Jump to content

New Tiers


Recommended Posts

EDIT: Summary:

New gens-> New mons -> Excessive large NU tier -> Consequences of getting such large tier -> Future and eventual discussion of spliting NU

 

 

 

With an implementation of two whole generations (Besides some pleb random mons, which no one cares about) We are getting ourselves a 200+ pokemon NU tier.

 

Now, in a competitive environment, one had felt already the pressure of building a team, in order to make it the most balanced as possible. Out of 6 pokemon, players had to build something of their likes that could deal with the majority of the tier, or at least, making it possible to work around against some specific targets, that can´t be dealt directly.

 

In our current metagame, NU is the most large tier we have, with around 70 relevant pokemon within it. We can watch that in some games, matchups plays an extremely important factor in the outcome of the matches, considering both players to be identically skilled-wise.  Now, this is not necessarily bad, since it forces us to actually think about the teams we create, however, in a tier where the number of relevant pokemon gets pretty close to tripled, Matchup importance will rise to sky-high levels. I mean, it´s outright impossible for a team consisted of 6 pokemons to deal around a 200+ pokemon tier without having some not so uncommon matches where player A 6-0s player B because of the better matchup.

 

Also, players will try to counter this flaw with more oriented wall teams so they can cover the maximum threats as possible, which is not an healthy tier at all. While offensive players will literally pray so that the opponent team doesn´t possess one of the now multiple pokemon that can solo the offensive player´s team)

 

I agree we have to work when teambuilding, but the way it will be if no other tiers split NU into two, I foresee fun fading away.

Furthermore, in a 200 pokemon tier, multiple of those will eventually grow blind by not seeing the sunlight again, which I consider a bad thing.

 

Lastly, I wanted to know if TC/DEVS, or whoever is in charge of this, if we are having some thoughts to discuss about a new tier to split NU. We already have RU gen5 on smogon, so we can literally steal the basis from that so the effort into splitting a whole tier isn´t that huge.

 

Feel free to discuss.

Edited by pachima
Link to comment

The problem we have with splitting the tiers up even more is that the lower tiers like UU and NU are already spread thin with active players. Sometimes even automated tournament brackets don't fill for those tiers, and the ranked matchmaking for them has become non existent, so the thought of dividing the low tier player base even more is scary. 

 

We'll see what happens though, who knows maybe the update will attract more comp players and this won't be the case, but for now this is how it is. 

Link to comment

So, you're right that in later gens (noticeable in gen 5, but gets really bad in gen 6+) that team matchups become a HUGE problem, and the problem with matchups from the massive amount of available pokemon caused a shift in tiering philosophy Gen 6+ on Smogon. Part of the reason Arena Trap and Shadow Tag got flatbanned; Trapping exacerbates the difficulty of bad matchups to absurd level.

 

With that being said, splitting up NU into RU and NU doesn't actually solve the problem at all. All your suggestion does is rename NU to RU, and put a tier below it. With that being said, the existence of a tier below RU doesn't make your suggested "70 relevant pokemon" any less relevant; You can still use NU pokemon in RU.

 

It sounds like your argument is "NU is too big, team matchups will be a huge problem, we need a tier below it to split up the good pokemon between the new RU and NU", but that doesn't actually lower the amount of pokemon in the newly proposed RU tier at all; By your logic, it will have the exact same problem. Yeah, the new NU will have less pokemon, but all you're doing is pushing the problem to a new name instead of actually fixing it.

Link to comment
14 minutes ago, Senile said:

So, you're right that in later gens (noticeable in gen 5, but gets really bad in gen 6+) that team matchups become a HUGE problem, and the problem with matchups from the massive amount of available pokemon caused a shift in tiering philosophy Gen 6+ on Smogon. Part of the reason Arena Trap and Shadow Tag got flatbanned; Trapping exacerbates the difficulty of bad matchups to absurd level.

 

With that being said, splitting up NU into RU and NU doesn't actually solve the problem at all. All your suggestion does is rename NU to RU, and put a tier below it. With that being said, the existence of a tier below RU doesn't make your suggested "70 relevant pokemon" any less relevant; You can still use NU pokemon in RU.

 

It sounds like your argument is "NU is too big, team matchups will be a huge problem, we need a tier below it to split up the good pokemon between the new RU and NU", but that doesn't actually lower the amount of pokemon in the newly proposed RU tier at all; By your logic, it will have the exact same problem. Yeah, the new NU will have less pokemon, but all you're doing is pushing the problem to a new name instead of actually fixing it.

I can´t deny you are right, but people´s mentality of using pokemons in the tier they are supposed to be only kinda eases things a bit. With this, I mean that there are some cases where a pokemon rly fits a higher tier compared to the one it belongs, but it sees little use on it, cause people mostly look into the stuff that is in the tier itself.

Not saying that this solves the problem, cause it doesn´t, and honestly, I wasn´t aware of it, but it certainly helps.

For the problem itself, I dont see other idea but to actually enlarge a bit the UU tier so the future NU doesn´t get saturated with stuff. Snce what you said holds true, and people could use NU mons in the UU tier, then getting something that usually wouldn´t be UU for UU literally doesn´t hurt said tier, while it does improve substantially the quality of our future NU.

I wouldn´t like to predict more than I could possibly know, but rather wait till the changes are made, but I wanted people to think about what can be done. Cause 200 pokemon in a tier will certainly make a lot of them unusable as hell.

34 minutes ago, Rigamorty said:

The problem we have with splitting the tiers up even more is that the lower tiers like UU and NU are already spread thin with active players. Sometimes even automated tournament brackets don't fill for those tiers, and the ranked matchmaking for them has become non existent, so the thought of dividing the low tier player base even more is scary. 

 

We'll see what happens though, who knows maybe the update will attract more comp players and this won't be the case, but for now this is how it is. 

Also didn´t think of this, but the whole idea of enlarging the UU quite a bit with some NU mons, making them unusable for NU, with no repercussions in UU itself, would probably be a better idea than splitting the NU, which by your and Senile´s statement, doesn´t really solve the problem.

Link to comment

seniles right it's putting a bandaid on a shotgun wound, but it's better than nothing and gives us a new tier to play around with which @DoubleJ can then go argue for being in the TT instead of LC and theirs not a whole lot reason not to, other than more work for TC. however it does need to be done eventually so why not in 5th gen? why wait for 6 or 7?

Link to comment

I'm guessing it's just going to, temporarily, work how it is normally. we'll sit and watch as things get divided into OU / UU / NU

Then eventually when things have settled we'll then look at what is super low usage in NU and make "NU" into "RU" and then move the lower usage down to the new "NU"?

that seems like it may be the best way to handle it...

Link to comment

If we ever hope to build a strong player base in another tier beside OU, it is imperative that no other tier get added. Dividing the competitive community by adding more tiers will only create more problems. I rather get first rounded in a big NU tournament than win a lower tier tournament where I was the only participant.

Edited by gbwead
Link to comment
1 minute ago, gbwead said:

If we ever hope to build a strong player base in another tier beside OU, it is imperative that no other tier get added. Dividing the competitive community by adding more tiers will only create more problems. I rather get first rounded in a big NU tournament than win a lower tier tournament where I was the only participant.

i can see that argument in 2015 or for LC. not so much for RU where many of those pokemon will be current comps that need little work to use in the new meta.

Link to comment
10 minutes ago, fredrichnietze said:

i can see that argument in 2015 or for LC. not so much for RU where many of those pokemon will be current comps that need little work to use in the new meta.

It doesn't really matter what comps people already have in their pc if those people are not even enough to make current UU/NU matchmaking viable. I certainly don't expect them to be enough to build a strong RU player base after the update.

Edited by gbwead
Link to comment
39 minutes ago, gbwead said:

It doesn't really matter what comps people already have in their pc if those people are not even enough to make current UU/NU matchmaking viable. I certainly don't expect them to be enough to build a strong RU player base after the update.

im neither do i. they change a few comps and make a few more. but thats going to happen to every single tier. not saying focus on it but put it on the to do list after NU but before LC 

Link to comment
3 minutes ago, fredrichnietze said:

im neither do i. they change a few comps and make a few more. but thats going to happen to every single tier. not saying focus on it but put it on the to do list after NU but before LC 

Oh, so replacing LC by RU as an official tier. I respect that even thought I don't like it at all.

Link to comment
5 minutes ago, gbwead said:

Oh, so replacing LC by RU as an official tier. I respect that even thought I don't like it at all.

i mean end game get both but having RU is a bit of a bandaid for the massive NU tier we are going to have and it will likely havce a bigger playerbase then LC. so why do Lc first? 

Link to comment
1 minute ago, fredrichnietze said:

i mean end game get both but having RU is a bit of a bandaid for the massive NU tier we are going to have and it will likely havce a bigger playerbase then LC. so why do Lc first? 

Well, it should be one or the other if we keep in mind that too many official tiers is a bad thing. I'm also not convinced that RU is going to have a bigger player base than LC.

Link to comment
4 hours ago, fredrichnietze said:

so why do Lc first? 

Because LC isn't really treated as a 'real' tier and is much easier to produce a team for.

 

It's more of a gimmick.

 

The reason I say that is because the species within it hold no bearing over OU|UU|NU, whereas RU would.

Link to comment
Just now, Darkshade said:

Because LC isn't really treated as a 'real' tier and is much easier to produce a team for.

 

It's more of a gimmick.

 

The reason I say that is because the species within it hold no bearing over OU|UU|NU, whereas RU would.

if you mean easier for the TC, sure. but making a LC comp is just as hard as making a RU or OU comp. the difference is a lot of current comps with adjustment are going to be useable in non LC tiers. so many current players will have a 6 man comp team ready for RU and testing within days of the updates maybe a week. most of it will be old comps but thats something all the tiers here have always had. LC is the exception because very few people have lc pokes and those very few pokes in circulation will soon become less as some need rebreeding or just arent usable anymore in LC. it will be weeks for a lot of players and maybe even a month or more until LC teams can be put together as more work from scratch will be needed. 

 

just go look for LC pokes in trade corner.

 

point is tier testing will happen quicker with every other tier. LC is going to take longer to start testing and get usage data. and without that we cant know if what works on paper works in practice or if we missed something. 

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.