(banning) Dynamicpunch

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Dunno if there's any gen 6 competitive implications but Dynamicpunch is a legitimate coverage move in Gen 2 on mixed attackers, and especially on Gengar who otherwise is heavily checked by Tyranitar. This raises the implication of possibility that Dpunch has actual use outside of confusion whoring.
GSC is a substantially different metagame than ORAS. Taking the risks with a 50% accurate move with 8 PP was actually considerable in GSC because the metagame was a lot slower-paced and filled with Pokemon that would be screwed over if they got hit with Dynamicpunch.

Meanwhile, in ORAS, relying on a 50% accurate move for coverage is a risk that is often not worth it because there is so much offensive diversity in literally every tier that can give more consistent strategies than relying on Dynamicpunch without No Guard.
 

Bughouse

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What Alfalfa said about GSC comparisons^. And also in ORAS, here's the entire list of fully evolved Pokemon that learn DynamicPunch and don't learn another physical Fighting move of BP 75 or greater:
Minun
Plusle
Probopass
Swalot

In GSC your alternative was piss weak HP Fighting or Rock Smash. And for people who don't know Hidden Power DVs for GSC, HP Fighting was barely even an option because you need bad DVs to get it (Atk and Def of 12, which then lowers HP to 3, so you lose 6 Atk, 6 Def, and 24 HP on Gengar for example).
 
I understand why people don't like complex bans, but what I don't understand is why the line should be drawn here specifically. There's been plenty in the past, including one which wasn't very long ago at all in Gravity + Hypnosis in doubles, and even a very similar situation to this in BW2 NU Prankster + Assist where they could have just banned Liepard but instead decided that banning a mon that was otherwise not a hinderance to the tier was not ideal and went with a complex ban instead. It's basically the exact same situation (besides the semantics of golett and machop etc); people just want the option that's best for their tier.
 

atomicllamas

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BW2 NU Prankster + Assist where they could have just banned Liepard
This was also really dumb and should have just been a Liepard ban, I laddered the entire time during this suspect with w/ an Assist Purrloin team and it wasn't broken (which is why I voted ban Liepard). Liepard also wasn't "healthy" for the tier given that Swagger was still allowed in BW2 NU at that point, I guess it adds to precedence for a Dynamic Punch + No Guard Ban in PU, but the fact that Assist + Prankster was banned over Liepard was absolutely the wrong decision and weakens your case (in my opinion) in that it allowed an unhealthy Pokemon to remain in the tier because the issue had been "dealt with".
 

Nails

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I understand why people don't like complex bans, but what I don't understand is why the line should be drawn here specifically. There's been plenty in the past, including one which wasn't very long ago at all in Gravity + Hypnosis in doubles, and even a very similar situation to this in BW2 NU Prankster + Assist where they could have just banned Liepard but instead decided that banning a mon that was otherwise not a hinderance to the tier was not ideal and went with a complex ban instead. It's basically the exact same situation (besides the semantics of golett and machop etc); people just want the option that's best for their tier.
because you're not a special snowflake. there is nothing about this that requires a complex ban. gravnosis is uncompetitive no matter what runs it, and many pokemon can use it effectively. i'd guess that purrloin was also broken assist + prankster abusers (i didn't play the tier at the time). blaziken is broken because its speed boost set is too strong, we don't nerf pokemon.

edit: because i'm retarded
 

Anty

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because you're not a special snowflake. there is nothing about this that requires a complex ban. gravnosis is uncompetitive no matter what runs it, and many pokemon can use it effectively. i'd guess that purrloin was also broken assist + prankster abusers (i didn't play the tier at the time). blaziken is broken because its speed boost set is too strong, we don't nerf pokemon.

edit: because i'm retarded
I (and others) have been playing around with a Machoke + Machop + Golett Trick Room team, and I've actually been able to confuse my way through competitive players. Although the team is obviously flawed, it shows that despite the Pokemon, there is still an uncompetitive aspect to 100% accurate dpunch. Replays (in neither of the games does the confusion seem too crucial, but both definitely made an impact):
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pu-378860863
http://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/pu-378938293
I haven't had much time to get replays (getting more isn't hard as there is an army of PU players willing to help), but I think they show that Machop and Golett have the potential to be uncompetitive. So if I get enough replays of Golett and Machop, and show dpunch + no guard is uncompetitive on both of them, can we ban it?

Also, you say that 'gravnosis is uncompetitive no matter what runs it', but what makes Hypnosis Ralts under gravity more uncompetitive than Spore Amoonguss or Breloom. Spore may be easier to deal with, but the ban does include any sleep move + gravity, which includes Sleep Powder.
 

Bughouse

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This was also really dumb and should have just been a Liepard ban, I laddered the entire time during this suspect with w/ an Assist Purrloin team and it wasn't broken (which is why I voted ban Liepard). Liepard also wasn't "healthy" for the tier given that Swagger was still allowed in BW2 NU at that point, I guess it adds to precedence for a Dynamic Punch + No Guard Ban in PU, but the fact that Assist + Prankster was banned over Liepard was absolutely the wrong decision and weakens your case (in my opinion) in that it allowed an unhealthy Pokemon to remain in the tier because the issue had been "dealt with".
No. It really should have been an Assist ban because Assist is not a competitive move. Slow teams without priority would still 100% lose to Assist Liepard or Persian, lacking Prankster. And there is absolutely no reason to use Assist other than cheese. It's the same reason Smogon didn't ban Prankster Swagger. Just Swagger.

BW NU was wrong here to complex ban. But Assist was the right ban. Not Liepard.
 
Yeah whoever called the pu council "greedy" for wanting to save a perfectly fine Pokemon like Machoke and simply ban a luck-fishing move like Dynamic Punch that has no place in virtually (outside of Machoke considering un weighted stats only about 85% of the very relevant Golett used it) anything else's moveset should remember that Cacnea, Sandshrew, and Froslass are now disallowed in DPPt just so that we can keep using Gliscor freely.

Either way if you guys want to discuss confusion inducing moves as a whole in another thread I would be cool with it.
 
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atomicllamas

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No. It really should have been an Assist ban because Assist is not a competitive move. Slow teams without priority would still 100% lose to Assist Liepard or Persian, lacking Prankster. And there is absolutely no reason to use Assist other than cheese. It's the same reason Smogon didn't ban Prankster Swagger. Just Swagger.

BW NU was wrong here to complex ban. But Assist was the right ban. Not Liepard.
Which is why Liepard and Persian assist continued to be a problem after this ban? Lol.

Edit @ below: more like I also bothered to ladder with assist Persian during that test and auto losing 4/5 games (and not auto winning the other 1/5) isn't something I'd consider broken or uncompetitive. The fact you got to vote and didn't bother to play with any of the options is exactly why that vote was a sham.
 
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Bughouse

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Not like many people used Assist shit beforehand either. Most people don't like using uncompetitive strategies. You're comparing two small numbers. Of course the banned strat is better than the other, still available one. That doesn't make the one that's still available any less uncompetitive.


EDIT: LOL I laddered with the actual team, with the team with Purrloin, with the team with Dark Gem Unburden Liepard, and with DiveCats. Don't tell me I treated the test like a sham boi.
 
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Aberforth

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I thought we should just ban Gliscor in that situation but fine clearly I'm a hypocrite.

But on DynamicPunch, why should we ban it in just PU when it is clearly fine in UU and NU? 100% accurate Dynamic Punches exist there (and in RU but those two are the ones with the No Guard + Dpunch mon in the tier) and unless I have been not paying attention at all there are no calls for it to receive a suspect test in those tiers. Or in any of the previous generations when Machamp has had No Guard + Dynamic Punch and it was perfectly manageable.

The only time DynamicPunch is considered too much is when it makes a pokemon broken. If you want to keep Machoke, keep Machoke, but that should not involve nerfing it so that it is manageable. It is either too much, and should be banned, or it is healthy, in which case all of it is healthy.
 

MZ

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But on DynamicPunch, why should we ban it in just PU when it is clearly fine in UU and NU? 100% accurate Dynamic Punches exist there (and in RU but those two are the ones with the No Guard + Dpunch mon in the tier) and unless I have been not paying attention at all there are no calls for it to receive a suspect test in those tiers.
And we banned Victreebel, Linoone, Chatter, Throh, etc from PU but not from NU. It's a lower tier, with a different banlist. Whether or not we do it in PU shouldn't be dictated by how bad it is in NU.
 

Aberforth

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If we're talking about something being uncompetitive by way of 100% confusion and banning that, it is different from banning a pokemon from the tier. Chatter I'll concede because it is similar, but there are other factors in the Chatter situation which make me more sympathetic to a chatter ban, namely the higher pp and spam-ability of the move.
 
no? chatter wasn't spammable at all because it was really weak, chatter was broken because it let chatot set up and sweep completely through teams if it got lucky enough (which it often did). dynamicpunch is much more spammable, and it only having 8 pp is rarely a huge issue.
 

Aberforth

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It was also only on one pokemon, and from the way you describe it there I would have just said ban Chatot rather than ban Chatter. There are also no similar cases anywhere else where we can point and say "Chatter is not a problem here" because Chatter isn't relevant in any other tier. With DynamicPunch, there are multiple examples of it existing in a tier without being banworthy.
 

Anty

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It was also only on one pokemon, and from the way you describe it there I would have just said ban Chatot rather than ban Chatter. There are also no similar cases anywhere else where we can point and say "Chatter is not a problem here" because Chatter isn't relevant in any other tier. With DynamicPunch, there are multiple examples of it existing in a tier without being banworthy.
Chatot is b- in the NU viability rankings so its hardly not relevant in any other tier. It only isn't a problem in NU because Chatot is a fairly niche mon there, unlike PU, where it was one of the best wallbreakers at the time.

I thought we should just ban Gliscor in that situation but fine clearly I'm a hypocrite.

But on DynamicPunch, why should we ban it in just PU when it is clearly fine in UU and NU? 100% accurate Dynamic Punches exist there (and in RU but those two are the ones with the No Guard + Dpunch mon in the tier) and unless I have been not paying attention at all there are no calls for it to receive a suspect test in those tiers. Or in any of the previous generations when Machamp has had No Guard + Dynamic Punch and it was perfectly manageable.

The only time DynamicPunch is considered too much is when it makes a pokemon broken. If you want to keep Machoke, keep Machoke, but that should not involve nerfing it so that it is manageable. It is either too much, and should be banned, or it is healthy, in which case all of it is healthy.
Firstly, Dpunch doesn't receive any calls for a suspect in other tiers as it isn't as relevant in those tiers. When an S-rank and the most used Pokemon's main move is very luck based (worse than scald before someone mentions it) it is definitely going to be more notable than a B rank mon (machamp) or a B- rank mon (Golurk). Usage in a tier is certainly important when it comes to situation like this, just look at the recent bans of BP in bw and dpp, as only when people started winning smogon tours with it did we do something about it.

Secondly, we aren't saying Dynamic Punch makes Machoke broken, but uncompetitive. If Machoke could easily get past any wall with its basic coverage + smart predictions then it would possibly be broken, but with dynamic punch, it luck can possibly luck past most its checks without requiring any skill.
 

Aberforth

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II.) Uncompetitive - elements that reduce the effect of player choice / interaction on the end result to an extreme degree, such that "more skillful play" is almost always rendered irrelevant
III.) Broken - elements that are too good relative to the rest of the metagame such that "more skillful play" is almost always rendered irrelevant
Machoke seems to fit one of these a lot more than the other. Dynamic Punch itself is not the problem, the combination of 100% accurate dynamic punch and coverage necessary to beat fighting resists on a pokemon bulky enough to abuse it is the problem, which adds up to Machoke being broken as opposed to Dynamic Punch being banworthy. Because in my view, Dynamic Punch does not fit the description of Uncompetitive as it does not, by itself, reduce the effect of player choice to an extreme degree.

Luck is a part of Pokemon, and what you said about Machoke could very easily be phrased to talk about Jirachi or Togekiss (arguably more so given that they can flinch more frequently than something can hit itself in confusion) but in none of these cases does it extend to an extreme degree.
 
I would sooner call Dynamic Punch irritating than I would uncompetitive. You still have the choice, when confused, to risk staying in or switch to get rid of the confusion. There is absolutely skill in making that decision. That decision is classic risk vs. reward, which is an important thing to factor in any game with or without confusion involved. The difference is that RNG decides the outcome rather than the opponent's play. You face the same risk with sleep turns. In fact, confusion is often less harmful than sleep because you have the opportunity to do something in spite of it with the drawback being hurting yourself, which has different implications against different Pokemon.

It seems pretty clear to me from this thread that Machoke is deserving of a suspect. I understand that Machoke offers utility and keeps certain Pokemon in check, but that has never been reason not to ban something in any tier at any time. Assist + Prankster was banned instead of Liepard because the userbase felt that the problem was that combination and not just Liepard itself. It had nothing to do with Liepard's utility in the tier. Similarly, Jynx was banned from BW2 NU because despite its Scarf set doing a great job of keeping boosting Water-types in check (SD Samurott, Shell Smash Gorebyss, Shell Smash Carracosta), it, in general, was a broken Pokemon. If you got rid of Lovely Kiss on Jynx, it would likely not have been broken. However, Lovely Kiss was not suspected because it is not a broken or uncompetitive move, even though it was broken on everything that gets it. I see no reason why this should not be handled the same way.
 

MZ

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It seems pretty clear to me from this thread that Machoke is deserving of a suspect. I understand that Machoke offers utility and keeps certain Pokemon in check, but that has never been reason not to ban something in any tier at any time. Assist + Prankster was banned instead of Liepard because the userbase felt that the problem was that combination and not just Liepard itself.
But we're only posting this thread because we do think the combination of No Guard Dpunch and Machoke is the problem and not Machoke itself?

And as for it not really being uncompetitive, yeah it's partially up to you on whether to switch out but it's not really a great option when they can just click Dpunch again and hit the switchin, causing the exact same thing. Or look at this replay from last week of PUPL which is a great example of how this is a little more than just irritating, it changes the game and there's no easy "just switch to something else" option.
 
The first sentence in your post makes no sense. I know you think Machoke without No Guard + Dynamic Punch would be not-broken. My entire post was why that doesn't matter.

Linking a replay of Machoke doing broken things does little to help your argument on why Machoke should not be suspected over No Guard + Dynamic Punch. I get that the replay was meant to showcase uncompetitiveness, but there were also ways to mitigate the effect Dynamic Punch could have on the outcome of that game. Clefairy getting smacked with a crit certainly didn't help anything. cryalot also did a great job of keeping Vibrava from being able to come in and Defog, which overloaded Clefairy's role as an Articuno check and a Machoke check, which is especially difficult without its Eviolite. Did the confusion hax suck? Sure. Could the game have been played in a way where the confusion hax mattered less? Yes. Could GeneralAnnoyance's team be built so as to prevent Probopass from getting up Stealth Rock easily? Also yes. Stealth Rock and the crit set up the game in a way where the confusion hax mattered a lot more than it could have.

Having a defensive core of three NFEs probably doesn't help much against a Machoke either.
 

Anty

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Machoke seems to fit one of these a lot more than the other. Dynamic Punch itself is not the problem, the combination of 100% accurate dynamic punch and coverage necessary to beat fighting resists on a pokemon bulky enough to abuse it is the problem, which adds up to Machoke being broken as opposed to Dynamic Punch being banworthy. Because in my view, Dynamic Punch does not fit the description of Uncompetitive as it does not, by itself, reduce the effect of player choice to an extreme degree.

Luck is a part of Pokemon, and what you said about Machoke could very easily be phrased to talk about Jirachi or Togekiss (arguably more so given that they can flinch more frequently than something can hit itself in confusion) but in none of these cases does it extend to an extreme degree.
It doesn't beat the relevant fighting resists with its coverage, but with confusion. The most common set just runs dpunch + knock off, and we do have quite a few resists like Altaria, Swanna, and bulky Beheeyem, which can switch in with srocks up and can recover more that Machoke does to them. However, I have played games where I have beaten all of them one on one with confusion. These mons cannot afford just to switch out if they have been confused as they still would have taken about 30% or more with hazards up so they need to recover. Knock off does help with ghost-types, but there are only like 4 relevant ones, one of which walls it (gourgeist), two which struggle to do much back (misdreavus and dusknoir), and another which is a late game cleaner which wouldn't want to switch in (drifblim). A lot of the time the more skillful play is rendered irrelevant, it isn't 'almost always', which is why this thread is controversial, but it definitely does overlap.

Yes luck is a part of the game, but by no means do we have to accept it. People can keep comparing it to other situation, but so far it has pretty much never been relatable. In this case there is a difference in flinch vs confusion, as confusion gives free turns whereas flinching for Jirachi won't really do much to steel checks, and also jirachi and Machoke has the same attack stat, but Machoke has a stronger move, and is in a lower tier. Togekiss is in a similar situation, but it is much less used (and as far as i'm aware only effective vs passive teams).

That argument to me sounds pretty much exactly like the speed boost blaziken arguments. Blaziken isn't a problem, it's the combo of speed boost + blaziken.
This post really frustrates me, as earlier in the thread that comparison has been made, and we responded to it. All it does is send this thread round in circles meaning we never reach a conclusion.
 
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