what's weird to me about these arguments is that it makes it seem like only side can tera? If both players can "tera to avoid a bad outcome", then how is it unbalanced? It's just like with Dmax, you often have to Dmax reactively to counter your opponent's Dmax, which ends up leveling the playing field. This isn't to attack your argument specifically, but it's more of a reaction to what I've been reading in this thread. Imo, if both sides have access to the broken mechanic, that means it's basically a level playing field, and it comes down to who utilizes it better.more than tera being a mechanic that you use to win, it is a mechanic you use to not lose
lying roaring moon, water annihilape - you aren't changing these mons types to "win", you are already using good mons in an attempt to win, you tera to avoid a bad outcome that you otherwise couldn't without tera
tera's potential comes from the ability to have what would normally be a losing situation and turn it around without needing to use a turn switching pokemon, changing the situation from a loss or at least mitigating the worst effects of such
basically you play the game without tera until you reach a turn where it looks like you would come off worse that turn (such as being walled, statused, knocked out, etc) AND have a tera type that allows you to attempt to negate predicted failure in a way you couldn't in another gen, then you use it and this comes at no immediate opportunity cost, you don't give up on anything by choosing x type for a mon unless you actually use it, unlike running 6 mons with mega stones or running 6 mons with dynamax abusive sets, you could do that with them but it wasn't a good strategy because it came at a cost of items and movesets
tera feels like you are trading 1 pokemon for another mid-battle one with the same stats/moves but with a diff typing (switching mons without switching mons?) and this is enough of a distinction to call it a different mon at that point - there are several past pokemon like this who have varied/viability tiering placement based on type changes: rotom forms, arceus, silvally, and megas - i bring them up cause they are the closest things to tera that we've had in the past
rambling
I could be missing something here tho since I've been pretty out of the loop. Personally, Gen7 was my favorite gen bc of Mega's and Z-moves. Nothing gave me more satisfaction than clicking All-Out-Pummeling with my Thundurus-T against Heatran's and T-tars and watching them drop. It made that generation feel special and unique, and it added an extra layer of strategy and outplay potential that I really enjoyed. Would hate to see this generation gutted like Gen8 was, but I understand why it might be necessary. I'm hoping we can find a way to keep it around tho.