Semi Invincibility Clause

[Beelzemon 2003]

Semi Invincibility Clause

Hi chums, this is Beelzemon 2003, the leader of the Gen 2 Item Clause Format. This is a short thread that I created to help those players that want to host Gen 1 matches or tournaments with the moves Dig and Fly allowed.

As you may know, in the first turn of Dig / Fly the user becomes Semi Invincible; however, if the second turn of the move is interrupted by Paralysis or Confusion damage, the move is disrupted AND the pokémon stays Semi Invincible indefinitely. The only way to get rid of the Semi Invincibility phase is to switch the user or use Dig or Fly again. If the user doesn’t switch or uses Dig or Fly again, it keeps its Semi Invincibility and can continue attacking from the Ground or the Sky with any move it desires, this creates an unfair advantage, because the only moves that can damage said pokémon are Bide and Swift.

To prevent a player’s pokémon to become Semi-Invincible for the rest of the match, I created the Semi Invincibility Clause, which says the following:

Short Version

If your pokémon gets stuck during the Semi Invincibility phase of the moves Dig or Fly, your next successful action must be Dig, Fly or Switch. If your next successful action is none of the ones mentioned before, you lose the match.

Detailed Version

If your pokémon gets stuck during the Semi Invincibility phase of the moves Dig or Fly, your next successful action must be one of the following:

1. Switch the pokémon that got stuck.
2. Use Dig.
3. Use Dig via another move in your first try (e.g. using Dig via Metronome).
4. Use Fly.
5. Use Fly via another move in your first try (e.g. using Fly via Mirror Move).

If your next successful action is other than the ones mentioned before, you lose the match even if you refuse to select the Run / Forfeit Options.

If your first successful action is one of the allowed options, but your pokémon gets stuck again in the Semi Invincibility phase, you have to repeat the process until you cease to be Semi Invincible.

You will also lose the match if none of the allowed options are available (e.g. if your last reamining pokémon uses Dig via Metronome´s last PP, gets stuck and doesn’t have the moves Dig or Fly).

As I said before, the intention of this thread is to establish a standard for Gen 1 matches or tournaments that allow the moves Dig and Fly; my intention is not to change the mechanics of Pokémon Showdown’s Simulator so the moves Dig and Fly are allowed (although that would make me very happy).

By the way, to disqualify players that break the Clause, the Tournament Organizer has to use the following command:

/tour dq NAME_OF_THE_PLAYER​

Where NAME_OF_THE_PLAYER is, well, the name of the player that violated the Clause and refuses to forfeit (Note: this command only works in tournaments that are created in private Chat rooms).

That’s all for now, see ya chums.

Related Topics

Tips for using Dig and Fly

Probability that a pokémon activates the Semi-Invincibility Glitch when it uses Dig anf Fly

 

[Omanyte]

Is there any reason to use dig instead of earthquake?
As for fly... how many (viable) pokemon would use it? Possibly Articuno or Dragonite at a stretch? Seems pretty mediocre at best. I don't really see the point of this, as these moves aren't that great to start with.

 

[Flares.]

It seems based on these threads you like to create in the ruins of alph forums. You are quite the big fan of clauses, have you thought about making a game-mode that has no clauses, a street war based game mode. I think it would be quite interesting for you to tackle.

 

[Beelzemon 2003]

Is there any reason to use dig instead of earthquake?
As for fly... how many (viable) pokemon would use it? Possibly Articuno or Dragonite at a stretch? Seems pretty mediocre at best. I don't really see the point of this, as these moves aren't that great to start with.

I've played many games with the Semi Invincibility Clause, but, to be honest, Dig and Fly are rarely used. Articuno is one of the few pokémon that use Fly and it only does it against the Water/Ice Pokémon like Lapras and Dewgong who are slower, take 105 points of Base Damage from Fly VS 100 from Double Edge (which also causes Recoil Damage to Articuno). Dig is good for pokémon like Ninetales or Arcanine which don't get Earthquake, the objective is to use Dig against Rock, Poison or other fellow Fire Pokémon.

Another uncommon but rewarding use for Dig and Fly is to avoid Explosions. By the way, Dragonite doesn't learn Fly (unless you play tradebacks).

 

[Omanyte]

Dig is good for pokémon like Ninetales or Arcanine which don't get Earthquake, the objective is to use Dig against Rock, Poison or other fellow Fire Pokémon.

Another uncommon but rewarding use for Dig and Fly is to avoid Explosions. By the way, Dragonite doesn't learn Fly (unless you play tradebacks).

Thanks, that seems like a pretty good summary of potential uses.

 

[Beelzemon 2003]

When to use Dig and Fly

As I mentioned before, Dig and Fly are not powerful moves; however they have some uses.

To begin with, both moves are only useful for pokémon that have bad movepools like Articuno, Pidgeot or Farfetch’d. Now, generally, you only want to use Dig or Fly when you are either low on health or your opponent is very unlikely to switch.

In the case of Articuno, imagine that it is low on HPs and has to face a Lapras, a Cloyster or a Dewgong that has full health. Articuno’s job is already done and it will die anyway, so, for your next move you have to choose between attacking with Blizzard or Fly. Blizzard is a terrible idea because it does 0.25 damage to those pokémon, while Fly does full damage (1.0), so the logical choice is Fly. After you use Fly, it is very likely that your opponent will stay in because it wants to kill Articuno with Thunderbolt / Surf / Blizzard and switching in the second turn will only make another pokemon to get damaged without punishing Articuno.

Another situation is when pokémon like Charizard or Pidgeot face opponents like Machamp. Let’s say that Charizard or Pidgeot are low on health or that they have full health but, for some reason, they don’t care about getting hit by Machamp's Rock Slide (perhaps their teams have the numerical advantage). In the first turn, Charizard/Pidgeot will Fly high into the sky while Machamp’s Rock Slide will miss. In the second turn, Machamp will have to decide whether it allows Charizard / Pidgeot to use Fly against it just to retaliate with Rock Slide or if it wants to switch and allow a teammate to get hurt. It doesn’t matter what Machamp does, at the end, Charizard and Pidgeot have the upper hand (unless Fly misses).

Now let’s talk about Dig. Some pokémon don’t learn Earthquake, but do learn Dig, like Charmander. Let’s say that you’re in a Little Cup match, that you have a Charmander at low health and that your opponent has an Omanyte. The fossil snail gets 0.25 damage from Fire attacks and 0.5 from Normal attacks; however, it recieves double damage from Ground Attacks, so what do you do? You use Dig! After you dig underground, Omanyte will use Surf and miss; then it’ll have to decide if it wants to get hit just to kill you with a second Surf or if it wants to switch and give you a free hit.

Now I’ll give you one more example. Imagine a match between Ninetales and Weezing. Weezing is low on health and it is likely that it’ll blow up, so what will Ninetales do? It’ll dig a hole underground! After Ninetales uses Dig, one of two things will happen: Weezing will use Sludge and fail or it’ll explode without hitting anyone.

How to Counter Dig and Fly

Finally, how do you counter Dig and Fly? Switching in the first turn is an option, but it requires prediction and also that the incomming pokémon fills the following requirements:

1. It has to be slower than the Dig/Fly user.
2. It has to get 0.5 damage from Dig/Fly.

The idea is to switch in the turn that the pokémon flies or digs a hole, take a resisted hit in the second turn and then counterattack, e.g. a Golem that switches against a Pidgeot just to hit it with a super effective Rock Slide in the second turn. Switching in the first turn is a good option; however, it requires prediction and you could end up being hit by another move.

The second counter is to use Dig or Fly yourself. Let’s imagine that you have an Arcanine and that your opponent has a Ninetales. If you think that Ninetales will use Dig in the next turn, you can counter it by using Dig yourself. In the second turn, Ninetales will pop up from the ground without hitting anyone and then it’ll be hit by Arcanine.

Finally we have the last counter: Substitute. This counter works better if your pokémon is faster than the Dig/Fly user, let’s give an example: you are in a Petit Cup match and have a Diglett, while your opponent has a Pidgey. Diglett hits hard Pidgey with its Rock Slide and then the Flying pokémon uses Fly, so what do you do? You create a Substitute! Pidgey will drop from the sky and hit the substitute instead (or it’ll simply miss).

Again, I know that Dig and Fly are not meta defining moves, but still, they have some uses, specially if your pokémon has a bad movepool.

By the way, remember that in Gen 1 Detect and Protect don’t exist, that Bright Powder is also abscent and that Counter doesn’t work against Dig nor Fly, so, if you have a situation where you can use Dig or Fly for your advantage, go for it!

It dug a hole underground!

 

[Beelzemon 2003]

What are the chances that a pokémon gets stuck in the air or underground?

Lately, I've been wondering which are the chances that a pokémon that is confused and/or paralyzed gets stuck in the air or underground. Well, in this post I'll give the answer.

First we have to remember two basic things: Paralysis doesn't wear off over time, while Confusion does. Now, regarding Confusion, it can last a maximum of five turns and it has a random chance of disappearing on turns two to five. There is a 25 % chance chance that it will disappear on turn 2, a 33.33 % on turn 3, a 50 % on turn 4 and a 100 % on turn 5. The pokémon never hurts itself on the turn that Confusion disappears.

In the turns where Confusion remains, the pokémon has a 50 % chance of hurting itself. Returning to Paralysis, this has a 25 % chance of preventing a pokémon from moving.

It is possible for a pokémon to be paralyzed and confused at the same time, in this case, the game performs three checks in this order: the Confusion remains or disappears? If the Confusion remains, does the pokémon hurt itself? If the pokémon doesn't hurt itself, does it get paralyzed or does it perform a move? The first check only takes place on turns 2 to 5 of the Confusion status, on the other hand, if the pokémon hurts itself after the second check, the third one doesn't take place and the pokémon's turn ends.

OK, now we have many scenarios that can be summarized into five: the pokémon uses Dig/Fly successfully; the pokémon hurts itself on turn 1; the pokémon gets paralyzed on turn 1; the pokémon hurts itself in the air/underground; and, finally, the pokémon gets paralyzed in the air/underground.
Sice we're only interested in the probability of the pokémon getting stuck in the air or underground, we'll only cover the fourth and fifth scenarios. The fourth and fifth scenarios can be analyzed in three cases, these are the following:

Short version

Case 1: The pokémon is Confused, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but hurts itself on turn 2 = 18.75 %

Case 2: the pokémon is Paralyzed, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but gets paralyzed on turn 2 = 18.75%

Case 3: the pokémon is Confused and Paralyzed, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but hurts itself or gets paralyzed on turn 2 = 19.921875%

Detailed version

Case 1: The pokémon is Confused, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but hurts itself on turn 2

The pokémon doesn't hurt itself and uses Dig/Fly on turn 1	The Confusion remains on turn 2	The pokémon hurts itself on turn 2 and gets stuck	Chances of getting stuck in the air/underground
1/2​	3/4​	1/2​	1/2*3/4*1/2=3/16=0.1875=18.75%​

Case 2: the pokémon is Paralyzed, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but gets paralyzed on turn 2

The pokémon doesn't get paralyzed and uses Dig/Fly on turn 1	The pokémon gets paralyzed on turn 2 and gets stuck	Chances of getting stuck in the air/ground
3/4​	1/4​	3/4*1/4=3/16=0.1875=18.75%​

Case 3.1: the pokémon is Confused and Paralyzed, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, but hurts itself on turn 2

The pokémon doesn't hurt itself on turn 1	The pokémon doesn't get paralyzed and uses Dig/Fly on turn 1	The Confusion remains on turn 2	The pokémon hurts itself on turn 2 and gets stuck	Chances of getting stuck in the air/underground
1/2​	3/4​	3/4​	1/2​	1/2*3/4*3/4*1/2=9/64=0.140625=14.0625%​

Case 3.2: the pokémon is Confused and Paralyzed, uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, doesn't hurt itself in turn 2, but gets paralyzed in turn 2

The pokémon doesn't hurt itself on turn 1	The pokémon doesn't get paralyzed and uses Dig/Fly on turn 1	The Confusion remains on turn 2	The pokémon doesn't hurt itself on turn 2	The pokémon gets paralyzed on turn 2 and gets stuck	Chances of getting stuck in the air/underground
1/2​	3/4​	3/4​	1/2​	1/4​	1/2*3/4*3/4*1/2*1/4=9/256=0.03515625=3.515625%​

Case 3.3: the pokémon is Confused and Paralyzed, the pokemon uses Dig/Fly on turn 1, the Confusion disappears on turn 2, but the pokémon gets paralyzed on turn 2

The pokémon doesn't hurt itself on turn 1	The pokémon doesn't get paralyzed and uses Dig/Fly on turn 1	The Confusion disappears on turn 2	The pokémon gets paralyzed on turn 2 and gets stuck	Chances of getting stuck in the air/ground
1/2​	3/4​	1/4​	1/4​	1/2*3/4*1/4*1/4=3/128=0.0234375=2.34375%​

If we add the percentages of the third case we get this probability:

Case 3.1	Case 3.2	Case 3.3	Chances of getting stuck in the air/underground
14.0625%​	3.515625%​	2.34375%​	14.0625%+3.515625%+2.34375%=19.921875%​

So there you have it. If your pokémon is Confused, there is a chance of 18.75 % that it gets stuck in the air/underground; if it is paralyzed, the chance is of 18.75 %; finally, if it is confused and paralyzed, the chance is of 19.921875 %.

If I did one or more mistakes with the mathematical operations, please let me know so I can correct them. Thank you for reading.

Dig Sandshrew, dig to the center of the Earth!​