Metagame Terastallization Tiering Discussion [ UPDATE POST #1293]

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Smogon: We dont want complex ban.
Also Smogon: What we do whit Terastalization?

If they can complex ban Terrastal, so then free DryPass and Houndstone for instance.

O you BAN Terastal as a hold o you don't ban it. Stop discussing what to do when you can basically do a suspect test and let people decide..
 
Smogon: We dont want complex ban.
Also Smogon: What we do whit Terastalization?

If they can complex ban Terrastal, so then free DryPass and Houndstone for instance.

O you BAN Terastal as a hold o you don't ban it. Stop discussing what to do when you can basically do a suspect test and let people decide..
Drypass is a more complex ban than a terra team sheet by a lot, and houndstone was banned because it's the only mon that gets Last Respects.
 
Drypass is a more complex ban than a terra team sheet by a lot, and houndstone was banned because it's the only mon that gets Last Respects.
The only smogon complex ban i remember was "No Swift Swim + Drizzle" in gen 5.

But the council always say no to complex ban. They could have banned "Speed boost in Blaziken" instead of "Blaziken" as a hold but they decided no complex ban this time
 
In my own opinion, The team preview option is the best. Not only does it take a lot of the "uncompetative unpredictability" out of the equation, but it will also nerf the super sweepers like Roaring moon, Anhiliape, gargancle, dragonite, ect because you can see their tera and go "ok, now I have to play so I don't lose to this set which I know about". Could there be some 5-D chess players out there who abuse the expectation? sure, but that's just like people running fake stall. It's usually worse to run the trick sets then the real ones, or the trick set wouldn't be a trick, it would just be the most used set. Finally, I don't think we should just outright ban tera, especially not now. The gen is barely been out for two weeks. Even busted ass dyanamax lasted longer than that. And you simply cannot make the argument that tera type is more broken than dynamax. If you give tera type some healthy table time, like 4 months or so, especially if you implement the team preview option, people will get used to tera and it will be just a new thing that we learn to play with.
 
If they can complex ban Terrastal, so then free DryPass and Houndstone for instance.
Yknow I wasn't going to dip my toes here because I truly do not care if tera stays, goes, gets restricted, you can play it only on Thursdays or whatever, but this argument makes no sense. Nothing suggested here is a complex ban, that'd have to be the weird "oh but what if we restrict tera for non boosters" idea I saw 7 pages ago or something.

Anyway, I think tera is fun but I don't really have an opinion on if it should go or not. I think banning tera blast is pretty goofy tho, if you're going to update it, i'd say focus on stuff like showing everyone's tera on team preview. Maybe do that immediately for the suspect test, and then let people decide if they want it hidden, with preview, or banned?
 
The only smogon complex ban i remember was "No Swift Swim + Drizzle" in gen 5.

But the council always say no to complex ban. They could have banned "Speed boost in Blaziken" instead of "Blaziken" as a hold but they decided no complex ban this time
Aldaron's proposal was a disaster and has shaped the way the council sees complex bans. As for the Blaziken example, banning a component of a mon+a mon would be a complex ban, and the equivalent here would be e.g. banning terastalize only on dragapult and roaring moon. A terra team sheet mod is not a complex ban.
 
Smogon: We dont want complex ban.
Also Smogon: What we do whit Terastalization?

If they can complex ban Terrastal, so then free DryPass and Houndstone for instance.

O you BAN Terastal as a hold o you don't ban it. Stop discussing what to do when you can basically do a suspect test and let people decide..
I agreed, full or no ban is the way to go. I don't see anything coming out of a complex ban. Just a waste of time until it eventually gets banned fully since complex ban won't fix the issues.

The only reason complex ban is considered is to appease casual players who don't play competitive 6v6 often (if at all), and want to preserve the generational mechanic
 
Anyway, I think tera is fun but I don't really have an opinion on if it should go or not. I think banning tera blast is pretty goofy tho, if you're going to update it, i'd say focus on stuff like showing everyone's tera on team preview.
This doesn't change anything on the problem of Terra. What happen if you counter to Dragonite only beats tera Normal and they show teraFire instead? You still have the same problem.
Also all the pokemon in both team can tera.
 
This doesn't change anything on the problem of Terra. What happen if you counter to Dragonite only beats tera Normal and they show teraFire instead? You still have the same problem.
Also all the pokemon in both team can tera.
Like I said, I do Not Care if it goes or stays. I just think banning tera blast is weird as hell if you want to try and nerf it lol
 
Like I said, I do Not Care if it goes or stays. I just think banning tera blast is weird as hell if you want to try and nerf it lol
Tera blast isn't even an issue, actually. It's probably the least problematic aspect of the mechanic. Only thing it does is give extra coverage, but most pokemon don't care about that coverage since they want to keep moves like U-turn/taunt/knock off/spikes/defog etc, and already have better moves with higher BP/additional effects.
 

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The only reason complex ban is considered is to appease casual players who don't play competitive 6v6 often (if at all), and want to preserve the generational mechanic
I trully hope this isn't the case kekw. Taking into account people's opinion about "Terastallization being fun or not" isn't a legit reason whatsoever to keep the mechanic around. People gonna be mad about that fact, but we're talking here about Terastallization being legit to use or not from a competitive point of view and if it's too much, how to fix the issue. Fun factor of the mechanic isn't part of the equation and should never be.

Also people need to understand that "Showing Tera type at Team Preview" isn't gonna fix the main issue we have with it which are 50/50's situations Terastallization leads to. Like I said earlier, think with you brain and not with your heart, we're not here to please people who "just" want to have fun with Terastallization. The purpose is to make a tier viable and playable with or without X/Y Pokémon or X/Y mechanic, tier being fun is a bonus.
 
The main issue I have is that I cannot foresee any arrangement, even a combination of heaviest proposed restrictions such as typing revealed at preview+only Tera into natural typings, leading to an acceptable level of normalisation for Tera, nor a stable meta.

I still think, even under the strictest of arrangements, it is still incredibly flexible & unpredictable (posts by Askeia & others outline the Tera users' favour in so-called 50-50 scenarios perfectly) - this will lead to a meta in which there are too many options to prepare for & an unacceptable regularity of near-guesses, thus minimising the impact of a player's meta knowledge in building & play. Even under these conditions, it remains uncompetitive. Not only that, but allowing any Pokemon to have Adaptability for one STAB, is far-and-away above the power level we should be comfortable with, and will inevitably lead to an unhealthy meta.

Furthermore, Tera essentially sets the stage for the Meta to play out on, and confounds any sort of current & future necessary tiering action. With Tera still legal, in any form, it is impossible to disentangle any Pokemon from its interaction & dependency on Tera, barring obvious exceptions. This will lead to tiering nightmares.

Edit: response to almostgood
 
Also people need to understand that "Showing Tera type at Team Preview" isn't gonna fix the main issue we have with it which are 50/50's situations Terastallization leads to. Like I said earlier, think with you brain and not with your heart, we're not here to please people who "just" want to have fun with Terastallization. The purpose is to make a tier viable and playable with or without X/Y Pokémon or X/Y mechanic, tier being fun is a bonus.
If this is true then a suspect test should reveal it, but it at least feels worth trying I think.
 
I would rather see 50 pokemon get banned, with a chance to get re tested when home connects.

That's much better than the generation mechanic getting removed permanently, and we have to wait until generation 10 for another chance.

It is much wiser to ban all offensive pokemon that become even stronger with tera; much healthier to ban roaring moon, dragonite, annihilape, iron valiant etc. than to ban terastalizing. Especially given it's one week into the gen, it would be nice to play with the actual generation mechanic for the first time in 3 years.
 
I trully hope this isn't the case kekw. Taking into account people's opinion about "Terastallization being fun or not" isn't a legit reason whatsoever to keep the mechanic around. People gonna be mad about that fact, but we're talking here about Terastallization being legit to use or not from a competitive point of view and if it's too much, how to fix the issue. Fun factor of the mechanic isn't part of the equation and should never be.

Also people need to understand that "Showing Tera type at Team Preview" isn't gonna fix the main issue we have with it which are 50/50's situations Terastallization leads to. Like I said earlier, think with you brain and not with your heart, we're not here to please people who "just" want to have fun with Terastallization. The purpose is to make a tier viable and playable with or without X/Y Pokémon or X/Y mechanic, tier being fun is a bonus.
I have been trying to argue this exact thing, but majority of the pro-tera arguments apparently are

a) it's fun because unpredictable
b) it's the generational gimmick

And neither consider it's strain on teambuilding. Both arguments are pretty ridiculous and it shows how so many casual players are completely out of touch with the singles 6v6 meta
 
I'm in the ban train. Trying to nerf it is a wast of time
Dude, You're upset becasue you've had to learn how to play in a new metagame. That's normal. I was mad as hell the first time I got tossed on my neck by gholdengo going tera fight on my sucker punch, but this metagame has only been out for like 2 weeks. Even dynamax lasted longer than that and dyanamax was infinetly more broken than tera. Let's at least try out one of the restrictions, (preferably team preveiw as all the other ones don't really fix the unpredictability problem imo) and if tera type is still so unbearable like 3 months from now after the crazy offense part of the meta has ended then we can look at an outright ban. Personally, I don't think that tera is busted the way it is right now as I can usually play around it, but then I'm only on the 1400's part of the ladder so make fun of me for being/playing against noobs I guess.
 
I would rather see 50 pokemon get banned, with a chance to get re tested when home connects.

That's much better than the generation mechanic getting removed permanently, and we have to wait until generation 10 for another chance.

It is much wiser to ban all offensive pokemon that become even stronger with tera; much healthier to ban roaring moon, dragonite, annihilape, iron valiant etc. than to ban terastalizing. Especially given it's one week into the gen, it would be nice to play with the actual generation mechanic for the first time in 3 years.

please no! Do you have any idea how many suspect tests there would be under that plan? there would never be a regular ladder, it would just always be the suspect test. You make a good point about it being one week into the gen, which is why the offensive pokemon seem busted right now. It takes a bit for counters to immerge to offensive pokemon. Let's just let the whole metagame breathe for a while and see what really becomes a problem. If anything is done it should be the team preview option.
 
People gonna be mad about that fact, but we're talking here about Terastallization being legit to use or not from a competitive point of view and if it's too much, how to fix the issue
Srry for asking. But exactly when the fix the issue other than banning it??
 
So you basically didn't read the thread at all.
I did, and there's this exact comment right above (#320)

Cloyster Chowder -
I would rather see 50 pokemon get banned, with a chance to get re tested when home connects.

That's much better than the generation mechanic getting removed permanently, and we have to wait until generation 10 for another chance.

It is much wiser to ban all offensive pokemon that become even stronger with tera; much healthier to ban roaring moon, dragonite, annihilape, iron valiant etc. than to ban terastalizing. Especially given it's one week into the gen, it would be nice to play with the actual generation mechanic for the first time in 3 years.
I could quote more but that would be futile
 

Srn

Water (Spirytus - 96%)
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Hello OU,

I am here to tell you why Tera should be banned outright. Any restriction does not solve the main problem of how unpredictable tera makes the game, and I would like to make my case with some replays.

Here's one that I had on day 0, where htcl brought some stall and I had some sash HO:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1714260194
Ultimately I won because I pulled out a novel tera type that htcl could not have possibly prepared for. It was pure MU. Now, would any of the restrictions have helped htcl not lose to tera flying gholdengo?
-If htcl knew that gholdengo could indeed tera flying, then he could try and force it with clodsire and then seismic toss with blissey, but I could just as easily stay ghost/steel and NP up some more. It's still a guessing game.
-Limiting the number of pokemon that could tera wouldn't help, because tera flying gholdengo was insanely good and it would be one of them on my team. That wouldn't have changed anything.
-Limiting tera type to stabs would have made a big difference. But as we'll see in some other replays, that doesn't necessarily make playing around tera any less difficult.
-Banning tera blast would have made no difference here.


Here's another replay from day 0, I was using the same team against 3B on the fire's pincurchin team:
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1714288396
Having gholdengo block memento and thus getting a free turn was the sort of stroke of luck you could expect so early in the metagame, but regardless, it was able to ultimately win because I could tera flying vs the iron valiant, tank the knock off, avoid being revenge killed, and continue to kill everything.
-If 3b knew I could tera flying, it certainly helps the guessing game, but it stays as one. He has to use the correct move to kill and predict my tera, and if he guesses wrong he loses. That's assuming gholdengo even dies to anything in that position.
-Again, limiting the number of pokemon that could tera wouldn't help, I'm gonna let gholdengo use tera flying.
-Here is a game where limiting tera type to stabs actually would not have helped 3b very much. If I could tera steel on knock off, I can still win. If I can tera ghost on the CC predicting 3b to predict tera steel, I can also win. The unpredictability remains either way. Revenge killing isn't safe either way.
-Banning tera blast also makes no difference here.


Here's a more recent battle on the ladder, where I'm using a sun team vs Stevy124
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1721143397-qaktbfne0kvp4t678ftoq4q4871uwkrpw
I used tera fire on my specs chi-yu to avoid dying to iron valiant. The moonblast damage meant it was specs, but in case it wasn't, Tera fire would have allowed my to live an aura sphere. Chi-yu then goes on to 2hko ting-lu while a tera blast cb ghost pult smashes my team.
-If Stevy124 knew I was tera fire, it wouldn't have much of a difference in this scenario. This is one of the times where it's more telegraphed who has what tera (chi-yu probably tera fires on a sun team, pult often tera ghost, especially when banded) The raw power of both of these teras really doesn't care about whether or not you know about it, because what in the world is tanking tera fire specs chi-yu under the sun.
-Limiting the number of pokemon that can tera wouldn't help. I only tera with 3 mons on the updated version of this team 95% of the time.
-Limiting the tera type to stabs also makes no difference here.
-Banning tera blast would certainly make cb pult worse, but I imagine tera ghost specs shadow ball can do similar things on the special side.


Here's an interesting case on the ladder where I'm using a sun team vs vkhss
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1721365332-uh0j4u83u5udbazasazhpy93mifdhv3pw
I used tera fire on specs chi-yu yet again, but this time to get a surprise kill vs palafin. I think vkhss was aiming to tank the hit and drain punch to heal the damage back because chi-yu from full will live an unboosted jet punch under sun, but the unpredictability of tera struck again as I tera fire to avoid drain punch but end up just killing from 83%.
-If vkhss knew I was tera fire, maybe he could've switched out and sacked something else, but nothing else could kill me from full under sun either. I think he would've played the exact same way.
-Limiting the number of pokemon doesn't help here.
-Limiting tera type to stabs makes no difference here.
-Banning tera blast makes no difference here.


Here's yet another ladder battle where I'm using a sun vs fewavead
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1722346772-gkngmx68bc763xfyr36aiufqjnxd55ypw
Turn 1 I tera steel my roaring moon and iron head to kill the sylveon. Yeah that's really it.
-If fewavead knew I could tera steel, they could play more defensively and try to scout, but they are also using a pretty fat team vs my specs chi-yu which can always tera fire. Any defensive play and scouting means giving room for chi-yu to come in and blow something up. Meanwhile, I have no real hyper voice switch-in. Even with the information that fewavead could have, they are still forced to make a very important guess right off the bat.
-Limiting number of pokemon doesn't help here.
-Limiting tera type to stabs makes a difference here, but not necessarily a big one. Roaring moon iron head won't kill without tera, but that's only because I'm scarf here. If I'm banded, it will kill, and fewavead and it doesn't change the decisions fewavead has to make.
-Banning tera blast makes no difference here, pult got greedy and put itself in first impression range anyway.


So what sort of trends are we seeing? What conclusions can we draw?
In my opinion, the problem of tera is twofold: 80% of the problem is that it is unpredictable, and another 20% is that it makes certain pokemon incredibly strong and hard to wall with the right combinations. Ok then, are the proposed restrictions effective?

Showing Tera type at Team Preview:
In my opinion, I think that showing tera type does not do enough to mitigate the guesswork involved in playing around tera types. For every replay, I feel that knowing the tera type would not have helped the opponent in making the correct play. Even if they knew my tera type, they would still have to guess when I do it and with whom. As the metagame develops, I think we will see certain pokemon settle into certain tera types, so perhaps the "who will tera" question will be easier to guess with time. However, the timing is the most important and most problematic factor, and knowing the tera type beforehand doesn't change the fact that you have to guess when it comes out, and guessing wrong can lose you the game.

Limiting the number of pokemon that have access to Tera:
I think that this restriction is near meaningless unless it is literally 1 or 2. Anything more really doesn't hamper the flexibility of tera. Very rarely am I using tera on any more than 3 pokemon on a team across many games, and I suspect many people feel the same way, depending on the team.

Limiting tera type to stabs:
This restriction would remove a LOT of the unpredictability of tera and take a lot of guesswork out of the game, but most crucially, it does not remove it entirely. Being able to tera into pure fire with chi-yu still forced my opponent to make the same guesses that I could force by tera steel with roaring moon. This restriction is meaningful but not complete enough. It also doesn't stop unwallable nonsense like ghost dpult or fire chi-yu.

Banning tera blast:
This is just a lesser version of limiting tera type to stabs imo. Very meaningless restriction.

Let's take a second to address all the pro-tera arguments too, while I'm here typing this thesis.

"You can't ban the generation defining mechanic!!"
Yes we can. Dynamax was completely unbalanced, and got accordingly banned. Tera does not get any special treatment. If the qualified playerbase thinks it's broken, then it goes. Simple as that.

"Give it some more time!!"
This is a discussion thread, not a suspect thread. We are doing exactly that.

"But it's fun!"
I think specs kyogre would be a lot of fun in OU. But my idea of fun has no bearing on what the OU community should do to make the OU tier as competitive and diverse a tier as possible. At it's core, tera is uncompetitive because it forces players to consider and prepare for WAY too many options and regularly forces near-50-50s. The free adaptability to strong pokemon is just the icing on the cake.

"Just get used to it!"
This one baffles me the most. We got used to broken pokemon like dracovish too, and we carried seismitoad on most of our teams. It lead to the worst stretch of gen8 ou. The meta CAN adapt to any broken nonsense, but that doesn't mean that's a good thing, nor does it mean we should be satisfied with just adapting to whatever exists naturally.

In conclusion, I think all of the restrictions are inadequate and I support a full ban of terastallization.
 
I have been trying to argue this exact thing, but majority of the pro-tera arguments apparently are

a) it's fun because unpredictable
b) it's the generational gimmick

And neither consider it's strain on teambuilding. Both arguments are pretty ridiculous and it shows how so many casual players are completely out of touch with the singles 6v6 meta
The argument is that the base game of Pokemon (plus all of its proxy metagames) is based upon predictions and educated guesses. Even at a lower level, making plays based upon a guess that your opponent's Chi-Yu is Specs instead of Scarf emphasizes this. Uncompetitive factors take away "skill" and replace it with alternate ways to win. Look at the Arena Trap/Shadow Tag ban. Shadow Tag allowed people to gain momentum and progress simply by switching a Pokemon in - rather than playing around the opponent's strategy. Similarly, the evasion ban took place because a Pokemon with its evasion fully boosted could win a game with little room for predictions and actual strategy. Ditto for Sleep Clause. You'll find that almost all bans on Smogon are, in fact, in place to preserve the "guessing games". Terastallization is noticeably different from these in that it embellishes the skill in a game. Making a skillful play with Tera simply has larger effects than a skillful play in a gimmick-less meta. The issue is whether or not the boost is too big. The pro-Tera side is arguing that the boost makes the game more competitive and that it will lessen as the metagame stabilizes. The pro-ban side is arguing that Tera allows for too big of a boost in power at once to be competitive. I've seen metas balance out over weeks, and from my experience, I think the safer bet is that the metagame will settle to a point where Tera's power boost are comparable to those of late-gen Z-moves. Neither side is particularly interested in the "fun" of it.
 
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