(banning) Dynamicpunch

Status
Not open for further replies.

Aberforth

is a Top Social Media Contributoris a Member of Senior Staffis a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a Contributor to Smogon
Ubers Leader
I don't think this situation is comparable to others, like Blaziken/Greninja/Aegislash, as Machoke is an otherwise healthy addition to the tier just with an uncompetitive move, which can easily be replaced (removing speed boost/protean/king's shield completely changes the Pokemon). Blaziken and Greninja would not be nearly as relevant in OU without their abilities, and the abilities made the Pokemon broken and not uncompetitive, whereas Aegislash would drop a lot of viability without KS, and KS wasn't the only factor which made Aegislash broken.
This is the only thing I can see where you addressed it at all, and myself and ryan among others all said that its BS. Either Machoke as a whole is healthy or unhealthy, you cant say its unhealthy when running certain sets and not when its running others, because that is not looking at the pokemon itself, but each individual aspect of the pokemon separately. If Machoke with Dynamic Punch is an issue, Machoke is an issue that should get tested on its own. If Machoke is not an issue, Dynamic Punch is not an issue on Machoke. What makes this worse for you is that there are no other instances of Dynamic Punch being an issue.

My stance is that the only thing I've heard is that Dynamic Punch specifically on Machoke is a problem. Dynamic Punch, and Dynamic Punch + No Guard, are not problems unless on Machoke. Ergo, they should not be tested, Machoke should be.
 

Stratos

Banned deucer.
speed boost isn't uncompetitive, whereas dynamicpunch (a move that is 100% outclassed except for its ability to cause confusion) is. that's the difference, we've said it plenty of times. Whereas the argument from the other side is that dynamicpunch isn't uncompetitive, it's just that machoke is a broken user of it. Can we stop retreading the same ground and get to the meat of the issue—i.e. whether dynamicpunch is an uncompetitive move? If it is, we should ban dynamicpunch; if not, we should ban machoke.

So addressing basically the only paragraph in the last two pages that argues dynamicpunch isn't uncompetitive:

I would sooner call Dynamic Punch irritating than I would uncompetitive. You still have the choice, when confused, to risk staying in or switch to get rid of the confusion. There is absolutely skill in making that decision. That decision is classic risk vs. reward, which is an important thing to factor in any game with or without confusion involved. The difference is that RNG decides the outcome rather than the opponent's play. You face the same risk with sleep turns. In fact, confusion is often less harmful than sleep because you have the opportunity to do something in spite of it with the drawback being hurting yourself, which has different implications against different Pokemon.
There's no doubt that unrestricted sleep is super uncompetitive which is why we claused it so that it can be handled with skill. Back to confusion, the choice to stay in or switch isn't that much of a choice at all when you will just be subjecting your next switch-in to confusion as well and have to make the same choice again. Sooner or later you will have to stay in—and as Anty addressed above, that choice will come sooner rather than later, so PP stall isn't really an option. What this means in practice is that games with DynamicPunch are usually decided on whether you can move through confusion or not. And games being decided on a 50/50 RNG is—in my mind at least—pretty uncompetitive. I'll admit that the line is less clear with DynamicPunch, whose users are all slow, than with prankster Swagger, because it takes more intelligence on the part of the confusion user in order to turn the game into, as Aldaron put it, "waiting on the RNG." But the end result tends to be the same.
 

destinyunknown

Banned deucer.
You can't just reduce this to ''Is DynamicPunch competitive?'', because on the same vein you could argue that Thunder Wave is uncompetitive. There is a difference between a move or an ability that is broken or uncompetitive in every pokemon, such as Moody or Guillotine, and a move/ability that is only problematic when used by a certain pokemon, such as Speed Boost Blaziken, and now, DynamicPunch Machoke.

So we are presented with the following possibilities:


1. DynamicPunch is broken
2. DynamicPunch + No Guard is broken
3. Machoke is broken (as a whole)

From the arguments on this thread, we can clearly discard option 1, as DynamicPunch is a non-issue on any pokemon without No Guard, and as I already said, saying DynamicPunch is uncompetitive by itself is on the same level as saying Thunder Wave is uncompetitive.

Now, if we take a look at option 2, we can see that the only No Guard user that is a problem in the tier is Machoke. Considering No Guard + DynamicPunch has existed (and exists) in other metagames and generations, and has never been broken by itself, we can discard option 2 as well.

So this leaves us with option 3, Machoke is a problem for the PU metagame, now, I am not sure if he is strong enough to deserve a ban or not, and that's what should be decided by the voters.
 

destinyunknown

Banned deucer.
just because dynamicpunch is a non-issue on other pokemon doesn't automatically mean it's competitive. I come back to this: supersonic is a total non-issue. do you think it's competitive? or lax incense.
Yes, I think they are as competitive as Thunder Wave or Rock Slide are. If we look at a comparison between Supersonic and Thunder Wave, the difference only comes to risk/reward assessment on the side of the user. Supersonic is a high risk/medium reward move, it has a decent chance (50%) of disabling the opponent, at the cost of low accuracy and being removable if the opponent switches. On the other hand, Thunder Wave is a low risk/medium-to-high reward move, as it has perfect accuracy and permanently disables the opponent, while having a 25% of disabling the opponent on top of that, while having no drawbacks.

In essence, both moves have an ''uncompetitive'' aspect, and the only reason Supersonic isn't used and is seen as a gimmick is because of its high risk. Thunder Wave (and paralysis) have a big luck component that is as uncompetitive as confusion, but since they have been a staple of pokemon teams for years, people are more used to it.
 

Giagantic

True Coffee Maniac
is a Community Leaderis a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a member of the Battle Simulator Staffis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
OM Leader
I don't get why we are even having this discussion in regards to uncompetitiveness, there are plenty of moves in Pokemon that are extraordinarily uncompetitive in the right circumstances as mentioned by others. Thunder Wave is most prominent in my mind in terms of how impactful it is in the metagame as it not only cripples the speed of the Pokemon effected but also has the potential side-effect of costing turns at a 25% chance, it is the literal posterboy of status moves yet are we gonna ban it on the basis of that 25% chance being uncompetitive. Moves such as Scald, flinches induced by Iron head / Rock Slide, etc can be considered uncompetitive due to their high chances yet would we ban the move to accommodate a single user, I really do not think so. There is a difference between something having elements of uncompetitiveness and things like Swaggplay that were full blown broken, and since Pokemon is so riddle with mechanics that are in essence uncompetitive (or in otherwords unfair / highly variable) and for an argument to hold weight, as an issue that should be addressed, would either need to be more prominent or actually broken in my opinion.

Dynamic Punch is not broken in any other tier, the only tier that has an issue with it is PU and this is not due to the move alone but rather Machoke + no guard, as such you should deal with the Pokemon rather then trying to ban a move that isn't inherently broken. Just because Machoke plays a potentially major role in PU does not mean it should get to override smogon precedence in order to make it fit in to the tier or else bans in other tiers such as OU could be contested on such a basis. Greninja was suspected and banned after it received a new slew of moves that effectively removed any checks that were used in XY (Gunk Shot + Low Kick), it is arguable that without King's Shield Aegislash isn't anywhere near as good (yes I know there was a set that didn't use KS) due to King's Shield forcing 50/50's that often worked more in favour of the Aegislash user. I honestly can't condone a ban that is a clear example of favoritism towards a specific Pokemon, it's effect on the meta while nice is only a single aspect of what makes a Pokemon good or bad not the sole factor and if other Pokemon get banned as a result of Machoke no longer being PU then so be it.
 
Last edited:

Pocket

be the upgraded version of me
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Team Rater Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnus
Stratos said:
Back to confusion, the choice to stay in or switch isn't that much of a choice at all when you will just be subjecting your next switch-in to confusion as well and have to make the same choice again. Sooner or later you will have to stay in—and as Anty addressed above, that choice will come sooner rather than later, so PP stall isn't really an option. What this means in practice is that games with DynamicPunch are usually decided on whether you can move through confusion or not. And games being decided on a 50/50 RNG is—in my mind at least—pretty uncompetitive. I'll admit that the line is less clear with DynamicPunch, whose users are all slow, than with prankster Swagger, because it takes more intelligence on the part of the confusion user in order to turn the game into, as Aldaron put it, "waiting on the RNG." But the end result tends to be the same.
When facing a Machoke, the logical thing to do is switch into a Pokemon that are immune/resistant to Dynamic Punch. Once Machoke connects its DPunch to the switch-in, it's not going to attack the switch-in again with the resisted DPunch; it's either going to attack with one of its coverage moves or switch out. Thus, the player facing a Machoke has the choice on that turn to 1) switch out its confused mon into a Pokemon which can either take the predicted coverage move or fares well against the predicted switch-in or 2) stay in if predicting another DPunch. If the Machoke user predicts a switch and uses Dynamic Punch, then he took a risk in an attempt to retain his upper position. Either way, both the Machoke user and its opponent has full control of the situation, with the opponent at a disadvantage thanks to being temporarily statused (akin to a Body Slam para).

I am going to reference Aldaron's OU Tiering philosophy:
IV.) Probability management is a part of the game.
A.) This means we have to accept that moves have secondary effects, that moves can miss, that moves can critical hit, and that managing all these potential probability points is a part of skill.
B.) This does NOT mean that we will accept every probability factor introduced to the game. Evasion, OHKO, and Moody all affected the outcome "too much" and we removed them.
C.) "Too much" is if a particular factor has the more skilled player at a disadvantage a considerable amount of the time against a less skilled player, regardless of what he does. In relation to the latter part, "too much" also refers to factors that nearly completely take a game out of the player's hands and turn the PRIMARY point of the game to wait for the RNG.
1.) OHKO moves are an example of the "too much" portion. With a 30% success rate, the other player will be put in an immediate disadvantage by the OHKO move user a considerable amount of the time no matter what he does.
2.) Moody and SwagPlay are examples of the "taking the game out of a player's hands". Both turn the PRIMARY point of the game waiting to see what the RNG spits out.​

-----------------------

Machoke's Dynamic Punch does not fit the description of "too much" RNG; it falls more in the lines of secondary effects that we should learn to manage in order to become skillful players. For example, build a team that minimizes free switch in opportunities for Machoke. If this is impossible, make sure there is a solid Dynamic Punch absorber as your defensive pivot against Machoke. If PU is having trouble tanking Dynamic Punches from Machoke, then it is obvious that the problem lies in Machoke, as its main STAB move is too overwhelmingly powerful for the metagame. This is indeed a Speed Boost Blaziken-type situation, rather than Sand Veil Garchomp-type situation.
 
Last edited:

Lord Death Man

i cant read
is a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributor
There's no risk management required once Dynamic Punch connects. Machoke threatens Knock off to all immunities and most resists. Further, you can't learn to manage true 50/50s; that's the illusion of control inherent in game theory. Once a mon is confused, there's nothing special for the Machoke user to actually manage. For them, good plays are almost always still good plays. For you, a good play can suddenly become a very bad one for no reason. This isn't comparable to a scald burn or a thunderbolt paralysis. This is a Sand Veil Garchomp scenerio. It's not a sub brightpowder Sand Veil Garchomp situation.
 

destinyunknown

Banned deucer.
There's no risk management required once Dynamic Punch connects. Machoke threatens Knock off to all immunities and most resists. Further, you can't learn to manage true 50/50s; that's the illusion of control inherent in game theory. Once a mon is confused, there's nothing special for the Machoke user to actually manage. For them, good plays are almost always still good plays. For you, a good play can suddenly become a very bad one for no reason. This isn't comparable to a scald burn or a thunderbolt paralysis. This is a Sand Veil Garchomp scenerio. It's not a sub brightpowder Sand Veil Garchomp situation.

Then clearly the issue is Machoke set of moves and stats, not solely DynamicPunch. Throh was also banned from PU as well, leaving Machoke as the only relevant Fighting-type pokemon, which seems to indicate that the issue is that Fighting STAB + Knock Off is overwhelming for the tier. As Pocket said:

If PU is having trouble tanking Dynamic Punches from Machoke, then it is obvious that the problem lies in Machoke, as its main STAB move is too overwhelmingly powerful for the metagame. This is indeed a Speed Boost Blaziken-type situation, rather than Sand Veil Garchomp-type situation.
So (unknowingly), you have basically agreed with what the post above you had said.

I don't know what you mean by brightpower Garchomp because it makes no sense, so not gonna comment on that.


Oh by the way, let's see this guideline:

IV.) Unhealthy - elements that are neither uncompetitive nor broken, yet deemed undesirable for the metagame such that they inhibit "skillful play" to a large extent
A.) These are elements that may not limit either team building or battling skill enough individually, but combine to cause an effect that is undesirable for the metagame.
1.) We haven't really had an example of an unhealthy ban yet, but a potential example is Stealth Rock; it certainly is on the mind of every team building experience and games are often steeped in Stealth Rock strategy. Whether or not this adds up to limiting team building skill or battling skill is part of the conversation to be had.
2.) One important thing to note with this is that distribution both matters (in the case of large distributions) and doesn't matter (in the case of low distributions).
a.) If Stealth Rock or Scald weren't so common, they probably would not be as controversial issues as they are.
b.) However, just because something isn't highly distributed, like Shadow Tag, doesn't mean it isn't unhealthy. Some tried to state that Shadow Tag wouldn't be broken on a 10/10/10/10/10/10 BST mon, but this is the wrong way to look at it.
c.) Things aren't broken (or unhealthy or uncompetitive) only in vacuums; they can contribute to the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. Instead, consider how potentially broken elements would be with average distribution on average BST Pokemon. If Shadow Tag was on, let's say 4-5 OU potential Pokemon as opposed to 1-2 and the average BSTs were something like 80/80/80/80/80/80, would it be broken?The take away from this is to not ignore distribution, but if lowly distributed, to assume how the element would take away from team building or battling skill if it was distributed to average pokemon in an average quantity.(Yes, we will provide average statistics)



Again, as I said in one of my previous posts, DynamicPunch is not an issue by itself, as it has a large distribution, and it is not a problem in any pokemon without No Guard, nor it is a problem in any metagame that has DynamicPunch users with -average- stats, in a similar way to Speed Boost, which has examples of average BST pokemon that are balanced. This is in contrast to Baton Pass, Moody or SwagPlay, which made pokemon well below average a genuine problem in various metagames.

However, if we then take a look at No Guard + DynamicPunch, it again isn't a huge issue on any pokemon that has access to it except for Machoke, and wouldn't be an issue on an average pokemon of the tier, unless said pokemon had Good stats + No Guard + Fighting STAB + Knock Off. This is an extremely particular set of moves + ability, and is basically describing what Machoke is. What is broken is Machoke in particular, not DynamicPunch in general.
 
Last edited:

Anty

let's drop
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Team Rater Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnus
Then clearly the issue is Machoke set of moves and stats, not solely DynamicPunch. Throh was also banned from PU as well, leaving Machoke as the only relevant Fighting-type pokemon, which seems to indicate that the issue is that Fighting STAB + Knock Off is overwhelming for the tier.
Machoke with Cross Chop or Close Combat isn't broken in PU, only sets with dynamic punch are. Additionally, Throh was a different situation as it could run Taunt + Toxic sets to screw over defensive switch ins, and didn't rely on eviolite, so could switch into more and run defensive bulk up and even choice band sets more effectively. We also have monferno as another relevant fighting-type
 

aVocado

@ Everstone
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Top Contributor Alumnus
Why is the SS preventing the PU council/leaders from banning whatever they think is broken? Isn't the entire point of making certain trusted users tier leaders/council members to let them, between themselves and possibly their community, decide on what's broken and what needs suspecting etc cuz they know best?

Because that is quite literally the point. Not to mention banning shit in PU literally won't affect any other tier.

The best way I see to fix this, since Machoke is seen as a valuable asset to PU without dynamicpunch, is a ban to dp on machoke. It's not hard to understand. "DP is illegal just on machoke" is a sentence I believe everyone on this site + showdown could comprehend and understand. I don't see a problem.
 

Aberforth

is a Top Social Media Contributoris a Member of Senior Staffis a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a Contributor to Smogon
Ubers Leader
The reason they're preventing it is the same reason that they would prevent OU from just banning Sheer Force on Landorus-I, because its inconsistent with our tiering system. Yes, saying "DP is illegal just on machoke" is easy to remember and keep track of, if it does happen multiple times the rules for a tier get very convoluted and not so easy to understand. "DP is banned on Machamp, Magic Guard is banned on Alakazam, Mega Pidgeot cannot use Hurricane, Togekiss cannot have Serene Grace as an ability ext ext" (just using a few examples from UU) is something that we want to avoid, and while that has not happened and might not happen even if SS let PU do a complex ban, but we'd rather not have to cross that bridge at all when there is another much easier and more consistent path.
 

destinyunknown

Banned deucer.
Why is the SS preventing the PU council/leaders from banning whatever they think is broken? Isn't the entire point of making certain trusted users tier leaders/council members to let them, between themselves and possibly their community, decide on what's broken and what needs suspecting etc cuz they know best?

Because that is quite literally the point. Not to mention banning shit in PU literally won't affect any other tier.

The best way I see to fix this, since Machoke is seen as a valuable asset to PU without dynamicpunch, is a ban to dp on machoke. It's not hard to understand. "DP is illegal just on machoke" is a sentence I believe everyone on this site + showdown could comprehend and understand. I don't see a problem.
Because PU is now an official metagame, so it has to follow the same tiering guidelines as the other official tiers, so that the system is consistent.


For the record, I don't necessarily agree with all the tiering decisions that have been taken in other tiers lately, and more precisely, I still think the BW complex bans are a huge mistake due to the bad predecent they are.
 

Giagantic

True Coffee Maniac
is a Community Leaderis a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a member of the Battle Simulator Staffis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
OM Leader
Why is the SS preventing the PU council/leaders from banning whatever they think is broken? Isn't the entire point of making certain trusted users tier leaders/council members to let them, between themselves and possibly their community, decide on what's broken and what needs suspecting etc cuz they know best?

Because that is quite literally the point. Not to mention banning shit in PU literally won't affect any other tier.

The best way I see to fix this, since Machoke is seen as a valuable asset to PU without dynamicpunch, is a ban to dp on machoke. It's not hard to understand. "DP is illegal just on machoke" is a sentence I believe everyone on this site + showdown could comprehend and understand. I don't see a problem.

Because at what point do we draw the arbitrary line in the sand, what is stopping someone from legitimately arguing for something like "if we banned Sucker Punch from Mega-Mawile it would not have had to be banned." What is stopping us from then going arguing for blanket banning moves to fit any Pokemon into any tier like "If we ban the following moves, A B C D, Arceus could be OU," essentially all our previous bans could be invalidated in various ways if we started allowing stupid selective move banning.

The policies we have in place are to keep those making them in check as much as anyone else or any person who became powerful enough in the community could easily just start shooting out ridiculous suspects.
 
The initial and only proposal that i tried to make was to ban Dynamicpunch which from a competitive standpoint is the same thing as the already banned Chatter and simply an uncompetitive move on anything that reasonably and realistically would run it (yes I know that Abra gets it and it is clearly not very good but still has a luck part to it that makes it difficult and STUPID to counterplay).
I understand that it is the fact that Machoke has a good combination of stat and ability that made the problem show up but the aim of tiering has always been to make this game more enjoyable and banning Dynamicpunch just does that without being complex ban and without collateral damage since it doesn't remove any fair move option (to quote nails "that would be used in a tournament game" lol) from anything else.

Again I understand why lot of you brought up points about banning Machoke (I don't understand some of you repeating the same thing over and over with some clear logical fallacies, especially slippery slope, without bringing nothing new up) but still Dynamicpunch isn't a competitive move on anything relevant but Machoke anyway and MACHOKE OR ANYTHING ELSE (UNLIKE SHARPEDO OR KECLEON IN THE CASES OF SPEED BOOST AND PROTEAN FOR BLAZIKEN AND GRENINJA WHICH DO NOT RELATE) WOULD NOT BE NERFED IN ANY WAY since Dynamicpunch is replaced in any "legitimate" use by Cross Chop or Drain Punch.

I don't understand why you guys did not vehemently opposed when Gliscor was saved by banning sand veil in DPPt forcing us to ban Cacnea and Sandshrew since those are as broken with Sand Veil as Kadabra or Nosepass are with Dynamicpunch.

The comparison with Thunder Wave is also pretty bad since the use of a paralysis inducing move is a long term "investment" that has counterplay in electric types and most of the time ground types and is used most of the time to cripple something by cutting its speed and the free turn is half as relevant and can be considered a secondary effect of the status.
 

Asek

Banned deucer.
There's no risk management required once Dynamic Punch connects. Machoke threatens Knock off to all immunities and most resists. Further, you can't learn to manage true 50/50s; that's the illusion of control inherent in game theory. Once a mon is confused, there's nothing special for the Machoke user to actually manage. For them, good plays are almost always still good plays. For you, a good play can suddenly become a very bad one for no reason. This isn't comparable to a scald burn or a thunderbolt paralysis. This is a Sand Veil Garchomp scenerio. It's not a sub brightpowder Sand Veil Garchomp situation.
PU guys keep regurgitating this logic as if its going to make it sound any better. Dynamic punch as a move isnt broken- as can be clearly seen by the fact that literally 0 pokemon not possessing no guard run it. The risk management of dymanic punch is in the fact that it only has a 50% chance of connecting for most mons - thats the risk management you face when deciding whether to stay in or not as well! There is only 1 problematic user of the move in your tier. The problem is evidently with that one pokemon, not with the move. We do not ban moves / abilities to keep a pokemon in a tier, we have only banned them when they present an uncompetitive aspect on numerous pokemon (usually) across multiple metagames. Many users have said that switching out of the confusion or taking the chance is a move on the players choice which you counter by saying machoke has the moves to then handle any switch in - does this not make the fault with machoke? If it posseses knock off to hit the switch in hard... well geez it sounds like machoke is the problem and not dynamic punch.

Before you draw the comparisons I've seen (mainly) cropping up in this thread;

r.e evasion clause - multiple uncompetitive users. This was a problem on basically any mon that had a slot in the meta, and it wasnt too far of a step to incorporate this into a preexisting clause. Double team / minimize being banned was evidently enough of a warrant to remove these / brightpowder (is that removed as well? idk) from the metagame under a similar situation type thing. Dynamic punch is only a problem on 1 mon, it hasnt been a problem on Machamp in the tiers its found itself in for the last 3 gens (someone feel free to correct me tho).
r.e swagger - This was quite controversial. once again multiple uncompetitve users, but predominantly mons possesing prankster were seen as an issue w. this one. I wasnt around to contend w. this but swagger was seen as the uncompetitive move mainly due to the fact that the +attack boost made it so much worse of a gamble to the player on the receiving end that it effectively forced switches, i think if this was a problem on only liepard it would of seen a liepard ban but the fact that we say multiple mons use it in the end was the nail in the coffin.
r.e baton pass- this clause is so complex idek how it works, it prolly should of just been a bp ban (imo) but w.e
r.e speed boost - multiple (potential) users. only one was breaking the metagames back. we banned that pokemon. doesnt that sound like a predicament PU now finds itself in?

If confusion as a status ailment is broken / uncompetitve you can try argue that. I don't see how it is much worse than paralysis which may have a 50% less chance of fucking you over, but is permanent and effectively makes you move last for the rest of the game, and has a far greater distribution across all tiers.

regardless most of the relevant points to be said in this thread have been bought up. Most posts (including mine) after pg 2 are basically the same arguments, worded differantly.
 

Raiza

is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a defending SPL Championis a Past SPL Championis a Past WCoP Championis a Former Old Generation Tournament Circuit Champion
World Defender
I don't know what keeping this inflexible stance on bans and policies will accomplish really, especially in this case. The council clearly wants the best for its tier and it's not like banning Dynamic Punch in PU would set any big precedent for other tiers, as this is a very unique circumstance and Dynamic Punch is a move completely based on RNG anyway(even more when not used on No Guard users for that matter), and so it isn't comparable to like banning Sheer Force on Landorus-I or Sucker Punch on Mega Mawile. Because this case is so unique, Smogon's bans in precedence won't be overrode. Instead one of these precedences, the Chatter ban that occurred some time ago, actually forms a point in favour of banning Dynamic Punch, as it is the most similar case.
Machoke without Dynamic Punch as already said by others would be healthy for the tier, and you also have to remember that banning Machoke directly would probably shape the tier in a negative way as it keeps many dangerous threats and team archetypes manageable, so you would probably fix one problem and create many other ones.
 
smogon tiers pokemon, smogon does not tier combinations of moves + abilities.
This, Smogon tiers Pokemon. The Chatter ban was done several months prior to PU becoming official, and was a mistake, in my opinion, so using it as precedence is a poor example. The same mistake shouldn't be repeated.
Chatot's Special Attack, Speed, and possibly its access to other moves, is what makes Chatter an issue.

Only in very special cases does Smogon add clauses (Moody, OHKO moves). Chatter and DynamicPunch do not fall under that category.
 
Last edited:

Raiza

is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a defending SPL Championis a Past SPL Championis a Past WCoP Championis a Former Old Generation Tournament Circuit Champion
World Defender
This, Smogon tiers Pokemon. The Chatter ban was done several months prior to PU becoming official, and was a mistake, in my opinion, so using it as precedence is a poor example. The same mistake shouldn't be repeated.
A Dynamic Punch ban was requested also before PU became official, so implicitly saying Chatter was allowed to be banned because PU wasn't official yet(even if it was several months prior to PU becoming official we were searching for official recognition already) doesn't quite hold up by itself as a point. Anyway, banning Chatter could be considered a mistake under the standard of Smogon's current policy on bans, but it still turned out to be one of the most prolific bans in the tier's history, so I would repeat that ''mistake'' any time. Also there are more precedents to it, not only Chatter, but also the whole Gliscor and Sand Veil situation in DPPt, which occurred in an official metagame and has yet to be addressed.
 

destinyunknown

Banned deucer.
A Dynamic Punch ban was requested also before PU became official, so implicitly saying Chatter was allowed to be banned because PU wasn't official yet(even if it was several months prior to PU becoming official we were searching for official recognition already) doesn't quite hold up by itself as a point. Anyway, banning Chatter could be considered a mistake under the standard of Smogon's current policy on bans, but it still turned out to be one of the most prolific bans in the tier's history, so I would repeat that ''mistake'' any time. Also there are more precedents to it, not only Chatter, but also the whole Gliscor and Sand Veil situation in DPPt, which occurred in an official metagame and has yet to be addressed.

The metagame wasn't official yet, that is why it was allowed. The fact that you made bans that don't follow the guidelines of Smogon Official Metagames only shows that the people leading the tier at the time didn't bother reading the guidelines. And ''we were searching for official recognition'' doesn't mean the tier was monitored, in fact, it only comes to show that the people leading PU (unofficially) weren't careful enough.
 

Lord Death Man

i cant read
is a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributor
Then clearly the issue is Machoke set of moves and stats, not solely DynamicPunch. Throh was also banned from PU as well, leaving Machoke as the only relevant Fighting-type pokemon, which seems to indicate that the issue is that Fighting STAB + Knock Off is overwhelming for the tier. As Pocket said:
The problem lies in risk management. You might need to to reread what I said; the fundamental issue is that Dynamic Punch takes away the risk. Knock Off's risk is greatly reduced. Every No Guard + Dynamic Punch mon can use Dynamic Punch + Dark/Ghost move anyway. The comment on Brightpowder Garchomp did make sense because the one of the teams that was brought up to get sand veil banned abused the combination of Sand, Brightpowder, and Substitute. However, that team is obviously not the sole reason it got banned, but was rather designed around highlighting an uncompetitive scenerio.

PU guys keep regurgitating this logic as if its going to make it sound any better. Dynamic punch as a move isnt broken- as can be clearly seen by the fact that literally 0 pokemon not possessing no guard run it. The risk management of dymanic punch is in the fact that it only has a 50% chance of connecting for most mons - thats the risk management you face when deciding whether to stay in or not as well! There is only 1 problematic user of the move in your tier. The problem is evidently with that one pokemon, not with the move. We do not ban moves / abilities to keep a pokemon in a tier, we have only banned them when they present an uncompetitive aspect on numerous pokemon (usually) across multiple metagames. Many users have said that switching out of the confusion or taking the chance is a move on the players choice which you counter by saying machoke has the moves to then handle any switch in - does this not make the fault with machoke? If it posseses knock off to hit the switch in hard... well geez it sounds like machoke is the problem and not dynamic punch.

Before you draw the comparisons I've seen (mainly) cropping up in this thread;

r.e evasion clause - multiple uncompetitive users. This was a problem on basically any mon that had a slot in the meta, and it wasnt too far of a step to incorporate this into a preexisting clause. Double team / minimize being banned was evidently enough of a warrant to remove these / brightpowder (is that removed as well? idk) from the metagame under a similar situation type thing. Dynamic punch is only a problem on 1 mon, it hasnt been a problem on Machamp in the tiers its found itself in for the last 3 gens (someone feel free to correct me tho).
r.e swagger - This was quite controversial. once again multiple uncompetitve users, but predominantly mons possesing prankster were seen as an issue w. this one. I wasnt around to contend w. this but swagger was seen as the uncompetitive move mainly due to the fact that the +attack boost made it so much worse of a gamble to the player on the receiving end that it effectively forced switches, i think if this was a problem on only liepard it would of seen a liepard ban but the fact that we say multiple mons use it in the end was the nail in the coffin.
r.e baton pass- this clause is so complex idek how it works, it prolly should of just been a bp ban (imo) but w.e
r.e speed boost - multiple (potential) users. only one was breaking the metagames back. we banned that pokemon. doesnt that sound like a predicament PU now finds itself in?

If confusion as a status ailment is broken / uncompetitve you can try argue that. I don't see how it is much worse than paralysis which may have a 50% less chance of fucking you over, but is permanent and effectively makes you move last for the rest of the game, and has a far greater distribution across all tiers.

regardless most of the relevant points to be said in this thread have been bought up. Most posts (including mine) after pg 2 are basically the same arguments, worded differantly.
First off, I'm not a PU player and have no invested interested in PU specifically as a tier. The risk you face is nowhere near the same because you don't actually have alternative plays; switching is not an alternative play, it's delaying the alternative play. That's not risk management and is why I referenced illusion of control - you don't actually have any control over the situation and are vastly overestimating what you do have control over.

I'm not even sure if Dynamic Punch is "breaking the metagame". It's just an intensely unfun, uncompetitive aspect of the meta that doesn't need to be in any tier. Keeping it around because it's not broken, just somewhere between what's keeping Machamp ok to good, in other tiers where it's available seems like the wrong decision.
 

Inspirited

There is usually higher ground.
is a Contributor Alumnus
I think the idea of tiering objective > precedent got passed over somewhere along the short life of this thread.

The tiering objective, to me, was to find a home for as many people's favorite Pokemon as possible while simultaneously creating stable environments that raise the skill ceiling of a calculated risk and luck based game. This ban looks like it was a tough decision to make due to precedent, but is objectively correct in my opinion. From what I have read in the posts by the PU players here and elsewhere, my thought process as the tier leaders would be something like this: Machoke's vacuum would leave the tier in worse shape than it staying and still using DPunch, so banning it would be objectively wrong. Banning Dynamic Punch would also hurt other Pokemon which is fairly uncalled for other Pokemon with the most notable being Golett (E: I got told that it's irrelevent which changes things, but not much). This leads to a rather complex problem that needed a complex answer to solve. Now we have a decision of whether to ban Machoke + Dpunch (helps tiering objective: removes a luck based factor with little to no repercussions thanks to other very viable and similar STAB options being available without the large luck element tacked on) or do nothing (stalls the tiering objective, but follows precedent).

So precedent needs to be the deciding factor here, but is it flawed precedent that hurts the objective in which it is supposed to aid? I think yes. Precedent should always aid the objective, otherwise there is no point in having it and it should not apply as a result. In this case, I used the precedent (trying to find a ban that worked based on it) as a starting point and built upon it (used a called for complex answer to solve a complex problem) thanks to the changing needs of the objective. This would change precedent which is a big deal, but precedent needs to change in order to keep with the pace the objective's needs are changing at.

Out of the four options, I would think banning Dpunch on Machoke is the way to go.

Now, the tiering objective I presented may be wrong as it is only based on what darkie wrote in the tiering faq and what we have been attempting to move towards in PR and other policy related forums and threads I have access to. The objective has changed since darkie's tiering FAQ and this is what I believe it has become and what it has been for a long time now.
 
Last edited:

Nails

Double Threat
is a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributoris a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Three-Time Past WCoP Champion
I think the idea of tiering objective > precedent got passed over somewhere along the short life of this thread.

The tiering objective, to me, was to find a home for as many people's favorite Pokemon as possible while simultaneously creating stable environments that raise the skill ceiling of a calculated risk and luck based game. This ban looks like it was a tough decision to make due to precedent, but is objectively correct in my opinion. From what I have read in the posts by the PU players here and elsewhere, my thought process as the tier leaders would be something like this: Machoke's vacuum would leave the tier in worse shape than it staying and still using DPunch, so banning it would be objectively wrong. Banning Dynamic Punch would also hurt other Pokemon which is fairly uncalled for other Pokemon with the most notable being Golett (it would lose its way of scaring Normal-types which would hurt the tier a bit (this is me only looking at tiering resources, any PU players should chime in and tell us whether this is actually the case or not)). This leads to a rather complex problem that needed a complex answer to solve. Now we have a decision of whether to ban Machoke + Dpunch (helps tiering objective: removes a luck based factor with little to no repercussions thanks to other very viable and similar STAB options being available without the large luck element tacked on) or do nothing (stalls the tiering objective, but follows precedent).

So precedent needs to be the deciding factor here, but is it flawed precedent that hurts the objective in which it is supposed to aid? I think yes. Precedent should always aid the objective, otherwise there is no point in having it and it should not apply as a result. In this case, I used the precedent (trying to find a ban that worked based on it) as a starting point and built upon it (used a called for complex answer to solve a complex problem) thanks to the changing needs of the objective. This would change precedent which is a big deal, but precedent needs to change in order to keep with the pace the objective's needs are changing at.

Out of the four options, I would think banning Dpunch on Machoke is the way to go.

Now, the tiering objective I presented may be wrong as it is only based on what darkie wrote in the tiering faq and what we have been attempting to move towards in PR and other policy related forums and threads I have access to. The objective has changed since darkie's tiering FAQ and this is what I believe it has become and what it has been for a long time now.
The precedent is have a really really good reason for a complex ban (or more broadly, a ban on a non-pokemon). "We might have to find new checks to things Machoke currently checks or ban the things that Machoke currently checks if other checks are not effective enough" is not a really really good reason. That is a normal result of a ban. A really really good reason is "save an extremely core game mechanic of bw ou (weather wars) by nerfing rain to maintain a tier which somewhat resembles that which the game devs intended". I still disagree with the decision to complex ban there just as I did at the time for multiple reasons, but regardless this doesn't come anywhere near that level. PU doesn't get to go this far outside of the lines of what every other tier does.
 

Inspirited

There is usually higher ground.
is a Contributor Alumnus
The precedent is have a really really good reason for a complex ban (or more broadly, a ban on a non-pokemon). "We might have to find new checks to things Machoke currently checks or ban the things that Machoke currently checks if other checks are not effective enough" is not a really really good reason. That is a normal result of a ban. A really really good reason is "save an extremely core game mechanic of bw ou (weather wars) by nerfing rain to maintain a tier which somewhat resembles that which the game devs intended". I still disagree with the decision to complex ban there just as I did at the time for multiple reasons, but regardless this doesn't come anywhere near that level. PU doesn't get to go this far outside of the lines of what every other tier does.
What's stopping them? Precedent can change and should change in order to make itself as useful as possible (this is the way we move towards the objective: we move the starting point (precedent) forward)

The precedent talked about is stalling the objective which hurts it as a whole in my opinion (our objective needs are changing and we need to keep pace with that or fall farther behind than we may already be). The other problem is going too fast and rushing to conclusions without being thoughtful of the objective as a whole and how this leap will help it (and not hurt it in the process), but I don't think that is the case here. If there is a problem, there should be a way to step back and tell what and why this bound is hurting the objective. That is what an objection to this ban should be.
 
no an objection to this ban is it's stupid to override our tiering philosophy to compartmentalize machoke because you think it's okay to have half a pokemon

if dynamicpunch is always broken, ban it. it's not though, so chill

the chatter ban was dumb too; you should have banned chatot and only got away with it because no one cared about PU at the time

we. ban. pokemon. not. parts. of. them.

complex bans are the absolute last resort and are only employed if a simpler, more elegant solution cannot FOR THE SAKE OF MAINTAINING THE TIER. bw rain? check. baton pass? check. no guard + dynamic punch? naaaaaah
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 0)

Top