Mega Sableye re-test discussion

WinstonRed

I COULD BE BANNED!
Thread approved by TDK & Earthworm

Hello everyone :)

I know this is an uncomfortable topic for a lot of players because of the slow and fat playstyles the pokemon generally promotes, but with how the metagame shaped up after the Mega Sableye ban back before SM got released, as well as some more recent meta shifts, there are a fair few amount of arguments to be made to at least start a discussion about whether or not it'd be worth to test the mon again in another suspect voting. I was also informed that it has been brought up in the ORAS OU council chat a few times but nothing really came to fruition - yet.

I won't go into too much detail about why it was suspected and ultimately banned, but for those who need a little refresher and/or didn't play back then, here is the original thread: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threa...ound-7-diamonds-read-post-226-banned.3585600/

On to a few of the more prominent concerns with Mega Sableye, and the reasoning why they do not currently hold true (anymore). The two big categories here are hazards and stall-esque archetypes:

1) The Stealth Rock issue.

Back in the days, Clef wasn't AS prominent as it is nowadays, so a lot of people felt very limited in their teambuilding process by being "forced" to include MG Clef or the less popular Mold Breaker Drill to consistently get up Rocks (an integral part for literally every competitive team of pokemon) against teams that included Sableye as their mega. Of course we now know just how good of a pokemon MG Clef really is because of the multitude of roles it can fulfill in top teams, so many players decided (and still do so) to make it their SR user anyway, even without being "forced" into it by the thread of Sableye. In that regard, a reintroduction of sableye would not MAJORLY shake up the usage of SR setters in top tier ORAS OU. The SR setters that are most held back by Sableye being in the tier are Ferrothorn, Skarmory, Azelf, and to a lesser extend, Lando-T, all which can fulfill either a different role for teams, have ways to circumvent or break through Sableye, or can be used to set Spikes instead, leading me to the second point.

2) The Spikes issue.

As the second most common entry hazard, Spikes are almost as important as Stealth Rocks, and have in turn even spawned whole archetypes revolving around them. A common point brought up by people who opposed the Sableye ban back in ORAS, was the "fear" that Spikes, or hazard-stacking teams in general, would run rampant if Sableye got banned, as the only other viable Magic Bounce user, Mega Diancie, didn't have the longevity of Sableye that would allow it to supress the hazards throughout the duration of a whole game. This did of course turn out to be wrong, as even though Spike teams are very strong in the current meta, they aren't oppressive by any means. So the question would be, just as above, how would a reintroduction of Sableye affect the situation for those strategies? They would certainly take a drop in viability, especially in the first few weeks or months should Sableye come back, but one of the best qualities of Spikes teams is how variable they are. Many of the pokemon included in those teams as spike abusers ANYWAY can reliably threaten and force out/take advantage of Sableye. Some examples would be Mega Lopunny, which can OHKO even physically defensive MSab with HJK (and has a lower risk of running into Protect Sableye sets due to there being no Tapu Lele in Gen6), Gliscor or Volcarona which are both not bothered too much by Willowisp or Knock Off and can set up on MSab or Lum Berry sweepers. This means that when intelligently played, spikes stacking teams will still be able to combat mega sableye teams without, or with only minor adjustments to their team structure. This can also be seen quite nicely when looking at the last OLT that included Sableye, when it was in its "primetime" due to the additional presence of pokemon like Dugtrio (more on that later) here: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/olt-discussion-thread.3579213/
This thread shows nicely that despite not only sableye being in the tier, but it also being directly supported by dugtrio, there were still several successful spikes stacking teams, such as the ones by Omfuga, Hiye, Ox, Patlop and Dann3, all with different megas or other pokemons to abuse the respective hazards, for example Lopunny, Diancie, Venusaur.

3) The Webs issue.

On to the last relevant hazard (not counting Toxic Spikes, which share a lot of the argument with their non-poisonous siblings), Sticky Webs. This is a particularly interesting point considering how much Sticky Webs, and particularly SoulWind 's team (https://pokepast.es/33cb655d7b8a1137) have split the playerbase lately. Whether you agree with the team just being an unprepared for Cheese that wins because people haven't found a decisive answer yet, or agree that the strategy itself is too strong by allowing the user to bring pokemon that normally wouldn't be viable (or much less) without the Web support is one thing. What CANNOT be denied though, is the success the strategy had on both the ladder, and in recent tournaments. So much so that there have been actual requests to suspect test Sticky Webs or Shuckle, which is something I don't think I would've ever seen myself reading. Now, as ABR described quite nicely in the description of one of his SM OU OLT teams (https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/olt-iv-discussion-thread.3611603/#post-7465419), Sableye is of course extremely good against these kind of cheesey strategies, acting as sort of a catch-all-check. Therefore, reintroducing Sableye to the tier would be a quick and very comfortable way to put a huge damper on it. Make no mistake, even though Webs has ways around MSab teams by using Smeargle with Skill Swap as their setter, it would make the strategy A LOT worse. Making an archetype drastically worse with a suspect test does of course always leave a sour taste, but not only may this be an acceptable side effect given the current strength of the strategy, but it has also been mentioned multiple times in the past (ironically especially in the sableye- and later dugtrio-suspect, regarding stall), that keeping an archetype "alive" is not something that has to be forced no matter the cost. Insert "if he dies, he dies"-meme here.

4) The Stall issue.

Now if I didn't save the best for last. A lot of players, particularly (but far from only) newer/lesser experienced ones, have a raging hateboner for everything that is even remotely resembling stall or defensive strategies. Mega Sableye just so happens to make these a lot better in a tier it exists in. While I personally don't see this as something inherently bad (as long as the strategies aren't oppressive), a lot of people would disagree with that just by the nature of games including fat balance, stall and semi-stall being longer on average. There are still two major points that imo drastically reduce the effect this would have on defensively oriented teams, and therefore reduce the potential "danger" of reintroducing Sableye. First of all, and this is something a lot of players like to forget when it comes to Stall, it should be noted that no team can ever be prepared for everything. Even if you disregard some of the anti-stall-measures that Sableye is good at shutting down (hazards, status, taunt), ORAS OU still has plenty of ways to combat and break Balance and Stall. Some of those ways have no reliable answer without the Stall player going out of their way and ignoring other threats. In the past, this "issue" was solved by including Trappers such as Gothitelle (Shadow Tag) and Dugtrio (Arena Trap). Lo and behold, neither of these are present in the tier anymore. I don't want to critizise earlier tiering decisions, as they were made by players much better than myself, but in retrospective, suspect testing Dugtrio/Arena Trap before Mega Sableye would've been a better solution, similar to how it was done in SM OU later on (there are of course other factors that came into play in Gen7, like Z-moves, the Tapus, etc., but the general concept still holds true). And while there are still strong trapping options for Stall such as Magnezone or Weavile, they are not only a lot weaker overall, but also trap a much more limited amount of threats to a Stall player. Second, the way some pokemon (such as Heatran, Lando or Reuniclus for example) are being used has changed or expanded a lot over the years, and pokemon that were not an issue for Stall earlier in the gen, can effectively threaten, or at the very least cause mindgames, against Sableye teams now. The very least this does, especially combined with the lack of a proper trapper, is force the Sableye user to make decisions in the teambuilder that will drastically affect their matchup against some threats. Knock Off vs Foul Play, physdef vs spdef and Fake Out vs Protect are just 3 things off the top of my head. Summed up, while it will certainly improve defensively oriented teams, due to other bans as well as the evolution of both the metagame and players, a reintroduction of Sableye would have much less of an impact as many people fear it could.

Alright, so that was it for now, I apologize for the wall of text this has become, but I think the points I brought up were important for this discussion. I'd like to hear the opinion of others, but please, as always, keep the discussion civil, as there are enough actual arguments to be made for either side that we don't have to resort to flaming each other ;) And maybe, if the discussion catches up properly, the council will decide whether or not a resuspect of Sableye is justified or not. Thanks for reading!
 
I remember about a year or so ago, my friend Persephone and I discussed about Sableye being re-tested, and initially I disagreed with it being released. I remember the pain of players running stall metagames with weavile/talonflame as the final sweeper, slowly paving the way to victory. Dugtrio at the time was rising in popularity as well, which did limit counterplay to alternative Sableye Stall teams. Overtime however, I did change my mind on the subject. If Mega Sableye does return to ORAS OU, Metagross's viability will decrease, resulting in a rise in usage of things like Diancie, or even Gardevoir for that matter. Crawdaunt's viability also will increase, since nothing on the typically mega Sableye stall teams we've previously seen can avoid a 2hitKO. Support Clefable's usage will probably increase to phase out Sableye into Chansey, allowing both knockoff/stealthrocks usage to increase.

Now with that being said, while Mega Metagross will suffer the potential prankster wisp burns, Sableye will still cripple other offensive mons, such as Mega Medicham, and Excadrill. Gliscor wasn't nearly as popular back then as it is now, and with that benefit, Gliscor does offer potential counter measures. I'm also sure that someone out there is probably considering running a Webs team with Sableye as their spin blocker, since it's one of the only ghost pokemon with recover. The players who disagree with webs may also have potential mixed feelings on this topic, but while I do also oppose the webs ban, I do think Sableye should have a shot at being re-tested. Re-testing a mon never means that it will be coming back unless a majority of players believe that it's appropriate for the metagame. I know there are alot of players who don't often change their opinions when facts are presented, but if we manage to re-test Mega Sableye, and determine that it's unhealthy, I will confidently vote against it coming back to the metagame like others intend to, but I also encourage those from the opposing views to view it the same way. If Mega Sableye is healthy for the metagame, even if you're against stall as a playstyle, or even if you hate facing Sableye; it shouldn't stop us from allowing it to join our metagame.

*Edit: While I do agree with the re-suspect of Sableye, my opinion isn't based on having Sableye come in as a result in the rise of webs, since I actually favor webs staying within the tier. My comment wasn't in an attempt to unban something as a result of webs rise to fame, or something else being viewed as "broken," in an attempt to counter one thing with another.*
 
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WinstonRed

I COULD BE BANNED!
I remember about a year or so ago, my friend Persephone and I discussed about Sableye being re-tested, and initially I disagreed with it being released. I remember the pain of players running stall metagames with weavile/talonflame as the final sweeper, slowly paving the way to victory. Dugtrio at the time was rising in popularity as well, which did limit counterplay to alternative Sableye Stall teams. Overtime however, I did change my mind on the subject. If Mega Sableye does return to ORAS OU, Metagross's viability will decrease, resulting in a rise in usage of things like Diancie, or even Gardevoir for that matter. Crawdaunt's viability also will increase, since nothing on the typically mega Sableye stall teams we've previously seen can avoid a 2hitKO. Support Clefable's usage will probably increase to phase out Sableye into Chansey, allowing both knockoff/stealthrocks usage to increase.

Now with that being said, while Mega Metagross will suffer the potential prankster wisp burns, Sableye will still cripple other offensive mons, such as Mega Medicham, and Excadrill. Gliscor wasn't nearly as popular back then as it is now, and with that benefit, Gliscor does offer potential counter measures. I'm also sure that someone out there is probably considering running a Webs team with Sableye as their spin blocker, since it's one of the only ghost pokemon with recover. The players who disagree with webs may also have potential mixed feelings on this topic, but while I do also oppose the webs ban, I do think Sableye should have a shot at being re-tested. Re-testing a mon never means that it will be coming back unless a majority of players believe that it's appropriate for the metagame. I know there are alot of players who don't often change their opinions when facts are presented, but if we manage to re-test Mega Sableye, and determine that it's unhealthy, I will confidently vote against it coming back to the metagame like others intend to, but I also encourage those from the opposing views to view it the same way. If Mega Sableye is healthy for the metagame, even if you're against stall as a playstyle, or even if you hate facing Sableye; it shouldn't stop us from allowing it to join our metagame.

*Edit: While I do agree with the re-suspect of Sableye, my opinion isn't based on having Sableye come in as a result in the rise of webs, since I actually favor webs staying within the tier. My comment wasn't in an attempt to unban something as a result of webs rise to fame, or something else being viewed as "broken," in an attempt to counter one thing with another.*
Just one little addition to this one from me: I didn't mean to say that MSab should get reintroduced to get Webs under control, it's just a nice little side-effect that would stop the whole discussion going on around the archetype rn, without having to go to lengths such as suspect testing a niche hazard like webs :) agree with the rest you said though, it's always good to look past someone's own preferences/bias and make an objective decision, something not enough people do

Edit: I know it's not relevant for the topic, but I thought I'd note that to deal with Crawdaunt in Stall, players like ABR have opted for item-less Amoonguss sometimes. Certainly not an ideal solution, but it's something to keep in mind
 
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Around a month ago I was pretty set on Webs being fine for the metagame. I can't say with certainty the same thing anymore, but in either case, Sableye would be incredibly unhealthy for the metagame.

Combatting stall teams without ever once having the aid of spikes or stealth rock are really part of the same issue. More specifically, that everything becomes much bulkier and more difficult to break. Sableye has a lot of unique properties that make it extremely obnoxious to deal with, in addition to it having access to very useful utility moves. As a result of magic bounce, it is immune to taunt, and deters a number of moves just by being in the back. It makes a number of pokemon, eg Ferrothorn, utterly useless. Magic bounce is better than defog for many reasons. It's more turn efficient than defog because you switch in and stop rocks going up in the same turn. You keep your own hazards, and also it doesn't consume any pp. The last thing to consider is that Sableye mirrors often just turn into endless switching because you can't get up hazards to discourage doing so - this will be terrible considering ORAS is currently part of the smogtour weekly livetours.

I don't particularly enjoy playing against webs, but dropping Sableye isn't the way to deal with them. I'm not entirely sold on webs being broken as of this present moment, even if they do appear to irritating in how they encourage people to just compulsively set up with their pokemon one after the other and never worry about defensive options because you check a great deal of the tier just by slowing them down. But even if you assume Webs are broken, introducing Sableye into the tier would just double the number of matchup fishing styles into the game, making the tier worse rather than better.

I would rather not see this suspect test go forward. The reason for this is that there seem to be more pressing issues. As a result of people, myself included, not wanting to see a webs suspect test go forward earlier, we may very well see this coming SPL's ORAS games be seriously negative affected by webs. At this point, myself and others will have to eat crow and ask for a suspect. Hoopa-U being free was another issue that saw some traction. Looking at freeing a very restrictive pokemon does not seem very appealing in comparison to either of these.
 

WinstonRed

I COULD BE BANNED!
Around a month ago I was pretty set on Webs being fine for the metagame. I can't say with certainty the same thing anymore, but in either case, Sableye would be incredibly unhealthy for the metagame.

Combatting stall teams without ever once having the aid of spikes or stealth rock are really part of the same issue. More specifically, that everything becomes much bulkier and more difficult to break. Sableye has a lot of unique properties that make it extremely obnoxious to deal with, in addition to it having access to very useful utility moves. As a result of magic bounce, it is immune to taunt, and deters a number of moves just by being in the back. It makes a number of pokemon, eg Ferrothorn, utterly useless. Magic bounce is better than defog for many reasons. It's more turn efficient than defog because you switch in and stop rocks going up in the same turn. You keep your own hazards, and also it doesn't consume any pp. The last thing to consider is that Sableye mirrors often just turn into endless switching because you can't get up hazards to discourage doing so - this will be terrible considering ORAS is currently part of the smogtour weekly livetours.

I don't particularly enjoy playing against webs, but dropping Sableye isn't the way to deal with them. I'm not entirely sold on webs being broken as of this present moment, even if they do appear to irritating in how they encourage people to just compulsively set up with their pokemon one after the other and never worry about defensive options because you check a great deal of the tier just by slowing them down. But even if you assume Webs are broken, introducing Sableye into the tier would just double the number of matchup fishing styles into the game, making the tier worse rather than better.

I would rather not see this suspect test go forward. The reason for this is that there seem to be more pressing issues. As a result of people, myself included, not wanting to see a webs suspect test go forward earlier, we may very well see this coming SPL's ORAS games be seriously negative affected by webs. At this point, myself and others will have to eat crow and ask for a suspect. Hoopa-U being free was another issue that saw some traction. Looking at freeing a very restrictive pokemon does not seem very appealing in comparison to either of these.
Sorry, it really seems like I misworded the part about webs in my original post. Please don't see this discussion as driven by a need to keep webs in check. Nerfing Webs without having to rely on a full on suspect for a niche hazard like that is just a positive sideeffect, nothing else!

Obviously we all know what Sableye does, even less experienced players, much of it is even just in the basic smogdex analysis, but it's being overexaggarated in your post imo. How would you judge not only the popularity, but also success of spikes/hazard stacking teams, relying on Skarmory and especially Ferrothorn, which you deemed "utterly useless" in the matchup, in times like during OLT3 when not only was MSab present, but it was also being backed up by Arena Trap on top of it? And don't take this as an offense, I'm genuinely interested, as I know you're a lot better player than I am

Edit: For those interested, I was actually crazy enough to look through all of the playoff replays of said OLT, which was MSab's "primetime". And while there ironically have been no direct Hazardstacking vs MSab matchups, the stats very clearly indicate that people weren't afraid to bring the archetype into a metagame that was apparently so massively negatively impacted by Sableye: There were 57 games played where a hazardstacking strategy was CONFIRMED (aka the sets revealed, I did not make any assumptions that the replay didn't clearly show), 31 where the hazard stacking team won, 20 where it lost, and 6 mirrors.
 
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Around a month ago I was pretty set on Webs being fine for the metagame. I can't say with certainty the same thing anymore, but in either case, Sableye would be incredibly unhealthy for the metagame.

Combatting stall teams without ever once having the aid of spikes or stealth rock are really part of the same issue. More specifically, that everything becomes much bulkier and more difficult to break. Sableye has a lot of unique properties that make it extremely obnoxious to deal with, in addition to it having access to very useful utility moves. As a result of magic bounce, it is immune to taunt, and deters a number of moves just by being in the back. It makes a number of pokemon, eg Ferrothorn, utterly useless. Magic bounce is better than defog for many reasons. It's more turn efficient than defog because you switch in and stop rocks going up in the same turn. You keep your own hazards, and also it doesn't consume any pp. The last thing to consider is that Sableye mirrors often just turn into endless switching because you can't get up hazards to discourage doing so - this will be terrible considering ORAS is currently part of the smogtour weekly livetours.

I don't particularly enjoy playing against webs, but dropping Sableye isn't the way to deal with them. I'm not entirely sold on webs being broken as of this present moment, even if they do appear to irritating in how they encourage people to just compulsively set up with their pokemon one after the other and never worry about defensive options because you check a great deal of the tier just by slowing them down. But even if you assume Webs are broken, introducing Sableye into the tier would just double the number of matchup fishing styles into the game, making the tier worse rather than better.

I would rather not see this suspect test go forward. The reason for this is that there seem to be more pressing issues. As a result of people, myself included, not wanting to see a webs suspect test go forward earlier, we may very well see this coming SPL's ORAS games be seriously negative affected by webs. At this point, myself and others will have to eat crow and ask for a suspect. Hoopa-U being free was another issue that saw some traction. Looking at freeing a very restrictive pokemon does not seem very appealing in comparison to either of these.
I can definitely respect this, and personally I think if Sableye were to be retested, it should be : 1) After SPL, and 2) Only allow tournament players to do the retest. As much as I'd like to participate in a retest on Sableye, I've never participated in wcup, smog tour finals, spl, or earned a ribbon. I do believe that I have years of experience within the metagame, but I'd rather see a re-test submitted by players that have already demonstrated their proficiency, than for players on a dead ladder to hit 87+ gxe. Sableye was banned previously for a reason, which initially I respected, and while I also have similar feelings with Hoopa-U, I think that Sableye could release other viable options within the metagame. My main focus on the oras metagame from my experience is to increase team viability and diversity, and although Gardevoir, Diancie, and Crawdaunt will most likely increase in usage as a result of Sableye returning to the metagame, Sableye also punishes a lot of other mons, especially Metagross, Excadrill, or even Ferrothorn as you mentioned. If Sableye returning punishes more mons than it does in creating more viable pokemon, then I'd honestly be content with it being banned, which is very likely and I think that the re-test would demonstrate this. I'm more of supporting the opportunity of it being tested since Sableye was banned back to back with dugtrio, while the attention of Gen 7 began to rise. I wouldn't want anyone with a gxe of 80 testing its viability since the ladder isn't always the best place to grow in this gen, but that's my opinion.
 
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WinstonRed

I COULD BE BANNED!
I can definitely respect this, and personally I think if Sableye were to be retested, it should be : 1) After SPL, and 2) Only allow tournament players to do the retest. As much as I'd like to participate in a retest on Sableye, I've never participated in wcup, smog tour finals, spl, or earned a ribbon. I do believe that I have years of experience within the metagame, but I'd rather see a re-test submitted by players that have already demonstrated their proficiency, than for players on a dead ladder to hit 87+ gxe. Sableye was banned previously for a reason, which initially I respected, and while I also have similar feelings with Hoopa-U, I think that Sableye could release other viable options within the metagame. My main focus on the oras metagame from my experience is to increase team viability and diversity, and although Gardevoir, Diancie, and Crawdaunt will most likely increase in usage as a result of Sableye returning to the metagame, Sableye also punishes a lot of other mons, especially Metagross, Excadrill, or even Ferrothorn as you mentioned. If Sableye returning punishes more mons than it does in creating more viable pokemon, then I'd honestly be content with it being banned, which is very likely and I think that the re-test would demonstrate this. I'm more of supporting the opportunity of it being tested since Sableye was banned back to back with dugtrio, while the attention of Gen 7 began to rise. I wouldn't want anyone with a gxe of 80 testing its viability since the ladder isn't always the best place to grow in this gen, but that's my opinion.
having only tournament players participate is an interesting idea, not sure if that has somehow happened before in the past? I guess it would have to be on a separate ladder then. The only issue I can see here is how to actually define who'd be allowed to partake and who isn't. Any suggestions?

Also having Sab retested after spl is totally fine, this is all just a suggestion and discussion thread, nothing more :P

Btw in case people haven't seen it yet, I edited my older post, to have a more detailled look in the spikes "problematic": I was actually crazy enough to look through all of the playoff replays of said OLT, which was MSab's "primetime". And while there ironically have been no direct Hazardstacking vs MSab matchups, the stats very clearly indicate that people weren't afraid to bring the archetype into a metagame that was apparently so massively negatively impacted by Sableye: There were 57 games played where a hazardstacking strategy was CONFIRMED (aka the sets revealed, I did not make any assumptions that the replay didn't clearly show), 31 where the hazard stacking team won, 20 where it lost, and 6 mirrors.
 

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