Approved by The Immortal
So Baton Pass is this brokenly powerful play style that managed to get itself banned down to just one Pokemon on a team. It also was quite a limited play style, having few viable mons to form a competent team. So why don't we do something crazy and turn every team into a Baton Pass team? No, I don't mean by just giving every Pokemon Baton Pass. That would be boring and not that interesting. Instead, let's do something a little less than sane: Ordinary switching acts as a Baton Pass, passing along everything the mon is currently affected by that's Baton Passable, good or bad.
So suddenly all those wonderful set-up sweepers without the moves to use them can provide epic set-up support now. And now this meta will surely go straight to hyper-offense... right? Well, keep in mind defensive buffs, like Furfrou's Cotton Guard, are also passed along. And even more clever, all those otherwise useless debuff moves like Fake Tears and Scary Face? They pass too! No more can the opposing team just switch out of your Feather Dance, they have to take it like a man!
It should be noted that, beyond passing boosts and unboosts, among other things like Aqua Ring and Leech Seed, switching out is otherwise the same as always. It's still affected by Pursuit, still affected by trapping, and still unaffected by Taunt. Also, only regular switching (and Baton Pass itself) passes boosts. Volt Switch, U-Turn, Parting Shot, Whirlwind, Roar, Dragon Tail, Circle Throw, Eject Button, and Red Card to not allow Baton Passables to carry along, allowing players to ditch unwanted debuffs or force an opponent to restart their chain. It also should be noted that Baton Pass is still useful since it still allows for low priority switching to bring something in safely.
Also features Noivern without STAB Boomburst!
Bans
-Standard OU clauses
-Perish Song, because guaranteed KOs against teams without Parting Volturn or Soundproof is just lame and certain to be over centralizing
-Sand Attack, Flash, Kinesis, Mud-Slap, and Smokescreen for the same reasons Evasion is banned.
-Acupressure since its Evasion boost is much more reliably obtained and kept.
Suspect (Opinions very much welcome!)
-Mirror Shot, Mud Bomb, Secret Power, Muddy Water, Octazooka, and Night Daze may need to be banned too since they have accuracy drop chances. However, I'm not entirely sure since their chances are low or the move is very limited in distribution.
Unbans
-Baton Pass is completely unrestricted. Teams may have Baton Pass on all six members if they wish.
For reference, Baton Pass passes all of the following, and possibly some more I'm not aware of...
-Status buffs and drops, like Swords Dance and Screech
-Substitute
-Ingrain and Aqua Ring (note Ingrain requires the actual move still because of the trapping effect)
-Confusion status
-Leech Seed
-Embargo
-Focus Energy
-Gastro Acid
-Being the victim of Lock-on or Mind Reader
-Magnet Rise
-Power Trick
-Partial trapping
-Curse status
-Foresight and Odor Sleuth
-Nightmare status, if the passer and recipient are both asleep
There might be a few I'm not aware of or sure of and there might be one or two here that no longer pass. Smogon used to have a nice list, but it seems to have been lost when they updated their pokedex to the new format. If anyone knows of moves not listed that can be passed, or moves on here that can't be as of Gen VI, let me know. My internet researching has only brought up incomplete or out of date move lists.
So Baton Pass is this brokenly powerful play style that managed to get itself banned down to just one Pokemon on a team. It also was quite a limited play style, having few viable mons to form a competent team. So why don't we do something crazy and turn every team into a Baton Pass team? No, I don't mean by just giving every Pokemon Baton Pass. That would be boring and not that interesting. Instead, let's do something a little less than sane: Ordinary switching acts as a Baton Pass, passing along everything the mon is currently affected by that's Baton Passable, good or bad.
So suddenly all those wonderful set-up sweepers without the moves to use them can provide epic set-up support now. And now this meta will surely go straight to hyper-offense... right? Well, keep in mind defensive buffs, like Furfrou's Cotton Guard, are also passed along. And even more clever, all those otherwise useless debuff moves like Fake Tears and Scary Face? They pass too! No more can the opposing team just switch out of your Feather Dance, they have to take it like a man!
It should be noted that, beyond passing boosts and unboosts, among other things like Aqua Ring and Leech Seed, switching out is otherwise the same as always. It's still affected by Pursuit, still affected by trapping, and still unaffected by Taunt. Also, only regular switching (and Baton Pass itself) passes boosts. Volt Switch, U-Turn, Parting Shot, Whirlwind, Roar, Dragon Tail, Circle Throw, Eject Button, and Red Card to not allow Baton Passables to carry along, allowing players to ditch unwanted debuffs or force an opponent to restart their chain. It also should be noted that Baton Pass is still useful since it still allows for low priority switching to bring something in safely.
Bans
-Standard OU clauses
-Perish Song, because guaranteed KOs against teams without Parting Volturn or Soundproof is just lame and certain to be over centralizing
-Sand Attack, Flash, Kinesis, Mud-Slap, and Smokescreen for the same reasons Evasion is banned.
-Acupressure since its Evasion boost is much more reliably obtained and kept.
Suspect (Opinions very much welcome!)
-Mirror Shot, Mud Bomb, Secret Power, Muddy Water, Octazooka, and Night Daze may need to be banned too since they have accuracy drop chances. However, I'm not entirely sure since their chances are low or the move is very limited in distribution.
Unbans
-Baton Pass is completely unrestricted. Teams may have Baton Pass on all six members if they wish.
For reference, Baton Pass passes all of the following, and possibly some more I'm not aware of...
-Status buffs and drops, like Swords Dance and Screech
-Substitute
-Ingrain and Aqua Ring (note Ingrain requires the actual move still because of the trapping effect)
-Confusion status
-Leech Seed
-Embargo
-Focus Energy
-Gastro Acid
-Being the victim of Lock-on or Mind Reader
-Magnet Rise
-Power Trick
-Partial trapping
-Curse status
-Foresight and Odor Sleuth
-Nightmare status, if the passer and recipient are both asleep
There might be a few I'm not aware of or sure of and there might be one or two here that no longer pass. Smogon used to have a nice list, but it seems to have been lost when they updated their pokedex to the new format. If anyone knows of moves not listed that can be passed, or moves on here that can't be as of Gen VI, let me know. My internet researching has only brought up incomplete or out of date move lists.
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