Announcement np: SM OU Suspect Process, Round 5 - I Can't Escape Myself (ARENA TRAP BANNED)

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Of Moose & Men said:
Dude, the mental gymnastics are insane.

Trapinch itself is not "uncompetitive". Sheer Force / Hyper Cutter Trapinch is useless as all hell. Until Arena Trap is thrown into the mix, making it viable if Dugtrio is gone. You know why? Because the God damned ability is the issue.

You CONSTANTLY cherry pick and avoid the otherwise blatantly obvious. I, as well as most others, am not saying Diglett nor Trapinch the Pokemon are the issue. I have constantly stated this. What is the issue, is Arena Trap. Regardless of who the ability is attached to, it removes, not reduces, player choice, which is inherently "uncompetitive", which has already been addressed.

You keep gish galloping and avoiding the blatantly obvious. There's no discussion to be had if you constantly refuse to acknowledge what people are saying and instead cherry pick in a feeble attempt to try to get the precious "gotcha".
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It's the combination of Dugtrio and arena trap that's really the issue here. Trapinch plus Diglett are either too slow or too weak to be consistently effective in trapping ou threats. What is Trapinch going to trap with base 10 speed and 45/45/45 defenses? Diglett is a bit more effective but with base 55 attack it will be harder to trap that aren't 4X weak before it gets killed itself.
 
preserve said:
It's the combination of Dugtrio and arena trap that's really the issue here. Trapinch plus Diglett are either too slow or too weak to be consistently effective in trapping ou threats. What is Trapinch going to trap with base 10 speed and 45/45/45 defenses? Diglett is a bit more effective but with base 55 attack it will be harder to trap that aren't 4X weak before it gets killed itself.
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Even still, the fact that Diglett and Trapinch are being put up for consideration, much less with some players even seeing success with them, raises heavy alarms about how potent this ability really is.

If we really have to draw comparisons, let's take Diglett as the 'Gothorita' of this Arena Trap situation, while Trapinch acts as the 'Gothita'. While these Pokemon are certainly more limited than the respective main perpetrator in Dugtrio / Gothitelle, their ability still encompasses enough targets that allow them to control their matchups (albeit with Trapinch taking a bulkier approach). Even if they're not as inherently broken with the ability as Dugtrio is, I would personally say that they would be "acceptable collateral" for this blanket ban. Wobbuffet and Wynaut are even worse cases of collateral damage in comparison, but no one has been making much of an outcry for them since no one wants to deal with the explicit (and implicit) problems that the entire Shadow Tag Goth line brought, so it's not worth skirting around for a complex ban. In Diglett and Trapinch's case, some have already seen their effect in the prior Dugtrio-less meta so it's less implicit now, meaning there's even less ground to argue against (or for) Arena Trap from a theorymon perspective.
 
I *really* can't see why we are still arguing semantics regarding "losing" Trapinch and Diglett. These arguments are irrelevant because your goal isn't to determine what is being suspected - the suspect is already well under way, the council has stated their reasoning, and many good posters who are at least competent at the game have defended those reasons. I mean come on, this is like Facebook level of pettiness lol. Listen up.

A) Smogon doesn't ban "parts of Pokemon" i.e. no Kyogre w/o water moves with base power >= 80.
B) The council decided that Arena Trap is still uncompetitive after the Duggy test.
C) The council does not (want to) suspect the same Pokemon in a short time period.

In order to satisfy these three things simultaneously, Arena Trap must be on the chopping block. It's really that simple. So let's stop arguing semantics to keep two bad Pokemon in the tier, and start discussing why or why not Arena Trap is banworthy. That is the entire point of this thread. Speak up while you still can.
 
yeah my view on this arena trap issue is neutral. The pokemon dugtrio in itself isnt broken but the ability coupled with duggy's movepool that allows it to trap most "stallbreakers" or traditional checks to pokemon like zard-y( toxapex adapted so just tran). This makes the ability Arena Trap uncompetitive because it has no counterplay besides the rare shed shell. stall is definitely going to take a hit if arena trap ends up going. Also some people think just arena trap is just broken on duggy when that isnt true as diglett and trapinch; while they trap less, still get the job done. i dont know if i want it banned or not because the metagame has already adapted with shed shell mons (toxapex and the rare heatran), but even if some adapt some pokemon still get trapped unavoidably (chansey, mawile in certain cases, weakened megamedi, and countless other mons. my prediction if arena trap gets banned is that the metagame trends such as volc+dug and zard-y+dug will be invalidated and other pokemon that were trapped by dugtrio: ttar, nihilego, heatran, toxapex, etc, will see a boost in popularity and to some viability.
 
NixHex said:
I *really* can't see why we are still arguing semantics regarding "losing" Trapinch and Diglett. These arguments are irrelevant because your goal isn't to determine what is being suspected - the suspect is already well under way, the council has stated their reasoning, and many good posters who are at least competent at the game have defended those reasons. I mean come on, this is like Facebook level of pettiness lol. Listen up.

A) Smogon doesn't ban "parts of Pokemon" i.e. no Kyogre w/o water moves with base power >= 80.
B) The council decided that Arena Trap is still uncompetitive after the Duggy test.
C) The council does not (want to) suspect the same Pokemon in a short time period.

In order to satisfy these three things simultaneously, Arena Trap must be on the chopping block. It's really that simple. So let's stop arguing semantics to keep two bad Pokemon in the tier, and start discussing why or why not Arena Trap is banworthy. That is the entire point of this thread. Speak up while you still can.
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I'm not really arguing a complex ban as I know how smogon feels about it. I'm just trying to say that people need to be careful when they start arguing that weak mons are better than they actually are in order to justify a suspect ban.

Also, your example of a kyogre complex ban is way to general that shouldn't really apply to a potentially legit complex ban argument catering more towards specific ones.
 
Stall Guru J said:
yeah my view on this arena trap issue is neutral. The pokemon dugtrio in itself isnt broken but the ability coupled with duggy's movepool that allows it to trap most "stallbreakers" or traditional checks to pokemon like zard-y( toxapex adapted so just tran). This makes the ability Arena Trap uncompetitive because it has no counterplay besides the rare shed shell. stall is definitely going to take a hit if arena trap ends up going. Also some people think just arena trap is just broken on duggy when that isnt true as diglett and trapinch; while they trap less, still get the job done. i dont know if i want it banned or not because the metagame has already adapted with shed shell mons (toxapex and the rare heatran), but even if some adapt some pokemon still get trapped unavoidably (chansey, mawile in certain cases, weakened megamedi, and countless other mons. my prediction if arena trap gets banned is that the metagame trends such as volc+dug and zard-y+dug will be invalidated and other pokemon that were trapped by dugtrio: ttar, nihilego, heatran, toxapex, etc, will see a boost in popularity and to some viability.
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If Arena Trap is banned then obviously Dugtrio core will be invalidated??? What?

Also Pokemon "adapting" by using Shed Shell cannot be used as a non-ban argument by the very nature of the fact. These mons are being forced to run a sub-optimal item that is only used in one case, against Arena Trap. Diglett and Trapinch are pointless to talk about because we are suspecting the ability not the mons that use it, as I posted previously, please read the policy in OP.

Really I'm not sure about how much the knock-on affects of this ban should be considered in the decision, it will throw the meta off for a while until people discover what the hot new "broken" mechanic is. But at the end of the day if Arena Trap is uncompetitive (which it is) it should be banned.
 
Altervisi said:
Also Pokemon "adapting" by using Shed Shell cannot be used as a non-ban argument by the very nature of the fact.
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That is in fact a perfectly fine Argument, since multiple Mons run "suboptimal" (the usage of this word alone is already a mistake in itself, since if it lets the mon do the Job despite threat X on the enemy Team, it clearly IS the optimal item for it at a given time) items, spreads or moves just for ONE other threat in the metagame. It's just one of many excuses to normally acceptable rules that People are willing to make to get rid of it.
 
NVT_Sart said:
That is in fact a perfectly fine Argument, since multiple Mons run "suboptimal" (the usage of this word alone is already a mistake in itself, since if it lets the mon do the Job despite threat X on the enemy Team, it clearly IS the optimal item for it at a given time) items, spreads or moves just for ONE other threat in the metagame. It's just one of many excuses to normally acceptable rules that People are willing to make to get rid of it.
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I'm having difficulty understanding what you're trying to say. I'm going by assumption here, since it appears your post contradicts itself.

Aside from the...um, unique formatting, what you seem to be saying is that Altervisi's argument is acceptable because "forcing suboptimal items" is a bad argument. It seems you're contradicting yourself. So, because I'm nice, I'll assume you mean the opposite (the alternative is to assume you can't use proper English grammar, which I don't want to do).

About your argument, forcing items/moves (or suboptimal, as you seem to want to call it) onto mons specifically to deal with certain threats has always been a thorn in OU's side. Examples include Hidden Power Fire on random mons for Ferrothorn and Focus Blast on Mega Charizard Y for Heatran, moves which would have limited application outside of Ferrothorn/Heatran and would therefore be considered "suboptimal" by you.

I think the difference here is that we're not being forced to use HP Fire or Focus Blast, because we have an option to deal with Ferrothorn or Heatran with teammates. In other words, we can choose to switch and have a teammate handle the issue, instead of being forced to use HP Fire or Focus Blast.

Let me put it this way: when fighting an enemy counter/check, we have a choice: we can either use a "suboptimal" move/item to stop that check/counter, or we can switch and have a teammate solve the problem. With Dugtrio, we only have one choice: we can use a "suboptimal" move/item (because the choice to switch is unavailable).

That's why I think Dugtrio's forcing of "suboptimal" items is a bigger problem, because it removes the element of choice we have in dealing with Dugtrio. And given the problems Dugtrio poses to OU (namely murdering a near-countless amount of important OU mons almost completely for free), I think that problem starts to grow really quickly.

Does this make sense? I'm willing to elaborate further if I must. At least I actually make an effort to make my posts clear.
 
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Alright before this degenerates further:

Spoons of Justice is assuming that NVT_Sart's point is that Shed Shell is merely part of 'natural metagame progression', as various Pokemon, such as Toxapex, Tapu Lele, Hoopa-U, etc. are resorting to that specific item to escape Dugtrio's clutches.

However, Spoons brought up the fact that, unlike HP Fire on Latios or Tapu Koko to handle Ferrothorn, Psychium Z on Volcarona for Toxapex, or Focus Blast on Magearna or YZard to work around Heatran, Shed Shell is far more necessary than these other 'tech options'; Shed Shell users have much greater difficulty to forgo it in favor of other options, as Dugtrio's ability to deny them from switching out of the unfavorable matchup heavily diminishes the usefulness of other items they could use. These Pokemon become constrained and inflexible as a result, which can lead to metagame staleness. I likely have added a bit more to Spoon's initial post, but his post still has enough detail to sum up the thoughts of most people who look at NVT_Sart's post and think that his comparison of 'Dugtrio forcing Shed Shell' as a natural form of metagame progression isn't exactly comparable.

NVT_Sart, on the other hand, assumed that Spoons missed the entire point of his post, yet has done absolutely nothing to further clarify his post to point out exactly what Spoons is not understanding (and not gonna lie, from Spoons's detailed post I, even as just a spectator, would have assumed he understood your post quite well), and immediately resorted to dismissing Spoons as 'incompetent'.

Is that the gist of what I am seeing here?
 
I personally have to side with Spoons here on his end of the team building limitations argument. While some people think comparing Arena Trap to Shadow Tag is too broad, the Meta similarities at the time makes this whole thing seem like déjà vu; both are/were most well known to push stall to a whole new level while limiting item choices, as well as Pokemon themselves, more so than most anything else in their respective metagames. Good Pokemon are now forced to run an otherwise pointless item (unless you're Skarmory v Magnezone) just to escape and survive. This all we know and you'd think it would be enough to prove that it's uncompetitive, especially when Diglett, an otherwise garbage mon in this meta (you ain't no OU fighter, Mac baby!), had minor success during the Dugtrio Suspect Test, a testament to how bad the ability was in comparison to the Pokemon itself.
 
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NVT_Sart ... Something I'll add to Spoons of Justice 's argument as well is that, running a move like HP Fire or Focus Blast only takes one of four moveslots, and deals with multiple mons, Ttar, Bisharp, Heatran etc etc. Shed Shell uses your one and only item slot and only has use against one Pokemon *drumroll*, Dugtrio. It carries a far greater cost than running a coverage move and literally has one use, yet is held over so many other items because *drumrollpart2* Dugtrio is broken. At the end of the day I can't say anything else on a ban argument then I already have, but saying Shed Shell is natural progression is ridiculous. Name one other instance where an item is run solely for the purpose of countering one Pokemon?

Altervisi said:
OK, from reading through these posts I've found 5 major points that keep coming up as an argument for an Arena Trap ban, I've got to say I now have a solid stance on the issue. BAN

1. Dugtrio essentially guarantees one kill, with very little skill involved. Although this in itself is not the major issue, the fact is that with the trapping a player can essentially pick and choose one mon of their opponents to remove, which as BeardyBennett mentions allows your opponent to remove your obvious wincon, when they only lose Dugtrio (maybe) after he has done his job.

2. Dugtrio forces other mons to run sets/items that are suboptimal in literally every other situation. Yep, Shed Shell, the only other situation I've ever seen this used effectively is on Skarmory against Magnezone, but Skarmory isn't grounded anyway. Tapu Lele, Hoopa-U, and pretty much any stallbreaker are forced to run Shed Shell, which limits their effectiveness in all other situations.

3. Dugtrio is broken on a large number of archetypes, the main problem being stall. Dugtrio is incredibly effective at what it does on any kind of team, the reason people bring up stall as the number one issue is that the archetype as a whole is broken with the presence of Dugtrio. Again his effectiveness at removing stall/wallbreakers means that every stall team has to have Dugtrio or they are playing at a huge disadvantage to other stall teams, not to mention the fact that Dugtrio is also an answer to Chansey, Toxapex and Clefable (to name a few).

4. Arena Trap is just Shadow Tag by another name. I know they are not exactly the same but if we look back at the reasons Shadow Tag was banned in the first place a lot of these reasons can be applied to Arena Trap and not affecting non-grounded pokemon is not enough of a counter, as this makes up such a small portion of OU.

5. Dugtio buff, Groundium-Z and Baton Pass banned. I think these 3 factors are the major reason that Dugtrio has slipped under the radar until this Gen, his attack boost combined with his Nuclear option in Groundium-Z further backs up the point that he guarantees one kill for players with even the least amount of skill. To a lesser extent, I believe the removal of another escape option in Baton Pass has also aggravated the situation.



But, this isn't an argument on whether to ban Dugtrio, Arena Trap is being suspect tested. The point that a pokemon with mediocre stats is so powerful only because of its ability is surely more of a ban argument than a counter point?
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i agree with all your points. now that i've heard everyone out this ability ultimately needs to go. Its very unhealthy for the metagame right now. it wasn't much of a problem in oras because oras had lots of more defined stops to stall that usually don't get trapped by dugtrio with a few exceptions(also dugtrio had 80 base atk). But this gen the cores of dugtrio plus mega charizard-y and dugtrio plus the five stall staples made an unbalance in the metagame where most of the games were decided by skill and others by just pure match-up as seen in tours such as WCOP, OLT, etc.
 
I'd like to add something about Dugtrio guaranteeing a kill. The common counterargument to this is "You lose Dugtrio in the process."

Except for the fact that people have been using suicide leads for at least a decade... remember Gen 4 Azelf and Aerodactyl? (Btw this trip down memory lane is based off of the last time I played gen 4 OU which was like 2010 but there's a point). They all but guaranteed Rocks, unless Azelf got Taunted by opposing Aero. Granted, Azelf could (and usually did) boom the next turn to land a serious blow on the opponent, but the opponent at least had the option to switch to something like Rotom-A. If people were willing to go down one Pokemon for rocks, it's no surprise that they're willing to sac Dugtrio to take down a Pokemon. Combine that with team preview allowing you to save Dugtrio to kill whatever your opponent has that troubles you, at your bidding, and it becomes clear that trading a mon for a mon is not the disadvantage that people think it is. It's a short-sighted argument by people who think that Pokemon is a linear game (meaning they probably don't play it).
 
Alright this thread has run its course. People are starting to throw out insults and shit is getting mad wild with the massive amount of post deletions in the last few hours. Going to kill it here, because I'm fairly confident everything has already been discussed. Thanks for contributing.
 
Hi everyone, we'll be holding a live suspect tournament tomorrow, September 15th at 4 PM EDT. It will be hosted by Mr. Perry on smogtours and will adopt the suspect ladder in which Arena Trap is banned.

- 64 man tournament, only the Top 2 (Finals) players get reqs.
- 96 man tournament, only the Top 3 (Finals) players get reqs.
- 128 man tournament, only the Top 4 (Semi-Finals) players get reqs.
- 192 man tournament, only the Top 6 (Semi-Finals) players get reqs.
- 256 man tournament, only the Top 8 (Quarter-Finals) players get reqs.

Good luck to all reqs hunting. :toast:
 
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