Metagame Terastallization Tiering Discussion, Part II [CLOSED FOR DLC]

[Rootb]

Would banning Tera Fairy be considered a normal ban as well then? I see how I misused "complex" but if we can ban certain Tera types isn't that a slippery slope? I'm not looking forward to "X is broken with 19th tera!" and then ppl going "Gambit is broken with Fairy, should we ban that?" It feels a bit messy even if it would be a standard ban. However, I don't think the 19th will be anything crazy though, but it could be knowing GF. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it I guess.

In theory, yeah. If it was decided that (for example), Tera Ghost did bad things for the tier due to its interactions with Rapid Spin, or Tera Fairy made dragon types too weak (lmao), it would be a simple ban to remove one tera type completely.

It's similar to how you can ban King's Rock, but not King's Rock on Cloyster.

I don't think that sort of ban would actually be helpful, unless the 19th type is truly insane, but it very much falls under the umbrella of regular banning.

 

[Avira]

That's still not a complex ban. A complex ban is a conditional ban: if X, then Y is banned. Banning a specific mon from using tera is a complex ban: If Kingambit, then tera is banned.

This is just nuking a tera type: "[New tera type here] is banned." It's not conditional, hence it's not complex.

This is not how I see it because it is conditional on Terastal being used.

Like preventing Speed Boost Blaziken from being used would be indicating you can use Blaziken but not with Speed Boost, which is complex.

Similarly I see a ban on the 19th Tera Type as indicating you can Terastalize your Pokemon, but it cannot be the 19th Tera Type, which is still an If X, then Y is banned situation.

Thus, I do not see banning the 19th Tera Type as the same as banning Tera Blast as banning Tera Blast means you cannot use Tera Blast in any situation regardless of whether you Terastalize or not, whereas banning the 19th Tera Type is indeed conditional, making it complex.

 

[Wapf]

This is not how I see it because it is conditional on Terastal being used.

Like preventing Speed Boost Blaziken from being used would be indicating you can use Blaziken but not with Speed Boost, which is complex.

Similarly I see a ban on the 19th Tera Type as indicating you can Terastalize your Pokemon, but it cannot be the 19th Tera Type, which is still an If X, then Y is banned situation.

Thus, I do not see banning the 19th Tera Type as the same as banning Tera Blast as banning Tera Blast means you cannot use Tera Blast in any situation regardless of whether you Terastalize or not, whereas banning the 19th Tera Type is indeed conditional, making it complex.

You could make anything sound like a complex ban if you used this kind of language though. “Every Pokémon can have 4 moves but if one of them is tera blast, it is banned”

 

[mathiau]

This is not how I see it because it is conditional on Terastal being used.

That's like saying that banning Lucarionte un 7g was a complex ban because it was conditional and Mega Evolution being used

 

[ant4456]

you cannot seriously tell me that you see nothing wrong with the idea of banning individual tera types just to defend the mechanic

like what is this shit are we gonna just ban all water z crystals or something if people dont like specifically water type z moves in the future

yeah you can do it in the same way that complex bans are fun fact, literally allowed and able to be done, just trying to be avoided as a general rule, overall it just sounds very stupid and makes it feel like tiering tera is a circus

omw to ban tera fairy because we gotta nerf the mechanic

 

[cala_aa]

you cannot seriously tell me that you see nothing wrong with the idea of banning individual tera types just to defend the mechanic

like what is this shit are we gonna just ban all water z crystals or something if people dont like specifically water type z moves in the future

I feel like banning the special overpowered tera type is different from banning waterium z in many ways. Even if we were to say that they were at all comparable, it's not like it would be that crazy of a concept. For example, eevium-z got banned in multiple tiers (IIRC dou and lc) for being overpowered.

 

[ant4456]

I feel like banning the special overpowered tera type is different from banning waterium z in many ways. Even if we were to say that they were at all comparable, it's not like it would be that crazy of a concept. For example, eevium-z got banned in multiple tiers (IIRC dou and lc) for being overpowered.

yeah eeveeium z was a unique z move that one pokemon could use. it is like banning a mega stone, a unique mega form. a unique move.

any pokemon can use a a typed z move if it has any move with the type, thats a bit different

 

[A_Wild_Noob_Appeared!]

I think is disingenuous to phrase a ban on the 19th Tera type as a "simple ban". There is no precedent for a teambuilder restriction of this sort and the effects would ripple through every tier. Such a ban would be quite a bit more radical than Tera Preview or a Tera Blast ban in how much the mechanic is effectively altered. The only other bans with such rippling effects on the game are the Dynamax ban and Baton Pass ban (both of which are the simplest possible methods of dealing with the problem, instead of an attempt to carve away a piece of something greater).

Like, it doesn't alter the mechanic as radically as Tera Captain or "only same/different-type Tera", but I think it should be clear that banning the 19th type should require more scrutiny and justification in the same vein as a complex ban.

 

[Rootb]

I feel like banning the special overpowered tera type is different from banning waterium z in many ways. Even if we were to say that they were at all comparable, it's not like it would be that crazy of a concept. For example, eevium-z got banned in multiple tiers (IIRC dou and lc) for being overpowered.

Yeah, like, if Gamefreak pulled this nonsense in gen 7, the sane solution would absolutely be to just knock out the broken DLC addition, rather than banning the entire mechanic because of a DLC drop. Banning specific megas isn't a perfect analogy, because not every mon got a mega form, but honestly?

It's so close that it might as well be.

Smogon as a whole spent two entire generations, (and Natdex, three and counting) with Megas, and the entire time, they've been more than willing to pick and choose which ones are balanced for OU play. If it really came down to it, it'd actually be far weirder for them to refuse to ban it.

 

[Magcargo]

I rather not jump down the rabbit hole of banning certain Tera-types like Fairy either. It may not being a complex ban, but it is unnecessarily fragmanting the mechanic and completely restructuring it in a way that wasn't intended. This is also not how we have handled banning stuff like gems in the past. When the Aurora-type or whatever its called comes, I think we can handle that as its own special case since its uniquely outside the type chart and it may radically alter Tera dynamics too much, but that all depends on if its even broken in the first place.

 

[Rootb]

I rather not jump down the rabbit hole of banning certain Tera-types like Fairy either. It may not being a complex ban, but it is unnecessarily fragmanting the mechanic and completely restructuring it in a way that wasn't intended. This is also not how we have handled banning stuff like gems in the past. When the Aurora-type or whatever its called comes, I think we can handle that as its own special case since its uniquely outside the type chart and it may radically alter Tera dynamics too much, but that all depends on if its even broken in the first place.

Oh, absolutely! I don't think banning a single tera type would be healthy in the slightest -- I just think that it's possible under Smogon's current framework. The only reason it's even up for debate is because they're about to do something very, very weird.

Hopefully it's weird-but-balanced, and not Gigantamax v2, because the latter would create a whole lot more drama.

 

[Bakugames]

The discussion around banning a specific type is mostly on the semantics of simple vs complex ban, rather than it actually happening, or at least I believe

 

[ant4456]

like i said it doesnt matter if its a complex ban or not

complex bans are real and are implemented into still played and extremely popular OU metagames

complex bans as a concept will not appear in your door and kill you

i just think its weird to want to ban one tera type

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

You could make anything sound like a complex ban if you used this kind of language though. “Every Pokémon can have 4 moves but if one of them is tera blast, it is banned”

i don't know why i'm defending that horrible argument but i do feel compelled to point out that, for a while, non-pokemon bans were considered complex bans. moody and swagger got entire clauses instead of just simply being added to a banlist

 

[Finchinator]

I am closing this now with DLC coming up in a few days, but this comes with a promise that it will be reopened (or a new thread will be reopened on the topic) in the future and Tera will be touched on in a future survey.

If you have questions on the timelines of those things or the specifics behind that promise, PM me on discord or here. I’m happy to discuss it with you. It’s important we are all on the same page.

For now, this thread has run its course. We have a greater idea of what’s feasible and preferred, but we do not have the greatest idea as to what the future holds with DLC(s), which could dictate how we proceed. Stay tuned for more.