banlist discussion

[1. Luftballon]

rotom-a is banned because it can't be brought on wifi without manipulation. I imagine it would be fine on shoddy or something. (the other two I guess could be kept on the list anyway?)

[Michi]

Espeon's idea seems great, as long as Kratos wants to do it.
I'd be willing to help if we had some battles or tournaments, if you need other members to help. :P
On another note, what other things are banned, since I can't seem to figure out or find any info? Like which clauses does this league use, what items and moves are banned here, and what pokemon combinations (e.g. SkarmBliss) are banned? Or is it all based on what the Gym Leader (or whoever posts a Battle Tower Challenge) wants to restrict, in addition to the rules and banlist?
Sorry if this is all obvious. :P

[1. Luftballon]

iirtrc*, it's the leader can make restrictions within reason, but the league's restrictions apply globally.

*if I read the rules correctly.

[Michi]

I know that, but the only league restrictions I can find are the ban list and the part of the rules that says they prefer we don't hack our pokemon.
Are there any other league restrictions? Like OHKO moves, SkarmBliss, Hax, any of that stuff?

[Kratos Aurion]

The list of pokémon is the only universal banlist. We usually use OHKO, hax, species, etc. clauses, but there's (supposed to be) enough variety on what we do that a blanket ban on most of that is rarely necessary. (Of course, in theory it would also be possible to have, say, ubers tournaments if anyone was interested, in which case the pokémon banlist wouldn't apply; it wouldn't hurt to define "standard" clauses and bans, given that, but we just never bothered.)

I'm okay with attempting to test assuming I can actually connect to other players (I haven't been able to lately :|), but I doubt there's enough widespread interest at this point to make doing any "official" testing seriously worthwhile--it'd just be three or four people, not everyone who could potentially be affected.

[1. Luftballon]

it might actually be better to just have the banlist as a recommendation instead of being universal, and only forced on gyms and official tournaments or something.

as the testing, even if everyone who's ever made more than three posts in this forum were willing to help, we'd have a small enough sample that a few outliers would screw up the numbers. in any case, I'm not too into suspect testing, because I find plenty of things are broken together that are fine alone.

[Bluberry Bat]

Originally Posted by sreservoir

it suffers from 4-move-slot syndrome, though. it can do either, but not both. rain/rest/surf/beam is vulnerable to tricking a scarf or something, too.

ED: and you forgot politoed. :P

That... is highly irrelevant. It can do everything it needs to. Rest with none of the drawbacks of rest is OP, status immunity is OP. If it runs TG / RD / Rest / Surf there are 4 Pokémon in total that rightfully counter it and they're easy enough to deal with otherwise, and Trick counters anything that isn't choice itself so that really isn't much an argument.

Also, Standard clauses should essentially always be Sleep, Evasion, OHKO, and Species. Hax Items is reasonably standard itself but was never put into common required-use, it was usually more a 'suggestion ban' since noone used the items anyway.
SkarmBliss was never a real clause, and the combo is barely even used any more... and for someone who preaches Infernape I'm surprised its even brought up.

Of course, this is all coming from the previous competitive environments I've been in, and albeit, they were.. well, more competitive.

[1. Luftballon]

Originally Posted by L'il Dwagie

That... is highly irrelevant. It can do everything it needs to. Rest with none of the drawbacks of rest is OP, status immunity is OP. If it runs TG / RD / Rest / Surf there are 4 Pokémon in total that rightfully counter it and they're easy enough to deal with otherwise, and Trick counters anything that isn't choice itself so that really isn't much an argument.

and faster encore. or something slower with a priotity move and an attack that gets it into range for KO with priority move. that set is "rightfully" countered in the sense of risk-free kill by just about anything with water absorb and decent attacking stats, CMbliss; tyranitar or abomasnow can switch in on rest and be a dick (especially abomasnow, which has variations which now threaten to KO with wood hammer or stuff); stuff I can't think of;. what makes manaphy difficult to deal with is the very fact that is suffers from 4mss, and thus has myriad viable variations. once the set is determined, it's fairly easy to counter. it's just horribly dependent on its weather effects, so.

Also, Standard clauses should essentially always be Sleep, Evasion, OHKO, and Species. Hax Items is reasonably standard itself but was never put into common required-use, it was usually more a 'suggestion ban' since noone used the items anyway.
SkarmBliss was never a real clause, and the combo is barely even used any more... and for someone who preaches Infernape I'm surprised its even brought up.

EDIT: freeze clause is common; soul dew clause is occasionally used as a signal for "this is ubers." and infernape... gets SE on both of skarm and bliss against their weaker defenses. with moves that don't have any real drawbacks.

EDIT EDIT: also timer clause or whatever it's called.

[Kratos Aurion]

Freeze and timer clauses? On a league that's primarily Wi-Fi? How do you even enforce those? Freeze clause effectively means "okay well just don't use ice beam anymore just in case", turning off entire offensive moves; timer clause can quickly turn into he-said, she-said arguments.

[1. Luftballon]

yeah, they're pretty much unenforceable on wifi. ignore what I said there.

[Kratos Aurion]

To actually move things along...

So are there any huge objections to giving garchomp a trial run in OU (meaning just see what happens, because as I said before actual suspect testing is impractical)? If enough people are vehemently opposed then it can stay where it is, but again, I don't see the harm in experimenting. Manaphy I'm a little leerier about allowing, though I suppose it could be tried as well--again, assuming no one's going to have an aneurysm over it.

[Shadow Serenity]

Just my two cents...

Garchomp, I pretty much agree with Lil'Dwagie, it was banned for a reason. Even if it's unbanned league-wide, I'll probably keep it barred. I wouldn't mind giving it its test run, though, especially with the 5th generation coming up. Who knows, maybe there'll be something that flat-out counters Garchomp without being broken.

Scizor, I'll admit, I use and love the darn thing, she's a beast. But one fire move ruins her, easily.

Manaphy... I'd probably allow this before Garchomp, but I can see why it was banned and think it should stay there for now. Again, though, I'm fine with testing it.

As for hax items, I don't see the problem with using them. They were included for the bit of luck, and just like criticals, I think they're part of the game that people should just suck up. The one exception to that is Double Team (in terms of "things included in the game"), because the few moves that always hit are so uncommon.

Sleep, Evasion, OHKO, Species clauses sound fine to me. Freeze clause is and always will be the stupidest rule I've ever heard of, for the sole fact that you cannot control when the freezing happens. Now, if there were a move whose only purpose was to freeze the target, I could understand, but otherwise, no. I'm not really sure what timer clause is.

[Ether's Bane]

Hey guys, Salamence is now officially uber.

[1. Luftballon]

we know.