On Bans

[WinstonShnozwick]

Jellicent was a bit overhyped at the start of gen 5. Not as great as people said it would be. There's Ttar with his Crunch/Pursuit, Hydriegon of course, Gengar, and many pokemon like Reuniclus carry shadow ball for that coverage.

Ferrothorn might have been a good wall when he first gained popularity, but now everyone carries fighting/fire because ferro is on every other team, or was.

Same thing with gliscor. He's such a pain in the ass with poison heal and a bane to physical attackers (specially fighting) that you have random sh*t carrying HP ice. Everyone should be prepared to deal with gliscor.

Reuniclus is the only pokemon that I feel is truly "difficult" to break through defensively. It has bulk even physically that it can take almost any powerful physical attack and live, and CM is a bitch specially to take down. Trick room is a pain late game. I find that I almost always have to sack a pokemon on reuniclus to dent him for a KO. So yeah, screw Reuniclus.

 

[StallMandibuzz]

Since Reuniclus is so damn slow, it can utilize TR perfectly, and Jellicent can utilize it too. Hell, even Ferrothorn is good in TR. Most defensive threats are hell at the beginning of the Generation, then they slowly lose hype because people learn ways to deal with them. But if there is no way at all to deal with a threat without getting destroyed, offensively or defensively, then there's a good chance it's broken.

 

[shinyskarmory]

Jellicent was a bit overhyped at the start of gen 5. Not as great as people said it would be. There's Ttar with his Crunch/Pursuit, Hydriegon of course, Gengar, and many pokemon like Reuniclus carry shadow ball for that coverage.

Ferrothorn might have been a good wall when he first gained popularity, but now everyone carries fighting/fire because ferro is on every other team, or was.

Same thing with gliscor. He's such a pain in the ass with poison heal and a bane to physical attackers (specially fighting) that you have random sh*t carrying HP ice. Everyone should be prepared to deal with gliscor.

Reuniclus is the only pokemon that I feel is truly "difficult" to break through defensively. It has bulk even physically that it can take almost any powerful physical attack and live, and CM is a bitch specially to take down. Trick room is a pain late game. I find that I almost always have to sack a pokemon on reuniclus to dent him for a KO. So yeah, screw Reuniclus.

This is exactly my point. Offensive pokemon can be revenge killed by Magnezone (if they're steel type), Scizor, Dugtrio, Heatran, etc. However, everyone has to carry fire, electric and ice attacks on a large chunk of their pokemon to stop the defensive threats, and even then the defender can switch out or cripple the attacker before fainting.

 

[WinstonShnozwick]

But if there is no way at all to deal with a threat without getting destroyed, offensively or defensively, then there's a good chance it's broken.

Ferrothorn is easy to kill. Let me think..

Fire moves will almost all OHKO him, so he can't do anything to you.
Fighting moves coming from the strongest users can OHKO him.
Slow pokemon that fight him won't give a damn about paralyze, and theres a good number of slower mons that don't care about ferro's STABs either.
Sub with pokemon that resist his stabs and who cares what ferro does.

He's OK. But he's been completely adapted to, he's not really a threat to anything anymore.

 

[StallMandibuzz]

This is exactly my point. Offensive pokemon can be revenge killed by Magnezone (if they're steel type), Scizor, Dugtrio, Heatran, etc. However, everyone has to carry fire, electric and ice attacks on a large chunk of their pokemon to stop the defensive threats, and even then the defender can switch out or cripple the attacker before fainting.

Exactly. I've been able to destroy whole teams on Wi-Fi with a Reuniclus alone, since it is an offensive and defensive threat at the same time. Focus Miss is a horrible move to rely on at times, but it does its' job. Sometimes, even with a counter for it, it can still destroy. Offensive threats can be revenge killed, but as new defensive sets are formed, there aren't that many counters that can safely kill it without being crippled in the process. Hell, even Clefable is pretty threatening with Magic Guard, since Status doesn't effect it at all, nor does Leech Seed or weather.

 

[Nkululeko]

Yes! Let's put Mewtwo in OU, but make it only use Tackle!

That's what will happen if we keep using more and more combo bans.

By that logic, things like Technician Scizor should remain OU and we should let Swarm Scizor be used in the lower tiers. It would add an unnecessary complexity to the rules, IMO.

Please don't take it personally, but Straw Man is a weak argument to begin with and doesn't actually (dis)prove a point at all. It mirrors the rhythm of one point while going off on an unrelated tangent, which only serves to entertain but not dispute any side of the argument.

Now that's out of the way, I believe there's something to be said when almost every defensive core revolves around 5 or so pokes and every defensive combo has an Excadrill counter. The metagame is very centralized towards certain threats but that's a property of any online game. I guess I'm getting off topic but w/e I just wanted to say that bans should be a last ditch effort to rid the metagame from a threat that is overwhelming and requires a counter and a good check to deal with. However, when we find that a banned pokemon is somewhat underwhelming in the metagame adaped to new threats, there should be some way of getting it tested again. I think there are two solid examples of where this could be good in Garchomp (My HP Ice never missed four times in a row and it's almost ridiculous to say take a 20% miss chance and extrapolate that into saying you're miracle hax is a solid example of how Garchomp is/isn't broken) and Blaziken (not sure how it was broken to begin with, it's fast, strong, but weak to all hazards and frail). IIRC alphatron posed a similiar thread about banning pokemon posing the question of how much the community could be asked to do in preparation of a pokemon and said that it'd be insane to prep for a Ho-Oh with OU pokes but that it's funny how you had to beg people to counter Garchomp or Blaziken but everybody and their mother packs an Excadrill counter nowadays. It's nice to ask how many pokemon we should be banning and how but I think the real issue is how a tier-wide restraining order has turned into a guillotine. We ban broken elements in the game, fine, but how do we go about bringing things that might not be broken into testing without getting flamed (JT Swift can testify how cruel some people on Smogon have been in dealing with that issue)? I never thought Blaziken was broken and even more so with the defensive rise in teams, why can't that be tested? If we're gonna ban pokemon that's all well and good but we need a mechanism to bring 'em back if the metagame adapts to them.

Feel like I need to say that I hate complex bans and I think they're an unnecesary step to take in banning pokemon. If we can find a way to use Drizzle teams so that they're offensively weaker than they used to be it only means that we're not using the archetype to it's full potential, not that it's not broken.

However, I will go on the record as saying I support banning Speed Boost+Blaziken for the sole reason that Blaziken's one of my favorite pokemon and I want to use it in OU. We all know that Blaziken's not broken with Blaze, but that's irrelvant, and I don't think the ban will do any good besides letting me use my favorite Fire starter. That being said, I feel that there are more practical and competitively relevant reasons to bring Blaziken in OU but I wanted to say my peace. Peace.

 

[JALMONT]

In my humble, less-than-200 post opinion, I think the criteria for banning should be based on overcentralization. If something is severely decreasing the number of viable pokemon, I think we need to ban it to keep the metagame fresh and enjoyable to play.

For example, during Gen 4, Tyranitar became extremely popular because it could do many different things (sometimes on the same set!) that made it almost impossible to predict against. Yet Salamence, who had a similar amount of options, ended up banned while everyone pulled out their Scizor, Skarmorys, and Lucarios to stop Tyranitar before it crushed their teams.

This kind of scenario begs the question: What are the criteria that makes a pokemon "overpowered"? Where do we, the Smogon community, draw the line on balance?

Take CM Reuniclus. The standard variant can't be phazed, statused, or reliably KO'ed after a Calm Mind. The only real way to beat it in my experience is to switch in a powerful sweeper who doesn't need setup and blast away with STAB, praying for a crit. In the process, the sweeper used gets hit hard by Reuniclus, crippling its sweeping ability.

Or Ferrothorn, who can be very bulky both specially and physically and at the same time dish out status and Power Whips. Disposing of it (since it can almost always switch out safely) requires allowing one of your pokemon to be crippled, once again making it useless for the rest of the match.

IMO we've been thinking so much about powerful offensive threats (like Blaziken, Garchomp, Lati@s, Salamence) to consider some of 5th gen's almost unbreakable defensive threats (Ferrothorn, Jellicent, Reuniclus). Let's try suspecting Ferrothorn, Jellicent, and Reuniclus at the next round of suspect testing and see what we come up with.

I'm a little confused here. You want to ban things based on usage because they make other pokemon unviable. Banning things on usage makes zero sense because they if you continously ban let's say the top 3 pokemon in OU just because they are the most used you end up banning every single pokemon. IMO this is the wrong way to go about the metagame.

I believe that the bans should be kept simple instead of doing complex bans. Complex bans opens up this whole argument of let's bring down ubers but they can only be at lv50 or they cannot be EV'd. That doesn't make any sense, and I think it would be best to stay away from that sort of a scenario.

But then again there was the SwSw+Drizzle ban. While I know that it probably won't be repealed anytime soon, I think it would be better to perhaps individual test Swift Swimmers or just ban the ability upright. Of course my opinion doesn't mean much but it's just what I believe.

I think the question that needs to be figured out is what defines a uber. I think that the best definition is the Portrait of an Uber thread which gives a good, comprehensive definition of what makes an Uber. While the thread was over 2 and a half years ago I don't see why it still can't apply today.

 

[Ilios]

Please don't take it personally, but Straw Man is a weak argument to begin with and doesn't actually (dis)prove a point at all. It mirrors the rhythm of one point while going off on an unrelated tangent, which only serves to entertain but not dispute any side of the argument.

I don't take it personally, but I don't see how it's unrelated to the argument, because it's a fairly close example to Blaziken (only difference being the tier they are in). What I wanted to say is that if we start making complex bans for one Pokémon, and have that same Pokémon allowed in two different tiers, why shouldn't we do it with others in the same situation? What's so special about Blaziken to have that priviledge? We can't place the same Pokémon in different tiers depending on their abilities, because the ruleset would become unnecessarily complicated.

 

[Vix]

I sorta like this as it could mean we could use things like blaziken again (with blaze ability) in ou/uu

 

[tomtom5858]

I voted yes without reading the question, now I feel sad. Teambuilding bans are acceptable, Pokemon nerfs are not, and we need to know the difference.

Furthermore, Shadow Tag Chandelure isn't broken

The Acid Armor/Calm Mind set would like a word with you.

 

[Stratos]

with team preview, if you let yourself get choice locked into a move that can't kill chandelure easily or let you escape, you deserve to lose.

 

[Scorpio]

I think a little clarification is in order.

First off, I was only thinking of having this for Ou/Uber banning. It becomes much too complex otherwise.

Secondly, combo bans will ONLY be used for Ability+Pokemon or Ability+Ability. Absolutely no movepool bans whatsoever, it's just stupid.

Thirdly, I only want Ability+Pokemon bans if said Pokemon is actually able to function in the higher tiers without said breaking ability. For example, if Pokemon A is broken with ability A but sucks without it, it stays in Ubers regardless (unless the ability itself is broken, in that case the ability gets banned). However, if Pokemon B is broken with Ability A and is not broken but still viable with ability B, that calls for a Pokemon B + Ability A combo ban. However, this will only happen if Pokemon B is confirmed not to be broken otherwise.

And yes, Blaziken is an example of this. Garchomp and Chandelure may be examples too, but we'll have to see whether they're not broken with Rough Skin and broken with Shadow Tag respectively.

 

[Scene Kid]

I don't understand how defensive threats get to be a problem, with priority taunts about and fast taunters in general.

It's the pokemon that hit hard, without set-up that people complain about.

Letting a defensive pokemon rack up calm minds, and set up a Trick Room is a misplay on the defending teams part..

---------
The banning of certain strong-hitting pokemon is redundant; if you want to be a good "smogon" player, play by their rules!

It's one thing to be good at Smogon, it's another to be good at Pokemon in general. Go to the Random Wifi matches, where evasion and sleep runs amok, those who can shine there are true Pokemon players.

Smogon clears away the muck and clutter of pokemon, and keeps the game running smoothly.

Only thing I don't get is why one abillity plus perma-weather is banned. Why not the Drought + Chlorophyll? Hail + Ice body? Sandstorm + Sand veil?

 

[Jaetheho]

but then again, dw doesnt have team preview

 

[Nkululeko]

I don't take it personally, but I don't see how it's unrelated to the argument, because it's a fairly close example to Blaziken (only difference being the tier they are in). What I wanted to say is that if we start making complex bans for one Pokémon, and have that same Pokémon allowed in two different tiers, why shouldn't we do it with others in the same situation? What's so special about Blaziken to have that priviledge? We can't place the same Pokémon in different tiers depending on their abilities, because the ruleset would become unnecessarily complicated.

It's unrelated because Scizor isn't banned from OU, nobody cares about Scizor in UU/RU/etc, and we weren't talking about Scizor to begin with. And unless you haven't noticed, Rotom is in OU and UU, and Deoxys is in UU, OU, and Ubers all due to exceptions in the species clause. You didn't even try to address the issue at hand and pointed out that Scizor shouldn't be in UU, adding zero substance to the discussion. The topic was complex bans in general and what complex bans were "bad." I already said I support SB+Blaziken (it doesn't make any sense I just want Blaziken in OU) but in general I think they only serve a purpose to keep certain popular pokemon in OU, like how Drizzle+SS kept Politoed and any Swift Swimmers getting banned in fear of Rain being a non-viable playstyle again.

Btw, Blaizken wasn't broken with Speed Boost, j/s.

Edit: @SceneKid Not only do I not agree with that ban but you're argument isn't helping the cause. Nobody wanted to deal with Swift Swimmers under Rain and they decided to ban it instead of clear up weather and counter/check them. What they did was debatable but we can at least say that under those conditions it was very hard to play around and something was broken. There isn't a situation like that with Drought+Chlorophyll, Hail in any tier, or Sandstorm+Sand Veil.

 

[Scene Kid]

Chandelure is going to be ridiculous when it comes out. A lot of people are going to claim right off the bat it's perfectly balanced. All it's going to do is force people to constantly bring counters to it in every battle. Each team will have a mandatory Choice Scarf Ditto, or their own Chandelure. When a pokemon invades every aspect of battle like that, it's when it becomes Ban-fodder.

Saying it's fair because there's counters to it is incredibly skewed. Not everyone wants to build their team around a certain pokemon. Saying it's not going to be overused is an astounding prediction. It gets to TRAP any pokemon. Not everyone wants to give up their held item for a shed shell. Play on Random-Wifi, the sheer amout of evasion moves just go to show how people naturally gravitate toward "certainty" in Pokemon. Chandelure really is a blessing, it destroys randomness in one way. Find a fighting type choiced move, switch in, Calm mind up and hope to god the next thing they send out isn't Ditto.

Whenever this thing is released Random Wi-fi will be shot to hell. Mandatory Chandelure counter. People will love the ability, the certainty of it is appealing in everyway.

Edit: I'm just saying, they should all be done away with or all be implemented. Sandstorm and sand veil is arguably as annoying as a speed increase, when Trick Room is still available to turn Swift Swimmers around. It's totally debatable. It does stale the gameplay though, making everyone bring another perma weather to shut off Swift Swim, and either hoping to win the initial "weather-off", or wasting a turn to bring in the perma-weather, allowing the other team a turn of set-up. But to allow all the other perma-weather + ability combos is a little hypocritial. This is why I will play in Random Wi-fi. I use Politoed + Kingdra all the time, and it's constantly getting shut-down. The rain opens up your electrical weakness. Rain is the only perma-weather that brings it's own destruction.

 

[Skore]

Not everyone wants to build their team around a certain pokemon.

I've lurked on these boards a long time and many of the analyses I've read mention Hidden Power Fire/Ice/Fighting for certain pokes because the writers know that there's generally a small pool of pokes that are being used the majority of the time. Gimmicky teams only work until someone figures out your gimmick and as someone above said, people gravitate towards surety and thus every team packs it's Gliscor check, it's Ferrothorn check, it's Heatran check etc.

Just for fun I booted up PO while writing this and peeked in on 10 battles. I just recorded the 2 pokes I saw out on the field then went to the next battle.
I saw:

3 Ferrothorns, 3 Lucarios, 2 Celebis, 2 Reuniclus, 2 Gliscors, 2 Tyranitars, 2 Infernapes, 1 Electivire, 1 Vaporeon (and it was raining) 1 Scolipede, 1 Hitmonchan (the Hitmon and Scoli were vs eachother so that was refreshing).

Obviously not conclusive of anything but it's fairly suggestive that the current metagame has properly settled down so the trick is keeping it from stagnating.

One question asked earlier which might have merit was about a sort of reverse-suspect testing; where previously banned aspects of the game would be un-banned to see if they were still ban-worthy.
This could be one method of keeping thing fresh.

 

[Stratos]

that's absolute bull, I got to number 17 on the Smogon DW ladder TWICE without a chandelure or dedicated chandelure counter or CS ditto, one of the teams with a CB Conkelhurr. All you need to do is ensure that all of your pokemon have a way to hit him on the switch, and baiting and killing him is easy.

 

[Scene Kid]

I don't know, I just don't consider Pokemon Online very conclusive. It's quicker. It's more relaxed. It doesn't leave you with a bad taste in your mouth when you lose. It's less consequential. You can throw your teams together quicker. You can use quirkier teams, because if you lose, oh well you lose. Find match is only a second away, eventually you'll find a team you can beat.

Random Wi-fi has a different sting to it, a different feel. The 3v3 setting essentially neuters combat from the get-go. You get STARS for winning so many matches. Seriously, you might laugh at that but think about Halo players and their rankings. Getting to level 50 meant killing one member of the other team and hiding for the rest fo the match. There's a level of pressure that differenciates it from Pokemon Online. When Chandelure hits Random Wi-fi, people will bring it purely for psyche purposes. Losing your ability to switch out is horrifying.

Of course you don't see Chandelure spam in Pokemon Online. There's a much greater chance of it getting repelled in a 6v6 setting than there is 3v3.

I just don't believe a loss carries as much weight as it does on the simulator, as oppose to actually playing it on the Gameboy. You don't get stars, you don't get to show off your wins to players all over the world. It's an insane feeling that breeds such strategies as minimize Drifblim, Chandelure, Garchomp'n the Sand, Double Team anything.

I just think it's a silly ability, and will be overused on the Random Wifi. Teams will be adjusted accordingly, but the switch-in happens at their leisure and the certainty of such an ability is pretty outstanding, not broken, just outstanding.

 

[WinstonShnozwick]

with team preview, if you let yourself get choice locked into a move that can't kill chandelure easily or let you escape, you deserve to lose.

This so much. I hate how people complain that ST chandy will be SOOOOO broken and then continue with play styles that beg for chandy to come in on them. It's called adapting to the metagame. Excadrill was huge at the start and is still kinda, but now everyone uses gliscor or some other exca counter. Ferro at the start was popular, #1 on the usage for june stats, but personally I've not once had a problem with ferro since june. He's kinda lackluster now with fire being common and fighting as well.

 

[Cold Fusion]

This so much. I hate how people complain that ST chandy will be SOOOOO broken and then continue with play styles that beg for chandy to come in on them. It's called adapting to the metagame. Excadrill was huge at the start and is still kinda, but now everyone uses gliscor or some other exca counter. Ferro at the start was popular, #1 on the usage for june stats, but personally I've not once had a problem with ferro since june. He's kinda lackluster now with fire being common and fighting as well.

And why is HP Fire so common? I can only think of one reason and that is because of Ferrothorn.

 

[WinstonShnozwick]

Fire is already abundant with sun teams. HP fire on something like Rotom W only gave it better coverage.

 

[Team Amon Amarth]

HP Fire is so useful because that's the best way most Pokemon can hit Steel-types as a whole- especially Scizor, Forretress, and Ferrothorn. HP Ice is the same with Dragons- Dragons and Steels are so prevalent that most Pokemon want to be able to hit them and HP is the only way a lot of Pokes have available.

It's not like Haxorus is overcentralizing. Or Dragonite. Or Lati@s. Or Hydreigon. But when you add a bunch of powerful Pokemon that can be hit by one attack, there becomes merit to use it, even if for no other reason.

 

[StallMandibuzz]

HP Ice can hit Dragons, Gliscor and Landorus while HP Fire hits Scizor, Escavalier, Ferrothorn, and Forretress.

 

[Stratos]

don't forget Gliscor, Amon.

EDIT: i got ninja'd by a poke with like base 55 speed. i'm ashamed

EDIT2: no wait i didn't. what is up with my browser