Revamp Progress Announcement #1

JJayyFeather

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Posted on the behalf of the Mod Team

It's been a chaotic past few weeks, as Dogfish44 stepped down and inducted myself, TMan87 and Toon as new moderators of the forum alongside ZhengTann, and we've been busy. Today we're here to give you a very in-depth look at what we've been working on.

Name Change
First big thing, our name will likely be changing to both re-purify our brand and to get it closer to what we are here. See the thread linked to the title for the discussion about that.

Data Organization
The Handbook and NDA are undergoing extensive pruning, trimming, and rewording in order to make all things as clear as we possibly can make them from there. A primary concern about ASB from the onset of our conversation from about a month ago was that there was too much information that was either written with excessive amounts of fluff that befuddled the reader or that some of the knowledge was purely folk tale rather than written information. We strive to remove both of those issues as well as to better organize information that we've seen on the way.

As a result:
+ The Handbook will be significantly shorter, will more clear descriptions of rules​
+ Both the NDA and Handbook will be closer unified in terminology​
+ Targeting rules are no longer going to include Positioning, as it is a dead mechanic that made some rules more unnecessarily difficult to interpret​
+ Moves, abilities, and items that constantly refer to groupings (such as Iron Fist, Soundproof, Electirizer, etc) now utilize the tagging system that is implemented in-game in the NDA, making it more clear what moves are affected without having to manually update several lists.​

The above is the bulk of what is changing there, but there are likely to be other adjustments, all in favor of making the content more accessible to all users.

Special thanks to Agender Nerd for being so helpful in this process.

Roleplays
As it stands, all currently existing roleplays will follow us through our transition, but with new leaders. Big thanks to:
+ Hall: nightblitz42
+ Pike: LouisCyphre
+ Anime-Style Simulator: PTPlatinum
+ Raid Zone: Hitmonleet
+ The Legend Run: JJayyFeather + Maxim

All of the above roleplays are undergoing updates to the newest content thanks to their new leaders. The details of each change will be released at a time subject to when their leaders deem it necessary.

As an additional note: Hitmonleet is in search of members of the community to assist him in running the Raid Zone, so if you're interested in that, do hit him up.

Economy
A part of the many gripes that were voiced was that the new player experience was too grind-heavy, and we agreed. We've changed some numbers in order to make the steps from new player to ready for the mid-game be less grind-based and more experience with the system linked. As such, these changes are coming to ASB in the future:
+ EC is getting fully scrapped; Pokemon are eligibile for evolution after one battle​
+ MC rewards are getting increased by 1 at each stage​
+ AC is getting fully scrapped; Hidden Abilities are available at the cost of 5 UC (20 CC)​
+ CC's reward table is getting reworked into a simple formula; ([total mons per side]/[active mons per side])+1​
+ All moves are having their purchase cost reduced to 1 MC. This includes Sketch's cost to copy a move a Pokemon you own has learned. Also includes Hidden Power's type change cost.​

Additionally, we're going to be adjusting the prices of all items to fit a new relative pricing model. The actual prices will not be open information until the release of the updates, but here is the table we're going to be basing it off of:
Mega Stones with bonus effects ==> 12 CC each
Mega Stones ==> 10CC each
Universal/Ubiquitous items ==> no changes
Mon-specific sigs ==> 8 CC
Consumables ==> really depends on the consumable, no more than 8CC for any of them
Z-Crystals ==> 4CC each
Berries ==> 2CC each


Gym League
As some of you may already know, the Gym League is going to get an expansion with these changes. A common statement that has been made, and we;ve seen it in practice, is that the Gym's are far too hard for any new or relatively new player to get into, especially with some of them being led by very established names. All but one, ZhengTann's Rock Gym. For the sole reason that it has both a Normal Mode and a Hard Mode. That is the inspiration for this change. The Gym League will now have all gym leaders run both a Normal Mode and a Hard Mode version of their gym, with the Normal Mode being aimed at relatively new players, while the Hard Mode being targeted at the highly experienced players or players who think they are ready for the challenge.

In line with the change above, the Gym League rewards are also changing:
1 badge: 1 of Pichu, Cleffa, Igglybuff, Togepi or Azurill
2 badges: 1 Hyper Potion
3 badges: 1 Mega Stone of the challenger’s choosing
4 badges: 1 Type:Null + 3 Memories
5 badges: 1 Phione
6 badges: 2 Heart Scales
7 badges: 4 of Heal, Quick, Repeat or Timer Balls
8 badges: 1 Greninja-BB
9 badges: 20 UC
10 badges: 1 Lycanroc-Du + Twilight Ray
11 badges: 1 of Moltres, Zapdos or Articuno
12 badges: Zeraora + 30 UC
13 badges: 1 of Entei, Raikou or Suicune
14 badges: 1 of Buzzwole, Kartana, Xurkitree, Nihilego or Pheromosa
15 badges: 1 Master Ball
16 badges: 1 Tapu
17 badges: 50 UC
18 badges: 1 of Shaymin + Gracidea or Manaphy
1 badge: 1 of Buzzwole, Kartana, Xurkitree, Nihilego or Pheromosa
2 badges: 2 Heart Scales
3 badges: 1 of Registeel, Regirock or Regice
4 badges: 1 Master Ball
5 badges: 1 Tapu
6 badges: 2 Sacred Ashes + 20 UC
7 badges: 1 of Buzzwole, Kartana, Xurkitree, Nihilego, Pheromosa, Blacephalon, Celesteela, Guzzlord, Stakataka or Naganadel
8 badges: 1 Tapu
9 badges: 1 of Celebi, Jirachi or Hoopa + Prison Bottle
10 badges: 1 Power Construct Zygarde
11 badges: 1 of Xerneas or Yveltal
12 badges: 1 of Buzzwole, Kartana, Xurkitree, Nihilego, Pheromosa, Blacephalon, Celesteela, Guzzlord, Stakataka or Naganadel
13 badges: 1 Victini + 30 UC
14 badges: 1 of Solgaleo or Lunala
15 badges: 1 of Groudon or Kyogre (without their respective orb)
16 badges: 1 of Dialga, Palkia or Giratina + their respective orb
17 badges: 1 Mew + 50 UC
18 badges: Necrozma + Dawn Wings + Dusk Mane + the respect of every active player

Badges for Hard Mode also count as Normal Mode badges for the sake of reward progression.

This comes with one more piece of news, a far sadder note honestly. As a result of the system being overhauled, all the badges earned in this current system will not count towards the new rewards. The badge counts will be retained for historical purposes, and the trainers may retain those rewards. But these new rewards will not be applied retroactively to them.

Battle Mechanics
If you haven't seen it yet, there's a mechanical test battle on the front page of the forum. The battle was being held to test a couple mechanics for increasing the pacing of the game and slightly adjusting the focus of what makes a Pokemon good here in ASB. The changes are proving successful and will be moving forward into the new rendition of ASB, alongside some other changes. The list of changes as of this post are below. They are likely to be the only changes, but there is always the possibility of more changes occurring as more concerns arise.
All Pokemon have 10 less Maximum HP (this means that Gardevoir has 90 HP, not 100, to start with)
The Rank Bonuses in the Damage Formula are now calculated as [2 × Rank] for all ranks (8 Atk -> +16, 4 Def -> -8, etc)
All rounding happens by move, rather than at the end of the round.

Encore: Now costs 15 EN, up from 10 EN.
Taunt: Duration down to 3 actions.
Torment: No longer prevents same-move combinations
Imprison: Now costs 10 EN, up from 8 EN.

Focus Band limits move damage to 25% of Maximum HP, rounded up. (up from 20%)
Focus Sash no longer stops applying benefits at 33% Health.


The Reset
Willing to bet anyone who has been involved in Discord discussions has been waiting on this part. And, quite frankly, we're glad we get to tell you all about this now. We apologize for keeping everything so hush-hush regarding the specifics of it, but here we are now to give you all the details.
Expected Date of Arrival: August 18th

All players retain a fourth of their CC and UC, rounded up
They may choose to retain up to 30 purchaseable Pokemon from their profile in full
They may choose to retain up to 15 items from their profile
Any non-purchaseable item that they earned is automatically retained, and does not count towards the 15 mentioned earlier. This also includes items such as the Master Ball and Sacred Ash

Additionally, in the future, players affected by this may opt to buy back their Pokemon at a cost based on the following formula.
6 * ([Current Stage]/[Maximum Stage]) + FLOOR([# of Moves]/15) in CC. Add 5 CC if you wish to have the Hidden Ability unlocked. Add 15 CC if it's a non-purchaseable Pokemon.

The above means that those Pokemon may be bought back in full as a part of a claim that's separate from your new profile. Think of it like buying a new Pokemon, but way better.


- All players will create a new profile.
- This profile contains 3 LCs of their choice that they get for free, along with all the CC and UC from their original profile.
- After all the starters on this new profile are FE with 40 moves, that player regains access to their original profile in full, to be imported and updated to go with the new profile.

These details were decided upon after careful evaluation of active profiles and how much we felt like was fair to ask you all to sacrifice in order to assist us. The reset is going to sting, we're very aware of this. But, we are fully confident that it is a step in the proper direction for ASB, simply because we do need the whole of our users to help us evaluate the changes, not just from the outside looking in, but also having been on the inside.

Closing
And now, we open this up to you all. The thread is intended to be a discussion thread, where you may feel free to pose any questions/concerns that you may have and we will do our best to address them, whether that be making changes or not is subject to the situation. Please keep the discussion civil and avoid repeating questions/concerns without adding more content to them if possible.

Thank you for reading all of this and we look forward to moving into the next stage of ASB with you all.

EDIT: Clarified things about the new Gym League and the reset
 
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Regarding MC awards, there's no longer an "at each stage" to be worried about since AC and EC are getting gutted. A flat payout might be more appropriate, especially for people who might not want to evolve certain mons. Whether we want to do that (and if we do what the flat rate should be) probably warrants discussion.

Also worth bringing up, Lucky Egg no longer has a function under these rules. Deleting it is probably the easiest and most probable course of action. But still should be discussed a little.

Also give me an Easy level bug/flying Gym. The reward is a choice of Caterpie, Wurmple, Burmy, or Scatterbug. It doesn't count towards Badge progression. Arena Rules are as Follows: Moth Dust applies to any Pokemon with the Lepidopterous shape and confers Sticky Hold. Default weather is Delta Stream.
 
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Everything there sounds quite good. However, won't Pokemon with x4 weaknesses be very, very unviable? They won't even have the time to attack because they will die in no time (especially with Focus Band being nerfed). Maybe we should make something about it in the formula.
 

Frosty

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Mixed feelings here but ok.

You are banking a lot on new players tho, and you gotta keep it in mind. Because not only you are making it attractive to new players, but also you punish the older players in a way.

This is not necessarily a bad choice, even though this will probably break this camel's back. It is probably a nice one. BUT if you dont manage to get new players fast, it might have the opposite effect and just speed up the fall.

So keep it in mind. You gotta figure out a way to advertise and get people here. Priority zero. It is way more important for this project than...well....everything else really. And I didnt see anything regarding that above, which worries me somewhat.
 

nightblitz42

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Piggybacking on Frosty's post: I've brought this idea up a couple times in Discord already but I really want ASB to have an official social media account on Twitter or Tumblr or something. I'd be willing to help. Post some strategies or news or whatnot once in a while... I don't think we can count on the Smogon community alone for the kind of playerbase growth we want.
 

JJayyFeather

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Going off of what nightblitz and Frosty said first:

Right. That's the other major piece that if I'm being completely honest, I hadn't gotten around to the plan for that due to kind of scattering my brain over the rest of the details. Only step I processed in my head, minorly at that, was the fact that Smogon does have its own advertising stuff for forum events. That being said, nightblitz definitely has the right idea in that we do need to establish and grow an audience. As far as media sources that I think would work well, my gut says Twitter, but that's a decision that warrants some discussion ahead of time. Especially in determining how we are going to use it to grow our audience. The other part of the plan here is that TMan does have an article coming, but thats a majorly soon(tm) type of thing, so we should take the matter into our own hands.
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Regarding MC awards, there's no longer an "at each stage" to be worried about since AC and EC are getting gutted. A flat payout might be more appropriate, especially for people who might not want to evolve certain mons. Whether we want to do that (and if we do what the flat rate should be) probably warrants discussion.

Also worth bringing up, Lucky Egg no longer has a function under these rules. Deleting it is probably the easiest and most probable course of action. But still should be discussed a little.
Fair point. I'll put my coin in the 5 MC per battle unless convinced otherwise.

Lucky Egg as an item I'd quite frankly rather just nuke. Not my decision alone though, especially if people have suggestions on how to repurpose the item.
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Everything there sounds quite good. However, won't Pokemon with x4 weaknesses be very, very unviable? They won't even have the time to attack because they will die in no time (especially with Focus Band being nerfed). Maybe we should make something about it in the formula.
This was initially on the list of changes proposed before the test match went up. We felt that it was a bit drastic of a change to the system, and also a little unnecessary. Granted, this was before the decision to nerf Focus Band was made. I'll float the idea that I have in my mind for it here and gather general opinion on it: SE/NVE - 1.5, Double SE/NVE - 2, Triple SE/NVE - 3.
 

nightblitz42

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I find the nerfs to Pokemon with x4 weaknesses disheartening because they already see relatively little play in ASB. If you want to buff them without changing mechanics, I would suggest buffing type-resistance berries. Make them reduce super-effective moves to x1 on activation or something.
 

Frosty

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I need to stress this further.

Everything else that is being done in this revamp is not only moot but harmful even, if you dont do something to solve the influx problem.

Messing with mechanics is easier because it is known territory. Advertising isnt. But dont be fooled. If this revamp isnt accompanied by massive not-done-before advertising strategies, then dont bother. You might as well halt everything else and go full force on this problem. We have done articles before, it doesnt solve it. Nightblitz suggested something interesting, so that is an option. But changes energy cost on encore, effects on torment etc wont mean squat by themselves. You need to focus your efforts on what really matters, and energy cost of encore or torment etc or damage mechanics, while possibly niceish, wont do nothing on the current problem. You need to have a community to have a metagame and you need to have a metagame first to then bother with making it healthier.
 
Some discussion on Discord, relayed here:

The general consensus seemed to be to start small on social media and grow from there. The most prominent idea was an official twitter, but ideas for a facebook page and a subreddit were brought up as well. For a facebook page and a twitter we can have more or less identical content, while a subreddit could be more discussion oriented.

Of course just having these accounts is no good unless we have things to post. There's the obvious choice of a new feed for updates on tournaments, mechanical changes, when a player defeats a gym or legend run, etc. We can also share fanart and official Pokemon news too. But that's not enough, we need some original content. We need articles. They don't need to be particularly big, just showcasing certain mons, moves, items, mechanics, RPs, etc. (I know I'd probably want to write up something on Gust).

Now some things to consider: What topics are appropriate or should take priority? Should we compensate writers? Do we need a dedicated subforum for these? How do we pace out this content? Who is managing our social media? Quality Control?
 
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JJayyFeather

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In terms of the attention-grabbing efforts, here's a first thought of a plan:
- Get a Twitter with a matching sub-forum with a sub-forum (article posting -> article writing)
- Articles should be far less focused on actual matches and more on highlighting underappreciated things or providing insightful knowledge on why something has suddenly begun seeing use.
- As a first thought, this needs to be handled on a small scale, using internal writers, editors, and media posters, ideally all within a narrow group of people just due to the lack of people we have on deck currently.

Additionally all of the above is held up by a need to check permissions over with TDP first.
======
On a more mechanical note, the mod team has decided to make adjustments to how the reset is going to occur. We do still believe it is important to get a good feel for how our new numbers work, but the previously mentioned method is a bit harsh on older players. The following is our method to attempt having the best of both worlds.
- All players will create a new profile.
- This profile contains 3 LCs of their choice that they get for free, along with all the CC and UC from their original profile.
- After all the starters on this new profile are FE with 40 moves, that player regains access to their original profile in full, to be imported and updated to go with the new profile.
 

nightblitz42

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We asked staff about whether or not we could write a bunch of articles to put in an ASB subforum, and also make a Twitter account to link to said articles. Articles Co-Leader The Dutch Plumberjack gave us the green-light, while also giving some helpful advice about the need to take content creation seriously and about the direction we should take the rework as a whole.

The Dutch Plumberjack said:
I think TMan PMed me about this yesterday but it got buried under three or four other messages, oops.

- There wouldn't be an issue with undermining TFP, even all the other considerations aside in the interest of schedule variety we don't really want to release articles about non-competitive topics more than like. monthly anyways, and sounds like you guys want to go for a higher frequency.

- I'm fine with you guys having resource articles and stuff in an on-site hub (that isn't listed on the main site page) if that makes things easier, just not something super visible / high profile, wouldn't make sense when a top-level forum isn't happening yet either. Just as a general note though, if you guys are gonna upload stuff there make sure it's a substantial amount too / an amount that warrants uploading it in the first place, a site section with only a few articles looks bad on you guys too. And, speaking from experience, this stuff tends to die quickly. Esp worth keeping in mind when you guys from what I can tell will still be short on contribs.

- Nevertheless, at this point in time your focus really should still be on revamping the rules and stuff, as long as the game is still regarded as "impossible to get into" or anything to that effect (not saying it is, I'm not super up to speed with where you guys are at in the revamp) then you can signal boost all you want but new players still won't stick around.
 
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Texas Cloverleaf

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kudos to you all for having the guts to make these changes, massive and sweeping as they are, the mechanical ones are definitively positive as far as making asb more accessible

the reset is far more surprising and less clear to see the outcomes but i support the decision to return everyone to a level playing field. the veterans who are most punished by this are the ones who are no longer playing anyway and they aren't the base you should cater to, as frosty rightly says drawing in new viewership and playerbase has become your largest priority, and one that i see as being greatly aided by the mechanical changes introduced

edit: i misread the reset rules, i would actually be in greater support to a full and final reset of everything rather than allowing for re-importing of previous mons. harsh, yes, but potentially re-creating a feeling of original asb of joining and helping to create something organic and growing. pros and cons for each though, y'all are doing a great job
 

LouisCyphre

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I think my personal fear regarding a hard reset is that it would set a precedent for future hard resets.

With how slow progression is in this game, we don't want prospective players to fear losing all of their progress arbitrarily. I'm not opposed at all to slowly trickling back previous progress, though, as long as it can be done. I don't mind if it takes a while to get back to where I was, if other players are also rebuilding alongside me.
 

JJayyFeather

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My initial plan was to entirely nuke old profiles and start from scratch. But eh, we don't want to cull our userbase before we have the new blood to replace them. So this serves as "good enough," giving me room to see if we fixed the game's progression speed, which I honestly think we've hit most of the issues pretty spot on with these changes.

This change has some layers to it, and the biggest goal in all of of it is really removing the barrier to entry. There's always going to be the "there's more skilled players" barrier, so a full reset does nothing really besides anger the old users. What we can do though, is make the game as simple as possible to new arrivals, which has been the focus of most changes. Shifting the game's damage forward a little bit to remove some emphasis from the importance of tricks in ASB, clarifying and condensing rules in the Handbook/NDA, re-writing the substitution rules (that'll be posted in a couple days, it's a lot of work considering I have to trace down all the WoGs that I'm sourcing for memory and define some new terms), and stuff of the like,

We are going to work on generating our audience, but as TDP said, we need to make sure that our game is refined and accessible before we promote it too heavily.
 
Has there already been a vote by those who care about the reset? I feel like it wouldn't hurt to do a quick opinion poll about full true reset vs. not. I'm fairly confident with what the answer would be, but if the mod team cares it could produce some constructive feedback.
 
give an incentive to people who want to reset and for new players to join. something like X amount of uc or increased rewards from battling for the first month or a couple of fullmons. advertise the reset, and that's how you can draw new players who want to dip their feet into asb but never found the time or incentive to compete with people at both a skill and a mons disadvantage. this is pretty basic stuff for creating a new userbase.
 

JJayyFeather

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A poll about the reset would do nothing but really clarify the lines as far as the current community stands... which is only significant if a super-majority of the community desires a full reset. Because otherwise, I wouldn't be too inclined to lean towards a full reset and I'd rather just keep moving forward from where we are presently.

As for incentives to new players/resetting players - no. Early boons are cool and all, but very much against the purpose of the changes that I'm making. The changes are being made already have the intention of increasing growth speed, and we've deemed them all that is necessary. This reset is to test the changes that are being made presently, not to just throw out more arbitrary boons. These are meant to be long-term mechanical changes to ASB as a whole.

Regarding players who want to full reset, that's on them. We are presently not forcing a permanent reset, and if they elect not to reclaim things from their profile once eligible to do so, that is their own decision and we are not going to compensate any player for things they decided to leave behind.
 

nightblitz42

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Idea for a rough draft of an Article-Writing Facility (which would reside in a new, dedicated subforum). All numbers here are tentative suggestions. Please tell me what you think, and whether or not you would be interested in working in such a facility (multiple owners would be greatly appreciated).

Name: The Bulletin Board Post
Purpose: pay visitors UC for writing articles about Battle By Post.
Secondary purpose: quality-check and edit article submissions.

Welcome to the Bulletin Board Post! BBP for short. We're a newspaper publication with the goal of -- oh, you're looking for Battle by Post? It's that way, a few blocks over. ...Yeah, happens all the time, don't sweat it. We really must see about getting a new name. Oh, but before you go -- we've got an opening for a new column in our paper. And, I figure a Pokemon battler like you must have all sorts of exciting things to write about, right? How about it? You interested?

Article requirements:
  • For now, the facility will accept articles which describe a single subject (Pokemon, item, ability, mechanic, etc.) and explain how it functions differently from how it does in the videogame series.
  • Article length must be at least 3 paragraphs.
  • The article must include:
    • A title
    • A subject which has not been written about in the last 6 months.
    • At least one Key Difference about the subject that makes it function differently in BBP than it does in the videogame. It does not have to be something extreme.
    • An example of a strategy that utilizes this key difference. Anything, simple or complex, is fine.
    • At least 1 strength and 1 weakness that the subject has (when applicable). This mostly applies to subjects which are Pokemon or Items, but nevertheless try to find strengths and weaknesses for whatever your subject may be.
In the future, we may choose to accept a wider variety of articles.

Facility flow:

1. The author posts, ahead of time, in this thread, a brief summary of the article they wish to write. This will reserve the author's right to the subject for 3 weeks so that players don't double-up on their work. Each player can only reserve one subject at a time.

The post must include, briefly:
  • 1 Subject to write about
  • At least one Key Difference this subject has between BBP and the videogames
  • Example of a strategy in BBP which utilizes this key difference
  • If applicable, strengths/weaknesses (1 of each is fine)
Subject: Zoroark
Difference: More durable than in videogame + full moveset = many more opportunities to abuse Illusion than in videogame
Strategy: Threaten with tricky moves like Counter, Taunt, Imprison, and Dig (moves it's rarely seen using in the videogame) to limit opponent's options when they're ordering
Strengths: Because 3 actions/round, possibility of wasting up to 3 of opponent's actions with a good Illusion
Weaknesses: Cannot disguise equipped item (which is public knowledge in BBP), weak to Fairy-Types

Please, before you post make sure that your subject is not already taken.

2. After reserving your subject, write the article and post it to this thread within a HIDE tag.

3. An approver will verify that the article does not contain grammatical errors and meets all the previously-mentioned requirements (length, content, etc.).
  • If the submission meets all requirements and has no grammatical errors, the approver will grant permission for you to post your article in a new thread in the subforum.
  • If the article contains a few grammatical errors, the approver will tell the author what errors to fix, then conditionally approve it.
  • If the article contains too many grammatical errors to fix quickly (but the content is acceptable), the approver will act as an editor, revising the article while taking care to only fix grammar errors and leave everything else unchanged. Then they will approve it.
  • If the article does not meet content/length requirements or shows an appalling lack of effort, the approver will reject it.
4. After your article is approved, post it as a new thread to the Bulletin Board Post subforum.

5. Finally, you may claim 3UC at the Prize Claiming Thread as if you completed a battle. In your prize claim, link to the approver's post here which granted permission, as well as to your new thread containing your article.

6. You may reserve a new subject immedately, but must wait at least one week before submitting another article.

Approver payment:

Approvers will be paid 0.5UC for each approval or rejection. They will be paid an additional 0.5UC for each approval in which they personally revised an article with a large number of grammatical errors.

********

This is pretty experimental, so any suggestions/opinions/advice?
 

JJayyFeather

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Articles: I love the suggestion. We will definitely look into this, as it seems like a phenomenal way to try to generate attention for us. I also really appreciate that you gave some realistic guidelines to use as baseline for evaluating, even better that I agree with them. I'll give more thorough and constructive feedback on it as we come out of this first step.
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Quick Balance Fixes

Expert Belt: +2 BAP -> +4 Damage
It was brought to my attention that Expert Belt *drastically* falls behind other items in power level as the effects of Stat Ranks has increased. As a result, it's effect will be moved to a flat +4 Damage on all Super-Effective Attacks. This makes it a contender with the type items, just a different restriction. As well, its effect, just like the type items, will generally outclass all Rank Boosting items on a Super-Effective attack, while being outclassed on Doubly Super Effective attacks.

Emergency Exit: Auto-Dodge -> Self-Phaze
This returned to my radar again last night with the fact that the lowered HP thresholds allow Golisopod to get a trigger of this sooner, not to mention it can get more through the use of Pain Split. As such, I'm removing the Auto-Dodge that it copied from the item Eject Button and replacing it with the Teleport (Switch) (KO) effect, which should still decent use without being insanely powerful.
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Substitutions
I'm willing to bet everyone was waiting to see what changes we're making to subs.

Chance Clauses: Defined
I sat down and took the time to clarify what is a chance sub, because the definition is very loose and dependent on Word of God.

Chance clauses include:
- Clauses that use an inequality related to any quantity associated with a Pokemon. Quantity is defined by something numeric, such as current HP or EN, or the current combat stage of a stat.
- The above includes inequalities that compare quantities of Pokemon, such as if the difference between two Pokemon's HP is more than 25.
- Clauses that check for the existence of an Ability(ies) or Type(s) on a Pokemon.
- Clauses that check for the existence of a status condition on a Pokemon. Status conditions are as defined in the Status section of the Handbook, whether it is Major or Minor.
- Clauses that check for the existence of an effect on the Battlefield, such as screens (Reflect, Light Screen, Aurora Veil) and hazards (Stealth Rock, Spikes, etc)
- Clauses that check for the result of a move, such as whether or not the move landed a Critical Hit or if the move hit/missed.
- Any clauses that mentions a successful use of a move (moves can succeed even if they miss) is both a Chance Clause and a Attack Clause
- Clauses that check for being in-between phases of any Damaging Evasive Move is both a Chance Clause and a Attack Clause

Coming along with this is a properly updated rendition of the 10 rules of substitutions:
  • A substitution is made of a Trigger and a Result.
  • Substitutions either activate, or they don't.
    • The result of a Substitute's "activation" can be changed by instance, but the trigger never changes.
  • A pokémon's substitutions activate whenever the trigger's conditions are met, a substitution with a higher priority has not already activated for that Pokemon, and the result of that activation is legally usable.
    • The priority of substitutions is set by the user - unless the user otherwise states, whichever sub is first in the list of substitutions they make activates first
  • All clauses of a substitution's trigger must narrow it's scope.
  • Substitutions based on knowing something can only trigger after that thing is known. (e.g if the opponent crits a2 then counter that action is legal if you were already going to move second a2, but illegal otherwise). (If you know something, your Pokemon knows it). Attack clauses activate based on what would currently be used according to the main order set.
  • Players can use Attack, Chance, and KO clauses, detailed below
    • All clauses can be appended by 'NOT'. Note that KO Clauses appended with 'NOT' become Chance clauses.
  • Chance Clauses are checked at the start of a user's turn, unless otherwise specified. See "Effect Timing" section for more details.
  • If a substitution causes an infinite loop, then it is ignored. If two or more substitutions would cause an infinite loop, ignore the substitution made by the player who ordered later. If the substitutions were ordered at the same time (Either a single player ordering, or in brawl orders where all player orders are treated as simultaneous), then both are deemed illegal.
  • If, ordering second, your substitution would cause the Trigger of an opponent's substitution which has already legally activated to no longer have it's unknown conditions met (Such as 'AND NOT Encore next action), then it is ignored.
    • Conversely, if, ordering second, your substitution would cause the Trigger of an opponent's substitution to have its conditions met, but that Pokemon has already acted this action, then it is ignored.
  • All substitutions may only have one attack clause per Pokémon per action.

Along with these changes come a lot of trimming redundant statements from the substitution section of the Handbook - no one did QC on it it appears, so there's just a lot of repeated things that add to the length of the segment.
 

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