Suggestions for OM Improvement

Quantum Tesseract said:
One other thing that would really improve other metagames is more active moderation. Obviously I'm looking at the BH threads in particular, but even like AG could use some more post moderation; yes, it was able to be brought back on topic, but metagame threads shouldn't be somebody's personal RMT dump or whatever that was. There's obviously ways to go too far, so it would require some care, but preventing what can only be described as shitposts should be, in my opinion, considered a positive end result.
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>Moderate
>AG
noh rulez in ay jee

I agree strongly with Quantum Tesseract (is that who I quoted? yes it is. cool no tag then.) about the issue of bans. Other Metas shouldn't be looked at as ou with something pasted over the top, in a meta like Sketchmons or AAA or even BH or Camomons or whatever, the mechanics of the game have been changed, and I don't think that looking at OU as the base form of the meta that can be referred to with bans is very helpful theoretically. I actually think Sketchmons is not the best example for this argument, because it doesn't actually give access to the move and rather gives access to Sketch, and there is an in-game precedent for a move not being sketchable.

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chatterchatterchatter
If you take AAA however, saying that Medicham should have access to Pure Power because it does in OU ignores the fact that we are now in the OMverse, where it doesn't matter what ability you have in game, you can have almost any ability.

The flipside of this is what is actually practical to do. I think this debate shouldn't be allowed to die just yet, but neither should hasty action be taken. Because honestly, we're here to have fun, and if nobody wants to make the switch to a new ban philosophy then whats the point? If nobody wants the unreleased megastones to be banned then whats the point woops how did this get in here
 
Ok, I feel better knowing I at least was able to open the dialogue on organization, which I agree should include removing shitposts with RMTs, and other random ideas.

I agree with the concept of Ou not being a base for OMs. From now on, we should identify what makes an OM a success and what makes it a failure.

There might not be a specific formula, or a list of all ingredients to a full recipe (if you will), but there should be some ground rules and some standards.

For example, if someone submitted Mix and Mega today, right now, as a new OM, would the leaders say we must limit it to Mega Stones currently available, and if so, should we postpone the game until more are released? Or would they release all the Mega Stones today to ensure maximum player base, variety, strategy, and overall concepts to the OM in its early development? Or would they play it by ear and say only the current for now, and the rest we can decide if we need it? Maybe they would vote or have the actual active player base vote?

Point is, like the Ruins of Alpha said, we should focus on the fun, if the game is not (as?) fun, and the rules are based on something that is arbitrary (following limitations of cartridges, while the meta game itself is actually breaking the rules and limits of cartridge play - the point of ALL OMs-except AG which actually follows cartridge play more than even Ubers and OU), then why would we not view the development of the OM individually or base it off a flexible formula or interchangeable ingredients to a recipe, because some games are not as easy to write off as others.

Tldr; some rules should be universal, some should be for certain types of OM's, and some should be OM specific (such as the balance hackmons vs hackmons metagames where OU rules like OHKO moves are banned in BH but not classic Hackmons).

I believe, if it makes a difference, is that we need to find a way to maximize playerbases and improve the way OM are approved and dealt with, so for example, an obviously unpopular OM won't get approved, and an obviously popular new proposed OM or just an obviously beneficial rule change proposal will get approved.
Perhaps the big suggestion to change the way the OMs section is being organized- postings, threads, rules, and spelling out for people who want to help: either with suggestions, or who want to create a new OM, or improve an old one.

Reminding people of the information they need to know or get access to- like the Smogon stats, can only help.
For example, if someone made a new OM, they should check if people are actually playing it, ask leaders for suggestions, ask their players what to improve, and overall turn a useful resource - the community, and its tools (such as stats per day, etc.), into a real opportunity to find what works and make the best of the situation- similar to using a winning formula, or getting the right ingredients to a recipe, or making the right plan to fix their OM and improve their thread). Oftentimes things fail due to not knowing where to look for helpful tips.
 
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Quantum Tesseract said:
One other thing that would really improve other metagames is more active moderation. Obviously I'm looking at the BH threads in particular, but even like AG could use some more post moderation; yes, it was able to be brought back on topic, but metagame threads shouldn't be somebody's personal RMT dump or whatever that was. There's obviously ways to go too far, so it would require some care, but preventing what can only be described as shitposts should be, in my opinion, considered a positive end result.
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We tend to be more lenient compared to OU and the like. If hosts want more strict moderation, then fine. Even if they don't have moderation powers, they should step in themselves and tell users not to do X in their thread. You do, however, have a point about RMTs. They should go in the Bazaar thread. I, admittedly, forgot we had a thread for that purpose. I moved the ones you mentioned and I will delete/move any RMTs in future. Thanks :)!
 
Hi there! I'm not super well known in the om community, but I am a supporter of Other Metas in general.
So a couple of suggestions:

New omotm’s being required to have a council and if not, having one appointed. I.E. Bans and suspects taking longer than they should when a omotm only has a month to figure itself out. I can understand only having one suspect at a time unless a meta is particularly broken without certain things being gone. But my main expertise is not in the other meta's community, so I would defer to other's expertise when it comes to this kind of thing.

Also, some ideas that likely can’t be done, but is worth bringing up just in case: Having more of a promotion for om’s. There are om’s that lay dormant, or that can be hard to find matches in. In all likelihood, the om staff/council are already trying to figure out ways to do this so I’ll make some suggestions and hope I don’t get shot down too hard:
1. This one may or may not be doable, but trying to encourage suspects/bans for om’s and omotm’s in the news: Consider that not all users frequent the forums and/or the Other Meta’s room, so these guys might pick up an om, only to be frustrated and leave because of something that’s actually in the process of getting removed from said metagame.
2. This might be extreme, but occasionally having a global announcement, or even just an announcement in rooms like tournaments, where battles are a common theme, about new om’s being input. But in all likelihood this might seem redundant, considering that om’s are a monthly news item.
3. And this one is extremely unlikely, but… you never know until you try: Considering some kind of om promoter global position for people the om community know (that’s not me :P) and that the om council/staff consider good for the position. This person would specifically have the role of promoting said om or omotm.

Finally I will say I appreciate the fact that om's exist. They provide a nice distraction and often some out of the box thinking, and that's always good for the ol' noggin.
 
The Ruins of Alpha said:
Suggestion for tibot to have a .om analysis [insertmonhere] command that gives a link to all the om analyses that exist for that mon so that analyses are easier to find, easy to link in chat, and actually get read after being written ;|

Credit to whoever was in the om room when we thought this up idr anymore
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The OM links for my project are going to be on the main server under /om aaa etc
 
In response to the separate section discussion, the plan that we had at the beginning of this generation was to have tags for each permanent OM. So instead of "Metagame" or "Ladder", Balanced Hackmons would have a "BH" tag, for example. And all BH threads would have that tag. In addition to that, I was going to sticky the metagame threads, so they would always be on top for easy finding and the tags would be easily accessible. However, that plan fell through because rotations were cut, so we would have ended up with too many stickies. I think I should still go through with the tags idea, though, as a way of improving forum organization.
 
Why not just have some Metagames Posted at the top, like where the other metagames rules threads are stickied? For top OMs and OM of the months only, such as BH; then it would be listed as a sticky so it wouldn't slip down if it was not the most recent thread posted. It's one way to organize without having to post the threads in a separate section; so it's in the General OM, unlike Monotype.
The Immortal said:
In response to the separate section discussion, the plan that we had at the beginning of this generation was to have tags for each permanent OM. So instead of "Metagame" or "Ladder", Balanced Hackmons would have a "BH" tag, for example. And all BH threads would have that tag. In addition to that, I was going to sticky the metagame threads, so they would always be on top for easy finding and the tags would be easily accessible. However, that plan fell through because rotations were cut, so we would have ended up with too many stickies. I think I should still go through with the tags idea, though, as a way of improving forum organization.
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I'd like to talk about something that's being brought up more and more as Automagic grows in popularity: bringing back LCotM ladders.

I'm aware that this might possibly go against rule 3 of the thread in that I shouldn't make suggestions that go above my level of authority, but it isn't made very clear for circumstances that only the leaders of OMs have to access to there'd basically be no point to the thread otherwise, so I'll just assume that it doesn't apply here, though I sincerely apologize if that is not the case.

This has been and still is a frequently brought up point of discussion in the Showdown chat, as proven by the fact that we need a !roomfaq command for the convenience of not having to explain it each time. The question that nearly always gets asked when this discussion pops up is "why?". I can't speak for TI and his mysterious way of handling things, but the only answer that people who somehow manage to keep track of all this smogon stuff can provide is "The LCoTM is challenge-only to preserve activity for the other OM ladders".

Personally this is not me trying to make any claims or attacks, just my opinion, I don't believe this line of reasoning makes any sense. If there are less OMs to play, then doesn't that make it more likely that people won't play OMs at all? Not to mention, having it be challenge/tour-only just makes it an uncomfortable compromise for people that would want to play it regularly. It's like having a bakery with every dessert option, but you can only have cakes if you pay for them in pennies; it might as well not even be an option at that point.

Now back to my attempts at being objective!!

It's a given that Monthly OMs are going to be more popular than our permanent OMs BH Doubles, Hidden Type, Sketchmons, AAA, even rivaling MnM and 1v1, which is why a course of action needs to be taken with LCotMs; either finishing the job at butchering them by getting rid of them completely, completely restoring their ladder, OR a compromise of the two where we turn LCotMs into an unrated ladder so that people can play them without being literally required to arrange a match while still not transforming it into as significant of a focal point as our other ladders, because otherwise, the LCotM is just ending up as wasted potential.

In addition this part is just me again, I'd like to suggest that future significant decisions take the sentiments of the people these changes will affect into account, and/or that we start having surveys to help collect user feedback on OMs/Policy/Whatever to ensure that people new to OMs, seasoned veterans, and everything in between can have their voices heard and that our leaders are actually listening to those voices.
 
I can remove it completely but I don't see what that accomplishes? It's getting an opportunity to earn some activity, possibly some balancing, as well as any potential bugs in the code being fixed. All this happening before it wins OM of the Month, before it gets a ladder. Sounds like a positive to me.
 
The Immortal said:
I can remove it completely but I don't see what that accomplishes? It's getting an opportunity to earn some activity, possibly some balancing, as well as any potential bugs in the code being fixed. All this happening before it wins OM of the Month, before it gets a ladder. Sounds like a positive to me.
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TI, I think the majority of the community has already expressed that they do want the LCOtM ladder back up based on the claimes of it affecting other ladder activity to be unsustainable. MAMP had the exact data proving this but if we really want testing and community activity on these chosen metas (because the threads had also decreased in contributions due to no ladder being availible), then why not have their ladders be placed? If your gonna introduce these again, then might as well do it properly imo.
 
Funbot28 said:
TI, I think the majority of the community has already expressed that they do want the LCOtM ladder back up based on the claimes of it affecting other ladder activity to be unsustainable. MAMP had the exact data proving this but if we really want testing and community activity on these chosen metas (because the threads had also decreased in contributions due to no ladder being availible), then why not have their ladders be placed? If your gonna introduce these again, then might as well do it properly imo.
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Off course they do. If you ask the community they would want every OM to be playable on the main server. These are the number of ladders scpinion and myself have selected to represent Other Metagames on the main server.
 
Leader's Choice has existed before and it's the current lack of it that people are annoyed about. Perhaps if it was more clear why it was once a good idea and why it is now not a good idea then people wouldnt be complaining?
e: I realized that there may have been some kind of announcement on why LCotM is gone, but then I couldn't find much more concrete reasoning than "we decided it shouldn't exist anymore". That might not be unreasonable since I don't know anything about fitting PS ladders but it's not really an answer yet.
 
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Megazard said:
Leader's Choice has existed before and it's the current lack of it that people are annoyed about. Perhaps if it was more clear why it was once a good idea and why it is now not a good idea then people wouldnt be complaining?
e: I realized that there may have been some kind of announcement on why LCotM is gone, but then I couldn't find much more concrete reasoning than "we decided it shouldn't exist anymore". That might not be unreasonable since I don't know anything about fitting PS ladders but it's not really an answer yet.
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Alright. The Leader's Choice overshadowed the permanent ladders, whether it did so with ladder activity or with actual discussion. This is not what we want. If we go back to the feedback received last generation, new metagames temporarily distracting players from better permanent ones was an issue brought up by many. As a result, one of the goals we set for this generation was to focus on cultivating existing metagames rather than continuously creating new ones. The Leader's Choice ladder somewhat went against that philosophy because of the overshadowing I mentioned above. Users would simply play the new Leader's Choice every month rather than the permanent ladders. As I mentioned in an above post, the current number of ladders is what we decided should represent Other Metagames on the main server. As OM continues to grow and expand, perhaps one day in the future there will be significant activity across all existing ladders, thereby demanding more.

I know people will not stop complaining so I'll just say: this suggestion is not being implemented at this point in time and any further posts about it shall be deleted.
 
Ok. Please dont delete this. This isnt an argument to bring back LCoTM's ladder. This argument is about the fact that the current way of choosing an OM for LCotM is flawed. I believe the original method (Selecting metas that have little attention) should be brought back. As of now picking the meta with currently the highest discussion is flawed and can be easily manipulated to sway in your favour (Believe me I tried) for your OM to receive LC. Also, the issue of hype. Fresh new metagames that may or may not be that good get LC just because of initial hype pushing its discussion and drawing it from older metas. Then halfway through when the hype is dead you realise the metagame is crappy, saturated or centralised around a set amount of threats and / or generally not as fun as the hype claimed. Right now there are great metagames that arent getting discussion, and thanks to not getting any attention, are stuck at the bottom of the thread or on the accursed page 2.

There are many examples of LCs that got picked in Gen 6 that, though didnt receive attention at first, once they became LC, skyrocketed in playerbase and discussion, often not losing the momentum once the LC status is over **cough cough Megamons cough**. So the argument that dead metas wont be good is wrong ten times over. (or whatever amount of plays Megamons got last year)

Tl:dr The picking of LCotM rn sucks and should revert to its old ways.

But then again, what do I know? Im just the Pet Mod guy. Topic for another rant
 
Would a topic dedicated for posting silly sets and memetic teams and the like be a good idea? I'm talking for all OMs combined, not individual topics for individual OMs. I feel like it'd give people wanting to share their joke teams and stuff a place to do so without cluttering the main topics of the OMs and risking getting corrected by multiple individuals and/or the post deleted.
 
Also would like to add, since many suspects are going on between different OM'S with perma ladders, would it be plausible to implement TC badge for OM suspects as well? This gen we have really gone formal with the whole suspect process (suspect ladder for 2 weeks, with certain COIL and GXE requirements) and honestly I find it should be considered due to how consice we follow official tier suspect procedure. It can also help give more incentive for players to ladder and get reqs too which is always nice.
 
Funbot28 said:
Also would like to add, since many suspects are going on between different OM'S with perma ladders, would it be plausible to implement TC badge for OM suspects as well? This gen we have really gone formal with the whole suspect process (suspect ladder for 2 weeks, with certain COIL and GXE requirements) and honestly I find it should be considered due to how consice we follow official tier suspect procedure. It can also help give more incentive for players to ladder and get reqs too which is always nice.
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While that's a nice idea, the problem that I see is that our reqs are really low since most of the ladders are so inactive. If you look at suspects for MnM and AAA specifically, you can see that people are getting reqs and voting with minimal meta knowledge. This is exacerbated in Sketchmons, but not quite as bad in BH, from what I can tell. For OM suspects to be worth any badges, in my mind, our reqs would have to be significantly higher; this would severely lower voting turnout, though.
 
How about we make a thread called Victim of the Week?

Say, we can have each OM's council members to choose an appropriate 'mons and ask people to post about what 'mons can check or counter them. For example, for BH, if the victim of the week is Primal Groudon, then a whole bunch of people will post what can 'counter' that mon by posting stuff like Giratina / Zygarde-C / Primal Kyogre / others, and we do voting, and decide the winner of the week.

I believe such thread will help any visitors learn about the meta better and assist them in general when it comes to teambuilding or gaining metagame knowledge.
 
RNGIsFatal said:
How about we make a thread called Victim of the Week?

Say, we can have each OM's council members to choose an appropriate 'mons and ask people to post about what 'mons can check or counter them. For example, for BH, if the victim of the week is Primal Groudon, then a whole bunch of people will post what can 'counter' that mon by posting stuff like Giratina / Zygarde-C / Primal Kyogre / others, and we do voting, and decide the winner of the week.

I believe such thread will help any visitors learn about the meta better and assist them in general when it comes to teambuilding or gaining metagame knowledge.
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Projects like this sadly have a historically poor rate of success. Last gen all the non specified resource threads for the most part (off the top of my head Teambuilding Comp, Good Cores, Role Compendium, etc) got roughly a page of discussion and then were never touched again. Keep in mind that despite best efforts to the contrary the OM playerbase is pretty divided by what they do or don't play so projects like this tend to struggle when being all inclusive.

Now, if leaders of specific metagames wanted to run pseudo versions of these projects within the discussion threads I couldn't see a thing in the world wrong with that. Give a very specific topic and you should get some good discussion going about it, ideally.
 
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