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Confusion thread


Tyrone

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1 minute ago, Greck said:

I'm a bit "confused" (if you get the joke) about this thread, do you say that people complain about RNG move in a RNG based game?

It seems like they are... how about ban every pokemon that can learn a confusing move. that would solve the problem, right? Same with paralyze and freeze too, so we dont have pretty much random burns and crits/misses left

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Alright. I wanna start out by saying we're playing Pokemon here. Not chess, Pokemon. Not rock & paper & scissors, but Pokemon. In Pokemon, hardly anything is 100%. Damage attacks have variants, moves have accuracy, secondary effects are made to happen. Even when one of these RNG aspects existing in the game, we should stop treating this game like chess - thinking only your moves determine whether you win or lose a match. I seem to see a lot of black and white arguments of "if it contains luck, it uncompetitive (or 'does not promote competition/skill'). If this was true, there would be no professional poker players in this world. And everyone who knows the slightest about poker knows it's about gazillion times more luck based than Pokemon would be with about zero bans ever. The whole game of poker bases on maximizing your chances of winning what comes to luck, putting yourself on a favorable situation in the eyes of madame fortuna. Pokemon inevitably is the same to lesser extent, because this is a game filled with RNG. It's a skill of its own to calculate the best overall play than just 'trying to outpredict your opponent'. Quite frankly, only the prediction part would make Pokemon very dry anyways.

 

I think people take matches a bit too 'personally' in PokeMMO. Losing to a match against someone does not mean you were 'worse' than that player. It does not even mean you played worse than the other player. We, as a community, just make it sound that way too often. Instead we should look it a bit beyond that. Confusion sometimes is the best overall play to maximize your chance to win. At the same time using it may lower your chances of winning if used wrong. The bottomline is that the players who are the best with the RNG win it with long run.

 

And before someone asks why do I support Evasion Clause being a thing? Because it's just ridiculously overpowered and everyone would use it if they could because set ups would be so easy. Swagger hardly makes you ever win more when you use it. It can just make your odds better in certain matches when played correctly.

 

 

Edited by OrangeManiac
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2 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

I think people take matches a bit too 'personally' in PokeMMO. Losing to a match against someone does not mean you were 'worse' than that player. It does not even mean you played worse than the other player. We, as a community, just make it sound that way too often. Instead we should look it a bit beyond that. Confusion sometimes is the best overall play to maximize your chance to win. At the same time using it may lower your chances of winning if used wrong. The bottomline is that the players who are the best with the RNG win it with long run

You sound like a father.

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1 minute ago, OrangeManiac said:

And before someone asks why do I support Evasion Clause being a thing? Because it's just ridiculously overpowered and everyone would use it if they could because set ups would be so easy.

Actually, the chance of you set up againt confused targets is more favorable than a +1 evasiveness pokemon. You say evasion is op? No, evasion is as rng based as confuse is, with the variant that confuse hurts the player. Sorry, but can´t really see the difference there.

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17 minutes ago, pachima said:

Actually, the chance of you set up againt confused targets is more favorable than a +1 evasiveness pokemon. You say evasion is op? No, evasion is as rng based as confuse is, with the variant that confuse hurts the player. Sorry, but can´t really see the difference there.

Switch out the confused pokemon, you lose momentun but that's it, you have a secure way of removing the rng factor, but against a pokemon that has boosted evasion you have nothing to do, unless you run haze (i think) since not even Roar/WW are a way to deal with them, leaving you with litterally no other choice as to pray to hit

 

 

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1 minute ago, londark said:

Switch out the confused pokemon, you lose momentun but that's it, you have a secure way of removing the rng factor, but against a pokemon that has boosted evasion you have nothing to do, unless you run haze (i think) since not even Roar/WW are a way to deal with them, leaving you with litterally no other choice as to pray to hit

 

 

But what is there to stop the other pokemon from confusing you even upon switching out? 

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@raaidn

Come back from the dead, there's a thread for you

Spoiler

remember that confuhax in verm? damn 30/30 turns of confuhax

I myself haven't had that much problems with it (confusion) although once, zdfire won a battle against me because my pokes kept confu-haxing themselves and it was his only chance of winning. Unsure if it was ranked or an OU official though

It kinda is annoying and seriously heartbreaking that players put everything in hands of luck instead of making good plays and relying on teambuilding

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6 minutes ago, NikhilR said:

But what is there to stop the other pokemon from confusing you even upon switching out? 

But what is there to stop the other Pokemon from thunder waving or wowing you even upon switching out?

 

If he confuses you, he is not doing damage. If he attacks you, he is not confusing you.

 

RNG is unfortunately part of the game. Play rock paper scissor like orange said if you don't want to deal with RNG.

 

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33 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

Confusion sometimes is the best overall play to maximize your chance to win. At the same time using it may lower your chances of winning if used wrong. The bottomline is that the players who are the best with the RNG win it with long run.

How does one use Confuse Ray wrongly and lower your chances to win? If anything all it does is increase it. 

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1 minute ago, NikhilR said:

How does one use Confuse Ray wrongly and lower your chances to win? If anything all it does is increase it. 

I mean, it's not a move you can just spam around and expect to win. Sometimes you might valuate the situation and recognize that a possible way to win is to win this coin toss in this certain situation. Sometimes it can save you from desperate situations, even undeserved situations to victory yeah which sucks but my main point there is skill involved using a luck based move.

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@Tyrone

 

I think the title of this thread has seriously devalued the discussion that was taking place in the other thread, at least the conversation that was taking place until a few players decided to bash anyone thinking Swagger was banworthy.

 

Out of respect, could you change the title? I honestly feel Swagger is a banworthy topic that deserves a respectful discussion rather than a continued shitfest as evidenced in the first few posts here. 

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This is one of the few times where I respond in a competitive thread, but I think my YouTube experience is needed in this thread. As a competitive commentator, I love the mixed bag that follows in competitive play. RNG spices up my commentary and puts some of my viewers in the excitement of the moment. If we take away the RNG and confusion aspect of this game, my competitive content would be quite dry.

 

 

This is one of the rare times where I talk about Donald Trump in PokeMMO, but I feel like he is needed in this discussion. Mr. Trump has had a lot of risk and reward in his time as a New York real estate developer, he took risks on building that were fair from perfect and turned them into successes. Not all of his ventures were successful like the Trump Shuttle for example, but he took the risk. In the 90s, Trump was having some serious troubles with his empire and almost lost it, but thanks to his confidence, he was able to revive the Trump empire and made it bigger and stronger. I feel like people in the competitive community take risks with their team and they are rewarded or they fail hard. Lets put Trump's situation in the competitive atmosphere, if NikhilR lost to PlayerA, then NikhilR would make a team a lot stronger and he would cover some of his weak points and that can take a para hax once or twice and then when he goes in and he wins the battle.

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Just now, OrangeManiac said:

I mean, it's not a move you can just spam around and expect to win. Sometimes you might valuate the situation and recognize that a possible way to win is to win this coin toss in this certain situation. Sometimes it can save you from desperate situations, even undeserved situations to victory yeah which sucks but my main point there is skill involved using a luck based move.

Why isn't it a move you can spam around and expect to win with? Many players have done it that way and run it for the sake of it. The purpose of confusion is to make the opponent do basically nothing while you can freely hit. Please tell me what skill is involved in using Confuse Ray / Swagger.

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Just now, NikhilR said:

Why isn't it a move you can spam around and expect to win with? Many players have done it that way and run it for the sake of it. The purpose of confusion is to make the opponent do basically nothing while you can freely hit. Please tell me what skill is involved in using Confuse Ray / Swagger.

I explained it in the very post you're quoting to, we just different definition of 'skill' what comes to competitive play. That's fair enough, not wanting to change anyone's opinion more than to share my own. And what comes to the people spamming it successfully, well that goes to my "not taking matches too personally" - argument.

 

Personally, I've said many times "Oh fuck off you uguu" for someone trying to paralyze/confuse me to victory. What I personally felt in those matches is different from me valuating if they should have a place in the metagame.

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13 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

I explained it in the very post you're quoting to, we just different definition of 'skill' what comes to competitive play. That's fair enough, not wanting to change anyone's opinion more than to share my own. And what comes to the people spamming it successfully, well that goes to my "not taking matches too personally" - argument.

 

Personally, I've said many times "Oh fuck off you uguu" for someone trying to paralyze/confuse me to victory. What I personally felt in those matches is different from me valuating if they should have a place in the metagame.

Let me know if this is the quote you were referring to :

" It's a skill of its own to calculate the best overall play than just 'trying to outpredict your opponent'. Quite frankly, only the prediction part would make Pokemon very dry anyways. "

 

It is also a skill to try and increase my probability of winning and the confuse ray user doesn't help me in doing so at all because I have 0 control of what I can do when I'm confused. I've explained in the OU tier discussion request thread as well, Sand Veil pokemon under sandstorm has a 80% chance of hitting with a 100% accuracy move which essentially means that you're using a move like hydro pump / stone edge under normal weather. So you can see how Sand Veil may look to be non banworthy because of how almost every move has a % chance to miss but yet it's deemed banworthy because of how uncompetitive it is. So I guess my question would be do you find sand veil / snow cloak banworthy? 

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9 minutes ago, Thunderprime said:

I prefer a lot more swagger than gyarados or aerodactyl rekt my whole team because of those damned 80% flinch. How is that competitive to kill my 3 tanks (2 anti gyarados ) then rekt my whole team? Shit rng happens and confusion is the most annyoying but yet the weakest statut

Since you're referring to rock slide / waterfall, flinching is a side effect but not the primary effect (to cause damage) and it's 30% and 20% respectively (flinch rate) and it's the most powerful stab move those pokemon even have. The primary effect of moves like confuse ray / swagger is to confuse, which is why we aren't calling for a ban on a move like signal beam which has 10% to cause confusion. 

 

I would say flinch hax has some uncompetitiveness in it, but not to the extent of being banworthy because of the rates. 

Edited by NikhilR
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3 minutes ago, NikhilR said:

Since you're referring to rock slide / waterfall, flinching is a side effect but not the primary effect (to cause damage) and it's 30% and 20% respectively (flinch rate) and it's the most powerful stab move those pokemon even have. The primary effect of moves like confuse ray / swagger is to confuse, which is why we aren't calling for a ban on a move like signal beam which has 10% to cause confusion. 

 

I would say flinch hax has some uncompetitiveness in it, but not to the extent of being banworthy because of the rates.

To me using a move like Confuse Ray/Swagger sounds way more 'competitive' because that was your actual intended play you wanted to do your to your opponent. Getting random lucky side effect from attack is what seems really luck based to me compared to actual intentions from your moves.

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Ok, to drag us back to the point of the original issue: The move Swagger used in combination with Substitute on Jolteon is, in my own personal opinion, a banworthy strategy due to an aspect of uncompetitiveness. This opinion though may be shared by other members of the community. 


The definition of uncompetitive from our best friends over at smogon states, " Uncompetitive game aspects (or strategies) are those that take away autonomy (control of the game's events), take it out of the hand's of player's decisions-- and do so to a degree that can be considered uncompetitive. "

 

There (Smogon), the combination of Swagger + Prankster was determined as banworthy under the above definition, especially in the context of paralysis which further hindered a player from having control of his or her own gameplay. What I am proposing here (PokeMMO) is that Swagger, in our very narrow metagame is on par with Swagger + Prankster in Gen 4+.  

 

When utilized by Jolteon, Swagger imitates being used by a pokemon with the ability Prankster. There are very few viable options that can outspeed Jolteon and avoid being struck by Swagger in the first place. This list includes only pokemon with a Choice Scarf (Swift Band) that are currently being used, such as Flygon, Heracross, and Starmie. This speed factor is reminiscent of the ability Prankster which provides priority to non-attacking moves, thus the fastest viable pokemon in our OU metagame would negate the necessity of an ability such as Prankster since it already outspeeds "everything". Back to those three common scarf users though, each are incredibly weak to Jolteon. Two of which are OHKO'd and the other is absolutely crippled by Thunderbolt. To make this worse, Jolteon typically forces an immediate switch when it comes in safely, providing an opportunity for a Substitute which further hinders Scarf users from even wanting to face Jolteon. 

 

Other more natural counters to Jolteon, such as Snorlax, Chansey, Porygon2, and Gardevoir are all slower and thus susceptible to Swagger. Fortunately, of those four only Snorlax is truly threatened by the +2 attack boost and 40bp self-damaging move that occurs roughly 50% of the time. The other three are appropriate counters to this set, but unfortunately currently lack viability since Chansey is readily removed by Trapinch, Gardevoir is readily removed by Houndoom, and Porygon2 suffers from being anything more than a glorified pivot. 

 

Another option was stated to break Swagger and that is simply to PP stall the move itself with switching. Now that would be dandy if it wasn't being used by a nuke of an offensive weapon in Jolteon which will safely sit behind a Substitute as you repetitively switch in and out. The only pokemon that can safely do this are Gardevoir, Chansey, and Porygon2, in conjunction with one another, due to the ability Trace and Chansey's incredible Special Defense. Snorlax has trouble with this tactic without instant recovery and also due to the risk of hitting itself with Swagger, should it attempt to stay in and Rest. Swagger also happens to be a 24 PP move. 

 

Now as stated, Swagger is a move that can change the momentum of the game in an incredible way. What I have been eluding to this entire time is that Swagger simply forces switches, placing you at a significant disadvantage. Scenarios include having your special wall trapped by Trapinch, having an offensive weapon hit by a powerful attack by Jolteon, or inflicting damage upon yourself with a sharply boosted 40bp physical attack. Each option comes with significant risk. 

 

So in summary, Swagger is uncompetitive because it is an easily spammable move that instantly changes the momentum of the game. The opposing player is put in a situation that is not conducive to gameplay and robs them of their own autonomy which is not competitive in the slightest. 

 

 

tl;dr Swagger is not banworthy because of its RNG mechanics alone, it is banworthy because of the unfair momentum it introduces that takes decision making compacity away from the opposing player. This strategy is improved and supported even further when used on Jolteon in the OU metagame. 

 

As reference: http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/swagplay-evaluating-potential-bans-basic-definition-of-uncompetitive-in-op.3500620/

 

@gbwead @Gunthug

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3 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

To me using a move like Confuse Ray/Swagger sounds way more 'competitive' because that was your actual intended play you wanted to do your to your opponent. Getting random lucky side effect from attack is what seems really luck based to me compared to actual intentions from your moves.

This is a complete mischaracterization of what we want our metagame to look like. You're right, Pokemon isn't chess - there are elements of luck involved that can be game changing. However, the focus of our game is on skill and preparation, and mostly risk management. Where hax becomes a problem is when the game turns from competition with a chance of hax, to hax alone without competition. That's the effect that swagger and other confusion based moves have the potential to inflict - the entire game becomes about hax, and it can either work or it can't, but is it healthy?

 

would love to give more but I'm still at work and have a long drive home afterwards. I wanna touch on londark's post from the discussion request thread because I think he made a few great points that can be expanded upon 

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