Other Tiers Gen 1 and Gen 2: how Sleep Clause works in the Pokémon Stadium games.

Note: This is the same thread that I created 16 days ago; however, I updated it to include info about Gen 2, also, if you don’t want to read the full article, you can simply check the short version below:

This is how Sleep Clause works in Pokémon Stadium 1 and Pokémon Stadium 2:

1. After you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, your sleep inducing moves will always fail until the asleep pokémon wakes up.

2. If none of your pokémon have been put to sleep by your opponent, you can make one of your damaged pokémon to use Rest to activate Sleep Clause.

3. You can use Rest to put to sleep more than one of your own pokémon.

4. Rest still works after one of your pokémon was put to sleep by the opponent.

5. If you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, then your opponent uses Rest successfully on a second pokémon and then the first pokémon wakes up, Sleep Clause activates and protects that and the other opposing pokémon from being put to sleep by your moves.

In Pokémon Stadium 2 the following rule is added:

6. If you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, damage it and then it uses Rest via Sleep Talk, Sleep Clause continues to be active.

The Stadium 1 simulator in Showdown is flawed and doesn’t apply the second rule correctly: your opponent can still put one of your pokémon to sleep even if another of your pokémon used Rest successfully before. The fifth rule is also not applied in the Stadium 1 simulator of Showdown.


And now, here is the full version of the article:

How Sleep Clause works in Pokémon Stadium 1

Back in 2004 I beat Pokémon Stadium 1 and, despite the fact that I played that game a lot, I never saw Sleep Clause being enforced. The rules said that it was illegal to put two pokémon to sleep; however, I never attempted to break the rules to see what happened if I cheated. Today I conducted some experiments to test how Sleep Clause worked on the first Pokémon Stadium and discovered some interesting things.

Experiment 1

For my experiment I used a Parasect with Spore to take misses out of the equation, then I performed the following actions:

Turn 1: Parasect used Spore and put his opponent to sleep.

Turn 2: My opponent swapped the asleep pokémon for one that was awake.

Turn 3: Parasect used Spore again; however, the opposing pokémon wasn’t put to sleep and the game displayed the mesage “but move failed” (the announcer even pointed it). Please take into account that in Pokémon Stadium 1 Spore has an accuracy of 100 % unlike the cartridge games where it has one of 99.61 % (you know, the infamous 1/256 miss chance).

Conclusion: Sleep Clause works in the same way as it does in the Showdown simulator.


Experiment 2

After my first experiment, I wondered if Rest would also ruin sleep inducing moves, so I conducted a new experiment, this is what happened:

Turn 1: Parasect harmed his opponent.

Turn 2: The opposing pokémon used Rest and recovered health.

Turn 3: The opposing pokémon was swapped by another that was awake.

Turn 4: Parasect used Spore; however, the move failed!

Conclusion: If none of your pokémon have been put to sleep by your opponent, using Rest successfully protects your other pokémon from being put to sleep by him.


The previous results surprised me because in Showdown Rest doesn’t prevent your other pokémon from being put to sleep by your opponent, not even if you play on the Stadium 1 simulator (great, now we also have to add that to the list of things that need to be fixed on the Stadium simulator).

Experiment 3

After the second experiment I wondered if you could only use Rest on one of your pokémon. Here is what happened on the third experiment:

Turn 1: I hurt my opponent’s first pokémon.

Turn 2: My opponent’s first pokémon used Rest and recovered health.

Turn 3: My opponent swapped his first pokémon for a second one that was awake.

Turn 4: I hurt my opponent’s second pokémon.

Turn 5: My opponent’s second pokémon used Rest and it succeeded, it recovered energy and began to sleep.

Conclusion: You or your opponent can put to sleep more than one pokémon via Rest.


Experiment 4

Finally I tested if a move like Spore could ruin Rest, this is what happened:

Turn 1: My Parasect used Spore and put my opponent’s first pokémon to sleep.

Turn 2: My opponent swapped his first pokémon for a second one that was awake.

Turn 3: Parasect hurt my opponent’s second pokémon.

Turn 4: My opponent’s second pokémon used Rest and it worked, it recovered its health and began to sleep.

Conclusion: Rest still works after one of your pokémon was put to sleep by the opponent.


Experiment 5

This experiment was suggested by my chum Earthworm:

Turn 1: Parasect used Spore against my opponent's first pokémon.

Turn 2: My opponent swapped his first pokémon for a second one that was awake.

Turn 3: Parasect harmed the second pokémon.

Turn 4: The second pokémon used Rest: it began to sleep and recovered health.

Turn 5: My opponent brought back his first Pokémon.

Turn 6: Parasect hurt the first pokémon.

Turn 7: The first pokémon woke up.

Turn 8: Parasect used Spore again, but Sleep Clause activated and the move failed.

Conclusion: If you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, then your opponent uses Rest successfully on a second pokémon and then the first pokémon wakes up, Sleep Clause activates and protects that and the other opposing pokémon from being put to sleep by your moves.


Earthworm and I expected this result, still, it was good that I could test it, also, I took the opportunity to play the Stadium minigames, so much fun! :D


Testing Sleep Clause in Pokémon Stadium 2

After finishing with the tests, I turned my attention to the second Pokémon Stadium game. For those who don’t know, Pokémon Stadium 2 is one of the main games of Gen 2 (or at least it was considered a main game back in the early 2000s, now some players consider it a spinoff). Like its predecessor, Stadium 2 was an arena game where the player could compete in different tournaments, rematch the gym leaders and play mini-games among other things. Since Sleep Clause is also enforced in that game, I decided to test it, for it, I simply repeated the same experiments I did on Pokémon Stadium 1.

To make the tests easier, I didn’t use items, also, I used a Paras and a Parasect with Spore to take misses out of the equation.

After repeating the tests I got the same results that I got in Pokémon Stadium 1, so I concluded that Sleep Clause had the same mechanics in Pokémon Stadium 2.

Experiment 6

After I repeated the Stadium 1 experiments I remembered that Gen 2 had some Sleep mechanics that were exclusive to it, namely, Sleep Talk, so I conducted a sixth experiment:

Turn 1: Paras used Spore against my opponent’s first pokémon.

Turn 2: Paras hurt the first pokémon.

Turn 3: The opponent’s first pokémon used Sleep Talk and got Rest, it recovered its energy.

Turn 4: My opponent switched out his first pokémon.

Turn 5: Paras used Spore against my opponent’s second pokémon, but it failed!

Conclusion: If you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, damage it and then it uses Rest via Sleep Talk, Sleep Clause continues to be active.


The lasts results contrasted with the Sleep Clause mechanics we had in Showdown for Gen 2, there, if you put an opposing to sleep, damaged it and then it used Rest via Sleep Talk, Sleep Clause deactivated and you could put another of your opponent's pokémon to sleep.


Should we change the way in which Sleep Clause works in Gen 1?

In the Pokémon Stadium 1 simulator of Showdown the answer is yes because the simulator has to work in the same way as the original game.

Regarding the Colosseum 1 simulator, aka the cartridge simulator, the question gets more complicated. As Enigami said, Pokémon Stadium 1 was the first game that implemented Sleep Clause, which was used again in Pokémon Stadium 2 (where it had the same mechanics). Sleep Clause also appeared in the other arena games: Pokémon Colosseum, Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness and Pokémon Battle Revolution (the clause was optional in those games, though, also, I don’t know how it worked there). Pokémon Showdown was launched in 2011, twelve years after the release of Pokémon Stadium 1, but, for unknown reasons it didn’t implement the clause as it worked in the game. Despite the differences, we can assume that the Showdown programmers used the Pokémon Stadium 1 Sleep Clause as a reference of how it should work in Gen 1.

Now, before we move on, we have to ask if Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be enforced in the real Gen 1 cartridge games. The answer is yes and to prove it I’ll use the following example:

When I play Gen 1 matches with my friends with real cartridges, we enforce Showdown’s Sleep Clause manually. If one of us puts two opposing pokémon to sleep via moves like Lovely Kiss or Hypnosis, then the violator loses the game and either player can click the Run option. Like in Showdown, we don’t take into account the pokémon that used Rest successfully to activate the clause.

Note: We also enforce the clause when a player only has one pokémon left and said pokémon only has PPs on its Sleep Inducing moves.


Since Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be enforced in the real Gen 1 cartridge games, we can use that as an argument to keep it intact.

I don’t like to be biased, so, before I finish this post I want to give the benefit of the doubt to the players that disagree with my last argument. Some players could say that the fact that Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be applied to the real cartridge games is not enough reason to not change it and make it work like it does on Stadium 1, so let’s be objective and ask ourselves: why should we keep Showdown’s Sleep Clause intact? To answer that we have to imagine how the cartridge games would be if we changed the clause. In most matches, Sleep inducing moves like Lovely Kiss are used at the beginning of the battle or in the early game, where all pokémon have full health and don’t have the option to activate Sleep Clause via Rest. The difference would be in the mid or late game where the remaining pokémon are hurt and can use Rest, some examples would be Snorlax in OU and Hypno in UU. After one of your pokémon uses Rest successfully you can switch it out, bring the other pokémon that your opponent put to sleep and try to wake it up, if you do, Sleep Clause would activate and your opponent would no longer be able to connect Sleep inducing moves.

In the last scenario, the worst that could happen is that the clause could give an unfair advantage to your Rest user, especially if your opponent’s Sleep inducing mon is paralized, because you could set up safely with moves like Reflect or Amnesia or force your opponent’s Sleep user to get chip damage on the switches, all this while your other pokémon are safe of being put to sleep by moves like Lovely Kiss. In short, changing Showdown’s Sleep Clause could make Rest users like Snorlax even harder to stop which could make the games even more stally.

Of course, I could be exaggerating, also I am open minded and if the Showdown community agrees to change Showdown’s Sleep Clause I’ll accept it.


Should we change the way in which Sleep Clause works in Gen 2?

If we added a Pokémon Stadium 2 simulator in Showdown, then, yes, Sleep Clause should work different there (it should have the same mechanics as the real game).

Regarding normal Gen 2, the answer would be no (at least in my opinion).


Before we begin, we have to give both clauses different names so we can distingish them with more ease, we’ll use the term Gen 2 Clause to refer to Pokémon Showdown’s Sleep Clause for Gen 2; on the other hand, we’ll use the term Stadium 2 Clause to refer to the Sleep Clause that is used in Pokémon Stadium 2.

As you know, in Pokémon Showdown we only have a simulator for the Gen 2 cartridge games: Pokémon Gold, Pokémon Silver and Pokémon Crystal; on the other hand, despite the fact that it belongs to the same gen, Pokémon Stadium 2 is considered a different game because it has slightly different mechanics compared to the cartridge games. In practical terms we could use the aforementioned facts as arguments to justify the resolution of keeping Showdown’s Sleep Clause intact; but what about the players that think that the Gen 2 Clause should have the same mechanics as the Stadium 2 Clause? After all, Pokémon Stadium 2 was the first game that implemented Sleep Clause in Gen 2, also, it is obvious that Showdown programmers took inspiration on the Stadium games to implement the clause. Since I’m a fan of unbiased procedures, I’ll give the benefit of the doubt to the other part.

Like it was the case with the first gen, to solve this problem we have to ask ourselves how the matches would change if we changed the Gen 2 Clause to work exactly as it does the Stadium 2 Clause. If we changed the Gen 2 clause, the following things would happen:

1. Using Rest to recover energy would activate Sleep Clause.

2. Using Rest via Sleep Talk to recover energy wouldn’t deactivate Sleep Talk.

In my opinion, the games would be more stally if we added those changes. Gen 2 is already considered a slow game for many reasons and two of them are Rest and Sleep Talk, which are viable moves regardless if the players enforce Item Clause or not. Sleep Inducing moves are average in Gen 2, even in the early game, because if you use a lead pokémon like Jynx or Nidoking, your opponent can simply switch to a Rest Talk user to reduce their threat; if we changed the Gen 2 Clause, things would get worse, not only because pokémon like Raikou, Snorlax or Zapdos would be even more powerful, but also because their teammates would increase their efficiency dramatically without worrying to be put to sleep. Sleep Inducing moves also have other counters in the forms of Heal Bell and Substitute; finally, Item Clause also has Mint Berry and Miracle Berry.

Moves like Lovely Kiss, Hypnosis and Spore are useful because they make matches faster and reduce the impact of the Rest Talk users, so if we changed the Gen 2 Clause to work like the Stadium 2 Clause, we would end up worsening the game.

As usual, I have to remind everyone that this is just my opinion and that if the Gen 2 community decided to change how the Sleep Clause works in Gen 2, I’d have to abide to the changes.


Conclusions

The results of the experiments were interesting because they allowed me to confirm that Sleep Clause was really enforced in the real games and because they allowed me to spot yet another flaw of the Pokémon Stadium 1 simulator in Showdown.

Note: I used the American version of Pokémon Stadium 1 for the tests.


Sleep.png
 
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Interesting find. Can you test how waking up works? e.g. If the Pokemon that the opponent put to sleep wakes up and another Pokemon is still asleep due to using Rest, can they put another Pokemon to sleep? I am guessing no but it is worth testing.

My attempt at summarising if I understood correctly:
1. If any of the Pokemon on your team are asleep, any attempts by the opposing Pokemon to put another Pokemon to sleep will fail. That is to say, successful use of Rest can prevent your opponent from putting any of your Pokemon to sleep.
2. You can use Rest to put further Pokemon to sleep regardless of how many Pokemon are already asleep.
 
Earthworm
My attempt at summarising if I understood correctly:
1. If any of the Pokemon on your team are asleep, any attempts by the opposing Pokemon to put another Pokemon to sleep will fail. That is to say, successful use of Rest can prevent your opponent from putting any of your Pokemon to sleep.
2. You can use Rest to put further Pokemon to sleep regardless of how many Pokemon are already asleep.
You understood well, that's how Sleep Clause works in Stadium 1. By the way, I hope we can play Item Clause soon chum.
 
That is a very interesting and important find, especially since this is Gen 1's Sleep Clause mechanics and thus has a pretty strong argument for being how RBY OU's Sleep Clause should be. This would have an impact on RBY's status metagame and thus it'll be ignored like Counter desync because change is anathemic to RBY players, Rest's sleep activating Sleep Clause and thus blocking sleep moves would increase the importance of early game sleep since mid-to-late game, viable Rest users like Snorlax, Cloyster, Jynx, Jolteon etc. could end up shutting down sleep doing what they already want to do.
 
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Question:

What if you use spore on an opposing pokemon, activating sleep clause, your opponent then uses rest on a pokemon and switches it out. If the spore'd pokemon wakes before the resting pokemon, does the resting pokemon then activate sleep clause, even though it wasn't the initial mon to activate it?
 
That is a very interesting and important find, especially since this is Gen 1's Sleep Clause mechanics and thus has a pretty strong argument for being how RBY OU's Sleep Clause should be.
Pokémon Stadium 1 and Colosseum 1, aka cartridge matches, are two different formats of Gen 1. When I play matches with my friends on real cartridges, we use the Showdown mechanics of Sleep Clause, this means that we don't count the pokémon that used Rest successfully to activate the clause. We can take the previous example to justify the decision to not change how Sleep Clause works in Gen 1 OU matches (however, we should change how the clause works in Stadium matches).

Of course, I am open minded and if the community agrees to take your approach of changing Sleep Clause for Gen 1 OU matches, I'll accept it gladly.

Note: When I play with real cartridges, my friends and I have to enforce the rules manually, e.g. if you put a second opposing pokémon to Sleep, you have to forfeit the game, it doesn't matter if you only had one pokémon left and it didn't have PPs for other moves.
 
@CrapAtRBY @Earthworm

Here is the answer to your questions:

This experiment was suggested by my chum Earthworm:

Experiment 5

Turn 1:
Parasect used Spore against my opponent's first pokémon.

Turn 2: My opponent swapped his first pokémon for a second one that was awake.

Turn 3: Parasect harmed the second pokémon.

Turn 4: The second pokémon used Rest: it began to sleep and recovered health.

Turn 5: My opponent brought back his first Pokémon.

Turn 6: Parasect hurt the first pokémon.

Turn 7: The first pokémon woke up.

Turn 8: Parasect used Spore again, but Sleep Clause activated and the move failed.

Verdict: If you put an opposing pokémon to sleep, then your opponent uses Rest successfully on a second pokémon and then the first pokémon wakes up, Sleep Clause activates and protects that and the other opposing pokémon from being put to sleep by your moves.

Earthworm and I expected this result, still, it was good that I could test it, also, I took the opportunity to play the Stadium minigames, so much fun! :D


Note: I already included this info in the main post of the thread.
 
Stadium and Cartridge have two different mechanics.
I am in favour of using Stadium as the standard if only because it means no more desync problems (Counter, Fire/Ice, Psywave, Mirror Move), and other glitches and allows Fly and Dig as possible options once we would start tier 3 and lower. Focus Energy becomes fixed and would allow for some unique combos!

There are also a few changes in the game itself. Now you see the team in advance. CH is slightly different. Sleep is 1-3 turns instead of 1-7. But it fixes so much and it plays more into the spirit of the game IMO.
 
In the Pokémon Stadium 1 simulator of Showdown the answer is yes because the simulator has to work in the same way as the original game.

Regarding the Colosseum 1 simulator, aka the cartridge simulator, the question gets more complicated. As Enigami said, Pokémon Stadium 1 was the first game that implemented Sleep Clause, which was used again in Pokémon Stadium 2 (where it had the same mechanics). Sleep Clause also appeared in the other arena games: Pokémon Colosseum, Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness and Pokémon Battle Revolution (the clause was optional in those games, though, also, I don’t know how it worked there). Pokémon Showdown was launched in 2011, twelve years after the release of Pokémon Stadium 1, but, for unknown reasons it didn’t implement the clause as it worked in the game. Despite the differences, we can assume that the Showdown programmers used the Pokémon Stadium 1 Sleep Clause as a reference of how it should work in Gen 1.

Now, before we move on, we have to ask if Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be enforced in the real Gen 1 cartridge games. The answer is yes and to prove it I’ll use the following example:

When I play Gen 1 matches with my friends with real cartridges, we enforce Showdown’s Sleep Clause manually. If one of us puts two opposing pokémon to sleep via moves like Lovely Kiss or Hypnosis, then the violator loses the game and either player can click the Run option. Like in Showdown, we don’t take into account the pokémon that used Rest successfully to activate the clause.

Note: We also enforce the clause when a player only has one pokémon left and said pokémon only has PPs on its Sleep Inducing moves.


Since Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be enforced in the real Gen 1 cartridge games, we can use that as an argument to keep it intact.

I don’t like to be biased, so, before I finish this post I want to give the benefit of the doubt to the players that disagree with my last argument. Some players could say that the fact that Showdown’s Sleep Clause can be applied to the real cartridge games is not enough reason to not change it and make it work like it does on Stadium 1, so let’s be objective and ask ourselves: why should we keep Showdown’s Sleep Clause intact? To answer that we have to imagine how the cartridge games would be if we changed the clause. In most matches, Sleep inducing moves like Lovely Kiss are used at the beginning of the battle or in the early game, where all pokémon have full health and don’t have the option to activate Sleep Clause via Rest. The difference would be in the mid or late game where the remaining pokémon are hurt and can use Rest, some examples would be Snorlax in OU and Hypno in UU. After one of your pokémon uses Rest successfully you can switch it out, bring the other pokémon that your opponent put to sleep and try to wake it up, if you do, Sleep Clause would activate and your opponent would no longer be able to connect Sleep inducing moves.

In the last scenario, the worse that could happen is that the clause could give an unfair advantage to your Rest user, especially if your opponent’s Sleep inducing mon is paralized, because you could set up safely with moves like Reflect or Amnesia or force your opponent’s Sleep user to get chip damage on the switches, all this while your other pokémon are safe of being put to sleep by moves like Lovely Kiss. In short, changing Showdown’s Sleep Clause could make Rest users like Snorlax even harder to stop which could make the games even more stally.

Of course, I could be exaggerating, also I am open minded and if the Showdown community agrees to change Showdown’s Sleep Clause I’ll accept it.
I fully agree that Showdown's implementation of sleep clause should be adjusted to reflect how it functions in Stadium (for Stadium at least). However, stating that Showdown's sleep clause is enforceable on cartridge is objectively false, and therefore sleep clause needs to be changed there as well, not kept intact. The reason is that in the example you describe the player violating sleep clause is disqualified, whereas on Showdown, the move fails and gameplay continues, which is not replicable on cartridge.

In order to replicate cart mechanics, the sleeper would have to either be disqualified if they violate it, or be prevented from selecting sleep moves unless they have no other option
 
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@Ortheore

Thank's for replying to the thread chum. Yes, you're right, Smogon's Sleep Clause can only be reproduced to a certain extent in the real Gen 1 cartridges. As I mentioned in my example, when someone brakes Sleep Clause in the real games he loses instantly; however, that doesn't happen in Showdown (there, the Sleep inducing move fails).

In my opinion, the aforementioned difference is not enough reason to change how Sleep Clause works in Smogon's Gen 1 Cartridge games (in any case, we would change what would happen to the players that violate the clause). I think it would be better to assess how the game would change if we changed Sleep Clause to decide whether or not we have to change it.

In my opinion, changing the clause would make Snorlax more broken in the mid or late game. Snorlax and Chansey are the culprits for turning Gen 1 into a stallfest, so it would be a very bad idea to implement a change that would make one of them even more powerful. On the other hand, I do agree that Sleep Clause should be fixed on Smogon's Pokémon Stadium 1 simulator to reflect how the real game is.
 
@Ortheore

Thank's for replying to the thread chum. Yes, you're right, Smogon's Sleep Clause can only be reproduced to a certain extent in the real Gen 1 cartridges. As I mentioned in my example, when someone brakes Sleep Clause in the real games he loses instantly; however, that doesn't happen in Showdown (there, the Sleep inducing move fails).

In my opinion, the aforementioned difference is not enough reason to change how Sleep Clause works in Smogon's Gen 1 Cartridge games (in any case, we would change what would happen to the players that violate the clause). I think it would be better to assess how the game would change if we changed Sleep Clause to decide whether or not we have to change it.

In my opinion, changing the clause would make Snorlax more broken in the mid or late game. Snorlax and Chansey are the culprits for turning Gen 1 into a stallfest, so it would be a very bad idea to implement a change that would make one of them even more powerful. On the other hand, I do agree that Sleep Clause should be fixed on Smogon's Pokémon Stadium 1 simulator to reflect how the real game is.
Wait is this referring to changing PS sleep clause for cart formats to mirror Stadium? Because if so, I agree that we shouldn't do that- it still wouldn't be cart-accurate, and it would significantly impact the metagame, likely for the worse as you say, so it would do nothing good

For cart formats where sleep clause doesn't exist, I am (mostly) fine with the current conditions for triggering sleep clause, my main complaint is with the consequences of violating sleep clause- it should be treated as equivalent to a DQ, and players should therefore be prevented from violating this. The only change I would make to the conditions for activating sleep clause for cart formats is to allow an exemption if the sleep user has literally no other option but to select a sleep move
 
@Ortheore

Yes, we were wondering if we should change Sleep Clause in Cartridge matches in Showdown to mirror how it works in Pokémon Stadium 1. By the way, I misunderstood your first comment, I also agree that we should change Sleep Clause to DQ players that violate it in Showdown.
 

Plague von Karma

Banned deucer.
I've raised the issue in this thread with footage comparisons between Showdown and Stadium. As expected, Rest activates Sleep Clause, thus making Parasect's Spore miss/fail. Enigami has also got this fixed on Pokemon Perfect and is looking to put it on PS Main, so this issue should finally be on the mend.

If you need any other interactions replicated don't be afraid to ask me. I can likely get the interactions replicated within a day.

EDIT: This was implemented and has been LIVE on PS for around a week. Thanks to Enigami for following my issues raised and getting stuff rolling.
 
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