When a Pokemon has no KO sub

[Objection]

This thread will be moderated to keep discussion focused.​

I'd also like to propose something myself. Now, Pokemon are fairly intelligent creatures. In the wild they manage to fight just find, and while they expect our orders in battle and obey them readily, I would think they'd possess some modicum of common sense. In particular, I would think they would realize when a target is defeated and know to stop attacking it and/or start attacking a new target. And yet, for whatever reason in ASB if a Pokemon isn't given explicit orders on what to do when a target is KOed, they will fruitlessly keep attacking that downed Pokemon, wasting energy and actions for no reason whatsoever. I feel like, if only for flavor reasons, this should be changed to either stop attacking or to attack a random other target. Yes, I know every Pokemon gets a free KO sub they can use to redirect their attacks, and yes I know that any good player should be using these. I'm not saying this change is required for balancing the game or helping players who make a stupid mistake and/or don't use their KO sub, but I do feel like it would make a lot more sense if the Pokemon had a brain and said "Hey, that guy is done for, let's stop attacking or even go get that guy over there instead!"

When a Pokemon has no KO sub, should it continue to attack the fainted opponent, sit and do nothing, redirect its attacks to a random opponent, or something else entirely? Discuss away!

 

[LouisCyphre]

It should redirect to a random appropriate Pokemon adjacent to the intended target.

• Random: 50/50 toss, isn't that hard. In matches higher than doubles without positioning, just use targets adjacent in the post's list of mons, or decide arbitrarily. If you didn't want it in the ref's hands, you'd have subbed for it.
• Appropriate: Damaging and harmful attacks redirect to adjacent foes, helpful attacks redirect to your allies. A Fire Blast aimed at your Flash Fire Houndoom will redirect to an enemy if Houndoom is KO'd beforehand. In-game cartridge precedent should be clear enough when determining whether a move is foe-intended or ally-intended.

That... should cover most important points? I figure we should approach this as if we were deciding it for the first time, instead of just saying "who cares the current way is fine."

 

[kingmidas]

I think it would be common sense for pokemon to go after the remaining opposing mon in a match and thus you should not even need a KO sub in doubles. But in triples it should be up to the ref to RNG for the mon the mon hits if the trainer does not put up a KO sub

 

[waterwarrior]

C/Ping what I wrote in the Feedback Thread because yay

There is reason behind your logic of saying that a Pokemon should know when to stop attacking a fainted opponent, but at the same time, a Pokemon redirecting an attack because it know it won't work is still deliberately disobeying the Trainer (aka the one it told to beat the dead horse, er... fainted Pokemon). The KO sub is free for this exact reason: so that the Pokemon can redirect their attacks against a mon that has already fainted without disobeying the orders that it will (mostly) carry out as much as it can. While it certainly is frustrating to see your mon wasting a turn wasting energy on nothing (especially when you didn't expect a KO), there really is nothing wrong with the current system IMO.

Really, KO subs are just a kind of thing where you have to be careful, or it sucks. If a Pokemon could just redirect its attack without any indication from the Trainer, why would it EVER use a move that is NVE or doesn't affect the mon when the Trainer screws up? Even though the illegal order discussion is not yet over, most people seem to be leaning towards Struggle. Struggle is only happening because the Pokemon is trying as hard as it can to fulfill its Trainer's orders, but it just can't. When the mon is perfectly able to fulfill its master's orders (such as in the case of attacking a KO'd mon), why wouldn't it?

Tl;dr Yeah, attacking a fainted mon sucks and is annoying, but you gotta deal with it and prevent it from happening in the first place.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

In my opinion the way ASB is set up the Pokemon are set up to do exactly what they're instructed to by their trainers, and I don't think that we should be going so far as to give them intelligence of their own to redirect their attacks to other enemies. I think that we should only go as far as to have them stop attacking when their target is KO'd and no KO sub is present.

 

[akela]

I think this begs a question. Are our Pokemon obedient or disobedient? Will they follow our orders or do as they see fit?

I oppose anything that places more work on the shoulders of referees and less effort on the trainers. Extra RNG computations only places more effort on the referees.

 

[kingmidas]

I think this begs a question. Are our Pokemon obedient or disobedient? Will they follow our orders or do as they see fit?

I oppose anything that places more work on the shoulders of referees and less effort on the trainers. Extra RNG computations only places more effort on the referees.

The only way to sort this kind of thing is add a happiness level kind of thing and that just makes having mons that are new annoying because of having to track happiness.

 

[Unoriginal Name]

My proposal: Make the Pokemon still use the given move for the purposes of Encore/Sketch/whatnot, but not waste Energy. That simple.

This way, crits won't screw up Encore and Sketch and whatever, but Energy won't be wasted. The Pokemon isn't disobedient, persay; simply putting less effort (Energy) in because they know their target is fainted. Again, Pokemon are smart but listen to their trainers - this combines both concepts.

 

[Frosty]

In-game it still attacks the dead dude. I suggest we go that rout.

KO subs are there and free for a reason. Also there is a ton of leeway for them (you can even post a target priority for every single mon). If you don't use them well, then your mon will just be obedient and follow your orders. Since you have the opportunity to order otherwise and you don't, there is no reason for the mon to think "oh my trainer didn't tell me to redirect to X but he obviously meant that so let's go with that". He will just attack the dead opposing mon.

If you RNG the target then you call for even more hax the matches become even more unpredictable. If you make the ref choose who is the target based on whatever, then the ref is being the player and correcting the mistakes done. If the player has the option to use a KO sub and opts not to, then leave them be stupid.

 

[Matezoide]

In-game it still attacks the dead dude. I suggest we go that rout.

I am fairily sure the pokemon will target the other opponent, if the target is knocked out.



I have very little problem with Unoriginal's idea. The pokemon obeys, but knows the enemy is out, so it puts less effort. That way, the player is still punished for not using the KO Sub, but not as much.

 

[ZhengTann]

Personally, I think that KO subs are very much common sense scenarios. If that Ferroseed is dead by Fire Blast in Doubles, your Torchic would surely redirect to Heatran, no? If that Heatran happens to have Flash Fire, well, as ww would put it, sucks to be you, but you gotta man up, learn from your mistakes, and move on. Seriously, the world won't end because you lost a match, right?

On the other hand, ASB's deep sea of mechanics means that KO subs will likely be neglected by new players (veterans not that much, unless you're so inattentive you deserve to lose the match). Of course, if you happen to have a lenient opponent and referee, you get a nice deal (Obj once let me put it in instead of locking my actions by ordering second. Yay).

I currently leaning towards Lou's idea - redirecting randomly isn't much of an issue. It's not that much of an extra ounce on the referee's workload. Going by common sense, you wouldn't ask your Pokemon to continue attacking a fainted opponent (unless you're a sadist, and I doubt ASB's honour code would allow that), so redirecting got my support.

Also, uhm I think we should probably limit ourselves to 3 options here, when no KO subs is applicable:

• Redirecting (I support this beside Lou)
• Do nothing (Texas is one of the supporters here)
• Attack the fainted opponent (Frosty and ww come here)

Because extra proposals would simply add another confusing facet into the fray, and it won't help new players should it be implemented. But that is just me, of course. If you can come up with a simple alternative to the above 3, feel free to shoot me down with it. Savvy?

 

[Objection]

Also, uhm I think we should probably limit ourselves to 3 options here, when no KO subs is applicable:

• Redirecting (I support this beside Lou)
• Do nothing (Texas is one of the supporters here)
• Attack the fainted opponent (Frosty and ww come here)

Because extra proposals would simply add another confusing facet into the fray, and it won't help new players should it be implemented. But that is just me, of course. If you can come up with a simple alternative to the above 3, feel free to shoot me down with it. Savvy?

I agree with this, so because the discussion in here has died down (even considering the Smogon downtime), I am going to issue a 24-hour warning and draft a slate:

[box]What should a Pokemon do if its intended target has fainted and it has no KO sub?
Continue attacking the fainted opponent
Do nothing
Redirect to a randomly-chosen opponent[/box]

 

[Objection]

OK, I know it's been nearly 48 hours instead of the 24 I specified, but obviously there's nothing more to be said, so ... expect a voting thread to go up shortly.