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Old 04-06-2014, 07:18 PM   #1551
Talon87
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The Smogon staff, in the Swagger suspect discussions, have repeatedly gone on record to say that just because they or their predecessors failed to ban something in the past does not mean that it should not have been banned in the past. For example, if they decide in the year 2018 that Swift Swim is uncompetitive, it wouldn't mean that they're arguing in 2018 that it was fine in 2014. It would simply mean that they argued incorrectly in 2014 that it was fine but that they're arguing correctly now in 2018 that it is not fine -- in 2018 or in any other time period. "Once uncompetitive, always uncompetitive": this seems to be their attitude regarding Swagger. None of them are interested in the challenge you're presenting them with. They are quick to write off failure to ban Swagger in previous generations as an error on their and their predecessors' parts.

That stated, this still does not bode well for Smogon's future, as a community or as a respected authority on the competitive metagame. It establishes that past precedent is meaningless: what we feel in our hearts is right today is all that matters. This means that there is no accountability to the past or to the future: the staff can ban at will whatever they feel like banning (and whatever their ever-shrinking fanbase supports them in banning). Everything banned today which has previously existed can be written off as an "oversight," as something that should have been banned in the past but was missed; and everything not banned today after listening to well-reasoned arguments but banned in the future can likewise be written off by future staff members as today's wisest members of the community having reached an incorrect conclusion.

There are people in this world who will find such a legal philosophy attractive. But I think history speaks for itself why accountability to both the past and to the future matters. I would love to hear the opinions of our community's legal experts and historians. (Read: career lawyers, politicians, and historians; not libertarian teenagers with Google and a keyboard at hand.)
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:28 PM   #1552
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That's something I completely agree on with you Talon. Smogon simply is going down a road where soon they will just begin to ban things on a whim. Or unban in this case. I mean, look what happened with Sand Veil and Garchomp. Can you tell me for two generations you got it all wrong and that Sand Veil was always broken? Only to have Garchomp innocuously come back down from Ubers very soon after? No of course not. The only reason you banned Sand Veil is because you wanted to justify bringing Garchomp back down. But you "painted" it as part of the Evasion issue.

I soon fear that this could become a pattern, a way for people to get things they like down from Ubers or things they hate into Ubers.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:32 PM   #1553
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The bigger issue is that they think it's become so over centralized and incredibly common. Heck no, even my DEATH TO HONOR! Team doesn't have it, and I've NEVER seen it at all. Only thing I've seen out of Klefki is double screening.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:34 PM   #1554
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Either that or Bulky Hazard set up.

I normally have fun throwing around Taunt as well.

Although what I normally run is:

Taunt, Light Screen, Reflect, Spikes
Holding Light Clay.

Fun shenanigans.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:37 PM   #1555
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No one actually thinks that Myles. They weren't banning it for overcentralization at all.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:39 PM   #1556
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Personally I would leave stuff alone unless it became a huge problem and actually began to become the entire metagame.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:41 PM   #1557
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That's something I completely agree on with you Talon. Smogon simply is going down a road where soon they will just begin to ban things on a whim. Or unban in this case. I mean, look what happened with Sand Veil and Garchomp. Can you tell me for two generations you got it all wrong and that Sand Veil was always broken? Only to have Garchomp innocuously come back down from Ubers very soon after? No of course not. The only reason you banned Sand Veil is because you wanted to justify bringing Garchomp back down. But you "painted" it as part of the Evasion issue.
You can't substitute "overpowered/broken" in for "unfair" and vice versa, which you seem to be doing. The former is a subset of the latter, and the distinction matters to this discussion.

I have no problem with Smogon banning and unbanning things when the basis of the ban is at least in part to do with its overpoweredness. For example, if Salamence is banned to Ubers at the zenith of Generation 3 because it is decided that he is just too damn powerful but if he is then unbanned in Generation 4 because it is decided that changes made to the metagame (Stealth Rock, Nasty Plot, Mamoswine a.k.a. powerful priority Ice, Heatran, ...) have made Salamence no longer quite so stupid-powerful as he once was, then that's fine. They can unban him. "Once stupid powerful, always stupid powerful" is not true with Pokémon. We have seen time and time again how today's chumps become tomorrow's champs and vice versa.

The problem that I have is with Smogon decreeing that something is fundamentally unfair, irrespective of the dynamic state of the metagame, when that same something has been on the table for nearly a decade with little to no complaint. While I agree in principle with the Smogon staff that oversights are made and sometimes what should have been banned ages ago are not banned until much later, in practice I am disgusted by the ease with which they dismiss the precedent of the past decade of competitive battling with the swish of a wrist because -- boo hoo -- it would inconvenience their agenda to give it proper consideration.
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Old 04-06-2014, 07:51 PM   #1558
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Yeah I know, I was being silly there.

Today on, "Blaze Plays Randbats!":

Toxic All the Things, and the Based Poliwrath that never dies.
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Old 04-06-2014, 08:30 PM   #1559
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Nice one blaze
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Old 04-07-2014, 05:18 AM   #1560
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Sorry I wasn't going to get involved but

>ever-shrinking fanbase

Yeah no. Tens of thousands of unique users go to Smogon's official sim every day to play by our rules. Yes some people are mad about the Swagger ban but lots of people are happy to see it go. It'll balance out.
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Old 04-07-2014, 07:44 AM   #1561
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I don't see why y'all are complaining so much about the Swagger ban. Sure, it was only Swagplay that was bad, but unless you had all of your wins by abusing Swagger, there's no need for you to go all apeshit about it. Drop it and move on. It's not even that bad of a ban.
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Old 04-07-2014, 09:23 AM   #1562
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It's the precedent it sets and the way the ban was handled that people are taking offense with.

The ban itself is sorta meh; it does eliminate a rather cheap tactic. But it also does so in a sweeping manner and caters suspiciously well to the playstyle most popular among the top-tier players (i.e. Hyper-offense) and seriously dents stall-like teams that threaten it. They've also ignored most input from anyone who is not part of their little elite backroom, which as far as I'm concerned, is one of the worst ways to make balance decisions.
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Old 04-07-2014, 10:56 AM   #1563
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Quote:
Originally Posted by phoopes View Post
Sorry I wasn't going to get involved but

>ever-shrinking fanbase

Yeah no. Tens of thousands of unique users go to Smogon's official sim every day to play by our rules. Yes some people are mad about the Swagger ban but lots of people are happy to see it go. It'll balance out.
If we're really going to get pedantic, then: thousands, not tens of thousands. You break 10,000 almost every day; I've not once seen you break 12,000, never mind 20,000. You can't really call it "tens of thousands" any more than I could say there were "hundreds" of Dalmations in 101 Dalmations.

I guess the problem I have with this line of reasoning is the same problem I have when Fox claims that the Simpsons has never been more popular ("more viewers in 2013 than in any year prior!", say). Yes, you have new blood that shows up to replace old blood -- but it's undeniable at this point that your policies are driving away old supporters in droves. In the same sense that the general consensus is that Simpsons peaked in the '90s, I feel like the general consensus is that Smogon's heyday, the time when its ratio of love to hate was at an all-time high, was Gen 4. Yes, you may have more total lovers today than you did in 2007 -- but ratio-wise, it feels like you've not only more total haters today too but that you've gained more haters this generation than in any previous generation. Without randomly sampling the community for a n > 100 poll in 2007 and again today, it's hard to say either way with certainty.

Another example that comes to mind is Penny Arcade. I think they've never been more popular if you strictly go by view counts ... but if you take a community pulse, a lot of their old readers have abandoned the site for any of a variety of reasons. Each PAX event sees more and more attendees, each Child's Play sees more and more money, but the ratio of love:hate today is less favorable than it was in 2005.

I'll admit the "ever-shrinking fanbase" was poor wording and, as it stands, may represent something which isn't true. I meant to communicate that Smogon is hemmorhaging fans. There can still be net growth despite record departures. That, I think, is what we have here.

But I also think it's wrong of you to conflate PS popularity for Smogon popularity. People, even people who hate Smogon, use PS because there are few alternatives and none as easy as PS. Once an alternative that is just as easy to use as PS arises, many people who hate Smogon but still use PS despite this will no longer use PS. You could better equate PS popularity with Smogon popularity were there only the five core Smogon tiers and were Smogon rules in full effect for each of them. But the presence of Random Battles (which only uses Übers rules, 90% of which predate Smogon), Doubles and VGC (which allows VGC saplings to test out the waters), and Custom (which allows anything to happen) complicates the picture greatly. You can have people who loathe Smogon Singles and use PS primarily for Random Battles.
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Old 04-07-2014, 10:59 AM   #1564
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PS is still one of the biggest places for the VGC meta, since you don't have to rebreed a team every time you want to test a strat.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:25 AM   #1565
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cloneblazer12 View Post
I don't see why y'all are complaining so much about the Swagger ban. Sure, it was only Swagplay that was bad, but unless you had all of your wins by abusing Swagger, there's no need for you to go all apeshit about it. Drop it and move on. It's not even that bad of a ban.
Someone doesn't read.

Anyways, they just made the RU meta and by God its all sorts of batshit crazy. Raikou, Cobalion, and Kyurem are RU for now yet Nidoqueen, Galvantula, and Entei are banned. I don't even.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:36 AM   #1566
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>Someone doesn't read

Yeah. I completely ignored your entire wall of text. /sarcasm

>RU

Time to finally kick ass with my Guts Luxray.

Galvantula is actually relevant this gen. The fact that you're upset about him being banned is quite ridiculous, seeing as he fares quite well in OU and UU.

Nidoqueen is still extremely powerful with the Sheer Force Life Orb set. Not as powerful as Nidoking, but she was UU for a reason last gen.

>Entei

Please tell me you're joking. For the love of god please be joking.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:39 AM   #1567
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>Raikou, Cobalion, and Kyurem are RU for now yet Nidoqueen, Galvantula, and Entei are banned. I don't even.

hahahah what

I really think Smogon needs to reconsider their tier structure. The game has gotten way too big between the addition of Megas and 200~ unique lines.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:45 AM   #1568
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cloneblazer12 View Post
>Someone doesn't read

Yeah. I completely ignored your entire wall of text. /sarcasm

>RU

Time to finally kick ass with my Guts Luxray.


Have fun losing to all the Trick Room teams out there! Reuinclus is a bitch!

Quote:
Galvantula is actually relevant this gen. The fact that you're upset about him being banned is quite ridiculous, seeing as he fares quite well in OU and UU.
I'm ticked because he WAS RU last gen, and with all the new powerhouses in RU now he should still be RU. I don't care how well he fares in OU or UU. Kabutops was amazeballs back in Driz/SS days but that doesn't affect his tiering.

Quote:
Nidoqueen is still extremely powerful with the Sheer Force Life Orb set. Not as powerful as Nidoking, but she was UU for a reason last gen.
See above. Don't take me for a fool. Nidoqueen was my first choice for a bulky, specially offensive pivot.

Quote:
>Entei

Please tell me you're joking. For the love of god please be joking.
I call sacred fire hype.

Also some of the things I've seen so far: Escavalier, Reuniclus, Jellicent, Cofagrigus, etc. A lot of UU things.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:50 AM   #1569
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KO Cofagrigus is tons of fun.
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Old 04-07-2014, 11:55 AM   #1570
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http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads...honko.3503680/

Read, weep.
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Old 04-07-2014, 12:27 PM   #1571
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Quote:
Originally Posted by blazeVA View Post
Have fun losing to all the Trick Room teams out there! Reuinclus is a bitch!



I'm ticked because he WAS RU last gen, and with all the new powerhouses in RU now he should still be RU. I don't care how well he fares in OU or UU. Kabutops was amazeballs back in Driz/SS days but that doesn't affect his tiering.



See above. Don't take me for a fool. Nidoqueen was my first choice for a bulky, specially offensive pivot.



I call sacred fire hype.

Also some of the things I've seen so far: Escavalier, Reuniclus, Jellicent, Cofagrigus, etc. A lot of UU things.
Ehh. Trick room Shouldn't be that much of a problem for me. OU is the only tier where I use things that are really fast.



He WAS now he's not. Times have changed and he's gotten good. Really good.



100 BP with a 50% chance to burn backed by great bulk and a base 115 attack and 100 speed isn't hype. He's lived up to this so called 'hype.'



Again, times have changed. I've seen all of those in both OU and UU (minus Cofagrigus). Although I HAVE made a successful team around Cofagrigus that fares well in OU.
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Old 04-07-2014, 12:48 PM   #1572
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It's important to note that this is a provisional ban list formulated purely based off of usage stats in UU. The moderator makes note of this:
Quote:
Some cool mons/big threats that are RU by usage atm include regular kyurem, shaymin, zoroark, froslass, reuniclus, Escavalier, toxicroak, and sableye.
Note that he refers to them as "RU by usage," not "RU." He's well aware that some of these bastards have no business in RU and will likely not remain there for very long. But because the Gen 6 RU tier is still in beta, and because the staff have opted to provisionally wipe the slate clean this generation and start the bans off with everything being based on usage in the tier one above, we're seeing the crazy lists we're seeing. With the creation of Gen 6 UU, it's a bit more clear that certain things cannot be allowed there and should be banned immediately despite low usage in OU. With Gen 6 RU, on the other hand, it's a bit less clear. Gen 5 RU bore so much in common with Gen 3 UU that I wouldn't be surprised if Gen 6 RU more or less becomes Gen 3 UU. That's probably what the staff thinks of threats like Calm Mind Raikou: "Good enough to make Top 10 in previous generations' UUs; not good enough here, maybe. Let's see. " Rather than assuming he's too powerful for RU right from the get-go, they're testing the waters. Maybe RU is where Raikou belongs as of Gen 6, who knows. The boundaries between the tiers are all lines in the sand anyway, so ...

If RU is to disallow the Top 50 UU, you can't really accuse them of being silly for banning threats that you think are weaker than the things they've chosen to allow. Usage is usage. It just so happens that Galvantula made Top 50 while Raikou didn't. That Entei made Top 50 while Cobalion didn't. Obviously they will probably circle back around in the end and ban Raikou and Cobalion, despite lower usage in UU, based on sheer performance. But as for banning (what to you are) perceptibly weaker Pokémon, usage is usage, man. I agree that it's silly. I agree that it was dumb in Gen 5 that Gastrodon was OU because of usage rather than UU because of prowess. But what can we expect Smogon to do? If the entire backbone of the project is "banning based on usage, in the interests of fairness," then what can we do if something we don't think warrants a ban just so happens to make Top 50 in a particular tier?
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Old 04-07-2014, 03:43 PM   #1573
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Personally I feel like lots of the lower tier ends up as usage stats. Because otherwise I wouldn't see a team that is literally 2/3 legends when I go for an OU battle, where low overall use of legends by people who don't use them because broken can put a big threat in a low tier.
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Old 04-07-2014, 04:15 PM   #1574
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tl;dr RU is gonna be extremely wonky for at least a month. I dotn think theres gonna be that many arguments to that

Anyways, I was going thru my old battles, and I just realized how terrible I was.

I went from this, to this

God I was so bad...

Probably still am by most standards, but still...
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Old 04-08-2014, 10:29 AM   #1575
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...am I the only one who thinks the Swaggerer is Thundurus and Landorus is crying because no ban?

lol it disappeared
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