Based on my research, everything that was voted Uber during BW2 would have had to be retested because they didn't reach the 75+1 super-majority. Kyurem-B would not have been unbanned (yet) and the only pokes that would have received another test run back in BW1 would be Blaziken and Excadrill. Also, Aldaron's Proposal would not have passed with the super-majority and there would have been an ability suspect round. I think the 75+1 super-majority is too much but Aldaron's Proposal has been very controversial and Blaziken, Excadrill, and Kyu-B have all been asked to be retested numerous amounts of times so I do these results rather interesting.
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OU Suspect Testing Proposals
- Thread starter X5Dragon
- Start date
While it doesn't invalidate any of the previous bans and their relevancy, I do think it is worth noting that many decisions would have been drastically different if Aldaron's proposal had not been voted in. The main driving force behind the support for that proposal was that people believed it was important to sustain the less conventional, less dominant playstyles that came with Drizzle, and that if we didn't keep Drizzle then we would have to subsequently ban Drought and possibly Sandstream.
The issue with this is that we were essentially playing game designer and nerfing aspects of our meta by bending over backwards with our ruleset rather than handling the problem directly. I believe this caused a lot of subsequent controversy as a result, and future bans would have been handled much more decisively had Drizzle been banned from the beginning. I also don't think we should be counting out chickens before they hatch and preserving problems to counter-balance other problems.
I think that percentage is ridiculous for one reason: the community is ALWAYS going to be divisive on issues like banning and unbanning Pokemon. Some people on principle don't like banning Pokemon, some people think banning Pokemon is the best way to achieve a desirable metagame and that one more doesn't matter, some people think that the actual suspect at hand is broken, some people think it isn't, and some people have stupid reasons that bias them in either direction. You will never get more than 3/4 of the voters to agree on a suspect unless something is so bad that it's not even funny, like initial Shaymin-S/Darkrai/Deoxys-A. You could never pass a controversial proposal like Aldaron's proposal because there's always a decently significant opposition. Voter error IS a significant issue, but there isn't a 25% range of error. I think a supermajority of 66%+1 is the best system because the 50-60% range = 50/50, and decisions should not be made where a few votes could have made the difference between a ban and unban, especially one with such huge ramifications as banning a Pokemon. Genesect got a supermajority, meaning a good amount of the community agreed that it was broken and needed to be gone. Look at these results:
ban: 84
dnb: 60
abs: 3
voted: 148 (91.35802469135802%)
total: 162
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Landorus-I is BANNED with a percentage of 56.75675675675676%
Deoxys-D: 37 OU, 54 Uber, 4 Abstain = 59.34% Uber
Tornadus-T: 22 OU, 54 Uber, 4 Abstain = 71.05% Uber
Genesect: 18 OU, 37 Uber, 1 Abstain = 67.27% Uber
Garchomp test:
Option 1 (unban Garchomp): 5 (6.1%)
Option 3 (ban Sand Veil): 15 (18.3%)
Option 4 (ban Sand Veil + Sandstream): 6 (7.3%)
Option 6 (ban Sand Veil and Snow Cloak under evasion clause): 56 (68.3%)
Kyurem-B: 18 Keep Banned, 48 Unban, 4 Abstain = 72.7% Unban
These are all of the results in BW2. You can clearly see the close voting in Landorus-I and Deoxys-D -- aka the last two suspects. Tornadus-T, Genesect, Garchomp, and Kyurem-B all had decisive votes either way. You can clearly see the massive difference in the agreement among voters, with these suspects averaging 10% or more higher for the decision that was made. Every decision before Deoxys-D and Landorus-I was made with the backing of a satisfying majority of the community. On average, about 30% of the community was dissatisfied with the result. Around 70% was satisfied. This is about the best you can possibly do. When 40%+ of the voters disagree with a decision, there becomes a noticeable disgruntled and honestly rather ignored part of the community. I really don't care about any of these suspects any more, but on principle it makes sense that they should be retested based on the facts alone.
I disagree that Pokemon failing to reach the supermajority should be banned, and here's why: the simple concept of innocent until proven guilty. If a Pokemon does not reach the qualifications for being essentially permanently banned, then why would you ban it. I also think that skipping a round before the next vote is vital to enable players to adapt to the Pokemon more and not bandwagon it into getting banned the next time. The simple majority is however sufficient for the second time because players have had the time to adapt to it after arguing over its placement tirelessly and therefore can make a more self-conclusive decision than before. Heck, it might not even get that the second time around. In the case of a Pokemon like BW1 Thundurus that just barely missed the supermajority -- that's an unfortunate rare case. However, I think the positives of a supermajority system outweigh negatives such as the case of Thundurus.
Also -- as an off-topic response to a few people who have posted -- DPP UU Yanmega also received a unanimous ban vote, so initial BW Shaymin-S was not the only one. Not sure if someone else has posted this, but I haven't dissected every last post in the thread to see if this was mentioned.
After reading this and reevaluating my opinion, I'm in 100% agreement based on the numbers with everything mentioned. I also concur that having a wait period in between tests when something fails to meet a majority is important, as I previously stated.
Ulevo, I am surprised that you support banning Drizzle, because it seems to contradict with your stance of only banning broken things. Granted the fact that Sand and Sun would be broken without Rain was a legitimate concern, but the primary reason for Aldaron's Proposal was to remove the broken part, which was the terrible synergy of the abilities Drizzle + Swift Swim.
There is nothing officially determined, but I think the popular consensus is to initially ban 670+ BST Ubers. I'm interested to hear your suggestion ;dUlevo said:
Groudon, Kyogre, Ho-Oh, Lugia, Rayquaza, Kyurem-W, Dialga, Giratina, Arcues, Palkia, Moody.inc, The Deoxys, Mewtwo, Reshiram and Zekrom. We'd have a strange Hybrid of OU and Ubers at the beginning, and start testing after one month immediately (prefrebly multiple tests).
Edit: On second thought initially ban Shaymin-S, Manaphy and keep Aladaron's Swift Swim + Drizzle too.
Edit: On second thought initially ban Shaymin-S, Manaphy and keep Aladaron's Swift Swim + Drizzle too.
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After thinking about it some more, I think I've come to the same conclusion.Ulevo said:
I think that complex bans only arise if people feel that there's an implicit need to keep something in OU (which there shouldn't be). The costs outweigh any potential benefits that might occur because it essentially means breaking the philosophy of only banning the things that are broken. For example...
Excadrill. Neither Sand Rush nor Sand Stream is broken in itself. The only thing that breaks them is Excadrill and hence should be banned. This is what we have been doing all along. Maybe simple really is best after all...
I'm on my iPhone, so excuse typos.
My position leans towards banning Drizzle under the absence of the Drizzle + Swift Swim complex ban. I do not feel complex bans should be used as an option as I expressed earlier, and thus this would necessitate an alternative solution; to ban Drizzle.
Also, at the time of the proposal, the community was not properly informed or aware of the implications of their choices available. Everyone just assumed that if we solve the issue surrounding Swift Swim users in rain, Drizzle and the rain playstyle would be balanced, or at least manageable. The majority did not consider that rain would be broken even without Swift Swim, and this is understandable given how early the game was in its life cycle and how chaotic the tier was for a while with Darkrai, Shaymin-S, and Deoxys-A running around.
That being said, while I don't have the BW2 experience to give direct input as to whether Drizzle now in its current state would warrant a suspect test or ban, the fact that some do believe so, and that we have had to ban several Pokemon who thrive under rain as a prominent condition (Manaphy, Tornadus-T, Thunderus) as well as currently suspecting another (Keldeo) where their status may have otherwise been proven to be OU if Drizzle was not legal is evidence enough for me to consider what the real culprit is.
So within my context, I believe Drizzle is likely broken. I believe it has played a significant role in other suspects being banned while it has remained untouched due to favouritism, even after Swift Swim was a non-factor (which as I stated shouldn't have been a consideration.)
EDIT: Moving on to my suggestion for the initial ruleset for X & Y.
I believe having the majority of 670+ BST Ubers banned from the start is the best for time efficiency, particularly since we will no longer have Japan only initial releases, and we will have much less time to properly analyze Pokemon before they hit the simulators to determine how we might tier them. While this list might be up for some debate, the obvious include Arceus, Dialga, Giratina, Giratina-O, Groudon, Ho-Oh, Kyogre, Kyurem-B, Kyurem-W, Lugia, Mewtwo, Palkia, Raquaza, Reshiram, Zekrom, and any newly introduced titled legendaries.
I added all the foreseen here for simplicity. Obviously there are specific cases that would be debated based on previous generation experience like currently legal Kyurem-B, but because of their innate base powers I think testing them in a more stable environment with semi-experienced Gen VI players would yield better results for properly tiering them.
Pokemon like the previously legal Blaziken, Darkrai, Deoxys, Deoxys-A, Deoxys-D, Deoxys-S, Excadrill, Genesect, Landorus, Manaphy, Shaymin-S, Thunderus, and Tornadus-T should be legalized. While some of these are extreme cases, like Shaymin-S, Darkrai, and especially the volatile Deoxys-A, most of them could be considered OU under the right conditions. Blaziken might not have access to Speed Boost initially, and there might be ways of handling it in Gen VI, while Manaphy might not have access to Drizzle initially to exacerbate its advantages. Some of these might just go through Latios/Latias syndrome and become less of a threat in Gen VI with new tools on how to handle them, or becoming outdated and obsolete due to power creep.
For the clauses, I advocate we remove the Swift Swim + Drizzle clause, not just for the sake of assessing the conditions of a new generation and setting a proper precedent on complex bans, but to allow us a chance to properly tier Drizzle by its own merit. We should carry over our rule to ban Sand Veil and Snow Cloak if it means that we won't innately ban any Pokemon unjustly from the get go. Soul Dew should likely be banned as usual, and I don't really see a reason to unban Moody either as it falls under the stipulations of evasion.
We take a 3 month period where no suspect tests take place, and we only resort to emergency tests or bans under extreme and blatantly obvious cases (i.e. Moody) while we let the meta set in. After 3 months, we nominate who we feel should be tested and proceed with the routine suspect tests.
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Call me crazy, but i honestly think that darkrai should be suspected, albeit its crazy strong. With breloom having such high usage as it does, terrakion, and even other priority such as bp scizor, darkrai is a lot more vulnerable than it was early b/w. its only broken quality is that it can get down a dark void even against faster opponents, but, with breloom running around we kinda already have this problem, except its against slower opponents. plenty of sleep fodder, plenty of good counters....why not give it a shot? if not, im excited to use darkrai in early X/Y, hoping it sticks around a while.
Focus
Ubers Tester Extraordinaire
I've been seriously thinking about what should be done at the start of gen 6 OU ever since Chou's poll popped up. I see no problem with starting off with banning 670+ legendaries or whatever clean cutoff there is when we learn more about gen 6 Pokemon, under the condition that the first round of suspect testing be completely devoted to unbanning Pokemon.
It might be irresponsible to rush to ban stuff that might coexist in a reasonably balanced metagame with a low-end version mascot or two (after taking into account all the new stuff, of course). The current system Smogon has for determining bans is basically to start out with a minimal banlist and then proceed to ban more things until enough people are satisfied, but that only really fits with our minimal bans philosophy if we are certain that everything that is banned reasonably needs to be banned. By concentrating our efforts on unbanning things from the get-go, we will hopefully gain that much more insight into the nature of the gen 6 metagame by changing the kinds of questions the masses ask themselves. It would be great if the initial conversation about the new meta is initially less "This Pokemon/strategy should be banned!" and more along the lines of "What all can be done to stop this new threat?"
It might be irresponsible to rush to ban stuff that might coexist in a reasonably balanced metagame with a low-end version mascot or two (after taking into account all the new stuff, of course). The current system Smogon has for determining bans is basically to start out with a minimal banlist and then proceed to ban more things until enough people are satisfied, but that only really fits with our minimal bans philosophy if we are certain that everything that is banned reasonably needs to be banned. By concentrating our efforts on unbanning things from the get-go, we will hopefully gain that much more insight into the nature of the gen 6 metagame by changing the kinds of questions the masses ask themselves. It would be great if the initial conversation about the new meta is initially less "This Pokemon/strategy should be banned!" and more along the lines of "What all can be done to stop this new threat?"
If I could have my way, this is how it would be done:
XY starts with the bans of all Arceus forms, Mewtwo, Groudon, Kyogre, and Palkia. After a full 3 months of playing and letting the metagame settle down, the first round of suspect testing will commence with whatever pokemon seem as though are broken. Of course I included a lot of the base 670+ in OU since I do not believe the BST of a mon should mean an auto-ban based on Kyu-B being in OU. It should be the characteristics such as moves, abilities, typing, and individual stats of a pokemon that determine whether it is broken or not. The Council plans on testing Stealth Rock early on so I can see that being tested within the first 3 months or so. There will likely be many first round suspects but I would consider this the most efficient way of working our way to a balanced tier. Based on what I have come across, Ubers, UU, and RU are all apparently balanced. I haven't lurked on the NU or LC threads so idk how they're doing, but OU has yet to be balanced.
When determining how to ban a suspect, a super-majority vote of 2/3 of the voters voting ban will lead to the suspect being banned from OU, while a simple majority means it will be on the chopping block the next suspect round, and sub-50% will lead to the suspect staying in OU. The same would apply to unbanning as well.
XY starts with the bans of all Arceus forms, Mewtwo, Groudon, Kyogre, and Palkia. After a full 3 months of playing and letting the metagame settle down, the first round of suspect testing will commence with whatever pokemon seem as though are broken. Of course I included a lot of the base 670+ in OU since I do not believe the BST of a mon should mean an auto-ban based on Kyu-B being in OU. It should be the characteristics such as moves, abilities, typing, and individual stats of a pokemon that determine whether it is broken or not. The Council plans on testing Stealth Rock early on so I can see that being tested within the first 3 months or so. There will likely be many first round suspects but I would consider this the most efficient way of working our way to a balanced tier. Based on what I have come across, Ubers, UU, and RU are all apparently balanced. I haven't lurked on the NU or LC threads so idk how they're doing, but OU has yet to be balanced.
When determining how to ban a suspect, a super-majority vote of 2/3 of the voters voting ban will lead to the suspect being banned from OU, while a simple majority means it will be on the chopping block the next suspect round, and sub-50% will lead to the suspect staying in OU. The same would apply to unbanning as well.
G-Von, are you saying we should let the other 680 cover legendaries be tested? Or you just listed some of them and the rest are implied?
The pokemon I listed would be insta-banned while the other 670 and 680 and Kyurem formes would start out in OU. I'm sure some of those new OU mons would then become banned but we wouldn't exactly know for sure until they're tested in a new meta with new threats. It sounds crazy and it may be difficult to grasp that idea but its just a way people need to start thinking after it turned out a BST 700 pokemon was legal for OU. Like I said before the BST of a pokemon should not be looked at as the way to determine who is broken or not; it should be the characteristics that make up that pokemon.
Just because the precedent for a BST 700 Pokemon becoming OU has been made does not mean that this should be the implied standard when deciding a list of Ubers once the green light hits for Gen VI, or any generation for that matter. Not only was Kyurem-B widely suspected of being simply OU material long before it was suspect tested, but there were convincing arguments and theorymon to back up a proposition for its specific case.
The Pokemon that we let loose in the beginning of Gen V for testing and observance, while I believe it necessary at the time and am suggesting we legalize them again, created heavy distortion in the balance of the OU tier. And these were just suspects like Deoxys-A, Darkrai, and Shaymin-S. We're not even talking about things like Rayquaza, or Giratina, or Dialga, or Ho-Oh, or Reshriam, who are all ludicrously strong, and arguably far more threatening than those we tested.
Not only do I find your list incredibly arbitrary and without logical basis for picking those specific ones mentioned and omitting the rest, I cannot say I agree with your approach even if you were to come up with another list of Ubers. It will make testing and adjusting to the new metagame more difficult than it should be, and we'll be too focused on how to deal with overwhelming threats that will inevitably be banned anyway to analyze and experiment with other top tier Pokemon in the Gen VI environment because they'll be overshadowed.
I'm going to focus on the middle section of your post since that's the part where you name a few pokemon. Take a second and look at the first three pokemon you named and there's a trend: they're fast as fuck. Today's metagame is incredibly fast paced and if you can't keep up you won't be used. DOA is straight up ridiculous with its base 150 speed and 180 attacking stats. I was almost inclined to include the bans on all Deo formes but opted against it. Skymin is relatively strong and sits in an incredible speed tier with base 128 speed. It doesn't even need to paraflinch to get by teams; all it needs to do is spam STAB Air Slash. Darkrai sits at another great speed tier of 125 base speed and has everything else it needs to sweep. Nasty plot along with Dark Pulse and Focus Blast for perfect coverage bar Heracross and Toxicroak. Dark Void also hits 80% of the time and Bad Dreams helps strip away an eighth of a sleeping pokemon's HP every turn. With these 3 pokemon you bring up, its their SPEED that makes them so hard to combat with.
3 of the 5 pokemon you mentioned out of the 670/680 BST group are SR weak so bringing them in is going to be a hassle. Ho-oh has the biggest problem with it thanks to being 4 times weak to SR, but is able to by pass this somewhat with the use of Regenerator. Even so, fire-types haven't been able to fair too well in OU thanks to Drizzle and normally are left outside residing in UU like Darmanitan, Victini, and even Moltres who's in RU. Rayquaza is able to negate it's speed problem by having access to ExtremeSpeed. Dragon Dance is also another way to by pass its speed along with giving it a power boost. However, we have two pokemon in the bottom in the bottom of OU that rival it in power and outspeed it named Haxorus and Hydreigon. Haxorus literally loses its only counters in Forretress and Skarm in rain thanks to Aqua Tail and Hydreigon is notoriously known for having zero counters but neither one of these see great usage because their speeds aren't up to par and Rayquaza is even slower. Reshiram is the 3rd pokemon on your list that has a SR weakness and also sits at a very manageable 90 base speed tier. It doesn't even have that unresisted STAB combo anymore thanks to the introduction of Fairy-type. I'll get back to that later.
Now onto the two pokemon that aren't weak to SR. Giratina and Dialga both seem like they are more on the defensive end of the spectrum as opposed to the other pokemon you listed but Dialga can actually wreck stuff with its base 150 special attack. It has the options to do well but its speed is going to hold it back along with being weak to super common attacking types in fighting and ground. Offensively speaking, Giratina has a weak secondary STAB in ghost since the strongest competitive move is Shadow Ball at base 80 power. Both of these pokemon would be highly used as defensive pokemon though because Giratina has sky high HP while Dialga resists a shit ton of attacks, even if those two weaknesses are common.
You've got to remember, I didn't say that these pokemon are going to all be balanced in OU. I just said that they should start out in OU and we will work our way to a balanced metagame, something OU currently hasn't been able to achieve in the nearly 3 years of playing. We still don't know what's going to happen when it comes to whether Stealth Rock is going to be banned or not. I know it will be tested very early on so that will be a huge influence on whether these high BST pokemon will fair. We also aren't sure what will be the deal with weather. Will there be a new Drizzle, Drought, Snow Warning, or Sand Stream abuser? Will any of these abilities end up getting banned? These are all questions that no one knows the answers to and only time will tell if these things are going to take place. Lets also not forget about the new pokemon coming into Gen VI. We have no idea what other new type combinations will be created that will completely change how competitive pokemon will be played. I know a ghost/steel type has been announced so that destroys what used to be an unresisted offensive combo in dragon and fighting moves.
Talking on types, fairy-type has officially been announced which fucking resists dragon-type moves. Thanks to this, fairy-type is going to flip the entire competitive pokemon community on its fucking head like a Tyrogue evolution. Dragons just became neutered thanks to this introduction and it seems like no one is taking that into consideration when it comes to this whole suspect policy and tiering situation. Things are going to have to change since the majority of these "cover legendaries" that are so damn scary to everyone are part dragon. Draco Meteor and Outrage aren't going to be as easily spammable thanks to this and this alone will probably force Haxorus, Hydreigon, and possibly Kyu-B into UU, but once again only time will tell. I just wish that people would break free from the usual way of thinking and start thinking outside the box because there's going to be a lot of changes that will need to be adapted to that hasn't been around since the 2nd generation when Dark and Steel were introduced to balance out Psychic types.
tl;dr-Speed is the main factor, and then other characteristics, that saw the bans of the base 600 pokemon that Ulevo mentioned before because if they were slower they would be manageable. We have no idea how the meta is going to be from day 1, what non-pokemon bans will be made early on in gen VI, and the impact of fairy-type is going to change how shit goes in competitive battling. These are reasons why we should be open to having the majority of these high BST pokes unbanned.
Maybe this is a controversial opinion, but I believe that the benevolent dictators of the council will need to take a more active role in shaping the XY metagame. I will explain my reasoning thusly: I was a few deviation points away from making reqs in the last suspect which I had just done on rather a whim. I don't really put too much stock in the metagame shaping decision-making ability of someone with my lack of experience and skill in the competitive pokemon scene.
Studying the voting trends of over the history of BW suspect also lead me to the conclusion that the voters can't be fully trusted with such decisions unless they come to a strong supermajority. So basically council and supermajority (maybe 2/3) requirements are necessary checks for the capricious (and questionably qualified) nature of suspect voting.
Studying the voting trends of over the history of BW suspect also lead me to the conclusion that the voters can't be fully trusted with such decisions unless they come to a strong supermajority. So basically council and supermajority (maybe 2/3) requirements are necessary checks for the capricious (and questionably qualified) nature of suspect voting.
Deluks917
Ride on Shooting Star
I support any proposal as long as there are tight time constraints. I want a playable OU in a reasonable time frame. I don't want the first year of OU to be dealing with a slowly dwindling list of OP pokemon.
I also propose we really raise the bar for suspect voters. I think 2100+-X is much better than 2000. Maybe 2150. I am easily able to get 2100 and I am not exactly a top player. I do not want people worse than me voting.
I also propose we really raise the bar for suspect voters. I think 2100+-X is much better than 2000. Maybe 2150. I am easily able to get 2100 and I am not exactly a top player. I do not want people worse than me voting.
@Deluks917
Raising the voting reqs in terms of getting a higher Glicko2 will not solve the problem of bad players being able to vote. The ladder is highly luck based in that most games are decided from team preview or lucky rolls. It is also highly luck based in versing a player with a really high rank at the start of your streak to get a massive boost or versing a player with a lower rank which doesn't raise your rank as much whilst also putting down your deviation. If you want to stop bad players from being able to vote, just make them add paragraphs or have it necessary to link to strong posts in the OU subforum.
Raising the voting reqs in terms of getting a higher Glicko2 will not solve the problem of bad players being able to vote. The ladder is highly luck based in that most games are decided from team preview or lucky rolls. It is also highly luck based in versing a player with a really high rank at the start of your streak to get a massive boost or versing a player with a lower rank which doesn't raise your rank as much whilst also putting down your deviation. If you want to stop bad players from being able to vote, just make them add paragraphs or have it necessary to link to strong posts in the OU subforum.
Just ban the combination of Sand Rush + Sand Stream
Sand Rush isn't dangerous because the only pokémon with good stats with it is excadrill and he has been banned a long time ago. Stoutland and Sandslash are RU and NU even with the ability. That is enough to prove that they aren't used in OU so baning the combination wouldn't affect them as pokémon. Nobody uses them so nobody cares...
I am pretty sure that some people are wishing to have a nice spinner with the ability to destroy the most common spin blockers (gengar, jellicent) in the sand! Yes, rain has many pokémon that are better under it and are very used but sand only has Stoutland to sweep using it (correct me if I am wrong but the other sand sweepers can also sweep in the rain without losing power).
Well, the mole wants to be back...
Sand Rush isn't dangerous because the only pokémon with good stats with it is excadrill and he has been banned a long time ago. Stoutland and Sandslash are RU and NU even with the ability. That is enough to prove that they aren't used in OU so baning the combination wouldn't affect them as pokémon. Nobody uses them so nobody cares...
I am pretty sure that some people are wishing to have a nice spinner with the ability to destroy the most common spin blockers (gengar, jellicent) in the sand! Yes, rain has many pokémon that are better under it and are very used but sand only has Stoutland to sweep using it (correct me if I am wrong but the other sand sweepers can also sweep in the rain without losing power).
Well, the mole wants to be back...
But then you're making Pokemon with the ability Sand Rush who aren't broken (Stoutland, Sandslash) to lose their niche in OU. If you actually look at the OU usage stats and viability ranking threads, you'd know that Stoutland actually gets a nice % of usage, and supports a solid B ranking. The reason it's NU is because the lack of permanent Sand in the lower tiers. "Nobody uses them so nobody cares". That's a pretty bad justification as to why we should ban an ability combo imo, and it isn't even true.
I think the emphasis you place on speed pertaining to my particular examples, or any for that matter, is overemphasized to prove your point. I don't agree with your point completely either. Yes it's true that fast 'mons are more likely to be used than slow 'mons as a general consensus, but it is still one piece of a larger picture, and that needs to be appreciated. In the case of Shaymin-S and Darkrai, both are pushed over the edge from respectable OU candidates to Uber threats because of Shaymin-S ability to flinch through any answer you would have otherwise had, and Darkrai's access to Dark Void. Without these two very specific key traits, its very unlikely they would be voted to Uber status at all. Slower Pokemon with similar assets, like Jirachi and Breloom, present similar glaring balance problems on their own but are kept in check by other factors outside of just speed. Deoxys-A is more understandable, but I still don't agree with the way you're positioning the debate because it places speed as significant over all else.
A second point in your post I would like to address is your assumptions on Fairy types and their impact. They're just that, assumptions. I don't think anyone here will argue that Fairy types won't have some impact on the metagame in Gen VI, but what kind of impact, and how significant, has yet to be seen. I do not see a purpose in you bringing in to this discussion when you and I lack the information to argue from a proper perspective. It's irrelevant at this point.
As for the rest, I'll simply say this since I do not feel like cherry-picking each case you've made. I am not an experienced Uber player, and I can tell by the way you've conducted your thoughts on these 'mons that you're probably not either. Correct me if I am wrong. However I do know and have seen players post regularly who are seasoned veterans of the Uber tier, and what they think is and isn't balanced both in and out of OU. Cases like Ho-Oh being OU due to glaring weaknesses like Stealth Rock have been made and humoured in the past to an extent, but ultimately fell flat on their face because while it sounds fine on paper it doesn't hold up in practice because the advocates for Ho-Oh being dropped in to OU didn't have the experience or appreciation for just how devastating it is. And Ho-Oh is I believe the most reasonable of cases to argue out of the ones you've choice to address. I won't even touch something like Reshiram; it should be glaringly obvious where it belongs.
I can't say I see it from your point of view, and I think players more established than you or I will be heavily inclined to agree.
I want to highlight this post because this is what results from a precedent like a complex ban from Swift Swim + Drizzle. While the responsibility doesn't fall on the rule to be properly respected and understood, but the player(s) ability to comprehend and interpret its significance and implications, it is preferable when a ruleset doesn't send the wrong message.
Swift Swim + Drizzle clause was enacted to help preserve what was believed at the time to be a diverse playstyle and numerable Pokemon that would have otherwise been suspected to Ubers that, outside the conditions of Drizzle, didn't deserve to be. As you said, the only Pokemon that has good stats with Sand Rush is Excadrill. So why would we enact a complex ban to preserve a single Pokemon?
I feel the need to throw my two cents about the current OU Suspect Process in here.
The current OU Suspect Process is very flawed. The first problem comes from the reqs to get voting privileges, which are entirely based on your Showdown Glicko2 and deviation. Your Glicko2 is heavily based on the players you play whilst you still have low deviation, this ironically adds a strong luck element to a req system that's main purpose is to ensure skillful and knowledgeable players as the ones who have voting privileges. Playing largely low ranked players while you still have a high deviation essentially cripples your Glicko2 in the long run and makes you put much more work in to meet reqs. Contrarily, losing just one or two games while you have high deviation also cripples your Glicko2. This wouldn't be a problem is Pokemon were 100% skill, but it isn't. Hax invariably happens, especially when our metagame mandates the use of moves such as Hydro Pump, Stone Edge, Focus Blast etc. that have high miss chances. Further supplementing is that ladders eventually become hard to climb due to players who have been at the top for long periods of time and thus have had a chance to accumulate a high Glicko2 and a low deviation, making them hard to upset. I remember hearing from one of my friends that he was 22-0 and in the low 2000's working his deviation down for UU reqs, when he lost a single game and had his rating drop to low 1900's! He struggled exponentially to climb the ladder and meet reqs due to this because after 23 games his combination of high Glicko2 and low-ish deviation made him gain minuscule amounts from each win and lose exponential amounts from each loss.
Simply put, the current reqs are hard for players who want to get involved in a test to do so unless they have a lot of time to spend playing Showdown, or are already high on the ladder. Potentially leaving knowledgeable players with lesser free time incapable of voting.
Even ignoring that, being a skilled pokemon player (Even if we assume only skilled players ever reach both the Glicko2 and deviation requirements needed for reqs) does not necessarily mean they are knowledgeable in what's best for a metagame. A lot of knowing what's best for a metagame comes from understanding game theory, much of which is not at all required to preform well in a game of pokemon.
So what exactly do I recommend? I'd like to change reqs for voting to be Play a set amount of games for the tier in question and maintain a certain Glicko2 score. The set amount of games is intended to be a high number and should make it so any and all eligible voters have played large amounts of the tier in question, the Glicko2 score is here to stop players from intentionally forfeiting over and over again to rack up their amount of games played. Players who have played large amounts of a tier are more likely to have asked themselves questions about the balance of a tier, as well as have a larger amount of sample games to draw a conclusion from and analyze.
The current OU Suspect Process is very flawed. The first problem comes from the reqs to get voting privileges, which are entirely based on your Showdown Glicko2 and deviation. Your Glicko2 is heavily based on the players you play whilst you still have low deviation, this ironically adds a strong luck element to a req system that's main purpose is to ensure skillful and knowledgeable players as the ones who have voting privileges. Playing largely low ranked players while you still have a high deviation essentially cripples your Glicko2 in the long run and makes you put much more work in to meet reqs. Contrarily, losing just one or two games while you have high deviation also cripples your Glicko2. This wouldn't be a problem is Pokemon were 100% skill, but it isn't. Hax invariably happens, especially when our metagame mandates the use of moves such as Hydro Pump, Stone Edge, Focus Blast etc. that have high miss chances. Further supplementing is that ladders eventually become hard to climb due to players who have been at the top for long periods of time and thus have had a chance to accumulate a high Glicko2 and a low deviation, making them hard to upset. I remember hearing from one of my friends that he was 22-0 and in the low 2000's working his deviation down for UU reqs, when he lost a single game and had his rating drop to low 1900's! He struggled exponentially to climb the ladder and meet reqs due to this because after 23 games his combination of high Glicko2 and low-ish deviation made him gain minuscule amounts from each win and lose exponential amounts from each loss.
Simply put, the current reqs are hard for players who want to get involved in a test to do so unless they have a lot of time to spend playing Showdown, or are already high on the ladder. Potentially leaving knowledgeable players with lesser free time incapable of voting.
Even ignoring that, being a skilled pokemon player (Even if we assume only skilled players ever reach both the Glicko2 and deviation requirements needed for reqs) does not necessarily mean they are knowledgeable in what's best for a metagame. A lot of knowing what's best for a metagame comes from understanding game theory, much of which is not at all required to preform well in a game of pokemon.
So what exactly do I recommend? I'd like to change reqs for voting to be Play a set amount of games for the tier in question and maintain a certain Glicko2 score. The set amount of games is intended to be a high number and should make it so any and all eligible voters have played large amounts of the tier in question, the Glicko2 score is here to stop players from intentionally forfeiting over and over again to rack up their amount of games played. Players who have played large amounts of a tier are more likely to have asked themselves questions about the balance of a tier, as well as have a larger amount of sample games to draw a conclusion from and analyze.
The amount of points awarded and lost as well as decay need to be revised, no question about that. However there needs to be a way to make sure that the voting member:
A) Is active in the metagame and aware of the recent changes that happened in playstyles and even finer details such as new sets
B) Has enough experience in a OU metagame that doesn't include the suspected pokemon (OU suspect)
C) Is skillful enough and knowledgeable to be able to pass judgments on whether or not a pokemon/item/move/ability is uber or not
I think the current requirement is OK, but what bugs me is when a suspect test is up, the OU ladder is discontinued and in it's place OU suspect and OU Current appear. I'm fine with laddering anew on the OU suspect, because it gives us a taste of a meta without the suspect in question, but why require us to ladder again on the OU current when it's the same meta as the OU ladder? Just keep the OU ladder and add the OU suspect until the vote is over, and then reset the OU ladder and remove the OU suspect pending for another test.
A) Is active in the metagame and aware of the recent changes that happened in playstyles and even finer details such as new sets
B) Has enough experience in a OU metagame that doesn't include the suspected pokemon (OU suspect)
C) Is skillful enough and knowledgeable to be able to pass judgments on whether or not a pokemon/item/move/ability is uber or not
I think the current requirement is OK, but what bugs me is when a suspect test is up, the OU ladder is discontinued and in it's place OU suspect and OU Current appear. I'm fine with laddering anew on the OU suspect, because it gives us a taste of a meta without the suspect in question, but why require us to ladder again on the OU current when it's the same meta as the OU ladder? Just keep the OU ladder and add the OU suspect until the vote is over, and then reset the OU ladder and remove the OU suspect pending for another test.
Well, I always thought it was to give players a chance to ladder fresh on the "current" metagame. I know my friend has used the same alt for pretty much PS!'s entire lifespan (at least since Smogon moved to it), and he hovers around 1500-1600, so if he had to ladder to 2000 Glicko2 and +/- 65, that'd be pretty much impossible. I also tend to keep alts for long periods of time.
I'll mention the one time I was at 2336 at 6-0 on an alt I played on PS once. Assuming I kept on winning until I got out of provisional I would've been at 3000+. That really shouldn't happen in about 20 games.
Maybe a more linear progression on how points are taken/awarded rather than an exponential decay would be nice. People talk about losing on purpose later on in their alt because it's faster to just quit and you don't really lose any points after a little while (mostly when we used 55 deviation). That's kinda dumb. If it was a more linear/less steep method of points giving you'd have to win more to get ACRE and Glicko2 high, but it'd make a deviation of 65 very good (assuming ACRE AND Glicko2 reqs) since it means you played and won enough games to prove the point you can keep your score that high at that point. Less mundane to grind than 55 but actually very skillful (unlike our current Glicko2 only with this kinda dumb system).
Maybe a more linear progression on how points are taken/awarded rather than an exponential decay would be nice. People talk about losing on purpose later on in their alt because it's faster to just quit and you don't really lose any points after a little while (mostly when we used 55 deviation). That's kinda dumb. If it was a more linear/less steep method of points giving you'd have to win more to get ACRE and Glicko2 high, but it'd make a deviation of 65 very good (assuming ACRE AND Glicko2 reqs) since it means you played and won enough games to prove the point you can keep your score that high at that point. Less mundane to grind than 55 but actually very skillful (unlike our current Glicko2 only with this kinda dumb system).