The Suggestion Box

Mmm, why do you think they should be?

Because, to me, they seem gamebreaking, plus pretty much everyone uses them as banned moves anyway.

Well, if you consider them gamebreaking, you can just ban them, right? I'm guessing some people don't feel the same way, which is why they play without them banned. If you ever see an open challenge that you want to take but OHKO's aren't banned, I'm sure you could ask the person who posted it if they'd be okay with making them taboo and they'd probably be cool with it.

In general, I'm not too keen on banning something universally unless it's due to some extreme problem with reffing it (i.e. nobody would be able to ref it consistently because they'd have no idea how it should work).

Oh, well that makes sense, then. Thanks.

Didn't there used to be a ruling on glitches?

There was one, when glitches were available. You had to buy them from a special business. Since that business no longer exists and Negrek hasn't listed them in the registration thread, it's safe to assume that they're simply outright banned. I don't know if she has any plans for reintroducing them.

At the moment, I don't plan on reintroducing them; nobody ever used them, so unless there's some indication of demand, I see no reason to bring them back.

Regarding the change in referee pay:

I do find it unfair that the novice referees are paid so much less than the elite referees, or even the advanced referees. Thing is, referees are within their rank for a reason, and if they can't produce work that's as good as that of those in ranks above them, I don't see why they should get paid the same. After all, if a referee's work is clearly above that of their current rank, it's quickly noticed and they're promoted. So what I'd suggest is to narrow the gaps in pay between the ranks slightly, instead of banishing the differences entirely.

Urp keep forgetting to reply to this.

The thing is, there already isn't all that much of a difference between each level in pay as it is. $3 from novice to advanced, then $4 from advanced to elite. The difference usually is most striking when comparing elite to novice (for reffing three battles, the elite makes $30, while the novice makes $9). Even if I went 5 - 7 - 10, the novice would still only be making $15 to the elite's $30. Is an elite reffing really worth twice a novice one? But at what point does it become pointless to have pay differentials, really--if there's only a couple of dollars between each level as it is.

Probably I'll up the levels regardless (it doesn't seem right that you can get more money for doing one team approval than one novice reffing), but it won't stop there from being a large gap between novices and elites as the number of reffings increases. Actually, I might just provide a bonus for a large number of reffings, independent of reffing level (for some undefined value of "large") and just solve the problem that way.

Sure, the differences aren't that big, and the biggest ones are when comparing novice to elite, as you said. That's more than a couple dollars, though; in ASB, a little money can go a long way. $7 doesn't seem much at first, but the difference shows when the reffings pile up, as you said once again. Narrowing the gaps in pay could help combat the problem a bit - not much when a ref types like there's no tomorrow, but looking at the paychecks for the last 3 weeks, each ref that actually, y'know, reffed produced on average 3 reffings a week. That isn't really enough to show, like, a tremendous gap in pay.

I can see a lot of people complaining if the pay differences are eliminated. I know that Jack_the_PumpkinKing worked hard for his elite referee status, as an example, and if people who are producing reffings that just scrape past the bare minimum requirements suddenly get paid the same as people who take the time and effort to polish their reffings to a good level, well... I can hardly see that as fair. And why bother to invest large amounts of time in typing blocks of text, anyway, if there aren't any benefits? In a worst case scenario (haha I'm a pessimist don't mind me), the higher-ranked referees' work might go downhill.

Giving a bonus for large amount of reffings is a good idea; hadn't thought of that. I'm still vouching for narrowing the gap in pay, though - not by all that much, mind you. It's just the idea of eliminating the pay differences between ranks that really gets me, so as long as that change isn't implemented, I'm good.

whoa I feel like I'm the only person addressing this issue with such vehemence

If the pay gap were to be eliminated, the ranks would be changed back towards what they were initially, with restrictions on the sort of battles that different referees can take (e.g. only elites can ref tournament battles, which confer a pay bonus). However, there are problems with these sorts of restrictions, so I would need to think about them for a while first. Making pay all the same does bring into question why there are different ranks at all if there weren't some other incentive to become a higher rank.

I probably won't kill pay grades entirely, but I will shift up the pay for lower ranks and probably implement something for people who ref a lot. Perhaps the two people who ref the most in a given week (above a certain minimum) would get a set bonus on their check.

Will there ever be events that let you get legendaries?

I won't rule it out, but there haven't been any yet.

I think that the winner of the 2009 League Championship should get a legendary to add to their team.

Or even a rare Pokemon of their choice. It gives them something other than bragging rights.

I apologise if I'm stating the obvious, but, if legendaries are given away, they'd also have to come with some kind of restriction in use, no?

The mystery prize and the accumulated rare candies and winnings from moving up through the ranks is already a bit more than just "bragging rights". Not that I'd complain if I were offered a legendary as well, but a total of $185 and what amounts to four free exp is pretty substantial, IMO.

And if I recall correctly, wasn't a legendary supposed to be the prize for the Big Kahuna Tournament back in '06?

EDIT @Metallica Fanboy: Possibly, possibly not. Most of the advantage legends have over normal Pokémon is base stats that go through the roof, and base stats are never handled the same way here as they are in the games; some people change them so that they don't make, say, Mightyena outlandishly bad when compared to something like Ursaring, and others ignore them outright. That power boost would go away unless a ruling was specifically added to put it back in.

There might be some sort of ruling attached, yeah, but going by the usual ASB rules there's no reason for legendaries to be any stronger than anything else.

By legendaries, I mean the weaker ones, such as the legendary trios, Jirachi, etc.

Kratos Aurion said:

EDIT @Metallica Fanboy: Possibly, possibly not. Most of the advantage legends have over normal Pokémon is base stats that go through the roof, and base stats are never handled the same way here as they are in the games; some people change them so that they don't make, say, Mightyena outlandishly bad when compared to something like Ursaring, and others ignore them outright. That power boost would go away unless a ruling was specifically added to put it back in.

There might be some sort of ruling attached, yeah, but going by the usual ASB rules there's no reason for legendaries to be any stronger than anything else.

Click to expand...

It's not just a matter of stats. I'd think most of them would be a cut above the usual because most of them possess powerful traits, a powerful signature move and, sometimes, a remarkable movepool.

Well, in the signature moves' case, a usage gap would do the job nicely.

Save for Mew, which probably would need some sort of Smeargle-like restriction, I don't know that most of them are any more diverse than your average Gen 1 or 2 Normal- or Psychic-type, and most of their abilities (a preponderance of Pressure, Clear Body and Levitate) aren't that broken, either.

Are we going to have a free Gen. V mon when Black and White are released in America, like what you did with Gen. IV?