Tournament PUPL IV Preamble Thread

[MZ]

PUPL IV
​

PUPL IV is on the way! This thread will serve three purposes: confirming most of the details of the tournament, format discussion, and manager signups (sign up in this thread if you want to be a manager Haund).

There will be 6 teams in this PUPL, so 6 managers will be chosen from this thread. The season will start mid June, approximately right as WCOP group stages are ending. If you want to manage, all you have to do is post and explain why you are fit to manage a team. Managers will be selected based on PU experience / Smogon experience / PUPL experience / PS as well so convince me, Akir (who will once again be hosting the tournament), and galbia you have that. Managers will be given the opportunity to buy themselves from the auction for ~10k points so they can play as well. Additionally, managers will be expected to:

• Send in a roster every week
• PICK A GOOD TEAM NAME
• Keep activity high in your team / make subs when required

Example sign-up (note that doing a better job is expected):

Example

Hello, my name is Akir and I would like to be the manager for the team Wang-Bang Wobbuffets. I am a PU council member and blatantly stole the DPP PU idea from multiple people before me. Additionally I have placed ok-ish in previous PU tournaments and I topped the illustrious GSC STABmons ladder this month. I would be a good manager because I too can put 8 people in a list and send it to the host.

There will be 6 teams with 8 starting slots each. That is already confirmed, and we are not considering increasing the number of teams this year. However, we would like to get community opinions on the inclusion of DPP PU this year. These opinions should take into account how easy it is to find good DPP players, how easy it is to determine better or worse DPP players, how competitive the games are, and its overall worth versus a fifth USUM PU slot. ADV PU is not going to be returning, but this should be seen as having an impact on whether DPP is included or not. Depending on the community's response to DPP, the two likely formats are either:
USUM PU / USUM PU / USUM PU / USUM PU / ORAS PU / BW PU / DPP PU / Bo3 PU (USUM ORAS BW)
or
USUM PU / USUM PU / USUM PU / USUM PU / USUM PU / ORAS PU / BW PU / Bo3 PU (USUM ORAS BW)

There is no exact deadline for manager signups. However, this thread will only be open for about a week, and posting earlier increases your chances of being chosen. If you are a prospective or previous manager, posting your opinions on the format would be highly appreciated.

 

[yogi]

Hey, I'll bite.

I do realise there may be some concern about my activity as I'm prone to quitting occasionally, but I will not be doing so! I've been heavily involved in the PU community since the last PUPL, with Tutoring roles, QC and analysis work, work with the teambuilding lab along with helping run several forum projects. I've also been active within the community for quite a while, conversing with its numerous members along with being very active within the Discord (memes or no memes alike). I know that I may be seen as the "meme pick" but I honestly believe that I'm good enough at organising and ensuring things are done, along with being a friendly face for my team to talk to. I'm also legit picking up Pablo and Heysup for 3k again, easy wins holy f.

I know I signed up last year as a total meme, but I'm actually pretty serious this year and would love a stab at managing n_n

Oh I also went undefeated last PUPL I guess.

My team name would be The Mokey Mokey Smackdowns

s/o dibs

 

[ManOfMany]

Hello.

I would like to return as a manager of the Half-Blood Prinplups. No, this is not a joke. I fully intend to take the position of a manager seriously in order to draft the best team possible and create a enjoyable team experience. I realize that my last attempt at managing a team was not always smooth. However, it was a learning experience and I have honestly matured as a person considerably since then. I'm ready to gear up the Prinlups for another chance- though this time with more sophisticated, smarter memes.

Why do I want to manage? Simple- I really like PU. It has been my favorite metagame since XY and the PU community is fantastic. Even when I took extended breaks from pokemon, I come back because I just like the people here so much.

I would like to give other players a chance to get more involved in high-level PU play and showcase some of our best talents. Some of my qualifications include being a former QC member, reaching Seasonal Playoff SFs, being a roomvoice for 3 years, being a manager PUPL II, and winning PUPL III with galbia. I have been involved with the community for a while and know a decent amount of players, both "local" PU guys and others. Of course, I can't possibly know every good player, so I'll hold tryouts of some form to help with that!

Regarding the format: I think the first option looks good! Although DPP doesn't have a large playerbase, it does happen to be a very balanced tier, and Akir and others have put a lot of work into making it competitive. I believe a 5th USUM slot is unecessary.

s/o dibs

 

[Teddeh]

Hi i don't want to manage but i think that personally from my own experiences, i think that there are a few options that I would prefer to what we have suggested in this thread.
1) I think that there should be 2 ORAS slots available, whether we drop dpp pu or bo3, i think that ORAS has enough players and was a very good meta for people to play.
2) BO3 including bw - I would much prefer for the bo3 slot to not include bw as there are not enough people who know the tier, who can build in the tier and there aren't many people who could play bo3 to a good enough standard. Evidence supporting this is that nearly every bw pu replay from the bo3 tournament includes HJAD's sample team (2 of my own rounds have included mirror matches of us both using this sample) and that this would reduce the standard of games played in the bo3, especially if oras + sm is tight and then it turns out to be a bad bw game deciding etc. My possible suggestions for this are:
- Removing the bo3 slot and replacing with another sm / oras slot
- Having it as a bo3 slot for purely sm/oras (though i don't know exactly how this would work) and I much prefer option 1.

The PU playerbase is relatively new and not many people who are active in current meta actually were around for bw pu during bw, the competition is largely dominated by omfuga or flcl (omfuga went 6-0 both pupl 2 and pupl 3) and the rest of the people in this community started playing PU in oras.

My proposed format instead would be :
SM / SM / SM / SM / ORAS / ORAS / BW / DPP
or
SM / SM / SM / SM / SM / ORAS / ORAS / BW

 

[MrAldo]

Just wanna tune in that Bo3 is the most exhausting and unrewarding format for an unofficial team tour ever. Personally I believe it is way too much demand for so little, burning up player since coming up with a good team takes time so make the calculations for 2 more multi-gen teams.

I agree with most of Teddeh points tbh. Fairly valid for a metagame like PU, and I really dislike Bo3 formats.

This format is also real nice imo:

SM / SM / SM / SM / ORAS / ORAS / BW / DPP

 

[EviGaro]

Hello I'm EviGaro and I'm a recovering abandoned manager, and I'd like to throw my hat in the ring to expand my brand with the Magnanimous Misdreavus. Now you may think, why are you trying you're not a PU main. Well first off, Megazard once affectionately called me half a PU main, but in more serious terms I actually have done pretty decently in some PU tours across gens, placing a scoring finish in ssnls and being in playoffs of the PU classic, while also being part of a pupl winning team. Ok it was from the bench, but being a manager doesn't correlate to playing. I've given chances to PU players when given the opportunity, I like the tier and know almost anyone in it, have a fairly good idea of how I would work a lineup and I just really liked my experience so I can guarantee I would push hard to win this and won't be a negative influence.

Also irrespective of this, bo3 slots are bad, I agree with Teddeh and MrAldo on that. Bo3 with two gens would make more sense considering the playerbase, but it completely defeats the purpose of having that slot to begin with, and it just pushes confusion in prep. Aldo's proposal makes more sense honestly, give more weight to the "official" PU metas and keep DPP, players from that gen are generally far easier to find and the tier doesn't really lack familiarity like ADV does so there's plenty of reasons to give it a spot.

 

[HJAD]

Hey! I will be signing up as manager again this year for the returning Destructive Dedennes.

I believe my credentials are strong having managed the boys to a runners-up spot last year, being the 2nd best PU player at the moment™, and being an esteemed PU council member.

Im in agreement with the above users that the Bo3 format sucks, and 4 SM+2 ORAS+1 BW+1 DPP is probably the best format with the next best being a 5+1+1+1 settup.

fuck user Haund and hoepfully we can make this tour a fun one :)

 

[MZ]

My decisions on the format have been fairly public but since some of these ideas are kinda new: I'm in favor of DPP since there's just enough of a playerbase to be able to tell who to draft and I can see every team having a solid DPP player although it's kinda close. I like BO3 personally but am willing to listen if people are this against it, and would really prefer not to do 2 ORAS since so many people just don't play it anymore or never did. It wouldn't be the worst thing, but I don't see the need to expand slots when it doesn't deserve it that much, and I feel like the push is mostly coming from the smaller group of players who were very into ORAS PU.

Also I'm managing again.

 

[Haund]

niggas be flaming me in the op niggas be flaming me in their very signup pots but niggas only making me stronger

hlelo it's me hound, I'd like to manage the Marxist Marowaks again. I've been involved with PU for a couple of years now, I know the ins and outs of the community, the players, and the tier (this one is debatable but w/e). I managed this same team last year and I think it went great! We were in for the playoffs till the very end, and the atmosphere within the team was always good. I also played and managed in some untier Premier Leagues like MPL or PSPL, and I'm currently managing our very own PSPL team in this year's edition.

re: formats. I actually told MZ I'd like to have 2 ORAS slots before this thread even came out, and I stick with that. I don't have strong opinions on DPP yes or DPP no, I guess it comes down to whether we prefer focusing more on older tiers or the current gen... Only thing I want to ask similarly to the others is to not have a bo3 slot that includes BW. Finding even more old gens players is a pain considering this year we don't even have the hype surrounding the PU Classic anymore, while I definitely think finding ORAS players is more accessible.

Thank you everyone!

 

[Chrisloud1]

Hi, I'm not going to manage, I just want to give my thoughts about what slots should be included on this PUPL, first of all, I think DPP should be included over a fifth SM slot or the Bo3 slot. I know there have been some arguments of why DPP shouldn't be included, so I'm gonna try to address what I have seen.

First is the "Finding DPP players to draft is hard", which is not entirely false. Im not gonna lie and say is super easy because it isn't, but its not that hard either, since there is 6 teams each team would probably want(at least) 1 DPP player, which makes 6 players. I'm sure some DPP players are on the radar due how they played their DPP games on last PUPL(the last time DPP had any tournament activity), Heysup, Void, TJ, Honko(Just the name a few because there are more). Keep in mind the scores aren't the only thing that says if x player is good, there has been really solid players that ended with bad PUPL scores. I'm basing this on the last PUPL because, again, it was the last time DPP had tournament activity and the meta hasn't change a bit from that time. There are also some good players that play DPP PU and the managers probably know of like GA for example.

Another thing I have seen is "DPP haven't had any tournament activity since last PUPL" this is true but I don't see how it should affect the inclusion of DPP at all. Since it hasn't had any tournament activity, the metagame is still pretty much the same as last PUPL, which means players that learned/know the meta at that time, still do and can still play the tier. I also want to mention how successful DPP PU was last PUPL and I'm sure everyone can agree on this. You could see the dedication behind the teams and how the players knew the meta, making the games really good and enjoyable. The tier also developed a lot on that time.

Overall what I'm trying to say is DPP PU should be included because, finding players isn't that hard as people make it out to be and you can tell which players are good and the games of last PUPL were really competitive. I think it would be such a waste to not include this meta on this PUPL when it did so good on last one. A fifth SM slot seems a bit overkill and I have pretty much the same opinion on the previous post (MrAldo, Evigaro, Teddeh) about bo3 so I'm not going to repeat what it has been said.

So the format I pretty much support is this one:
SM / SM / SM / SM / ORAS / ORAS / BW / DPP

 

[gz]

Hey!
Although I'm one of the newer players, joining the PU community in late oras, I feel capable of managing a PUPL team, the Beastly Bellossoms. I already have a couple of team tours under my belt, most notably wcop, powc and ourpl, which I co-managed and successfully lead to the currently ongoing final, so I'm not completely new in that regard.
Furthermore, I would also claim that my PU knowledge is also fairly good, especially in oras and sm, which also confirm my latest records like reaching finals in open and semis in the latest seasonals and official roomtours respectively. Because I played that much PU in the last year, I also know pretty much every relevant current gen player. Additionally, my old gens know-how is also good enough to support my team in the best possible way and I feel confident forming a great team, full of motivated and hungry players.

Separately I wanna throw in my two-cents about the format discussion. While I'm a big fan of the bo3 format, I feel like it's not the best thing for the pu tier. Most players joined in gen6 or even gen7 and have no connection to bw pu whatsoever, which also will lead to some uninteresting and unmotivated games. So I'm also leading towards the SM / SM / SM / SM / ORAS / ORAS / BW / DPP format, cause finding 2 oras players is not difficult at all in my honest opinion and DPP needs some tour presence as well, cause it's being ignored most of the times and there is an actual playerbase playing dpp.

 

[lax]

galbia you gotta sign up again for the best team bro

 

[termi]

Hello, I'm Robert Alfons and I will be managing Team Boku no Pika (team name is WIP). I managed the Fudge Packing Passimians last year to great success, ending in the top 10 best performing teams that PUPL, and I would like to do it again. I'm very good at making sure the battles get done which is more or less the most important part of all this to begin with so yeah. I also have team tournament experience in spades outside of PUPL, appearing in most if not all RUPLs to date, fighting for PU in PSPL for the second time as of right now, starring in Smogon Exhibition this year, and benchwarming in NUPL every year. Everybody in the PU community loves me so please let me manage again thanks!

As for my stance on the tiers, a DPP slot is neat and I definitely prefer 4 SM slots and 2 ORAS slots rather than 5 SM slots, ORAS has a big enough potential playerbase to deserve two slots and 4 current gen and 4 oldgen slots just Looks More Aesthetic. BO3 sux.

 

[TONE]

Sup everybody, you got TONE here and I'd like to throw my hat in to be the manager of the Olivine Octilleries (yep Octilleries are coming back). Despite the lack of tournaments played, my knowledge of the meta more than makes up for this. Not only am I able to send a list of 8 people, but I'm the only person to draft 18 people in an auction and look good doing it. And I'm also easy to get along with and I took part in all previous PUPLs, manager or player, including being on the first PUPL champion Great Gastlys (s/o Raiza).

idk how much merit this will hold since I last managed in PUPL 2 and after playing in last year's PUPL, 4 SM slots, 2 ORAS, 1 BW, and 1 DPP would be best for the sake of the tournament overall as it feels more inclusive of the current playerbase. It's already been said many times already, but Bo3 just isn't good at all tbh.