Metagame Workshop

[SadisticMystic]

More so than revenge chip damage, the point of Fake Out/U-turn is that if you have two of them on your team, and your opponent can't block priority (Dazzling)/flinching (Inner Focus)/the move itself (Protect), you just keep wailing away with impunity turn after turn, with shades of the old Linked metagame except here the priority boost is actually real. Persian and Ambipom are the fastest available users of that combo; Mienfoo and Mienshao are the only two that can have Regenerator, and also the only two that can have Inner Focus, either of which potentially have merits when you get into a mirror match.

Other questions:
-If you have Ambipom @ U-turn and click Beat Up, does the move forcefully end after the first hit, or do you actually get to switch six times in one turn (which is terrible with hazards up, but otherwise gives you a chance to pull stuff like Intimidate spam)?
-Are move-items given the same "unremovable" treatment as Z-crystals and mega stones, for the purposes of moves like Knock Off/Trick/Fling?
-Do move-items have to comply with set legality as though they were a fifth move (e.g. Raichu @ Extreme Speed using Fake Out, a combo that can't normally coexist, to beat Protect on account of priority alone)?
-If Hawlucha @ Flying Press used Fire Punch on a Parasect or Leavanny, is that supposed to result in a 16x type multiplier?
-Aron @ Endeavor uses some move. Does the move damage come before or after the HP-setting?

Also another moveset:

Dugtrio @ Mud-Slap
Ability: Arena Trap
Jolly Nature
EVs: 252 Atk/252 Spe/yeah it's a Dugtrio
Beat Up
Earthquake
Rock Slide
Filler

Trap the opponent and Beat Up to get them to -6 accuracy all at once, then do whatever a Dugtrio does. Pretty risky, but sure.

 

[Pipotchi]

Tuthur1 good sets- although pursuit cant be an itemized move :T i like the nidoking one a lot.

More so than revenge chip damage, the point of Fake Out/U-turn is that if you have two of them on your team, and your opponent can't block priority (Dazzling)/flinching (Inner Focus)/the move itself (Protect), you just keep wailing away with impunity turn after turn, with shades of the old Linked metagame except here the priority boost is actually real. Persian and Ambipom are the fastest available users of that combo; Mienfoo and Mienshao are the only two that can have Regenerator, and also the only two that can have Inner Focus, either of which potentially have merits when you get into a mirror match.?

Ah- i missed that interaction. well yea honestly fake out is totally deserving to be on the banlist. even though it can be countered, it doesnt make for a good metagame.

Other questions:
-If you have Ambipom @ U-turn and click Beat Up, does the move forcefully end after the first hit, or do you actually get to switch six times in one turn (which is terrible with hazards up, but otherwise gives you a chance to pull stuff like Intimidate spam)?
-Are move-items given the same "unremovable" treatment as Z-crystals and mega stones, for the purposes of moves like Knock Off/Trick/Fling?
-Do move-items have to comply with set legality as though they were a fifth move (e.g. Raichu @ Extreme Speed using Fake Out, a combo that can't normally coexist, to beat Protect on account of priority alone)?
-If Hawlucha @ Flying Press used Fire Punch on a Parasect or Leavanny, is that supposed to result in a 16x type multiplier?
-Aron @ Endeavor uses some move. Does the move damage come before or after the HP-setting?

Ambipom + Beat Up: Since eat hit of Beat Up would trigger something like Rocky Helmet I assume these attacks are all separate. So U-turn or whatever would trigger after each hit- cancelling the atk after the first turn. Beat Up should be included with the multi-hit ban moves, I missed it.

Move items are unremovable.

Move items dont have to comply with legality.

Hawlucha flying press: yes

Regarding the order of effects: The damage of the attack always comes first, followed by any primary/secondary effects. Whether the effects of the original move or the itemized move come first, I dont mind. If it was Endeavor + Iron Head, Iron Head would always hit for 80BP followed by either flinch chance/endeavor, or endeavor/flinch chance.

I dont know how I feel about Endeavor as a legal itemized move.

 

[SadisticMystic]

You have stuff like Zap Cannon and Dynamic Punch banned from the item slot, but their functions can be replicated by Nuzzle and Chatter (albeit with more limited distribution), and in fact doing it the other way around--using something like @ Swift or @ Shock Wave to give almost anything a makeshift No Guard--is probably more dangerous since then those moves can be in the actual move slots and hit for their full power.

Is it possible to use @ Fury Cutter with a move like Super Fang so that the second hit and beyond starts dealing 100% of the remaining HP?

It would never see serious use, but something like Smeargle @ Water Pledge, using Fire Pledge and Grass Pledge...how does that work? Likewise for Fusion Bolt/Fusion Flare. In both cases Smeargle is the only legal user, so it's not a serious threat to do much damage, but just the idea.

Conkeldurr @ Circle Throw, using Focus Punch: Supposedly the "focusing up" message has priority 6, so would Circle Throw drag that down to 0 (and presumably after the opponent has moved, since Conkeldurr is so slow) such that opponent hits before there's even a focus that can be broken, then everything about Focus Punch goes off unhindered and as usual (other than the fact that it hits at -9 priority and also forces a switch)?

About "status moves don't inherit anything", does that mean I could run a set like Komala @ Sucker Punch with Return/Sleep Talk/2 empty slots, and use Return as priority, or else Sleep Talk (without getting the Sucker Punch effect stapled to it) if the opponent had a priority blocker or I expected them to do something other than use a damaging move? (Triage Comfey @ Draining Kiss could do something similar, but it's more awkward there since that actually has to use Rest before it can Sleep Talk.)

 

[Pipotchi]

You have stuff like Zap Cannon and Dynamic Punch banned from the item slot, but their functions can be replicated by Nuzzle and Chatter (albeit with more limited distribution), and in fact doing it the other way around--using something like @ Swift or @ Shock Wave to give almost anything a makeshift No Guard--is probably more dangerous since then those moves can be in the actual move slots and hit for their full power.

Is it possible to use @ Fury Cutter with a move like Super Fang so that the second hit and beyond starts dealing 100% of the remaining HP?

It would never see serious use, but something like Smeargle @ Water Pledge, using Fire Pledge and Grass Pledge...how does that work? Likewise for Fusion Bolt/Fusion Flare. In both cases Smeargle is the only legal user, so it's not a serious threat to do much damage, but just the idea.

Conkeldurr @ Circle Throw, using Focus Punch: Supposedly the "focusing up" message has priority 6, so would Circle Throw drag that down to 0 (and presumably after the opponent has moved, since Conkeldurr is so slow) such that opponent hits before there's even a focus that can be broken, then everything about Focus Punch goes off unhindered and as usual (other than the fact that it hits at -9 priority and also forces a switch)?

About "status moves don't inherit anything", does that mean I could run a set like Komala @ Sucker Punch with Return/Sleep Talk/2 empty slots, and use Return as priority, or else Sleep Talk (without getting the Sucker Punch effect stapled to it) if the opponent had a priority blocker or I expected them to do something other than use a damaging move? (Triage Comfey @ Draining Kiss could do something similar, but it's more awkward there since that actually has to use Rest before it can Sleep Talk.)

okay so

chatter and nuzzle are super limited distribution and mostly granted by garbage mons so im fine with this

swift and shock wave would not grant their accuracy component when used in the first slot since like i said before it would be on-hit effects and move order that are granted, and an accuracy check occurs before hitting anything

depending on which pledge effect occurs first, it would create a field effect. but this is probably not worth the consideration

conkeldurr: i dont know whether the message would occur at +6, +0 or -9 but im fine with just banning overcomplicated moves that dont make sense and this is one of those situations

sleep talk: yes you could use sleep talk in that fashion to use a move without inheriting anything from the itemized attack

 

[GrubbinTheGreat]

Do the item effects stack with move effects? Like, if a Porygon-Z @ Tri Attack used Ice Beam, is that a 6.67% burn, 6.67% paralyze, and 16.67% freeze? Or 7.32% freeze?

 

[Pipotchi]

it would stack multiplicatively rather than additively, so it would do a check for a tri-attack freeze and then do a check for an ice beam freeze if the tri-attack freeze misses which i believe turns out to be 16.003%

 

[Martin]

I have two meta ideas that I wanna gauge interest for:

Move Evolution or Move Training

Metagame inspired by the evolution system in Inazuma Eleven.

Mechanics: Attacking moves evolve as their PP gets used up throughout a match.

Evolution system:

Rules: Standard OU bans and clauses

Questions to answer:

• How would both offensive and defensive teams be able to hold up if moves got stronger as their PP gets expended?
• How much would Choice Scarf users and sweepers benefit from this change?

Eternal Bonds (name subject to change)

Metagame inspired by Battle Bond

Mechanics: Every Pokemon has the option to replace their regular ability with a slightly modified version of Battle Bond; if a Pokemon with Battle Bond gets a kill, they get a permanent boost to their three highest base stats (excluding HP) as follows:

• Highest: +10
• Second highest: +50
• Third highest: +50

In the case of ties, the following stat priority is used:

1. Attack
2. Defense
3. Special Attack
4. Special Defense
5. Speed

Rules:

• Standard OU bans and clauses
• Slaking, Regigias, and Archeops are banned
• Limit of one or two Battle Bond users per team? Or would people prefer to play without limits?

Questions to answer:

• Would everything having the potential to be battle bonded be too much for the OU metagame to handle?
• Which Pokemon value their ability little enough to sacrifice their normal ability for Battle Bond? And vice versa?

 

[SadisticMystic]

Move Evolution or Move Training

Metagame inspired by the evolution system in Inazuma Eleven.

Mechanics: Attacking moves evolve as their PP gets used up throughout a match.

Evolution system:
View attachment 80135
Rules: Standard OU bans and clauses

Questions to answer:

• How would both offensive and defensive teams be able to hold up if moves got stronger as their PP gets expended?
• How much would Choice Scarf users and sweepers benefit from this change?

This seems like the kind of metagame that would prefer to exist in an environment where players can optionally decline to use PP Ups, something that isn't currently available in the sim. If a Ditto transforms into you and you have a 5 PP move, you're both starting on equal ground, but if your version of the move is forced to start at 8 PP, then the Ditto starts at 5/8 so they get a 10-power head start, which will increase to 20 on the second use, while your second use is still unboosted. Anything 15 or higher means Ditto always starts with max level no matter if you're PP-Upped or not, but at least on 10 PP, you can give them one turn where they only get the +20 boost if you go without.

Also, something like King's Rock Beat Up could be a serious threat if the level-up mechanic works that way.

 

[Martin]

This seems like the kind of metagame that would prefer to exist in an environment where players can optionally decline to use PP Ups, something that isn't currently available in the sim. If a Ditto transforms into you and you have a 5 PP move, you're both starting on equal ground, but if your version of the move is forced to start at 8 PP, then the Ditto starts at 5/8 so they get a 10-power head start, which will increase to 20 on the second use, while your second use is still unboosted. Anything 15 or higher means Ditto always starts with max level no matter if you're PP-Upped or not, but at least on 10 PP, you can give them one turn where they only get the +20 boost if you go without.

Also, something like King's Rock Beat Up could be a serious threat if the level-up mechanic works that way.

I'd prefer to keep to max PP ups personally; I want moves to always start before evolution whilst enabling all moves to level up to True status, and in order for that to happen they all need to have at least 7 PP (you can't subtract 6 from 5) and because there are no drawbacks to having maximum PP. I think you might have misinterpreted what my chart shows; it is indicating a subtraction: not a PP range. So True would be be the maximum PP minus 6 (e.g. EQ (16 PP) would attain have evolved into True Earthquake by the time it hits 10 PP).

 

[SadisticMystic]

There most certainly is a drawback to having maximum PP here: if the opponent transforms into you, your movelist starts at "<max> out of <max>", but their version of the movelist starts at "5 out of <max>". As this isn't a double battle metagame, hence doesn't allow tricks like Spiting your teammate or using a global spread move to hit a teammate with Pressure, Ditto becomes the only reliable way to manipulate your own PP totals below maximum in a timely manner. Likewise allowing your opponent to do that, transforming into you while your maximum PP is high enough that they're using the "True" versions of moves right away, is a huge drawback. Sure, being able to say that you really do want your move to have only 5 PP (instead of 8) comes with the opportunity cost that you will never be able to unlock its "true" form, but it's also the only way to prevent your imposter from starting out more powerful than you with that very same move.

 

[Yxalitis]

I was thinking that one of the most annoying aspects of pokemon battles is the luck factor.
This has nothing whatsoever to do with skill, team selection, strategy, etc.
A close game can be won or lost because of luck.
Some examples (You all have stories like this to tell!)

90% attacks that miss twice in a row.
Being frozen by Ice Beam, and staying frozen for 8 turns!
Crits that happen when your enemy is on 5% health, so wasted.
Toxic...missing...Aaaugh!

Luck is why OHKO moves are banned!
Swagger was removed for much the same reason...simply too much luck at play.
So why stop there!

So how about a:
No Luck mod.
Basically an attempt to eliminate luck as much as possible from the game.

Now if you think to yourself: "I have no problem with the element of chance in pokemon battles", well, good for you, there are dozens of formats for you to play in.
But if you want to see how the game plays with little to no luck, then why not allow that option?
It is also useful for testing balance issues.

Obviously we can't be 100% successful at eliminating ALL chance, this isn't chess after all.
Also, some luck aspects should remain:

The damage a move deals should still vary as it does now (minus crits) to give some variance and flavour.

"Luckily" predicting the switch in and hitting for effective damage are obviously important parts of the game and arguably a skill based on experience.


But other that that, what can we do to reduce/eliminate luck as much as possible:
(I'm not suggesting the following are exactly what should happen, but merely examples to be used to discuss how to create the meta.)

STATUS
Before we can deal with damaging moves, we need to look at status moves...because frankly they are a mess!
We have....oh, so many states a pokemon can be in.
States are important, we can't simply eliminate them, or we'd have a very dry game.

So let's split them into three categories:
Permanent, unless cured, a pokemon with these statuses will keep them until it is KO'ed:
Paralysis
Burned
Poison
Toxic

Temporary, these statuses will automatically be cured after time:
Sleep
Confusion
Frozen

Battle: The effects last until the pokemon faints, or is switched out:
Leech

The "Sleep clause" exists because there are several moves that cause sleep, and apart from very rare cases, is a totally debilitating status.
But what if by chance you freeze 3 opponents? Rare, but it can (and does) happen.

Of these 4, only frozen cannot be caused directly by a status move. It is ONLY caused by a low-chance from a damaging move.
So, all status moves are now 100% accurate, no more 90% toxic misses.
As there is no move that can freeze directly, or with a higher chance than 10% (that I could find), meaning it is purely a "lucky" status to inflict.

Duration

Paralysis slows the pokemon, but also has a 25% to cause that pokemon ot not move at all.
Sleeping pokemon will wake up, again by chance.
Frozen pokemon have a chance to defrost every turn.

DAMAGING MOVES:
There are hundreds of damaging moves in Pokemon, some are as inaccurate as 50%! 70% or 80% are very common. There are even ones that are 95% accurate...How infuriating for this move to miss!
Yes, this does add "flavour" to combat, but in this mod, we can try and give moves other ways to be differentiated.

"Normal" moves.
These are moves that inflict damage and have either no, or less than 10% chance at a side effect.
Thunderbolt, flamethrower, ice beam etc etc.

All these moves are balanced to be 100% accurate.

The "Base" moves to consider are 15pp, 100% accurate 100 damage.
If the move varies widely from that, ask the question: "Why"
Why is heat wave 90% accurate? Why would a pokemon who can learn flamethrower take this nove instead? There is no reason, the only pokemon who run with this attack are those that have no decent options...like Zapdos.
Let's just jump the accuracy to 100, and drop the damage to 85.
It already has a reduced pp of 10 from Flamethrower's 15.

So, higher damage moves may have lower pp, to compensate for the accuracy bump.

What about "weather moves"
Exceptions to moves that are affected by weather:
Hydro Pump, Blizzard, and Thunder. (Any others I might be missing?)
Instead of becoming less accurate, Thunder, Blizzard, and Hydro pump instead decrease in damage without their associated weather.
Thunder:
In rain: 100% accurate, 110 damage always paralyses
Outside of rain 100% accurate, 70 damage, no paralysis.
Blizzard:
In Hail: 100% accurate

CRITICAL HITS
Extra damage from critical hits is wrapped up into the overall damage the move causes, effectively boosting all damage for all moves across the board.
This would be based on a the % chance of a crit occurring for each event (Base chance, "higher chance", focus energy etc) multiplied by the boost in damage.
Moves that have or cause a higher crit chance are therefore boosted more.
So for example let's say a move has base damage of 100, and a 10% chance of this being critical, to cause 50% more damage.
If the pokemon uses Focus Energy, this base damage is simply increased to 110 (I know that's not the exact maths, this is an illustration only).
Every hit does 100 base damage and a critical bonus of 5%, for total damage of 105
The Abilities Battle Armor and Shell Armor and the effect of Lucky Chant will remove the extra 5%
All moves that can crit, crit all the time, but only for the average damage based on the chance to crit multiplied by that boosted amount.

SIDE EFFECTS:
Wow, the biggy...what to do about side effects.

Let's use Freeze Shock as an example:
It has a 90% chance to hit, but at base 140 damage, that miss is gonna suck!
then it has a 30% chance to paralyse the target.
Paralysis is a reduction in speed, and a 25% chance of not moving at all.
So using Freeze Shock could:
Miss altogether
Hit but only do damage
Hit and paralyse
Hit with critical damage only
Hit with critical damage and paralyse
afterwards:
The opponent may move
The opponent may not move

That's an awful lot of possible outcomes for one move!
It may seem harsh, but removing side effects seems the only possible choice to reduce the luck factor.

Attacking moves that have a %Chance at a side effect have that side effect removed, and damage balanced accordingly depending on the "severity" of the side effect, so Ice Beam goes to 100 damage, up from 90.
However Flamethrower is only boosted to 95 damage as burn is a less "severe" status than frozen.
Obviously lots of discussion will be had about how to incorporate side efects into damage, some moves are very complicated to remove all luck from.

Dynamic Punch is a 50% accurate move that confuses the target, and we know confusion itself either does nothing at all, or causes the pokemon to hurt itself instead of you, possibly evenly killing itself.

Look, there's a lot to discuss here as to the HOW...
But firstly, is there enough interest for this discussion to continue?

 

[RNGIsFatal]

Ability Contrary inverts the stat boost.

If it is applied to your Smogon alt, Toxic will have 10% accuracy.

That is how I missed 5 V-creates and lost 250 ladder.

If you want no luck mod,

Same damage roll
All inaccurate moves are banned or have their accuracies increased to 100
No critical hit bullshit can happen
Secondary effects do not happen

 

[Speny]

Deltamons
Premise: All Pokemon are changed into to the type next alphabetical order but shiny Pokemon are changed to the previous type instead. The Pokemon gain moves based on there type changes.
Rules: OU Clause
Example:

Regular Azumarill: Bug/Fighting

Shiny Azumarill: Steel/Electric

Added Moves:

Bug: Bug Buzz, X-Scissor
Dark: Crunch, Dark Pulse
Dragon: Dragon Pulse, Dragon Claw
Electric: Thunderbolt, Wild Charge
Fairy: Dazzling Gleam, Play Rough
Fighting: Aura Sphere, Brick Break
Fire: Flamethrower, Fire Punch
Flying: Air Slash, Drill Peck
Ghost: Shadow Ball, Shadow Bone
Grass: Energy Ball, Seed Bomb
Ground: Earthquake, Earth Power
Ice: Ice Beam, Ice Punch
Normal: Hyper Voice, Return
Poison: Sludge Bomb, Poison Jab
Psychic: Psychic, Psychic Fangs
Rock: Power Gem, Rock Slide
Steel: Flash Cannon, Iron Head
Water: Surf, Liquidation

Threats:

Tyranitar: Steel/Dragon

Articuno: Normal/Ghost

Hoopa-Unbound: Dragon/Rock

Latios: Electric/Rock Levitate

Latias-Shiny: Dark/Poison Levitate

Kartana: Ground/Water

Question: Who else would be a threat?

 

[sin(pi)]

I was thinking that one of the most annoying aspects of pokemon battles is the luck factor.
This has nothing whatsoever to do with skill, team selection, strategy, etc.
A close game can be won or lost because of luck.
Some examples (You all have stories like this to tell!)

90% attacks that miss twice in a row.
Being frozen by Ice Beam, and staying frozen for 8 turns!
Crits that happen when your enemy is on 5% health, so wasted.
Toxic...missing...Aaaugh!

Luck is why OHKO moves are banned!
Swagger was removed for much the same reason...simply too much luck at play.
So why stop there!

So how about a:
No Luck mod.
Basically an attempt to eliminate luck as much as possible from the game.

Now if you think to yourself: "I have no problem with the element of chance in pokemon battles", well, good for you, there are dozens of formats for you to play in.
But if you want to see how the game plays with little to no luck, then why not allow that option?
It is also useful for testing balance issues.

Obviously we can't be 100% successful at eliminating ALL chance, this isn't chess after all.
Also, some luck aspects should remain:

The damage a move deals should still vary as it does now (minus crits) to give some variance and flavour.

"Luckily" predicting the switch in and hitting for effective damage are obviously important parts of the game and arguably a skill based on experience.


But other that that, what can we do to reduce/eliminate luck as much as possible:
(I'm not suggesting the following are exactly what should happen, but merely examples to be used to discuss how to create the meta.)

STATUS
Before we can deal with damaging moves, we need to look at status moves...because frankly they are a mess!
We have....oh, so many states a pokemon can be in.
States are important, we can't simply eliminate them, or we'd have a very dry game.

So let's split them into three categories:
Permanent, unless cured, a pokemon with these statuses will keep them until it is KO'ed:
Paralysis
Burned
Poison
Toxic

Temporary, these statuses will automatically be cured after time:
Sleep
Confusion
Frozen

Battle: The effects last until the pokemon faints, or is switched out:
Leech

The "Sleep clause" exists because there are several moves that cause sleep, and apart from very rare cases, is a totally debilitating status.
But what if by chance you freeze 3 opponents? Rare, but it can (and does) happen.

Of these 4, only frozen cannot be caused directly by a status move. It is ONLY caused by a low-chance from a damaging move.
So, all status moves are now 100% accurate, no more 90% toxic misses.
As there is no move that can freeze directly, or with a higher chance than 10% (that I could find), meaning it is purely a "lucky" status to inflict.

Duration

Paralysis slows the pokemon, but also has a 25% to cause that pokemon ot not move at all.
Sleeping pokemon will wake up, again by chance.
Frozen pokemon have a chance to defrost every turn.

DAMAGING MOVES:
There are hundreds of damaging moves in Pokemon, some are as inaccurate as 50%! 70% or 80% are very common. There are even ones that are 95% accurate...How infuriating for this move to miss!
Yes, this does add "flavour" to combat, but in this mod, we can try and give moves other ways to be differentiated.

"Normal" moves.
These are moves that inflict damage and have either no, or less than 10% chance at a side effect.
Thunderbolt, flamethrower, ice beam etc etc.

All these moves are balanced to be 100% accurate.

The "Base" moves to consider are 15pp, 100% accurate 100 damage.
If the move varies widely from that, ask the question: "Why"
Why is heat wave 90% accurate? Why would a pokemon who can learn flamethrower take this nove instead? There is no reason, the only pokemon who run with this attack are those that have no decent options...like Zapdos.
Let's just jump the accuracy to 100, and drop the damage to 85.
It already has a reduced pp of 10 from Flamethrower's 15.

So, higher damage moves may have lower pp, to compensate for the accuracy bump.

What about "weather moves"
Exceptions to moves that are affected by weather:
Hydro Pump, Blizzard, and Thunder. (Any others I might be missing?)
Instead of becoming less accurate, Thunder, Blizzard, and Hydro pump instead decrease in damage without their associated weather.
Thunder:
In rain: 100% accurate, 110 damage always paralyses
Outside of rain 100% accurate, 70 damage, no paralysis.
Blizzard:
In Hail: 100% accurate

CRITICAL HITS
Extra damage from critical hits is wrapped up into the overall damage the move causes, effectively boosting all damage for all moves across the board.
This would be based on a the % chance of a crit occurring for each event (Base chance, "higher chance", focus energy etc) multiplied by the boost in damage.
Moves that have or cause a higher crit chance are therefore boosted more.
So for example let's say a move has base damage of 100, and a 10% chance of this being critical, to cause 50% more damage.
If the pokemon uses Focus Energy, this base damage is simply increased to 110 (I know that's not the exact maths, this is an illustration only).
Every hit does 100 base damage and a critical bonus of 5%, for total damage of 105
The Abilities Battle Armor and Shell Armor and the effect of Lucky Chant will remove the extra 5%
All moves that can crit, crit all the time, but only for the average damage based on the chance to crit multiplied by that boosted amount.

SIDE EFFECTS:
Wow, the biggy...what to do about side effects.

Let's use Freeze Shock as an example:
It has a 90% chance to hit, but at base 140 damage, that miss is gonna suck!
then it has a 30% chance to paralyse the target.
Paralysis is a reduction in speed, and a 25% chance of not moving at all.
So using Freeze Shock could:
Miss altogether
Hit but only do damage
Hit and paralyse
Hit with critical damage only
Hit with critical damage and paralyse
afterwards:
The opponent may move
The opponent may not move

That's an awful lot of possible outcomes for one move!
It may seem harsh, but removing side effects seems the only possible choice to reduce the luck factor.

Attacking moves that have a %Chance at a side effect have that side effect removed, and damage balanced accordingly depending on the "severity" of the side effect, so Ice Beam goes to 100 damage, up from 90.
However Flamethrower is only boosted to 95 damage as burn is a less "severe" status than frozen.
Obviously lots of discussion will be had about how to incorporate side efects into damage, some moves are very complicated to remove all luck from.

Dynamic Punch is a 50% accurate move that confuses the target, and we know confusion itself either does nothing at all, or causes the pokemon to hurt itself instead of you, possibly evenly killing itself.

Look, there's a lot to discuss here as to the HOW...
But firstly, is there enough interest for this discussion to continue?

This sounds a lot like Skillmons

 

[legend slayer]

That sounds more like a pet mod and I think it already exists.

yeah its called mix n mega and they get boosts proportional to the mon they came from.

 

[motherlove]

yeah its called mix n mega and they get boosts proportional to the mon they came from.

I was referring to megas for all or something where every mon got its mega.

 

[GrubbinTheGreat]

Lockmons
Premise: All Pokemon are locked into the first move they use until they switch out.
Potential Bans and Threats: OU banlist, Choice items?
Questions for the Community: Would this be too intolerant of defensive Pokemon?

 

[readytolose]

Move Evolution or Move Training

Metagame inspired by the evolution system in Inazuma Eleven.

Mechanics: Attacking moves evolve as their PP gets used up throughout a match.

Evolution system:
View attachment 80135
Rules: Standard OU bans and clauses

Questions to answer:

• How would both offensive and defensive teams be able to hold up if moves got stronger as their PP gets expended?
• How much would Choice Scarf users and sweepers benefit from this change?

I thought of an idea similar to this, with some differences. In my version, the power, accuracy, and added effect chance of moves increase as they are used, but all Pokemon on the team operate on the same counter. For example, if Earthquake is used three times, the power and accuracy of Earthquake increases for all Pokemon on that team. This lets teams built around spamming a certain move become popular. I thought of a few other possible implementations of this but you get the general idea.

Eternal Bonds (name subject to change)

Metagame inspired by Battle Bond

Mechanics: Every Pokemon has the option to replace their regular ability with a slightly modified version of Battle Bond; if a Pokemon with Battle Bond gets a kill, they get a permanent boost to their three highest base stats (excluding HP) as follows:

• Highest: +10
• Second highest: +50
• Third highest: +50

In the case of ties, the following stat priority is used:

1. Attack
2. Defense
3. Special Attack
4. Special Defense
5. Speed

Rules:

• Standard OU bans and clauses
• Slaking, Regigias, and Archeops are banned
• Limit of one or two Battle Bond users per team? Or would people prefer to play without limits?

Questions to answer:

• Would everything having the potential to be battle bonded be too much for the OU metagame to handle?
• Which Pokemon value their ability little enough to sacrifice their normal ability for Battle Bond? And vice versa?

I like this too, seems like a very offensive meta. Dugtrio seems cool because it can trap something and guarantee a kill and then get 35/150/50/50/120/130 stats.

 

[Speny]

I was think maybe we should make a vote for what meta should be programed or something like that.

 

[Uselesscrab]

My feedback on every single suggestion (except Totem Showdown, which has already been submitted, as well as some suggestions that have already been revealed to be preexisting metas).

david0895 Crystal Power: not a big fan. We already have many submissions having to do with reduced restrictions on Z-moves, and this strikes me as a mindless offensive buff.

Gøvhatanks Morphinmons: already exists. It's megas for all

whide Consolation Prize: has been incredibly well received, go ahead and submit

aki0s Z-Evolution: I think this is pretty complicated and type-changing metas are rather overdone right now.

Speny Tag Teams: Sounds fun but rather unpredictable and therefore uncompetitive. And because of the movepools, it ends up being somewhat like Inheritance.

Dunsparce Fanboy Ability Sharing: The name is indeed mediocre, but this is a solid idea and some people seem to like it. I have a feeling we have some similar submission or old meta somewhere, but you can ignore that for now and maybe go ahead and submit.

iLlama: Why not just bring back Ability Unity? This is like a weird hybrid.

Reviloja753 Free-for-Alls: not available on Showdown currently.

Mr. Querty Protect: Not a big enough change to be intriguing (in my opinion, at least; I know the move is fundamentally incredibly significant in doubles, but I can't imagine the community loving this one), not to mention that doubles OMs are rarely successful.

Speny Completed: Not loving the name. The idea is decent but I share some of the concerns that lost heros expressed. I also wonder if there are even enough relevant Pokemon to make this worthwhile.

SadisticMystic Proxy War: I'm having a hard time figuring out how this metagame would be particularly attractive, and the lack of feedback seems to confirm my suspicion.

Speny Scalemons: Kris submitted this, I think, and we had already denied an existing Scalemons submission

RNGIsCancer SOSmons: Not sure if capable of being coded. Also I'm getting sick of the -mons suffix

ChrystalFalchion Monotype 2.0: Don't love the name. The concept itself also seems prone to broken stuff. Too much weather, terrain, and overall really powerful abilities

Why Nerdy Nature's Fear: Go ahead and resubmit. Lots of people liked your post and you're right that it never got a chance to shine last gen.

Solarblade A Berry Useful Immunity: Long name but I approve of the pun. Also got a great reception. Make a submission!

Speny a whole bunch of things: Some of these are Pet Mods and I don't like the ones that aren't. Shifted is too similar to other stat-switching metas. Class-based metagames have been largely unsuccessful.

Nixola Type Scramble: Not a big fan. Randomness makes things uncompetitive, generally.

Chrispy Burns 3 ideas: That Protean one is pretty crazy. We already have Protean Palace so I'm not sure if it's necessary, but might be worth looking into anyway. I like High Risk. That weather one is my least favorite, as you might as well just have perma-weather at that point.

Kadabrium Tapumons: This is extremely strange. I guess it could be interesting, but it seems fairly similar to Averagemons, just with several different options available. I feel like similar threats would rise to the top.

Mr. Querty Plate Power: similar thread currently in OM Submissions

whide Rock Bottom: The distinctions between certain types of items and abilities you're making here are extremely specific and I feel like that takes away from the metagame.

Tuthur1 No Evolution: So-called "micro metagames" have never really caught on and I don't believe this would either.

iLlama Downloadable: Mixed feelings about this. I am not a huge fan of "everything gets X" metas, but I like the idea of a defensive Download, so that remedies those feelings somewhat.

G-Luke Weightmons: I am pretty sure this was one of the least successful OMs of Gen 6, and as such I would not approve it again.

lost heros Final Wish: I actually think this is pretty cool. We have a new OM called Last Will coming out, so I'd pick a different name. Not sure why yours hasn't received much interest yet.

Samtendo09 Chart Swap: I think this idea is pretty creative, but Inverse itself has been dead enough, and I'm not sure if an even weirder Inverse would succeed. You can submit if you like, though.

Ludicrousity Moxiemons: Not a fan of mindless offensive buffs, for the most part.

Pipotchi Fortemons: Lots of crazily broken stuff, but I like the idea overall if it turns out to be codeable. Also, the community seems to like it!

Martin 2 things: In Move Evolution, I like the balance between risking your attackers to lower PP and the increasing power of those moves. Definitely makes Recover-stalling harder. Not a big fan of Eternal Bonds.

Speny Deltamons: I've always thought a Delta Species OM would be super cool, and I like the shininess component. Not always a huge fan of type-changing submissions (in fact, I'm pretty sure I said I didn't like them in one of the above bits of feedback) but this one seems interesting.

GrubbinTheGreat Lockmons: Reminds me vaguely of the unsuccessful PP-based Low Mana Mania. This completely disables stall, as you yourself intuited. I wouldn't submit it.

***

Keep on liking each other's posts! It's a great way of encouraging metagame creators to submit. Also, if you get a sufficient amount of positive feedback and discussion, please don't hesitate to submit. (Looking at you, whide, Solarblade, etc.)

 

[anaconja]

Hide

i had an idea
Fortemons

Metagame premise:
An attack is put into the item slot, and its effects are granted to all of the attacks in the moveslots!
This includes both primary and secondary effects- so for instance drain punch in the item slot would grant 50% recovery on every single attack. Scald in the item slot would grant 30% burn chance on every single attack. Close Combat in the item slot would drop your def/spd with every attack, and Flare Blitz would cause you to take recoil on every attack.

When it comes to priority, the priority of the item and moveslot moves are added together. So Extremespeed + Return is +2, and Extremespeed + Dragon Tail is -4.

This only works for attacks, not status moves. Status moves dont inherit anything and also cant be put into the item slot (thats another meta!)

Potential bans and threats:
These are moves that are banned as items:
-Power-Up Punch
-Zap Cannon
-Inferno
-Dynamic Punch
-Sky Drop
-"Attacks" that call other moves
-Counter/Mirror Coat/Bide
-Multi-hit moves
-Pursuit

These are moves that are banned as moveslots:
-Seismic Toss / Night Shade
-2-5 Multi-hit moves (fixed 2 and 3 hit moves are fine- Beat Up is banned alongside this)


Banned abilities:
-Serene Grace
___________________

Here's a few example sets:

Togekiss @ Extreme Speed
Ability: Super Luck
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SpA
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Nasty Plot
- Air Slash
- Dazzling Gleam
- Aura Sphere

Togekiss is an example of something that will be popular- inheriting +priority to several moves. It cant use serene grace anymore (because its banned), but the combination of nasty plot + 3 excellent prio moves at +2 with increased crit chance will make it a successful sweeper.

Excadrill @ Rapid Spin
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
- Rock Slide

Excadrill grants utility in a hyper-offense team without dropping a beat- rapid spin on all of its attacks lets it clear hazards without wasting moveslots, doesnt have to worry about ghosts spinblocking, and can still set up and sweep in sand.

Magearna @ Volt Switch
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 Spe
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Fleur Cannon
- Flash Cannon
- Aura Sphere
- Thunderbolt

This Magearna doesnt attempt to sweep, rather puts its great typing and attacks to use to become a pivot. The main selling point of the set is the ability to fire off a powerful fleur cannon and immediately switch out, making the special attack drop a non-problem.

Tsareena (F) @ Feint
Ability: Queenly Majesty
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Adamant Nature
- Trop Kick
- U-turn
- High Jump Kick
- Play Rough

Tsareena is a key pokemon in the metagame as it will stop 4x priority sweepers in their tracks. It can also run all priority itself, and ensure it cant be outsped while having access to pivoting, and a high jump kick that cant be blocked by protect.

Ferrothorn @ Payback
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 88 Def / 168 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Gyro Ball
- Power Whip
- Leech Seed
- Stealth Rock

Payback and the other damage-doubling abilities are really strong, although they usually come with a setback such as requiring you to take damage, be statused, move last etc. If you can make the sacrifice, then go ahead! This Ferrothorn will move last anyway, so doubling the power of gyro ball and power whip makes it hit really hard.

Questions for the community:

Can you think of any weird interactions that would not have an obvious effect? For instance I was not sure how seismic toss would interact with a doubling-effect like payback, would it deal 200 hp of damage instead? So I threw it into the banlist for now. If you can think of any others, then lemme know!

Some more threats:

Draining Kiss

Gallade (M) @ Draining Kiss
Ability: Justified
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Swords Dance
- Close Combat
- Knock Off
- Zen Headbutt
Who needs Bulk Up when you drain 75% of all damage dealt?

Charge Beam

Magearna @ Charge Beam
Ability: Soul-Heart
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Fleur Cannon
- Flash Cannon
- Aura Sphere
- Volt Switch
Fleur Cannon, now without the special attack drop.

Sheer Force

Darmanitan @ Psychic
Ability: Sheer Force
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Flare Blitz
- Stone Edge
- Superpower
Not sure if this would work, but if it does, this would add 1.3x power to every move.

Contrary

Serperior @ Leaf Storm
Ability: Contrary
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Dragon Pulse
- Giga Drain / Leaf Storm
- Hidden Power [Fire]
- Substitute
Every move boosts your Special Attack by 2? Sign me up!

Retaliate

Latios @ Retaliate
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Recover
- Hidden Power [Fire]
Revenge killing just got a whole lot better.

V-Create

Victini @ U-Turn
Ability: Victory Star
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- V-create
- Bolt Strike
- Final Gambit
- Zen Headbutt
Hit hard with 270 base power and then switch out of the debuffs.

Poison (BAN ME PLEASE)

Muk-Alola @ Poison Fang
Ability: Poison Touch
EVs: 252 HP / 240 Atk / 16 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Knock Off
- Pursuit
- Poison Jab
- Shadow Sneak
Sure, it doesn't have its Assault Vest, but now it has a new job of spreading poison everywhere.

Technician + Priority

Scizor @ Bullet Punch
Ability: Technician
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 8 SpD
Adamant Nature
- X-Scissor
- Superpower
- Iron Head
- Swords Dance
Every move now has +1 priority and is 50% stronger. Pretty OP if you ask me.

Power Trip

Krookodile @ Power Trip
Ability: Moxie
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Hone Claws
- Earthquake
- Crunch
- Stone Edge
+20 for each boost. Hone Claws + Moxie. With Webs, Tailwind, or Speed support nothing's stopping this.

Stored Power

Swoobat @ Stored Power
Ability: Simple
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Calm Mind
- Roost
- Psyshock
- Air Slash
Krookodile but special-based.

Core Enforcer

Zygarde @ Core Enforcer
Ability: Aura Break
EVs: 248 HP / 40 Atk / 220 SpD
Sassy Nature
- Substitute
- Coil
- Extreme Speed
- Thousand Arrows
Abilities be gone.

 

[whide]

whide Consolation Prize: has been incredibly well received, go ahead and submit

All of my yes <3

whide Rock Bottom: The distinctions between certain types of items and abilities you're making here are extremely specific and I feel like that takes away from the metagame.

Yeah, I suppose. Oh well, I'll try working that out sometime, if even. Thanks for the feedback doe~ I'll keep it in mind if I come up with something new.

 

[snaildelagate]

Meta-Name - Set-up Remix
Concept - So this metagame would make it so that both boosts and drops would affect the next stat down for pokemon in this order:
atk>def>sp. atk>sp. def>speed>atk etc.
(excluding accuracy and evasion boosts from being changed because there are so few accuracy boosting moves in the game and evasion would mean I'd have to make a whole slew of already legal boosting moves illegal)

So for example Dragon Dance now instead of boosting atk and speed is a psuedo coil boosting attack and defense instead. Likewise a Hydreigon who fires off a Draco Meteor gets -2 in special defense instead of special attack. This would even affect abilities so Lando-T's precious intimidate that allowed it to act as a great defensive pivot in standard is now a -1 drop to the opponents defense instead.

Some sets

Jirachi @ Life Orb
Ability: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Cosmic Power
- Psychic / Flash Cannon
- Draco Meteor
- Hidden Power [Fire]

Cosmic Power is now one of the few moves that boosts both Sp. Atk and Speed at the same time and Jirachi is the best user of said boosts making it... serviceable set up sweeper in a meta with relatively few options for one! It can also abuse an event which gave it draco meteor since the drawbacks are pretty negligible on an aggressive sweeper.

Crustle @ Life Orb
Ability: Weak Armor
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Shell Smash
- Rock Blast
- X-Scissor
- Earthquake

Shell Smash is now a +2 boost to Attack, Defense and Special Defense and -1 to Special Attack and Speed making it an insane bulky boosting move. Too bad its distribution is still terrible. That being said there a couple pokemon who get the Shell Smash, Weak Armor combo which allows them to boost their defense tank a potential physical hit and get +2 attack again while getting -1 in special attack. WARNING DO NOT TOUCH.

 

[iLlama]

A couple of ideas.

Statisticians

Premise: Pokemon can use the stats of another Pokemon by having the Pokemon's Dex number as their name, i.e. Ferrothorn -> Chansey (598)
Potential Bans/Suspects: OU Clauses. No taking stats from Mega Evolutions and OU Banned Pokemon. Kyurem-B, Regigigas, Slaking, Huge Power, Pure Power, Water Bubble
Questions: In the case of form changes, should the pass always defer to the base form (meaning Meloetta-P, the Therian forms, etc. can't pass stats)? How should Eviolite be dealt with? Should there be a restriction on what Pokemon can pass stats to what other Pokemon, i.e. only pass among the same typing, only pass among Pokemon with a similar stat such as HP or Speed, the passer and receiver have to share the same first letter in their name, etc.?

My quarrels with this idea is that it seems insanely difficult to maintain a power balance without adding a restriction of some kind as I mentioned in the Q's. Restricting passes to Pokemon with the same typing seems like a standard solution, but the matching stat aspect could be pretty interesting, although that may be a tad too restricting.

-------

Multi-Memory

Premise: Each [Type] Memory item provides its own -ate ability to its user. This means that any Normal-type move of the user automatically becomes whatever type of Memory the Pokemon is holding as well as the 1.2x boost that comes with it.
Potential Bans/Suspects: OU Clauses. Dragonite, Kartana, Kyurem-B, Zygarde.
Questions: Should any moves be put on the watchlist, i.e. Extreme Speed?

 

[ChrystalFalchion]

Name: Wonderful Weaknesses (was super effective mons in Gen 6.)
Premise: Pokemon gain the moves of all types they are weak to (e.g. Tornadus-T gets Rock, Ice and Electric moves). If the Pokemon has a X4 weakness, they can use any move of that type. If they only have X2, they must choose between damaging and status moves.
Questions:
What about megas / forme changes?
Only outside of battle forme changes count, so all the Rotom formes can use Dark, Ghost, Ground, Grass, Rock, Water, Fire, Ice, Bug, Poison and Fighting moves. However, Mega Charizard X could not use Dragon Hammer.
Are Abilities considered?
No. So Mamoswine can use Fire moves even if it's using Thick Fat, and the Rotom formes can all use Ground moves.
Banlist: OU Banlist, OU Clauses, Kyurem-B, Geomancy, Thousand Arrows is locked to Zygarde formes