill", but this is not necessarily true. For example, Excadrill works excellently with 30 moves, while a Pokemon like Nidoking or Gengar could buy 50 moves without coming close to overkill. Furthermore, I concur with what deadfox said; I have seen players outmaneuver my 50+ move Gengar and Nidoking enough to know that 2 subs is more than sufficient if your builds are within striking distance of the opponent's and you know what you're doing.
 
I agree Terrador. But what do 30 and 50 have in common? They average out to 40. I think 40 is the best middle ground we're going to get for 'good' movepools.
 
Terrador said:
Furthermore, I concur with what deadfox said; I have seen players outmaneuver my 50+ move Gengar and Nidoking enough to know that 2 subs is more than sufficient if your builds are within striking distance of the opponent's and you know what you're doing.
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That still doesn't say anything about this very valid point. Two substitutions is enough to avoid having your ass completely handed to you in all but the direst of situations, situations which are far from realistic.
 
I don't buy it. Most high-level players have multiple Pokemon with 40+ moves, and two substitutions is just not enough to take some of them down.
 
deadfox081 said:
Ugh, I really dislike all this talk of increasing subs. I think 2 is more than enough. Moving second is/was always designed to be an advantage, thats why it is alternated. Plus you're all forgetting that in addition to making subs you're actually ordering first. You can dictate a whole hell of a lot about what the other player is going to do based on just your own actions. And unless you are horribly counterteamed or just outmatched you are highly unlikely to die in one round and get to turn it all around in your favour next round. Any more than 2 subs would be complete overkill and just isn't necessary.
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This. This is why I am against any kind of substitute-increasing ideas from now on. I mean, back when we had a one-sub meta & most of us shrugged at the idea of Substitution tiering. Now with the Sub Tiering & I feel this is basically balanced as it is between attacking first & attacking second. Attacking second is supposed to be an advantage over attacking first. While it's true that two subs doesn't cover everything, people just need to accept this, & realise that three or more subs is just overkill.

Seriously, back in the old days, before the Substitution rules came into force, everyone was complaining when one player was making substitutions against basically...Every move that the opponent had. Why should we go back to those days?

Basically, leave subs the way things are. Acting second is supposed to be advantage & the one's who really want to raise the sub limit are ones that can't use them effectively. If it ain't broke, don't fix it...Ugh, I really don't know what I'm going on about...
 
Oh yeah, another energy cost suggestion: Reduce the energy cost of Body Slam.

As of right now, Body Slam costs way too much energy. Refer to the table below.

Weight Class | Body Slam | Normal Move
1 | 8 BP / 6 EN | 8 BP / 6 EN
2 | 8 BP / 7 EN | 8 BP / 6 EN; 9-10 BP / 7 EN
3 | 9 BP / 7 EN | 9 BP / 7 EN
4 | 9 BP / 7 EN | 9 BP / 7 EN
5 | 9 BP / 8 EN | 9 BP / 7 EN; 11-12 BP / 8 EN
6 | 10 BP / 8 EN | 10 BP / 7 EN; 11-12 BP / 8 EN
7 | 10 BP / 8 EN | 10 BP / 7 EN; 11-12 BP / 8 EN
8 | 11 BP / 9 EN | 11 BP / 8 EN ; 13-14 BP / 9 EN
9 | 11 BP / 9 EN | 11 BP / 8 EN; 13-14 BP / 9 EN

As you can see, for Weight Classes 1-9, Body Slam costs 1 energy or has 2 less BP than other moves of the same caliber most of the time. This is further exacerbated once you get to the even higher weight classes; a WC of 12, for example, gives you a BP of 12 and an EN cost of 10, which is 2 more than usual. To remedy this, I see a couple possible solutions. We can change the BP denominator from 2.5 to 2, which makes it more fair and/or change the EN denominator from 3 to something like 4, which also makes it fairer. Thoughts?
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I could see changing the BAP denominator. I've reffed a few Snorlax Body Slams, and they were rather underwhelming for their cost. It should cost these heavyweights a lot of energy to make the leap, but it should cause corresponding damage.
 
Different topic, different post.

What would be people's ideas of an gameplay advice thread? For those difficult decisions between possible purchases between mons, moves, or items, and so on, say. There's IRC for that sort of questions, but not everyone uses IRC.

I suppose this sort of thing could be integrated into SQSA, but that's geared more towards questions about game functions.
 
LouisCyphre said:
Different topic, different post.

What would be people's ideas of an gameplay advice thread? For those difficult decisions between possible purchases between mons, moves, or items, and so on, say. There's IRC for that sort of questions, but not everyone uses IRC.

I suppose this sort of thing could be integrated into SQSA, but that's geared more towards questions about game functions.
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Personally, the number of stickies is so high that I would not post others unless they are completely necessary
 
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