Yea, I do notice the lack of Pokemon animation is enough to reduce the lag substantially. It would be awesome if we can automatically turn off their movements when the ladder traffic is high (ie when it exceeds 2000 players). Seriously, playing on Showdown! can be atrocious lagfest during peak times, and I think turning the pokemon animation would alleviate this to a degree. Battle animations would remain to give us the Showdown! feel.