"Smogon wants to replicate cart play as close as possible" is simply a lie. Visible HP percentage, visible moves already used and their PP, visible possible speed, team preview and opponent's HP and status visible throughout battle, none of these features exist on cart. Sleep clause is not going against cart as the way it's enforced on Smogon is the less frustrating way of 2 possible ways it could be enforced - the other being "if you try to put another Pokémon asleep while one is asleep, lose the battle instantly." It's simply just breaking a rule, the same as bringing a banned Pokémon in (which by the way is "not enforceable on cart" as Volcarona, Espathra, etc are not banned on cart.) The move doing nothing, rather than the game ending instantly because someone forgot they already put a Mon to sleep, simply is a better way to enforce tiering decisions for gameplay. Tera Type at preview does not "go against cart" in any way because it is simply one person giving another person information, just like showing HP percentage, current status, and possible speed. Let's quit pretending giving a player a piece of paper with a list of Tera types on it is the same as modding the game.
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Metagame Terastallization Tiering Discussion, Part II [CLOSED FOR DLC]
- Thread starter Finchinator
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"Smogon wants to replicate cart play as close as possible" is simply a lie. Visible HP percentage, visible moves already used and their PP, visible possible speed, team preview and opponent's HP and status visible throughout battle, none of these features exist on cart. Sleep clause is not going against cart as the way it's enforced on Smogon is the less frustrating way of 2 possible ways it could be enforced - the other being "if you try to put another Pokémon asleep while one is asleep, lose the battle instantly." It's simply just breaking a rule, the same as bringing a banned Pokémon in (which by the way is "not enforceable on cart" as Volcarona, Espathra, etc are not banned on cart.) The move doing nothing, rather than the game ending instantly because someone forgot they already put a Mon to sleep, simply is a better way to enforce tiering decisions for gameplay. Tera Type at preview does not "go against cart" in any way because it is simply one person giving another person information, just like showing HP percentage, current status, and possible speed. Let's quit pretending giving a player a piece of paper with a list of Tera types on it is the same as modding the game.
I'm relatively new to Smogon so I won't pretend to know everything or know how things have been done here, but I feel that you're mixing things up with this response so I wanna give a rundown of the argument for clarification:
My original post was the response to someone responding to "what if mons that tera can't use an item". It went like this:
User A: I suggest mons that tera can't use an item.
User B: That is not possible bc that goes against cart play.
Me: I don't believe it goes against cart play but it doesn't make any significant changes as some mons would prefer to be itemless and still abuse tera.
When people discuss what cart play actually means, I think we often forget about the multifaceted nature of it. I think the "cart play" argument has to be divided in two:
1. Cart play defines the actual core mechanics of the game, everything from type matchup, accuracy, speed tiers, damage calculation, terastallization, megaevolution, etc...
2. Smogon has made some changes to the "display" aspects of the game in comparison to cart, but all those aspects (bar sleep clause) fall into what I'd call "social contract".
This social contract aspect of the game entails everything that theoretically could be agreed upon outside of an actual cart play.
Aspects like the ones you mention can easily be agreed upon:
-Both players can agree to have a notepad where they write down used moves, PP used, boosts and more.
-Both players can agree to having access to a database of what moves certain mons have and usually use.
-Both players can agree to having access to a damage calculator.
-Both players can agree to having a calculator by their side and calculate the percentage of total HP.
At no point have I implied that Tera Preview is against Cart Play, as I believe it falls under this "Social contract" side. In fact, I never mentioned Tera Preview in my original post, as such I don't know why you argued against me in that regard when I agree with you wholeheartedly.
The original problem, which was "what if mons that tera cant run an item", also falls under this, but let's pose two questions:
1. Could two players agree to bring a team in a cart battle in which mons that would tera don't run an item? Yes, most definitely
2. But could two players agree to give a Terastal Orb to the mons that would tera in cart? No, because there is no such item.
The thing about this argument is that we cannot create a Tera Orb item out of thin air because it simply does not exist in cart, and many users reasonably took issue with such arguments, because it is (without wanting to be condescending) extremely naive to aspire to shift the game in such a way. There's many reasons why Tusk is better than Lando this gen but one of them is hazard removal. What if we just gave Lando Defog again so that it can compete with Tusk? Yeah, of course not, because movepools are determined by cart. Why did Showdown add that thing where Body Slam can't paralize normal types in RBY? Wasn't the metagame already formed and wouldn't that suppose a change in the meta? Yes but the thing is that what was happening before simply wasnt accurate.
One last quick thing too, regarding what you said about bans not being enforceable in cart. Another element that we need to consider, and precisely the reason why I chose the words "social contract", is that we need to presuppose that people are going to follow these rules. Of course in cart nothing is enforceable, but for that we already have Freedom Cup. The suposition is that every player would follow these rules or that there'd be a way to monitor that they were followed, otherwise nothing matters. But if we are on Page 31 of this Tera discussion post, the reason why someone created smogon like 15 years ago, thats because there are people who believe in rules and believe that they can make the game better.
What I want to say with this post is that, while I agree with the points you make, we need to be surgical in the way we discuss mechanic changes and have a solid reasoning behind it. I feel like many people here are arguing in bad faith or telling half truths regarding what is and what isnt possible, and we need to counter arguments with actual counterarguments and not oneliners, and if we are suggesting something that is completely unreplicable thru cart play like Sleep Clause, the argument better be fucking good.
Sorry for the rambling have a great saturday my dudes
I’m lumping these together because they both say the same thing, and they’re also both just wrong???
I agree that stall would get worse without tera, it relies on tera flying on mola or whatever else they have to check otherwise nuclear threats like banded meowscarada but balance wouldn’t love to see tera get the axe, as the only losses for that style are dirge and bax losing what little defensive counterplay it had.
Tera, fundamentally, benefits more offensively minded teams as an offensive team has 2-3 types that need to be accounted for on every mon while you can only use a single tera defensively, and also the boons that tera gives offensive mons such as changing defensive typing, boosting the power of coverage, and boosting the power of stabs just makes it an incredibly hostile mechanic for the teams trying to soak hits up.
Also the assertion that the loss of scald and toxic killed defensive styles is also wrong, as not only are there other ways of dishing out high levels of chip damage that have been demonstrated throughout the years (volt turn, hstack, will o wisp, contact punishing) but also those moves are incredible ways to exert pressure on a more passive team as the damage that a status condition could put out is crippling for a lot of mons.
The cuts hurt, but the assertion that they’re the reason that balance is on life support and not tera is a flat out lie.
To be honest, when I read everything, nothing will make the community happy ... I hope we don't split OU in two metagames, OU Tera and OU without Tera
That was a really nice comment, i agree with most of the things you said and still, i feel like saying that you can only tera a pokemon if you didnt have an item on it as the battle started is a good chance, the thought of a terastral-orb was more of a "there are the items that can change tera-types, why dont we make these the held item for tera-ing" but i didnt realize that these were basic items ungiveable to pokemon, so no item would be better and actually possible on cart, the only two things that are on showdown and not agreeable on cart are sleep clause so i guess everyone saying that showdown should be more like cart or fully like cart want either no sleep clause so you can sleep the whole opposing team or all sleep inducing moves to be banned, also the percentage-mod, that would technically be possible if both opponents used a calculator and told their opponent the exact percentage of their pokemon but thats not feasably probable on cart, still possible
tbh, lets ban all sleep inducing moves, i personally dislike games to be decided by sleep turns but thats something very different, still i see no problem with putting a "no-item-on-teramons" restriction on the board for all the people desperately trying to keep tera to keep "weak" mons on the "they can be cool because tera makes them better" chance while actually making tera more like megas or z-moves in that you have to commit and less like dmax in "oh i want that now to just instantly win" (yeah i just really dislike the way how it is so easy it is to completely change the tide of a game with one tera, it feels very close to dmax in that regard imo, also to all the people saying that you have your own tera to check the opposing tera: dynamax was the same and it was outrageously broken, i dont want to defend that in any way)
wanted to address some false statements about tera that Eelstartega made in the Kingambit thread.
1) Tera Blast has been problematic on many more Pokémon than those 3, just not enough to get them banned - Dragapult and Cresselia come to mind especially quickly, but any Pokémon can use Tera blast to blow up their checks and use that new 3rd stab to take over games. And either way ruining 3 Pokémon is reason enough to look at this absurd move
3) If you view the only role of Fairy Tera Blast as "killing Tusk" than maybe, but Tera Fairy Kingambit's job isn't just that, it's having perfect unresisted neutral coverage. Tera Blast Fairy hits dark types, Zen Headbutt does not. Running a bad tera type or suboptimal move to hit one thing is not remotely comparable to using tera to gain perfect coverage, which many Pokémon can use tera blast for
The entire scenario of tera at the right time and completely swinging the game is what causes this discussion of tera. The person who used tera to win vs who lost to tera. The roaring moon who used tera steel to take down your checks vs the tera that got outplayed.
It really all depends on if you like the idea of having a comeback mechanic being competitive or not. I think giving the opponent information about the tera completely destroys this surprise factor that can win games, but that also destroys that prediction factor that made players not only fall in love with tera, but also fight tooth in nail to keep it untouched.
It really all depends on if you like the idea of having a comeback mechanic being competitive or not. I think giving the opponent information about the tera completely destroys this surprise factor that can win games, but that also destroys that prediction factor that made players not only fall in love with tera, but also fight tooth in nail to keep it untouched.
You are correct, but it's not a modification. Just a requirement to reveal respective Tera types before battle. This has been enforced in VGC very easily, though I know it's not specific to Tera there. You can contrast this with the sleep clause mod, which is wholly unenforceable on cart even with gentleman's agreements. While having mods doesn't justify additional modifications, using this logic does call into question the existence of mods.
What exactly does this pertain to it's a clear statement that to claim that something like preview would be something never before done on smogon and would harm a supposed "purity"?
Tera doesn't make worse mons better, if anything it ups the danger from top tier threats. There's no legitimate reason to tera a low tier mon, because it's such a powerful mechanic. Being a "tera eater" has even been used as a con for Garganacl.
Alomomola would like a word with you. Low-tier mons using tera are niche, but then they're niche in general, or else they wouldn't be low tier.
So I think there may be a misinterpretation here as to what I meant by “purity.” Yes, it is purity in a sense that it sticks true to game mechanics, but one can argue that Tera Team Preview falls under the realm of a gentleman’s agreement and that revealing Tera Types is a clause that can be implemented. Frankly, the “can” discussion is semi-irrelevant, as this should be a “should” discussion. Before we do that, I want to take a moment to reflect on previous ways that Smogon has decided to institute a complex system to preserve a problematic element instead of a straight up getting rid of something. The five that come to the top of my head are Sleep Clause, Endless Battle Clause, Gen 5 Weather Clauses, Gen 6 Baton Pass, and Gen 8 Ubers Dynamax Lists.
Gen 6 Baton Pass clauses have aged poorly. Prior to the ban of Baton Pass, many restrictions were made to the ability to use Baton Pass, and all of those restrictions were insufficient. Baton Pass was eventually banned. Looking back on the situation, we probably should have just banned BP.
In Gen 8 Ubers, prior to the banning of Dynamax, there was a restricted list of Pokémon who could not Dynamax. This restriction did not prove sufficient, and the tiering of Dynamax users became a headache. Eventually, Dynamax was banned. Looking back, we probably should have just banned Dynamax.
I am not super knowledgeable on the Gen 5 weather clauses, but from my limited knowledge, the theme remains consistent: complicated compromises were insufficient.
Sleep Clause was implemented. It also remains controversial, it was removed in some old generations (in favor of sleep banning), and has repeatedly caused issues (with things like Dire Claw). In the policy framework, there are comments about sleep clause, implying that it should not be used as a precedent for anything.
Endless Battle Clause was a complex ban done right - not because it was trying to fix a pervasive mechanic, but rather because it was trying to eliminate a niche uncompetitive strategy.
Now, consider the opposite, when Smogon has done the “simple thing” immediately. The Shadow Tag ban, for example - there was no Goth suspect then Gothita suspect then Wob suspect, we just banned Shadow Tag. Evasion and OHKO clauses - we did not test the specific abusers, we just banned those moves. Dynamax in Gen 8 OU - it was just banned. Those decisions have, for the most part, aged incredibly well.
So when considering the argument of “should we bend Smogon’s tiering policy and enact a complex system to preserve Tera or should we just ban/no ban Tera,” history would indicate that the compromise won’t really work, and that decisive action is probably the better way to go. So, yeah, maybe we can carve out an exception for Team Preview, but looking at history, straying away from purity leads to generally worse outcomes and more required tiering action.
Alolamola using tera is a bandaid to a playstyle that got hit hard during the gen. Doesn't mean it's healthy. Low tier mons shouldn't depend on an unstable mechanic to be viable in the first place, that's not having a niche, it's being a "gotcha" moment.
While I agree it's more of a gentleman's agreement, it's still bending the modification similarly to a modification and I think it's fair to treat it similarly. I do not think it's desirable to have the entirety of generation 9 to be heavily influenced by a gentleman's agreement.
Gentleman's agreement that changes the mechanic to meet our liking is not "pure".
Gentleman's agreements are pretty much the foundation of what OU is, there is a vast difference between an agreement made between players before the match, and mods that directly change how the game is played.
A "pure" OU would have every uber pokemon unbanned, after all players are entering a gentleman's agreement to not use pokemon that are deemed uber, we enter an agreement to not use Last Respects or Shed Tail, we agree to not use certain abilities.
Ultimately every proposition to restrict tera does not fundamentally change how tera works, but mainly to restrict and make it more palatable.
You can't just pull out the "ur bad L" defense of a mechanic that fundamentally breaks the foundation of Pokemon battles. As long as the game has existed, the type matchup chart offers a small concrete idea of checks and balances (e.g, your opponent has Weavile, you have to be careful switching in your Landorus-Therian against it cause even with intimidate you still have a good likelyhood of getting OHKO'd by even ice shard).
With Tera, the whole fundamental relationship between pokemon checks and counters is flipped on it's head. Suddenly, the Landorus-Therian (who's now let's say Fire type and resists ice stabs) now hard counters Weavile, and you either lose the weavile due to tera blast or (more likely) you lose the game due to a shift in momentum.
The offensive capabilities of Tera Blast specifically are also stupid. Multiple mons have been banned solely due to the fact that Tera Blast exists (Volcarona and Regieleki being the most notable).
This isn't even to say how incredibly strong free Adaptability is. Again, multiple mons have been banned solely due to the fact that Mono Tera makes them unwallable (Chien-Pao and Chi-Yu, Urshifu-Rapid-Strike, etc)
The problem is that not only do you not know what exactly your opponent's tera types are (yes there's general usage patterns but due to the nature of tera, it's infinitely changable), but you also never know when or where or who your opponent will Tera (e.g, will he Tera Ghost with his Samurott Hisui to get free spikes, potentially winning a massive amount of tempo? Will he tera at the end on his Kingambit? If so, is it a defensive Tera (Fairy, Flying, Fire), or is it a Dark Type tera to beat me with even more massive sucker punches?
Tera isn't a comeback mechanic. Tera is a completely chaotic mixup tool in a metagame that normally demands not only memorization, but also game-sense which is completely nullified by "Oh this King-gambit is Tera Water, cool guess i lose cause i couldn't have possibly guessed that he was going to do that"
EDIT: If anything, it's the opposite, as the person who has more mons always has the advantage since they have more tera types to take advantage of at any given time.
And the main 2 agreements would be INCREDIBLY EASY to do, just show certain switch screen of your team to another player so you show the tera type the specie has, although covering the item part. Banning a move is also easy although it should not be your only solution, you must prove the move is a problem (I can think of 4 problems right now. Enough evidence to me). We used to have so many silly ideas in the past that would have made the problem much worse (Just look at the first OU survey and see the main suggestions are completely different to Tera Blast and Tera Preview of today) and also were overly convoluted.
I think there's a clear difference between a gentleman's agreement to not bring Mewtwo and a gentleman's agreement to reveal information about your team that's not normally seen at preview.
- ARGUABLY problematic. A lot of times the mon is just obnoxious to deal with but it's fine, like Landorus-T or Weavile. People is not sure if Bax is too much overall. Also, I did made a mistake. KINGAMBIT is also a problem using Tera Blast, but it use not to be up until recently. Maybe you have a point on tera Blast though, Kingambit made me realize it was a serious problem, but only because it's the same as Chi-Yu. Is maybe a sacrifice worth taking. After all, Hidden power got nerfed before removed for a reason.
3) Kingambit still has low kick for those cases, and considering kingambit just 1V1s three quarters of OU, defeating 3 of the 4 things that reliably is good. Even without Tera, Dark + Fighting is an almost unwallable combo that send Urshifu to ubers back in gen 8. That being said, some cheese of the Tera who is causing this frustration can be reduced.
What I was saying in that post is that Kingambit is more of an "Annihilape case" than a "Volcarona case". The monke was problematic just by the sheer type change and should be banned in case, Volcarona needs unrestricted Tera to be banworthy. I was saying why Kingambit getting tera blast banned would still be busted. That's important to realize what is safe to unban once Tera gets restricted.
This is generally true, mons like kingambit, ival, bax, and booster moon are all top threats that make incredible use of tera as a mechanic. That being said, leeching it is a problem for a lot of mons, most notably dirge and garganacl.
They are literally the same exact thing "Hey im not gonna bring Kyogre" ----> "Hey im gonna show u my tera's"
You don't think there's a difference between agreeing to not bring something and agreeing to reveal additional info? Both are possible on cart yes, but they're not the same in concept even if you can put "--->" between them.
This makes zero sense it is exactly the same as telling someone what your bringing because you are both agreeing to reveal tera types just as one would agree to not bring a pokemon for the sake of fairness?
You don't agree to tell what you're bringing, the game tells the players that (although I'm assuming you meant agree on what you're not bringing). I think there's a stark difference between "don't use X" and "tell me Y" that if you don't see I think we'll have to just agree that we see it differently.
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