CAP 33 - Part 1 - Concept Submissions

[viol and bass]

Final Submission

Name - Catch-22

Description - This Pokemon forces opponents to make sacrifices or enter disadvantageous game states in order to make progress against it.

Justification-

Catch-22s as I defined them here are very common situations in battle. Clicking Close Combat into a Rocky Helmet user forces you to sacrifice health. Hitting Bellibolt powers up its next electric move (a disadvantageous battle state). Baxcalibur might force you to sack a mon to bring in a revenge killer safely. Dragapult might force in scarfers or Booster Energy Pokemon, locking them into a move or using up their Booster Energy early (again a disadvantageous state that can be taken advantage of by teammates). In short, actions have consequences, sometimes even when they're the right choice. This concept is centered around being in the driver’s seat in as many of these interactions as possible. It’s a Pokemon that is designed around forcing risk/reward calculations, sacrifices, and/or self-advantageous positioning which allows us to take a deeper look at gameplay itself and everything that goes into a given turn. Every stage can play into the concept in concrete ways like contact punishing or a high speed stat drawing in scarfers, or more abstract ways like the threat level we exhibit, the interplay between moves, the ways we can allow teammates to capitalize on opponents who have overstepped, etc.​

Questions To Be Answered -

• Since sacrifice, risk, and reward are such a fundamental part of almost every interaction, how can we allow ourselves to be in the driver’s seat in these exchanges?
• In-battle sacrifices as I've defined them above are often mutual to some degree between you and your opponent– there is loss on both sides. If your full-health Ferrothorn dies to Close Combat but gets Iron Barbs damage off, that's rarely a worthwhile trade. What constitutes a successful sacrifice on your part? Is having more control than your opponent enough to stack the odds in your favor?
• How can we turn our own weaknesses into potential strengths, or allow our teammates to take advantage of potential counterplay?
• How can you take advantage of your own Pokemon taking damage or even fainting? Can we design a Pokemon where this is often a beneficial trade, even outside of roles like suicide lead?
• Can a Pokemon that forces sacrifice or risk from its opponent be low-risk itself? What does that look like?
• Some concrete ways of achieving this concept are inherently reactive rather than proactive. How can we achieve consistency while taking these routes?
• If we choose a team support-oriented route centered on baiting in opponents, can we be useful throughout a match regardless of a successful bait?

Explanation -

What sparked this concept was the idea of an interaction between Focus Punch and Rage Fist, where stopping the Focus Punch means powering up the Rage Fist. I'm not sure if that particular scenario is feasible, but the concept is quite broad in its applications. One example is a threatening sub user (think something like Sub Toxic Aegislash), where the immediate threat level can force a lot of game states in which you have more control and less risk than the opponent. Another example might be a strong attacker to force damage on walls to allow teammates to sweep, or a speedy Pokemon to force scarfers to lock into certain moves (or force early Booster Energy activation) which our teammates can take advantage of. Another interesting example is an attacker that can take advantage of damage received (see Galarian Moltres or Bellibolt).​

​

"Disadvantageous states" is the most abstract but most interesting part of the concept to me. To illustrate it, let's say I bring my Scarf Enamorus in on your Dragapult. I kill your Dragapult with Moonblast, and you bring in Booster Energy Iron Moth. I'm in a disadvantageous position here. You proceed to Fiery Dance a few times and sweep. In a way, Dragapult facilitated that by drawing in Enamorus to give Moth a free turn. That's one model to look at for executing the concept, and CAP33 could be more tailored to this sort of role.​

​

The concept also applies more generally to many forms of contact punishing or general move punishing (Seed Sower or Toxic Debris for instance), on-death effects, time-limited setup (terrain, rooms, weather, screens) such that dying might be beneficial, moves that force 50/50s that are often in your favor like Sucker Punch or Destiny Bond… there are a lot of cool applications of this, so I think it has a ton of depth but also enough focus to be interesting to tackle.​

 

[ultramafia]

WIP

Name: Optimised Item User

Description: CAP 33 would be optimised around the use of one or more specific held items. The selected item/s should generally be the "best pick" for CAP 33, and should meaningfully contribute to CAP 33's viability.

Justification: Every concept since Chromera has been focused around a specific element. CAPs 29 and 30 both explored ability, CAP 31 had a move-centric concept, and CAP 32 was centred on stats. In addition, several past CAPs have been focused on typing. However no CAP has ever been built around the item slot. Building around a specific item is unique from the other aspects of a mon's design however, as that the standard CAP process doesn't allow us to constrain what item is used. If we want a CAP to use. Instead, the item that CAP 33 ends up using will be a decision made by players post-release. This gives us a clear way to determine how successfully we have achieved the concept, while also requiring us to deepen our understanding of what makes certain mons such good users of certain items.

Questions to be answered:

• How much of CAP 33's viability should be directly dependent on the item chosen?
• How heavily min-maxed around the chosen item/s should CAP 33 be?
• Do we have to optimise around a single item, of can we select a group of related items (e.g. all Choice items, all berries)?
• Is there merit in selecting a niche/weak item that might not see the spotlight otherwise?
• How do we distinguish item optimisation from item dependence? e.g. Volcarona is very Heavy-Duty Boots dependent, yet other mons such as Slowking-G or Zapdos feel like more "optimal" boots users.

Explanation: The term "Optimised" was chosen intentionally, as a reference to the winning concept from CAP 30: "Optimised Ability". The definition of optimisation that we landed on back then was pretty good, and I thought it applied well to this concept too. The main difference here is that we are not specifically trying to optimise around an underutilised item the way we did with abilities in CAP 32 — a popular/common item would be an equally valid choice. This concept was inspired by a BKC video (I don't remember which unfortunately), where he mentioned that:

1. The best item on Gen 5 Genesect is Choice Scarf
2. It is unusual/rare for Choice Scarf to be a pokemon's best item

This got me thinking about what makes a pokemon a better or worse user of certain items: Why would an offensive mon be better with scarf than specs or band? What makes a mon like Heatran such an iconic leftovers user compared to other bulky mons without recovery? No CAP concept has ever been focused around the item slot, so I think this could be a really interesting process that would help deepen our understanding of how the various elements of a pokemon's design synergise (or not) with particular items.

 

[taziathegreat]

WIP I would really appreciate any suggestions

• Name - Apex Predator/ Pseudo Trapper
• Description - Through the combination of existing abilities typings and moves this Pokémon create pseudo trapping situation against certain types of Pokémon.
• 
  
• Justification- Your concept must answer the following questions to be eligible:
  • What new territory will your Concept Pokemon explore, why do you believe it’s interesting, and how would it interact with the metagame?
  • How does your concept motivate in-depth discussion at each stage of the process, and why do you believe the CAP Project community should discuss these topics?
• In filling out your concept submission, copy the questions above and add your answer after it.
• Questions To Be Answered - The purpose of the CAP project is to learn new things about the metagame, and each concept submission is a proposed "experiment". Each tool has its own specific set of questions, but good concepts often can explain other facets of competitive Pokemon. Use this section to pose those additional questions. Note that this is different from Justification where you are answering tool-related questions, in this section you are proposing questions.
• Explanation - This can contain just about anything. This is where you can explain your concept without restraint. You may make suggestions, even specific suggestions, regarding the possible implementation of the Concept. This explanation should help facilitate discussion of the Concept -- but the Explanation is NOT part of the Concept and will be omitted from the polls and any future use of the Concept. Since your explanation is non-binding, regarding future polls and threads, it will not be evaluated for purposes of determining if your concept is legal or illegal. Although it is tempting, refrain from making too long of an explanation; it will deter readers from fully considering your concept

 

[snake]

snakepost:

It has come to my attention that a rule (and associated commentary) that has been implicitly enforced since I’ve been involved with the project has not been previously written in the OP:

All submitted concepts for a standard CAP process will be used to create one fully-evolved Pokemon with zero alternate forms. This restriction can be partially or fully lifted by a winning framework that corresponds to the current project. Steps involving the CAP’s pre-evolutions are inherently flavor-based in nature and will have no bearing on concept fulfillment.

Please ensure your concept adheres to this rule, which is now written in the OP.

 

[Panic Station]

Watch me crawl out of the woodwork and toss a bunch of layman's feedback at y'all.

Schrödinger's CAP: I love this concept. There have been many CAPs where secondary ability has been thrown to the wayside. Focusing on how to have our cake and eat it too seems like a learning process we can benefit from in the future as well as here.

The Pawn: Another interesting one. There seems to be an obvious role for this concept to fill, but I'm curious about how positioning and promoting would work within that role.

Reconnaissance: Uh, did scouting become a thing again? This seems like a "Kitsunoh but better" concept.

Wind-Up Soldier: Does this concept suffer from a lack of CAP Doubles meta?

Debuff Specialist: Seems like a solid concept.

Create-A-Parasite: My mind instantly goes to a certain pokemon I loved playing with in USUM. I'd love to see what kinds of counterplay would come up against this CAP.

Version 3.3: Another solid concept.

Ability Neutralizer: How would this differ from Schrödinger's CAP?

The Weatherman: Oh boy, Weather Wars 2.0

Skoupaphobia: Sweep Police: Hmm, interesting. On surface level this seems like building a new role from scratch. At least, idt this is an archetype role yet. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

Total Downer: How would this differ from Debuff Specialist?

Immovable Object: Can we do this without adding "Make your opponent tear their hair out" to endgame goals?

Mage Killer: Do we really want to bring the dreaded Pink Blob role back into the meta? If it wasn't for that one question, I'd be all for this one.

Create-A-Pivot: Didn't we just do this one? We ended up covering this ground recently with Hemogoblin and iirc Miasmaw.

Mixed Attacker: Another solid concept.

The Terraformer:

reaction image might be a bit too big

Wounded Warrior: (Not gonna bother with a second gif) I, too, like to live dangerously. Might be fun to explore this.

Training Dummy: I feel seen. This concept is worth exploring whether or not a CAP is attached to it. Now make a CAP that teaches me how to fix the login screen telling me my username is already taken.

Game of Inches: Another solid concept.

Position is Key: This is big brain time. How much fine tuning for this CAP is too much? And how much is not enough?

Timeless: Same thoughts as Position Is Key, except it seems both harder to pull off and more appealing.

Parry and Riposte: Another solid concept.

One-Trick Pony: Hmmmm... I'd say solid concept, except I'm not entirely sure this would hold its own on a slate against these other concepts.

No Shuckles Given: shudders slightly in hyperoffensive playstyle

Catch-22: This seems like it'd be fun to explore. How do we do it without making it too annoying?

Optimised Item User: Nope, not appealing. One Knock Off or Switcheroo and your concept is ruined. (post-edit:) There are ways to avoid that, but that would pigeonhole us in certain stages.

Apex Predator/ Pseudo Trapper: How would we distinguish this from Pajantom, our full on trapper CAP?

 

[StarFalcon555]

Final Submission

Name: A Blessing From the Heavens

Description: This Pokemon is designed to be the perfect user of the move Revival Blessing.

Justification: This is an Actualization concept - we are taking a move that seems powerful on paper but criminally underused in practice and actualizing its potential applications into reality.

Questions to be Answered:

• Revival Blessing is, in its very nature, a purely support-based move. How can we make CAP 33 a perfect user of this move without making it too passive? Should we make it a defensive mon that can use Revival Blessing consistently, or is there merit into going the offensive route?
• Revival Blessing is also notable in that it has only 1 PP, and unlike Sketch, it cannot be learned multiple times, meaning that the only way to increase its usage is through a Leppa Berry. How can CAP 33 make the most of this two-time-maximum use move? Are we pigeonholed into using Leppa Berry as our held item, or can we make CAP 33 work without it?
• The two currently available users of Revival Blessing, Pawmot and Rabsca, are both extremely unviable in OU, and even in the lower tiers where they are viable, they prefer to not run Revival Blessing. What traits do these two Pokemon have that make them unable to abuse Revival Blessing, and how can CAP 33 learn from the failures of these two Pokemon and abuse Revival Blessing to its fullest potential?
• What kinds of team structures does Revival Blessing work best on? Are they offensive teams, as seen with Pawmot, or defensive teams, as seen with Rabsca? Does Revival Blessing benefit certain Pokemon? How does it do so? What are the pros and cons to using Revival Blessing on a certain playstyle?

Explanation: Generation 9 introduced quite a lot of new moves for our favorite new critters to learn, as Pokemon games tend to do. While most of these moves are simply run of the mill signature moves, one move stood out above the rest for being completely unique in terms of effect: Revival Blessing. This move has only 1 PP, but in exchange, it acts as a free Revive, healing any fainted Pokemon back up to 50% of its HP. There was much discussion about this move prior to release, with some even speculating that it would be banned. After all, this move does something that no other move has done before in competitive - straight up revive a teammate, which was previously impossible in competitive due to Bag items not being allowed for usage. This has a wide variety of practical applications, from reviving an offensive teammate to come in on a weakened late-game opposing team and sweep, or to bring back a defensive teammate to check the opponent's remaining offensive threats. In practice, however, Revival Blessing barely sees any use in current OU. It is only seen on two Pokemon, Pawmot and Rabsca, both of which are very poor users of the move. Pawmot, while decent, is a fast offensive pivot, and Rabsca is incredibly slow and frail, making it incredibly hard for both Pokemon to pull off a Revival Blessing. The goal with CAP 33 here is simple - take this very powerful but criminally underutilized move and give it the OU usage it deserves.

 

[Fenghuang]

Are you allowed to make a concept based off a specific move?

 

[ausma]

Are you allowed to make a concept based off a specific move?

Movepools or lists of moves are not allowed. A specific move can be mentioned if it is the basis for the entire concept. For example, the Concept "Rapid Spinner" would obviously mention the move Rapid Spin.

You can, but I usually would not recommend it as usually the design space around specific moves can be greatly limited, difficult to justify, or, simply, already explored naturally by existing CAPs/canon Pokemon. For the future, please direct questions to the CAP Discord or my DMs instead of this thread.

While I'm here, I also wanted to make it clear for posters that I do intend to go through every concept posted here and give feedback when I have the chance! If you have any questions or concerns regarding this or your concept, feel free to message me or air them through the CAP Discord.

 

[BasedShammai]

WIP

Name: Pleistocene

Description: The usage of Primordial Sea/Desolate Land in an OU setting

Justification: The primal weather abilities present a fascinating and somewhat untappd design space, giving an immunity and the powers of a weather effect without allowing teammates to take advantage.

Questions to be Answered:

• These abilities are extremely strong, how do we balance around very strong abilities while keeping the overall power level in check?
• Rain and Sun boost water and fire attacks respectively, and so a primal weather setting offensive threat would obviously be very strong. But they also negate other weather effects and nullify fire/water attacks. The specific typing of any mon with these abilities would have to be very carefully considered.

Explanation: The primordial weathers are some of the more interesting abilities in the game, playing with weather effects (usually team-focused mechanics) in interesting and unique ways. Unfortunately, these abilities have only ever appeared on 770 BST monstrosities, except in AAA. I think that the uses of primal weather in AAA provides interesting ideas in what sorts of underrated utility these abilities can have. Aside from boosting the power of already strong fire and water attacks, they can provide specific benefits to some moves (one turn solar beam and perfectly accurate thunders and hurricanes come to mind), provide an immunity (a very strong effect) and negate weather (allowing mons with this ability to be ironically quite anti-weather). Some of my favorite CAP projects have played with dialing down a very powerful trait rather than working around a specific role or constraint, and I think this would be a really fun tool to play with.

 

[Fenghuang]

My little review of other people's submissions (or at least the ones I really like):

The Pawn: This is a really out-there submission, bordering on a flavor suggestion, but I think it kinda works. There's some good ideas in here for sure, and the theme doesn't need to give perfect direction (that's what the later votes are for!)

Skoupaphobia: This would have been a cool idea last gen, but we got three new unaware mons now and I wonder how much this is an unfilled niche. Definitely a more conventional pick.

Toal Downer: I really like this. I think stat lowering is a really neat mechanic that doesn't see much focus, and a crafting mon centered around the tools we currently have would be a fun process I think. Definitely one of my favorites, I just think that some of the obvious ones like Lumina Crash should be avoided (just kinda boring).

Very Fast Immovable Object: I love fast bulk and we really haven't had much in the whole history of mons. Making a fast wall would make for a really fun CAP, there are a lot of directions and roles a fast wall can approach.

Create-A-Pivot: I will admit my biases: I like the positioning game and pivots, and I think there's some unexplored design space among pivot mons with all of them either being strong to force switches or have utility and a pivot to let them chip after doing their job. In the past two gens we've seen the rise in prominence of another pivot: the slow bulky pivot, which wants to move after the opponent to allow safe switch-ins to powerful but frail or weakened offensive threats. I think there's more room for ideas here, but we'd really have to flex our creative muscles to make something unique.

The Terraformer: Isn't it weird how we now have a litany of strong Eterrain abusers and no good Eterrain setters? But I digress, I think this is a cool idea, especially for misty terrain and grassy terrain which have seen less love than their stronger and sexier siblings. Especially misty terrain has a lot of potential I think, and I actually think that a misty terrain setting fast pivot could be really cool, allowing you to run mons which fear burns and paralysis more (especially burns, which can cripple physical threats). If this was just another psyspam enabler that would be boring imo.

Wounded Warrior: This is another one that's pretty out there, focusing less on a particular mechanic or niche as much as it focuses on a particular subset of mechanics. I really like this idea and I think there's a shockingly high number of tools to really make it work, I just wonder how much we can avoid being Goltres 2.0, seeing as Goltres is basically this idea.

Parry and Riposte: Another quasai-flavor concept, but I think this one has a lot of fun ideas. The only mon we had centered around counter moves was Wobbuffet, who was a pretty jank and gimmicky mon and also shadow tag is a dumb ability. A mon centered around using counter/mirror coat/comeuppance/metal burst could be really cool and there are a ton of ways that sort of disincentivizing hitting you can be exploited for offensive play and utility. Big fan of this.

One-Trick Pony: I like this one, though I feel like a mon with really high HP and really high speed would be a boring use of an interesting suggestion, my preferred outcome is that we make a CAP with a monstrously high attack stat, that feel like by far the most interesting design space here. I don't like this one as much as some of the others, but there are fun directions to take it in.

I think people have some really great ideas, I really enjoyed reading a lot of these. The ones I didn't mention are ones that I don't like as much, but that doesn't necessarily mean I have less to say about them. I might make another post with my thoughts on them later.

 

[snake]

WIP

Name: Pleistocene

Description: The usage of Primordial Sea/Desolate Land in an OU setting

Justification: The primal weather abilities present a fascinating and somewhat untappd design space, giving an immunity and the powers of a weather effect without allowing teammates to take advantage.

Questions to be Answered:

• These abilities are extremely strong, how do we balance around very strong abilities while keeping the overall power level in check?
• Rain and Sun boost water and fire attacks respectively, and so a primal weather setting offensive threat would obviously be very strong. But they also negate other weather effects and nullify fire/water attacks. The specific typing of any mon with these abilities would have to be very carefully considered.

Explanation: The primordial weathers are some of the more interesting abilities in the game, playing with weather effects (usually team-focused mechanics) in interesting and unique ways. Unfortunately, these abilities have only ever appeared on 770 BST monstrosities, except in AAA. I think that the uses of primal weather in AAA provides interesting ideas in what sorts of underrated utility these abilities can have. Aside from boosting the power of already strong fire and water attacks, they can provide specific benefits to some moves (one turn solar beam and perfectly accurate thunders and hurricanes come to mind), provide an immunity (a very strong effect) and negate weather (allowing mons with this ability to be ironically quite anti-weather). Some of my favorite CAP projects have played with dialing down a very powerful trait rather than working around a specific role or constraint, and I think this would be a really fun tool to play with.

Hi! The following rule from the OP means your concept is not allowed:

Specific Abilities are not allowed. This applies to existing abilities and new abilities. Do not attempt to circumvent this rule by mentioning specific battle effects that can only be achieved by the implementation of an ability. For example, the following phrases would be illegal:
"This pokemon should have a defensive ability like Intimidate or Marvel Scale..." "This pokemon has an ability that steals the opponent's held item..." "When this pokemon is switched in, all weather conditions are nullified..."

Please reach out on the CAP Discord if you have further questions :)

 

[caninesfan]

WIP


Name: Critical Receiver

Description: A Pokemon that is designed to react positively to being critted instead of having to play around crits.

Justification: Many notable battles could have ended very differently if a critical hit hadn't landed at the moment it did. Often, a critical hit is something that you want to land on the opponent, while doing everything you can to avoid your opponent landing one on you. Introducing a Pokemon that appreciates critical hits could add new ways to play stall teams and hyper-offensive teams, by eliminating the need to play around a critical hit and allowing your Pokemon to retaliate more easily.

Questions To Be Answered:

• How would this Pokemon react to non-critical hits?
• In a Double Battle, how would this Pokemon's allies react to a critical hit?
• Other than Anger Point, by what means can a Pokemon react positively to a critical hit?

Explanation: Many notable battles ended in the ways that they did because a critical hit ruined someone's strategy at exactly the wrong moment. Often, stall teams and hyper-offensive teams alike see crits as something to play around, overlooking the potential of a Pokemon that eliminated these restrictions. Abilities like Anger Point (which maxes out the Pokemon with this ability's Attack when hit by a crit) are typically given to unviable Pokemon like Crabominable or Pokemon that work better with other abilities like Krookodile. "Super Luck Spam" being a bad concept made me wonder if an anti-Super Luck Spam Pokemon would be a better concept.

 

[Darek]

WIP

Turn Killer

This CAP specializes in exploiting a specific move or set of moves the opponent may choose. This pokemon's playstyle is centralized around doing so, creating many switchin opportunities for itself on the basis of the opponent selecting the targeted move/moves.

While a pokemon's checks and counters are largely defined by typing, this CAP aims to buck the convention by threatening to switch in on the opponent clicking a certain move and punishing regardless of typing. In doing so, we are able to explore the implications of a pokemon that can situationally soft-check several pokemon, and how being able to exploit a specific move has on the opponent's actions. Furthermore, this concept offers a unique design space in how it is directly focused on punishing moves that are likely difficult to punish by conventional means.

Questions:

• What moves are frequently used enough to shape a pokemon around exploiting them? Which moves can be categorically exploited through the same strategies?
• How should CAP33 fare in matchups where the opponent's pokemon aren't running the targeted move(s)?
• This concept can easily end up focusing on answering the common pokemon that use the targeted move moreso than the move itself(ex. a focus on beating Rapid Spin may focus on just beating Great Tusk and Equilibra). Is this an acceptable outcome? If not, how can we take action to avoid doing so?

 

[Scizivire]

WIP

Name: New Toy Syndrome

Description: This Pokémon is optimized around effectively making use of one move or ability newly introduced in the current generation.

Justification: Gen 9 has followed the trend of introducing many new moves and abilities to the game, many of which are exclusive to a single (line of) Pokémon. These new elements have varying levels of success within the current OU metagame, with some of them being so strong their users were immediately banned to Ubers while others are stuck on less viable Pokémon in lower tiers or simply are not used in OU. The CAP Project has the unique opportunity of creating a Pokémon centered around one of these moves or abilities and making them work within an OU-like metagame, as we have shown before with moves like Doom Desire on Equilibra or abilities like Stamina on Venomicon-Prologue.

Questions To Be Answered:

• What do these new moves or abilities bring to the table that other moves or abilities do not?
• Of the new moves and abilities currently exclusive to a single (line of) Pokémon, which ones are most probable to be OU-viable on a different Pokémon? Which ones are not worth pursuing?
• There is a big difference between picking a move to build around and picking an ability to build around. Should the process order change for either of these options, and if so, which option is more likely to lead to a smooth and succesful process?
• Which other attributes of a Pokémon positively or negatively interact with our move or ability of choice?
• How can we ensure CAP33 wants to use our move or ability of choice on any given set?

Explanation:
With each new generation of Pokémon, new moves and abilities are introduced to the game, and gen 9 is no exception. Personally I think many of the moves and abilities introduced in gen 9 are very interesting mechanically, with a wide variety of different usecases and niches. However, while some of these moves and abilities see great success in OU and CAP - think of Kingambit's Supreme Overlord, (Galarian) Slowking's Chilly Reception or Garganacl's Salt Cure and Purifying Salt, not everything has been viable, either because their users are not viable themselves, do not have the synergy to pull it off or because they are overshadowed by better moves. I think by building a Pokémon specifically around optimizing these new moves or abilities we can create something interesting to add to the metagame in a way that other processes might not. Some examples:

• Ability-wise, I think Bellibolt's Electromorphosis is a pretty strong ability that theoretically allows it to tank hits and hit back hard, but Bellibolt doesn't really have the freedom to invest in both bulk and power so that it can survive multiple hits in the OU metagame while still dealing enough damage to compete.
• Similarily, Klawf's Anger Shell allows it to gain a mini Shell Smash when dropping below half health, but Klawf doesn't really have the raw stats to abuse this boost and is also weak to many priority moves, leaving it prone to revenge killing.
• Moves like Rage Fist and Lumina Crash are powerful, so powerful in fact that they contributed to the bans of their users Annihilape and Espathra because of the synergy they provided to Pokémon with already strong qualities across the board. One might wonder what these moves look like on Pokémon that are not quite as strong as the aformentioned Pokémon, such as, for example, defensive walls?
• Veluza's Fillet Away sort of combines the utility of Shell Smash with the drawback of Belly Drum, allowing it to have potential as a powerful mixed attacking glass cannon, but with mediocre stats across the board and a relatively small movepool it is really hard to get in and even harder to get a sweep off without a ton of support of the team.

All of this said, I do not think we necessarily need to pursue a signature move or ability here, though the other options are quite limited. Also, I don't think we should only give CAP33 only one new toy by default, but rather we try and build around this one move or ability and if we happen to find the need for another new move ability along the line, it is acceptable to add it on.

 

[Sephy Took My Name]

WIP, will try and flesh out soon

Name: Unexplored Potential

Description: This Pokemon takes advantage of an obscure, overlooked, or seemingly redundant aspect of an existing ability, effect, or other mechanic in a way that sets itself apart from other Pokemon who commonly use that mechanic.

Justification:
- What new territory will your Concept Pokemon explore, why do you believe it’s interesting, and how would it interact with the metagame?

- How does your concept motivate in-depth discussion at each stage of the process, and why do you believe the CAP Project community should discuss these topics?

Questions:
- Which battle mechanics available in Scarlet and Violet have elements of unexplored territory to them? And of those, which have the potential to be used creatively to provide an interesting and viable role for a Pokemon?

Explanation: Honestly, my main inspiration behind submitting this concept is that the idea of a Misty Surge dragon type tank has been living rent free in my head for a little while now (since before CAP 32), though I doubt that EXACT idea is the most viable or practical way to execute this idea given how many powerful fairies are out there. The dragon move nerfing effect of Misty Terrain is always something that's seemed fairly redundant (especially when compared with the more obviously useful status prevention, though being able to weaken the damage a Pokemon like Dragapult is able to do to your non-fairies with meteors and darts is likely still appreciated), given that the vast majority of Pokemon that get access to the terrain are already immune to the moves being nerfed. But I'm always partial to the more weird and out there ideas in any given game, the kinds that seem on the surface like they shouldn't work before you dig down and realize "wait, there's actually something really interesting here" (though that does likely stem from me having maybe a little bit of a weird playstyle sometimes).

Also, had a bit of a tough time trying to differentiate this idea from Chromera's concept. Hard to reverse engineer a concept like this when you have such a specific idea in mind, but part of the advantage of working as a team is getting more nuanced perspectives and feedback from other people. Here's to another good CAP process!

 

[Dratios]

Final Submission

Name: Burn Your Boats

Description: This Pokemon effectively uses the move No Retreat to make progress in battle.

Justification:
No Retreat has always been an interesting move to me because it plays with two courses of action integral to the current battle system: boosting and switching. Boosting is balanced by the fact that it resets upon switching. In some, perhaps even many cases, a battler has to pick between trying to power through a counter with boosted moves or switching to gain some headway. The move No Retreat inverts this concept, giving the user an oft-feared omniboost at the cost of being unable to switch, and really forces the player to consider what stage of the battle they are at and whether their Falinks can power through the rest of the opponent's team (or break through a particularly difficult mon). The mechanics of this move are further complicated by Gen 9's addition of Tera Ghost, which completely removes the downside of being unable to switch, but at the very high price of blowing your Tera. Not only does this remove the tension that your opponent may have about anticipating a Tera, but in Falinks' case, it also removes some notable resistances like Rock and Dark. Thusly, I think this point in the metagame is a prime time to delve into No Retreat, and to create something that can use it well.

Questions To Be Answered:

• What, specifically, makes Falinks a suboptimal user of No Retreat?
  • Consequently, what, specifically, would make a good user of No Retreat? Typing? Stats? Movepool?
• What would a good user of No Retreat be able to accomplish before and after using the move?
  • In other words: is it useful at all before hitting the No Retreat button? Can it create its own opportunities to use No Retreat by forcing switches via Taunt, Encore, Intimidate, etc.?
  • After hitting the No Retreat button, what can it do? Does it have the stats to break through a bulky 'mon it couldn't before? Can it clean up a weakened team?
• What specific utility is gained from an omniboost as opposed to simply raising Speed and the offensive stat of choice?
  • How should a bulk increase make a difference in how a Pokemon is played? Should an increase in defenses allow it to sponge hits from offensive threats it couldn't take otherwise, turning it into a check for that mon?
  • What does the Pokemon newly threaten with both of its boosted offenses that it didn't before? Should the boost in both offensive stats allow it to break through walls of a specific defense? (i.e. if the CAP is a special attacker, would No Retreat's +1 in Attack give it the offenses to deal with, say, specially defensive Glowking?
  • What moves or capabilities would justify using a mixed set (which often requires careful balancing and reallocation of EVs), even with both offenses boosted?
• Precisely what does this CAP, and the team at large, lose via its inability to switch out after using No Retreat?
  • How can it make up for the inherent momentum lost with the inability to switch? Should it have the movepool to fully overcome this opportunity cost with deft predictions?
• In what ways should an opponent be able to capitalize on use of No Retreat?
• How should this No Retreat user interact with Terastallization? Is sacrificing the team's Tera for a highly predictable use enough of a price to pay for an infinitely reusable omniboost, and perhaps more importantly, the ability to maintain team momentum? And if not, are we willing to make this Pokemon innately unable to Terastallize?

Explanation:
No Retreat is unique to me in how it embraces opportunity cost. In Gen 8, its use was pretty binary: either you go for your wincon by clicking the move, with the knowledge that you're stuck having Falinks out until it dies or the opponent gets swept, or you maintain your ability to switch and reposition. There was a little more depth added in Gen 9 - interactions went from a binary to more of a triangle between boosting, switching, and Tera-ing to get some use. But judging by poor Falinks' showings in both SS and SV (Untiered and PU respectively), though, it becomes really clear that the mon is just... not good. (Which is sad because look at the little soldier dudes, they're adorable.) Furthermore, its sick unique move isn't even necessarily the best thing to use on it, often ditched in favor of a Choice set. To my chagrin, even being able to Tera Ghost didn't save Falinks. I'd like to see something that can and will use No Retreat well, but crucially one that maintains that aspect of opportunity cost. There's no fun in clicking a button and steamrolling your opponent's whole team (looking at you, Tera Flying Kingambit), so I would want to make sure that this CAP is balanced enough to make waves with No Retreat, but not to be completely off-the-walls stupid.

To be honest, the question of how something could use No Retreat best really came to me after a frustrating randbats game where I had no removal and my opponent got up three layers of Spikes. The necessity of switching to maintain positioning and to create advantages, all the while taking chip damage, made me start to wonder if a mon could be viable without needing to be switched in or out - and the answer came to me a few matches later, when I rolled a Falinks. No Retreat is uniquely positioned as a tool that, in my opinion, sacrifices momentum (i.e. dictating the flow of the battle) in the traditional sense but immediately brings to the fore a more immediate threat for your opponent to deal with - in turn hurting their own momentum.

I think there's a lot of depth to be brought to the table in terms of typing, ability, stats, and movepool. If its typing sucks defensively, it incentivizes Tera Ghosting and completely bypassing the interesting drawback of No Retreat. If its ability is something like Regenerator, using No Retreat is an active detractor from keeping the mon healthy in favor of a bid for progress. I think there's countless ways that this CAP could potentially pan out, and I'd love to see how we might bring this concept to reality.

 

[BobKingOfSeagulls]

WIP Would love any feedback!

Name - A Rising Star

Description - This Pokémon uses a strategy/toolset that was not viable in OU in previous generations.

Justification- As with all generations, new powerful pokemon, new items/moves for those pokemon, and changes to mechanics have resulted in what's viable/unviable shifting. However, with this generation, a combination of the generational gimmick, a more limited pokedex, and the significant changes to moves and movepools have resulted in some huge shakeups. This concept seeks to explore the *new* and *unprecedented*, rather than keying off of already well understood concepts in a pokemon. A CAP based around making use of only recently-viable tools will encourage really thinking about what makes this generation special compared to the rest of the series, and result in a CAP that performs distinctly from many others - leaving it a unique but non-toe-stepping presence.

Questions To Be Answered -

• What new tools have been introduced into the game for this generation? What are their uses?
• What existing tools (moves, items, abilities) have been changed, and what is the impact on strategies that used these tools in previous generations?
• What pokemon have stayed relevant, and what pokemon have lost their relevancy? What trends seperate these two groups?
• Are there any strategies that have become common in OU this generation? What characteristics do they share?
• How can a pokemon make use of previously underused tools in this new environment?

Explanation - This concept is inspired by some of the big shakeups in existing pokemon, such as Blissey going from almost entirely OU to NU thanks to the changes to movepool and move traits. I think that developing on this, to provide a pokemon that can do something that was previously considered unviable, would be a quality concept. We've already seen some example of the positive side of these changes with the introduction of Ursaluna in pokemon Home providing a quality user of trick room in singles. In this case, rather than creating a CAP to make a totally unviable niche viable, we would be aiming to create a CAP that fits into a newly-viable role in order to have much greater synergy with other team members.

 

[GONER]

WIP

Name: One-hit-wonder

Description: This Pokémon aims to succeed with as limited a move pool as humanly possible.

Justification: When discussing a Pokémon, its movepool is inarguably one of the key factors to dicuss. After all, it was the main reason why Regieleki got so much better in gen 9 than it was in gen 8 — due to the fact that it now had something to actually hit ground types with in Tera ice Tera blast, or Wobuffett and Wynaut in gen 3 being the first non-legendary and the first NFE to be banned from OU despite having a whopping 8 moves at their disposal. Restricting the movepool of a Pokémon leads to some interesting considerations and ideas, while giving an overall indication of the full impact of a Pokémon’s movepool.

Questions to be answered:

• What task would this Pokémon be best suited for? (e.g. utility, sweeping, etc.)
• Can a Pokémon rely or a single move alone, or do they need further factors to be viable?
• How many moves would this Pokémon actually need?
• Is being unpredictable and flexible truly necessary for success?
• How metagame-dependent would the success of such a Pokémon be?

Explanation

I thought of this concept over a discussion over how the success of Samurott-Hisui largely depended on Ceaseless edge, and how Kingambit was so much better with simply sucker punch. Hence, this got me thinking about how many Pokémon depend on a single move or a certain combination of moves to achieve competitive viability.

There are very few examples of Pokémon which have been able to suceed with small movepools and nothing else — they usually need something else, like a combination of factors, like abilities or other moves at its disposal. For example, the mentioned wobbufett might have a tiny movepool, but the main reason it was banned were these moves in tandem with the most broken ability in the game, shadow tag. And while some might argue that dracovish could be broken with Fishious rend alone, also needs its ability and other coverage options to make itself truly broken (the other user of fishious rend, arctovish languishes down in untiered.)

However, some Pokémon really do just rely on a single move with poor distribution to make work, as the reward for setting something like sticky web is greater than using shitmons like masquerain or shuckle in a high power context like Ubers, however the viability of such a strategy is largely metagame dependent.

And then there are the Pokémon that while their movepool is small and shallow enough to hold it back, it is still able to find viability in the metagame. Gen 1 Zapdos might hate ground types with its life, but it is still able to work effectively doing what it does — being one of the strongest electric types around.

Overall, the movepool is a very important part of what makes a Pokémon good, and there are many different ways that a Pokémon with a small movepool can function. as such I am curious on how a Pokémon with a limited movepool will function and play out, and I would be excited to see how far such a Pokémon can go.

Thanks to Pitpochi for the feedback.

 

[PoorlyDrawnPhantump]

Name - Bulky Gravity user

Description - This Pokémon can setup gravity, as well as benefit from the effects of gravity.

Justification-

• What new territory will your Concept Pokemon explore, why do you believe it’s interesting, and how would it interact with the metagame?
  I believe this could make certain Pokémon and moves more useful in the meta with the help of gravity increasing their accuracy. This can also help out against Pokémon like Venomicon and Equilibra removing their immunity to ground types.
• How does your concept motivate in-depth discussion at each stage of the process, and why do you believe the CAP Project community should discuss these topics.
  From what I’ve seen, there’s hasn't been much talk about making a good gravity user in the CAP project community. Even though in my opinion, the topic would be an interesting topic to talk about making a good gravity user.

Questions To Be Answered -

• How can this Pokémon benefit from having gravity as one of its 4 moves?
• Can this allow someone to makes a gravity-based team?
• What would make this Pokémon a more preferable gravity user than Pokémon like Sandy Shocks or Fidgit?
• How can this Pokémon help out against other Pokémon like Venomicon, Kingambit, or Equilibra?
• Should this Pokémon have any other way of setting up gravity?
• How would the typing and stats on this Pokémon be without it being broken in gravity?
• What should the move list be that allows for more creative strategies than just using gravity and three other strong attacks like hydro pump, gunk shot, and earthquake?
• Could this Pokémon have a move like Flapple that has an extra effect in gravity?

Explanation - There are many Pokémon like Diancie or Landorus-therian that have been in OU and know the move gravity, but are not know for using the move. This is because those Pokémon are designed in a way that they would rather use other moves instead of gravity. That’s why I think that it would be nice to have an OU Pokémon that would actually be know for using gravity as one of its moves.

To make this work we’ll have to make sure that it would be different than other gravity users like Sandy Shocks. The main difference that I believe is necessary for this new Pokémon is that it needs More bulk so it can enter the field setup gravity and then leave safely without taking too much damage. It’ll also needs to have something that would help it benefit from the effects of gravity, increasing the incentive to use gravity on this Pokémon.

The other thing that I think would cool for a bulky gravity user would be that it could have an ability like drought that would instead of setting up sun upon switching in, would be setting up gravity upon switching in. Letting gravity be more of a part of its play style, rather than it being an optional move to run. Again I think that would be cool but you don’t have to do that, this last paragraph was just a thought that I had and wanted to share as a bonus.

Edit: This is more of a response for shnowshner’s question on why it needs to be bulky. First thing to mention on that question is that when I mentioned bulky, I was thinking of something like defensive stats or defensive typing. The reason I think it would need bulk is so it can switch in and setup gravity more often in a match without getting KOed.
As for how it could benefit from gravity, there are many thins that can be improved with gravity up that I think wouldn’t matter it the Pokémon was bulky or not. The first thing for me that comes to mind personally is hypnosis which I just learned recently has yet to be on a CAP Pokémon. So hopefully this helps out with shnowshner’s on my concept. I know it’s not perfect, but I think it could be a fun addition and maybe even kickstart a gravity archetype like with tailwind and trick room.

 

[Brown4Sides]

Some feedback:

Mage Killer - This feels like it's trying so hard to reference RPG roles that it forgets about the big question: Why special bulk in particular? It seems like the only reason this is the case is because you wanted it to reference RPG roles, at the cost of the concept itself. Concepts should be interesting because of their value in how it relates to competitive Pokemon itself, not because it references something else. If you remove the special bulk aspect and make it so that it's just "uses bulk to generate offensive momentum" then it becomes a better concept.

Timeless - We have no way of knowing what the Gen 10 metagame will look like, or even what the Teal Mask metagame will look like. We can analyze trends of existing "timeless" Pokemon, sure, but that does not make them immune to potential power creep in the future. Anything can happen. I also don't like the idea of a concept that we won't know if the CAP fulfilled it until potentially years after its release.

Very Fast Immovable Object - We have several defensive oriented concepts here, and this is my favorite of them because of the extra layer of being fast. Typically we see mons with offense + speed, or offense + bulk, but we don't see bulk + speed often. Making what will essentially be a better Scream Tail is a cool idea.

Critical Receiver - There is very little room to make this a workable concept for a scenario that does not happen most turns. It seems like this would just be an Anger Point Pokemon, and I can't see how else we could acheive this.

New Toy Syndrome - One of my favorites. Gen 9 introduced so many cool new toys, many of which I don't know if we would see discussed in other concepts, so dedicating an entire concept to one is a good idea to me.

Unexplored Potential - This concept feels too broad, as many concepts already try to do some form of this while having more direction. If you narrow this down to say, unexplored ability or unexplored item, or really anything at all as long as you decide on something, this would be a better concept.

 

[Pipotchi]

Gunna list some ones that stood out to me so far and some suggestions to make them even better:

Very Fast Immovable Object by quziel : This gets more interesting the faster the wall gets. Pre-nerf spdef talonflame is one good blueprint that a project like CAP should aim for in my eyes, whereas mons in the 100 and 110 range start to become a lot more mild when it comes to exploration. If this concept is actually about being fast enough to be fast among offensive mons, rather than just outspeeding wallbreakers and swords dancers, then its a great project. I'm only saying this because I know a lot of ppl would consider base 110 as a fast wall nowadays when it is scraping the bare minimum of what a project like this is capable of exploring.

Mage Killer by hexatron : This is potentially really interesting. I dont think it needs to be about special bulk just to match the archetype that inspired it though. The leveraging of huge bulk to create offensive pressure is definitely cool and worth exploring. Choosing where to place this bulk will be a meaningful part of the process.

Catch 22 by viol and bass : Its a strong concept. Only thing I dont like is that the interpretation of "taking risks" could start getting really vague... such as hitting moves like Focus Blast and Stone Edge, which is honestly lame. Same with "disadvantageous game states" like justifying it to be a free entry for any other pokemon after KO (not only is this plasmanta territory, its just incredibly non-interactive with the process in general and i wouldnt consider it a success). These are mild and downright boring explorations found in all mons by coincidence, and none of them have a deep exploration during the process, and would be near-invisible in the final result especially in comparison to the quality exploration/result that would come from focusing on sacrifice to progress. Just having it be about making sacrifices to progress and leaving everything else as optional bonus points is a lot more exciting for me.

Nearly Useless by GONER : this is a good concept in theory but im not sure what the intent is. Is the goal to rely on a single really good move, and not much else? Or a really concise, amazing movepool that is also really tiny? Or a truly limited movepool of generic things, bolstered by being amazing in all other fields? Also, the examples don't really have a through-line which is part of whats confusing me; Garganacl has every tool it could possibly want, same with arguably Scizor and Cyclizar. Alomomola and Zama have small movepools without real standouts, boosted by their wonderful stats/abilities/other traits. Orthworm has a pretty average movepool but with one standout move carrying the set. Clearing that up would give me more confidence with what Im voting for- also as a sidenote, Id prob try and find a more fun name that doesn't have competitive implications

If yours isnt there doesn't mean I dont like it. I only included the ones that I liked but would change slightly.

 

[Gaboswampert]

Final Submission

Name: Workaround

Description: This Pokémon finds creative and interesting ways to punish and bypass the immunities of other Pokémon.

Justification: Many top-tier Pokemon have an immunity of some kind, being an immunity to a type (granted by typing or ability), or to a status. Such immunities help these Pokemon fulfill their role by easing switching in, walling opposing Pokemon, or allowing setup.

This Pokemon would be able to punish Pokemon with inmunities that would normally stop it on its tracks, via bypassing, pressuring off, or straight up ignoring the immunity of the immune Pokemon to do its job properly, making would-be hard checks due to their inmunities to this Pokemon main tools, fearful of switching into this Pokemon. Many abilities and moves can actualize this concept, so there is room for discussion about combinations of type, abilities, and movepool.

Questions to be answered:

• How will Tera affect the way it punishes/bypasses immune Pokemon?
• What are the most common inmunities on the metagame? And what are the ways to punish and bypass them?
• What important inmunities do top tier Pokemon have? Do they have any similar inmunities we can bypass with a single move or ability, or are they more widespread?
• In what ways should it capitalize on bypassing inmunities? Is there anything specific that bypassing a certain inmunity provides?
• What moves that are shut down by specific inmunities could be more interesting and appealing if they were able to bypass and punish those inmunities?
• What strategies may shut down its ability to bypass inmunities?
• What interactions between moves, abilities, or Pokemon could change if this Pokemon bypassed specific inmunities?
• How do we make it so that its worth to stay in against a Pokemon inmune to what you are going to do to punish it, instead of switching out?
• In what situations should its coverage help it? Since it would be encouraged to not use coverage as its main way to punish inmune Pokemon, what would coverage help it on, if should even gets meaningful coverage?

Explanation: Many top-tier Pokemon have immunities that help them excel with their respective roles, such as being a wall, offensive powerhouse, pivot, etc, and there are a lot of mons that rely heavily on its immunity/immunities, Venomicon, Equilibra and Rotom-Wash immunity to ground helps them a lot since without it they would be weak to it, Hatterene needs Magic Bounce to be as good as it is, Gholdengo is already good on its own but Good as Gold makes it so much better, Corviknight and Cawmodore make great use of their immunity to ground and poison/toxic, and Cawmodore has the added benefit of having Volt Absorb to remove another one of its weaknesess and synergizes with it because of its role as a Belly Drum sweeper, so on and so forth, so this Pokemon can punish those mons with immunities that would normally stop it on its tracks, making its job easier. Moves like Knock Off, Trick/Switcheroo, Toxic, Spore, Glare/Twave, Will-O-Wisp, Taunt, etc, can help it punish and pressure opposing inmunity-holding Pokemon by being able to shut down some of their strats if they try to switch into a move they should switch in freely, or it can maybe go to another route and punish those mons by ignoring its inmunities entirely, with abilities like Mold Breaker, Scrappy, Corrosion, etc.

The metagame has to also be taken into account, mons like Kingambit, Garganacl, Great Tusk, Hemogoblin, Glowking, and the aftermentioned Venomicon, Equilibra and Gholdengo have inmunities, and all share that they are top tier threats on the metagame, in part or mostly because they are inmune to an specific inmunity to a status (or multiple) they fear, or a type that, if it wasnt because of the inmunity, would be weak to, or being able to ignore specific types of moves, and this Pokemon should be expected to be able to punish these inmunities if one gets on the way of its role, or bypass one or more of these, being able to take them on from where they would normally be safe, which would lead to interesting interactions between this Pokemon, and top tier ones.

There are also many interesting interactions that could come up as the result of this, what if the Levitate mon was hit by a Ground move, or the Steel type wall was poisoned, or the mons with access to move category-inmunuties were able to be hit by them? The Sap Sipper mon not being able to switch into Leech Seed or Spore, the Volt Absorb mon not being able to block a Volt Switch, the Ghost type being hit by the Focus Blast or CC, the Flying type being punished for switching into a Ground type, the Ground type being punished for switching into an Electric type, the Spinblocker not being able to block the spin due to it fearing switching in, and a large etc, all of these interactions are very rare, and i think should be explored more on, normally, the Flying type would normally switch into the Ground type move, and then punish, or the Ground type switches into the Volt Switch, and punish, or the Fire type switches into a Will-o-Wisp, the Electric type into a paralyzing move, but can we search for a way so that they are scared of switching into them, without the need to resort to coverage? Maybe it isnt worth it for the mon switching in to be burned, or get its item removed, or be paralyzed, put to sleep, poisoned, get its item switched, give the opponent a free pivoting opportunity, get hazard damage, etc, there are many ways to make mons that would normally freely switch into an attack that they are inmune to, to not ever want to switch into it.

Some Pokemon we could use as examples are Gliscor, which is one of the best toxic stallers to ever exist, due to one of the main things stopping toxic stallers being that Steel and Poison types hard walling them, something that Gliscor punishes by hitting both with very strong STAB superefective Eq's, Rotom-Wash is able to punish opposing bulky Ground types switching into its Volt Switch hitting them with a strong STAB Hydro Pump, and if they were also inmune to Hydro or could take it on easily, it could also Trick them a Choice Scarf, possibly invalidating them with it, maybe removing a crucial item from them, Caribolt is one of the most effective hazard removers on the meta due to it being able to spin on the face of Gholdengo, but at the tradeoff of it being spinblocked by Ground types, which it can deal with with its superefective Grass STABs, or Jellicent in the lower tiers, that was effective at spreading burns at opposing Pokemon due to its STAB Water moves hitting the Fire types that were inmune, in fact, Scald on itself is a pretty interesting move for this concept, if it cannot burn the opposing Pokemon, it deals superefective damage to it, punishing the opposing Pokemon's inmunity to burns, we could learn from a mon like this that inmunities are not the only thing that matters for a Pokemon to be good, it also needs be able to hold itself when it will get hit outside of its inmunity, not being able to rely on its inmunity to protect it from the hit, and some rare interactions about how Pokemon who are normally inmune to a strategy would deal with not being inmune to that strategy anymore.

 

[lezzy cuttlefish]

Final Submission

Name: Benchwarmer

Description: This pokemon doesn't ever have to switch in to be a great teammate.

Justification: Prediction is one of the most important aspects of competitive pokemon, and it hinges around an awareness of what options your opponent has & how they're most likely to evaluate the information that they have about your team. It can be useful to think of that information as placing a series of constraints on your opponent's decisions; they're probably not going to risk U-turn when you've got zapdos sitting on the bench, for example; the chip damage is just not worth the chance of paralysis.

These kinds of decisions are all over a good game of pokemon (how many times have you found yourself thinking something like, "I'd love to do X - but if I do, this sweeper might get a chance to come in and set up on me!") and while some of this idea is encompassed by thought about checks & counters but there are a lot of ways to constrain your opponent's decision-space and we don't really have a great way to talk about this effect in the broader sense. So I think a CAP project concerning the extreme case could lead to some fascinating discussions.

Questions to be answered:
-Is this kind of pressure created primarily through opportunity (eg, chances to switch in) or threat (eg, what you could do once in) ?
-How does seeing a lategame pokemon in the team preview impact early-game strategy?
-What kinds of pokemon force more conservative or more risky play? Do they have anything in common?
-What game states make prediction easier or more difficult?
-When a "benchwarmer" pokemon forces a player to avoid some specific line, how can they mitigate their opponent's ability to capitalize on that?

Explanation: There are a few obvious ways for a pokemon on the bench to constrain the opponent. One way we see this effect happening naturally is the way that strong but frail wallbreakers and sweepers discourage very passive play - but there are some more interesting ones. Contact effects like static or rocky helmet or toxic debris are an obvious example, but you can also think about the way a defogger can force a hazard stacking team to make specific plays, or the way that coming in for free on an immunity can prevent certain moves from being picked to begin with.

 

[viol and bass]

Here are the concepts I currently like the most, for whatever that's worth.

No Shuckles Given: There are a number of vaguely similar abilities to this, but I like the simplicity of this one, the way it's presented and the broad set of options it gives us. It's not necessarily just "fat: the mon". We don't build mons like this very often so I think this would be a cool project.

Wind-up Solider: I think this concept has more possibilities than you might immediately think of. Pip asks good questions and is pretty smart about what sorts of team support we should go for and conversely which ones are unreliable or gimmicky. Care is certainly needed there, but I like that the process would give a lot of direction not just in creating the mon but also in teambuilding and playing with it.

Version 3.3: Mini-Uber was neat and this is too. I really appreciate that it begins very broad, but the point at which it becomes significantly narrower is only after a lot of discussion and community input. The vastness of the pool of mons we're choosing from is a little bit daunting though, and I'm not positive that opening it up to every single gen was the play. If somebody suggests gen 1 PU parasect, most of us are going to have no context for how that mon played or what trying to recreate that looks like. That's my only real qualm with the concept.

Schrödinger's CAP: Move-ability synergies are one of the coolest things in Pokemon and are always very fun to work with. My only concern is about properly balancing the abilities (and maybe also unpredictability when facing this thing if we do actually achieve balance). Explosion Badger broadened the wording to include changes of moveset so I'm no longer worried about a lack of options.

There are a number of other cool options that I would be pleased with as well. Happy to provide feedback if that's valuable to anyone.

 

[shnowshner]

Can't settle on a concept of my own, so I went ahead and looked through every concept, and gave them ratings on the following, out of 10:

1. Design Space (DS): How I gauge the available routes possible with this concept, and the possibility of exploring these options instead of pushing a select few. This is important for us to have an enjoyable and fulfilling process.
2. Sense of Direction (SD): How much the concept aligns users to a common goal, without being too broad to scatter thoughts and purpose, or too narrow and leaving very little room for flexibility. This gives us both room for creativity while also ensuring we have the capacity to steer the CAP in a direction where it works in the current metagame.
3. Ease of Access (EA): How achievable the concept is given the nature of CAP processes and the harsh reality of competitive play. Pretty straightforward.
4. End-Product Potential (EP): How a finished CAP might play, function, and adhere to the concept if achieved, as well as possessing a unique niche or set of traits that distinguishes it from competition. Arbitrary in some ways but relevant if we want something to be proud of after months of work.

Definitely subject to my own personal tastes, potentially uneven with how scores were given out, but hopefully my thoughts provides extra perspective for people to better iron out there concept or rethink their ideas.

Schrödinger's CAP

This is from last process and retains a lot of the intrigue I had for it before. The concept is extremely tight in scope: we need Abilities that influence how our Movepool would be utilized. This isn't necessarily just Abilities that directly interact with our moves: rather, whatever Ability we would choose would recontextualize what value a move is bringing to us. I do find that tying these two together railroads the concept more than we need to.

At its core, a concept where our CAP could fulfill different roles based on part of its set, but what set it is running on preview isn't clear, is less limiting on the process while still having the potential this one would bring. Ultimately it's a choice of "is the concept better when we have to follow it in a specific way" or "is the concept better when our only goal is to make a CAP that has two distinct sets which play differently because of a single move or ability change."

DS : 8/10 (there's a lot more to this then seems at first when you look past obvious examples)
SD : 6/10 (feels a tad more narrow than needed but should be workable
EA : 4/10 (trying to do more than one thing with a CAP is usually a tall order, and this is now mandatory)
EP : 9/10 (getting this right is likely to result in one of the most dynamic CAPs we've created)

The Pawn

This is the most elaborate and bold concept I've seen, perhaps the most ambitious ever proposed. Unfortunately, this doesn't make it too appealing in my eyes. There are a ton of hurdles we'd have to cross in order to even begin to understand how this should be tackled, and a lot of the goals outlined feel ethereal to approach and rather alienated from competitive Pokemon as a whole. I think parts of this concept work better when done individually instead of compounded together: instead of trying to recreate the Pawn in its entirety, focusing on a specific aspect of a Pawn keeps things more manageable while reducing the amount of mental gymnastics we'd need to even attempt this.

DS : 5/10 (i am struggling to think of what this even looks like, and that has me worried)
SD : 4/10 (it feels like there's very little wiggle room to work with if something falls a bit out of line)
EA : 1/10 (i genuinely do not see us managing to fulfill this concept ever, especially not with the rules we follow)
EP : 10/10 (godspeed)

Reconnaissance

So this is Kitsunoh's concept, though given that Kit has functioned more like a scuffed wall in recently years, I wouldn't mind a revisit. Gen 9 gives us plenty to scout with Tera, and even without it there's a lot Pokemon you want to get a feel for before you start making certain plays.

DS : 8/10 (there's a good amount of ways to do this though i see a couple choking out competition)
SD : 8/10 (a pokemon that scouts for information shouldn't be too hard to conceptualize)
EA : 7/10 (scouting alone doesn't feel super strong, so we'd really need to balance concept w/ actual power)
EP : 6/10 (this feels like space already occupied by a handful of mons, or just game knowledge alone)

Wind-up Soldier

I feel the amount of ways our teammates can support our ability to threaten the opponent rather limited: field conditions are the most common because they have the strongest effects or interactions, and I don't really care for any of these as we have plenty of abusers, and I envision many others not liking these routes or standing at odds over which is best. Beyond field conditions I don't see a lot of options remaining that are both viable and not better fulfilled elsewhere.

DS : 6/10 (there's certainly options at our disposal but not a lot of enticing ones)
SD : 7/10 (plenty of examples of this to work with, though i see things narrowing pretty hard after typing)
EA : 9/10 (this is absolutely doable if we elect for a path of low resistance)
EP : 7/10 (i find a lot of routes end up as matchup-fishy mons that's aren't interesting conceptually, but just optimize a facet of play over existing options)

Debuff Specialist

It's pretty easy to make a mon that boosts itself to threaten, so one that focuses more on making the opponent weaker to gain an advantage is more novel. There's a pretty large amount of "debuffs" in Pokemon that don't see a whole lot of use and exploring some of these would be cool, though often times the strongest options are the easiest and most effective and would push others away.

DS : 7/10 (the possibilities for debuffs are wide, but the ability to utilize some is dubious at best)
SD : 7/10 (there's not much complicated about this)
EA : 7/10 (unless we go with the safe options, things could flop pretty quickly)
EP : 6/10 (imagine garganacl with toxic or wisp)

Create-A-Parasite

I had been thinking about a mon like this, and a Pokemon that turns actions the opponent makes (usually because they want to win) and takes advantage of them is really cool. I really enjoy how many different avenues we can take, since the opponent has many different actions they can take, and thus we have some very distinct paths to take to accomplish this concept.

DS : 9/10 (gaining an advantage from what the opponent does has a vast selection of options to choose from)
SD : 8/10 (the broadness in choice is a tiny concern, but this remains rather concise in purpose)
EA : 7/10 (needing to rely on the opponent's play to achieve success is worrisome, but doable)
EP : 8/10 (there's not a whole lot doing this right now and even less doing so in a specific form)

Version 3.3

This isn't anything new to Concept Subs but still has a good amount of merit. A lot of cool Pokemon reside in the lower tiers due to lacking the power needed to secure a place in OU/CAP, and in turn means a lot of moves or abilities with potential waiting to be realized.

DS : 9/10 (how many pokemon are there in ru or below)
SD : 6/10 (how many pokemon are there in ru or below, also there's not a whole lot given towards what exactly we should do besides "make a better version of an existing mon that's not good)
EA : 7/10 (ultimately we need to accept that some pokemon are bad because their strategy is bad as well)
EP : 7/10 (we'd at least be unique for our metagame, but maybe not always super interesting)

Ability Neutralizer

This is woefully unfinished so it's hard to really give it a fair rating: still, a Pokemon with multiple strong Abilities where one doesn't grossly overshadow the other is tricky to pull off, especially when there's no real restriction on what we can choose. I find that exploring how a mon can use two or more Abilities is more interesting when our Abilities are less conducive to how we play, as it asks us to consider what exactly each one offers us on the macro scale. Dragapult is the prime example here and the concept would benefit immensely from considering it more heavily, as it's an offensive behemoth with three abilities that don't really bolster its power in a significant way, yet all have legitimate reason to be run.

DS : 7/10 (there's a lot of abilities to choose from, though some are way too good to be reasonable here)
SD : 4/10 (this is all over the place right now, since we can do anything from weaker abilities that offer aid in specific scenarios, to conkeldurr and its three different ways to hit like a truck. we're also not given any real motivation besides "use more than one ability")
EA : 3/10 (any cap that uses more than one ability is either not good and trying to find whatever niche it can, or equilibra where you just pick the funniest immunity for your team)
EP : 7/10 (this could either be pretty cool or super lame with the additional consideration of being too weak or strong)

The Weatherman

This is a much more narrow version of Wind-up Soldier which faces many of the same issues as that one does, but with the additional downside of restricting us fully to weather (and thus we either need a setter or the respective ability). Not going to rate this as it'd just have broadly lower scores of that one.

Strategy's Bane

So this feels super aimless, shutting down strategies as a whole gives no clear direction to what we want to do other than "stop the opponent from winning?" Which is what we want to do anyway?

DS : 8/10 (the amount of space here is cosmic in nature, perhaps too much for comfort)
SD : 2/10 (there's almost nothing to really kickstart discussion, nor an obvious prospect to work towards)
EA : 6/10 (i struggle to find a suitable answer here just because of how this is set up, but wanting to try and handle multiple strategies at once sounds tough)
EP : 5/10 (this sounds annoying at best and overcentralizing at worst)

The Spore You Know

I'm gonna say it no matter what people may think of me afterwards: this is a prime time to explore a Spore user. Between existing Grass-types, the ability to tech with Tera, and mons like Gholdengo and Garganacl that simply ignore the move entirely, there's no shortage of options to deny Spore room. Sleep remains controversial and this won't fix that, but getting a better understanding of how Spore works and how it can be utilized and played against sounds fine to me.

DS : 5/10 (we have to use spore, but how do we use spore?)
SD : 8/10 (the benefit of not just doing sleep moves makes things easier to approach during the process)
EA : 7/10 (similar to above, since we can't debate what form of sleep we use. main struggles would be how do we "use spore to the best of its ability" and how that relates to C&C)
EP : 7/10 (sleep sucks to fight but if we're smart we make it work, plus it's a way to shut down stuff in a metagame where type matchups are less reliable)

Very Fast Immovable Object

This is super targeted but still treads new ground in CAP and sorta in general. Defensive Pokemon are traditionally seen as slow, but Speed is a genuinely useful stat to have for defensive play: it's just that most defensive Pokemon allocate all their stats to defenses and an attacking stat instead of Speed since Gamefreak doesn't like going above certain BST thresholds. The ones that do fit this mold are either banned or fall flat for other reasons.

DS : 5/10 (we have to make a wall and it has to be fast. not much room there for diversity in stats, role, or even typing)
SD : 9/10 (this gives us a direct goal to works towards but still leaves the doors open for us to broaden the scope of the wall we make)
EA : 7/10 (this is a rare archetype to make and draw examples from, as well as needing strong synergy between typing and stats to succeed)
EP : 8/10 (a fast wall is a cool subversion of pokemon stereotypes and certainly has room in the metagame)

Mage Killer

Others have said this and I will echo them: this concept is good but defines more than it has to. A Pokemon whose best offensive trait is its ability to eat hits is interesting on its own, and doesn't need bogged down with specifics. Too much feels said here as if you have a particular Pokemon in mind already, and those kinds of concepts tend to be unpopular or short-sighted.

DS : 4/10 (some parts of this are good, but the necessity to be a spdef tank and lack team support holds this back severely)
SD : 7/10 (tanks are cool and have a lot of ways to be synthesized)
EA : 7/10 (definitely doable, though there's a good amount of competition)
EP : 7/10 (a bit of the above, we should be fun to use but not really the most unique thing out there)

Create-A-Pivot

I don't really see how we can be a "pure" pivot. What makes a pivot good is the fact that they have some sort of presence the opponent has to respect. Offensive pivots force the opponent out else they take too much damage, while a Defensive pivot either prevents an active Pokemon from accomplishing anything significant or simply has the bulk to get its pivoting job done with ease. The concept feels at odds with itself and that's not a good sign. Also, way too much is stated directly in the post towards what you want this to be. CAP isn't a pet project and treating it as such makes you look bad and would leave you disappointed when the end result doesn't happen. I'm not rating this because it largely just falls flat as a concept.

Mixed Attacker

Yeah. Mixed Attackers are a dying breed as metagames become more specialized and the changing ways Pokemon are designed. Forcing ourselves to do this instead of just suggesting has merit, but I'm still not convinced that this is terribly engaging.

DS : 7/10 (there's a lot of ways to go about being mixed, but it feels super constraining on stats)
SD : 7/10 (we all know what a mixed attacker would do, the question is how)
EA : 5/10 (i feel we'd have to make a lot of amends to achieve this, which comes off wrong. imho valiant only goes mixed because it lacks the options to commit to one side entirely)
EP : 8/10 (it'd probably be fine and have some fun interactions with the metagame)

The Terraformer

Another concept that is just a narrower version of Wind-up Soldier, with again many of the same pitfalls. Not repeating myself further and not giving a rate as with Weatherman.

Wounded Warrior

There's a decent amount to work with here and given the general goal of Pokemon is to not get KO'd, a Pokemon that frequently flirts with death has me quite interested. Part of me feels this would be a better concept if expanded to "This Pokemon is most useful after having received damage," as it opens the door to more than just being at lower HP amounts. Still, the groundwork here is quite solid.

DS : 7/10 (there are options available here, but not a whole lot. it at least covers a spectrum of our set)
SD : 8/10 (we know we want to be at low HP, and there's some clear ways to get us there or take advantage of this situation)
EA : 7/10 (there's a couple factors that make being at low health dangerous given the great speed of gen 9 cap)
EP : 9/10 (sounds absolutely thrilling to play with and watch if done correctly)

Training Dummy

This is quite intriguing. CAP is not the kind of place I would expect players to look for a tutorial on competitive basics, but a mon like this that helps players better understand how they can forge a path to victory sounds like it'd be engaging process to partake in. I'm not sure how applicable it is to CAP overall, yet I do like it in a sitewide metaconceptual way.

DS : 6/10 (it's hard to pinpoint what exactly this entails at the moment)
SD : 4/10 (there's not really any tangible goal to work towards here, regarding what this cap does in the metagame)
EA : 5/10 (a beginner-friendly mon is often at odds with a highly competitive one. would take a lot of work)
EP : 10/10 (this is the ideal CAP creation were it to happen)

Game of Inches

And it's back! All we need is Bulletproof Glass to return and this will meet all the requirements of a CAP Concept Submissions stage. Anyway, I've always had a soft spot for this one as the amount of tools given to Pokemon towards wearing the opponent down or keeping oneself healthy is quite wide for the rather small pool actually used. A bit of overlap with Debuff Specialist, but not enough to be problematic for either.

DS : 7/10 (we can focus on dishing our damage, regaining health, or both, which helps a lot)
SD : 8/10 (a pokemon that aims for the long game is understood here, and has various ways to function)
EA : 8/10 (some very good mons do this already and we shouldn't be hard pressed to follow their lead)
EP : 7/10 (i see a strong cap that is definitely more fun to watch die than it is getting it to that point)

Position is Key

My issue here is that a mon which excels in one stage of the game but isn't good during the others will end up pretty linear in how it's best used. That said, exploring a mon that is exclusively good in the early stage and isn't just a better Screens setter than the competition has potential.

DS : 7/10 (having just one strong point during a game sorta limits what exactly we can accomplish)
SD : 8/10 (early-, mid-, and late-game are easy to identify for the most part, and many examples exist which show how mons operate here)
EA : 6/10 (balancing being good at a certain game state without being too strong on the others is tough to coordinate)
EP : 6/10 (this feels like an "ho flavor of the month" kind of mon and i don't vibe with it)

Timeless

This is asking a lot of us without a clear way to determine if our product is truly "timeless" in nature. The only CAP that remotely feels this way would be Fidgit, and that's solely because it has a custom Ability that gives it a wholly unique niche among every existing Pokemon—and there's no stopping GameFreak from changing this situation in the future. The examples used in Arghonaut and Krilowatt as succeeding for many generations don't consider how these mons have been significantly buffed over time; is this something we'd have to account for as well? Ultimately making a CAP whose traits are made to give it a lasting presence in the metagame is interesting, but a huge gamble.

DS : 7/10 (there's a lot of ways we could establish a unique niche, but it may as well be impossible to secure it)
SD : 6/10 (very broad scope that would surely leave people vying over what form of timelessness has the greatest potential)
EA : 4/10 (the mon we make could be rendered obsolete in an instant if pokemon feels like it, not to mention the trouble we'd find in even figuring out how to get to that point)
EP : 7/10 (this ends up like hazehawk doesn't it)

Parry and Riposte

I like CAP concepts that carry a high skill ceiling with using it, and this sounds right up that alley. Punishing the opponent for making a certain play is what separates the good players from the great ones, and is something one has to develop over time either through intuition or sheer mental mapping and gamesense.

DS : 9/10 (there's plenty of actions the opponent can make, and thus plenty to respond with)
SD : 7/10 (i can see a decent amount of debating over what exactly we should use, and if certain options are too braindead to really count as "parry and riposte")
EA : 6/10 (a pokemon like this that hinges on more advanced play will inevitably have some process hurdles to overcome)
EP : 8/10 (this concept feels quite apt for the metagame right now with the myriad of safe options at our disposal)

One-Trick Pony

I'm a bit down on a stats-based concept after just doing one, especially when this is largely just the inverse of what we did with Hemogoblin. Unfortunately I am biased and think Pokemon that have one really stupid stat are cool and most of them have annoying design issues so getting to do this ourselves sounds fun.

DS : 7?/10 (there's only six stats, and HP probably ain't it chief unless you want krilowatt 2)
SD : 7/10 (we probably need to establish which stat is highest early on, otherwise things could get hairy)
EA : 9/10 (plenty of good pokemon now and then have an exceptional stat, and we're not forced to leave our other stats low, just noticeably lower than one of them)
EP : 7/10 (should be a fine addition, could see attack/special attack variants missing the mark a bit)

No Shuckles Given

This is the second "fuck it we wall" concept posted and is made directly to oppose the common CAP trend of "be offensively threatening in some form even if you aren't an attacker." Forcing us out of this comfort zone is enticing as we've never truly explored a CAP that isn't out to deal damage.

DS : 6/10 (our attack and special attack should never matter, and that greatly limits what this CAP does)
SD : 9/10 (without the ability to lean on attacks, we'd have nothing left but to focus on other means of providing value)
EA : 8/10 (there's a good amount of examples to look at between defensive mons, hazard/team support users, and unusual setup mons)
EP : 7/10 (we make usum pyukumuku with base 106 HP in at least 25% of cases)

Catch-22

This has some similarities to existing submissions, but still has plenty going on for it. A lot of strong teams tend to employ these very tactics in order to break down the opposition, as you either let the mon on the field click for free, or punish it and leave yourself vulnerable for whatever comes next. Alternatively, this would explore options where the opponent's best action irreversibly harms it in some way: all the adverse contact effects like Rocky Helmet, Iron Barbs, and Static are the most familiar here, but there's surely more ways to punish the opponent's actions or force them to take a risk.

DS : 7/10 (i think we may want to default to the better, more common examples, but we don't have to)
SD : 8/10 (we know we want to force the opponent into awkward situations, and there's a good selection of methods available to examine)
EA : 8/10 (i don't see any major hiccups and mons that can swing advantage like this tend to be useful)
EP : 7/10 (the score here somewhat depends on how much you like facing down static zapdos or random red card users. guess my opinion)

Optimised Item User

I am very pleased to see this isn't "Optimized (Underused) Item User," as many underused items are that way for a reason. Some very good items, however, are just very specific in their use cases, and perhaps a couple items just need the right user to work effectively. There's a couple more boring options but even among the "Good Items" list are a couple noteworthy choices.

DS : 8/10 (we can stick with familiar options and flesh out their potential, or take one by the wayside and breathe new life into it)
SD : 8/10 (the focus here is the item slot, and there's a lot of ways to make that slot very powerful. only the most situational items lack examples, so there's a lot to draw inspiration from)
EA : 7/10 (things could get dicey if we decide to get a bit too creative with our item choice)
EP : 7/10 (this lets me recreate Blunder Policy Melmetal which is good for exactly nobody else)

Apex Predator/Pseudo Trapper

This one is extremely unfinished and it's unfair to rate as a result. "Trapping" the foe in the manner I'm grasping from what's given feels quite similar to what Catch-22 is going for, but perhaps there's some more nuanced ways to get this effect?

A Blessing From the Heavens

-,.
Listen, I'm all for getting this move out of yalls systems, and I must admit for a move that generated immense hype, it's definitely been on the backburner for much of the generation as far as we're concerned.

DS : 4/10 (we gotta build around revival blessing, and that likely means a lot of options are off the table if that move ever wants used)
SD : 7/10 (could be some funky discussion on what "optimal" is but i don't think it'd be too bad)
EA : 7/10 (move isn't hard to use and we only need to worry about it for like a single turn)
EP : 6/10 (this gets a lower score just off the fact that revival blessing has seen limited play, and thus we don't know with certainty if the move is too strong to handle, or just not worth the effort)

Critical Receiver

As-is, this has an alarmingly low amount of potential for a process. I genuinely cannot think of what situations you want to be crit outside of Anger Point, or some weird, overtly complex situation where we get knocked into like Blaze range by a crit? Also why are Doubles mentioned in the questions, that's never a consideration for CAP due our focus on Smogon Singles.

I think this works better if expanded from critical hits to any sort of "hax" in general, of which there is a lot. Alternatively, keep the crits angle, but 180 as a mon that uses critical hits to its advantage in some way.

DS : 2/10 (very little to work with as far as benefitting from crits more than non-crits)
SD : 3/10 (incredibly narrow scope that leaves us with only a few routes available)
EA : 3/10 (this mon gets to +6 and then is walled by unawares)
EP : 2/10 (actualization comes only by random chance unless more 100% crit moves enter the field)

Turn Killer

So, we want a CAP that doesn't need its typing to deny the opponent their turn? I like the approach of "soft-checking" various threats simply by being an answer to one of their options, especially for moves that are usually low-risk high-reward. I do want to see this fleshed out more when you have time but the fundamental idea is pretty solid.

DS : 8/10 (we look at commonly used moves that we can exploit the usage of, which is two things to explore)
SD : 7/10 (some moves might find themselves hyper-fixated on, or we just give this an immunity ability)
EA : 8/10 (this feels reasonable to due for a variety of high-profile targets, and if done well could add a lot to the metagame)
EP : 7/10 (could end up being more of a "solve the meta" type mon than we'd like)

New Toy Syndrome

Pretty much a broader version of the Revival Blessing concept, in that both it's seeking to utilize a new move that may have been shut out in favor of stronger options (looking at you Espathra), and also because the odds of us doing Revival Blessing with this one are higher than I wish they were.

DS : 8/10 (some stuff may dominate discussion, but i could see a lot of diversity even among those)
SD : 8/10 (should go smoothly once we lock in our move or ability)
EA : 7/10 (any of the less explosive options have a bit of uncertainty about them)
EP : 7/10 (i give a lot more favor to the options that are more nuanced versus obviously strong moves that simply lack a user due to them being banned, and the former isn't guaranteed to happen)

Unexplored Potential

Taking something commonly understood and working with it under a new light holds promise. There's a good amount of interactions within Pokemon that end up largely overshadowed by more direct options. We have to concede that these lesser-used aspects of certain mechanics or elements in Pokemon might be that way for a reason, but I can't dismiss the potential here.

DS : 7/10 (perhaps there's a lot of obscured effects to take advantage of, but i struggle to come up with many)
SD : 7/10 (can see this getting a bit tricky, or just having a small pool of options to play with)
EA : 6/10 (need a lot of careful planning to let the weaker aspects outshine the stronger ones)
EP : 8/10 (cool and unique mons are often a fine addition to the metagame)

Burn Your Boats

Another concept around one particular move. No Retreat hasn't seen much success in standard play, but some may know of the move's true potential (and associated jank). It's awfully limited, but has a decent amount of discussion towards overcoming the many hurdles which arise when trying to make this work.

DS : 3/10 (the need for no retreat limits not only movepool, but also our role, and potentially typing + stats)
SD : 8/10 (an omniboost that traps you in has a surprising amount of ways to be played with and routes towards success)
EA : 6/10 (there's a lot that makes no retreat difficult, but there's enough ways to get around those issues: the bigger picture is, should we?)
EP : 7/10 (a no retreat user could have a surprising amount of depth in how they play, given a specific moveset, though it could just end up as another one-and-done sweeper like we've seen before)

A Rising Star

So from what I understand, this is essentially looking at strategies that have seen increased success, and attempting to keep that momentum going? Honestly, kinda neat! There's inherent risk involved since we could just be chasing after the wind here, but putting focus on strategies that have seen an uptick in relevance now compared to prior gens is something I like the sound of at least in theory.

DS : 7/10 (i worry about how much is available that compliments the concept here)
SD : 7/10 (a bit of the above again: bit hard to pin down given how certain options could have different needs)
EA : 7/10 (we need to correctly identify what a strategy or specific tool needs in order to function)
EP : 6/10 (could very easily flop if the strategy we choose suddenly falls apart, also if you guys leave me unchecked this will end up a quick claw user)

One-hit-wonder

We tend to struggle with movepool bloat and throwing out a ton of options to see what works and what can be retracted. Going the way of having a small but concise movepool certainly breaks away from this trend, but rather inorganically. I also don't know what knowledge we gain from having a small movepool versus having a singular good set, but perhaps that's the point?

DS : ??/10 (honestly not sure about this one, since the only stipulation is we have a small set of moves)
SD : 5/10 (feels a tad aimless, but perhaps certain routes will give us the direction we need)
EA : 8/10 (we tend to do this anyway given 1.0 movepools, just need to be more stingy here)
EP : 7/10 (i think a mon with a tiny movepool could have some interesting strategy, or at least be easy to play against)

Bulky Gravity user

Why does it need to be bulky? Just looking at Gravity alone, or other field effects that aren't used nearly as much, is enough to warrant discussion. Outside of this, Gravity has been something I've wanted to see used successfully more often, as the forced grounding and decreased evasion on all side has a lot of potential synergies.

DS : 2/10 (we both need to utilize gravity, and apparently have bulk to us. very limiting)
SD : 5/10 (narrow concept but at least we have a decent amount of ways to explore gravity on its own)
EA : 6/10 (some pokemon have set gravity for themselves before, and cap is fortunate to have a workable setter thanks to the funny spider guy)
EP : 6/10 (pretty high variability with this, and could also be rather polarizing, adding another thing to the threatlist you want to cover for)

Workaround

OK we just embrace immunities as part of the process this time. This is a bit broad as having both immunities of our own on top of wanting to bypass the immunities of the opponent is a lot to keep track of. Maybe this is the sort of concept where overcoming this challenge is the main reward, but it's still off-putting to me.

DS : 7/10 (good amount of immunities we can use, along with some tools to get around the opponent's)
SD : 5/10 (feels rather narrow in direction, given we have to do both instead of having the option to follow only one, and needing that immunity to perform a role is a bit obtuse i feel?)
EA : 8/10 (oh we're super familiar with immunities alright, not only that but these are strong)
EP : 7/10 (if successful, would make a for a good anti-meta mon IMO, could just be annoying however)

Benchwarmer

God, this feels really hard to approach, but I can't deny that I love the idea. A CAP whose built around the idea of seeing it in preview and already needing to plan ahead for whatever it might do is a very off-the-grid concept. I don't really know where to begin with this, which is a problem on its own. Being vague in the description is both a blessing and a curse here, as the goal isn't that we don't switch in, but that we are problematic before we've even done so, right? A couple examples of mons that accomplish this would help better illustrate what's going on here.

DS : 8/10 (fairly uncharted territory to discover, and a lot of different ways to be a threat prior to touching the field)
SD : 6/10 (could see a good deal of arguing here since nothing is really stated outside of "we don't need to come in to help the team")
EA : 7/10 (once we work out a plan, i feel things would go alright towards achieving the concept, and having it work real-time)
EP : 7/10 (successfully fulfilling the concept might result in a mon that has a lot of annoying 50/50 situations that aren't fun to deal with)

Could just be my most long-winded post yet. Thanks to my sponsor ulrichschnaussmusic for providing the empty recesses of my brain with ambient musical content as I wrote this, and Mojang for their questionable game design causing me to idle for hours just to get a single Turtle Shell and compelling me to do something productive while I wait.

spoo include this post when you nom me for cap contributor in february 2024 after johning for 6 months