i think the main thing everyone should take away from this debate is to never doubt me again
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Metagame Views From The Council
- Thread starter njnp
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hi just my two cents, i reached 1350 and feel like i have a right to an opinion lol
for me, this discussion is only worth it if it is a smogon-wide discussion. in OU in particular i don't feel sleep is specially oppressive (although we can discuss how cheesy it is). only amoonguss runs ALWAYS a sleep move, and amoonguss isn't even that common. point being, yeah it can help alliviate things to ban sleep, but the impact isn't as monumental in the tier. i think this discussion is interesting insofar as what differentiates smogon from official formats? do we believe as a community that sleep is an inherently cheesy strat that suppresses all reasonable counterplay? for me, not in particular. spore mons are usually bad aside from amoonguss and breloom and those are relatively straightforward in how to handle them. other sleep moves are way morw inaccurate and sacrifice a team slot in favour of something inconsistent. i like sleep in how it forces some choice mons in past gens to run sleep talk, seems like a fun dynamic to me. but hey, that's just my opinion. i'm all for voting on it and arguments against sleep as a whole are compelling, i'm just saying it seems more worthwhile to discuss it as a smogon-wide affair.
last but not least, i agree with many others that yawn doesn't seem controversial at all, however i wouldn't go as far as to call it a phazing move with a silly hat on top. in certain occasions it definitely is worth it to let your mon fall asleep in trade for that extra turn. also resttalk strats should be something to consider, for me there's no issue with those but the revamp of the clause should address how to handle rest.
thats all i have. regardless of the outcome of the discussion i strongly value us opening these big melons that are dubious in how to handle them, so props to us in general and the council in particular.
for me, this discussion is only worth it if it is a smogon-wide discussion. in OU in particular i don't feel sleep is specially oppressive (although we can discuss how cheesy it is). only amoonguss runs ALWAYS a sleep move, and amoonguss isn't even that common. point being, yeah it can help alliviate things to ban sleep, but the impact isn't as monumental in the tier. i think this discussion is interesting insofar as what differentiates smogon from official formats? do we believe as a community that sleep is an inherently cheesy strat that suppresses all reasonable counterplay? for me, not in particular. spore mons are usually bad aside from amoonguss and breloom and those are relatively straightforward in how to handle them. other sleep moves are way morw inaccurate and sacrifice a team slot in favour of something inconsistent. i like sleep in how it forces some choice mons in past gens to run sleep talk, seems like a fun dynamic to me. but hey, that's just my opinion. i'm all for voting on it and arguments against sleep as a whole are compelling, i'm just saying it seems more worthwhile to discuss it as a smogon-wide affair.
last but not least, i agree with many others that yawn doesn't seem controversial at all, however i wouldn't go as far as to call it a phazing move with a silly hat on top. in certain occasions it definitely is worth it to let your mon fall asleep in trade for that extra turn. also resttalk strats should be something to consider, for me there's no issue with those but the revamp of the clause should address how to handle rest.
thats all i have. regardless of the outcome of the discussion i strongly value us opening these big melons that are dubious in how to handle them, so props to us in general and the council in particular.
I’ll add another voice to the pile of sleep being an unfun, rng-based mechanic that is propped up by a pet-mod that would never be allowed to be implemented in the modern day. I don’t know that Darkrai+Hypnosis is that much if an issue even in my experience (although I’m certainly not a top ladder player). I just think smogon should fully ban sleep on ideological grounds and have for years.
I don’t think we should say that just because this decision should have been made years ago, we should force this on old gens for the sake of consistency though. Old gens were tiered with sleep clause in mind, and letting them keep their identity is more important than consistency in my opinion. That said we should make this decision not just for this gen, but all gens moving forward (assuming sleep mechanics don’t change in the future, of course).
I don’t think we should say that just because this decision should have been made years ago, we should force this on old gens for the sake of consistency though. Old gens were tiered with sleep clause in mind, and letting them keep their identity is more important than consistency in my opinion. That said we should make this decision not just for this gen, but all gens moving forward (assuming sleep mechanics don’t change in the future, of course).
That's just the perfect way to explain how sleep can be extremely oppressive in the right scenarios if anything
Big post sorry ahead of time
I think the argument of it being anti-competitive is pretty thin. It is relatively consistent, you know you will wake up after 3 turns of sleep max and those turns can be spent in any order while switching around. The only thing inconsistent is when you will wake up. This is a risk both players choose to make, since youre as likely to wake up first turn and hit the sleep abuser hard as you are to sleep for three turns and give them all that setup. Since this is so inconsistent its unlikely players relying on this strategy will consistently get wins. Most of the time you will wake up after before getting to the third turn, and this is what players like myself largely play around.
I know the argument here is that its the luck aspect here that makes this uncompetitive. I feel like trying to fix luck in pokemon of all things is a really poorly thought out plan, and I felt this way with the Quick Claw/Bright Powder/King's Rock dicussions as well. I mean Ice Beam has a 10% chance to freeze, and freezing can easily decide whole games. Are we going to wake up one day and decide to ban Ice Beam? Probably not. The argument I would make there is 10% is such a low chance that it cannot be consistently relied on as a strategy, and doing so would lose you games. But that argument holds no wait if we're banning Bright Powder for its 10% dodge chance or Sleep for the potential to be asleep for 3 turns. Instead we would keep Ice beam purely because of its usefulness as an offensive move. But that is absolutely a double standard. To bring it back to Sleep, I know council said they have no plans to ban Relic Song. But that logic makes literally no sense. If we are concerned about getting slept for an inconsistent number of turns, than the method putting something to sleep shouldnt matter, just the mechanic of sleep itself. By this logic, is it not uncompetitive for a Meloetta to Relic Song -> get the sleep on the opponent -> the opponent sleeps for three turns as the meloetta swords dances? Its unlikely, but by the same logic this is as uncompetitive as any other form of sleep!
As much as we want to control it, these games are decided on luck, and that is unchangeable in pokemon's current state. As 'uncompetitive' as it is to get flinched by a King's Rock or slept for three turns, it is also uncompetitive to get frozen from Ice Beam or to be fully paralyzed for 4 turns in a row or to be Dark Pulse flinched repeatedly. Using these arguments of 'uncompetitiveness' pretty much only serves to remove these strategies as a tool from the game. For Kings Rock and Bright powder, this could be fine as its something that can be thrown on any pokemon. But by removing sleep you are removing the niches of many pokemon in the game!
TLDR (focusing on the darkrai claim)
b) like it or not the RNG is an inherit part of pokemon. If this sleep ban does go through I expect to see a post on the banning of paralysis, Ice beam, and dark pulse flinches in the next few weeks. But it ultimately isnt the mechanic thats the problem, its the scariest pokemon that are able to abuse the mechanic.
c) Bans are as unfaithful to cartridge as mods are, which includes bans of moves and pokemon. This is a non-argument.
and finally a) Darkrai may not be the only problematic pokemon with access to sleep but the list of these problematic pokemon is nevertheless very small as compared to the full list of pokemon that have access to sleep. Why are we punishing all sleep-inducing pokemon for the sins of the ones that abuse it the hardest? We could just ban Darkrai, Iron Valiant, and any other pokemon that is broken if it gets a sleep off
If a pokemon is broken with sleep, ban the pokemon. Ban the mon not the mechanic.
Personally, I don't agree with the views of the council here I feel that action on sleep as a mechanic would be pretty dumb. Sleep is a whole mechanic that has counterplay built around it. Grass types/sap sippers to absorb spore and sleep powder, sinking your chesto or lum berry into a possible sleep, insomnia or vital spirit mons in the tiers where those pokemon are viable, and even the niche but surprisingly useful Sleep Talk slot on a pokemon that would counter a common sleep inducing pokemon like breloom. Additionally, most of the sleep-inducing mons attribute their usefulness in higher tiers largely around their ability to sleep. I feel like we can completely kiss Amoonguss and Breloom out the window if we ban all sleep moves.
I think the argument of it being anti-competitive is pretty thin. It is relatively consistent, you know you will wake up after 3 turns of sleep max and those turns can be spent in any order while switching around. The only thing inconsistent is when you will wake up. This is a risk both players choose to make, since youre as likely to wake up first turn and hit the sleep abuser hard as you are to sleep for three turns and give them all that setup. Since this is so inconsistent its unlikely players relying on this strategy will consistently get wins. Most of the time you will wake up after before getting to the third turn, and this is what players like myself largely play around.
I know the argument here is that its the luck aspect here that makes this uncompetitive. I feel like trying to fix luck in pokemon of all things is a really poorly thought out plan, and I felt this way with the Quick Claw/Bright Powder/King's Rock dicussions as well. I mean Ice Beam has a 10% chance to freeze, and freezing can easily decide whole games. Are we going to wake up one day and decide to ban Ice Beam? Probably not. The argument I would make there is 10% is such a low chance that it cannot be consistently relied on as a strategy, and doing so would lose you games. But that argument holds no wait if we're banning Bright Powder for its 10% dodge chance or Sleep for the potential to be asleep for 3 turns. Instead we would keep Ice beam purely because of its usefulness as an offensive move. But that is absolutely a double standard. To bring it back to Sleep, I know council said they have no plans to ban Relic Song. But that logic makes literally no sense. If we are concerned about getting slept for an inconsistent number of turns, than the method putting something to sleep shouldnt matter, just the mechanic of sleep itself. By this logic, is it not uncompetitive for a Meloetta to Relic Song -> get the sleep on the opponent -> the opponent sleeps for three turns as the meloetta swords dances? Its unlikely, but by the same logic this is as uncompetitive as any other form of sleep!
As much as we want to control it, these games are decided on luck, and that is unchangeable in pokemon's current state. As 'uncompetitive' as it is to get flinched by a King's Rock or slept for three turns, it is also uncompetitive to get frozen from Ice Beam or to be fully paralyzed for 4 turns in a row or to be Dark Pulse flinched repeatedly. Using these arguments of 'uncompetitiveness' pretty much only serves to remove these strategies as a tool from the game. For Kings Rock and Bright powder, this could be fine as its something that can be thrown on any pokemon. But by removing sleep you are removing the niches of many pokemon in the game!
As someone pointed out, bans are as inconsistent to the cartridge as mods are. This is a REALLY strange take. So much of what we are doing is already removed from cartridge, making the argument now that we aren't mirroring the cartridge is almost not even an argument. If we're being consistent to cartridge, give me back Flutter Mane. If you don't want to do that, we really shouldn't be talking about cartridge. Especially since I think most people who play are cartridge understand and even prefer sleep mod clause. Its a nice middleground that allows pokemon whose strategy revolves around sleep to remain relevant without being broken.
I know the idea of sleep ban is not strictly to worsen Breloom's viability in OU, and is largely driven by the worse pokemon in the tier such as Darkrai, Iron Valiant a few months ago, and other offensive sleepers. Therefore I really feel like the icky feeling associated with sleep recently is a burden that rests on their shoulders alone. Hypnosis's greater distribution is a reason there are insanely good pokemon that, on top of all their other tools, have sleep induction as a tool for them to win games. But sleep induction is the same as any other tool in my mind. If a combination of tools proves to be too much for a tier, you ban that pokemon. Baxcalibur for instance has many tools in Dragon Dance, Ice Shard, Scale Shot, Icicle Spear, Earthquake, Thermal Exchange. None are broken on their own but combined together are too much for the tier. If hypnosis feels broken on a mon than the mon is broken and should be banned. Saying 'no Darkrai would be fine if it didnt have Hypnosis' is like saying 'Bax would be fine without scale shot'. Maybe true but close to just theory moning. By past OU logic standards, we don't tend to ban moves unless they are broken on all pokemon that can use them (loading up my team with Rage fist primape). And I really don't think you can make the argument hypnosis drowzee is too much for the tier.
TLDR (focusing on the darkrai claim)
b) like it or not the RNG is an inherit part of pokemon. If this sleep ban does go through I expect to see a post on the banning of paralysis, Ice beam, and dark pulse flinches in the next few weeks. But it ultimately isnt the mechanic thats the problem, its the scariest pokemon that are able to abuse the mechanic.
c) Bans are as unfaithful to cartridge as mods are, which includes bans of moves and pokemon. This is a non-argument.
and finally a) Darkrai may not be the only problematic pokemon with access to sleep but the list of these problematic pokemon is nevertheless very small as compared to the full list of pokemon that have access to sleep. Why are we punishing all sleep-inducing pokemon for the sins of the ones that abuse it the hardest? We could just ban Darkrai, Iron Valiant, and any other pokemon that is broken if it gets a sleep off
If a pokemon is broken with sleep, ban the pokemon. Ban the mon not the mechanic.
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As a side note, Sneasler is unaffected by this sleep ban assuming Dire Claw is treated the same way as Relic Song.Honorable mention to Sneaslerfor being absolute cancer to play against defensively, with good part due to it's 1/6 chance to sleep after clicking an 80 BP STAB move :) really fun times to just get cucked on Skeledirge because your opp rolled the "fuck you i win now :3" number on their dice
Easily done on cartridge
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i feel like the points about sleep not being broken kinda miss the mark because we already decided long ago that it is, hence why we have sleep clause. no one is arguing for unrestricted sleep because it's a mechanic that is fundamentally broken and uncompetitive and only really held in place because of a weird, shaky restriction thats backed by a game mod.
that being said, i still think sleep moves should only be banned if a proper suspect test is given. it's been shown time and time again that making significant changes to meta for solely policy reasons is an awful idea so i think it should really be left to the community to decide if sleep clause should stay or not. i do think tho that a ban of solely hypnosis should be considered because its pretty much the biggest offender here of being a tech option mons can just slap on to be cheesy and it arguably doesn't really add anything good to the game
that being said, i still think sleep moves should only be banned if a proper suspect test is given. it's been shown time and time again that making significant changes to meta for solely policy reasons is an awful idea so i think it should really be left to the community to decide if sleep clause should stay or not. i do think tho that a ban of solely hypnosis should be considered because its pretty much the biggest offender here of being a tech option mons can just slap on to be cheesy and it arguably doesn't really add anything good to the game
Tests over, so writing my post.
ain't the issue with this it is sleep. With tera, sleep screws many mons which would expect to one-shot :Amoongus: (or other sleepers) which allows you to destroy a sweeper's attempt (considering they usually only have one shot). Counter to sleep is 
, 
and finally tera grass/
(only for :amoongus:). Echoing the sentiment that hypnosis and sleep powder are more annoying than spore, because the unpredictability means your fodder might just become setup fodder.
ain't the issue with this it is sleep. With tera, sleep screws many mons which would expect to one-shot :Amoongus: (or other sleepers) which allows you to destroy a sweeper's attempt (considering they usually only have one shot). Counter to sleep is , and finally tera grass/ (only for :amoongus:). Echoing the sentiment that hypnosis and sleep powder are more annoying than spore, because the unpredictability means your fodder might just become setup fodder.spicy take: y'all are only saying hypnosis and sleep powder are more annoying than spore because nothing fast has ever gotten spore. if toedscruel got a different ability (and keep in mind that mycelium might was clearly designed that way specifically because of spore, so even game freak recognizes on some level that sleep is uncompetitive cheese) this wouldn't even be up for debate
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I mean, yes, it acknowledges that Sleep is something to take into account. On the flip side tho, I'm thinking of something like Scarf Lucario in DPP OU, where it runs Sleep Talk in the fourth slot. I don't know Lucario's moveset back then and am not familiar enough with the meta to say it would like to run any other move, but the fact is that the tradeoff for controlling sleep is losing a moveslot and losing control of the desired move to click. I'm not saying it's super healthy, it's just a dynamic I enjoy.
Although after writing this I'm now completely sure that Scarf Lucario infamously ran Copycat in the fourth slot lol. Maybe I saw it on some Latios. Point still stands tho.
Me loading up Flutter Mane anyways (this is perfectly legal on cart)
Also as said by other people, we have many other things that don't reflect cart. Our timer, skipping to end of turn, the whole battle log on the right (so we dont have to stare hard at the booster activation to see if a Roaring moon is booster attack or boost speed), not needing to grind to get the correct sets/levels on mons, hp percentage mod, OHKO clause.. We aren't playing cartridge and honestly I don't want to be playing on cartridge. I mean a lot of us are of the opinion GF doesn't provide a great implementation of mons anyways.
For once the council had a productive discussion. Aislinn pointed out already a few focal points of sleep interactions across gen 9, red card amoonguss is huge enough for the reasons stated and I'd also add that hypnosis valiant could be seen in screens oriented teams taking less damage and getting more chances to fish for the sleep move. Sadly we needed a darkrai unban for many of you to realize that it still has an ability and putting something to sleep with the potential to setup and open even more holes is nothing to laugh about (No more "midrai" and "darkrai is not even top 5 dark mon in ou", good statements to post on Twitter to get likes and attention but also good at showing how clueless someone can be).
The problem gets more evident when darkrai during the game can eventually attempt to land hypnosis more times vs fatter teams that lack the possibility to hit harder and ko it as soon as possible. Other answers like sleep sacking were mentioned by xavgb to not be that effective as you might think, "surprisingly" playing 5 v 6 out of nowhere because hypnosis lands is not an advantage and in a very offensive oriented gen like this one you can't afford giving free turns like that, it's not just darkrai alone that can setup and do stuff but the 5 mons behind also have to be taken into account.
There is indeed a risk in attempting to connect the move but the risk can always be minimized with proper planning and positioning. Vert I very well understand your sentiment behind that post, we talked in the past about the funny interactions with static and flame body being accepted for some reason to keep a form of "fake balance" around, then again we should use these occasions to speak up and try changing the status quo. You can't really not act in this situation even if you believe darkrai is not ban worthy.
Something must be done for sure, being it removing sleep moves all together or ban the major offender at the moment that would be darkrai.
The problem gets more evident when darkrai during the game can eventually attempt to land hypnosis more times vs fatter teams that lack the possibility to hit harder and ko it as soon as possible. Other answers like sleep sacking were mentioned by xavgb to not be that effective as you might think, "surprisingly" playing 5 v 6 out of nowhere because hypnosis lands is not an advantage and in a very offensive oriented gen like this one you can't afford giving free turns like that, it's not just darkrai alone that can setup and do stuff but the 5 mons behind also have to be taken into account.
There is indeed a risk in attempting to connect the move but the risk can always be minimized with proper planning and positioning. Vert I very well understand your sentiment behind that post, we talked in the past about the funny interactions with static and flame body being accepted for some reason to keep a form of "fake balance" around, then again we should use these occasions to speak up and try changing the status quo. You can't really not act in this situation even if you believe darkrai is not ban worthy.
Something must be done for sure, being it removing sleep moves all together or ban the major offender at the moment that would be darkrai.
This sleep thing is such a straw man discussion, because the OU community can’t decide on which actually problematic element in the meta to move on first.
Sleep is a non issue. Losing points to a hypno Darkrai sucks, but for every time you lose to this set you don’t lose to the at least as good Nasty Plot or 4a sets.
People complain about red card amoongus being a Russian roulette Mon, when it’s one of the things that’s able to stop some of the most impossible to play against sweepers in the tier.
Darkrai and Valiant are elements that are able to fish for wins with Hypno bc their versatility means you almost can’t prepare for every set and the few mons that can handle most of those sets could be taken out of commission via sleep.
The broken element is how unpredictable these mons are and how much tools they have access to. Sleep is only one of them and tbh it’s not even close to being the best option for these mons.
At the same time mons that more predictably run sleep are hardly close to broken. Breloom and Amoongus are fine to use and play against almost always.
As I see it there are very good arguments to banning Darkrai and Valiant amd a bunch of other stupid mons and except for „but Hax doesn’t reward skill it rewards being lucky“ I don’t see a good argument against sleep, which tbh is another can of worms.
Sleep is a non issue. Losing points to a hypno Darkrai sucks, but for every time you lose to this set you don’t lose to the at least as good Nasty Plot or 4a sets.
People complain about red card amoongus being a Russian roulette Mon, when it’s one of the things that’s able to stop some of the most impossible to play against sweepers in the tier.
Darkrai and Valiant are elements that are able to fish for wins with Hypno bc their versatility means you almost can’t prepare for every set and the few mons that can handle most of those sets could be taken out of commission via sleep.
The broken element is how unpredictable these mons are and how much tools they have access to. Sleep is only one of them and tbh it’s not even close to being the best option for these mons.
At the same time mons that more predictably run sleep are hardly close to broken. Breloom and Amoongus are fine to use and play against almost always.
As I see it there are very good arguments to banning Darkrai and Valiant amd a bunch of other stupid mons and except for „but Hax doesn’t reward skill it rewards being lucky“ I don’t see a good argument against sleep, which tbh is another can of worms.
Writing as a cart purist, I absolutely agree that sleep needs to change. It is tiering policy that we strive to make the game as accurate to cart as possible. Therefore, if anyone is dismissing the "cart accuracy" argument, I interpret their thoughts as wanting to change tiering policy, which is a whole other thing that I don't agree with. The only other cart inaccuracy mentioned is how enemy health is shown, which isn't as much of a "gotcha" as people who bring it up think it is. For one, I've watched battling videos for years where rulers are used on cart to determine easily how much health is left (yes, it does still rely on the idea of 1/48th health increments, I agree). Furthermore, in both Showdown and cart, an actual numerical value of health points is always measured, no matter what. Cart doesn't arbitrarily round to 1/48th damage, it always does xHP of damage (which PS then converts to percentage for convenience and easy understanding of damage ranges, something achieved with a calculator anyways for cart). Therefore, there is no fundamental difference to health between PS and cart, so that is not a valid argument for cart mods. Overall, because sleep clause is a mod, I believe that whether or not Darkrai is broken, whether or not sleep is broken or uncompetitive at all in its current iteration, a change needs to be implemented to be cart accurate. Whether it's graying out the option to select a sleep move if an opponent's Pokemon is asleep, banning direct sleep inducing moves, or even letting chaos reign and permitting 6 mon sleep, a change needs to happen as per tiering policy.
What is the "problem", exactly? Can someone define what collectively we are trying to solve for?
As was laid out in the original post prompting this discussing, I see the following points:
I think taking a brush to all of sleep moves is silly. Ban Darkrai or don't. To me, there are far higher priority broken things in the tier than whatever this "problem" involving Darkrai is.
As was laid out in the original post prompting this discussing, I see the following points:
Like what? Amoongus? Breloom? Brute Bonnet? Hypnosis Valiant? Is this really a sleep problem or a Darkrai + Valiant issue? I certainly haven't seen NP gengar doing what could be exactly the same thing vs fat teams.
What is undesirable about that intrinsically? Everything outside of the type chart is RNG (and even tera can make that a guessing game!) Isd there something about sleep RNG specifically that is "bad"?
idk. I wasn't around for it. i'm for an additional paralysis mod if anything.
I think taking a brush to all of sleep moves is silly. Ban Darkrai or don't. To me, there are far higher priority broken things in the tier than whatever this "problem" involving Darkrai is.
I can't believe "Sleep" is causing all this controversy when its main users have terrible accuracy of it (Darkrai/Valiant) or aren't doing that great nowadays in the tier (Amoongus/Breloom)
I feel like they are bigger and more important things in the tier to worry about than that but well...
I feel like they are bigger and more important things in the tier to worry about than that but well...
60% chance to hit hypnosis into sleep chance just can't be healthy for the meta.
If a player happens to be "lucky" they can gain a massive advantage straight from the start of the game with sash darkrai just by... landing the 60% accurate move.
While i do think the scarf set is probably a good addition to the metagame and is a solid revenge killer, hypnosis just doesn't have enough reliable counterplay and takes the pokemon too far.
I dont think banning sleep outright is necessarily a good decision but something needs to be done to restrict darkrai.
If a player happens to be "lucky" they can gain a massive advantage straight from the start of the game with sash darkrai just by... landing the 60% accurate move.
While i do think the scarf set is probably a good addition to the metagame and is a solid revenge killer, hypnosis just doesn't have enough reliable counterplay and takes the pokemon too far.
I dont think banning sleep outright is necessarily a good decision but something needs to be done to restrict darkrai.
I would like to point out that HP% is possible to recreate on cart by just asking your opponent what it is. Everyone has a calculator in their pocket.
You can also technically keep a damage log on cart by writing that shit down but that's obviously inconvenient.
Don't have time to text wall, but I've been a proponent of removing Sleep Clause and banning the moves for a very long time (possibly as far back as Gen 6?) and this isn't a Darkrai problem. Being forced to sack something because your opponent brought an Amoongus or Breloom has never been fun or the height of competitive play.
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I think it's fine in older gens because it was an actual in-game rule prior to Gen 5 in some capacity. Plus the RBY community will eat us alive for removing it lol.
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I find it quite strange to assert that sleep is not broken, or that a ban will open Pandora's box, when sleep is literally the only status in the game to have the right to a complex ban in the form of a mod...
The r/stunfisk mains in the thread don't really like to think that hard, don't mind them
no, don't you get it, it's a slippery slope! it'll lead to banning other status conditions and rng-related elements! you know, just like how they banned freeze and paralysis and confusion and flinch and critical hits and missing and damage rolls in bw after sleep moves clause was implemented there! remember when they totally did that? and you know how every om that implements sleep moves clause proceeds to ban every status condition one by one afterwards? guys, we have to consider the ramifications of getting rid of this absolute fucking dinosaur of a rule and replacing it with something that makes sense under current policy!
WoUlD yOu LiKe To LeArN aBoUt ThE sLlIpPeRy SlOpE fAlLaCy?
Ted Ed Lesson
no but actually, this is a very good point which I think is very applicable to sleep.
If Darkrai is causing sleep to be an issue, ban it.
If Valiant or ATales (or anything else) are causing sleep to be an issue, ban them too.
The issue with Sleep is not the status itself. The issue with Sleep is Pokemon that are strong enough to create a scenario where a free turn or two is enough to win on the spot with minimal viable counterplay. And the solution is not to chip away at these broken threats, but to ban them. There is way too much effort being spent trying to allow some of Game Freak's craziest and most powercrept mons in OU by any means possible.
Smogon mocked the people that wanted to ban Speed Boost instead of Blaziken for well over a decade. Let's not creep towards that. Ban Darkrai instead of Sleep.
If Valiant or ATales (or anything else) are causing sleep to be an issue, ban them too.
The issue with Sleep is not the status itself. The issue with Sleep is Pokemon that are strong enough to create a scenario where a free turn or two is enough to win on the spot with minimal viable counterplay. And the solution is not to chip away at these broken threats, but to ban them. There is way too much effort being spent trying to allow some of Game Freak's craziest and most powercrept mons in OU by any means possible.
Smogon mocked the people that wanted to ban Speed Boost instead of Blaziken for well over a decade. Let's not creep towards that. Ban Darkrai instead of Sleep.
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