RBY 2U General Discussion Thread

[Lusch]

i wasn't going to comment but holy fucking shit, this spiel is something else. if your opinion is so different from the community's (and it most often is), you're not leading anyone. you're just using your position to get people to follow you.


if you're a true leader right now, you respect the community's strong questions about the state of 2U and general ideas behind retiering as a whole - why did Rhydon end up in old 2U? is the 1U line in the proper place? do you actually know what you're doing, or just following what 'feels right' to you? can we have a discussion about the policies, when they've been shown to be faulty in places?

I really don't know why the 1U line is placed where it is. Why is it not immediately below Slowbro? Or immediately below Jynx? Or much lower, after Moltres and Articuno? Can we discuss this and establish a proper, logical way to go about retiering, now that we have an opportunity to restart from scratch with 2U and lowtiers as a whole?

Rhydon ended up in 2U because PP started the project when there were only a few people (even fewer) involved. And they just hated Rhydon at the time in 1U (did not have the clue they have now). It was a big mistake. Even I was not involved with it at the time (was around the time I joined PP). Had I been,I would have fought for Rhydon in 1U hard, believe me. The wrongdoing kept on, the banned the birds from 2U, a tier filled with viable water Pokemon to answer them (Tentacruel, Vaporen, Omastar). It is when 3U started, that more people joined the process (Peasounay and myself for example). I might be biased, but I think from then on, our tiering went great. Unfortunally the foundation was not solid...
Regarding the line. I think voting on C ranks is fine. Where else would you draw the line? Really below Slowbro? no, man. Including stuff like Moltres, Articuno, Hypno, which have their niche, but are never seen??? also no, man. (my opinions)

 

[Disaster Area]

The whole point regarding where to draw the line is that Pokemon above the line are good enough in a given tier that a player could use them fairly frequently in the tier without being put at a very significant disadvantage. That's the reason for it. The purpose of that is so that whatever a player's favourite Pokemon is, there is a tier where they can viably run it.

And yeah, Lusch is 100% right. Once 3U got going our processes I think improved quite a bit and we avoided using councils for anything really, the community really was in control of decision making from then on. And yes, Lusch is definitely right in saying that letting Rhydon down to 2U, and banning birds, was a mistake, and also that from then on the tiering was very good.

 

[Disaster Area]

Also, the importance of discussing 5U, even if eventually that metagame will probably change by the time we get to retiering it, is that it provides a data point when we want to talk about Wrap, and AgiliWrap, when we want to ask about whether they are so unhealthy that we should remove either of them from the game entirely.

 

[marcoasd]

marcoasd, seriously. Like, really... what you are doing here has nothing to do with RBY 2U...
I sincerely want you to state why you think the tier is "wrong" and what is "wrong" with it. Please... because honesstly, I have not been able to filter that from the book you've been writing, i'm sorry. I really wanna stay factual here. Please keep it to 2U. (pm me on discord if you want, I really want to know, because clearly we have different opinions here, I don't see the tiering as failed)

From what I could gather, you made a lot of arguments based on history. What does it matter? What does it matter what people used to play in old RBY? (the mechanics were not even correct, neither for Body Slam nor for Wrap mostly, and RBY2K10 had Wrap banned, I believe, so of course UU looked different). In my honest opinion (even though it seems to be "classical" RBY; which I can see what you mean by that), I don't understand why every RBY tier has to be hit and run or whatever you called it? 3U is very much hit and run, current 2U isn't. What's the big deal? Does every tier have to be a copy of the other, but with weaker mons? (except 1U, because no need for type diversity, cause Chansey)

I'm really trying to understand, please help me underatdn your point of view. And I assure you, flaming DA does not help me understand.

respectfully, Lusch

Which book exactly? The book about refusing to ban TWave or to allow the likes of Wrap, OHKO and evasion moves?

The fact that the historical memory of RBY is vanishing (Isa is somewhat the last other remaining guy, not willing to fight and mocking and possibly trolling us instead) is a problem too.
I played and tried to understand the classic tiers (not that we succeeded completely, I have to admit, but at least we showed some respect) before trying to make them better, and it looks like most people just want to directly make their thing right now - without any yardstick whatsoever.
Body Slam mechs don't have all that much of an impact on lower tiers, I don't know why you even bring that up.

And you pretty much said it yourself: 2U is different from OU because it doesn't have Recover trio, I don't know what happens with lower tiers and I don't support any kind of dominant threat: 3U might be the same as 2U, 4U might be about Amnesia and 5U about AgiliWrap DNair and fine with it.
It's only pretty natural for 2U to be hit and run, considering the pokemon which it includes (unless you want it to be a pathetic Wrap party...).

Flaming DA? Lol where? Just telling him in every possible way that we're hitting a wall after he told me that I'm just as much at fault as he is, so he doesn't care that much?

Rhydon ended up in 2U because PP started the project when there were only a few people (even fewer) involved. And they just hated Rhydon at the time in 1U (did not have the clue they have now). It was a big mistake. Even I was not involved with it at the time (was around the time I joined PP). Had I been,I would have fought for Rhydon in 1U hard, believe me. The wrongdoing kept on, the banned the birds from 2U, a tier filled with viable water Pokemon to answer them (Tentacruel, Vaporen, Omastar). It is when 3U started, that more people joined the process (Peasounay and myself for example). I might be biased, but I think from then on, our tiering went great. Unfortunally the foundation was not solid...
Regarding the line. I think voting on C ranks is fine. Where else would you draw the line? Really below Slowbro? no, man. Including stuff like Moltres, Articuno, Hypno, which have their niche, but are never seen??? also no, man. (my opinions)

This describes the specifics of major errors that happened in the tiering process (not that keeping two separate tiers for birds and the rest of 2U would be a mistake: the birds got simply overshadowed by Tentacruel, which speaks volumes), and they aren't unlikely to happen AGAIN only because you and Peasounay joined - of course it will help, but it's a bit arrogant to suppose it will be the cure of all problems.

 

[Heroic Troller]

I called "set in stone" this state because when Marcoasd brought up the complex ban, the answer has been "this is not how we re-tier". What should i say? When i arrived on pp that was chosen already and today i don't see any good (to me) reason to avoid complex bans, but just "we work this way" ok. If you are so scared of banning Tentacruel's Wrap only in 2u because could drop to 3u, just ban the move again if it looks broken there too, until you find Tentacruel's place with or without Wrap. I really don't understand why you are so afraid of changing your "guidelines", birds are broken without Tentacruel? There's a problem? Fix again! Even if it takes time...

 

[marcoasd]

And yeah, Lusch is 100% right. Once 3U got going our processes I think improved quite a bit and we avoided using councils for anything really, the community really was in control of decision making from then on. And yes, Lusch is definitely right in saying that letting Rhydon down to 2U, and banning birds, was a mistake, and also that from then on the tiering was very good.

The tiering went better because we all agreed on almost everything: the interest got lower and lower and we didn't face just as many issues with power level other than Nidoking and maybe Dragonair.
2U is more complicated (and causes domino effects too) with a huge number of tricky decisions which we don't agree on, but you're happy thumbupping each others and going ahead, wearing blinders and pretending everything is ok...

 

[The Idiot Ninja]

Rhydon ended up in 2U because PP started the project when there were only a few people (even fewer) involved. And they just hated Rhydon at the time in 1U (did not have the clue they have now). It was a big mistake. Even I was not involved with it at the time (was around the time I joined PP). Had I been,I would have fought for Rhydon in 1U hard, believe me. The wrongdoing kept on, the banned the birds from 2U, a tier filled with viable water Pokemon to answer them (Tentacruel, Vaporen, Omastar). It is when 3U started, that more people joined the process (Peasounay and myself for example). I might be biased, but I think from then on, our tiering went great. Unfortunally the foundation was not solid...

Okay, then we need to make sure the foundation is solid. Which is what I'm doing by asking a lot of questions and double checking every assumption about how to go about retiering.

Regarding the line. I think voting on C ranks is fine. Where else would you draw the line? Really below Slowbro? no, man. Including stuff like Moltres, Articuno, Hypno, which have their niche, but are never seen??? also no, man. (my opinions)

Well, I think this is a point worth debating. First of all, do we know exactly how good all of those less common pokémon really are? I have an Hypno build that's been working well for me, since you brought him up. He's perfectly 1U-viable, in my opinion/experience. But more importantly, SPL has shown Victreebell is perfectly 1U-viable AND much stronger than some of the pokemon above the line, yet he sits below the line. I haven't experimented with DNite, but I'm willing to bet not many, if any at all, have experimented with him at the top level recently, and we might be surprised if we try him more seriously. I'm not saying all of the ranks are wrong, far from it; but some things might - and will, inevitably - be found to be off over time, as new experimentation and metagame trends evolve, ESPECIALLY around the 'just viable enough' line. What do we do when that happens? Do we have a contingency plan other than blaming our stupid past selves for not having a "solid foundation"? I don't think we do, and we NEED to have one, or this debate will happen again and again and again.
Do we want our lowtiers to change and evolve and have mons rising and dropping regularly? If yes, establish a plan to make that happen, and establish how often you want it to happen. Do we want our lowtiers to be static and established so that they can develop better? Then find an answer for the inevitable cases where you mess up (Drowzee dropping to 5U is a shining example, you cannot claim that tiering went much smoother when slip ups like that one still happened), and find an answer for whatever happens when the metagame shifts and some stuff falls in and out of viability.

I believe these questions are of much larger importance than the specific issue of Wrap and Tentacruel right now.

 

[Lusch]

That might be true. About Victreebel. We on PP had a vote at some point when we started retiering 2U. We voted on the C-Rank Pokemon. We in this case was anyone particpating regularly enough in seasons so that they had a ceratin amount of points (don't remember how many). Victreebel was voted by the majority of people to not be 1U worthy and thus ended up in 2U (for what it's worth, I voted it 1U,wasn't enough...). Hypno is "viable" in the broader sense (which is why I grouped him with the birds), but still there are not too many reasons to use him, if you're really honest.
Drowzee in 5U I cannot comment too much cause I never played 5U. The explanation as to why he ended up there is pretty simple. You had better Psychic types available in the higher tiers. (2U Hypno and Kadabra, 3U Mr. Mime, 4U Abra). You might argue Drowzee is not worse than Abra, but in the 4U environment where speed is worth gold, Abra was the choice players went with.

I'm going to answer marcoasd some time later or tomorrow. I'm relatively busy today and want to keep it businessmenlike, like really I don't mean to attack anyone, no need to get defensive.

 

[marcoasd]

Do we want our lowtiers to change and evolve and have mons rising and dropping regularly? If yes, establish a plan to make that happen, and establish how often you want it to happen. Do we want our lowtiers to be static and established so that they can develop better? Then find an answer for the inevitable cases where you mess up (Drowzee dropping to 5U is a shining example, you cannot claim that tiering went much smoother when slip ups like that one still happened), and find an answer for whatever happens when the metagame shifts and some stuff falls in and out of viability.

I believe these questions are of much larger importance than the specific issue of Wrap and Tentacruel right now.

This piece possibly explains why I think that the current "system" failed better than I did, and I think we should forget it entirely: we got 5/6 tiers and had fun with them - you can always write them somewhere and play them as RBY OU friendly matches.

We need something more static, involving more players so we can develop it.

 

[Disaster Area]

Okay, then we need to make sure the foundation is solid. Which is what I'm doing by asking a lot of questions and double checking every assumption about how to go about retiering.

Alright, good, nothing wrong with that.

If we do choose to use complex or non-transitive bans, then I would really hope that everyone involved understands the consequences of that.

Well, I think this is a point worth debating.

Sure.

I'm not saying all of the ranks are wrong, far from it; but some things might - and will, inevitably - be found to be off over time, as new experimentation and metagame trends evolve, ESPECIALLY around the 'just viable enough' line. What do we do when that happens?

When our opinion changes of whether something belongs above or below a line, we do what we did the first time: we discuss and vote on changes, and then if anything changes then we test the tier below with the changes, and so on. It's slower and less dynamic than a usage based system, but it's the only really logical way of doing things.

You're perfectly right in this post, basically you're acknowledging something which isn't talked about much, which is that what's legal in lower tiers will very likely change over time, and the further down u go the more likely it is that the metagame will change at some point in the future. That is the nature of doing a sort of tiering where we can make changes.

That might be true. About Victreebel. We on PP had a vote at some point when we started retiering 2U. We voted on the C-Rank Pokemon. We in this case was anyone particpating regularly enough in seasons so that they had a ceratin amount of points (don't remember how many). Victreebel was voted by the majority of people to not be 1U worthy and thus ended up in 2U (for what it's worth, I voted it 1U,wasn't enough...). Hypno is "viable" in the broader sense (which is why I grouped him with the birds), but still there are not too many reasons to use him, if you're really honest.

This is why I would like it if like anyone at all actually tried to discuss who should be in the voter pool on who gets to make changes, but whenever I do threads about it literally noone responds.

Drowzee in 5U I cannot comment too much cause I never played 5U.

TIN is talking about how good Drowzee is in 4U (saying it should not be legal in 5U). I agree w/ him. We didn't realise how good Drowzee was in 4U until the 4U world championship, but it's definitely a good Pokemon in the meta.

 

[Isa]

Side note since i was mentioned.

The 2k10 tiers were complete wingings. I enjoyed all the tiers at the time but they were very centralized. The BL tier was reasonable (jolt pers cuno deemed ou on power level) but uu and uu was waterworld. No metrics existed to my knowledge (the tiers existed before i joined).

I think PPs model for retiering is fair. I cannot comment on the quality of the outcome but the retiering follows good principles. Keep them. If not, ban reflect on chansey in 1u

 

[The Idiot Ninja]

what's legal in lower tiers will very likely change over time, and the further down u go the more likely it is that the metagame will change at some point in the future. That is the nature of doing a sort of tiering where we can make changes.

So do you think these shifts are inevitable and will happen frequently? If yes, set a system in place to make them happen smoothly and regularly (note: I think this is not the way to go, and so does marco if I understood him correctly). If no, get to work on making a FINAL version of "the 1U line" - which as of right now DEMANDS at least one change in Victreebell and I don't think anyone can deny this - and establish procedures to handle mistakes, to cover our back if and when we make mistakes on placing the line. "We just kinda agree on this" is not a sustainable way to go about tiering. Once 2U is updated accordingly, talk about Tentacruel and Wrap will have a place again.

 

[marcoasd]

Side note since i was mentioned.

The 2k10 tiers were complete wingings. I enjoyed all the tiers at the time but they were very centralized. The BL tier was reasonable (jolt pers cuno deemed ou on power level) but uu and uu was waterworld. No metrics existed to my knowledge (the tiers existed before i joined).

I think PPs model for retiering is fair. I cannot comment on the quality of the outcome but the retiering follows good principles. Keep them. If not, ban reflect on chansey in 1u

This catches me off guard: I didn’t think you would like this (are you serious?), but on the other hand I expected you to support newgens guidelines for tiering in RBY – which is something that looks totally out of this world to me given the size of the tier (which would be enough of a reason) and the playerbase too, but hey you became a smogoner at some point after all.

Anyway, PP’s tiering model is definitely better than rby 2k10’s – which was simply “we’re not going to play more than 3 tiers, so let’s just make 3 big groups”.
With PP’s tiering, every pokemon is going to see some decent usage, which is a great criteria: I support that as a general rule of thumb, but it’s extremely ambitious too.
The main problem of it is that it requires reccurring attentions (that we fail to provide because the playerbase is rightfully busy playing tournaments…): it doesn’t have an ending, so it keeps the doors shut for any other possible system to ever get a shot.
But hey “that’s how the system works”: you can check out any time you like but you can never leave.

Spoiler

Talking about singles, RBY 2k10’s BL was better than PP’s 2U for one reason alone: it had trapping moves banned (I guess… because I don’t have memories of them anyway).
Jolteon used to be a nice addition too (yeah, it was good but that tier should be tested again…); don’t know would happen with Articuno and Moltres (which we didn’t think was that good), and I don’t remember Persian being that much of a problem.

Back to us, there are just too many bones of contention: Jynx, Gengar, Persian, Victreebel, Golem, Tentacruel, Dragonite, Jolteon…. It looks like everything which isn’t in the top 10 RBY OU list is up for discussion, and it could shift whenever we can be bothered with it.

So do you think these shifts are inevitable and will happen frequently? If yes, set a system in place to make them happen smoothly and regularly (note: I think this is not the way to go, and so does marco if I understood him correctly). If no, get to work on making a FINAL version of "the 1U line" - which as of right now DEMANDS at least one change in Victreebell and I don't think anyone can deny this - and establish procedures to handle mistakes, to cover our back if and when we make mistakes on placing the line. "We just kinda agree on this" is not a sustainable way to go about tiering. Once 2U is updated accordingly, talk about Tentacruel and Wrap will have a place again.

Shifts are going to happen, and part of those things I just listed are going to be discussed over and over again depending on how they perform in OU following the current system – which is the thing I’m actually contesting: we’re trying to use Smogon’s newgen (unsustainable) tiering criterias on RBY OU while claiming that we want to differ from Smogon…

I feel like we should use totally different criterias and allow the Wrapless version of Victreebel (Tentacruel, DNite) in 2U as it should be (you didn’t see the years of Victreebel’s absence from RBY OU in terms of usage).
I feel like the original RBY 2K10’s RBY OU list was pretty accurate as a “FINAL OU LINE”, bar GolDon also because having Graveler as the next Rock-Ground thing looks pretty awful and one of the two between Golem and Rhydon is destined to a low usage in OU.
The impact of Golem to a 2U tier has never been tested (I suggest you that Haunter is the only Explosion user that sees play in 2U).
So again, totally different criterias IMO when you have 151 pokemon (most of them being terrible) instead of 700 – and even more, I don’t like the fact that the counterpart isn’t open to other options.
All in all, I took part to the current tiering system until the very end as a player/tester… I completed one full cycle of it.

 

[Disaster Area]

So do you think these shifts are inevitable and will happen frequently?

Somewhat frequently. It depends a bit on stuff like how often the tiers are played, but, particularly in later generations, yes.

If yes, set a system in place to make them happen smoothly and regularly (note: I think this is not the way to go, and so does marco if I understood him correctly).

What alternatives do you suggest?

we’re trying to use Smogon’s newgen (unsustainable) tiering criterias on RBY OU while claiming that we want to differ from Smogon…

We don't have to differ with Smogon on everything. We don't differ with them for the sake of contrarianism. We differ with them because we disagree with them on some stuff.

 

[Ortheore]

Hi all, this discussion has gone way off-topic, to the point where I'll be deleting any more posts that aren't related to 2U

If you wish to continue discussing the tiering project as a whole rather than things specific to 2U, please use this thread:
Community - Discussion on the tiering project | Pokémon Perfect

 

[Ortheore]

Signups Open - RBY 2U New Frontiers Redux | Pokémon Perfect

Bumping because rebooting New Frontiers.

I guess the biggest question at this point (for those with experience with this tier) is; do we feel we need a suspect? Obviously this would most likely be of Tenta, but other suggestions are always welcome. Personally I think it's dominant enough that it merits at least a suspect, although I'm not sure whether or not I'd ban it. Its impacts on the meta are nothing short of absurd, but I feel like its impact on actual matches, while still dominant, is not nearly as notable. That said, this is the kind of thing that actual play will be useful for, just refreshing opinions.

Also, what are some underrated threats you think are worth exploring?

 

[Disaster Area]

Hmm, having watched a bit, I don't think that Tentacruel really limits the competitive depth of the tier. If anything it might actually increase it, and I think 2U is adequately competitively deep as it is. I don't think Tenta is suspect worthy.

Will have to play some though to get more opinions on stuff!~

 

[Lusch]

I think we should suspect Tentacruel. See what the meta looks like without it. 2U is playable with Tentacruel, but it is heavily centralizing and honestly just very restricting.

Theorymonning in case of an eventual Tenta ban:
Articuno and Moltres get stronger because they lose a good check that even outspeeds them (granted, you don't really want to switch Tento in too often, casue it does not like both burn and freeze (obv)).
Dragonite gets stronger, because the tier loses one naturally faster mon that threatens the 1HKO. It is already the second best Pokemon in the tier imo, so this might be problematic. That means we need to keep an eye open for those Pokemon in particular.
On the other hand a lot of slow stuff that "should" be good (simply because there are good Pokemon overall, but not used because you really can't afford to stackk too many slow Pokemon because of Tentacruel) would be more viable. Don't really wanna think of concrete Pokemon right now, but I know there are a few I have considered using but "couldn't" because Tenta would be too problematic. Yet one example does come to mind. Simply the fact that the ground type of choice in this tier is weak ass Dugtrio (as opposed to Sandslash for example, an actual good Pokemon) is kinda weired. The only reason is Tentacruel.

 

[marcoasd]

It's been almost half a year, tier was put on a hold/not being played in tournaments and I don't remember a single thing - still Tentacruel is worrisome.
Didn't you figure that Wrap is the problem with both Tentacruel and Dragonite (in case Tentacruel gets somehow hammered and Articuno + Moltres do as well soon after)?
I would start everything by simply banning Wrap for Dragonite and Tentacruel, at the end of the day it would save both of them from being unused through all of the tiers and one of the purposes of tiering is using all of the pokemon at some point, isn't it?.
Leave the current, Wrap-allowing, version as "Ubers of 2P"? So you can make a sheltered decision on banning Moltres and Articuno from 2U after giving them a home?

Anyway, I won't be able to play in tournaments for another month at least.

 

[Lusch]

I understand the point. But I personally am opposed to something like "ban Wrap on Dnite and Tenta", because then you can also say similar things for Ubers/OU such as "ban Soft-Boiled on Mew" or (probably a bit more relevant) "ban Reflect on Snorlax and Chansey".
Once again, I get the point, but it just leaves too much room for ambiguity for my taste.

Before the argument "Wrap is special/boring" or whatever and thus it is not comparable to something like Reflect comes:
Yes, I compare them and do in fact believe they are comparable, simply because they both are moves that, while doing completely different things, are (and this is questionable if you want) "broken" on certain Pokemon in a tier [Snorlax and Chansey in 1U, Tentacruel and Dragonite in 2U] while being totally fine on other Pokemon in said tiers [Alakazam in 1U, Victreebel in 2U]. So yea... I in fact believe this is a comparable situation to 1U and for the sake of consistency, if we leave one thing untouched in terms of banning moves, we should not open that can of worms for the other tier.