Announcement np: SV OU Suspect Process, Round 1 - Oops!...I Did It Again

[Levant Mir Celestia]

Among the things discussed were Magearna being able to constantly adapt to the metagame by swapping to the Right Z-Move, and that Z-Moves are what pushed Pheromosa and Zygarde into being the unstoppable forces they became. They probably would have been banished even without Z-Moves, but those contributed in making them broken.

However, at the end of the day, Z-Crystals weren’t removed from the game. Why throw an entire mechanic is we can get rid / nerf the few offenders?

The Z-move comparison falls flat when you realize that Z-moves had an opportunity cost, that being the mon's item slot. Whereas there's nothing stopping any of the 6 mons on any given team from terastallizing. Also, how do you propose we nerf the tera abusers?? Because at this point, I am not convinced any of the restrictions will make tera healthy. As a result, I find it better to just get rid of the root of the problem and then go from there.

On the other hand there are some mons that may not be broken without tera that may be broken with tera. However instead of banning the mechanic i prefer to ban the mons, as i also dont think the amount of mons to whom this applies is a lot (maybe 5 or so - im thinking mainly of roaring moon, chien pao, iron valiant and maybe dragapult, baxcalibur or kingambit). Afterall defensive tera also helps to keep some threats in check rigth now

No. That's only a band-aid solution that ignores the real problem, AKA terastallization. Also, the defensive part of tera is dwarfed by the offensive part of it; what's more, that sounds like a "broken checking broken" situation, something we don't accept. I want games to be decided by skill, not the ability to abuse a broken mechanic to BS your way to victory.

What limitations were there to be made with both players dynamaxing, none really; you can at least control limitation on Tera.

Like what? Because I am not convinced any of the limitations will work. Also, as I stated above, I'm not gonna pretend that having tera types revealed at team preview fixes anything. Paranoia will still reign supreme.

 

[njnp]

I got reqs and i will vote no ban. The reason is that i dont think tera is uncompetetive, since neither the tera types you or your opponent pick nor the time you decide to tera is chosen randomly.
On the other hand there are some mons that may not be broken without tera that may be broken with tera. However instead of banning the mechanic i prefer to ban the mons, as i also dont think the amount of mons to whom this applies is a lot (maybe 5 or so - im thinking mainly of roaring moon, chien pao, iron valiant and maybe dragapult, baxcalibur or kingambit). Afterall defensive tera also helps to keep some threats in check rigth now, so im not sure if the amount of broken mons is very diffrent with or without tera.

If tera gets restricted, i vote for the following restrictions
1. Reveal Tera type at team preview
2. 1 Tera user per team
3. Outright ban
4. Only STAB Tera types allowed

Baxcalibur reading this

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1528991325160448000

 

[incorolla]

The discussion of individual future suspects and lower tier ramifications just don’t belong in this thread. People are allowed to vote based off of whatever they want and nobody can ever stop this, but these matter don’t really belong in the suspect thread for this because they don’t have to do with the topic of this thread. Otherwise, every suspect will devolve into a thread where you can justify discussing just about anything.

Let’s say no action happens and we go through the tiering process for every Pokemon that’s currently problematic in the metagame, which consists mostly (but not all) of major Tera beneficiaries. At that point, there’s no saying the metagame is balanced either as all we have done is de-crept the power level of the tier and we could potentially spend all generation chasing a balance that simply won’t exist given the nature of the mechanic. There’s also no saying that it won’t be a fix — the point is that we have no way of knowing for sure. Any speculation on what will ultimately balance something when balance is months and many moves away is sheer theorymon, which is pretty clearly not a good faith argument that holds the most water here.

In a similar light, assuming Tera will naturally balance in UU and lower tiers is somewhat theorymon. UU is the only lower tier that exists now and it’s in its infancy. UU players can draw some conclusions and I respect that as they have had an unofficial metagame to play for some weeks now, but further down the line really cannot. Once it becomes official and strategies continue to refine, tiering practices continue to update, and so on, a more substantial sample and perspective will exist for UU even and obviously below as they don’t even exist yet.

It has never been a best or optimal practice to let a lower tier stop a higher tier from having any tiering action. This has been the standard forever and if we were to ditch it, then we would also have to consider ditching rises based on usage and the transitivity of tiering as a whole — you don’t just get to handpick what does and doesn’t apply. And if you wanted to begin handpicking or fundamentally alter the system, that goes way above my head and the scope of this thread, so it wouldn’t belong here regardless.

You can vote based on whatever ideology you wish and that’s one of the best parts of our system — you are free to make that choice if you read reqs, but I don’t see how discussion of other tiers and discussion of future suspects that are largely based off of theory rather than anything substantial and known have a place in the suspect thread. This has never been allowed before and has derailed discussion many times, so let’s not start up with it now. Otherwise, this’ll just devolve into the “let’s discuss anything relevant to any Gen 9 format“ thread and the specific suspect thread just won’t exist.

I appreciate this, and I appreciate that the focus of the vote is on OU - not just because this is an OU subforum, but for the reasons you described. I also appreciate that a lot of the discussions are purely theory, as we've only one lower tier.
With that in mind, do you have suggestions on where to raise issues/exceptions to the system? I know this is above the scope of the thread and is out of your hands so I won't continue the debate here but just wondering if you could signpost somewhere for this debate to happen

 

[Finchinator]

I appreciate this, and I appreciate that the focus of the vote is on OU - not just because this is an OU subforum, but for the reasons you described. I also appreciate that a lot of the discussions are purely theory, as we've only one lower tier.
With that in mind, do you have suggestions on where to raise issues/exceptions to the system? I know this is above the scope of the thread and is out of your hands so I won't continue the debate here but just wondering if you could signpost somewhere for this debate to happen

I would not call tiering transitivity an active “issue”, but the technical answer is the Policy Review subforum and discussing it in the subforums of the lower tiers themselves would be best. That way you’re discussing things specific to those metagames in those metagames spaces, which is especially applicable now as Tera remains allowed for the time. It seems people from all walks of the community are getting reqs, too.

 

[bruno]

I generally don't feel comfortable posting in these, but I was curious enough to read most of what's been written and feel pretty invested in the gen so just leaving my (personal) thoughts, as this could end up being the most important suspect of the gen and seems like it'll be pretty close.

I agree with a lot said by lily, nat and ima. The main thing I wanted to make clear is that i'm voting to not ban tera because I don't deem it as outright banworthy, not just because "it's fun" or "it opens creativity", which seems to be what a lot of pro-banners believe.

During the first days of playing, yes, it seemed like everything was random and impossible to understand. I think I lost 5/7 of my suspect games to tera espathra alone. The more I get used to the meta and play more and more games the more it really has not felt that bad at all to me. There is a reason why some of the Pokemon have common Tera choices. Water/Fairy Garg can be a great answer to gholdengo/dragapult, Dark Chien-pao makes great use of Sucker and dark as a strong offensive typing, if you see Booster Energy Roaring Moon you can try and prepare to answer acrobatics Tera Flying as it's just a really strong offensive threat and destroys Great Tusk. You learn to read this in team preview and adapt to it, and play/predict as follows.

Sometimes I get caught off guard by a random tera moveset/idea I haven't seen yet, sure. Sometimes your opponent won't actually follow logic, that's the magic of ladder for you in the first place. That has it's own can of worms you will find when you try and stick to consistency when using this kind of thing(sure, you can lead Tera Fairy scarf Glimmora and try and one shot my Great Tusk turn 1, but if I switch trying to preserve my tusk's health expecting a sashed Modest Dazzling Gleam or sniffing something suspicious, you've wasted your tera turn 1 with a pretty underwhelming set), but regardless, that's why I'm hoping it is nerfed in some way. I am personally hoping for 1 mon per team and like this choice the most, but would be down for types revealed by preview as well.

I also wanted to talk about LoseToRU?'s post , as I thought it was a pretty interesting point about how Volcarona is a big nuisance with the current Tera ruleset. There's 2 main things I concluded, though.

As some people pointed out already, it would be considerably easier to deal with through any of the nerfs we're looking for. If you're able to see it's typing, you can be wary to not let it set up so easily, and make a longterm gameplan. If it's 1 tera per team you immediately know it's the tera mon. If it's only STAB it's basically the same but stronger.

But also, this is kind of just.. Volcarona for you. If you've played through past generations, it's kind of its thing(a recent example gen-wise would be last gen with the Safeguard set getting past blisseys and sub Bug Buzz destroying Heatran late game through Swarm or knock support). I don't really see Tera being what pushes it over the edge. The examples brought up just don't seem convincing. Dragonite isn't a safe answer against the wisp set(which is IMO the best set), and can even be 1v1'd in some cases after burn. Dondozo isn't a good answer to Giga Drain sets in the first place, I guess if you run a full spdef set but have fun using that in this meta. Toxapex can get destroyed by Tera Psychic, but it would also struggle vs a Life Orb/Lum set anyway. Clodsire can get it's recover PP stalled through wisp+flame+rocks, I actually did this on a ladder game as the Pokemon is just so passive, you don't actually need to Tera Psychic on it.
Maybe the possibility of being able to run a boots set so freely alongside Tera is what pushes it over the edge(i don't personally believe so, atm), but at that point, you look into that at a later point with a different meta.

The only times i truly have a lot of trouble with tera is because the pokemon itself is stupid, like chi-yu, annihilape and chien-pao, maybe espathra but not as much, garg gets annoying defensively when you have momentum but the iron defense set has plenty of ways to be dealt with. This is why I also agree a lot with what ayevon said that it would have been nice to see some of this banned before the suspect, as we could have had a much more clear vision of things, but I understand why it was done this way.

I guess this is a pretty subjective post because im just saying "i play game mechanic not broken to me, deal with it", honestly most of it feels subjective based on each person's experience anyway. But I just don't see the heavy need for this to be rushed now. If you ban it now there's no chance it will ever be revisited in the future, for the entirety of this (new, month old?) generation. You can nerf it now and re-visit later if it deems itself to be too much. A lot of people saying "no point nerfing it now because you will just ban it later, you just don't have enough foresight". I guess I don't? But it would be nice to see it as an actual metagame before being proven wrong because I don't believe anyone is out here playing test games with the nerfs and seeing how it truly feels.


edit: I've thought about it some more and have changed my mind, I'll be voting teras revealed by preview first, and 1 tera per team second now. This doesn't change anything I wanted to say in my post and I did say I don't mind seeing either option win over the other(I still don't), just thought i'd make this clear for transparency reasons.

 

[Spark31]

To be clear, everything I say here should be taken with a grain of salt. I don't intend to get reqs, and even after the suspect I'm not likely to play the format. As a VGC player, I am not nor have ever been an OU player, and simply have a large volume of high ladder games spectated. However, there are some interesting things to consider.

Firstly, there simply is no rational way to defend the way Tera works currently. Every turn players have to predict not only when their opponent will tera, but also who will tera and what that Pokémon will tera into. I think individually any of these questions is reasonable to ask of players in a format, but combined the amount that needs to be considered is absurd. And of course, the punishment for guessing wrong is incredibly high in such a positionally focused format. You could guess that the opponent's Kingambit is tera flying and still lose because you keep pivoting around the Tera and taking chip because your opponent hasn't pulled the trigger on Tera in a disadvantageous situation. This creates incredibly high variance because high risk plays that still allow you to keep Tera as a weapon for the endgame (e.g. keeping your Kingambit in on an EQ mon trying to bait them into playing around tera flying) are rewarded the most.

This means that ultimately two of the three problems Tera poses must be solved by any restrictions put on it, otherwise high risk, high variance plays will always be rewarded more than consistent strong positioning (which is something that is valued incredibly heavily in Smogon OU gameplay).

Personally, as someone who has no dog in this race I would love to see Tera stay in some way or another. In the games I've spectated it's always interesting to see which player uses Tera better. I've watched several games where one player burns Tera early to take out an important check on the enemy team just to lose the match by losing the ability to reactively counterplay an opponent out positioning them with more hidden information, but this argument is ultimately just a slightly less problematic argument than the arguments appealing to dynamax which got banned incredibly quickly. I think restrictions could help this dynamic, especially when stacked (show tera types and an item has to be used to introduce opportunity cost), but I'm all too aware that Smogon generally likes to avoid complex bans when possible.

In order my preference for bans would be:
Type Preview > One Per Team > Action Needed > Ban Non-Stab Tera > Outright Ban > Doing nothing

But ultimately, I think that more stacking restrictions to reduce variance is preferable to anything on the list currently

 

[ayevon]

I'll try to and culminate my final thoughts as we approach the vote. I've laddered a lot this gen on a few different accounts and have had a good amount of success, and I feel at this point I very rarely lose to the 'randomness' aspect of Tera, and much less than I do to 'random' sets. I feel like it's been something I've kind of viewed as a nooby arguement, but from a variance point of view, the number of viable strategies and pokemon that can be used (or ultimately will be upon a Home release) is the greater frustrating aspect of variance in a ladder setting than Tera has been. Obviously, you can't completely divorce Tera from what allows for additional viable strategies and sets, but it does also alieviate some of that stress in the builder to an extent. Perhaps Tera Steel Great Tusk would be the most applicable Tera typing in most matchups, but if I can forgo those benefits for Tera Water, I don't have to compensate for Belly Drum Azu as much in my build. I think I've been pretty consistent in my thinking that Tera as a mechanic is mostly fine, and policing 'randomness' or variance in Pokemon is a bit of a fools errand, but Tera certainly does break a lot of pokemon, and pushes a whole bunch close to a borderline. I think the most frustrating Tera experience has been with Chi Yu, Chien Pao, Espathra, and Annihilape, and while Tera might push them over the edge, they each have their own individual factors that contribute to their brokeness a bit more so than Tera does itself. Again, in retrospect I think that the best course of action to take would have been to continue with banning the most problematic Pokemon in a Tera metagame while giving more time for players to flesh out their experience, allowing them to push it's boundaries of being broken or reining it in to something closer to Z Moves. As bans continue, we could examine whether a lot of bans were just collateral from Tera, or if those Pokemon were just broken in what could be a balanced Tera metagame. Unfortunately, that was not the route which was taken, so for now I think the best approach will be to vote for whichever of tera preview or tera in first slot you believe is best, continue to take action on the problematic pokemon which ruin the meta, and examine Tera from there. So to sum it up, I don't really think Tera adds any more variance or randomness than we accept from other aspects of the game, but revealing types or limiting to a single pokemon could ultimately be a benefit to the user experience in the metagame. I think further action beyond that is premature especially considering what pokemon are still allowed in the tier, clouding the picture.

 

[PokePoindexter]

Honestly, it would probably help to answer these questions in an objective way. (Hopefully not with stuff like “50/50” which has basically become a meme at this point.)

For someone who claims to have been spectating this thread, you seem to have glossed over a lot of pro-ban posts, because many people already have answered the questions you provided, myself included.

• What Pokémon are broken because of Tera or facilitate Tera abusers? Would they be as troublesome even without Tera around?

• What Pokémon are balanced with Tera? Did Pokémon with bad typing get a new lease of life by being able to ditch their original typing?

"Just ban (Pokemon) if (Pokemon) is broken with Tera."
There's a reason I keep saying that battle gimmicks are the last things we should care about maintaining. Stop and think about how many Pokemon you could say are broken simply because of what they can do after Tera'ing. A few I can name off the top of my head: Annihilape, Dragonite, Espathra, Kingambit, Roaring Moon, Volcarona, Dragapult, Iron Valiant. Then tack on another batch of potential abusers if those were all banned (e.g. Garganacl, Ting-Lu, Garchomp, Toxapex, Iron Moth, Great Tusk). Sure, you might still have a few broken mons independent of Tera's legality (e.g. Chi-Yu, Chien-Pao, maybe Gholdengo), but I'd rather throw out the gimmick and three problematic mons than put as many as seventeen - most of which wouldn't even be problematic if they couldn't use the gimmick in the first place - on the chopping block just to preserve said gimmick. If you have to potentially cut out more than a third of the meta to make Tera healthy (assuming you can even stop there), that's a pretty good sign that it's the gimmick that needs to go, not the Pokemon.

• If the unpredictability of Tera is the problem, then why not entertain the preview option (+1 Tera user, eventually) before nuking Tera as a whole? Even if nobody is a mind reader and can tell when the opponent is about to Tera, wouldn’t knowing the opposing Tera help mitigate the risks of failing predictions (ex. by relying less on supereffective attacks and using more neutral hits, perhaps)?

"When something Teras into a different type, it becomes weak to other types."
Sure, but it's not weak to those other types until it does. As an example: A Tera Ground Volcarona that has QD'd once can be RK'd by a Flower Trick from Scarf Meowscarada... if Volc has Tera'd, that is. If you're playing Meow in that circumstance, do you think it would make any sense to bring it in against Volc if it hasn't? Hell no; the most you're doing to it is tickling it with Knock Off before getting roasted by the inevitable Fire Blast that follows. And if you're playing Volc, are you Tera'ing while Meow is still around? Of course not; unless a previous circumstance absolutely required you to, you're staying away from that Tera button until Meow is gone. And remember, you don't know when something will Tera or what it will Tera into until it does. The aforementioned Volc's Tera type could just as easily be Ice, and Meow wouldn't save you if it was.

Besides, does it really make any sense to have to run both a check to a given mon in its normal form, and then another check to that same mon once it Teras?

But also, this is kind of just.. Volcarona for you. If you've played through past generations, it's kind of its thing(a recent example gen-wise would be last gen with the Safeguard set getting past blisseys and sub Bug Buzz destroying Heatran late game through Swarm or knock support). I don't really see Tera being what pushes it over the edge. The examples brought up just don't seem convincing. Dragonite isn't a safe answer against the wisp set(which is IMO the best set), and can even be 1v1'd in some cases after burn. Dondozo isn't a good answer to Giga Drain sets in the first place, I guess if you run a full spdef set but have fun using that in this meta. Toxapex can get destroyed by Tera Psychic, but it would also struggle vs a Life Orb/Lum set anyway. Clodsire can get it's recover PP stalled through wisp+flame+rocks, I actually did this on a ladder game as the Pokemon is just so passive, you don't actually need to Tera Psychic on it.
Maybe the possibility of being able to run a boots set so freely alongside Tera is what pushes it over the edge(i don't personally believe so, atm), but at that point, you look into that at a later point with a different meta.

Sets like you mentioned were specifically intended to thwart specific checks that Volc wouldn't have to worry about if it could hit them super-effectively. Why burn a Dnite and gamble on potentially stalling it out if you can just use Tera Ice and nuke it instead (or Pult for that matter)? Why forego Boots and lose half your health to SR if you can Tera Psychic or Ground and crush Tox that way? By using Tera, Volc can bypass at least one of its common checks far more easily without resorting to any gimmicks and can still threaten +1 Fire Blasts and whatever other coverage move it wants. So in this case, Tera definitely is what breaks it.

I guess this is a pretty subjective post because im just saying "i play game mechanic not broken to me, deal with it", honestly most of it feels subjective based on each person's experience anyway. But I just don't see the heavy need for this to be rushed now. If you ban it now there's no chance it will ever be revisited in the future, for the entirety of this (new, month old?) generation. You can nerf it now and re-visit later if it deems itself to be too much. A lot of people saying "no point nerfing it now because you will just ban it later, you just don't have enough foresight". I guess I don't? But it would be nice to see it as an actual metagame before being proven wrong because I don't believe anyone is out here playing test games with the nerfs and seeing how it truly feels.

Considering Dynamax was banned within a month of Gen 8, I think we can say Tera has gotten the time it has needed to evaluate it as well.

 

[tofa]

I got my reqs laddering with the team of the week by Vrin. Going into this suspect test, I wanted to outright ban Terastallization. Now, I'm not so sure. If I were to vote today, I'd probably vote for no ban. Here are my thoughts:

Teambuilding pros: When laddering, I ended up benefiting from Tera in almost every game, the vast majority of times through Tera Water Garganacl. I would argue that this is a result of great teambuilding, as the Tera types complemented the playstyle of the team very well. Furthermore, the team allowed me to essentially play without any attempts at predicting enemy Terastallization, while still having the full freedom of choosing when and what to Tera on my team. Again, this suggests that a team is well adapted to the meta. Lastly, there were games that I did Tera but didn't have to, which suggests that the combination of Pokémon themselves fit in general, and not only because of Terastallization. So all in all, there is definitely a reward & opportunity to express skill in learning how to properly teambuild with Tera types, which is an argument for keeping Terastallization around as part of a healthy metagame.

Teambuilding cons: I worry that teambuilding might become too difficult with unrestricted Terastallization. You'd need to keep in mind the most common Tera users (& how often they Terastallize), their Tera types and how it was used (e.g offensively or defensively). This information is unfortunately not documented in usage statistics at all at the moment (which is completely understandable considering how new the mechanic is). Due to this, I have felt that there's a lot more "undocumented knowledge" & experimentation involved in teambuilding to end up with a team that is consistent enough. This could alienate new players who may otherwise enjoy teambuilding. In previous gens, viability rankings and usage statistics or a couple of games were enough to get a clear view of a Pokémon's role(s).

Gameplay: I do not see any clear pros or cons gameplay-wise anymore. I used to think a major con was that Terastallization essentially allowed a bunch of "Gen 8 Kyurems" to exist (i.e multiple sufficiently different sets with different checks) that introduced lots of 50/50s. After laddering for reqs with a good team, I realised that there are indeed ways to heavily mitigate the uncertainty introduced by Terastallization through proper teambuilding. Also, I realised that the Pokémon that are difficult to handle with Terastallization are usually very strong even without the mechanic (e.g Chi-Yu, Roaring Moon). Finally, I realised that not all Pokémon Terastallize; some are much more prone to than others, which also cuts down uncertainty.

All in all, I believe teambuilding is currently a bit too difficult to "get right" with unrestricted Terastallization. This could possibly settle once usage statistics include Terastallization usage, and the most viable Terastallization types are clearly documented. It is difficult to say for sure whether updated usage statistics would be enough to make Tera types more approachable in the teambuilder. But I wouldn't be opposed to finding that out, hopefully over the next 1-2 months of usage statistics and the metagame settling. I'd rather keep Terastallization & re-test in the future than prematurely banning it.

 

[BobKingOfSeagulls]

People have mentioned the tera and dynamax comparisons a couple of times and while I do think it's 100% important to compare this to dynamax, since dynamax was a banned mechanic, imo they don't compare when we talk about the issue of both players having access to it. One of the issues with dynamax was it could only be counter played by using your own dynamax. The same doesn't apply to tera - using your tera isn't the only or best tool against an opposing tera the same way it was with dynamax - and so I think that particular comparison isn't super accurate.

 

[Marrilandra]

I've had like, no time to get the reqs myself so I cannot say much on the matter outside of getting my own thoughts out there, but I will say this:

Tera Preview eliminates where I think a lot of the issue is coming from, being the unpredictability, though others who've had more time can say otherwise. While in the current Ubers tier and Doubles in general I think Tera is kinda okay, I can understand that OU is a different beast altogether, especially when it's on top of some massively broken pokemon both banned (Iron Bundle and Palafin) and still legal (Goldengho and Chi-Yu), both offensively and defensively.

Albeit I will admit I do think Z-moves were balanced despite being close to it, partly cause with them and Megas you had to give up the item slot, which with Tera and Dynamax I don't know why GF didn't do the same for those, and I while I know this isn't the place to suggest different avenues (I swear I'm not, just what I think), I do think it is a contributing factor to how strong offensive and defensive Tera is, on top of the extra STAB and defensive typing as well as a free Adaptability boost for anything wanting it.

If I had time to get reqs, I'd be on the camp of Dedicated Tera and especially Tera preview, especially since this is definitely no Dynamax in terms of being just ridiculous, I can understand a ban for now and later on down the line maybe looking at it more since it's clear that perhaps there's a way to balance it better when DLC opens things up more.

I guess it's just a wait and see kind of thing now.

 

[LoseToRU?]

The pro-terra camp doesn't really address the core issues in a, let's say, scholarly, way.

Their core argument has now been boiled down to: Ban mons, not the gimmick.
They would rather ban any mon that becomes too strong with Terra, than Terra itself.

This reveals a lot about pro-Terra arguments, and how broken Terra is, but I won't delve into it; others have done it better at this point.
Also, as I said, it doesn't seem to matter how intelligently someone breaks down Terra as an uncompetitive and unhealthy.

So, let me at least address their core argument, and why it's... (I can't find anything to say without adding 2-4 expletives lol)

When we ban a mon, we remove a piece off the board.

This is why we have suspects, sometimes very silly suspects when we all know a mon is broken.
Because it's a serious thing to remove a piece off the board.

That's one less mon to fill a niche roll, one less mon to help with your team composition, one less option to choose from.

To appeal to pro-Terra camp, I'll speak their language:
Removing a mon makes a meta less fun.

Steamrolling with Spectrier was "fun" for a lot of people.
It was broken, but people had fun with it.

We ban a mon only when it's so oppressive that we can't play the game competitively anymore.

For the most recent, and pertinent example, let's talk about Melmetal suspect in 8.
Imagine gen 8 without Mel.
Would the meta still be playable without it? Sure, of course.
But Mel gave you more options, helped fill holes in your team, helped balance the meta, and provided a lot of utility.
That's why it passed the suspect, even though CB has basically no switch ins, it lives attacks it really shouldn't, and can be oppressive at times.

A mon is a huge factor in a meta, some to lesser degrees, but take a look at Lando, Tran, Zone.. imagine a gen where one of these got banned.
Things would change, options would be removed: less counterplay, less offensive options, less defensive options.
Just take a look at some of your favorite mons, and pretend they never existed, or got banned, or whatever
Sucks, right? Well, that's exactly what happened last gen.

The entire Dex cut thing was very unpopular for a reason: people want as many options, as many mons as possible.
I don't care how good Breloom would have been in Gen 8, I had an option removed from me, and it wasn't cool.
How would the meta have been with Gliscor? We'll never know.
To me, banning a mon is the same thing.

Removing a mon should be the last thing a meta considers.

Let me as something of pro-Terra players: How is advocating for multiple mons to be banned different than a dex cut?

I'm talking specifically about mons that would be fine w/o Terra, but are OP with Terra.
It will be a long list.
It's already a long list, and we have like 40 mons in OU lol
I will even be very conservative in my hypothesis, but I think at least 7 mons will need to be banned post-Home if we keep Terra.
Could be up to 15-20...

When Home drops, I'm excited to use some of my favorite, classic, OU staples.
Are you... not?
You would really rather remove pieces off the board, and give yourself less options, and less fun, to keep a literal gimmick designed for children who play the main game?
My brother in Christ, you're playing competitive Pokemon on an online simulator with a custom ruleset.
If you want to have fun with Terra, bust out your Switch.

I don't want to play with less mons if at all possible, do you?

This isn't true whatsoever, but let's say Regieleki is the only mon that's banned post-Home due to being broken with Terra Ice.
I use it as an example, because even the most casual, thoughtless pro-terra player has a hard time saying this mon won't be broken with Terra.
Anyway, let's say it's the only one and all the other Home mons are magically fine with Terra (lol)
If we ban Regieleki, that's one less spinner, one less revenge killer, one less special wall-breaker, one less Electric special mon
Less options- a piece off the board- less fun.

If you're pro-Tera, and then your favorite mon gets banned post-Home, how are you going to feel?
When one day you go to your builder and X is gone due to being broken with some Terra set, are you still gonna have "fun"?
How are you going to feel when 7 out of your top 10 mons are gone due to being pushed out by Terra?
Is that worth it to you, as a player, playing Pokemon, to have less Pokemon? To not get to use your favorite Pokemon?

 

[lax]

I’ve enjoyed this gen a lot so far and have laddered way too much while on my break

I am very pro-Tera. This mechanic has limitless potential for creativity and outplay potential (for the most part). It’s an amazing breath of fresh air to Pokemon and brings a new enjoyment I didn’t expect Gamefreak to pull off, in all honesty

I think anti-Tera people are coping out the wazoo with the arguments on unpredictability and lack of skill. There are certain mons that are less “skillful” or creative, such as Chi-Yu and Chien-Pao. Those two just tera into STAB Fire and Dark respectively and 2hko or ohko your entire team. If anything is OP, it’s their ability and how they have practically 0 switch-ins. However, they do require positioning to get their full use as they are weak to SR with the choiced sets and both are somewhat frail, so there are arguments over them being amazing, but not too much.

In a different vein, Tera allows for high level predictions and ingenuity. Off the top of my head, I was laddering in UU with Haxorus. My opponent sent out mence which is obviously Tera steel, but I said fuck it and earthquaked that shit and it disappeared, winning the game. You can get punished hard for your Teras. People can bait em out and then your biggest weapon and surprise is revealed. You’ll never be able to consistently predict Teras, but you can learn and be prepared as much as possible.

I’ve also obviously lost to random Teras on the ladder, as I’m sure many of you have. Shoutout to that one guy who showed me how good Tera fighting Esprathra is. 6-0’d me because I relied on Kingambit to shut down Fairy Esprathra. The thing is, I don’t look back on an Espratha 6-0 and slam my desk in anger and type to my buddies “holy fucking shit what a stupid mechanic and stupid pokemon”. I learn from it and then I steal it lmao. It’s more like “yo check this out lol seems god”. I think you have to play a lot of high ladder or tournament games to garner the experience to know when is best to Tera and to be on the lookout for surprising sets. I think a metagame should reward you for having this kind of experience, to the point that a surprise Tera doesn’t upset or tilt you, but you can learn from it and maybe even use it yourself. As mentioned previously, there is no perfected way to handle Teras, but there is a better way. That’s been my approach to this generation so far.

While I am pro-Tera in general, I don’t think nothing should be done per se. It’s tough bc the idea of revealing types gets rid of unpredictability (and many see this as a major negative point to Tera), but I can see this as a way to limit its control on the game, despite what I’ve said previously.

I would personally prefer limiting one Tera mon per team with unknown Tera typing. This means you can’t have a Tera Fairy or Water Garganacl hiding in the back to lean on; you have to dedicate a specific slot to your Tera. This means that when you fish for sets like Tera Fight Esprathra, you can get punished and it might just end up useless. I believe this is in line with how most people view cheese/match-up fish strategies across any generation of Pokemon. If it works out, sick. If it doesn’t, you regret wasting a set on it and move on.

I’m not the best at writing these posts bc my thoughts kinda just flow out in a rambling way. I made it a point to not bring up direct examples for people to reply to with “well, actually __”, instead focusing on just how I feel about the meta and the competitiveness and enjoyment I experienced from it.

 

[KeemyCakez]

The pro-terra camp doesn't really address the core issues in a, let's say, scholarly, way.

Their core argument has now been boiled down to: Ban mons, not the gimmick.
They would rather ban any mon that becomes too strong with Terra, than Terra itself.

This reveals a lot about pro-Terra arguments, and how broken Terra is, but I won't delve into it; others have done it better at this point.
Also, as I said, it doesn't seem to matter how intelligently someone breaks down Terra as an uncompetitive and unhealthy.

So, let me at least address their core argument, and why it's... (I can't find anything to say without adding 2-4 expletives lol)

When we ban a mon, we remove a piece off the board.

This is why we have suspects, sometimes very silly suspects when we all know a mon is broken.
Because it's a serious thing to remove a piece off the board.

That's one less mon to fill a niche roll, one less mon to help with your team composition, one less option to choose from.

To appeal to pro-Terra camp, I'll speak their language:
Removing a mon makes a meta less fun.

Steamrolling with Spectrier was "fun" for a lot of people.
It was broken, but people had fun with it.

We ban a mon only when it's so oppressive that we can't play the game competitively anymore.

For the most recent, and pertinent example, let's talk about Melmetal suspect in 8.
Imagine gen 8 without Mel.
Would the meta still be playable without it? Sure, of course.
But Mel gave you more options, helped fill holes in your team, helped balance the meta, and provided a lot of utility.
That's why it passed the suspect, even though CB has basically no switch ins, it lives attacks it really shouldn't, and can be oppressive at times.

A mon is a huge factor in a meta, some to lesser degrees, but take a look at Lando, Tran, Zone.. imagine a gen where one of these got banned.
Things would change, options would be removed: less counterplay, less offensive options, less defensive options.
Just take a look at some of your favorite mons, and pretend they never existed, or got banned, or whatever
Sucks, right? Well, that's exactly what happened last gen.

The entire Dex cut thing was very unpopular for a reason: people want as many options, as many mons as possible.
I don't care how good Breloom would have been in Gen 8, I had an option removed from me, and it wasn't cool.
How would the meta have been with Gliscor? We'll never know.
To me, banning a mon is the same thing.

Removing a mon should be the last thing a meta considers.

Let me as something of pro-Terra players: How is advocating for multiple mons to be banned different than a dex cut?

I'm talking specifically about mons that would be fine w/o Terra, but are OP with Terra.
It will be a long list.
It's already a long list, and we have like 40 mons in OU lol
I will even be very conservative in my hypothesis, but I think at least 7 mons will need to be banned post-Home if we keep Terra.
Could be up to 15-20...

When Home drops, I'm excited to use some of my favorite, classic, OU staples.
Are you... not?
You would really rather remove pieces off the board, and give yourself less options, and less fun, to keep a literal gimmick designed for children who play the main game?
My brother in Christ, you're playing competitive Pokemon on an online simulator with a custom ruleset.
If you want to have fun with Terra, bust out your Switch.

I don't want to play with less mons if at all possible, do you?

This isn't true whatsoever, but let's say Regieleki is the only mon that's banned post-Home due to being broken with Terra Ice.
I use it as an example, because even the most casual, thoughtless pro-terra player has a hard time saying this mon won't be broken with Terra.
Anyway, let's say it's the only one and all the other Home mons are magically fine with Terra (lol)
If we ban Regieleki, that's one less spinner, one less revenge killer, one less special wall-breaker, one less Electric special mon
Less options- a piece off the board- less fun.

If you're pro-Tera, and then your favorite mon gets banned post-Home, how are you going to feel?
When one day you go to your builder and X is gone due to being broken with some Terra set, are you still gonna have "fun"?
How are you going to feel when 7 out of your top 10 mons are gone due to being pushed out by Terra?
Is that worth it to you, as a player, playing Pokemon, to have less Pokemon? To not get to use your favorite Pokemon?

Not much to say in regards to these reasons but the cut of mons is where Tera can shine creatively. Cut mons will happen regardless. Less or more can only be told through time.

 

[Rootb]

Not much to say in regards to these reasons but the cut of mons is where Tera can shine creatively. Cut mons will happen regardless. Less or more can only be told through time.

Along those lines, both power and efficiency creep are a much stronger pressure on the tier than Tera could ever hope to be. Gen 9 isn't where it started, but with 22 of Paldea's 65-ish final evolutions having 570+ BST? It certainly hasn't slowed down in the slightest. Even that's underselling Paldea, though - the quality of mons is insanely high here, and it would have been completely justifiable to ban another 3+ new mons (Chi-Yu, Cyclizar, maybe one of Annihilape/Gholdengo/Chien-Pao/etc) before even opening a Tera suspect at all!

Even then, that's not getting into the three viable starters, or the defensive menaces of Garganacl and Dondozo, or the 4 mons we've already had to ban. It's a good time to be a new Pokémon, and an even better time to be a new Pokémon enjoyer!

Still, I sympathize with the idea that Tera does need some kind of restriction, and strongly favor revealing tera types for that reason. But, Tera ban or not? I think there's still a lot more work to be done.

 

[LoseToRU?]

Not much to say in regards to these reasons but the cut of mons is where Tera can shine creatively. Cut mons will happen regardless. Less or more can only be told through time.

After the posts by Srn, Vrin, and others, I don't understand how anyone can logically be pro-Terra.
But I see that maybe logic isn't the way to go.
So I tried to really simplify it, but then I see responses like this...

First sentence makes almost no sense; I'll disregard.

Cut mons will happen regardless. Less or more can only be told through time.

Yes... cut mons will happen.. but the entire point was Terra will force us to cut so many more mons.
It's not "can only be told through time" it's literally happening right now, mons like Espa are proof that Terra can push a mon into OP territory.
Not only is it happening now, it just takes a drop of game knowledge to foresee how this will happen with many other mons.

I think there's still a lot more work to be done.

Why do people keep saying this? We've had plenty of time to analyze the situation.

No one has refuted and even had a semi-logical rebuttal to Srn's post. Literally.
All I see, as he outlined, are subjective ramblings.

I'm not sure why the burden of proof that Terra is broken falls on those who want it banned, but regardless, it's been posted.
I haven't seen a legitimate argument illustrating how Terra makes a meta more healthy and competitive.
I've seen "fun" and "Give it a chance" and of course the aforementioned subjective reasonings
No one has truly documented how Terra adds more to the meta than it takes away.

Anyone who wishes to post is free to continue regurgitating the above reasonings and opinions, of course.
But to the next pro-Terra poster, I kindly ask you to actually address the points made by Srn, specifically.

Thank you in advance.

 

[Shaymin Sky]

Very rarely do I play out turns where I am paranoid about a potential tera that I am already not aware of, like I am not playing being afraid of "what if the chien pao turns ghost on my cc" those situations literally don't happen lol and this argument can be made for anything. You can say "well what if hes x ev spread or x moveset" that is never ran in the first place unless your trolling. Just feels like the ban camp is grasping at straws at that point talking about situations that both parties know is not going to happen lol, unless your Finchinator and theres a bug type roaring moon then ok sure u can complain.

There was 1 game during my entire reqs run where it was a genuine random tera + random set and due to good positioning prior i still won, its rlly not as guessy as u think and most tera's are defensive so its not like u can get a clean sweep off a surprise tera in the first place in most circumstances.

 

[alephgalactus]

Very rarely do I play out turns where I am paranoid about a potential tera that I am already not aware of, like I am not playing being afraid of "what if the chien pao turns ghost on my cc" those situations literally don't happen lol and this argument can be made for anything. You can say "well what if hes x ev spread or x moveset" that is never ran in the first place unless your trolling. Just feels like the ban camp is grasping at straws at that point talking about situations that both parties know is not going to happen lol, unless your Finchinator and theres a bug type roaring moon then ok sure u can complain.

Bruh. Ghost Pao is actually a set I’ve run and won matches with. Your example of something that “literally never happens” is actually a solid anti-meta pick, and it’s one of literal thousands that can, and will, be run as surprise sets. If the pro-ban camp is grasping at straws, the anti-ban camp ran out of straws weeks ago and has been grasping at thin air.

 

[Unhinged Manchild]

Skimming through, I concur with no ban, but wouldn't mind reveal team tera types. I see tera as less a variable/"random" than items currently are.

I strongly believe I've lost more games this gen to key reveals of enemy mon's items/moves over the use of just the one tera per game (and hell, maybe even lost more games to jank crit over tera.) Scarf/band tusk, AV/shuca kingambit (late in one game, these ones gave me PTSD, no lie I still have nightmares to this day,) scarf/specs/trick/leftovers/sub gold man bad, scarf/specs/NP/sub doomfish, list goes on.

I've beaten the normal espeed dnites, flying moons, ghost pults, and sometimes even fire doomfish, but once I was horrifically defeated by fairy skeledirge, and it did legitimately feel like a 50/50. I could have killed him, I knew the potential to tera fairy, but my choices in moves were dragon or normal, literally dependent on his tera. However, that was only one instance in.... 60+ games? Yeah, that loss totally sucked, because I won that game had I predicted right. But isn't that Pokemon in a nutshell? The "50/50" doesn't happen nearly enough to make me uncomfortable with tera, especially given how 6 times in each game I have to wonder what ITEM the enemy is holding.

 

[Levant Mir Celestia]

Not much to say in regards to these reasons but the cut of mons is where Tera can shine creatively. Cut mons will happen regardless. Less or more can only be told through time.

The problem is, we'd have to ban a lot of mons to keep tera... at which point it'd prolly become blatantly obvious tera itself is the real problem, and action would likely be taken against it.

Very rarely do I play out turns where I am paranoid about a potential tera that I am already not aware of, like I am not playing being afraid of "what if the chien pao turns ghost on my cc" those situations literally don't happen lol and this argument can be made for anything. You can say "well what if hes x ev spread or x moveset" that is never ran in the first place unless your trolling. Just feels like the ban camp is grasping at straws at that point talking about situations that both parties know is not going to happen lol, unless your Finchinator and theres a bug type roaring moon then ok sure u can complain.

There was 1 game during my entire reqs run where it was a genuine random tera + random set and due to good positioning prior i still won, its rlly not as guessy as u think and most tera's are defensive so its not like u can get a clean sweep off a surprise tera in the first place in most circumstances.

Bruh. If the pro-ban side is "grasping at straws", that says nothing good about the anti-ban side's arguments, far as I'm concerned, as I've found the pro-ban side's arguments far more convincing. FYI, Ghost Chien-Pao is viable, considering that it turns its greatest weakness into an immunity.

 

[GoodGuy13]

I personally believe tera shouldn't be banned. I don't know if that's a popular or unpopular opinion. But that doesn't matters anyways. The reason I think it shouldn't banned is: I don't think the mechanic is broken. Sure, can you lose a game because your opponent tera a mon you can't break through due to the new type. Or you get swept randomly. Sure. But does that mean it's a game breaking mechanic? Not necessarily. I'm going to compare tera to dynamax. When you to compare the two mechanics. It's literally a night and day difference. Terra only changes the typing of one mon. While dyna basically gives you Z moves while improving your hp. For the most part. You kinda know which mons are likely to terra. Ofc you can run to certain mons that you won't expect to terra. But that's with most concept's within pokemon. You never for sure what your going to expect. Certain mons are literally pointless to terra. It's not like you have to worry about all six mons terra. At best 2-3 mons are likely to terra. And even so. That doesn't mean you still can't win the game. With dynamax, you basically won the game if you got momentum off with most mons. But I've seen games where terra didn't help much. I think pro-ban players ideal meta would be battles where you pretty much knew what every mon was going to do. With little no randomness at all.

 

[Goodbye & Thanks]

I get that this isn't adding too much of value but I find it interesting that some of the best and most accomplished tournament players ever like lax, ima, bruno, aim, cbb, and blunder are all pro-tera. Obviously there are tons of other extremely accomplished tournament players like ABR and SoulWind (possibly the two most accomplished players ever) who think that tera needs to be banned, but I feel like sometimes the pro-tera contingent is portrayed as more casual players that aren't as invested in the competitive health of the game, and that doesn't seem to me to be a fair unilateral depiction. Either way, I hope that everyone can remain civil and respectful regardless of the outcome concerning tera; there are a lot of excellent players and perspectives being shared on both sides, and that's a great thing!

 

[Beaf Cultist]

I’ve also obviously lost to random Teras on the ladder, as I’m sure many of you have. Shoutout to that one guy who showed me how good Tera fighting Esprathra is. 6-0’d me because I relied on Kingambit to shut down Fairy Esprathra. The thing is, I don’t look back on an Espratha 6-0 and slam my desk in anger and type to my buddies “holy fucking shit what a stupid mechanic and stupid pokemon”. I learn from it and then I steal it lmao. It’s more like “yo check this out lol seems god”.

I really think looking at this from a tournament perspective is the way to go if you want to understand why so many people are anti-tera, and why they complain about this aspect in particular. Okay, sure, losing one game on the ladder isn’t a big deal, but in tournament? One game can be a HUGE deal, and losing randomly to a player who was otherwise playing worse than you because they brought a less viable Tera option that you couldn’t have reasonably prepped for, sucks ass. You can compare it to niche coverage or weird sets, but those still need some semblance of good piloting to achieve their full potential, whereas something like Espathra just clicks the Tera button on a mon that would threaten it out but can’t hit it once it Teras, and wins immediately. Truly an awful dynamic. Plus, if continuing along the niche coverage path, it’s not like every mon gets access to every move, like they do with every Tera type. Tera’s unpredictability is a SERIOUS problem in a tournament setting, and it really can’t be brushed past like y’all seem to want.

Not to mention, this has been playing out already on ladder. I’ve seen lots of mention that getting reqs for this suspect has been an incredibly tedious experience, and I can only imagine the impact Tera has had on that. Haven’t gone for reqs myself, so I’d love if someone who has could back me up on this.

 

[ayevon]

whereas something like Espathra just clicks the Tera button on a mon that would threaten it out but can’t hit it once it Teras, and wins immediately.

This says much more about Espathra than it does Tera

 

[Srn]

This says much more about Espathra than it does Tera

If the implication here is that espathra is strong to begin with and tera just makes it a bit better, I disagree. Espathra is MID without tera and a top tier threat with it. The key here is that tera allows it to break dark types, letting it flex the obscene stored power+speed boost combo. Without tera, this is how it is faring vs common dark types using the current max defense set:

+2 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 133-157 (39 - 46%)
+2 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Chi-Yu: 99-117 (39.4 - 46.6%)
+2 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam affected by Vessel of Ruin vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ting-Lu: 146-172 (28.4 - 33.4%)
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Chien-Pao: 248-292 (82.3 - 97%)
+1 0 SpA Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Meowscarada: 234-276 (79.8 - 94.1%)

Let's be generous and say espathra goes offensive to salvage its dazzling gleam if tera is banned:

+1 252+ SpA Life Orb Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 116 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 179-212 (48.3 - 57.2%)
+1 252+ SpA Life Orb Espathra Dazzling Gleam affected by Vessel of Ruin vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Ting-Lu: 198-234 (38.5 - 45.5%) (and eq now 2hkos)
+1 252+ SpA Life Orb Espathra Dazzling Gleam vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Chi-Yu: 134-159 (53.3 - 63.3%)
It kills chien pao and meowscarada cleanly, but must be wary of sucker punch.

Needless to say, this is a very limp performance at breaking through dark types. It becomes much more matchup dependent without tera, and thus it's a great example of a mon that is top tier only because of tera. Stored power mons that can't break through dark types on their own tend to be pretty mid, look no further than demon mew last gen.