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Why not go back to the old tournament keys? (Not randomly)


Huargensy

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I previously was one of the biggest advocates for bracket shuffling, but I have to say it has instilled a more defensive (and somewhat bland) mentality when it comes to teambuilding. Analysing your next opponent's teambuilding trends definitely affords you a lot more creative license to adapt teams and use movesets that might be weak in the general meta, but are designed specifically for the match up that you are expecting, and I do believe that is a great skill to have in competitive play.

 

Speaking as an NU player, I feel like the shuffle system has only exacerbated the already very match-up dependent nature of the tier; and does not leave much room for more niche teambuilds and movesets which, for me, are two of NU's most appealing properties. The process of innovation, and deviation from standard movesets, has become a lot more risky because it's now much more difficult to assess when it is an appropriate time to employ your new ideas. As a result, you end up seeing very similar team archetypes in most matches which I can understand may be boring for both players and spectators.

 

However, I quite enjoy having the ability to rigorously test and scrutinise a new teambuild in a tournament setting - where the competition is often markedly higher than in matchmaking - without fear of being counter-teamed. It can't be denied that a certain level of skill is required to win several tournament rounds with the same team, against all different types of matchups, both favourable and unfavourable. But, whether this system fosters a similar level of skill to the previous system is a matter of debate. I agree with points from both sides and can also see cons in both. 

 

As Poufilou said above me, a lot of the arguments back and forth (much like my one here) have largely been founded on personal preference and rhetoric rather than objective evidence. Having said this, I don't see a way of objectively proving whether one system is "better" than the other, because ultimately "better" in this instance is an inherently subjective measure.

 

I don't think there will be an outcome that will truly please both parties, but it's clear that a lot of people are quite upset with the way things are at the moment. Maybe it's worth taking the democratic route and creating a poll where competitive players can vote on their preferred system, and going with the majority... But I'm not sure how you would define the target audience and conduct it in a way that prevents falsification. Difficult situation.

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1 hour ago, pachima said:

1 - Do you realize how controversial this is? You are saying u don't need matchup to win, but then you outright imply you need to use a counterteam for whoever your opponent may be. If you want to counterteam the enemy, then you necessarily want to win via matchup, disregarding all skill put into the game. However, building a solid team around stuff that are good versus the few different opponents you may find, like nikhilr said, makes you able to beat all those enemies most of the time without relying on matchup alone.

I'm not saying having a good matchup is 0% or 100% needed to win. Its just another factor of the game, as playing and rng are as well. Like I said before, regardless of matchup you still need to play correctly if you're facing a good opponent.  Its not about relying on it, but as good as one team may be, it will always have weaknesses, sometime you will get into a complicated MU and there's nothing you can do about it (I'm just talking of matchup here, in game if you play better you can manage to win). I also believe that chosing the best team for the occasion has merits, so what kind of bracket should we have, one where MU factor can be better controlled by players skills, or one where MU is more random?

 

1 hour ago, pachima said:

  2- All I am saying is that people who want to win via counterteams (and I've seen a lot of hard counterteams that are inherently bad) don't want to put effort into the actual game to win.

If a player can't build a solid team to beat someone else that means he's bad, you can easily punish it by using something he didn't expect. I don't see why we shouldn't have the kind of bracket that rewards skills the most because some people can't build (Again, I don't agree when you say that randomized bracket makes games more relying on plays, there will be unequal matchups and having a good MU doesn't give you a free win anyway)

 

1 hour ago, CHUCKunso said:

Well I don't value it as a relevant skill because it's yet again something that enables players with more resources to do better (e.g. having a team scout for them, etc.) opposing to giving the better play an edge per se.

Looking team preview takes no time. I guess you mean scouting items and sets but I don''t think that makes a big difference in most cases.

 

2 hours ago, CHUCKunso said:

That's certainly a point, yet as my above mentioned point should make clear there is more to resources besides having the comps.

Other resources like what?

 

2 hours ago, CHUCKunso said:

My experience from before this change was that there were A LOT of people hardcore fishing for matchups. And while I do agree that prebuilds certainly help you theoretically to not be c-teamed you'd need 6-7 prebuild teams if you don't want to build in between the rounds. I have just witnessed a lot of frustration when it comes to getting c-teamed and not just from people who just have one team but also people who would be able to build from round to round.

6-7 teams doesn't seem like a big deal. I think you could even lower the number, its not like you can't repeat teams. And yeah, no matter how many mons you have it's possible that you get countered, you can only bring 6 at the end. It can be frustrating but if someone predicts what is opponent going to use even tho opp has multiple choices then that person deserves to be rewarded.

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There are too many points that I'll reach character limit before I can address all of them and I have no interest in multiposting to do so.

 

1) Scouting is hindered but not impossible. You just don't know if the information you can glean is going to be relevant to your next match or not. What this means is that you have an idea of what you /could/ still face. You then have the option to build for coverage for some of that and coverage for other unknowns or not. That's your choice at the end of the day. The ability to respond to less than complete information and still win is a critical skill you need for team building.

 

2) I've never once said scouting is lame and should be prevented. What I said is that scouting /should not make a difference in the flow of the tournament/. There is a big difference between saying it shouldn't exist at all and saying its impact should be lessened. Do not interpret this as me even remotely implying that tournaments where scouting can't be lessened are inferior or lame or any other negative description you can apply to them. Stop arguing against statements I've never made.

 

3) Scouting doesn't rely on all of your opponents using the same team, and it never has. That's just plain ridiculous if you think it does. What the old system allowed was for you to gain information on 2 distinct players. With this system you can't just stop at 2 players until later in the bracket. What this means is that you now have several different scenarios you have to look at along with your own match to set your team for the next round. I find it quite ridiculous that there are very skilled comp players in here who are saying that not being allowed to just stop at 2 players is hindering the meta. You all drive the meta, not the devs. Regardless of what system is put in place, if you aren't actively trying to innovate then you are contributing to stagnation. I will yield to a potential that the current system may hasten stagnation, but the only way to stop that is for you to stop playing safe. Which brings me to my next point.

 

4) The notion that this system encourages playing safe teams above others is completely false. I can't tell you how many times I've sat through matches where both players used similar teams before this was even a thing. It's ridiculous to say that this system has encouraged it when playing safe has always been the mantra when prizes are on the line. Nobody wants to lose in the first round with an unproven build, but everyone wants someone else to win the whole event with an unproven build. It's a vicious cycle, and the only ones responsible for it are /you/. Not the devs, not me, and definitely not the system. At the end of the day, you are the ones responsible for where the meta heads.

 

5) Comparing PokeMMO meta to Showdown Meta for Gens 3-4 is not an apt comparison. You aren't grinding for access to materials you need to build a team in Showdown so it stands to reason that players there will be more willing to play with risky builds. They don't lose anything other than time and maybe a bit of pride. If you lose with a risky build here you are out money, items, breeding fodder, and time. Team building in PokeMMO is a larger investment overall.

 

Unless the devs decide to revert the system, which honestly wouldn't be terrible either, you need to adapt to the system. The only thing the devs can do is decide whether or not to keep this system. They can't force you to play teams that are less safe than others. That's your decision.

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25 minutes ago, XelaKebert said:

1) Scouting is hindered but not impossible. You just don't know if the information you can glean is going to be relevant to your next match or not. What this means is that you have an idea of what you /could/ still face. You then have the option to build for coverage for some of that and coverage for other unknowns or not. That's your choice at the end of the day. The ability to respond to less than complete information and still win is a critical skill you need for team building.

In a 128 man OU tournament, 64 players advance to the next round.  This means that the information would be "gleaning" over is of 63 participants.  Gathering information of 63 players with the time available is literally impossible unless you have the power to hack into the game to know who your opponent is in advance or the power to stop time.

 

27 minutes ago, XelaKebert said:

3) Scouting doesn't rely on all of your opponents using the same team, and it never has. That's just plain ridiculous if you think it does. What the old system allowed was for you to gain information on 2 distinct players. With this system you can't just stop at 2 players until later in the bracket. What this means is that you now have several different scenarios you have to look at along with your own match to set your team for the next round. I find it quite ridiculous that there are very skilled comp players in here who are saying that not being allowed to just stop at 2 players is hindering the meta. You all drive the meta, not the devs. Regardless of what system is put in place, if you aren't actively trying to innovate then you are contributing to stagnation. I will yield to a potential that the current system may hasten stagnation, but the only way to stop that is for you to stop playing safe. Which brings me to my next point.

There is something called an incentive, which drives people towards wanting to innovate.  This system incentivizes players to play safe rather than innovate because the lack of scouting makes the risk of bringing an innovative build over a safe build all the more higher.  At the end of the day, both players (the safe player and the riskier player) compete for the same prize, so the riskier player enjoys no benefit by taking the higher risk by bringing that riskier build.  When you don't give players a reason to want to innovate, then yes you are hindering the meta which contributes to its stagnation.

 

34 minutes ago, XelaKebert said:

4) The notion that this system encourages playing safe teams above others is completely false. I can't tell you how many times I've sat through matches where both players used similar teams before this was even a thing. It's ridiculous to say that this system has encouraged it when playing safe has always been the mantra when prizes are on the line. Nobody wants to lose in the first round with an unproven build, but everyone wants someone else to win the whole event with an unproven build. It's a vicious cycle, and the only ones responsible for it are /you/. Not the devs, not me, and definitely not the system. At the end of the day, you are the ones responsible for where the meta heads.

The bolded part is simply anecdotal and not specific enough to be given much weight.  There is no reference as to which players you are referring to, the situation in which these players were competing in, the skill level of the players competing etc.  Just because the players you have watched were running safe builds does not mean that the rest of the players you did not watch were also running safe builds.

 

This is then used to support your stance that playing safe has always been the mantra.  In short, it is a weak stance.  People do run safe builds in the first round, but they go out of their comfort zone in the later rounds.  In a scouting-based system, there will still be players who run safe builds, but there are also folks who run riskier builds.  If you want evidence for this, I can show you replays of SPL / WCOP for almost any gen.

 

45 minutes ago, XelaKebert said:

5) Comparing PokeMMO meta to Showdown Meta for Gens 3-4 is not an apt comparison. You aren't grinding for access to materials you need to build a team in Showdown so it stands to reason that players there will be more willing to play with risky builds. They don't lose anything other than time and maybe a bit of pride. If you lose with a risky build here you are out money, items, breeding fodder, and time. Team building in PokeMMO is a larger investment overall.

You are now adding an additional factor as to why players in MMO run safe builds -> the resources argument.  

 

This bolded part is also false because there is still a commonality with the loss associated with Showdown and MMO.

1) You referred to the loss in MMO as "money, items, breeding fodder, and time."  What you have actually then lost is time because what you mostly spent to acquire those money, items, breeding fodder is time to grind them.

2) When you invest in resources to build a team, you are also investing in resources to build those actual pokemon.  We also need to define what we mean by a "risky build."  It can consist of an unconventional set on a Pokemon or an unconventional combination of 6 pokemon.  If you breed 12 pokemon with generic sets, but an unconventional combination of 6 of them results in your loss, it is not a waste of investment of money or breeding fodder because all it means is that the combination you ran was wrong, not the components of the combination.

3) If you do run something idiotic like a Choice Specs Scyther, then yes that could be a complete waste of investment because it is unlikely you will be able to use it effectively unless you manage to sell it to another fool down the road, in which case it still wouldn't be a waste of time since you are getting your money's worth.  These same resources can be used for grinding NPCs or as breeding fodder itself, so the likelihood of you breeding something that is a complete waste of time is rare.

4) As far as Showdown players go, they have the freedom to build more teams than the MMO player, which also means that they spend a lot more time testing out teams.  They also compete in tournaments where they play biweekly for 3 months to then be eligible to qualify for Playoffs (the tour is called Smogon Tour).  Some of them still run riskier builds in playoffs with the risk that in one bo3 they are completely eliminated for a tour that they spent months to qualify.  So saying that all that a Showdown players loses is a bit of time and pride is heavily downplaying the amount of time they have lost.

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I thought the whole point of this game was to continuously grind for more resources?

The current tournament system promotes the exact opposite. There's no need to build different sets, because you can simply get away with running the same 6 mons over and over again. And this last part only promotes copying teams that make deep runs and spam them without any drawbacks, something that is easily avoided in an environment that allows scouting. 

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12 hours ago, NikhilR said:

There is something called an incentive, which drives people towards wanting to innovate.  This system incentivizes players to play safe rather than innovate because the lack of scouting makes the risk of bringing an innovative build over a safe build all the more higher.  At the end of the day, both players (the safe player and the riskier player) compete for the same prize, so the riskier player enjoys no benefit by taking the higher risk by bringing that riskier build.  When you don't give players a reason to want to innovate, then yes you are hindering the meta which contributes to its stagnation.

I don't understand the argument of the actual system encouraging "safe builds". Yes, this system may lead people to use the same team for the first rounds because there is no way to get easely countered, but why do you think the scouting system allowed "risky builds" ? Players that were scouting their opponent usually went for another "safe build" that would give them slight advantage over the opponent's previous team. Pretending like c-builds are only useful against a specific team is not fair argument. There's not that much difference of innovation between a c-built team and another "safe team" that you know is effective against what your opponent played before. It's not like players used to often risk bringing gimmicks to counter an opponent. Yes, some of them did, but in later rounds. And this is still possible in the actual system. I think there's an idealized idea of counter-building here. From that point of view where c-building is the sole reason for innovation, of course everything you say is right and relevant. But it's only a factor amongst others, that randomized seats do not affect in a negative way. Some players keep innovating because it's fun to play different teams. If you need to know that you will most probably win because of countering to start being innovative, then you've got only yourself to blame. Innovation in counter-building is a gamble because you don't know what your opponent will really bring anyways, and innovation with randomized seats is also a gamble. One of them gives you more confidence about winning while the other gives you less. Confidence doesn't mean it actually rewards you to be innovative by winning. At the end of the day, you just try to do your best with what you've got, and adapt to your opponent's team. If you know beforehand what will happen in c-building, what's the point of playing this game ? 

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Hace 11 minutos, Poufilou dijo:

" . Si sabes de antemano lo que sucederá en la construcción de c, ¿cuál es el punto de jugar este juego? 

Who says it will happen as you plan? The other player has the option to change, or at least if he is a bit intelligent he will do it, when changing both it will be as if neither had scouted, because both will carry different things, and there the difference, both went out of their boxes and used those 10 minutes to build something new in front of the other, at least that makes 6 mons out of spam, and makes it more fun

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4 minutes ago, Huargensy said:

Who says it will happen as you plan? The other player has the option to change, or at least if he is a bit intelligent he will do it, when changing both it will be as if neither had scouted, because both will carry different things, and there the difference, both went out of their boxes and used those 10 minutes to build something new in front of the other, at least that makes 6 mons out of spam, and makes it more fun

Do you really think players bring a whole different team if they know which opponent they face ? Players have limited resources and often build their teams around some core mons. So is there really much difference of match-up between two players that changed a bit their team because of scouting, and two players that choose a team not knowing who their opponent is ? 

 

"Countering" is more random as you think, and while c-building try to make it happen, it's just a matter of randomness, if the other player brought something that is good against your team, it's not because he had "skills" because of his big brain who foreshadowed your team, it's mostly because he got lucky in match-up. And what's the difference then with random seats ? Nothing, except the fact that you hyped yourself in counter building. And I understand that's something fun that you lost. But it doesn't affect the actual meta and gameplay. 

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5 minutes ago, Poufilou said:

"Countering" is more random as you think, and while c-building try to make it happen, it's just a matter of randomness, if the other player brought something that is good against your team, it's not because he had "skills" because of his big brain who foreshadowed your team, it's mostly because he got lucky in match-up. And what's the difference then with random seats ? Nothing, except the fact that you hyped yourself in counter building. And I understand that's something fun that you lost. But it doesn't affect the actual meta and gameplay. 

According to what you say, both are random ways, so why not go for the funniest way? If according to you both are the same, "random"

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1 minute ago, Huargensy said:

According to what you say, both are random ways, so why not go for the funniest way? If according to you both are the same, "random"

I mean, don't ask me. I have no say in what system get to be chosen. I like to think that the best system is the one that satisfy the most players. And as someone said before it would be nice to have some sort of vote/place where we can speak about it. But arguing over things that are mainly feelings about what is fun or not while pretending that gameplay, meta and stuff are involved is not productive in my opinion. 

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9 minutes ago, Poufilou said:

 

I don't understand the argument of the actual system encouraging "safe builds". Yes, this system may lead people to use the same team for the first rounds because there is no way to get easely countered, but why do you think the scouting system allowed "risky builds" ? Players that were scouting their opponent usually went for another "safe build" that would give them slight advantage over the opponent's previous team.

The bolded part isn't 100% true.  Some players opt for going for safe builds when scouting their opponents while others adopted riskier builds.  At the end of the day, the players still had the choice of being able to choose what kind of build they want to run.  But now that choice is taken away since you're not able to scout your opponent early on because you don't know who your opponent is.  Yes, you can still run riskier builds even if you don't know who your opp is, but the risk in doing it now is much higher than now before.  

 

12 minutes ago, Poufilou said:

 

 Pretending like c-builds are only useful against a specific team is not fair argument. There's not that much difference of innovation between a c-built team and another "safe team" that you know is effective against what your opponent played before. It's not like players used to often risk bringing gimmicks to counter an opponent. Yes, some of them did, but in later rounds. And this is still possible in the actual system. I think there's an idealized idea of counter-building here. From that point of view where c-building is the sole reason for innovation, of course everything you say is right and relevant. 

It's not about c-builds only being useful against a specific team.  It's that they are the best team to go with when you know what the opponent likes.  The innovation comes with choosing an unconventional 6 or an unconventional set on a pokemon that is effective against your opponent.  For example, I know that it is a standard practice for many players to use Cofagrigus to stop Conkeldurr, so I can now build teams where I pair Conkeldurr with something that easily beats Cofagrigus, like maybe a sub tyranitar (which is a bit novel for the meta).  My preference towards running that Conk-Sub TTar team arises when I know my opponent is the kind to use Cofagrigus, because I know that that running such a team is most likely to give me an advantage.    

 

When you say that bringing gimmicks is still possible in this system, you also have to account the higher risk of bringing it early on, and how that risk decreases only when you reach a stage where you're able to determine who your opponent is likely to be (such as in finals, I think?).

 

C-building becomes a huge factor in creating innovation.  When you see a standard / safe team that is being dominant or doing super well in multiple tours, you ask yourself how to then build a team that doesn't lose to that.  As a response to it, you then start to build teams to counter it or be able to deal with it.  This may require breeding new sets on a Pokemon or again, an unconventional combination 6 generic pokemon, to deal with it.  That's still innovation and it comes as a response to wanting to counter something.

 

When I played DPP in SPL, one of the most safest and best builds out there was a BKC team with (TTar / Nidoqueen / Skarm / Jira / Clef / Rotom).  It's a team that can perhaps handle one water type, but if you overload it with 2 water types or a water type with longevity, then it can lose.  I then made sure that it was a requirement that every team I built from then on was capable of beating such a team.  So I am innovating or coming up with new builds as being able to beat a standard team has sort of become my baseline for building a good counterteam.

 

19 minutes ago, Poufilou said:

 

But it's only a factor amongst others, that randomized seats do not affect in a negative way. Some players keep innovating because it's fun to play different teams. If you need to know that you will most probably win because of countering to start being innovative, then you've got only yourself to blame. Innovation in counter-building is a gamble because you don't know what your opponent will really bring anyways, and innovation with randomized seats is also a gamble. One of them gives you more confidence about winning while the other gives you less. Confidence doesn't mean it actually rewards you to be innovative by winning. At the end of the day, you just try to do your best with what you've got, and adapt to your opponent's team. If you know beforehand what will happen in c-building, what's the point of playing this game ? 

I think countering is a much bigger incentive to innovation than simply innovating because it is fun.  The reason being that losing sucks and feels terrible.  At the same time it is also a learning lesson for you to then change your approach so that you can avoid that same shitty feeling you experienced.  Repeating the same pattern of using the same old playstyle that brought about the loss would fall under the definition of insanity of Einstein.  So a player is forced to branch out to different playstyles.  It's just that in this tour system, this happens way too late in the tour, which to me is worse.

 

Innovation is innovation nonetheless.  It is a gamble if it works, but changing the metagame for the better is what we should strive for.  Sure we don't know what our opponent is going to run, but if you go into your game with a psychological advantage that your team is better than theirs, that helps a lot.  

 

Regarding the bolded part, the opposing player is still not a bot.  We don't really know what exactly will happen beforehand, but I'm happy to learn from my wins/losses because that is information that is useful.  If I run a team that I was earlier sure about having an upper hand match up wise, and it turned out to be false, I can know not to repeat it.  

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Imo, bringing a whole different team is not a big issue when it comes to ending up with good duels. If you have several teams, you will want to bring the best suited one to face a specific opponent. If scouting allows that, that's good. However, that's not what we used to see in tournaments. People would use these 10 mins to build the most ridiculous counter teams against each other. These teams had little to no viability or purpose aside from countering a specific team and the duel was atrocious, not because one person is getting hard countered, but because both opponents brought garbage to counter teams they end up not facing. If you are a new player, you would not have the resources necessary to counter team like your opponent is doing and therefore you will get destroyed by unviable 10 mins absurdity. 

 

I think a tournament system where scouting is allowed needs restrictions and we didn't have any in the past. If you want to counter your opponent, you need to do so with teams in your battle box and not something dumb you come up with in 10 mins. 

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8 minutes ago, NikhilR said:

C-building becomes a huge factor in creating innovation.  When you see a standard / safe team that is being dominant or doing super well in multiple tours, you ask yourself how to then build a team that doesn't lose to that.  As a response to it, you then start to build teams to counter it or be able to deal with it.  This may require breeding new sets on a Pokemon or again, an unconventional combination 6 generic pokemon, to deal with it.  That's still innovation and it comes as a response to wanting to counter something.

Well this kind of c-building is possible in randomized tournaments aswell. If a dominant team is doing well, you should be innovative to counter it. It's the players own fault if they aren't innovative because they didn't find a way to counter most common builds. 

 

11 minutes ago, NikhilR said:

Innovation is innovation nonetheless.  It is a gamble if it works, but changing the metagame for the better is what we should strive for.  Sure we don't know what our opponent is going to run, but if you go into your game with a psychological advantage that your team is better than theirs, that helps a lot.  

 

Regarding the bolded part, the opposing player is still not a bot.  We don't really know what exactly will happen beforehand, but I'm happy to learn from my wins/losses because that is information that is useful.  If I run a team that I was earlier sure about having an upper hand match up wise, and it turned out to be false, I can know not to repeat it.  

It does make your strategy more oriented ; you try to come up with a team that do good against another, and it can be fun as gamble. But it doesn't change anything to the meta, as your strategy will only be available for that particular match. Of course this strategy can bring you more knowledge. But you don't necessarily need tournaments to obtain that knowledge. 

 

Your point seems more that you enjoy c-building because of unique situations and duels with variety of mons in your build. But it's not fair to say that randomized prevents that. As I said, it is the same gamble, only with more or less confidence. It doesn't change anything if you go for an interesting c-build because you guess what you opponent will use by scouting, or because you know what popular builds are. 

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4 hours ago, gbwead said:

I think a tournament system where scouting is allowed needs restrictions and we didn't have any in the past. If you want to counter your opponent, you need to do so with teams in your battle box and not something dumb you come up with in 10 mins. 

Ngl I was thinking about something exactly like this a few hours ago.

Why not make it a requirement to use Battle Boxes in tournaments? Like the first signup window you register all of your teams and they become locked during the whole tournament, meaning you can't build one of those 10 minute garbage counter teams in between rounds. And then we can go back to how brackets used to work before. 

 

Pros:

- You can't just spam the same team in a blind bracket for tournaments in a row, basically contributing to metagame stagnation. 

- Since now players have an actual reason to be innovative and build different teams, the need for different mons/sets allows the in-game economy to move much better. 

- It actually incentivizes (well, forces but w/e) the use of Battle Boxes, which probably took a bit of work to even get implemented. 

 

Cons:

- Some 2-month old nab can't get away with spamming Rain? :/

- TBA

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1 hour ago, LifeStyleNORE said:

Ngl I was thinking about something exactly like this a few hours ago.

Why not make it a requirement to use Battle Boxes in tournaments? Like the first signup window you register all of your teams and they become locked during the whole tournament, meaning you can't build one of those 10 minute garbage counter teams in between rounds. And then we can go back to how brackets used to work before. 

 

Pros:

- You can't just spam the same team in a blind bracket for tournaments in a row, basically contributing to metagame stagnation. 

- Since now players have an actual reason to be innovative and build different teams, the need for different mons/sets allows the in-game economy to move much better. 

- It actually incentivizes (well, forces but w/e) the use of Battle Boxes, which probably took a bit of work to even get implemented. 

 

Cons:

- Some 2-month old nab can't get away with spamming Rain? :/

- TBA

Should there be a limit for the amount of teams you are allowed to register? If a new player only has enough resources to register 1 team, that player will not stand a chance against someone with 20 registered teams.

 

In order to balance this out, 2 things are necessary imo:

  1. The number of allowed registered teams should be a function of the number of rounds in a tournament. If there are 5 rounds in a tournament, you should only be allowed to register 6 teams. If there are 6 rounds, you should only be allowed to register 7 teams. If there are 7 rounds; 8 teams.
     
  2. As the tournament progress, you should be forced to remove your access to one team per round. In a 7 rounds tournaments, on round 2, you should have access to 8 teams. On round 3, only 7 teams. On round 4, 6 teams. On round 5, 5 teams. On round 6, 4 teams. On round 7, 3 teams. This way, someone that reaches finals with only 1 team will stand a chance against an opponent that had access to multiple teams during the tournament because in the end that opponent will only have 3 teams to choose from. It's still a huge advantage to be able to choose 3 teams when you know in advance your opponent only has one, but at least the winner will not be set in stone before the duel starts. The player with multiple teams would have to strategically choose which team to keep and which teams to remove to get the best odds possible in the end. 
     

Just throwing ideas out there because it's difficult to solve all tournaments issues (scouting/resources management/duel quality) with a simple system.

Edited by gbwead
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I don't think anyone will disagree when I say that matches can be incredibly match-up dependent. That part is obvious. As others have pointed out, there is very little skill involved in a match where both players tried to counterteam each other and brought some nonsensical mishmash of Pokemon intended to lopsidedly destroy their opponent's team (even if they ended up changing their team too). Compare that to a match where both players are blind and brought a solid, well-rounded, well-structured and long-premeditated team. In that situation both players must play a traditional match where they identify their win conditions during the team preview and as the match plays out. That involves far, far more skill. 

 

I understand why the shuffle/blind bracket format exists. My one complaint is that the UI layout is hard to follow. It would be nice if there was a real bracket layout, but the bracket was just shuffled at each new branch (as it is now functionally). This is not a functional change, only a UI change.

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2 hours ago, gbwead said:

Should there be a limit for the amount of teams you are allowed to register? If a new player only has enough resources to register 1 team, that player will not stand a chance against someone with 20 registered teams.

I would say maybe put a cap on 6 teams max. allowed to be registered in every tourney, since that's the amount of Battle Boxes everyone starts with.

 

About the resource part tbh, this is a MMO. It's normal that older players have an advantage over newer players just for playing the game a longer time. Like I remember starting the game out and not being like "oh man poor me I can't compete with these people that have 500 comps etc", I just kept grinding until I got closer and closer to their level. It's also not that common for new players to be super knowledgeable in our meta, that the only thing stopping them from smashing everyone is lack of resources. If that's the case, they usually end up joining a big team and borrow stuff anyways. 

 

PvP is also considerably worse than PvE when it comes to money making, so it's not like being at an early disadvantage in PvP (due to lack of comps) stops a new player from grinding more PvE and getting more comps. Like tournament rewards are kinda useless for getting more resources, 1k RP + Untradable Shiny for 1st place? You can make way more money from gym runs, farming berries, etc. 

 

What I mean by this is, this suggestion is more about improving tournaments in general for players who can actually compete, and for that it shouldn't be too focused on the little guy that started the game a month ago and has no comps. 

 

Tl;dr - Only a max of 6 battle boxes allowed to be registered in each tourney, and nabbs just need to grind more. 

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9 hours ago, gbwead said:

People would use these 10 mins to build the most ridiculous counter teams against each other.

No. You got it all wrong. It's a win/win scenario.

- If counterteam is successful, they win

- If counterteam is unsuccessful then they have to win with the most dumb team ever, and since they consider the game too easy, its a challenge they won't find anywhere else.

Also, no-water resistance teams >

Edited by pachima
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I like the idea of being locked into X number of teams per tournament, it’s an interesting concept. But I don’t think making tournaments more “fair” for newer players is the correct reason to make this change.

 

This is an MMO - a game largely based around item and money farming. Being the new guy with less resources is all part-and-parcel of the MMO experience, and it only makes sense for the old guard to be rewarded with the advantage, for the time that they have spent amassing their comp and team collections. This is a competitive game, not a pity party

Edited by Zymogen
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Hace 14 horas, Zymogen dijo:

Me gusta la idea de estar encerrado en un número X de equipos por torneo, es un concepto interesante. Pero no creo que hacer que los torneos sean más "justos" para los jugadores más nuevos sea la razón correcta para hacer este cambio.

 

Este es un MMO, un juego que se basa principalmente en la agricultura de objetos y dinero. Ser el chico nuevo con menos recursos es parte integral de la experiencia MMO, y solo tiene sentido que la vieja guardia sea recompensada con la ventaja, por el tiempo que han dedicado a acumular sus colecciones y equipos. Este es un juego competitivo, no una fiesta de lástima

exactly that is what we should think, this is a mmo there is no reason to give more advantage to new players without resources who have or would have to do everything possible to advance and thus reach the top of the competitive game, if we wanted that because not only go to compete at showdown where you do not need resources to have the teams you want, who here did not sacrifice days and days of games and farming to be able to build their teams I do not understand why we should be harmed or is it that we are people who want play wow starting at lvl 100 and with a lot of money?

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From what all I have read: I agree mostly with Nik, if it was a perfect world. But GB and Pachi are more realistic about what scouting actually brings to tournaments. Ideally people would have multiple solid teams that can tackle different types of teams well, but this isn't how the tournaments were played. When people say 'scouting is a skill' its most of the time players looking through their comp box and throwing six Pokemon together with no real synergy with each other, but with a great matchup against the opponent. That doesn't really do anything to evolve the metagame.

 

So in an ideal world. I agree with Nik, but this isn't smogon sorry. So this game doesn't work like that. Which means I side with gb and pachis points.

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El sistema actual de los torneos esta muy bien, no lo regresen al anterior. Si quieren hacer alguna modificación, seria mejor aun el que no se pueda observar ningun duelo hasta

finalizar dicho torneo, asi se evita las molestias de los mismos observadores que solo hacen spam dentro del torneo entre otras cosas. Y el que inicio este tema no le queda de otra ya que ahora no puede ganar ningún torneo, todo se le hace difícil ya que estaba acostumbrado a solo sacar counter de los oponentes con los que sabia que enfrentaria..... vamos deja de llorar y usas tus variedades de competitivos, eso SI ES DIVERTIDO!!.

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primero, si te parece aburrido spamear el mismo equipo durante el torneo ¿quizás no te diste cuenta que puedes cambiar de equipo cuando desees?, porque cambiar de equipo se puede hacer, ahora si lo haces porque deseas saber con quien te enfrentaras para poder armar un equipo que le de counter al contrincante y así poder avanzar mas fácil pues yo no diría que eso es habilidad. como esta el sistema ahora mismo esta bien. Aunque es molesto que los espectadores estén hablando durante todo el duelo, se les debería silenciar.

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Now with the new tournament system, it makes no sense that it is called tournaments, it really seems like ranks, u only spam a team and if you are lucky u win and change it at the end for the scout, before the player's ability was rewarded by changing teams each round, Giving each team their own strategies that in the end gave victory, now yes, it can benefit the new players but it does not prepare them for certain circumstances that have to change team completely for any reason

 

It would be better to return as it was before, so skill can be rewarded more than luck

Edited by MendeeZ
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