CAP 32 - Part 1 - Concept Poll 2

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spoo

spoo

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Before you vote, it's important that you read through each concept carefully, as well as look at our TL spoo's final post in the concept submissions thread with their justification for each that made the slate, since this concept will guide the discussion for the rest of the CAP Process. This is linked here.

This will be a Ranked Pairs vote (RP) (a form of voting where each candidate is ranked according to head to head matchups with each of its competitors in a directed acyclic graph), the details of which were discussed here.

This is a ranked vote: order does matter! You can upvote your favorites and downvote your least favorites. You may choose to rank as many or as few options as you like, but we encourage you to rank as many options as possible to ensure your preferences are taken into account fully.

Bold your votes and nothing else!

A typical vote might look like the following:

Most Preferred
Second Most Preferred
Third Most Preferred

Any comments that the voter has would go below the votes in non-bold text. Bold text is used to determine what the user's votes are, so none of the supplementary text should be in bold.
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IMPORTANT: When voting, use only the exact name of the concept submissions as listed below! The concept submissions are quoted below in alphabetical order:

Bang Average
Name: Bang Average

Description: This pokemon will attempt to circumvent average or below average stats to become viable.

Justification: Ou has always shown a massive preference towards mons with great statlines and high base stats, but there have always been exceptions to this rule. However in Cap we have always exclusively made mons with good to great stats, meaning we have left a lot of interesting design space untouched. There's a variety of ways we could go about a concept like this and I think this would be an illuminating and interesting project for us to engage with.

Questions:
What actually counts as average stats?
This will likely be up for some debate, as this is somewhat relative. 85 speed is a perfectly good speed stat on fini, but if zera had 85 speed it'd probably be in ru. As for bst, the lowest bst of ou ranked mons at the conclusion of ss (sv is a bit young to draw conclusions from) is Pelipper at 440, with Clefable in 2nd with 483. Both of these are undeniably average but 3rd lowest is Ferrothorn at 489, whose statline could definitely be seen as above average. It'd be pretty hard to deny that Toxapex has a better statline than Alolatales, despite the 10 point bst difference being in the fox's favour. Particular attention will have to be paid to how the stats synergise, rather than a flat interest in BST

How much stat efficiency is permissable?
To return to the above example part of what gives Ferro and Pex above average stats is the efficiency with which their bst is divided, with speed and various attacking stats being dropped in favour of juicing up defenses. Conversely, to use a lower tier example, Cobalion has a bst 91 points higher than ferro, but that bst is inefficiently distributed giving Cob mediocre attacking stats and good bulk on only one side. Despite it's high bst, Coba has pretty average stats. Obviously some degree of efficiency will be necessary but to what extent. Breloom has a frankly awful statline with the exception of it's attack, finding use through it's unique combination of other strong attributes. Is one stat pushing 130 fundamentally antithetical to the concept or is it permissable if all other stats take hits? Where do we draw that line?

Do we actually do stats first?
This is obviously a very stat centric concept, but there's good reasons that stats are usually done so late in the process. It'd certainly be a shake up to the process but you could probably still achieve a similar result with a more standard process order.

How does this affect our power budget?
The Chromera process afforded a large power budget to other aspects of the process to account for it's bad ability. To what extent, if any, do we allow that here? Remember that the goal here is using stats that are average or below average, not explicitly bad. The sort of affordances allowed in chroms process are almost certainly over the line, and honestly we could potentially make a perfectly reasonable end product without dipping into anything explicitly overpowered.

What types suit average stats, if any?
For example, dragon might be more suitable for it's access to strong stabs like Draco and Outrage that mitigate ower attacking stats. Psychic on the other hand may suit less well due to its reliance on weaker stabs. Are there typings that can work around mediocre bulk by leveraging unique or valuable defensive profiles?

What can we learn from gen 9?
The early stages of SV has given us some interesting examples of successful mons with average stats. In particular, we've been given two excellent examples of what to avoid. Espathra and Houndstone both clearly have very average stats with both having a sub 500 bst and highest individual stats of 105 and 101 respectively. These two became the lowest bst mons to be banned to ubers since Mega Sableye in oras. Houndstone isn't particularly interesting, as it was purely broken by virtue of having one of the most cracked moves to ever exist. Espathra is more notable, as it initially fell to uu before rising through the ranks thanks to it's stored power shenanigans and ridiculous tera synergy. Espathra shows us that even with pretty shit stats, we have to be careful to not overtune in other stages, which is definitely a tendency that we have in cap projects.
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Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal
Name: Good artists copy, great artists steal

Description: A pokemon that revisits old existing concepts and takes a more modern spin on it while going a completely different route with its execution than we did previously. Creating a distinctly different CAP functionally while still being notably similar through concept. (Think Convergent Species esque)

Justification: It's no secret to any CAP player that as time goes on, older-generation CAPs tend to lose touch with their initial concept. Whether that be buffs / nerfs needing to make them fit better in the current generation's metagame or the execution of the concept being products of their time, it's safe to say that sometimes no amount of reworking can save a CAP conceptually. Since we are at the beginning of a new generation, revisiting one of these more ancient concepts and executing it completely differently than we previously did while adapting it to work within generation 9 seems like a particularly fun prospect at this point in time. With the general infancy of generation 9, I find taking a more broad concept like this more appealing than the very particular ones as we are very much still polishing this meta.

Some examples of potential exploration might include;
-With the modern CAP framework avoiding custom abilities and moves, what would Colossoil's concept look like now? In the modern meta colo has kind of strayed away from its initial intention and is more of a bulky pivot that provides hazard removal, however, it faces a lot of competition currently as hazard removal and is easily overwhelmed due to its typing and general lack of longevity.​
-Tomohawk was a CAP specifically designed as a response to the BWOU metagame, as such its role has gradually strayed away from its initial concept since generation 5 alongside a gradually drop in viability. How might a CAP with Tomo's concept look now? How can we make a CAP with the same concept that is more generalized than Tomos initial creation?​
-Kitsunoh was created in a metagame that lacked team preview, how might a pokemon of a similar concept look now? The lack of team preview was an important aspect of Kitsunoh's creation and people of the time couldn't have predicted team previews addition and its impact on how we play the game.​
-Malacondas concept in today's metagame would likely end up wayyy different than its previous execution due to the addition of the fairy typing, type chart changes and the power creep being higher than it was in gen5.​

Questions To Be Answered:
-How can we adapt a concept designed for an older generation to fit within our current environment, while preserving its initial identity?​
-What niches/roles are considered valuable in generation 9 CAP? What niches/roles are not? How would that influence which concept we choose to redo?​
-How can we make CAP32 distinctively different than its predecessor?​
-How would we react to particular core features removed from the games that otherwise existed during the previous CAPs concept creation?​
-How would an older concept react to newer features? (abilities, moves, mechanics etc...)​
-Should we target a more complex concept or a simpler one? An ancient concept or one that is more recent in history?​
-Should we target a concept that is used by a CAP that has fallen out of favor or a concept used by a still viable CAP?​
-Should we choose a "failed" concept or a concept that was historically successful? (Plasmanta vs Astrolotl)​
-What past concepts should we consider unsalvagable? How should we determine which concepts are still viable in generation 9?​
-Should we stick to one concept altogether or find concepts that are similar functionally and combine them?​
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Schrodinger's CAP
Name: Schrödinger's CAP

Description: The Pokémon’s abilities change the effect of parts of its moveset, thus changing the Pokémon's role in battle.

Justification: Designing a Pokémon with the ability to change its role on a team is difficult for many reasons, but one of the biggest difficulties CAP faces when creating a Pokémon like this is designing its movepool. Often, Pokémon that can fulfill different roles end up having heavily bloated, utility filled movepools, and with CAP's focus on producing a viable Pokémon, this effect is at its most extreme with certain processes. This concept, then, aims to explore a different path to achieving role diversity. Rather than giving Pokémon a bloated, utility-heavy movepool, this concept aims to explore the possible utility options found in the interactions between certain abilities and moves, and limiting the movepool size of the Pokémon while using different abilities to change the utility found in that movepool. Examples of this can include using abilities such as Prankster vs Mycelium Might to create a Pokémon that can switch between fast or slow pivoting, or Triage vs Berserk to change a Pokémon from being a passive wall to being a bulky setup sweeper with the same recovery tool.

Questions to be asked:
  • Depending on the roles and abilities chosen, how important is it for the opponent to be able to "open the box" (aka know what role is being run)?
  • What are some utility options that CAP hasn't explored before? How can information discovered during this process be applied to CAP processes in the future?
  • What are some examples of Pokémon with multiple viable abilities? How do these examples align or contrast with the goal of this concept?
  • How do the specified moves interact with each ability? how much should these interactions compare/contrast with one another?
  • How might two role-defining abilities affect a Pokémon's versatility?
  • How do we prevent one ability in a pair from completely overshadowing the other?
  • How might Terastalizing affect this concepts goal? Can Terastalizing change how a move other than Tera Blast is used in a battle?
  • How do multiple roles in a concept affect certain stages of the process? Similarly, how does the given movepool restrictions affect move-related stages of the process?
  • How have CAP concepts that focused on having multiple or changing roles turned out in the past? How do they compare with this concept? How has movepool bloat affected previous CAP projects?
  • How would this concept affect stage order? Specifically, how would both the ability and move stages be ordered?
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Once again, your options are:


Bang Average
Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal
Schrodinger's CAP

Please ensure your ballot uses the concept names listed above in bold and not the usernames of the submitters. This vote will end in 24 hours, so please do not feel rushed, and instead ensure you make an informed decision!

This poll will be open for 24 hours.
 
dex

dex

Hard as Vince Carter’s knee cartilage is
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Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal
Bang Average
 
skippergamez

skippergamez

Schrodinger's CAP
Bang Average
Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal

Comments: I would be happy with any of these lol. Schrodinger’s CAP seems super fun and there are many routes to explore. Bang Average explores power creep which will be fun, and considering Saharaja’s initial BST was 580, this is much needed. GAC, GAS, there are really good concepts (Break the Mold!, Cawmodore’s concept, Plasmanta’s Concept, CAP25’s and CAP30’s concept) that are worth exploring
 
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quziel

quziel

I am the Scientist now
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Bang Average
Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal
Schrodinger’s CAP
 
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