Discussion TLG Feedback Thread

TMan87

TMan87

We shall bow to neither master nor god
is a Site Content Manageris a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributor
Moderator
Hello all!

A new Policy thread for TLG is opening, since it's pretty much become its own thing now.

This thread is open to all, and is meant to gather feedback from the community. Examples include (but are not limited to!):
  • Feedback on the format as a whole
  • Feedback on specific, already existing arenas (balance and/or flavor-wise)
  • Arena/Flavor suggestions for yet unreleased Pokémon (keep in mind I have some stuff prepared already though)
  • Bundle suggestions
Feel free to discuss! don't let this thread become empty please
 
Overall I've very much been enjoying the TLG format, it presents an interesting new way to play BBP which I love.

In terms of feedback I think that one in the current rotation could use a bit of tweaking, namely Entei's Journey to the West
I like the flavour implications of the arena, but as it stands the arena massively skews to favour the battler with second order round 1. Entei's Journey to the west essentially creates two 1v1 matchups that will never change, with each battler having one matchup where they will always order second. Without combinations, it is extremely rare for a battle to end in 1 round, meaning that the battler with second order in round 1 will almost always have a 1v1 matchup where they have second order multiple times giving a massive advantage.

This is the only arena I really have an issue with balance wise, been loving everything else and I look forward to seeing the new rotations as they come out!
 
I've also been really enjoying TLG, I'm finding it both very interesting and a lot of fun to play. Overall the main thing I've noticed is Eject Button is very strong in this format, probably as a result of the format being a fight to first KO. I'm not sure how we could go about balancing Eject Button for this mode if we wanted to or even if it's a good idea to balance it instead of leaving it as probably the strongest item in the format, just because if it can't be used for self-switching then I feel like that would greatly increase the importance of self-switching and trapping to the point where I suspect it would greatly restrict team selection.

With regard to Entei's Journey to the West, it does isolate 2 separate 1v1 fights, which I think was the intent of the arena, but more importantly, one of these fights will always have the same player ordering first, and the other fight will always have that player ordering second. In theory, I think a race like that to see who wins the fight where they have second order first could be interesting, but the problem is, the fights don't occur simultaneously; one of the fights always has its equal-number round happen before the other one (fight 1 round 1, fight 2 round 1, fight 1 round 2, fight 2 round 2, etc). This means that the person with second order in the first fight has a massive advantage because if both fights have the player with second order winning in the same number of rounds, which will not be at all uncommon, then the person with second order in the first fight wins because their KO round happens first. Thus, the person with second order in the first fight only has to KO in the same number of rounds as the opponent, but the person with second order in the second fight has to KO faster than their opponent. The one exception to this is if the person with second order in the second fight (i.e. the person with first order in the first fight) has a strong enough counterpick to the opponent's lead that they can win the first fight despite only ever having first order. I'm not entirely sure how to fix this, especially considering that the person with first order in the first fight is the only one who ever gets to choose a matchup, so any balancing that results in that person having second order in the second round of the first fight will then heavily favour that person, because then they both get to choose the matchup and have second order in what is often a KO round, with no other matchup control options available to the person ordering second in the first fight because self-switching, phasing, and trapping. I will note that in this case switching becomes an okay option depending on matchup, but if the opponent decides not to counterswitch then the player is still in a situation where both mons on the field have taken 2 rounds of stealth rocks, one round of damage, and they still have first order.

Overall I'm not sure how to fix it, because I don't see a way to lock in 2 separate 1v1 matchups without favouring one battler or the other, and if it ends up favouring the person with first order round 1, then it would never be picked because that player doesn't choose the arena.

As for bundle suggestions, based on the tierings of legendaries, the only ones I can see being approved are tapus (which there has been some speculation on discord that those are the next bundle), possibly genies (the highest tier genie is lower than the highest tier dog, and the second highest tier genie is lower than the second highest tier dog), and significantly less likely either galar birds or regis. Galar birds and regis would both have the highest average tier of all bundles so far, so that's why I think they're less likely, tapus would almost certainly would be approved because 3 of them are tier 3 and those 3 could be released in a bundle, and genies at least have a lower average tier than the dogs, although not by a lot. I think a Regieleki, Calyrex, Regidrago bundle is also a possibility, although I'm not sure how well those fit together thematically.
 
Entei's Journey to the West is getting retooled, though I'm unsure what to do with it. I might just scrap it and create a new arena altogether (this one was based on Entei's various Pokédex descriptions recounting it traveling tirelessly).

I will also retool Raikou's Battle Tower: as it stands, I see two problems with it. One, it's kind of too easy to get BP. The mechanic was used to reward high damage, but I find its current threshold too low. Two, the 3 BP = +1 everywhere looks too strong, especially coupled with the previous flaw. Snowballing is easy and prevents the opponent from doing the same. I plan to raise it to 4 BP, ordering first still.
 
One other thing that I think would be nice is if it would be announced in advance when the mons available are going to change/what they're going to change to, just so that people know and can decide if they want to prioritize trying for the current mons and risk missing the first pool for the next rotation or wait until the next rotation to go for the mons they want.
 
That would be an option, but at times even I don't really know what's going to come next, and sometimes I don't even have anything for 'next time'.
I also kinda like the element of surprise that comes with each rotation, but that's probably my pride talking.

It will be much more feasible once a tier is completed, though.
 
New question in which I'm interested: which frequency would you like TLG to rotate at, at least concerning T3 mons? (since T2+ may have their own rotation rules etc.)
Do you feel like it would be better to have a 'fixed' rotation time, like 'one rotation every two months', or rather something similar to 'all T3 TLG should be available in one year's timespan'?
 
I like the idea of a fixed rotation schedule, because that way people can know when the next rotation is coming up well in advance and decide if they want to go for the current pool or wait for the next one. There are 4 pools for TLGs right now, so I think a 3 month rotation period would work well, because that gives people time to complete one match and start another at the cost of not being ready to jump into the next rotation immediately, or just complete one match and then wait for the next rotation. Additionally, this ensures that all of the currently available TLGs will come up within a year, which seems like good variety.
 
How about when tlgs are rotated in they come with an end date? That way we still know in advance when we want to be done by if we want to participate in the next tlg, but it's not nearly as restricting as insisting there will be exactly four per year or something.
 
Isn't that identical to 'rotation every two months' though? Not that it's a bad thing, but just for clarity's sake.
 
It's slightly more flexible! You can decide "this time the tlg will stay for 1 month" if you want to, for instance. But yes it is very similar to "rotation every two months" and I prefer the set time option to the option where we squeeze them as small as they need to be to ensure every legend comes up yearly.
 
Entei's Journey to the West is getting scrapped, that's for sure. It's mechanically too inconvenient and bothersome to ref.
Instead, I propose a new arena to replace it:
Battle Castle
An Entei once found refuge in Sinnoh, precisely in the Battle Castle. Caitlin herself may have left for Unova, but the Entei stayed… and who’s to say it won’t attract others of the same kind? You’re going to have to play by the rules to see it for yourself though. Let’s get you started with a welcome pack!
  • At the start of the game in this arena, both players receive 5 CP (Castle Points). Before anyone sends out, each player must declare which item or items they buy, starting with the player who chose the arena.
    • No more than 2 of the same item can be purchased
    • A Potion costs 1 CP and heals 20 HP
    • A Super Potion costs 3 CP and heals 50 HP
    • A Full Restore costs 5 CP, heals 50 HP and clears the Pokémon of all status ailments, whether major or minor
    • A Full Heal costs 2 CP
  • No more than 2 items can be used on the same Pokémon in the same match
  • Using an item takes up an action
  • Using an item has the same action timing as Mega Evolving
Codifications are TBD, but what are your thoughts on it? The community wanted something to use "TLR items" in PvP, so I tried to deliver.
 
Last edited:
The biggest problem I see with that arena is the codification of item timings. Per the PHB, Mega Evolution happens at an unspecified time during the "start of round" phase, so by tying them to Mega Evolution timing you make it so that either all items get used at start of round regardless of which action you sacrifice to use them (also means you can't use subs to modify that action or to use items unless those subs check at start of round), or you can only use them A1. I think it would be better to tie their timing to the activation of RCB.

The only other thing I want to talk about are the items. Overall, these are my first thoughts on those items:

Potion: this item seems situational. If you're using it on an active pokemon, then it has the same downsides as recovery moves, namely that you'll rarely come out better than action neutral, but if you're in a situation where you need to bring your low-HP lead back out, then using it on that mon while your second mon is on the field can help a lot. While situations like that don't come up every TLG, they come up often enough for this to be useful.
Full Heal: this seems like the weakest item of the bunch. While there are niche cases where status heals are useful, they're not that common, especially in a fight to first KO. In addition, when comparing similar moves, most status heals heal the entire team for slightly less EN than recovery moves cost, so it feels weird for a status heal that only works on one pokemon to cost more than something with the same effect as a recovery move, especially when the thing with the same effect as a recovery move can be freely used on benched pokemon, unlike normal recovery moves. I guess this can be used during Endure, but your opponent can just status you again right after, so that's not very helpful.
Super Potion: this seems like the best item of them all, by quite a bit. I would generally expect this to buy me an additional action and a half in most cases, possibly more depending on how it gets used. The only possible reason I could see for not taking this every time is if you want the Full Restore.
Full Restore: this seems similar in power to taking Super Potion+Full Heal, you're trading the ability to use the two effects on different pokemon or at different times for it only costing 1 action instead of 2.

Overall, I think there are 3 item choices that people will ever take: Full Restore, Super Potion+Full Heal, and Super Potion+2 Potion, and to be honest, I'd be inclined to pick the last option every time outside of a few matchups. I'm not really sure what a good way to address this would be, however, because I think I'd feel the same way if it was Super Potion+Potion instead of Super Potion+2 Potion, and if you allow Super Potion+Potion+Full Heal then that becomes the obvious choice every time because it gives you more flexibility. It's also possible I'm overrating the healing from Potions, considering you're already getting +50 HP from a Super Potion, so Potions are a relatively smaller amount of HP compared to the total pool.
 
I did not know Mega Evolution was fixed at start of round instead of action.
I propose the following: using items shares its timing with RCB activation.
 
If there is no more discussion by tomorrow I'll officially implement this arena, given that epicdrill's first concern has been fixed, and the second feels fine as there is still a diversity of sets people would go for.

e: Actually I just noticed something. Super Potions in Realgam heal for 40 HP, this was a mistake by me. Would it be better to bring them down to this level to avoid confusion, and would that shake the 'item meta' in this arena?
 
I agree with what Lou said in Discord that items should be consistent across RPs, simply so that we can both have a central database of items to pull from when people make RPs in the future and to avoid confusion.

With regard to changing the item meta, the main difference I think this would create is it would mean Super Potion+Full Heal gets used very rarely if at all. I think trading flexibility (which you get from Super Potion+Full Heal) for +1 action (which if you actually use the Full Heal portion is the payoff from Full Restore) is a reasonable trade, but when the +1 action option also gives you an extra 10 HP that becomes a lot less reasonable, especially when I don't think actually using the Full Heal (or the Full Heal portion of the Full Restore) will be very common. I do think that this would also slightly incentivize Full Restore over Super Potion+2 Potions, just because there's a big difference between giving a mon 50 HP in one action and giving a mon 60 HP over 2 actions in that the former is likely to be much more HP positive.
 
Alright so here are proposed changes as discussed on Discord:

Potion costs 2 CP
Full Heal costs 1 CP
Super Potion and Full Restore only heal 40 HP to bring them in line with other facilities
 
Should I bar people from reffing more than one TLG at a time? Going with yes for now, since JC is quite difficult to come across and reffing TLG is quite lucrative.
 
"When you send in your team, if a Pokemon has access to form-changing items or attachments: submit one (1) form-changing item or attachment to your ref. The item you submitted to the ref is a secret. During battle, you may not attempt to equip form-changing items or attachments, other than what you submitted to the ref."

Can this be amended to "if a Pokemon has access to more than one form-changing item or attachment"? The rule is a nerf to Pokemon like Silvally, Rotom, and Charizard, but megas with only one stone or mons with only one possible form changing item will always submit that item, so there's no reason to penalize the player for forgetting to write it in their sendin pm.
 
It’s also a bit unclear to me; if I bring two mega capable Pokémon to a match, can I only mega one of them in the entire series? Or can I evolve one in match one and the other in match two?
 
To me it seems pretty clear that it's the latter case, since if you look at the format information it lists determination for who sends out first in each game and then it lists the rules for each game, which include 1 mega. After all, the B3P2 part of the rules applies to each individual game, not the series as a whole.
 
Can we write down somewhere the various tlg tiebreakers so people don't need to keep asking on discord? If I remember correctly:

Use a self-KO move or Destiny Bond: You lose
Use an attack that KOs the opponent but makes you ENKO: You win
Use a recoil move that KOs both of you: You win

Were there others?
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top