I've played Pokemon for a couple of years now, and just recently begun semi-competitive (and naturally, became introduced to Smogon). I don't really use Smogon, as I like coming up with ideas on my own...but why is it so bad? Is it their tier system? Or their pointers? What is it?
>>25607283
/vp/ literally can't git gud, so it's a meme to hate them.Also Smogon's community has been overun by underage fags and is beginning to turn toxicly cringey
>>25607283
Mostly it's buttblasted Karenfags who get cross that their favourites can't compete with the big boys.
Then there are the guys who get cross that Smogon bans something they deem acceptable, like evasion, OHKO attacks, putting everyone to sleep, Moody, using M-Salamence, Aegislash and the likes
It's casuals from both sides missing the point of what Smogon is supposed to be
Smogon isn't using the best Pokemon to win, it's using Pokemon at their best. The tier system is a way of keeping higher mons out of lower tiers to make it feel more fair. It's totally possible to wreck someone's OU team using a Sunkern, but you gotta know your shit and Pokemon is a mind game similar to that of Chess
The folks at Smogon do their damnedest to balance a trash meta game. Hating Smogon is a meme that shows how ignorant some people are, just as shittalking someone's favorite Pokemon for 'not being good enough' is also missing the point. When you have a Meta with Mega Fug, balancing it is one of the hardest things you can possibly do
>>25607283
I use their site for sometimes for tips and ideas and go on from there.
Their rules and other retardation mean absolutely nothing unless you use their showdown shit.
>>25607327
So the folks at Smogon should be respected for their work, right?
>>25607372
Not all of them. As I said, there are some Smogonites that miss the point entirely
Respect those that come up with the movesets and share them with people. Don't respect those that take those moves and don't give back
There are problems with both sides. Smogon do have a tendency to be very inconsisten with what they deem to be "over-centralising". And nearly all the bans they do make just end up bringing in some other Pokemon that no longer has many real counters (and it ends up being used on every team because of this).
On the other hand, you have idiots who think that Smogon ban all Pokemon they don't like and only let you use OU Pokemon (even though you're free to use Pokemon from lower tiers). They also think that if Smogon says a Pokemon is NU, it's dogshit and you're a retard for liking it.
It really is quite simple though. If you're playing on cartridge then ignore Smogon's rules. If you're playing on Showdown then play by their rules. Smogon's site is helpful when you're playing Showdown, mainly because it shows you the most common movesets that all of your opponents are more than likely to use. Although a Smogon moveset might end up being pretty shit in VGC format, where they different rules.
>>25607283
Casualfag here. Why is Blaziken banned? Why is Mega Gengar banned from OU?
>>25607283
It's a meme.
>>25607326
>Mostly it's buttblasted Karenfags who get cross that their favourites can't compete with the big boys.
No, most Karenfags are happy to use their favorites while standing a decent chance of winning in lower tiers.
>>25607482
>Blaziken
Here's a hint: Giving Speed Boost to a Pokemon with obscene attack can really ruin your day. Why not ban Speed Boost? Because eventually you're gonna be stuck banning specific shit like "Aerodactyl can't Mega or carry Stealth Rock at the same time with Roost" or some dumb shit. Let's keep it simple
>Mega Gengar
It's the Pokemon equivalent to the Black Plague
>>25607283
Nothing, just asshurt VGC fags
>b-but muh official muhta
>>25607482
Because its hidden ability Speed Boost turns it into one of the best Pokemon in the game, even being better than some legendaries, like all 3 Kyurems.
>>25607482
Blaziken has speed bost and M-Gengar almost broke Ubers it can Perish-Trap easily, revenge kill and drag opponents with it with destinty bond.
>>25607482
Baton Pass Speedboost. With bulk+swords dance
It's natural for a non-official attempt to balance an imbalanced game to spring up. You'll see it in just about any genre, because the developers are rarely in a position to make changes after a game is released, even today. FPS will ban certain weapons, or put limits on class representatives. Fighting games will require specific match formats to avoid people tripling the length of a match with timerstalling, or to stop infinites from devolving the meta to running one character and hoping for the best. Smogon is different. Smogon is excessive.
Let's look as ASSFAGGOTS, since they're the opposite end of the spectrum, but just as mechanically complex. Both ASSFAGGOTS and Pokemon have a million moves and characters that equip various items, leading to an imbalanced clusterfuck.
In both games, the meta can become centralized (i.e. a good strategy gets spammed).
In ASSFAGGOTS, this progesses like so:
Strategy is successful > strategy gets popular > strategy gets overused > counter-strategies develop > strategy stops being successful for low-skill users piggybacking on the strategy > strategy declines in use
Smogon goes like this:
Strategy is successful > strategy gets popular > strategy gets overused > strategy gets accused of being unfair
and then there's a split between >strategy gets banned for being unfair, but so many minor changes apparently make the strategy fair that the ban becomes "Surskit is banned when it has its Hidden Ability and tackle and you are playing during the after-school hours and the server admin couldn't find the meatball Hot Pockets last week at the store."
or the alternative >strategy is not overpowered because players were playing in an environment where they knew the strategy would be used in every match and were able to pack a counter-strategy.
In the end, this accomplishes two things. First, it encourages the very centralization that it attempts to avoid. Second, it leads to an inconsistent ruleset.
1/2
>>25607482
Blaziken mainly cause it can set up Swords Dance on something it can switch into, then get a Speed Boost and be largely unstoppable.
M-Gengar was primarily because he could Perish Song on something that couldn't touch it, force it to stay in because of Shadow Tag, then switch out on the last turn causing the other 'mon to faint. Essentially allowing it to net KO's as long as it could last 3 turns, which is often for such mons like Chansey, Ferrothorn, etc.
>>25607570
Baton Passing was literally unbeatable bro.
>>25607570
>counter-strategies develop > strategy stops being successful for low-skill users piggybacking on the strategy > strategy declines in use
That's not always the case anon. There are checks/counters, but not good enough ones sometimes that doesn't force your team to be built around 1 or 2 threats.
>Inconsistent Rule set.
Where anon?
>>25607482
Because Blaziken with Speed Boost is insanely powerful. It's speed increases every turn and it already has insane attack and better bulk than other Speed Boost users.
It raises the question "Why didn't Smogon just ban Speed Boost Blaziken and not Blaze Blaziken?" The reason for that is that they didn't want "complex bans" (even though they were fine with the DrizzleSwim ban) and if they did this then they were forced to re-tier every Pokemon based on all their abilities (for example, Swarm Scizor is nowhere near as good as Technician Scizor).
>>25607598
I can't fucking English sometimes.
*but not good enough counters that force you to build/rebuild your team for 1 or 2 specific pokemon, we don't get patches for moves/over powered mons.
>>25607570
1. Encouraging centralization
When you spend months bitching about how OP something is, people adopt it as a meme, especially when, as in both ASSFAGGOTS and Pokemon, your player base is almost entirely children. Tell a kid that clicking Heatran will make them win, and every fucking kid will click Heatran.
2. Inconsistent ruleset.
The metric for banning something is pretty stupid: "did a bunch of people playing with the express purpose of using/attempting to fight this strategy think it was too strong?" This leads to a lot of stupid rulings.
>raising evasion is banned even though it can be completely countered by Unaware, a crit-guarantee build, or countless other strategies.
>Stealth Rock, which doesn't rely on luck like evasion, is perfectly fine, despite only being countered by shitty move Rapid Spin or Defog, which also cancels many of your hazards
Almost every Smogon rule is the same way. If you spend one or two minutes thinking about it, you can find a strategy that is a mainstay of their meta and more effective than the ones that get banned. As a consequence of leaving the bans up to the user base, as opposed to some agreed upon objective rulings or committee, you get a lot of rules which look reasonable on paper but do nothing.
The only defense you'll ever be given is "you shouldn't have to build your team around a handful of possible threats," and then the people saying it go right back to ignoring the genie in the room.
2/2
>>25607482
>Blaziken goes too fast if I give him 12 hours to charge up and jump four parallel universes over
>>25607791
Sneaky pebbles makes it far easier to kill pokemon which is the entire point of the battle to kill everything on the opponent's team, and it also punishs faggots that switch constantly.. Its a great move it makes it easier for my sweepers to kill shit and trolls faggots with focus items and sturdy.
>>25607597
le laughing haze bat
>>25607868
>move is good because I like it and it counters everything that counters me
That should clear things up, OP.
>>25607791
Unware.... The thing 7 pokemon have.....?
>>25607902
Yeah, that thing on beloved mememon Boom Boom V2.
>>25607791
>encouraging centralization
when people bitch about things that are OP and succeed in convincing the majority of others that something's OP, they are usually OP. Look at the fucking Megagross suspect, people knew it was bullshit and rightfully didn't ban it. banning 'strategies' like shadow tag or baton pass make sense when they can be easily abused and when people often need to get lucky or have very select counters against them.
>tell a kid that clicking heatran will make them win
you could tell this to adults too. nigger, good pokemon are good pokemon. good classes/weapons/builds/whatever in any game will be used more than others. hence why smogon bases tiers off usage and has separate viability rankings where other pokemon than heatran are encouraged since they fulfill certain niches. something, I notice, the official format does not do.
>evasion
been over this, the only way to counter evasion is to bring out a hazer or use weak guaranteed accuracy strategies, where very very few pokemon come out on top. I don't want to play a game where I have to worry that it becomes a stall match against a +6 evasion chansey cuz my machamp died. that's retarded.
>stealth rock
already been established a thousand times that this is perfectly fine and even healthy in some cases. hazards punish switching so that the game doesn't become an entire stall match of just switch and counter. it'd be like saying screens are anti-meta, since they can be only countered by defog or brick break
>but do nothing
except lessen the number of broken mons, which they were meant to do...?
see, you sum up the most retarded anti-smogon arguments I've seen here, propped up by lingo that you no doubt believe makes you seem smarter than you really are.
I don't even like smogon - I agree on that most of them are snotty little fucks - but /vp/ has no concept of what a truly competitive meta looks like and resorts to the same arguments that have been calmly disproven over and over again.
>>25607873
>Prankster Taunt
Suuuure...
Should there be Stealth Rock equivalents for other types?
>>25609437
>/vp/ has no concept of what a truly competitive meta looks like and resorts to the same arguments that have been calmly disproven over and over again.
Not all of /vp/ is as retarded as the anti-Smogon guys.
Don't lump us all together.
>>25609530
>Icicles - stealth rock equivalent based on Ice weaknesses.
At least you'd never see Lando-T in OU again
>>25607482
There's a good reason why most Pokemon in Ubers is banned (some are questionable, but the meta really is better off without them in the game)
For the examples above that you mentioned, Blaziken can sweep really easily because of Speed Boost, and it's ridicilous base power in it's moves while having a high attack stat. Blaziken is beatable, but no one wants tot carry a Talonflame/Azumarril on every team just to deal with it.
M-Gengar invalidated an entire playstyle (Stall) because of it's ability combined with it's movepool
>>25609530
no, unless said equivalents (and stealth rock) only lasted a limited amount of turns, like 10 turns on the field before you have to set them up again
there is literally no good reason to dislike smogon. anyone that's personally offended by how smogon chooses to regulate their metagame on their simulator is an autist and is completely ignoring the services smogon provides to the competitive pokemon community
http://steamcommunity.com/groups/pokemonmarket
it's funsometimes
A lot of people think Smogon discourages the use of weaker Pokemon but that's not really true imo
They're trying to"min-max" the game - they're trying to find the most efficient EV spreads, the movesets with the best coverage, and which Pokemon that can utilize them.
Personally I enjoy trying to fit "cool" Pokemon onto a team and seeing what I can do with them. Turns out Victreebell is actually really fun to use in Sun teams and Cobalion is pretty good as a Volt Switch pivot
If you put a cookie-cutter team on their forums to rate you'll probably get a lot of hate for lack of creativity, while you'd be praised for getting a team with Specs Tropius to 1600
>>25607391
I helped make a Jolteon set back in dpp, I never recommend or submit it to anyone but I wrecked a ton of people with it in a place where a lot of smogon people used to battle
>>25607623
It still boggles my mind they thought keeping Drizzle in OU was a good idea
