Smogon bans and suspect tests discussion

[TerraTF]

Smo-gon (gotta ban em all), we could do complex bans, /
But, That requires thought and effort,

This is funny because the only bans that haven't been complex belong to Genesect, Deoxys-D, Deoxys-S, and Aegislash. Complex bans so far have been Gengarite, Lucarionite, Kangaskhanite, Mawilite, and limiting of Baton Pass to just a single Pokemon.

EDIT: Also following the Mawilite ban the S Rank in the viability thread now is the following:

Azumarill
Charizard (Mega-X)
Keldeo
Landorus
Thundurus

Personally I believe that we're fine with bans now. I'd say just wait until ORAS is released and see how the meta settles about a month after that.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

This is funny because the only bans that haven't been complex belong to Genesect, Deoxys-D, Deoxys-S, and Aegislash. Complex bans so far have been Gengarite, Lucarionite, Kangaskhanite, Mawilite, and limiting of Baton Pass to just a single Pokemon.

EDIT: Also following the Mawilite ban the S Rank in the viability thread now is the following:

Azumarill
Charizard (Mega-X)
Keldeo
Landorus
Thundurus

Personally I believe that we're fine with bans now. I'd say just wait until ORAS is released and see how the meta settles about a month after that.

None of those bar BP are complex bans. We're not banning Mawile + Mawilite, we're just banning Mawilite. So it's like banning Soul Dew or Bright Powder - just a straight ban. And if you ever want to know why we don't do complex bans, here's why (this is satire, it didn't actually happen):

[video=youtube;mMKnlY97g1c]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMKnlY97g1c[/video]

 

[Pokepal148]

Ah, the slippery slope fallacy, how fun. Now M-kangaskhan is beyond salvageable but something like a ban on trapping moves/abilities with destiny bond (seems like something they should have done ages ago. I was honestly shocked that It hadn't been done.) Could maybe make Gengar not so broken.

IDK I've lost alot of respect for smogon this gen. I feel like they have been very banhappy lately. I mean I don't know what it is, maybe the people voting on the suspect tests are more concerned about how banning this or that could help their W/L reco- wait

They limited the use of Batonpass... really...?

-facepalm-

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Ah, the slippery slope fallacy, how fun. Now M-kangaskhan is beyond salvageable but something like a ban on trapping moves/abilities with destiny bond (seems like something they should have done ages ago. I was honestly shocked that It hadn't been done.) Could maybe make Gengar not so broken.

IDK I've lost alot of respect for smogon this gen. I feel like they have been very banhappy lately. I mean I don't know what it is, maybe the people voting on the suspect tests are more concerned about how banning this or that could help their W/L reco- wait

They limited the use of Batonpass... really...?

The funny thing is that while the video I posted uses the Slippery Slope Fallacy to parody complex bans, you seem to be unintentionally trying to use it seriously. Just because Smogon banned Maeile and Aegislash doesn't mean CharX or Thundurus is necessarily going to be banned, and assuming they're going to "ban them all" based in the recent bans is a perfect example of the SSF.

Also DBond alone isn't what makes MGar uncompetitive/broke, Gothitelle is just as cancerous in Ubers and it doesn't even have DBond. And even in OU the combination of above average stats, fantastic Spe and SpA, a good typing, and a bitchin' movepool with good shit like Perish Song, Taunt, and tons of strong Special Attacks to abuse its high SpA would leave still make Gengar completely and utterly broke without DBond.

 

[TerraTF]

Ah, the slippery slope fallacy, how fun. Now M-kangaskhan is beyond salvageable but something like a ban on trapping moves/abilities with destiny bond (seems like something they should have done ages ago. I was honestly shocked that It hadn't been done.) Could maybe make Gengar not so broken.

The problem is that it isn't M-Gengar that is broken. Its M-Gengar along with the ability it has that it broken. Banning Destiny Bond + Shadow Tag does nothing to stop Gengar. You're forgetting about the rest of Gengar's movepool. It doesn't need Destiny Bond to succeed in Singles. The combo of Shadow Ball, Focus Blast, and Psychic does that well enough. Add in Thunderbolt and there are few Pokemon that are stopping M-Gengar, namely just Chansey and Blissey.

IDK I've lost alot of respect for smogon this gen. I feel like they have been very banhappy lately. I mean I don't know what it is, maybe the people voting on the suspect tests are more concerned about how banning this or that could help their W/L reco- wait

I personally don't like these words to describe the community. I'll just explain how the Suspect testing process works for the umpteenth time. Suspect Tests are decided by a council of the best players of the tier. Then the discussion is turned over to the community where you, me, and your grandmother have the opportunity to argue for a ban or for a no ban. At the same time players are given the opportunity to ladder in the suspect ladder to get necessary requisites, which you, me and your grandmother can achieve. After the 2 week Suspect Test is over those who qualified, 97 people with the Mawilite Suspect Test, vote between Ban, No Ban, and Abstain (Mind you the people who abstained caused the ban of Aegislash as well as those who did not try for Req's since Aegis was banned on a 62% margin and will likely see retesting in the future).

They limited the use of Batonpass... really...?

Baton Pass was the suspect test in late June. It was originally going to limit teams to a maximum of 3 users, but early on many argued that a single BP user would be the healthiest for the meta.

 

[Pokepal148]

There's a reason that I used the word maybe.

My reference to the fallacy was more towards the whole 'everything on every tier' thing.

And the song was meant to poke fun at the situation more then anything. A bit of humorous exaggeration and fun really. I don't think they are at that extreme right now but at the same time I absolutely don't agree with all of these bans.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Then you should have laddered and voted.

 

[Pokepal148]

Because clearly the fact that I didn't do so automatically completely invalidates my ability to have an opinion on the matter.

 

[TerraTF]

Because clearly the fact that I didn't do so automatically completely invalidates my ability to have an opinion on the matter.

Did you state your argument in the Suspect Test thread?

 

[Pokepal148]

Because clearly the fact that I didn't do so automatically completely invalidates my ability to have an opinion on the matter.

Did you state your argument in the Suspect Test thread?

.....

 

[TerraTF]

Because clearly the fact that I didn't do so automatically completely invalidates my ability to have an opinion on the matter.

Did you state your argument in the Suspect Test thread?

.....

Then don't complain. If you clearly could have done something, which you could have, then you have no reason to complain. You could have been the person with the argument to swing the people who abstained in the Aegislash ban to vote no ban.

 

[Alexey]

Ah, the slippery slope fallacy, how fun. Now M-kangaskhan is beyond salvageable but something like a ban on trapping moves/abilities with destiny bond (seems like something they should have done ages ago. I was honestly shocked that It hadn't been done.) Could maybe make Gengar not so broken.

Destiny Bond is not how Mega Gengar operates. Destiny Bond is just a tool for it to give a final FU to whatever can beat it 1 v 1 (and there are things that beat it 1 v 1 without much trouble, such as Yveltal against any set or Scizor against non-HP Fire variants). What it does is this: once you see it at the team preview, you have to guess every single turn if it will come in to take out your EKiller or Kyogre check or not. Guess. It's not predictions, predictions are based on risks/rewards evaluationa and/or reading your opponent, and here there is no such thing. It's doesn't matter if coinflips have to be done in player's head as opposed to being done by the RNG, they're still coinflips. It's not broken because it's overpowered, it's not (overpowered things go to Ubers, not from Ubers). But it sure as hell is uncompetitive, which is why Gengarite will almost certainly get banned.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Because clearly the fact that I didn't do so automatically completely invalidates my ability to have an opinion on the matter.

It doesn't invalidate your opinion, but it does invalidate your right to whine about it. The day I whine about the results of a community vote for an optional, fan based ruleset for a children's game that I chose not to participate in when there was absolutely nothing stopping me from doing so is the day I toss my 3DS in a fire and ask to be banned from every Pokémon forum I've ever had an account on.

 

[Pokepal148]

An ode to Smogon, (to be sung to the tune of the Pokemon theme song)
----------------------
I wanna be, the very best /
That no one ever was /
So I made an OU team /
And put it on showdown /

So X and Y, have just come out /
And some of these mons are OP, /
So we'll send em, to ubers now /
And then be done with it /

Smo-gon (gotta ban them all) mega gengar /
get kangaskhan out as well /
Smo-gon, Oh Blaziken too, /
might as well were on a roll. /

Smo-gon (gotta ban em all), we could do complex bans, /
But, That requires thought and effort, /
so we'll ban this and we'll ban that, /
(It's Smogon) gotta ban em all /
Smogon ----- (yeah!!!!)

Every challenge along the way, /
I face with skill and class, /
Oh that noob had Mega Lucario /
Oh man, he whooped my team /

So we'll ban, that one too /
'Man I can't beat aegislash' /
Then we'll ban that one too /
For a 'healthy metagame'/

Smo-gon (gotta ban them all) aegislash banned /
'Wait, you got sweeped by a mawile?' /
(Smogon) 'hey Jim,' (what?) he got sweeped by mawile' /
'Heh heh, that's hilarious bill' /


Smo-gon (gotta ban em all), you could prolly counter this /
But, That requires thought and effort, /
so we'll ban this and we'll ban that, /
(Smo-gon) gotta ban em all, yep every single one /
Smogon /
------------

This isn't whining about the situation, this is poking fun of it. Apparently Smogon's fanbase can get really overdefensive but whatever, I've said my piece, I'm out.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

An ode to Smogon, (to be sung to the tune of the Pokemon theme song)
----------------------
I wanna be, the very best /
That no one ever was /
So I made an OU team /
And put it on showdown /

So X and Y, have just come out /
And some of these mons are OP, /
So we'll send em, to ubers now /
And then be done with it /

Smo-gon (gotta ban them all) mega gengar /
get kangaskhan out as well /
Smo-gon, Oh Blaziken too, /
might as well were on a roll. /

Smo-gon (gotta ban em all), we could do complex bans, /
But, That requires thought and effort, /
so we'll ban this and we'll ban that, /
(It's Smogon) gotta ban em all /
Smogon ----- (yeah!!!!)

Every challenge along the way, /
I face with skill and class, /
Oh that noob had Mega Lucario /
Oh man, he whooped my team /

So we'll ban, that one too /
'Man I can't beat aegislash' /
Then we'll ban that one too /
For a 'healthy metagame'/

Smo-gon (gotta ban them all) aegislash banned /
'Wait, you got sweeped by a mawile?' /
(Smogon) 'hey Jim,' (what?) he got sweeped by mawile' /
'Heh heh, that's hilarious bill' /


Smo-gon (gotta ban em all), you could prolly counter this /
But, That requires thought and effort, /
so we'll ban this and we'll ban that, /
(Smo-gon) gotta ban em all, yep every single one /
Smogon /
------------

This isn't whining about the situation, this is poking fun of it. Apparently Smogon's fanbase can get really overdefensive but whatever, I've said my piece, I'm out.

Was talking about this:

Ah, the slippery slope fallacy, how fun. Now M-kangaskhan is beyond salvageable but something like a ban on trapping moves/abilities with destiny bond (seems like something they should have done ages ago. I was honestly shocked that It hadn't been done.) Could maybe make Gengar not so broken.

IDK I've lost alot of respect for smogon this gen. I feel like they have been very banhappy lately. I mean I don't know what it is, maybe the people voting on the suspect tests are more concerned about how banning this or that could help their W/L reco- wait

They limited the use of Batonpass... really...?

-facepalm-

The song was Actually Pretty Funny.

 

[Alola]

The meta was already stall-friendly, especially to people like me who don't use Mega Mawile in the first place. Cue Lati usage increase.

Are you kidding me? Maybe the ladder is domiated by stall because a shitty player with a stall team will beat a shitty player with an offense team 90% of the time, but in high level play stall took a huge blow with the Aegis ban.

I hope so. Maybe it will encourage such people to rely less on it.

 

[Alexey]

At this point stall is extremely hard to pull off
With the Aegislash ban the trio of Mega Heracross, Mega Medicham, and Mega Gardevoir has risen, and stall cannot efficiently check them
The closest there is to a check to all three of them is Doublade, but it has to either invest into SpDef and hope that Mega Heracross is not packing EQ or invest into physical defense and lose to Gardevoir
When the opponent's team has only one of those, it's manageable, but if it's paired up with something like Trick Latios/Rotom, or Bisharp, or another stallbreaker/wallbreaker like Mew or Knock Off genie-I of choice, or one of them is paired with another wallbreaker, like MCharizard Y, it's pretty much an auto-loss for stall player

 

[TerraTF]

At this point stall is extremely hard to pull off
With the Aegislash ban the trio of Mega Heracross, Mega Medicham, and Mega Gardevoir has risen, and stall cannot efficiently check them
The closest there is to a check to all three of them is Doublade, but it has to either invest into SpDef and hope that Mega Heracross is not packing EQ or invest into physical defense and lose to Gardevoir
When the opponent's team has only one of those, it's manageable, but if it's paired up with something like Trick Latios/Rotom, or Bisharp, or another stallbreaker/wallbreaker like Mew or Knock Off genie-I of choice, or one of them is paired with another wallbreaker, like MCharizard Y, it's pretty much an auto-loss for stall player

0- Atk Skarmory Brave Bird vs. 40 HP / 0 Def Mega Heracross: 340-408 (109.3 - 131.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

0 Atk Ferrothorn Gyro Ball (107 BP) vs. 0 HP / 24 Def Mega Gardevoir: 302-356 (109 - 128.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Mega Venusaur Sludge Bomb vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Gardevoir: 240-284 (86.6 - 102.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

The only one of those 3 that is harder to be with a common stall Pokemon is M-Medicham. We'll likely see stall much less lower on the ladder but higher level players who know how to counter those three will be just fine.

 

[Alexey]

At this point stall is extremely hard to pull off
With the Aegislash ban the trio of Mega Heracross, Mega Medicham, and Mega Gardevoir has risen, and stall cannot efficiently check them
The closest there is to a check to all three of them is Doublade, but it has to either invest into SpDef and hope that Mega Heracross is not packing EQ or invest into physical defense and lose to Gardevoir
When the opponent's team has only one of those, it's manageable, but if it's paired up with something like Trick Latios/Rotom, or Bisharp, or another stallbreaker/wallbreaker like Mew or Knock Off genie-I of choice, or one of them is paired with another wallbreaker, like MCharizard Y, it's pretty much an auto-loss for stall player

0- Atk Skarmory Brave Bird vs. 40 HP / 0 Def Mega Heracross: 340-408 (109.3 - 131.1%) -- guaranteed OHKO

0 Atk Ferrothorn Gyro Ball (107 BP) vs. 0 HP / 24 Def Mega Gardevoir: 302-356 (109 - 128.5%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Mega Venusaur Sludge Bomb vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mega Gardevoir: 240-284 (86.6 - 102.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO after Stealth Rock

The only one of those 3 that is harder to be with a common stall Pokemon is M-Medicham. We'll likely see stall much less lower on the ladder but higher level players who know how to counter those three will be just fine.

I assume that you are not aware that Ferrothorn is 2HKOed by a Focus Blast and thus can't switch in, Skarmory is 2HKOed by Heracross' CC after rocks and therefore can't switch in either, and defensive Mega Venusaur is 2HKOed by MGarde's Psyshock and thus can't switch in, and it also cannot OHKO with Sludge Bomb because Venusasurs don't run SpAtk on stall.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

And of course if Hera SDs as Skarm switches in on Rocks you're just plain screwed