BH BH7 Suspect #8: Contrary - Voter ID & Information

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E4 Flint

-inactive in BH due corrupt leader-
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
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What?
I am beginning a suspect on implementing the Contrary as per discussion in the Suspect Thread and the Suspect Poll (more information below)

Why?
(Original Announcement - including my thoughts on the issue)
Recap/Summary on the presence of Contrary in BH:
  • A long running ability the BH playerbase seems to always have had a Love-Hate relationship with, Contrary has seen use in BH since it was released, with a lot of straightforward offense high-power spamming sweepers being used
  • Recap: A Contrary Pokemon that has a stat stage raised is lowered instead, and vice versa
  • The following moves are very popular and often abused with Contrary users (in no particular order, non-exhaustive): Superpower, V-Create, Dragon Ascent, Close Combat, Psycho Boost, Draco Meteor, Leaf Storm, Fleur Cannon, Overheat
  • The combination of these moves with new ones released in gen 7 like Fleur Cannon, and Moongeist Beam, Photon Geyser and Sunsteel Strike - collectively referred to as the "MoldMoves" due to their intrinsic feature of ignoring the opponent's ability - have started a discussion on whether Contrary users are now too much to handle
How?
  • We will be using the new suspect process laid out by Zarel here(aka no COIL). I already did not support game limits so that shouldn't be an issue.
    Therefore the requirements simply are 85 GXE with at least 38 games.
  • Do so by making a new alt with the sequence "CON" in it anywhere, but not separated.
  • The alt must have a creation date on or after May 19, 2019.
ContrastHologram ✓
CovalentHologram X
  • I will also hold a mini contest, where the alt I like the most will also be given a shoutout during the final announcement in the BH Discord (and maybe even a custom role) and the voting thread on Smogon
I have several reasons: allows me to eyeball ladder/room for suspect activity for future suspect tweaks, lets people know who are participating in suspect/raises awareness, etc. However, the key one that should matter is that if you don't have an alt with one with reqs, you can't vote/I won't count your vote.
NEW! The rest of smogon seems to now agree with me and this seems to be how most suspects are done now! Wouldn't you believe it..
Where?
You must post your proof of reqs in this thread and play your games on the main pokemonshowdown.com sim. Contrary will be in effect in the ladder for the duration of this suspect.

Do:

  • Post your proof and, if you wish, your stance on the matter briefly, in this thread. Read the following CAREFULLY on how to do so:
    • you MUST FIRST AND FOREMOST PROVIDE AN IMAGE OF THE ALT WITH PROOF OF OWNERSHIP. I can't stress that last part enough. Refer to these examples of how to do this: example1example2example3
      • If you don't do at least the above, your vote won't be counted. I will be very strict about this.
  • Post in this thread if you have any questions about THIS SUSPECT PROCESS
Do NOT:
  • Post your stance in detail on the matter in this thread without proof. (Why? Post in the main suspect thread instead)
  • Post anything in this thread unrelated to this suspect (with or without proof)
When?
This suspect period will last until 11:59PM Sunday, June 2, 2019 (<-this link will show how much time is left). I will try to begin the voting immediately after confirming some other details on how it will be done and posting the Voter Id Thread similar to past suspects.

GLHF!
---
TLDR?
 
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Aight shoutouts to A loser I used his pikachu team for ez reqs (the beedrill one), got one contrary countersweep but honestly the games I had weren't really good so I'll play some more cause I'm undecided rn.

Here's a pretty good team featuring contrary if anyone wants to try it out and doesn't normally build with contra: https://pokepast.es/fc4693992f094fbf

Completely forgot about the alt contest so I guess I'm not getting a shoutouts this time :/
 
What?
I am beginning a suspect on implementing the Contrary as per discussion in the Suspect Thread and the Suspect Poll (more information below)

Why?
(Original Announcement - including my thoughts on the issue)
Recap/Summary on the presence of Contrary in BH:
  • A long running ability the BH playerbase seems to always have had a Love-Hate relationship with, Contrary has seen use in BH since it was released, with a lot of straightforward offense high-power spamming sweepers being used
  • Recap: A Contrary Pokemon that has a stat stage raised is lowered instead, and vice versa
  • The following moves are very popular and often abused with Contrary users (in no particular order, non-exhaustive): Superpower, V-Create, Dragon Ascent, Close Combat, Psycho Boost, Draco Meteor, Leaf Storm, Fleur Cannon, Overheat
  • The combination of these moves with new ones released in gen 7 like Fleur Cannon, and Moongeist Beam, Photon Geyser and Sunsteel Strike - collectively referred to as the "MoldMoves" due to their intrinsic feature of ignoring the opponent's ability - have started a discussion on whether Contrary users are now too much to handle
How?
  • We will be using the new suspect process laid out by Zarel here(aka no COIL). I already did not support game limits so that shouldn't be an issue.
    Therefore the requirements simply are 85 GXE with at least 38 games.
  • Do so by making a new alt with the sequence "CON" in it anywhere, but not separated.
  • The alt must have a creation date on or after May 19, 2019.

  • I will also hold a mini contest, where the alt I like the most will also be given a shoutout during the final announcement in the BH Discord (and maybe even a custom role) and the voting thread on Smogon
I have several reasons: allows me to eyeball ladder/room for suspect activity for future suspect tweaks, lets people know who are participating in suspect/raises awareness, etc. However, the key one that should matter is that if you don't have an alt with one with reqs, you can't vote/I won't count your vote.
NEW! The rest of smogon seems to now agree with me and this seems to be how most suspects are done now! Wouldn't you believe it..
Where?
You must post your proof of reqs in this thread and play your games on the main pokemonshowdown.com sim. Contrary will be in effect in the ladder for the duration of this suspect.

Do:

  • Post your proof and, if you wish, your stance on the matter briefly, in this thread. Read the following CAREFULLY on how to do so:
    • you MUST FIRST AND FOREMOST PROVIDE AN IMAGE OF THE ALT WITH PROOF OF OWNERSHIP. I can't stress that last part enough. Refer to these examples of how to do this: example1example2example3
      • If you don't do at least the above, your vote won't be counted. I will be very strict about this.
  • Post in this thread if you have any questions about THIS SUSPECT PROCESS
Do NOT:
  • Post your stance in detail on the matter in this thread without proof. (Why? Post in the main suspect thread instead)
  • Post anything in this thread unrelated to this suspect (with or without proof)
When?
This suspect period will last until 11:59PM Sunday, June 2, 2019 (<-this link will show how much time is left). I will try to begin the voting immediately after confirming some other details on how it will be done and posting the Voter Id Thread similar to past suspects.

GLHF!
---
TLDR?


Aight shoutouts to A loser I used his pikachu team for ez reqs (the beedrill one), got one contrary countersweep but honestly the games I had weren't really good so I'll play some more cause I'm undecided rn.

Here's a pretty good team featuring contrary if anyone wants to try it out and doesn't normally build with contra: https://pokepast.es/fc4693992f094fbf

Completely forgot about the alt contest so I guess I'm not getting a shoutouts this time :/
So there isn't going to be a suspect ladder this time (or are his reqs kaput)?
 
176138

Here are the reqs, if somebody fight ferearw, destroy him, burn him, starve his family, kill his friends and tease him after please (but in the rules of the sport and in all friendship of course). WARNING ! This gerhsgidhf of noob haxx about 18 times a turn ... :)

More seriously, I'll vote no ban for Contrary, because it's good only in good teams. You can maybe forbid to use it on 2 mons but I always have at least 1 counter or a Dbond prank. If you want to beat 1 user of contrary, any imposter works 99% of the time. So it might be a dumb ability, it's still like Dazzling, simple, ... : manageable.
 
176151

My pseudo means "I'm really dumb" in french. And yes I had some troubles with the ladder (Use a subteam with a lead Audino PH when you meet a lot of Ray Specs Aerilate and Lead Choice Trick... I got a lot of bad match-up)

I don't know if Contrary is really broken or not, I use an HO with one Sceptile Contrary (which did a good 5 victory for 1 defeat in BH SSNL), but isn't the Sceptile who is broken, it get only between 0 and 2 kills by matches (and 2 kills is very rare). Maybe Ray and MMY are the most powerful user of Contrary because they can run also some good sets (Aerilate Specs, Triage, SF, Tinted Lens...), and Mixed Contrary can be pain (specially with M-Ray).

The first hit doesn't hit so hard, doesn't have priority, Physical sets can be walled by a Giratina Fur Coat or Prankster, Special sets can be walled by a steel Flash fire who spamming Spectral Thief for example.Mixed sets are harder to check.
Destiny bond can be useful to stop Contrary (but isn't good for the meta, i think and predictable if the Contrary isn't a Full-Attacker).
Imposter can deal with Contrary specially with scarf, because Contrary is hard to improof. You can do this with Plate by the way. And if you improof your Contrary, you lose power.
For this case I got an old replay of WCoOM with a Ray Contrary improof by a Magearna, but my Registeel tank this also : https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7balancedhackmons-829619838

Some sets can deal with this but I'm not fan to had this kind of set just for that like Registeel Prankster Haze + Topsy.
Also 2 Contrary in one team can be horrible to deal with this (The new Ability Clause can be create just for that)
I didn't have a lot of trouble with Contrary but when I see a lot of high ladder complaining about that, maybe I missed something what make Contrary broken. If some player can explain me why they really want ban that and why it is so important, i'm listening.

Good luck for your suspect!
 

cityscapes

Take care of yourself.
is a Tiering Contributoris a Community Contributor Alumnus
spammed contrary, he won less than 20% of the games altho that doesnt mean anything bc i didnt play anyone good. sub 1600 gang


aight heres the hl special HOW TO BEAT CONTRARY EZ. in this post i will be providing counterpoints to the points flint provided on why contrary is a problem. i will also be giving specific teams as examples to further my point. lets get into it gamers.

[Moves that can be used with Contrary] have expanded with the beginning of the new gen, specifically with Fleur Cannon. Coverage options can also be used, the most popular of them currently being the "MoldMoves", Photon, Sunsteel and Moongeist, but can also be used in conjunction with Power Trip and Priority.
this is true. contrary did improve in gen 7 with new moves and stuff. this point does little to illustrate why contrary is allegedly broken, though, and instead just argues for its viability.
Unaware can now be pierced through with the so called "MoldMoves", all of which together have decent coverage.
As from upside (1), the pool of Unaware users has been limited as the main mons that can tank the MoldMoves are defeated by +0 Contrary SE moves.
Because of these points, Unaware has seen decreased use this gen, meaning that this would fall into "preparing against one thing leads to a worse matchup against other threats"
in my opinion unaware has always been a super niche ability, at least since usum came out. it's a reactive thing that gives up momentum, which is fine on some stalls but bad on balances where you need to get this slow pokemon in and recover somehow. it is also, for the most part, pretty inefficient at checking offense outside of specific mons, including vs contrary. also, the fact that unaware can be unreliable vs contrary in itself means that when it is used, it's not exclusively to prepare for contrary.
[Spectral Thief can be used to turn the match around vs. Contrary], but it is not fair to expect to use Spectral Thief every single turn, and without Unaware, which as was discussed earlier is seeing decreased use, it is often difficult to bring in something with heightened offenses and then survive and use Spectral Thief. And your Spec Thief user has to also think about the play of facing Imposter right afterward. Contrary has the capability of providing "momentum" while staying in.
ok, let's consider some other moves the defensive mon might have:

- pivoting should work fine if you have any sort of revenge killer, which you really should on balance. even something like regenvest ogre can be brought in, eat a +2 hit, and retaliate.
- recover is honestly a pretty bad move to click vs mmy/scept/etc with unrevealed set. i'd only click it on a mon good in the matchup that can effectively wall them even factoring in contrary, like unaware ho oh vs unrevealed scept.
- defog should never be clicked vs an offensive mon that could potentially be a threat w contrary. you just dont do this.
- core enforcer/worryseed can work if u have a regenvest dude in the back to eat the +2 hit.
- topsy is a good move to click if youre scared of contrary but can handle other sets, or you know the set already. one of the better options.

if youre using a defensive mon without either pivoting or topsy and you're sick of losing to contrary as balance, just run paralysis like nuzzle or something on the set. it's not that hard and doesn't fall under leading to a worse matchup vs other threats, because all offensive sets hate paralysis so it ends up being really useful even outside of contrary.
[Fat mons with Destiny Bond/Haze(?)/Encore(???) can do a good job at handling Contrary], however see previous points on the expanded coverage of Contrary, and how it is unreasonable to expect being able to switch in and spam such moves, and also they can just switch out.
i dont know what this point is saying. the prank user cant come in and spam dbond? how? the mmy can just switch out like every other offensive threat when it faces a counter??? what is this
Shedinja doesn't work because they have Mold Breaker moves
i honestly really like the shed vs contrary matchup. going hard shed then hard imposter is an option vs like mray that does a great job at scouting for photon. scarf imposter + shed espeed for sash in general is already super good vs contrary without even factoring in shed's teammates. he might not hard counter but that doesn't really matter here.
MOLD BREAKER MOVES ARE THE REAL PROBLEM :blobastonished:
irrelevant here
Imposter + Spectral Thief walls/RegenVest is matchup reliant and often unsustainable throughout a match
you can usually sense whether or not contrary is on a team from preview and play accordingly from there. imposter will put in work in every matchup outside of that dumb mray set that never does anything anyway. all imposter-proofers will take a significant amount from one of the contrary user's attacks except shed, who can be pressured by playing proactively with your hazard setters. ate users can be kept healthy and you can keep in mind what percentage they can revenge kill the contrary user from. (all contrary users are pretty weak to ate except like vcreate/ks mmy.) ill go into that in more detail here.

here are some example teams i have that dont lose to contrary, and the building process behind them.
https://pokepast.es/6d4fef2d36d232a1 bowser jr collab
original offensive core. ogre offers some defensive utility and can hurt mmy with knock, but in general both are really weak to contrary.
regenvest steela is added to imposter proof mray while taking on the scary specs ray and triage to some extent, and generates momentum by pivoting on stuff like giratina. it also loses to contrary.
scarf imposter is added to better take care of triage ray while providing insurance vs smash sweepers and contrary. it doesnt do a great job at directly switching in but can come in if steela lives a hit and uturns or something, or if steela comes in on a psycho boost and switches out on vcreate.
legendary fc 0 atks cress is the fire resist for blaziken and vcreate mmy. steela lives unboosted overheat well enough already. topsy means its not setup bait so this mon ends up handling contrary quite well especially considering uturn steela (which comes in if u drop their spa). i hate needing defog on literally all teams.
prank guzzlord is needed to not lose to drum and gar. as far as opposing setup is concerned its not really needed for anything else (steela uturn into imposter can handle most of the goons on offense) so dbond can safely be run here. if they dont have drum or gar, which are both extremely obvious at preview, you can just dbond the contrary away and go to imposter if you get killed on the switch by fleur cannon. not that hard.

this team can overall blanket check contrary pretty easily despite how weak the offensive core is to it thanks to the use of cress, regenvest, prank dbond, and scarf imposter. losing to it is pretty unlikely unless they outplay in which case they deserve to win anyway lol

but what if you dont have imposter?
https://pokepast.es/0ac72279d586c629 third strike
offensive mon + imposter proofer. seeds is used on audino to be less passive vs imposter and does a great job making sure it lives 2 hits from contrary in a 1v1. kee berry is also great for this. the core overall does pretty well vs contrary considering that arceus lives 1 from everyone except mmx then proceeds to kill w +3 boomburst.
needed this boy to not lose to ray and diancie. nuzzles contrary but doesnt beat it 1v1 and loses to superpower.
gira is a good choice since i needed a fighting resist and fairies are already covered by the don. he takes on mmx decently and can 1v1 all contrary variants thanks to core + sap living +2 fleur.
dialga covers most sleep users decently while providing a non passive mon which is nice. also blocks hazards from common passive dudes (ph mmx is already covered well by gira while bastiodon counters diancie). it loses to contrary but can live 1 hit from everyone except mmx and hit back with core.
dumb meme set that cant check or come in on contrary but can win if its already boosted. its meant to get initiative vs more passive teams.

this team overall handles contrary super well. although on paper nothing switches into contrary, in practice contrary tends to have a pretty annoying time getting started up as well, and without photon/sunsteel they're limited to 1 kill by audino even assuming they can set up.

but what if you don't have unaware?
https://pokepast.es/90dad8a095aef710 soup time
initial offensive core with an imposter proofer for diancie. fun fact, revdance arceus actually still works so the set is still imposter proof. diancie provides a good revenge killer for contrary, arceus can live a hit but cant hope to switch in without getting overwhelmed, while mmx is a liability here.
prank glare xern is added, partially as an imposter proofer for mmx and partially as an offense killer in general. it cant switch into contrary without dying the next turn but can almost guarantee a glare, and contrary can't come in while xern is in at all-- although it can 2hko, the xern player can just glare, sack something that does nothing in the matchup, then revenge kill with ease.
bounce jelly + regenvest guzzlord core is added, handles gar, pdon, ph mmx all those guys. they do pretty poorly against contrary in general although jelly counters contrary mmx and isnt setup bait thanks to worry seed (which isnt specifically for contrary by any means) while guzzlord can live non lo fleur from mmy and retaliate by getting them in range of diancie.

now you might be wondering "sl42 how does this team even beat contrary at all". think of it like this: there are 2 types of contrary teams, the ladder kid offense and the tryhard balance with some kinda imposter proofer. your counterplay can adjust based on the matchup.

vs offense, xern is your key mon to keep alive because he beats offense. in this scenario, you have 2 ways around contrary. first of all, you can try to have xern in and force them to go to the contrary mon somehow, then glare him and switch out to kill while preserving xern and the stuff you actually need. if keeping xern in isn't an option because of a specific mon, then your play is to chip the contrary mon into range of diancie espeed. this can be done by anyone except for jellicent (which has worry seed anyway) and mmx locked into psycho boost (lol).

vs balance, xern will probably not be that necessary. its good as a safe imposter proofer for mmx, but even if it does die, the team doesn't just lose to imposter mmx (for example, guzzlord is a reasonably safe switchin because he lives 1, and diancie can check as well). because of this, you can typically play pretty aggressively with xern vs contrary, even switching it directly in and just clicking glare. contrary balance is really ineffective at pressuring xern even if they get the switch right because of all the things they have to not lose to in the building stage.

overall, i dont think contrary is something that significantly limits building balance, because a team that loses to contrary is typically going to get overwhelmed by faster teams anyway. if you're using imposter, that's already a mon that does super well if you give it any sort of support at all, and if you're not using it and still lose to aggressive builds with 6 slots, that's kind of on you.

if you guys want to convince me otherwise, i want more proof. strong teams that see consistent success on ladder, games where the opponent did everything right and still couldn't beat the contrary user, teams you built that seem to work fine against everything except contrary. or at least give me some counterarguments on here or discord. thanks for reading guys.
 

Funbot28

Banned deucer.


After like a million attempts cause the way GXE climbs is weird on this ladder specifically for some unknown reason, I finally managed to get them reqs.

Gonna keep this brief as most of what I feel has already been said pretty well by the majority of others on the pro-ban side, but in short Contrary is too skewed of an ability to stay in this metagame due to it bypassing the usual ways of combatting setup sweepers in the tier. While Haze, Spectral Thief and Unaware may all seem like viable strats opposing this, most of the most common defensive abusers have a difficult time taking on Life Orb boosted Psycho Boosts and Draco Meteors from the likes of MMY and Mega Ray respectively. Due to this, Contrary can easily snowball into a sweep in the majority of games once given one free chance to abuse these high power moves and thus really provides endless amounts of opportunity of and lategame sweep opposed to setup sweepers who need to spend a turn dedicated in using a status move to boost their stats.

Knowing this, I will comfortably vote to ban Contrary.

Shoutout the ladder gang, mainly being GL Volkner and motherlove.
 
177050
BH Ladder should be removed from Pokémon Showdown. Shoutouts to Shed for bodying me on ladder across numerous accounts. Contrary is obnoxious, and you basically need to have dedicated contrary checks. You could say that’s the same for stuff like Normgar, but Normgar is much easier to check because all you need is to slap a Regenvest on your team and you’re set. Contrary makes you basically have to run either imposter to force it out or some niche set that has little viability outside of beating contrary. Ban contrary and ban DeoS because I would die happy if I never had to see that mon again, despite how bad it is
 
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I got tilted a little in the beginning (hence the W/L ratio) but I got the reqs. I will vote BAN for contrary, and I think Chessking explained it pretty well in this post. Since this is my first bh post, I decided to do some shoutouts

Test Rex Thank you for teaching me BH and being a super nice and supportive friend.

Mickle Thanks for spreading BAND ADAPT TTAR and making me take king’s shield on my Giratina. Cool offense player!

test qaefqa Thanks for being a great memer throughout the months, stay dank fren :]

Zyniti h

superSkylake Thanks for also teaching me BH and being a chill friend to talk to.

Gupreet patel Anaconja Hong Kong 97

Headninja Shedinja wanna $ay thank$ but I’m too tired of winning

Zovrah secret leader of Stealth Rock clan

Koyomi (aka Filia) I always enjoyed talking with you, hope you do well with school stuff.

Card master Come back :(((

Coldembrace I love your new meta strats, keep it up bro.

Loser I like using your teams, great builder and great player!

SR guys <3

Mastermewtwo, the ladder god for instant forfeiting and ignoring every message I send :/
 
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