OU Balancing: Finding a standard!

[Oracle]

Ariados will be too good with those stats
lol
Otherwise this project seems really cool.

 

[ss118]

The only way to know is to test. You shouldn't base anything off of regular OU speed numbers, because by the time this project is through I'm sure that 110 won't be as high as it seems to be now.

By the way, does anyone get the reference to my Dragonair changes? xD

 

[Terywj [태리]]

The only way to know is to test. You shouldn't base anything off of regular OU speed numbers, because by the time this project is through I'm sure that 110 won't be as high as it seems to be now.

By the way, does anyone get the reference to my Dragonair changes? xD

Lol wait. Please tell me Dragonite still only has Inner Focus.

-Terywj

 

[UltiMario]

Dragonair is now better than Dragonite.

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE

 

[ss118]

Dragonair is NOT better. I'll be giving boosts to Dragonite to ensure that he's usable over Salamence for certain teams so yeah: don't worry.

And yes, his ability is still Inner Focus. Might change that if anyone has suggestions.

 

[UltiMario]

Perma Rain/Sun >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Anything you could do to buff DNite.
You'd have to make DNite better than Mence for it to be useful at all, and if you make it better than Mence its going to be Uber.

 

[Wave⁂]

I'm trying to think of an analogy of the new Dragonair / Dragonite situation. I think Magneton / Magnezone is a good(-ish) example. By evolving, you sacrifice Speed for overall better stats. Evolving Dragonair transforms you from a weather beast to a bulky Dragon-Dancing beast.

 

[Terywj [태리]]

Allowing a Pokemon to bring permanent rain or permanent sun in the OverUsed environment is just...bad.

-Terywj

 

[ss118]

Perma sun isn't that bad.... and there are particular pokemon that can be used to completely eliminate Rain Dance teams(vaporeon comes to mind), and even then don't forget that ALL pokemon will be getting better(except Garchomp/ other top OUs). If it becomes broken we can change it in some manner. It's not something like wobbuffet where trap + encore ignores the opponent's team and just does whatever it wants whenever.

And Dragonite won't be better than Mence: just usable in some other manner. I'm considering giving him technician(boosts Dragon Rush and Aerial Ace as far as I know). Anything else I can do for Nite? Considering more power for less speed, or maybe just a little more overall bulk.

 

[Terywj [태리]]

Dragonite is already pretty bulky, moreso than Salamence I believe (not factoring in Intimidate) so I don't see the point of giving it more bulk in order to make it more usable.

Technician seems like a start, I guess.

What's our plan of order anyways? Will we be balancing out the OverUsed Pokemon first? Or others.

-Terywj

 

[UltiMario]

This entire project just seems like a step in the wrong direction of EVERYTHING.

I'm probably not even going to bother helping out anymore since art really has no intentions to making things actually balanced :/

 

[ss118]

Rather than making accusations about my "unbalance" of the metagame, would you elaborate on exactly where my intentions are lacking?

Though let's not talk here: I'll get on AIM so that we can (politely) discuss this matter. If you want, we can create a procedure before getting to the pokemon specifics(in which case I'll save these I've made for later).

 

[UltiMario]

Simply explain how a Pokemon with two of the best abilities in the entire game is balanced.

You'll turn OU into Ubers. Everything and its mother carries Thunder, Rain is present in almost every game, **** like Rotom-W going ape**** on the Metagame, Scizor becoming even more of a threat with weakening of Fire moves. This is simply Rain power (which will be the more used ability since Rain >>>> Sun). In Sun you have **** like Jumpluff going around. Either way its just a plain bad idea.

 

[ss118]

So basically you just don't want the abilities in OU at all? Well that's a shame, really. And I thought it was cool considering in the manga, Lance uses two Dragonairs to control the weather.

Sunny Day teams don't usually go anywhere. I don't think I've ever seen a terribly good one: this gives them a chance to compete, if anything as anti-metagame, if Rain becomes so centralizing as you say.

And you're looking at Rain as it is in OU: sure, against the most common offensive teams they do **** against rain teams, but when you go on the flip side and look at stall(and even some balanced teams), only the most ****ty of them do bad against rain dance teams. There are very good pokemon such as Celebi and Vaporeon that crap on Rain Dance teams, and there are lesser-used pokemon such as Vileplume, Eggecutor, Poliwrath, and Toxicroak that do well versus them. If we increase the viability of these pokemon(and MANY others, I promise you) to that of being in OU, then the style overall becomes quite unreliable, or just as reliable as any other team arche-type.

And that's not "centralization". It as may start as such since everyone and their mothers will think "wow this is broken", but when people realizes there are just as good strategies that do better against the current metagame, then w/e.

 

[Terywj [태리]]

While I do agree with the act of balancing the general metagame, as stated before I frown upon bringing any type of Auto-Rain or Auto-Sun inducer into the metagame.

Other people need to voice their opinion on this.

-Terywj

 

[ss118]

well honestly I'd rather have a fun metagame with the ideal ratio of 25% Sun, 25% Rain, 25% Sand, and 25% Hail compared to the boring current metagame being 75% sand, 15% none, 6% Rain, 4% Hail

 

[Wave⁂]

I don't think anyone will argue against auto-weather over-centralizing the metagame.

Although I'm not sure whether or not it will be broken...

 

[Pink Reaper]

Art, im yo-ing you on AIM and you're ignoring me T_T

 

[UltiMario]

well honestly I'd rather have a fun metagame with the ideal ratio of 25% Sun, 25% Rain, 25% Sand, and 25% Hail compared to the boring current metagame being 75% sand, 15% none, 6% Rain, 4% Hail

TTar isn't on THAT many teams. Its more like 40% Sand, 4% hail, 4% Rain, and 52% none.

Also Hail will NEVER get to 25% unless you SUPER BUFF every single Ice Type in the game. Nor will Sun with Grass and Fire buffs to the extreme. It'll be Rain and SS on top going against each other to screw the opposite team over, pretty much. I'd rather see less weather happening not more. What do you want, our current metagame, or 45% rain, 45% SS, 5% hail, 5% sun :/ EVEN MORE UNBALANCED WEATHER SHIZ

 

[Terywj [태리]]

Is Abomasnow / Hail even used that much in OU?

-Terywj

 

[UltiMario]

Like 2% of teams have Abomasnow.

 

[supermarth64]

IIRC the people over at CAP tested out teams with a level 1 Groudon and found it to be broken.

 

[ss118]

Since people seem to be against against the idea of a permanent rain or sun ability because it allows pokemon to destroy speed tiers(with Swift Swim and Chlorophyll), while at the same time giving dual STAB to Water types using Drizzle, I think that the best "negotiation" might be to allow them, but limit the length in which they exist.

Since Drizzle and Drought would be banned from regular play regardless of their length in regular pokemon(due to the nature of the pokemon that they exist on), it wouldn't truly be nerfing them, since we bring them from being used 0% of the time to now, like, 30% of the time.

Maybe something like:

Drought/ Drizzle- Brings out a permanent Sun/ Rain as long as the pokemon with the ability stays on the field. If the pokemon switches out or faints, the sun/ rain effect is limited to the next four turns(including the turn in which it took to switch-out or faint the Drought/ Drizzle user).

So basically, now:

Dragonair switches in, sun comes into effect.

Dragonair switches out.
something comes in.
*3 turns remaining*

Compare it to a pokemon designed to set up rain dance with the move.


Azelf starts the battle.

Azelf uses Rain Dance.
*4/7 Turns Remaining

Azelf uses explosion.
something comes in.
*3/6 Turns remaining.

This also gives a good reason to use the moves themselves over using a Drought/Drizzle pokemon: the weather effect will stay longer when you use it in conjunction with a heat/ damp rock.

any objections?

 

[kirbyraeg]

I think it would only work a la Cloud Nine/Air Lock but with the replacement of weather while it was on the field. Maaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyybe with it lingering for a turn after it leaves the field/dies... Weather overwrites when two pokemon with this type of ability face off would occur when each pokemon attacks so that there is no weather disadvantage (with the slower pokemon's weather lingering through to the next turn).

Also, my easy thoughts on how to balance pokémon:

Stealth Rock does 12.5%, easy, no type calcs for it. Spikes and toxic spikes are fine as they are.

UUs get +10 to each stat (except Speed) that isn't over 110, and NUs get +20 to each stat that isn't over 110. Stats can't be boosted to over 110 by this stat boost. Speed for UUs and NUs are +5 and +15 respectively.
Ubers are Ubers, but we could reduce them to 600 BST individually or redistribute to balance them around that point.
Simple, generic stat calcs. Exceptions can be spotted and dealt with accordingly.

Bug is neutral vs. fighting/ghost/poison.
Dark is not very effective vs. bug.
Dragon is nve vs. ice, and SE vs. normal.
Electric is SE vs. steel.
Fighting is ok.
Fire is neutral vs. rock. but nfe vs. ground.
Flying is neutral vs. electric.
Ghost is neutral vs. psychic and nve vs. normal.
Grass is neutral vs. dragon.
Ground is neutral vs. poison and rock.
Ice is neutral vs. steel.
Normal is se vs. psychic.
Poison is nve vs. steel, neutral vs. ghost, and SE vs. dragon.
Psychic is nve vs. dark/normal, and neutral vs. steel.
Rock is nve vs. itself and neutral vs. ice.
Steel is neutral vs. electric.
Water is ok.


The way to balance pokémon in its entirety is to work with simple ground rules and then figure out when those rules don't work. Ability fixes are too micromanaging and would be dealt with as exceptions to the ground rules after figuring out whether a simple BST change would improve it enough or not.

Food for thought.

 

[CRASHiC]

Bug doesn't need buffs o_O

 

[UltiMario]

Weather stuff

I think 5-turn Drizzle/Drought was tested as well.

Still broken. So this being even longer means that its even more broken yet.

 

[ss118]

How was this tested? And this is four turns, mind you.

 

[UltiMario]

I just remember hearing little bits and pieces of it being tested from just looking around Smogon. Also, this was 5-turn weather PERIOD, while that is infinate weather with Dragonair out to abuse until it leaves, and then some turns for someone else to abuse the weather.

 

[Terywj [태리]]

Well that's why this is different. The inducer only brings with it 4 turns of the said weather.

Edit: I better watch where I post. Is it worth conserving #8000 for Zook?

-Terywj

 

[ss118]

So having an otherwise weak-*** pokemon with essentially a 3-turn lingering weather effect is worse than using something with the appropriate item and using Rain Dance/ Sunny Day to DOUBLE this effect?

 

[Oracle]

I don't think it would be broken because it's just an easier way to set up regular rain dance. In fact, most rain teams would actually prefer not to use this because they need the six turns of rain to prevent it from being stalled out.

 

[Wave⁂]

Also, Taunt.

 

[UltiMario]

Just the fact you're nerfing the ability to no end shows that the ability truely is broken and doesn't deserve to last out of ubers.

 

[Wave⁂]

You don't know that it is or isn't broken without testing.

 

[ss118]

Wait why wouldn't we want to nerf an ability if it meant that it could be used in standard play? especially if in the end it allows for more variety? I thought he point of these changes is to allow underused pokemon and strategies to be on equal grounds with those of standard. If that isn't the point of the "NU to OU" project, as well as the point of the SWFCaP and the point of modding the game in the first place, PLEASE say so and I will ask a mod to close this thread and I'll do this myself(and post the server later, for anyone to try). I really don't care enough to argue any further because we've both laid our points across: if neither of us budge after this point, it's likely we won't ever do so.

 

[UltiMario]

All this project is doing is taking a huge step in the wrong direction by putting broken elements into the metagame right off the bat. Dragon Priority? Dragon/Fire Charizard with enough stat buffs to potentially be Uber? Drizzle and Drought out of Ubers?

This isn't balancing Pokemon so far, its HORRIDLY UNBALANCING it.


THAT is my point here.

 

[CRASHiC]

Dragon will also hit steel for super effective too. How you feel about that Ulti?

 

[TLMSheikant]

I think some nerfs to the ubers would be good. I dont know how Wobbuffet could be fixed tho >_>.
Also:
Espeon- + Solarbeam, +Psycho Boost.

@ Crashic- dragon hitting steel would break them O_o, steel types are the only resist dragon has anyways. @_@

Ninja edit- ****it I just realized u were being sarcastic.

 

[UltiMario]

No need, Charizard already hits Steels with STAB Fire Blast which now has 180 Power and 100% Accuracy, oh, did I mention it has +2 Priority too?

 

[ss118]

All this project is doing is taking a huge step in the wrong direction by putting broken elements into the metagame right off the bat. Dragon Priority? Dragon/Fire Charizard with enough stat buffs to potentially be Uber? Drizzle and Drought out of Ubers?

This isn't balancing Pokemon so far, its HORRIDLY UNBALANCING it.


THAT is my point here.

meh. maybe we should have talked about how we would change the type chart before I went into specifics on pokemon.

**** this